Arabelle

The soft blue lace of her lingerie seemed almost ghostly in the dim light filtering through the windows—the city’s perpetual glow, cold and indifferent, casting long shadows across her bare shoulders. Her hair, once styled into elegant waves, had begun to loosen, strands of pale gold falling across her face like whispered secrets. Her hands rested on her thighs, palms up, fingers slightly curled, the posture of someone who had been trained to wait and had learned, through repetition and punishment, that waiting was all she was permitted to do. Beside her, untouched, unlifted, unbuckled, lay the collar Finnick had dropped there before walking out the door. The soft blue leather gleamed dully in the half-darkness, the silver tag catching the light and throwing it back in small, sharp flashes.

Property of F. Odair.

The words seemed to mock him from where they lay.

Finnick closed the door behind him, the heavy mahogany clicking shut with a soft finality that echoed through the quiet apartment. He stood in the entryway for a moment, his hand still resting on the cool metal of the doorknob, his eyes adjusting to the dimness. The lights he had left on earlier, now seemed too bright, too harsh, their edges blurring and pulsing in a way that made his temples throb. He had drunk too much. He hadn’t drunk enough. Somewhere between the fourth glass and the fifth, the world had gone soft at the edges, losing its sharpness, its clarity, becoming something, he could almost pretend wasn’t real.

He crossed to the wall panel and began switching off the unnecessary lights, one by one, until only the faint glow from the windows remained and the single distant lamp in the hallway that he had forgotten to turn off. The darkness settled around them like a blanket, soft and forgiving, hiding the corners of the room, blurring the lines between what was real and what was merely possible. In the near-darkness, the golden cage seemed less imposing. The briefcases seemed less threatening. And Y/n, still kneeling on the floor, seemed smaller somehow. More fragile. More like a girl and less like a symbol of everything he had learned to hate.

Finnick walked toward her. His footsteps were slow, deliberate, the soft pad of his bare feet against the carpet the only sound in the room besides the distant hum of the city and the whisper of his own breathing. She did not look up as he approached. Her gaze remained fixed on the floor, on a point approximately three feet in front of her, just as the rules had prescribed. Her posture remained perfect—back straight, shoulders back, hands resting lightly on her thighs. She had been waiting for hours and yet she showed no sign of discomfort, no indication that her knees ached or her back protested or her mind had begun to wander through the dark corridors of fear.

Finnick stopped in front of her. Looked down at the crown of her head, at the pale gold hair falling across her face, at the curve of her neck where the collar would soon rest. Then, slowly, he lowered himself into a squat, bringing himself to her level, his sea-green eyes level with her bowed head. He could see the fine tremor running through her body now—the way her shoulders shook almost imperceptibly, the way her fingers twitched against her thighs, the way her breath came in shallow, controlled sips. She was terrified. Of course she was terrified. Anyone in her position would be terrified.

He reached out and picked up the collar. The leather was cool and smooth against his palm, supple from whatever treatment the stylist had applied to make it soft against the skin. He turned it over in his hands, his fingers tracing the edge of the silver tag, reading the words engraved there even though he already knew them by heart. Property of F. Odair. His name. His claim. His responsibility. The weight of it settled into his chest, heavy and cold, like a stone dropped into deep water.

He unbuckled the collar. The leather strap parted with a soft click, the buckle swinging open, the silver catch gleaming in the dim light. He lifted the collar, brought it toward her throat and paused with his hands hovering on either side of her neck. He could feel the heat radiating from her skin, could see the pulse fluttering in the hollow of her throat, rapid and shallow like a bird’s heartbeat.

Finnick slid the collar around her throat. The leather settled against her skin like a second layer, cool at first, then warming rapidly to match her temperature. He pulled the strap through the buckle, adjusted it to fit—not too tight, not too loose, just enough to be felt, just enough to remind her it was there—and pressed the clasp closed. The soft click of the lock engaging seemed to echo through the silent room. The leash, still attached to the collar’s front ring, slid between his fingers like a silver serpent, its fine links cool and smooth against his skin.

There, he thought. It’s done. She’s yours now. Officially. Legally. Inscribed in silver and sealed in leather.

It made him sick.

“You know I have to hurt you, right?”

The words came out before he could stop them—low, rough by the whiskey and the weight of everything he wasn’t saying. He hadn’t meant to ask. He hadn’t meant to give her the opportunity to respond, to acknowledge, to participate in her own destruction. But the question had escaped anyway, rising up from some place deep inside him that still believed in choices, still believed in consent, still believed that the person on the receiving end of pain deserved to know it was coming.

Y/n stilled.

Her whole body went rigid, frozen, as though someone had poured ice water into her veins. The fine tremor that had been running through her shoulders stopped abruptly, replaced by a stillness so complete it seemed almost unnatural. She didn’t look up. She didn’t speak. But after a long moment—a breath, a heartbeat, an eternity—she nodded. Slowly. Once. A small, jerky motion that seemed to cost her more than it should have.

She knew her place. She had always known her place, even before the parliament had voted, even before the collar had closed around her throat. She was a Snow and Snows paid for their crimes in blood and silence and the slow erosion of everything that made them human. She knew exactly what was going to happen to her—had known since the moment she stood up in that chamber and offered herself in exchange for Lucia’s safety. The stylist had explained it to her, in clinical, euphemistic terms, during the preparations. The rules had been read aloud to her, line by line, while she knelt on a cold floor and tried not to cry. She knew what Finnick was supposed to do. She knew what the parliament expected. She knew that her body was no longer her own, that her pain was no longer private, that every mark, every bruise, every tear would be documented and submitted and judged.

And she would let it. She would let it all happen, would open herself to whatever they chose to do to her, because this was the only way she could atone for the sins of her family. This was the only way she could ensure Lucia’s safety. Tigris had come to see her before the stylist took her away for preparations—had slipped into her holding cell in the middle of the night, her spotted face creased with worry, her golden eyes soft with something that might have been pity or regret or love. Tigris had taken her hands, had squeezed them tight, had promised that Lucia would now be her ward. That Lucia would be granted mercy. That Lucia would grow up in a world without collars and cages and the slow, systematic destruction of everything that made a person whole.

This is a small price to pay, Y/n had told herself, over and over, as the stylist measured her for lingerie that left nothing to the imagination. This is a small price to pay, she had repeated, as they painted her face and styled her hair and taught her to kneel without trembling. This is a small price to pay, she had whispered, as the collar locked around her throat for the first time and explained that she would never remove it, never touch it, never question it.

She repeated it now, silently, as Finnick squatted before her with something dark and troubled in his sea-green eyes. A small price. A small price. A small price.

Don’t think about it too much, Finnick told himself, the words forming in his head like a mantra, a prayer, a spell meant to ward off the creeping horror that threatened to overwhelm him. She’s a Snow. She’s that man’s granddaughter. She’s the enemy. She’s not a person. She’s a symbol. She’s a punishment. She’s a responsibility. She’s not a person.

He tried to believe it. He tried to let the words sink into his bones, to harden his heart, to turn her from a trembling girl into an abstraction, a problem to be solved, a task to be completed. Perhaps it would be easier if he stopped thinking of her as a person. Perhaps it would ease the repulsion he felt—the revulsion at what he was about to do, at what the parliament expected him to do, at the role he had been assigned in this grotesque theatre of vengeance. Perhaps if he could look at her and see only a Snow, only a symbol, only a vessel for the pain of a nation, then his hand would not shake. Then his stomach would not turn. Then he could do what needed to be done without losing the last fragments of himself that still felt like something other than a monster.

Don’t think about it. Don’t think about her. Don’t think about any of it. Just do what they expect. Just give them what they want. Just survive.

He closed his eyes. The darkness behind his lids was soft and forgiving, a temporary refuge from the sight of her kneeling before him, the collar gleaming at her throat, the leash trailing across his fingers. He focused on his breathing—in through the nose, out through the mouth—and tried to empty his mind of everything but the simple, mechanical motions of what came next.

Then he opened his eyes.

And she was looking at him.

Her pale blue eyes—those strange, light eyes that had haunted him since the parliament chamber—were fixed on his face with an expression he couldn’t quite name. There was fear there, yes, and resignation, and a kind of weary acceptance that made his chest ache. Her gaze held his, unwavering, and in that moment, she was not an abstraction. She was not a symbol. She was not a Snow.

She was a person. A person with pale blue eyes so similar to his eyes—to the eyes of the monster who had destroyed so many lives, who had turned Finnick into something broken and reshaped and sold. Those eyes had watched him from across the room during Capitol parties, had followed him with cold curiosity, had lingered on his body in ways that made his skin crawl. Those eyes had belonged to Cornelius Snow too, the man who had taken Johanna apart piece by piece, the man who had designed arenas specifically to prolong suffering, the man who had looked at innocent women and seen nothing but meat to be consumed. Eyes of a monster and eyes of a wolf.

And now those same eyes—or eyes so like them that it hardly mattered—were looking at him with something that might have been trust.

Something inside Finnick snapped.

His hand moved without realizing it—a flash of motion, too fast to track, too sudden to stop. His palm connected with her cheek with a sharp, sickening crack that seemed to echo through the silent apartment. The impact jarred his wrist, sent a shock of sensation up his arm and left behind a burning sting in his palm that he knew would linger for hours.

Y/n let out a sound—a wet, startled hiccup, more surprise than pain at first—as she fell sideways, her body crumpling beneath the force of the blow. Her hands shot out to catch herself, her palms slapping against the carpet, her hair falling across her face in a pale gold curtain. She didn’t cry out. She didn’t scream. She simply lay there, half-curled on the floor, her breath coming in short, ragged gasps, her whole body shaking now with a tremor he couldn’t stop.

Finnick stared at his hand. At his palm, already reddening from the impact. At his fingers, still curled slightly, still ready to strike again. Something dark had glazed over his eyes—a film, a veil, a dissociation that separated him from what his body was doing. He could feel himself pulling back, retreating into some distant corner of his mind where the sounds were muffled and the images were blurred and nothing could touch him. It was a familiar place, this inner fortress. He had built it during his years as Snow’s plaything, had reinforced it during the war, had retreated to it countless times when reality became too heavy to bear.

But even from that distant watchtower, he could see what was happening. He could see his hand raising again. He could see it coming down on her skin—her shoulder, her arm, the side of her ribs—each impact producing a soft, wet sound that seemed to come from somewhere far away. He could see her body jerking with each blow, could see her trying to curl into herself, to protect her vital organs, to make herself as small and unappealing a target as possible.

Instinctively, her hands came up to cover her face—a primal response, the body’s desperate attempt to shield what was most precious, most vulnerable, most easily broken. Her fingers splayed across her cheeks, her palms pressing against her forehead, her arms forming a protective cage around her head. She made herself small, made herself compact, made herself into something that might survive if only the blows would stop.

Finnick’s hand shot out and grabbed her wrist. His fingers curled around the delicate bones, feeling the rapid flutter of her pulse beneath his thumb, the warmth of her skin, the slight resistance as she tried instinctively to pull away. His grip tightened. Squeezed. He could feel the bones shifting under his fingers, could feel the soft tissues compressing, could feel the fine tremors running through her arm as she tried not to fight back.

She whimpered. A small, soft sound, barely audible, more breath than voice. Tears formed in her eyes—pale blue eyes, so like his eyes—and began to spill down her cheeks, tracing silver paths through the soft makeup the stylist had applied. She didn’t sob. She didn’t beg. She simply cried, silently, her body shaking, her breath hitching, her wrist still trapped in his grip.

Finnick looked at her. At the tears on her cheeks. At the reddening marks on her skin. At the collar still gleaming at her throat, the silver tag catching the light, the words Property of F. Odair seeming to glow in the darkness.

He thought of the counsellor’s words. If they decide you’re not making good use of her, they’ll remove her from your custody.

She thought of Tigris’s promise. Lucia will be my ward. She will be safe.

He thought of his own hands, and all the things they had done, and all the things they were doing now. And he kept squeezing.

“Stop crying.”

The words came out sharper than he intended—edged with irritation, with frustration, with something that sounded almost like contempt. Finnick heard himself speak and didn’t recognize his own voice. It belonged to someone else, someone harder, someone who had been hollowed out and filled with something cold and unfeeling. He stared down at Y/n, still half-curled on the floor, tears streaming silently down her cheeks, and felt a surge of something hot and ugly rise in his chest.

Why was she crying? It was barely anything. A few open-handed strikes. A wrist squeezed a little too tightly. Nothing compared to what he had endured in the arena, in the Capitol, in the dark rooms where Snow’s associates had paid for the privilege of putting their hands on him. Most people—most survivors—had been forced to endure pain infinitely worse than this. What he had given her would barely leave a bruise. By tomorrow, the redness would have faded to a faint yellow and within a few days, it would be gone entirely, leaving no trace behind. And yet she was crying as if he had broken her bones, as if he had torn her apart and left her bleeding on the floor.

But that was it, wasn’t it? That was the heart of it. Her privilege. Her soft, sheltered life in the Snow mansion, where the worst pain she had ever known was probably a stubbed toe or a paper cut. She had never been forced to build endurance the way district children had. She had never learned to bite down on a leather strap while someone carved into her flesh. She had never been taught to dissociate, to float above her body, to become someone else entirely while her physical form was being used and discarded. She had never had to develop calluses on her soul.

The thought should have brought him satisfaction. Instead, it only made him angrier.

Y/n nodded at his command—a quick, jerky motion, her chin dipping toward her chest—but she couldn’t make herself stop crying. The tears kept coming, welling up from some deep, overflowing reservoir inside her, spilling down her cheeks and dripping onto the carpet. She tried to blink them back, tried to swallow the sobs that kept catching in her throat, tried to compose her face into something neutral, something obedient, something that wouldn’t provoke him further. Her breath came in short, hitching gasps, each inhale a battle, each exhale a surrender. She pressed her lips together until they went white, until the taste of copper filled her mouth, but still the tears fell.

Stop. Stop. Stop, she told herself fiercely. You’re making it worse. You’re making him angry. Stop crying. Stop being weak. Stop—

Finnick’s hands shot out and curled around her throat.

The contact was sudden, unexpected—his fingers wrapping around the column of her neck, his thumbs pressing against her jaw, his palms warm and slightly damp against her skin. He didn’t squeeze, not yet. He simply held her, his grip firm enough to keep her in place, to force her to look at him. The collar shifted against her skin, the leather creaking softly, the silver tag tapping against his knuckles.

Y/n’s eyes flew to his face. She looked at him through a veil of tears, her pale blue gaze meeting his sea-green one, her expression a mixture of fear and confusion and something else—something that might have been understanding. Her throat moved beneath his hands as she swallowed, the muscles working against his palms, her pulse fluttering rapid and fragile against his fingertips.

He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know what to feel. The certainty that had propelled him through the past few minutes—the dark, dissociated certainty that had allowed him to raise his hand and bring it down, over and over—had evaporated, leaving behind nothing but confusion and dread and a sick, spiraling sense of unreality. Should he have stopped? Should he have continued? Should he hit her again, harder this time, to make up for the hesitation? Should he let her go and walk away and pretend none of this had ever happened?

He didn’t know. He didn’t know anything anymore. The ground beneath him seemed to shift and crack, threatening to open up and swallow him whole.

His grip loosened on her throat. His fingers slackened, his palms pulled back and then his hands dropped away entirely, falling to his sides like dead weights. He released her as though her skin had burned him, as though touching her had been a mistake he couldn’t take back.

Finnick turned away. His gaze drifted to the windows—the floor-to-ceiling glass that dominated the far wall of the living room, offering an uninterrupted view of the Capitol skyline. The city sprawled before him, a glittering expanse of lights and shadows, beautiful and rotten, indifferent and eternal. He stared at his reflection in the dark glass—a pale, hollow-eyed stranger with copper hair and sea-green eyes that seemed to belong to someone else. He didn’t recognize himself. He didn’t know who this man was, standing in this luxury apartment, putting a collar around the throat of a woman who had been given to him like a gift.

This isn’t me, he thought. This isn’t who I am. This isn’t what I wanted. This isn’t—

Behind him, he heard Y/n gasping for breath. The sound was wet and ragged, her lungs struggling to pull in air after the pressure on her throat had been released. She was lying on the floor a few feet away from where he stood, her body still half-curled, her hands still trembling, her chest heaving with the effort of breathing. The soft blue lace of her lingerie seemed obscene in the dim light, a mockery of beauty, a costume for a role she had never auditioned for.

Finnick looked down at his hands. They were shaking. Fine, rapid tremors travelled through his fingers, his palms, his wrists, as though his body was trying to shake off something that had latched onto him from the inside. The skin of his right palm was still flushed from the impact of her cheek, a faint pinkness that would fade by morning. His fingernails were clean, his knuckles unbroken. There was no blood on him. No evidence of what he had done except the memory, already beginning to blur at the edges and the marks already blooming on her skin.

Then the images came.

They flashed through his mind without warning—not memories, not quite, but fragments, shards, pieces of a life he had tried so hard to bury. The parties, first: chandeliers and champagne and silk-draped rooms where the air smelled of perfume and sweat and something darker. The hands that had touched him, countless hands, grabbing and groping and claiming. The faces that had hovered above him, their features blurred together into a single, monstrous mask of hunger and satisfaction. Then the arena: blood-soaked sand, the screams of dying children, the weight of a trident in his hands, the knowledge that he would have to kill again and again and again just to see another sunrise. Then Snow’s mansion: the cold, sterile rooms where he had been taken after the parties, where he had been made to kneel on hard floors, where a collar had been locked around his throat and he had been told to smile for the cameras.

The images came faster now, overlapping, bleeding into one another, until he couldn’t tell where one memory ended and another began. The laughter of Capitol guests mingled with the screams of tributes. The taste of champagne mixed with the copper tang of blood. The quiet of his apartment—the silence he had always treasured, the silence that meant he was safe, he was alone, he was no one’s property—filled with noise, with voices, with the terrible symphony of his past.

He could hear them. All of them. Snow’s cold, measured tones. The counsellor’s ugly laugh. The stylist’s honeyed voice. The hands that had held him down, the mouths that had whispered filthy promises, the eyes that had watched him and seen nothing but a body to be used.

Stop, he thought. Stop. Please. Make it stop.

But the voices only grew louder.

Finnick curled into himself. His shoulders hunched forward, his head dropped, his arms wrapped around his torso as though he could hold himself together through sheer pressure. His breath came in short gasps, each inhale a battle, each exhale a surrender. Tears formed in his own eyes now—hot and sudden, blurring his vision, spilling down his cheeks in a way that felt foreign and wrong. He hadn’t cried in years. He had forgotten how. And yet here he was, sobbing silently in his own living room, a few feet away from a woman he had just hurt, a woman who bore the marks of his hands on her skin.

“I’m sorry,” he muttered. The words were barely audible, more breath than sound, spoken to no one and everyone. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—I don’t want—”

He didn’t know what he was apologizing for. For hurting her? For losing control? For being exactly the kind of person he had spent his whole life trying not to become? The words tumbled out of him in a broken stream, each one dissolving into the next, until they became nothing more than a string of syllables, meaningless and desperate.

This isn’t who I am, he told himself, but the voice in his head sounded less certain now. I’m not like them. I’m not a monster. I’m not—

But he had hurt her. He had raised his hand and brought it down on her skin, had felt the impact travel up his arm, had watched her crumple and cry and beg without words. He had done exactly what the counsellor had wanted him to do. Exactly what the parliament had expected. Exactly what Snow had done to him, over and over, until the memory of it had become a second skin he could never shed.

The spiral worsened. The abyss beneath him yawned wider, darker, hungrier. Nothing seemed able to drag him out of it—no rational thought, no comforting memory, no flicker of hope. He was falling, and falling and falling, and there was no bottom to catch him, no ground to break his descent. Just the endless dark, and the voices, and the knowledge that he had become the very thing he had once sworn to destroy.

And then he heard a soft voice call out to him.

“Master?”

The word was tentative, almost questioning, as though she wasn’t sure she was allowed to speak. It cut through the noise in his head like a blade through fog—not silencing the voices, not banishing the images, but creating a small, clear space in the centre of the chaos. A space where something other than horror could exist.

Finnick felt a soft touch on his hand. Light, barely there, the brush of fingertips against his knuckles. He looked down and saw Y/n’s hand resting on his—pale and slender, the fingers slightly curled, the nails bare and clean. She wasn’t gripping him, wasn’t holding on, wasn’t trying to restrain him. She was simply touching him, making contact, letting him know that she was there.

He looked up. Met her eyes.

Y/n was crawling closer, her movements slow and careful, her body still trembling from the aftermath of his hands. The bruises were already beginning to form on her skin—faint shadows on her cheek, darker marks on her arm where he had grabbed her, a hint of purple blooming at her collarbone. Her cheeks were tear-streaked, her makeup smeared, her hair a tangled mess of pale gold. She looked broken. She looked ruined. She looked like someone who had been hurt and was choosing to approach her abuser anyway.

“I know you have to do what you have to do,” she said, her voice soft and hoarse from crying. She paused, swallowing, wincing slightly as her throat moved. “I—I don’t blame you for it.”

She crawled closer still, until she was kneeling beside him, her shoulder almost touching his, her breath warm against his arm. Her hand remained on his, not squeezing, not pulling, just resting there like a small, fragile anchor.

“You’re not them,” she whispered, as though she could hear the thoughts screaming in his head. “You’re not like them. I know you’re not.”

Finnick stared at her. At the bruises already beginning to bloom across her skin—purple and blue shadows that marred the soft, pale perfection of her body. At the tears still clinging to her lashes, trembling there like dew on a spider’s web. At the collar around her throat, gleaming softly in the darkness, the silver tag catching the glow from the windows and throwing it back in small, sharp flashes. Property of F. Odair. The words seemed to burn in the air between them, an accusation and a confession all at once.

She reached up and took his hand. Her fingers were warm and slightly damp from her tears, her grip gentle but insistent as she guided his palm toward her face. He let her, too shocked to resist, too exhausted to pull away. His hand moved through the air as though guided by strings, weightless and disconnected from the rest of his body, until his fingers made contact with her cheek.

The skin there was soft. Warmer than he expected. And slightly swollen beneath his palm, already tender from where he had struck her.

“It’s okay,” she said, her voice barely above a whisper, each word a small, fragile thing that seemed to cost her more than it should. Her pale blue eyes held his, unblinking, unwavering. “You can hurt me. You can use me. I deserve it.” It’s a small price to pay.

Finnick’s features twisted in pain. His brow furrowed, his lips pressed together, his jaw tightened until the muscles stood out in sharp relief against his skin. Something cracked open inside his chest—a fissure, a fault line, a wound that had never fully healed and was now bleeding fresh. He stared at her as though seeing her for the first time, as though she were a riddle he couldn’t solve, a language he couldn’t speak.

Why was she doing this? Why was she encouraging her own abuse? Why was she offering herself up like a sacrifice, pressing his hand to her bruised cheek, whispering words of absolution he hadn’t asked for and didn’t deserve? She should have been hateful. She should have been resentful. She should have been spitting venom, clawing at his eyes, screaming for help that would never come. That was what he expected. That was what he understood. That was the language of survivors—the language he spoke fluently, the language of anger and resistance and the desperate, clawing fight to remain whole.

But she wasn’t giving him that. She was giving him softness. She was giving him forgiveness. She was giving him permission to hurt her and somehow that was worse than any accusation she could have levelled.

Y/n was close to him now. Too close. He could feel the warmth radiating from her skin, could smell the faint, floral scent of whatever products the stylist had used on her hair and body—something sweet and delicate, like night-blooming jasmine, utterly at odds with the violence that had just passed between them. Her breath fanned across his lips, soft and warm, carrying the faintest hint of mint. Her body was curled beside his, her shoulder pressed against his arm, her hip brushing against his thigh. She was a source of heat in the cool darkness of the apartment, a small, living flame that seemed to draw him toward her despite every instinct screaming at him to pull away.

Finnick’s body buzzed with the warmth of the alcohol still swimming through his veins. The whiskey had dulled the sharpest edges of his thoughts, had smoothed the jagged fragments of his memories into something almost bearable. But it had also lowered his defenses, had loosened the tight hold he kept on his impulses, had blurred the line between what he should do and what he wanted to do. His head felt thick and heavy, his limbs loose and uncoordinated, his judgment clouded by the pleasant, numbing fog that had settled over his brain.

His eyes traveled down her body.

He didn’t mean to look. He told himself he didn’t mean to look. But his gaze slipped from her face—from those pale blue eyes, from the bruises—and began to drift downward. Down the milky column of her neck, where the collar rested against her throat. Down the curve of her shoulder, bare and smooth in the dim light. Down the swell of her breasts, barely contained by the soft blue lace of the lingerie, rising and falling with each shallow breath. Down the narrow span of her waist, the flare of her hips, the long, elegant lines of her legs, bare from mid-thigh to ankle.

She looked so beautiful in this light. Almost ethereal. The soft glow from the windows caught the pale gold of her hair, turning it into something that seemed to glow from within. The shadows played across her skin, accentuating the curves and hollows of her body, the subtle architecture of bone and muscle and soft, yielding flesh. Her bruises stood out in stark relief against marble of her skin—dark flowers blooming on a field of snow, evidence of what he had done, what he was capable of.

Johanna had been right. She did look like an angel. A fallen one, perhaps. A broken one. An angel with bruised wings and tear-stained cheeks and the collar of a slave around her throat.

Finnick’s hand rose to her cheek. The same hand that had struck her. The same hand that had wrapped around her throat. Now it cupped her face with something approaching tenderness, his palm moulding to the curve of her jaw, his fingers threading into the soft hair at her temple. The warmth of her skin against his palm was almost shocking—a reminder that she was real, that she was here, that this was happening. He almost flinched at the contact, almost pulled away, almost retreated back into the cold, safe distance he had maintained between them.

But he didn’t.

The voices in his head didn’t quiet. They were still there, a low, constant murmur at the edge of his consciousness, whispering fragments of memory and fear and self-loathing. But they didn’t grow louder either. For the first time in hours—perhaps for the first time in years—they seemed to recede, to retreat, to give him a moment of blessed, fragile silence.

Finnick was too tired. Too tired of pretending. Too tired of being civilized, of holding back, of burying his feelings beneath layers of charm and politeness and carefully constructed composure. Too tired of smiling when he wanted to scream, of nodding when he wanted to argue, of taking the high road when every fibre of his being wanted to burn it all down. Too tired of being the survivor, the victor, the senator, the man who had overcome unimaginable horrors and emerged whole on the other side. He wasn’t whole. He had never been whole. He was a patchwork of scars and coping mechanisms and desperate, fragile strategies for making it through one more day.

And in this moment, in the dim light of his apartment, with a woman kneeling beside him and offering herself up like a sacrifice, he simply let go.

He cupped her face with both hands now—his palms warm against her cheeks, his fingers threading into her hair, his thumbs brushing across her cheekbones. He could feel the tears still wet on her skin, could taste the salt of them in the air between them. She didn’t pull away. She didn’t flinch. She simply looked up at him with those pale blue eyes, waiting, accepting, surrendering to whatever came next.

Then he smashed his lips onto hers.

It wasn’t gentle. It wasn’t tender. It was raw and desperate and almost animalistic—a collision of mouths, a clash of teeth, a hunger that had been building for longer than he wanted to admit. He kissed her like a drowning man gasping for air, like a starving man reaching for bread, like someone who had been touched without his permission so many times that the only way he knew how to touch was to take.

There was something in him that wanted to consume instead of be consumed. To touch instead of being touched. To be the one holding someone down instead of the one being held. For years, he had been on the other side of this equation—had been the object, the target, the body to be used and discarded. He had learned to dissociate, to float above himself, to become someone else entirely while his physical form was being violated. But he had never learned to want it. He had never learned to enjoy it. He had simply learned to survive it.

But this—this was different. This was his choice. His desire. His hunger. And for once, he didn’t want to hold it back.

He pushed her down to the carpeted floor. The motion was sudden, almost rough and she let out a small, surprised sound against his mouth as her back hit the soft fibres. He followed her down, his body pressing against hers, his weight pinning her to the ground. The carpet was thick and soft beneath them, muffling the sounds of their movement, cushioning the impact of his knees and elbows as he settled over her.

He hovered above her, his body a cage around hers, his chest against her breasts, his hips pressed against her stomach. She was so small beneath him—fragile and warm and impossibly soft. He could feel her heartbeat through the thin lace of her lingerie, could feel the rapid flutter of her pulse against his chest, could feel the way her breath hitched and stuttered with every movement he made.

One of his hands caught both of hers, his fingers wrapping around her wrists, pinning them above her head. She didn’t struggle. She didn’t resist. Her arms stayed where he put them, her hands open and palm-up, her fingers slightly curled. She looked up at him through the tangled fall of her pale gold hair, her eyes wide and luminous, her lips parted and slightly swollen from his kiss.

His other hand began to trail down her body.

Slowly. Deliberately. He let his fingers trace the line of her jaw, the curve of her throat, the hollow at the base of her neck where her pulse beat rapid and fragile. He let them drift lower, across the soft blue lace covering her breasts, feeling the warmth of her skin through the thin fabric, feeling the way her body arched slightly toward his touch even as she made herself small and still. He let them trace the outline of her ribs, the dip of her waist, the flare of her hip, until his hand rested on the bare skin of her thigh, just below the hem of the lingerie.

She trembled beneath him. Her whole body shook like a plucked string still vibrating after the note had faded. But she didn’t pull away. She didn’t close her eyes. She kept them fixed on his face, watching him, waiting for him, accepting whatever he chose to give her.

Finnick looked down at her and felt something crack open inside him. Something he had kept locked away for a very long time. Something that might have been hope, or might have been despair, or might have been something else entirely, something he didn’t have a name for.

He wanted to consume her. He wanted to devour her. He wanted to lose himself in the warmth of her body, the softness of her skin, the surrender in her eyes. He wanted to forget—forget the arena, forget the parties, forget Snow’s cold smile and the counsellor’s ugly laugh and the stylist’s honeyed voice. He wanted to be someone else, if only for a few minutes. Someone who took instead of being taken. Someone who chose instead of being chosen for.

So he stopped thinking. Stopped questioning. Stopped trying to be good.

He lowered his mouth to hers again and let himself fall.

╰ ┈➤ A/n: Both y/n and Finnick deserve a hug so bad 😔😔 they’re like wet kicked stray kittens at the side of the road and someone please put them in a lake house away from the capitol’s bs 🙏🙏

╰ ┈➤ Masterlist

╰ ┈➤ Tags: @avantlilies @joekitsu @sarabelllah @lil-mex-child @themischievousher @saoriixbjh @fnimln @gmiasa03 @foulkingtree-101 @doll-parts111 @aaaashiiii @theregoeskittykat @psamathegoesrawr @erisfayred @fgskna @ameliyaroseaster @blackpearlodair @yagiyoshikawa @teenagerunawayangel @aliteralprincess @oursizy @antobooh @readawaythereality2 @imn0t4v4mpir3 @dawnzephyr @redr0sewrites @asterwriter221 @wandressfox

© cheriecelestial - arabelle | 2026

The counsellor from District 6 scowled, his face darkening with something that might have been disappointment or rage. “And why should you—”

“Sit down,” Finnick said quietly. He didn’t raise his voice. He didn’t need to. There was something in his tone—a cold, flat authority—that silenced the objection before it could fully form. He turned to face the parliament, his hands resting on the back of his chair. “I am a victor. A senator. A man who has served this Republic since its founding. I have given my blood, my body, my sanity to the people of Panem. If anyone here has earned the right to make this decision, it is me.”

He looked at Katniss. She held his gaze for a long moment, searching his face for something—motive, perhaps, or hidden cruelty. Whatever she found there made her nod slowly, reluctantly.

“The motion is amended,” Katniss said, turning back to the chamber. “Y/n Snow will serve her sentence in the custody of Senator Finnick Odair, subject to parliamentary oversight. All in favour?”

The vote was closer this time. But it passed.

And Finnick sat down, his heart pounding, his hands steady, his mind already spinning with the weight of what he had just agreed to do.

That evening, Finnick returned to his apartment alone, the weight of the day pressing down on him like a physical thing. He had barely registered the drive back—the familiar streets of the Capitol blurring past the soft hum of the electric engine doing nothing to quiet the noise in his head. Now he stood in the middle of his living room, still in his formal clothes, pacing a slow, restless path from the windows to the fireplace and back again.

He didn’t know what to do. He didn’t know what to expect. He had volunteered to take custody of Y/n Snow on impulse—a split-second decision born of something he couldn’t quite name. Disgust at the counsellor from District 6, perhaps. A flicker of recognition when her haunted eyes had met his. Or maybe just the memories that he didn’t want to recall. Whatever the reason, the deed was done. The parliament had voted. And now she was coming here. To his home. To his care.

To his cage.

His stomach turned. He resumed pacing.

The doorbell rang at precisely seven minutes past eight. The sound sliced through the heavy silence of the apartment, making Finnick’s shoulders tense. He crossed to the door in four long strides, pulled it open and found himself face to face with a ghost from a life he had tried very hard to forget.

“Senator Odair.” The man’s voice was smooth as poisoned honey—warm on the surface, cloying underneath, with something sharp and unpleasant lurking just below. He was a former stylist from the Hunger Games, one of the ones who had dressed tributes for the cameras, who had painted smiles on frightened children and called it pageantry. His hair was silver-grey and swept back from a narrow face. His suit was immaculate, tailored to within an inch of its life. And his smile, wide and white and utterly insincere, never quite reached his eyes.

Finnick gave him a small, tight nod of acknowledgment. Nothing more. He had learned long ago that men like this fed on warmth; the best defence was to offer none at all.

“I’ve brought the goods,” the stylist continued, undeterred by Finnick’s cool reception. He clapped his hands twice—a sharp, theatrical gesture—and two assistants emerged from the shadows of the hallway, moving with the practiced efficiency of people who had done this many times before. One carried two large briefcases, sleek and black, their handles gleaming. The other wheeled a hanger rod, the kind used by couturiers to transport gowns to fashion shows. But these were not gowns.

Finnick’s eyes travelled slowly along the rod, taking in what hung there. Lace. Silk. Leather. Straps. Cutouts that revealed more than they concealed. Pieces of fabric so small and so strategically placed that they could barely be called clothing at all. Some were transparent. Some were trimmed with fur. One appeared to be made almost entirely of gold chains linked together by tiny rings, designed to cover nothing and accentuate everything. His jaw tightened. His hands curled into loose fists at his sides.

“Now for the fun part,” the stylist said, his voice rising with theatrical excitement. He gestured over his shoulder. “Bring her out.”

Y/n stepped forward from behind the assistants, where she had been standing, waiting, in the shadows. She was wrapped in a simple white robe, the kind hotels leave folded at the foot of the bed, belted tightly at her waist. Her hair had been styled into soft, cascading waves that fell past her shoulders, catching the light from the hallway fixtures. Her face was bare of heavy makeup—just a touch of gloss on her lips, a hint of colour on her cheeks, a subtle smudging of shadow around her pale blue eyes to make them appear larger, more luminous. The stylist had designed to highlight her features rather than transform them. She looked younger than her years. More vulnerable. More breakable.

The stylist beamed. “I took my artistic liberties with this one,” he said, as one of his assistants stepped forward and, with a single, practiced motion, untied the belt of Y/n’s robe.

The white fabric parted and fell to the floor in a soft heap.

Finnick’s eyes widened. His breath caught somewhere in his throat. She was wearing a lingerie set the colour of a summer sky—soft blue, almost ethereal, made of delicate lace and whisper-thin silk that clung to every curve and hollow of her body. The bra was sheer, the underwear cut high on her hips and the entire ensemble seemed designed to flaunt rather than conceal. Her body was completely on display, from the slender line of her neck to the gentle flare of her hips to the long, elegant length of her legs. She was beautiful in every sense of the word but it wasn’t something that would help her now.

Without a word, without meeting his eyes, she sank to her knees on the floor in front of him. Her hands rested palms-up on her thighs. Her head bowed slightly, exposing the curve of her neck. The posture was practiced, precise—she had been taught this, rehearsed it, probably until her knees were raw and her back ached. The thought made Finnick’s stomach churn.

“We’ve done her makeup in a softer look, as you can see,” the stylist continued, apparently oblivious to—or delighted by—the horror spreading across Finnick’s face. “To accentuate her natural features. I’ve also taught her some basic tips so she can do her own face in the future. Hygiene, maintenance, all of that. She’s a quick learner. So very eager to please.” He said the last part with a smirk that made Finnick want to break something.

The stylist glanced at his lead assistant, who stepped forward and opened one of the black briefcases with a soft click. Inside, nestled in a bed of dark velvet, lay a singular collar—matching the soft blue of the lingerie set exactly, the leather supple and gleaming, the buckle polished to a mirror shine. Attached to it was a silver leash, fine-linked and delicate, the kind one might use for a small dog. The assistant opened the second briefcase as well, revealing more collars in different colours—black, red, white, deep green—some with matching leashes, others with chains, still others with small padlocks and tiny, delicate bells.

“The outfit sets are complete with matching collars and leashes,” the stylist said, reaching into the first briefcase and lifting the blue collar out with something like reverence. He held it out to Finnick like an offering. “Some sets include additional accessories as well. Muzzles, cuffs, blindfolds. I included a few ‘training aids’—nothing too severe, of course, just the basics. Reward markers, correction tools, that sort of thing. All very humane.”

Finnick stared at the collar in the stylist’s outstretched hand. It seemed to pulse in the low light, the silver accents catching the glow of the city beyond the windows. He reached out and took it on instinct, his fingers closing around the cool leather, and the weight of it—the finality of it—settled into his palm like a stone dropped into still water. His head was spinning. His thoughts were a jumble of images: the arena, the Capitol parties, the hands that had touched him without permission, the collar he himself had worn once, briefly, as part of a “costume” for a private event he had never been able to fully forget.

He looked down at Y/n, still kneeling on his floor, still not meeting his eyes. The soft blue lace of her lingerie seemed almost beautiful in the dim light. Almost innocent. Almost like something a person might choose to wear.

But she hadn’t chosen it. None of this had been her choice.

“I went for a nice ‘puppy chic’ aesthetic,” the stylist said, breaking into Finnick’s thoughts with his chipper, commercial tone. “Personally, I would have preferred ears and a tail—to really sell the concept, you understand—but I kept it intentionally plain. Neutral. A blank canvas, if you will. I thought you might want to customize her in the future. Add your own touches. Make her truly yours.”

He smiled again, that wide, empty smile and gestured to his assistants. They began moving the hanger rod into the apartment, positioning it near the corner where the golden cage now stood—a detail the stylist’s eyes lingered on with professional appreciation. The briefcases were set down on the coffee table, their contents waiting to be unpacked. And Y/n remained on her knees, motionless, her breath shallow and even, her pale blue eyes fixed on a spot on the floor in front of her.

Finnick looked at the collar in his hand. Then at the cage. Then at the woman kneeling before him, wearing clothes that weren’t really clothes, her body already beginning to tremble from the effort of staying still.

“Leave,” he said quietly.

The stylist blinked. “I beg your pardon?”

“Leave.” Finnick’s voice was soft, but there was no mistaking the command in it. “All of you. Now.”

The stylist opened his mouth to protest, thought better of it, and closed it again. He snapped his fingers at his assistants and they filed out of the apartment with the quick, nervous energy of people who had just realized they had overstayed their welcome. The door clicked shut behind them.

Finnick stood alone in his living room with a collar in his hand and a woman at his feet.

He did not move.

He did not speak.

The door had barely clicked shut behind the stylist and his assistants when a soft knock sounded again. Finnick’s shoulders tensed. He had been standing in the same spot, the blue collar still clutched in his hand, Y/n still kneeling motionless on the floor before him. The silence between them had been thick, charged with something neither of them seemed willing to name.

He crossed to the door and pulled it open. The stylist stood in the hallway, his smile somewhat diminished but still firmly in place, like a mask that had cracked but not yet fallen.

“Apologies, Senator,” the man said, reaching into the inner pocket of his immaculate suit jacket. “I nearly forgot the most important part.” He withdrew a folded sheet of heavy parchment—creamy white, edges gilded, the kind of paper used for formal invitations or legal documents. It was covered in elegant, looping handwriting, the letters so precise they might have been printed. “The rules. For your reference, she is already aware.”

Finnick took the paper without a word. The stylist lingered for a moment, clearly hoping to be invited back inside, then thought better of it. He offered a curt bow and retreated down the hallway, his footsteps fading into the soft hum of the building’s ventilation system.

Finnick closed the door and leaned against it, the parchment crackling softly in his grip. He could feel Y/n’s eyes on him now—not staring directly, but watching from the corner of her vision, her pale blue gaze tracking his every movement. She was still on her knees, still in that soft blue lingerie that left nothing to the imagination, still trembling almost imperceptibly. The white robe lay in a heap where it had fallen, a puddle of fabric on the expensive rug.

He unfolded the paper and began to read.

RULES AND PROTOCOLS FOR THE CUSTODY AND MAINTENANCE OF Y/N SNOW

As decreed by the Parliamentary Oversight Committee on Transitional Justice, in consultation with the Office of Senator Finnick Odair and the former Grand Stylist’s Guild of Panem.

ARTICLE I: GENERAL CONDUCT

1. The ward (hereafter referred to as “the asset”) shall address Senator Finnick Odair (hereafter referred to as “the Master”) as “Master” at all times when in private quarters. In public settings, she shall address him as “Senator” unless otherwise instructed.

2. The asset shall speak only when spoken to, unless granted explicit permission to do otherwise. Permission may be granted verbally or through a non-verbal signal to be established by the Master.

3. The asset shall maintain eye contact only when invited to do so. The default posture requires her gaze to be directed at the floor, at a point approximately three feet in front of her position.

4. The asset shall stay on all fours at all times and rise only when commanded. She shall remain in whatever position she has been placed until explicitly released or redirected.

ARTICLE II: APPEARANCE AND GROOMING

1. The asset’s appearance shall be maintained at all times to the satisfaction of the Master. This includes, but is not limited to: hair styling, makeup application, skincare, nail care and body grooming.

2. The asset shall wear only such clothing, undergarments, accessories and collars as the Master provides or approves. She shall not alter, remove, or replace any item without direct permission.

3. The collar issued to the asset shall remain affixed at all times except during bathing, medical examinations, or when the Master removes it for specific purposes. The asset shall not remove her collar under any circumstances.

4. The asset shall maintain a body weight within ten percent of her current measurements. Weekly weigh-ins shall be conducted by the Master or his designated proxy.

ARTICLE III: DOMESTIC DUTIES

1. The asset shall greet the Master at the door upon his return to the residence. The greeting shall be performed on her knees, with her head bowed, until the Master acknowledges her.

2. The asset shall be responsible for the cleanliness and organization of the Master’s personal quarters, including but not limited to: making the bed, laundering garments, dusting, vacuuming and the proper storage of all personal effects.

3. The asset shall prepare and serve all meals and beverages consumed within the residence, according to the Master’s preferences and dietary requirements. She shall not eat or drink without the Master’s explicit permission.

4. The asset shall retire to her designated sleeping area (the cage) no later than 10:00 PM each evening, unless otherwise instructed. She shall not leave this area during the night without permission.

ARTICLE IV: PHYSICAL CONDUCT AND RESTRICTIONS

1. The asset shall not touch the Master without his explicit invitation. This includes incidental contact, reaching, leaning, or any other form of physical approach.

2. The asset shall not touch herself for purposes of pleasure or comfort without the Master’s explicit permission. Any violation of this rule will result in immediate corrective action.

3. The asset shall not leave the residence without the Master’s accompaniment or written authorization. Any attempted departure will be treated as escape and referred to parliamentary authorities.

4. The asset shall surrender all bodily autonomy to the Master upon request. This includes, but is not limited to, the right to refuse physical contact, the right to privacy and the right to determine her own schedule.

ARTICLE V: BEHAVIORAL STANDARDS

1. The asset shall not speak of her former life, her family, her status as a Snow, or her crimes except when directly questioned by the Master. Questions shall be answered truthfully and without embellishment.

2. The asset shall not express negative emotions—including anger, resentment, sadness, or frustration—unless the Master explicitly requests such expressions. The expected demeanour is one of cheerful compliance.

3. The asset shall not cry except in response to physical discipline or when explicitly permitted. Unauthorized crying will be considered a behavioural infraction.

4. The asset shall thank the Master for any punishment she receives, recognizing that such correction is administered for her improvement and the maintenance of order.

ARTICLE VI: CORRECTIVE MEASURES

1. Infractions shall be addressed according to a tiered system:

Minor infractions (tone of voice, slow response, imperfect posture): verbal correction and a period of kneeling on a hard surface.

Moderate infractions (failure to complete a task, speaking without permission, improper grooming): removal of privileges (warm meals, soft bedding, etc.) and/or physical correction not exceeding ten strikes.

Major infractions (lying, attempting to hide violations, disrespect toward the Master, attempting to remove the collar): confinement to the cage for an extended period, restriction of food and physical correction by a method of the Master’s choosing.

2. All physical correction shall be documented and submitted monthly to the Parliamentary Oversight Committee.

3. The asset shall maintain a log of her own infractions and punishments, to be reviewed weekly by the Master.

ARTICLE VII: ENRICHMENT AND REWARDS

1. The Master may grant rewards for exemplary behavior, including but not limited to: extended freedom of movement within the residence, choice of clothing, preferred foods, time outside the residence, or physical affection.

2. The asset may earn the privilege of sleeping outside the cage by demonstrating sustained compliance over a period to be determined by the Master.

3. The Master may, at his sole discretion, grant the asset temporary relief from any of these rules, for any period of time, for any reason. Such relief shall be documented but need not be justified.

ARTICLE VIII: FINAL PROVISIONS

1. These rules take effect immediately and remain in force until such time as the Parliamentary Oversight Committee orders the asset’s release or transfer, or until the Master formally relinquishes custody in writing.

2. Any ambiguity in these rules shall be resolved in favour of the Master’s interpretation.

3. The asset shall sign a copy of these rules, indicating her understanding and acceptance. Failure to sign does not constitute grounds for non-compliance.

Finnick read the document three times. Each pass made his stomach sink a little deeper, his jaw tighten a little more. The language was cold, clinical—bureaucratic euphemisms for something that looked, sounded and smelled like ownership. Asset. Master. Correction. Maintenance. They had packaged the destruction of a human being in legal jargon and presented it to him on gilded paper.

He looked up from the parchment. Y/n was still kneeling, still waiting, her pale blue eyes now fixed on his face. She had seen him reading. She knew what the document was—probably had been shown a copy earlier, probably had been made to sign something similar in triplicate before they ever brought her here. There was no surprise in her expression, no curiosity. Just exhaustion. And that same haunted, hollow look he had seen in the parliament chamber.

Finnick dropped the collar next to her—a small, careless motion that sent the soft blue leather tumbling onto the rug beside Y/n’s kneeling form. It landed with a whisper of sound, the silver leash pooling next to it like a fallen serpent. He did not look at her as he stepped past. He did not acknowledge the way her breath hitched, the way her hands twitched as though she wanted to reach for it but knew better. He simply walked, his footsteps heavy and deliberate, carrying him away from her and toward the door.

His shoes were still by the coat stand where he had kicked them off earlier. He bent down and pulled them on with rough, impatient movements, not bothering to lace them properly. His phone was on the kitchen counter—he snatched it up. His car keys were in the bowl by the entryway—he grabbed those too. And then he was out the door, the heavy mahogany closing behind him with a soft, final click, leaving Y/n alone on the floor in her soft blue lace, surrounded by briefcases full of collars and a list of rules she had now live by.

The hallway stretched before him, empty and elegant. The lift arrived with a soft chime. Finnick stepped inside and let the doors close, leaning his forehead against the cool metal wall as the car descended. He could deal with this. He would deal with this. But not now. Not tonight. Everything was too much—the weight of the parliament’s decision, the stylist’s leering smile, the list of rules folded in his pocket, the collar he had just dropped on the floor like an offering he was not ready to make. He knew what he had volunteered for. He had stood up in that chamber and spoken the words with full knowledge of what they meant. But watching it unfold—seeing it made real, made tangible in lace and leather and card stock, was a horror in its own right. The kind of horror that settled into your bones and whispered that you were no better than the monsters you had helped to overthrow.

The garage was dimly lit, smelling of concrete and exhaust. Finnick walked to one of the cars the Republic had provided him—a sleek black sedan, powerful and silent, the kind of vehicle that had once belonged to Capitol elite. He slid into the driver’s seat and sat for a moment with his hands on the wheel, his breathing shallow, his mind racing. Then he turned the key and pulled out into the night.

The city lights flashed past his windows in streaks of gold and silver and electric blue. Billboards towered overhead, advertising luxury goods and entertainment complexes, their bright faces beaming down at the empty streets. The Capitol had rebuilt itself quickly after the fall—too quickly, some said. The scars were still there if you knew where to look: the cracked facades, the empty lots where buildings had been razed, the occasional memorial wreath tied to a lamppost. But for the most part, the city glittered on, indifferent and eternal, as though the rebellion had been nothing more than a brief, unpleasant dream.

Finnick drove without direction, his hands guiding the wheel automatically while his thoughts churned. The flashing lights did nothing to ease the chaos in his head. If anything, they made it worse—each flicker and glow a reminder of the world he had chosen to live in, the world he had helped to build, the world that had just handed him a woman on a silver platter and called it justice.

He needed a drink.

The establishment he finally chose was one of the few reserved for government officials—a private club tucked away on an upper level, inaccessible to ordinary citizens. The doors were heavy and dark, manned by security officers who nodded in recognition as Finnick approached. Inside, the space opened up into something almost beautiful: a high ceiling hung with crystal chandeliers, walls panelled in warm wood, soft amber lighting that made everything look golden and safe. People laughed and talked in clusters around small tables, their voices blending together into a low, indistinct hum. The noise blurred at the edges, becoming something almost soothing—a white noise of human connection that Finnick could hide inside.

He made a beeline for the bar, a long polished stretch of mahogany manned by a bartender in a crisp white shirt. Finnick slid onto one of the leather stools and caught the bartender’s eye.

“Strongest thing you have,” he said. His voice came out rougher than he intended, scraped raw by something he couldn’t name.

The bartender raised an eyebrow but didn’t comment. He reached for a dark bottle on the top shelf—something amber and expensive, the label written in a language Finnick didn’t recognize and poured a generous measure into a crystal glass. Finnick took it, raised it to his lips and downed the entire thing in one long, burning swallow.

The liquid seared a path down his throat, settling into his stomach like a small, controlled fire. He set the glass down with a click and stared at it for a moment, waiting for the warmth to spread, for the sharp edges of his thoughts to soften. They didn’t. Not yet.

“Senator?” The voice came from his left, smooth and familiar in a way that made his spine stiffen. “Didn’t expect to see you here.”

Finnick turned his head slowly. The District 6 counsellor was sliding onto the stool beside him, his broad frame barely fitting into the space between the bar and the next seat. He was dressed in civilian clothes now—a dark jacket, an open collar, his face flushed with whatever he had been drinking before Finnick arrived. His smile was wide and genial, the smile of a man who believed he had won something important.

“I thought you’d be spending the night getting to know your whore better.” The counsellor’s voice lingered on the last word, turning it into something almost obscene. His eyes glittered with a mixture of envy and amusement. “Must be nice, having a Snow on a leash. The rest of us have to make do with memory.”

Finnick’s jaw tightened. He could feel the muscles in his neck corded with tension, could feel the urge to say something sharp rising in his throat like bile. But he swallowed it down. He had spent years learning to keep his composure in the face of men like this—men who smiled while they dug their thumbs into old wounds, men who mistook silence for weakness and politeness for permission. He would not lose control now. Not here. Not over this.

The bartender appeared again and Finnick gestured for another pour. The amber liquid filled his glass a second time and he downed it just as quickly as the first, feeling the burn layer itself on top of the previous warmth. His head was beginning to feel looser now, the thoughts inside it moving slower, like fish swimming through honey.

“Yes, well,” he said at last, his voice carefully neutral. He shrugged, a small, dismissive motion that he hoped conveyed indifference. “I have time.”

“Of course, Senator. Of course.” The counsellor raised his glass in a mock salute, the amber liquid catching the chandelier light and throwing small golden reflections across his face. He took a slow, deliberate sip, his eyes never leaving Finnick’s. “And make sure that one suffers. Properly, I mean. None of this soft-handed, lenient treatment I’ve been hearing about from some of the more sympathetic members of parliament.” He leaned in closer, his voice dropping to something almost confidential, as though he and Finnick were old friends sharing a private joke. “If I had it—that creature, that Snow bitch—I’d make sure it paid off its debts in one weekend. One long, hard, memorable weekend. By the time I was done with it, there wouldn’t be anything left but a husk.”

He laughed. It was a thick, ugly sound—the laugh of a man who had fantasized about this moment for years, who had lain awake at night imagining all the ways he could hurt someone smaller and weaker than himself and who now believed he had been given permission to make those fantasies real. The sound grated against Finnick’s ears like broken glass, setting his teeth on edge.

Finnick’s hand tightened around his glass. The crystal creaked softly under the pressure, a thin, warning sound. Another fraction of force and it would crack—would shatter in his grip, sending shards slicing into his palm, drawing blood that would mix with the whiskey and drip onto the polished bar. He wanted to let it break. He wanted to feel the sting, the pain, something physical to match the fury coiling in his chest. But he didn’t. He forced his fingers to relax, one by one, until the glass sat safely in his palm once more.

“I prefer to draw out suffering,” Finnick said. The words came from somewhere dark and hollow inside him—a place he didn’t like to visit, full of old angers and older griefs. He didn’t mean them. He wasn’t a sadistic person; he had never taken pleasure in the pain of others, had never understood the particular cruelty that seemed to come so easily to men like the counsellor beside him. But the war had changed him. The war had reached into his chest and rearranged his insides, leaving behind a stranger who looked like him and sounded like him but sometimes acted in ways he didn’t fully understand.

The violence had been the first sign. Small things, at first—a door slammed a little too hard, a glass thrown against a wall, a fist driven into a pillow until the feathers burst out like snow. Then bigger things. Shouting matches with people who didn’t deserve his anger. A broken nose in a bar fight he couldn’t remember starting. The way his hands would shake sometimes, not from fear, but from the effort of holding back, of not reaching out and grabbing and squeezing until something gave way. His psychiatrist—a soft-spoken woman with kind eyes and an endless supply of patience—had called it PTSD. A natural response to unnatural trauma. A brain trying to protect itself by staying alert, staying angry, staying ready for a threat that no longer existed.

But Finnick sometimes wondered if it was simpler than that. If all those years of smiling, all those years of spreading his legs for people he despised, all those years of choking down his rage and his disgust and his shame—if that anger had been pooling inside him like water behind a dam and the war had simply been the crack that let it start to leak out. Perhaps the psychiatrist was wrong. Perhaps it wasn’t the trauma making him violent. Perhaps he had always been this way, deep down and the trauma had simply scraped away the nice, polite veneer and revealed what had been there all along.

He didn’t like that thought. He tried not to dwell on it. But sometimes, late at night, it came to him unbidden, whispering in the dark.

“It makes sense why they gave it to you, given your history and… experiences.” The counsellor’s voice dripped with false sympathy, his head tilting to the side in a gesture of mock understanding. His eyes glittered with something that might have been curiosity or cruelty or both. “I mean, you understand the, ah, logistics of the situation better than most. The training. The conditioning. The—what did they used to call it? Ah yes. The breaking in.”

Finnick’s blood turned to ice. He knew exactly what this man was implying. He knew because he had lived it—had been forced into the same role the counsellor was now gleefully describing, sold to the highest bidder, passed from hand to hand like a piece of meat. President Snow had put him on a leash, both metaphorical and literal, parading him at parties, lending him out to favoured allies, using him as both a reward and a warning. There had been nights Finnick couldn’t remember, mornings he wished he could forget, hands that touched him without permission, mouths that whispered things he had tried desperately to bury. The collar around his throat hadn’t been soft blue leather with a silver tag—it had been cold metal, unyielding, a constant reminder that he owned nothing, not even himself.

The memories were ones he wanted to bury so deeply that no shovel could ever reach them. But they had a way of surfacing at times like this, rising up through the dark water of his consciousness like drowned things returning to the light.

“But I mean, look at it.” The counsellor shook his head slowly, his gaze turning speculative, almost dreamy. He wasn’t looking at Finnick anymore. He was looking somewhere else—somewhere in his own mind, where images of Y/n Snow danced behind his eyelids. “That body was made to be ravaged. You can just tell, can’t you? The way it moves. The way it stands. All that elegance and poise, just waiting to be stripped away.” He took another sip of his drink, his tongue darting out to wet his lower lip. “I wonder how it looks under all that pomp. Under all those fancy dresses and designer gowns. I bet it’s even better than we imagine. I bet—”

“Don’t.”

Finnick’s voice was quiet. So quiet that, for a moment, the counsellor didn’t seem to hear him. He kept talking, kept musing, his words growing more explicit, more graphic, as though the alcohol had loosened something in him that should have remained tightly bound.

Finnick set his glass down on the bar with a soft click. He turned on his stool, slowly, deliberately, until he was facing the counsellor fully. His sea-green eyes were flat and cold—not the warm, charming eyes he wore for the cameras, not the haunted, weary eyes he wore when he was alone. These were the eyes of someone who had killed before and would kill again if pushed far enough. The eyes of a survivor. The eyes of a man with very little left to lose.

“I said don’t,” Finnick repeated. His voice was still soft, still deceptively gentle, but there was steel beneath it now. “Don’t talk about her like that.”

The counsellor’s smile faltered. His mouth opened, then closed, then opened again, as though he were trying to find a response that wouldn’t make things worse. His eyes darted to the side, gauging the distance to the door, the number of witnesses, the likelihood of intervention. “Her?” he said at last, his voice light, almost playful, as though he were testing the waters. “Oh, we’re using pronouns now? I thought she was just—”

“I said don’t.”

Finnick turned on his stool fully now, squaring his shoulders, planting his feet on the brass rail that ran along the base of the bar. He didn’t stand. He didn’t need to. The weight of his presence was enough—the reputation that preceded him, the stories people whispered when they thought he couldn’t hear. Finnick Odair. The Capitol’s darling. Snow’s favourite. They say he’s killed more people than anyone in the rebellion. They say he’s not quite right in the head. They say you don’t want to be alone with him when he gets that look in his eyes.

The counsellor must have heard those stories too, because he swallowed, his Adam’s apple bobbing visibly in his thick neck. His smile had disappeared entirely now, replaced by something that looked almost like unease.

“You got what you wanted,” Finnick continued, his voice low and even, each word placed like a stone in a wall. “The vote passed. She’s in my custody, not yours. Whatever fantasies you’ve been entertaining—whatever you’ve been picturing when you close your eyes at night—you can put them away. All of them. They’re not going to happen.”

He paused, letting the silence stretch between them. The noise of the club seemed to fade, the laughter and conversation receding until all that remained was the space between two men and the weight of everything unsaid.

“You don’t get to touch her,” Finnick said. “You don’t get to look at her. You don’t get to talk about her. Do you understand me? She is not yours. She was never yours. And if I ever hear you speak about her like that again—if I ever hear your voice in the same sentence as her name—I will make you regret it.” His voice dropped even lower, barely above a whisper. “And believe me when I say that I know exactly how to make someone regret things. I learned from the best.”

The counsellor’s smile flickered, dimming at the edges like a candle caught in a draft. For a brief, fleeting moment, something ugly surfaced on his florid face—a flash of anger, perhaps, or the sting of humiliation. His eyes narrowed, his jaw tightened, and for an instant Finnick saw the man beneath the politician’s mask: someone petty and vengeful, someone who would remember this moment and nurse it like a grudge, someone who would look for opportunities to pay back the slight. But the counsellor was a politician first and foremost and politicians learned quickly how to swallow their true feelings, how to choke down the bile of wounded pride and smile through the bitter taste. The mask slid back into place with practiced ease.

He raised his hands in mock surrender, palms out, fingers spread, his expression shifting to something almost jovial. He leaned back on his stool, putting a few inches of distance between himself and Finnick, and let out a chuckle—a sound that filled the space around them but never quite reached his eyes. Those eyes remained cold, calculating, already cataloguing this encounter for future reference.

“Fair enough, Senator. Fair enough.” He signalled the bartender with a snap of his fingers—a gesture that made Finnick’s hackles rise and ordered another drink. The bartender poured quickly, efficiently, and the counsellor wrapped his thick fingers around the fresh glass, raising it in a small, sardonic toast. The amber liquid caught the light, throwing tiny golden pinpricks across his knuckles. “To your new ward, then. May she serve you well. May she suffer well. May she give you everything you need to keep those parliamentary reports satisfying.”

Finnick did not raise his glass. He did not acknowledge the toast. He simply stayed there, his body still, his gaze fixed on the polished surface of the bar. The amber liquid in his own cup caught the light of the chandeliers above, refracting into small pools of gold and honey that seemed to shift and dance with every subtle movement of his hand. The noise of the establishment washed over him in waves—the laughter, bright and brittle; the clinking of glasses, sharp as little bells; the low, indistinct murmur of conversations he was not part of, would never be part of, could not bring himself to care about. He felt very far away from all of it, as though he were watching himself from a great distance, through the wrong end of a telescope. There was a man at the bar, a man with sea-green eyes and copper hair, a man wearing an expensive suit and a carefully blank expression. But that man seemed like a stranger. That man seemed like someone Finnick had known once, a long time ago, and had since lost touch with.

“But don’t go easy on her.” The counsellor’s voice cut through the fog, sharp and insistent. He had leaned in again, his shoulder almost brushing Finnick’s, his breath sour with whiskey and something else—triumph, perhaps, or spite. “You still have to submit reports each month. The Oversight Committee will be watching. They’ll be reading every word, scrutinizing every detail. And if they decide you’re not making good use of her—if they think you’re being soft, being lenient, being anything less than what they expect—they’ll remove her from your custody.” He paused, letting the weight of the words settle. Then he smiled, slow and unpleasant, his teeth yellowed and uneven. “And of course, I always have a spot free in my kennel. Just in case. The offer stands, Senator. For whenever you tire of her. Or whenever they tire of you.”

He clapped Finnick on the back—a hard, patronizing smack between the shoulder blades that made Finnick’s entire body go rigid. Then he slid off his stool, straightened his jacket and walked away without another word, disappearing into the warm amber crowd like a shark slipping beneath dark water. Finnick watched him go, watched the other patrons part around his broad form, watched until the crowd swallowed him completely and there was nothing left to see.

Then he turned back to the bar and stared at his reflection in the dark wood.

He should go home. He knew he should go home. Y/n was still there, still kneeling on the floor where he had left her, still wearing that soft blue lace, still surrounded by briefcases full of collars and a golden cage and a list of rules she had to follow. She would be waiting. She had been trained to wait. She had probably been waiting her entire life—for permission to speak, for permission to move, for permission to exist in spaces that were not already occupied by someone more powerful than herself. The thought of her there, alone in his apartment, her knees probably aching against the hard floor, her arms probably trembling from the effort of holding the same posture for hours, made something twist inside his chest. Something that might have been guilt. Something that might have been pity. Something that might have been the ghost of an emotion he had tried very hard to not feel.

But then again, the thought of walking back into that apartment—of crossing the threshold and seeing the cage in the corner, the collars laid out on the coffee table, the woman kneeling in submission—made something else twist inside him. Something darker. Something he didn’t have a name for and didn’t want to find. The weight of it pressed against his ribs, made it hard to breathe, made his hands shake slightly as he reached for his glass.

So he stayed.

He ordered another drink. The bartender poured without comment, his face professionally neutral, his eyes carefully averted. Finnick wrapped his fingers around the fresh glass and lifted it to his lips, letting the liquid burn its way down his throat, welcoming the heat, the sting, the temporary numbness that spread through his limbs like slow poison. The club continued to hum around him—the laughter, the clinking glasses, the low murmur of people who had never worn a collar, never knelt on a cold floor, never been sold to strangers by a man in a white rose-scented suit. They laughed and talked and pretended the world made sense and Finnick sat among them like a ghost at a feast, unable to join in, unable to leave, simply there, taking up space, breathing air, existing.

But the counsellor’s words lingered in his head, burrowing into the soft tissue of his thoughts like parasites. If they decide you’re not making good use of her, they’ll remove her from your custody. I always have a spot free in my kennel. The threat was clear, almost naked in its transparency. If Finnick failed to perform—if he failed to hurt her, to use her, to make her suffer the way the parliament wanted—they would take her away and give her to someone else. Someone like the counsellor. Someone with hungry eyes and wandering hands and a kennel waiting in some dark corner of his estate. Someone who would not hesitate, who would not flinch, who would do all the things Finnick’s conscience screamed against.

She would be removed from his custody if he didn’t use her. If he didn’t hurt her the way they wanted.

The thought made him sick. His stomach churned, his throat tightened and for a moment he thought he might be sick right there at the bar, in front of all these laughing, talking, pretending people. The whiskey sat heavy in his gut, a leaden weight that seemed to grow heavier with each passing second. He set his glass down before he could drop it, before his trembling fingers could betray him.

But then—insidious, unwelcome, creeping in from the shadows of his mind—another voice spoke. Not the counsellor’s. Not the bartender’s. Something deeper, something older, something that had been born in the arena and raised in the Capitol’s pleasure houses. The twisted, war-bruised part of him that he tried so hard to ignore. The part that had learned to survive by any means necessary, that had learned to smile through pain, that had learned to hurt before being hurt.

Or perhaps it’s the alcohol, he thought, grasping for an excuse, for any explanation that wasn’t the truth. Just the alcohol. Just the whiskey talking. Just the exhaustion and the memories and the weight of everything pressing down.

But the voice persisted, soft and insidious, whispering in the dark corners of his consciousness. She has to suffer. The parliament demands it. The Oversight Committee will be watching. They’ll read your reports. They’ll check for marks, for evidence, for proof that you’re doing what they couldn’t do themselves. If you don’t give them what they want, they’ll take her away. And if they take her away—

He didn’t finish the thought. He didn’t need to.

Because he knew, with a certainty that sat like stone in his chest, that his hand would be much kinder than the others. Whatever he did to her—whatever the parliament demanded, whatever the reports required, whatever dark thing the counsellor expected—it would be gentler than what awaited her in that kennel. Finnick had been hurt. Finnick had been used. Finnick knew what it felt like to be held down by hands that didn’t care, to hear laughter while he bled, to wake up in strange rooms with no memory of how he had gotten there. He would not wish that on anyone. Not even a Snow.

So maybe, the voice whispered, maybe this is mercy. Maybe this is the kindest thing you can do for her. Take her. Use her. Hurt her just enough to satisfy them. And keep her safe from everyone else.

Finnick closed his eyes. The chandeliers blazed orange against his eyelids. The noise of the club faded to a dull roar. And somewhere, in the dark behind his eyes, he saw Y/n’s face—pale and trembling, her pale blue eyes fixed on his, her lips parted around words she hadn’t been allowed to speak.

He opened his eyes. Finished his drink. Set the glass down with a soft click.

╰ ┈➤ A/n: As for the references, some of ‘em were from handmaid’s tail and also the horrible treatment of Louis XVII after the French Revolution. And how he was given to a person who was named his guardian by the Committee of Public Safety.

╰ ┈➤ Masterlist

╰ ┈➤ Tags: @avantlilies @joekitsu @sarabelllah @lil-mex-child @themischievousher @iloveyou3000morgan @saoriixbjh @fnimln @gmiasa03 @foulkingtree-101 @doll-parts111 @aaaashiiii @theregoeskittykat @psamathegoesrawr @erisfayred @fgskna @ameliyaroseaster @blackpearlodair @yagiyoshikawa @teenagerunawayangel @aliteralprincess @oursizy @antobooh @readawaythereality2

© cheriecelestial - arabelle | 2026

“Jungkook, for the love of all that is holy, stop tugging at your collar,” Y/N murmured through a fixed, professional smile, her own words barely slipping past her lips. Without looking, her hand darted out to swat his away as he yanked at the stiff fabric for what felt like the hundredth time that evening. “I am not your personal stylist and I refuse to keep fixing that thing again and again.”

Jungkook’s jaw tightened as he fought the urge to roll his neck, the starched shirt feeling more like a straitjacket than formalwear. “I’m just not used to it, all right?” he grumbled, his voice low with barely concealed discomfort. “It’s stuffy, it’s suffocating and why, in this day and age, did I have to wear a fucking tie? It’s a medieval neck-noose.”

“If the decision had been left to him,” Eunwoo interjected smoothly, not even bothering to look at Jungkook as he adjusted the cuff of his own impeccably fitted sleeve, “he would have likely graced this black-tie event in one of his beloved oversized t-shirts or perhaps one of those... compression shirts he seems to so like. Very on-brand for a gala, very fashion-forward.” His tone was polite, almost pleasant but the snark dripped from each syllable like honey from a thorn.

“I cannot deal with this tonight,” Y/N exhaled, the sound a mix of exasperation and weary resignation as she smoothed the fabric of her elegant dress, a silent prayer for patience on her lips. This was one of the primary downsides of having her two idiot coworkers double as her best friends— they required constant, exhausting babysitting. In truth, Eunwoo was perfectly capable of handling himself with grace and wit, he was a master of social navigation. The problem was Jungkook, who seemed to operate with the sole purpose of provoking him, a chaotic force that necessitated her constant supervision lest their bickering escalate into a full-blown scene.

“I am going to go mingle and speak with the potential investors for the upcoming project. It is literally my job tonight. Behave yourselves. I mean it.” She shot them both a sharp, pointed glare that could have cut glass, waiting until she received Eunwoo’s subtle, acknowledging nod and Jungkook’s dramatically exaggerated raising of his hands in mock surrender before she turned on her heel and disappeared gracefully into the glittering crowd.

With a steadying breath, Y/N gracefully navigated through the clusters of conversation until her gaze landed on her first target of the evening: Kim Taeyeon. The woman stood near one of the marble pillars, a flute of champagne barely touched in her hand, her presence commanding despite her relatively petite frame. Dressed in a sleek navy-blue gown that spoke of sophistication and confidence of someone who knew her worth down to the last decimal. In her late thirties, she had already built an impressive portfolio that made her a legend in their industry—a name any company would kill to have associated with their brand. She was notoriously difficult, often described as standoffish by those who had the misfortune of approaching her unprepared. But Y/N had dealt with her before and more importantly, she had won. If she dared to boast, she might even say she was the only one in her entire department that the woman genuinely tolerated.

“Miss Kim. Good evening.” Y/N’s voice was warm but professional as she approached, careful not to startle the older woman.

Taeyeon turned, her expression settling into its usual stern mask, the kind that had made grown executives stammer through presentations. But then something shifted—the corners of her mouth softened, just slightly, curving into a small, knowing smile. “Y/N. Good evening. Tell me,” She said, her tone laced with dry amusement, “What scheme did your idiot boss send you to convince me of today?”

Y/N felt the corner of her own mouth twitch, both at the accurate assessment of her superior and at the rare moment of almost-teasing from Taeyeon. “It isn’t a scheme, Miss Kim. More so a project,” she corrected gently, her smile widening with genuine enthusiasm. “One I worked on myself, actually. From the ground up. And I genuinely think it’s something that would interest you.”

“Oh?” Taeyeon’s perfectly sculpted eyebrow arched upward, a mixture of curiosity and skepticism dancing in her sharp eyes. She was not a woman who wasted her time or her considerable fortune—on things that lacked substance or value. That was precisely why she cherry-picked her projects with meticulous care. Her stamp of approval was more than just a signature, it was a golden seal that made any project ten times more reliable, more desirable, more likely to succeed. Investors, small and big, followed her lead like ducklings after their mother, trusting her instincts implicitly.

With a deliberate motion, she glanced down at the delicate watch gracing her wrist, the diamonds on its face catching the chandelier light. “You have two minutes to pitch it to me,” she announced, her voice leaving no room for negotiation. Then her eyes lifted back to Y/N’s and there was something almost like encouragement hidden in their depths. “Do your best, Y/N.”

Y/N straightened her shoulders, feeling the weight of those words. Two minutes. One hundred and twenty seconds to convince one of the most formidable women in the industry that her project was worth not just investment, but the invaluable weight of the Taeyeon name. She took a quiet breath, organized her thoughts like neatly stacked papers and began speaking.

“Hmm. Interesting.” Taeyeon’s eyes lingered on Y/N for a moment longer when she was done, as if she were mentally filing away every word that had been spoken. Then, with a slight pursing of her lips and a single, decisive nod, she delivered her verdict. “Have the finer details sent to my personal assistant by Monday. I... will consider it.” And just like that, as smoothly as she had arrived in the conversation, she turned and glided away, disappearing into the crowd like a phantom in navy-blue silk.

The moment Taeyeon was safely out of sight, Y/N felt her carefully constructed composure crumble like a sandcastle meeting the tide. Her shoulders sagged almost imperceptibly and she released a breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. Goodness, she thought, pressing a hand briefly to her racing heart. That was stressful. That was absolutely, utterly, bone-meltingly stressful. She needed a moment. She needed air. She needed—

“Champagne?” a voice offered from her left, smooth as honey and warm as summer.

Without looking, without thinking, Y/N’s hand reached out and accepted the proffered flute, her fingers wrapping around the cool stem as she worked to collect herself. She brought the glass to her lips, ready to take a much-needed sip—

“You look very pretty tonight, Y/N.”

The words, spoken with a familiar, teasing lilt, snapped her out of her daze instantly. Y/N’s head whipped to the side, her eyes widening as they landed on the face attached to that voice. The champagne sloshed dangerously in its glass as her grip faltered for just a moment.

“Mingyu?” The name escaped her lips in a breathless rush, disbelief colouring every syllable. “No way. Long time no see.” A grin, genuine and giddy, spread across her face as she took in the familiar sharp jawline, the mischievous sparkle in his dark eyes, the way he stood with that effortless confidence that had always drawn her in. Without a second thought, she wrapped her free arm around him in a half-hug, the kind that was too familiar for mere acquaintances but too brief for something more. They pulled back and she found herself still smiling, memories of late-night study sessions and stolen moments flickering through her mind like an old film reel.

Mingyu had been a friend from college, one she’d shared a complicated, on-and-off something with that had never quite found its footing. Then internships had happened and jobs and life had swept them in different directions until they’d lost touch completely. She hadn’t expected to ever run into him again, let alone here, of all places.

“I didn’t know you were going to be here!” She exclaimed, genuine surprise in her voice. She had pored over the guest list at least three times before attending, memorizing names and faces, doing her due diligence. His name had definitely not been on it.

“Well,” Mingyu rubbed the back of his neck, a boyish gesture that hadn’t changed since their college days, “I wasn’t supposed to, initially. But my father asked me to substitute for him at the last minute.” He shrugged, as if attending high-profile galas in place of his father was just another Tuesday for him.

Ah. There it was. The reason his name hadn’t appeared on any list she’d studied. Mingyu came from new money—the kind that had been carefully cultivated over a couple of generations, invested in all the right places at all the right times and was now reaping benefits so massive they could barely be quantified. His family didn’t just attend events like this; they owned pieces of them.

Y/N almost lost track of time talking to him. The minutes fizzled away like bubbles in warm champagne as they fell back into their old rhythm, trading stories and laughing at inside jokes that had somehow remained fresh despite the years apart. Mingyu had always been easy to talk to, dangerously so—the kind of person who made you forget that the world existed beyond the small bubble of conversation you shared. He was recounting a particularly embarrassing story about their disastrous attempt at cooking together during finals week when his expression shifted almost imperceptibly.

“Hey, Y/N?” His voice dropped, the teasing lilt replaced by something more measured. “I don’t mean to intrude and correct me if I’m wrong, but...” he tilted his head subtly in a specific direction, “that guy over there has been staring at us for the past ten minutes. Like, not subtly. At all.”

Y/N followed the direction of his discreet gesture, her eyes scanning the crowd until they landed on a familiar face. Jungkook. He stood near one of the tall windows, a half-empty glass of something amber-coloured in his hand and his gaze was fixed on them with an intensity that made her pause. There was something in his eyes—a look she didn’t quite recognize, one she couldn’t remember ever seeing directed at her before. His jaw was tight, his posture coiled like a spring under too much pressure. He almost looked angry. No, not just angry. There was something else beneath the surface, something that bordered on dangerous and it sent a confusing flutter through her chest.

“Oh!” Y/N’s face brightened with realization, dismissing the strange tension that had momentarily gripped her. “Come on, let me introduce you to him. That’s Jungkook, one of my coworkers—well, one of my best friends, really. You’ll like him.” Without waiting for a response, she grabbed Mingyu’s hand, her fingers wrapping around his as she tugged him through the crowd, weaving between clusters of guests with ease.

“JK!” she called out as they approached, her smile wide and genuine. “I want to introduce you to someone.”

Jungkook’s eyes dropped to their joined hands for the briefest moment, something flickering across his features before settling into a carefully neutral expression. He acknowledged her with a slight tilt of his head but his gaze slid past Mingyu as if he weren’t there, offering no greeting, no nod of recognition. Just silence, heavy and pointed.

Undeterred—or perhaps oblivious—Y/N pressed on, gesturing enthusiastically toward her companion. “This is Kim Mingyu. He’s an old friend from college. We go way back.”

Before Y/N could say another word, Mingyu stepped forward with that charming grin she remembered so well, the one that had probably worked on countless people over the years. “Come on, Y/N. ‘Good friend’? You’re really underselling me here.” He chuckled and Y/N found herself rolling her eyes instinctively, her hand coming up to smack his shoulder in that familiar, affectionate way she’d done a hundred times before.

“Shut up,” she laughed but there was no real heat behind it.

It was in that exact moment that Eunwoo materialized behind them, seemingly out of thin air—because of course he did, because the universe clearly had a sense of humour tonight. His expression, usually so carefully composed and politely detached, hardened the instant his eyes landed on the stranger standing with such easy familiarity next to Y/N. His gaze flickered down to their still-intertwined fingers then back up to Mingyu’s face and something cold settled behind his eyes.

“You two seem close,” Eunwoo commented, his voice deceptively light, the kind of tone that sounded pleasant on the surface but carried something else underneath.

Y/N nodded, a smile still playing on her lips. “Well—”

“We are,” Mingyu cut in smoothly, effortlessly, his grin widening as he glanced down at Y/N with an expression that held just a little too much warmth, a little too much history. “At least, we used to be.” His eyes lingered on her for a beat too long before lifting to meet Eunwoo’s gaze, then Jungkook’s. “Though I wouldn’t really mind going back to it, if I’m being honest.”

The air around them seemed to thicken.

Jungkook’s jaw tightened visibly, the muscle jumping beneath his skin as he forced his lips into something approximating a smile. It didn’t reach his eyes. Not even close. Both he and Eunwoo knew—of course they knew. Y/N had spent countless late nights at the office, during post-work drinks, during those rare lazy weekends when they all crashed at someone’s apartment, spilling stories about her college years. They knew about the adventures. The misadventures. They knew about the boy she’d had an on-and-off thing with, the one who had made her laugh and made her cry in equal measure.

They knew exactly who Kim Mingyu was.

And neither of them, for entirely different reasons, was happy to see him standing here now, looking at Y/N like he had every right to step back into her life and pick up exactly where they’d left off. As if that wasn’t salt rubbed directly into an already stinging wound, the live band shifted their melody. The upbeat tempo that had filled the ballroom moments ago dissolved into something softer, more intimate—a classic waltz, the kind that demanded proximity and promised romance. Couples around them began to pair off, drifting toward the dance floor like leaves caught in a gentle current.

“Oh, Y/N, this is so our song!” Mingyu’s face lit up with boyish enthusiasm, his eyes sparkling with the memory of countless college nights that Jungkook and Eunwoo hadn’t been part of. Before Y/N could respond, before she could even process the implication of those words, his hand was around hers, pulling her toward the growing crowd of dancers.

Y/N stumbled forward a step, surprise flickering across her features but she didn’t refuse. She didn’t pull away. If anything, there was a softness in her expression, a nostalgic warmth that made Jungkook’s stomach turn. As Mingyu guided her onto the polished floor, she glanced back over her shoulder, her eyes finding Jungkook and Eunwoo where they stood frozen near the window. Her lips formed a quick, apologetic “sorry”—silent, hurried, sincere—before Mingyu spun her around and she disappeared into the sea of swaying couples.

Jungkook’s hands curled into fists at his sides, his knuckles whitening with the effort of restraint. The muscles in his arms tensed, coiled like springs and before he fully registered what he was doing, he took a step forward. Then another. His vision had narrowed to a single point: the back of Mingyu’s head, the way his hand rested on Y/N’s waist, the easy confidence in his posture as he led her across the floor. Jungkook didn’t know what he intended to do—march onto the dance floor and physically separate them? Challenge Mingyu to something stupid and primal? He didn’t care. The impulse was there, hot and urgent, demanding action.

“Jungkook.”

Eunwoo’s voice was low, controlled but it cut through the red haze like a blade. His hand shot up, palm flat against Jungkook’s chest, not pushing but blocking—a subtle, firm barrier. “This is not the place.” His words were measured, each one deliberate, carrying the weight of someone who understood exactly how much damage could be done in a single unguarded moment. “Look around you. Investors. Media. Your boss’s boss is standing twenty feet away. You make a scene now and you don’t just ruin your night—you ruin hers.”

Jungkook’s jaw clenched so tightly he thought his teeth might crack. His breath came in short, sharp bursts through his nose and for a long, agonizing moment, he didn’t move. Every fibre of his being screamed at him to ignore the warning, to give in to the fire licking at his insides. But Eunwoo was right. God, he hated when Eunwoo was right. Slowly, incrementally, he forced himself to still, though his hands remained balled into fists at his sides, trembling with suppressed energy.

On the dance floor, Mingyu and Y/N moved together like they’d been doing this their whole lives—which, Jungkook realized with sickening clarity, they probably had. Mingyu’s hand rested naturally on the small of her back, guiding her through turns with finesse. Y/N’s head was tilted back slightly, her smile bright and genuine as she laughed at something he whispered near her ear. Her dress swirled around her ankles with each spin and for a moment—just a moment—she looked carefree in a way Jungkook rarely saw her at work events. It was beautiful. It was devastating.

Jungkook watched and his gaze was like fire—all scorching heat and consuming intensity, burning with an emotion he couldn’t name and didn’t want to examine too closely. Every laugh that fell from Y/N’s lips was another log on the pyre. Every touch, every glance, every familiar ease between them stoked the flames higher.

Beside him, Eunwoo watched too. But where Jungkook burned, Eunwoo froze. His expression remained perfectly composed, almost serene, but his eyes—his eyes were something else entirely. They were pure icy coldness, the kind that could freeze a person solid from the inside out. He observed Mingyu with the detached focus of a predator studying prey, cataloguing every gesture, every smile, every perceived slight. His posture was immaculate, his breathing even but behind that placid facade, something dark and sharp was taking shape.

How dare someone like him just whisk away Y/N like she was his? The thought echoed in both their minds, though it manifested differently in each. For Jungkook, it was a roar of possessive fury, a primal need to reclaim what felt threatened. For Eunwoo, it was a cold, calculated assessment—a recognition of threat and a silent vow to neutralize it, preferably without getting his hands dirty. They stood there, fire and ice, watching the woman they both cared for spin gracefully in the arms of someone who had no right to hold her.

Y/N returned to where Jungkook and Eunwoo stood, this time alone. Mingyu had been pulled away mid-conversation by an urgent work call—something about a deal that couldn’t wait, accompanied by profuse apologies and a promise to find her again before the night ended. She watched him disappear into the crowd, his phone already pressed to his ear before making her way back through the crowd of guests toward her two friends.

The moment she was within a few feet of them, she could sense it. The air around them felt different—charged, heavy, thick with something unspoken that settled in her chest like a stone. Jungkook wouldn’t meet her eyes, his gaze fixed somewhere over her shoulder at a point that apparently required intense study. Eunwoo’s smile was in place, because it was always in place, but there was a tightness around his eyes that hadn’t been there before. Y/N noticed, because Y/N always noticed, but she made the conscious decision not to say anything. Not yet. Not here, surrounded by people who didn’t need to witness their private dynamics playing out like some poorly scripted drama.

The rest of the event continued as intended. Y/N threw herself back into work mode, approaching more investors with the practiced ease of someone who had learned to compartmentalize long ago. Eunwoo accompanied her for several of these conversations, his presence a steady anchor at her side, his contributions to discussions always perfectly timed and impeccably phrased. He kept the polite smile firmly in place while talking to potential partners, charming and disarming in equal measure. But the second they stepped away from a group, the moment it was just the two of them navigating between clusters of guests, that smile would drop—just slightly, just enough for her to notice if she was paying attention.

And she was always paying attention.

Meanwhile, Jungkook busied himself with networking, though “busied himself” was a generous way of putting it. He had been nagged into socializing by their superiors, ordered to make connections and charm potential collaborators. He moved through the crowd like a man fulfilling an obligation rather than engaging in an opportunity, his interactions brief and transactional. Every few minutes, Y/N’s eyes would drift toward him, hoping to catch his gaze, but he was always looking elsewhere. Always conveniently turned away. Always just out of reach.

At one point, between conversations, Y/N found herself alone with Eunwoo near the bar. She studied him for a moment, taking in the carefully neutral expression, the way his shoulders held just a fraction more tension than usual. Concern bubbled up inside her, warm and genuine and before she could overthink it, she reached out and touched his hand.

“Eunwoo,” she said softly, her voice barely audible over the ambient noise of the ballroom. “Is everything okay? Are you not feeling well?” Without waiting for an answer, she lifted her hand and pressed it gently to his forehead, the way she might check a child for fever. The gesture was instinctive, intimate, born of years of friendship and casual physical affection.

Eunwoo felt something shift inside him at her touch. The rage that had been simmering beneath his composed exterior began to quiet. Of course. Of course, no matter who came, no matter who tried to insert themselves into her life, his sweet girl still cared for him. Still worried about him. Still reached out to check on him first.

He captured her hand gently in his own, his long fingers wrapping around hers with a warmth that belied the coldness in his gaze just minutes ago. He gave her hand a reassuring squeeze, then released it. A small smile curved his lips—not the practiced, professional one he wore for investors, but something softer, more private. It still didn’t quite reach his eyes but it was real in its own way.

“We’ll discuss this when we get home, hm?” he said, his voice low and soothing, the kind of tone that had talked her down from countless panics over the years.

Y/N didn’t understand—not really, not fully—but she nodded anyway. She trusted him. She trusted both of them, even when they were being inexplicably strange and moody.

The hours crawled by. Jungkook didn’t speak to her for the rest of the event. Not once. Not even when they passed within feet of each other. It almost felt as though he was actively avoiding her, creating distance with every step and the realization stung more than Y/N wanted to admit. She caught glimpses of him across the room—talking to strangers, nodding along to conversations, his expression carefully blank but whenever she tried to approach, he was already moving in another direction.

Finally, Y/N made the executive decision that they were leaving early. She had accomplished what she needed to accomplish and more importantly, whatever was festering between the three of them needed to be addressed before it grew worse. She gathered Jungkook and Eunwoo with nothing more than a look, the kind of silent communication that developed between people who spent nearly all their time together and they made their excuses and slipped out into the night.

The car ride home was suffocating in its silence. No music played. No one spoke. Even the usual background hum of the engine seemed louder than usual, filling the void where conversation should have been. Y/N sat in the back seat, watching the city lights blur past the window and felt increasingly unnerved with every passing mile. Her mind raced through possibilities, trying to identify what she had done wrong, what had shifted, why Jungkook wouldn’t even look at her.

When they finally reached their floor—the three apartments on the same hallway, with Jungkook and Eunwoo sharing the larger unit next to Y/N’s smaller one—Jungkook punched in the door code with more force than necessary and stormed inside without a word. The door didn’t slam, but only because he caught it at the last second, a restraint that seemed to cost him physical effort.

Y/N moved to follow him instinctively, her feet carrying her toward the door but Eunwoo’s hand on her arm stopped her gently.

“I’ll deal with this,” he said, his voice calm and steady, the anchor in the storm of her anxiety. “Y/N, you go freshen up. Take your time. You can come by once you have.”

Y/N looked at him, searching his face for something—reassurance, answers, anything. What she found was Cha Eunwoo at his most characteristic: composed, controlled, utterly reliable. He really did have his way of reassuring people, she thought dimly. Even when everything felt wrong, his presence made her believe it might eventually be right again.

She nodded slowly, reluctantly, and turned toward her own door. Behind her, she heard Eunwoo slip into the apartment she had just been barred from and she was left alone in the hallway with nothing but questions and the echo of a night that had gone so strangely wrong.

Y/N didn’t take long to change. The moment she stepped out of the shower, her mind had been a storm of confusion and unease, each passing minute amplifying the questions that had no answers. She had dried her hair hastily, pulled on the softest pair of cotton shorts she owned and one of her oversized shirts, well in truth, one of Jungkook’s shirts that she stole. The grey one that had seen better days but felt like a warm hug and stood barefoot in front of their door, her heart hammering against her ribs like a caged bird desperate for escape. The rhythm seemed to accompany her spiralling thoughts, each beat echoing the what ifs and maybes that circled endlessly in her mind. She raised her hand to knock, hesitated, then forced herself to follow through before she could talk herself out of it.

The door swung open and Eunwoo stood before her.

He had changed out of his suit, now wearing simple grey sweatpants that hung comfortably on his lean frame and a plain white t-shirt that somehow, inexplicably, still looked effortlessly put-together. It was infuriating, really—the way he could emerge from a high-profile gala, deal with whatever emotional turmoil had transpired between him and Jungkook and still look like he had stepped out of a carefully curated editorial spread. Y/N was fairly certain he would look impeccable even if he were crawling out of a dumpster and the unfairness of that thought almost made her smile despite the tension coiling in her stomach. His expression was carefully neutral but there was a softness around his eyes that hadn’t been there before.

“Jungkook’s in the shower,” Eunwoo said quietly, his voice low and soothing as he leaned against the doorframe. His arms crossed loosely over his chest but there was nothing defensive in his posture. “To cool down. Figure out what he actually wants to say instead of whatever storming off was supposed to communicate.” He shrugged, a hint of something almost amused flickering across his features.

Y/N huffed a soft laugh despite herself, some of the tension in her shoulders easing at the familiar dynamic. Eunwoo stepped aside, gesturing for her to enter, and she moved past him with the easy familiarity of someone who had done this a hundred times—because she had. Their apartment was as much hers as her own at this point, her presence so frequent that she had her own designated spot on their couch, her preferred plain black mug in their cabinet and a drawer in their bathroom that had started with a spare toothbrush and somehow accumulated an entire collection of hair ties and skincare samples over the years.

She settled onto the couch without asking, tucking her feet beneath her as she reached for one of the throw blankets draped over the back and she pulled it into her lap more for something to hold onto than for actual warmth. Her fingers worried at a loose thread as she watched Eunwoo lower himself into the opposite corner, tucking one leg beneath him with the graceful ease that seemed to characterize his every movement.

“So,” she said, her voice carefully light, “Are you going to tell me what’s going on? Or am I supposed to guess?”

Eunwoo’s gaze met hers, his dark eyes studying her with an intensity that made her want to look away. When he finally spoke, his voice was measured, deliberate. “He is upset. We both were. Are.” He paused, choosing his words with the careful precision that was so distinctly him. “I won’t speak for him—he’ll tell you himself when he’s ready. But I think...” He trailed off, something flickering behind his dark eyes. “I think tonight forced us to confront things we’ve been very good at avoiding. Both of us.”

Y/N’s fingers stilled on the blanket. “What kind of things?”

Before Eunwoo could answer, the distant sound of water stopped running somewhere in the apartment. The sudden silence that followed was deafening, punctuated only by the faint hum of the refrigerator and the rapid beating of Y/N’s heart. Footsteps approached from the hallway—heavy, deliberate, each one seeming to echo in the charged air between them.

And then Jungkook appeared in the doorway.

His hair was still dripping, rivulets of water trailing down his neck and disappearing beneath the towel slung carelessly around his shoulders. He wore nothing but a pair of grey sweatpants that hung dangerously low on his hips, the waistband riding just above the sharp cut of his pelvic muscles and his torso was completely bare— glistening with residual moisture, every line of muscle defined under the soft glow of the apartment lighting.

Y/N had seen Jungkook shirtless before. Countless times, actually. It was impossible to avoid when she spent as much time at their place as she did, when they had movie marathons that stretched into early mornings and lazy weekends where dress codes simply didn’t exist. But somehow, tonight was different. Tonight, the sight of him like this made her stomach flutter in a way she didn’t quite understand—a confusing, traitorous flutter that she immediately tried to suppress.

Usually, his face would crack into that familiar, warm smile the moment he saw her. The one that crinkled the corners of his eyes and made him look younger, softer, like the boy she had grown so close to over the years. But tonight, his expression was anything but warm. It was carefully neutral—too neutral, the kind of deliberate blankness that suggested he was working very hard to keep something contained. And beneath that careful surface, Y/N could see it: anger simmering like lava beneath thin crust, threatening to burst through the cracks at any moment.

Y/N rose from the couch slowly, the blanket slipping from her lap and pooling on the floor unnoticed. She took a couple of steps toward him, closing the distance until she was only a few feet away, close enough to see the way his chest rose and fell with each breath, close enough to catch the faint scent of his body wash mingled with something uniquely him. She tilted her chin up slightly to meet his gaze, refusing to be intimidated by whatever was brewing behind those dark eyes.

“Okay,” she said, her voice steadier than she felt. “So, what is this about? What’s going on with you tonight?”

Jungkook’s eyes searched her face for a long moment, as if looking for something—answers, maybe or confirmation of some suspicion he’d been nursing all evening. When he finally spoke, his voice was rough, raw, stripped of all the playful banter and easy affection that usually coloured his words.

“Do you like that guy?”

The question hung in the air between them, simple and devastating. Y/N blinked, momentarily thrown by the directness of it. Of all the things she had expected him to say—accusations about her behavior, frustration about being abandoned at the gala, even anger about some work-related slight—this hadn’t even made the list.

“What guy?” she repeated, confused. “You mean Mingyu?”

Jungkook didn’t respond, didn’t nod, didn’t do anything to confirm or deny. He just stood there, watching her with those intense eyes, waiting.

Y/N shook her head slowly, her brow furrowing as she processed the question and everything it implied. “He’s... nice,” she said carefully, choosing her words with the same precision Eunwoo often used. “He’s nice and we have history, but he’s just an old friend. That’s all.” She paused, something shifting in her chest as she looked at Jungkook—really looked at him, at the tension in his shoulders and the vulnerability he was trying so hard to hide. “Honestly? I doubt I’ll even stay in touch with him after tonight. Whatever we had was a long time ago and it’s not...” She trailed off, then met his eyes directly. “I don’t care about him, Jungkook. Especially not if caring about him comes at the cost of upsetting you and Eunwoo. That’s not even a contest.”

The words were true. Painfully, achingly true.

Because for all the good things Mingyu was—charming, successful, familiar—there were the bad things too. The way he had let their connection fade without a real conversation, without closure. The way his attention had always felt conditional, dependent on her being at her best, looking her best, performing her best. Sure, he was passionate about certain things, but his passion had never extended to truly seeing her—not the way Jungkook and Eunwoo did.

They saw her. All of her.

They had seen her at her lowest—sick and feverish on her bathroom floor and Jungkook had carried her to bed while Eunwoo made soup and called in sick for her the next day. They had seen her at her worst—throwing a tantrum over a work project gone wrong, yelling and crying and being utterly irrational and they had just sat there and taken it, waiting patiently for the storm to pass before pulling her into a group hug that made her feel ridiculous and loved in equal measure.

They had seen her at her most vulnerable—the night her father was rushed to the hospital with chest pains and she had been too sick herself to drive there, too weak, too drained to do anything but slip to the floor and sob. Jungkook had driven her anyway, wrapping her in blankets and propping her against the passenger window, while Eunwoo had called the hospital every twenty minutes for updates because she couldn’t stop shaking long enough to dial. They had sat with her in that sterile waiting room for hours, taking turns holding her hand and fetching terrible vending machine coffee, never once complaining about the sleepless night or the missed work or the way she kept apologizing until Jungkook finally told her to shut up because that’s what friends were for. And then the late-night confessions about her fears, her insecurities, the parts of herself she tried to hide from the world and they had never once made her feel like she needed to be anything other than exactly who she was.

They didn’t mind when she showed up at their door at 2 AM because she couldn’t sleep. They didn’t mind when she ate the last of the snacks without asking. They didn’t mind when she rambled about nothing for hours or when she needed silence for days. Their care for her was genuine, unconditional, woven into the fabric of their daily lives so deeply that she sometimes forgot what life had been like before them.

And she cared for them the same way. More than she cared for anyone else, if she was being honest with herself. More than she had ever cared for Mingyu, or any of the other people who had drifted in and out of her life over the years. They weren’t just friends, they were family, in every sense of the word—the family she had chosen, the family that had chosen her back, the family that made her believe she was worthy of love exactly as she was.

The realization settled over her like a warm blanket as she stood there, looking at Jungkook’s tense face, feeling Eunwoo’s presence behind her on the couch. These were her people. These were the ones who mattered.

Jungkook was silent for a long, suspended moment, his dark eyes searching hers as if weighing every word she had just spoken. The air between them grew thicker, charged with something unnameable. Then, slowly, his eyelids fluttered closed—just for a second, just long enough for Y/N to notice the way his jaw tightened, the way his chest rose with a deep, steadying breath. When his eyes opened again, there was a sense of finality settling over his features, a decision made, a line crossed in his mind that there would be no coming back from.

And then he moved.

He closed the gap between them in a single stride, his damp body radiating heat despite the water still cooling on his skin. His hands came up to cup her face with a tenderness that seemed almost at odds with the intensity burning in his gaze—large palms cradling her cheeks, fingers threading into the hair at her temples, thumbs brushing softly against her cheekbones. Y/N froze, her breath catching in her throat, surprise washing over her in waves so powerful she thought she might drown in it.

And then it happened.

Jungkook crashed his lips onto hers.

It wasn’t gentle. It wasn’t tentative or questioning or any of the things a first kiss between friends might reasonably be expected to be. It was messy and hungry and desperate, a collision more than a kiss, as if he had been holding himself back by a thread and that thread had finally snapped. His mouth moved against hers with a ferocity that stole her breath, letting every single bit of frustration and desire and longing he had been holding back for God knows how long pour into the space where they connected. It felt like he wanted to devour her, to consume her, to pour years of unspoken feelings into a single moment because he simply couldn’t hold them anymore.

Y/N’s hands flew up on instinct, her fingers curling around his forearms where they framed her face. She wasn’t pushing him away—she couldn’t, didn’t want to—but she needed something to hold onto, something to anchor herself in the storm of sensation overwhelming her senses. His lips were warm and insistent, the slight roughness of his skin contrasting with the softness of his mouth and she couldn’t keep up with his pace, couldn’t think, couldn’t breathe, her mind growing cloudier and more dazed with every passing second. The world narrowed to just this— Jungkook’s hands on her face, Jungkook’s lips on hers, Jungkook’s body so close she could feel his heart pounding against her chest.

When he finally broke the kiss, they were both panting, breathless, their foreheads pressing together as they gasped for air. Y/N could feel the water still dripping from his damp hair, cool droplets landing on her heated skin, contrasting with the warmth of his breath fanning across her face. Neither of them spoke. There were no words adequate for what had just happened, for the shift that had occurred in the space of a single kiss.

“You have no idea,” Jungkook whispered, his voice rough and raw, so quiet she almost missed it, “how hard it is.” He pulled back just enough to meet her eyes and the vulnerability there made her chest ache. “How hard it’s been. Watching you. Wanting you. Not being able to do anything about it.” His thumb traced the curve of her cheekbone, a gesture so tender it made her heart stutter. “Let us take care of you, Y/N. Please. Let us show you what you deserve.”

“Jungkook, I—” she started, her voice coming out shaky and uncertain, the words tangled somewhere in her throat.

Before she could finish, she felt it—a warm hand hooking gently under her chin, guiding her face away from Jungkook’s. Her gaze shifted and there was Eunwoo, standing so close she hadn’t even heard him approach. His dark eyes were soft but serious, studying her with that familiar intensity that always made her feel like she was the only person in the world worth looking at. His hand remained beneath her chin, light but present, a grounding point in the chaos of her swirling thoughts.

“You can tell us to stop,” Eunwoo said quietly, his voice smooth as velvet and just as soothing. “Right now. And we’ll forget this ever happened. We’ll go back to how things were and we’ll never mention it again. No pressure, no expectations, no awkwardness.” He paused, his thumb brushing once across her jaw before stilling. “But you have to tell us, Y/N. Because if you don’t, if you want this too, then we’re not going to hold back anymore.”

Y/N’s eyes flitted between them, her heart racing so fast she thought it might burst from her chest. Jungkook, still close enough that she could feel his breath on her skin, his expression open and vulnerable in a way she had never seen before. Eunwoo, calm and steady as always, but with something burning beneath the surface that matched the fire in Jungkook’s gaze. Both of them watching her, waiting for her, giving her the choice they had clearly been sitting on for longer than she wanted to consider.

“But—” Her voice faltered and she swallowed hard, trying to find the words for the question burning in her mind. Her gaze moved from Jungkook to Eunwoo and back again, silently asking what she couldn’t quite voice. How? When? Both of you?

Jungkook must have seen the confusion in her eyes, because something shifted in his expression—tension easing, a small smile cracking through the intensity like sunlight through storm clouds. It was the first real smile she had seen from him all night and it made her heart flip.

“You don’t have to choose, baby,” he said softly, the endearment rolling off his tongue so naturally it made her breath catch. “We have no problem sharing. Me and Eunwoo came to that agreement ages ago.” He glanced at Eunwoo, something passing between them—years of friendship, of understanding, of conversations Y/N had never been privy to. “We both want you. All of you. And we’re both okay with that. But only if you are.”

Eunwoo’s hand slid from her chin to cup her cheek, mirroring Jungkook’s earlier gesture and suddenly she was bracketed by them—surrounded by warmth and wanting and the impossible, overwhelming reality that her two best friends had just confessed to wanting her. Together.

“So,” Eunwoo murmured, his voice low and intimate, “what’s it going to be, Y/N?”

Y/N’s mind was a battlefield.

On one side, years of carefully constructed boundaries—the ones that kept her friendships safe, that prevented her from reading too much into lingering glances or casual touches, that maintained the delicate balance of three people who had somehow become each other’s entire world. On the other side, a truth so obvious now that it felt almost absurd she had missed it: the way Jungkook always found excuses to touch her, the way Eunwoo’s eyes followed her across every room, the way they both showed up without being asked, without expecting anything in return, simply because she needed them.

The kiss still burned on her lips. Jungkook’s taste, his desperation, his years of restraint finally shattering against her mouth. And now Eunwoo’s hand on her cheek, warm and steady, waiting for her answer with the patience of someone who had already waited forever and could wait a little longer if he had to.

But she didn’t want them to wait.

“I want it too.”

The words hung in the air for a single, suspended heartbeat.

And then the world exploded into motion.

It wasn’t even a second, barely a breath, before Jungkook moved. His arms wrapped around her with the kind of desperate impatient strength and suddenly her feet were leaving the ground, her body being lifted as if she weighed nothing at all. She barely had time to gasp before he was carrying her, his damp skin pressed against her through the thin fabric of her oversized grey shirt. The hallway blurred past in a rush of shadows and doorframes and then they were in Eunwoo’s bedroom—she recognized it instinctively, the faint scent of his cologne lingering in the air, the neatly made bed that was such a contrast to Jungkook’s perpetual chaos.

Jungkook threw her onto the bed.

Y/N let out an undignified squeak as her back hit the mattress, the soft comforter cushioning her fall as she bounced once before settling into the sheets. Her hair fanned out around her, her heart hammering so hard she could feel it in her throat and she pushed herself up onto her elbows just in time to watch them.

Jungkook reached for the towel still slung around his neck and tossed it aside as if it meant nothing—as if the only thing that mattered was getting closer to her, removing anything that might possibly stand between them. Water still dripped from his hair and his eyes were dark with an intensity that made her stomach flip.

Eunwoo moved differently. Where Jungkook was all fire and urgency, Eunwoo was calm water—steady, deliberate, controlled. He approached the bed with the same careful grace he brought to everything, his eyes never leaving hers as he sat on the edge of the mattress. One hand reached out, long fingers tracing the line of her jaw with a tenderness that made her breath catch. He followed the curve from her chin to her ear, then back again, as if memorizing the shape of her, as if she was something precious and fragile and worth savouring.

Then he leaned in and kissed her.

And oh, it was different. So different from Jungkook’s desperate, hungry collision. Eunwoo’s kiss was soft and gentle, a slow exploration rather than a claiming. His lips moved against hers with a sweetness that made her heart ache, as if he was holding back—as if he was scared, somehow, that she might break if he let himself go completely. One hand cradled her face while the other braced against the bed and he kissed her like she was something sacred, something to be worshipped rather than consumed.

Behind her, she felt the mattress dip.

Jungkook’s arm snaked around her waist from behind, his chest pressing against her back as he settled into the space she created. His lips found her neck, that sensitive spot just below her ear that she hadn’t even known was sensitive until this very moment and ghosted across her skin with a lightness that made her shiver. He wasn’t kissing so much as breathing against her, his warm breath raising goosebumps along her throat while his arm tightened around her middle, pulling her closer, holding her steady.

Eunwoo continued to envelop her in his sweet kiss, his thumb stroking her cheek as he tilted her head slightly to deepen the connection. She was surrounded—Jungkook’s warmth at her back, his lips tracing a path of fire along her neck, his arm a band of security around her waist. Eunwoo’s gentleness at her front, his kiss a promise, his hand a reassurance. Between them, she felt wanted in a way she had never experienced before—not torn or divided, but complete. Whole. Like she had finally found the place she was always meant to be.

When Eunwoo finally pulled back, just barely, his forehead rested against hers, his breath mingling with hers in the small space between them. Behind her, Jungkook’s lips stilled against her neck, waiting, listening.

“Still okay?” Eunwoo whispered, his voice rough in a way she had never heard before—controlled, yes, but barely. The restraint was costing him. They were both holding back, she realized. For her.

Y/N smiled, small and real and certain, and reached up to touch his face.

“More than okay,” she breathed. “Don’t hold back. Not anymore.”

Something shifted in Eunwoo’s eyes at her words—a dam breaking, a decision made. And when he kissed her again, it wasn’t gentle anymore.

Jungkook’s mouth latched onto her neck with a hunger that bordered on desperate, his lips and teeth working in tandem to leave a trail of purple-red bruises across the sensitive skin where her neck met her shoulder. Each mark was a claim, a visible reminder that she was theirs now—no more dancing around feelings, no more pretending. His breath was hot against her skin, his tongue soothing over the tender spots before his mouth found another patch of untouched skin to mark. She could feel the slight scrape of his teeth, the way he sucked just hard enough to make her gasp and the sensation sent sparks cascading down her spine.

At the same time, Eunwoo’s hands began their own exploration, slipping beneath the hem of her shirt with a deliberate slowness that made her stomach clench in anticipation. His fingers were cool against her heated skin as they inched upward, tracing the curve of her ribs, the dip of her waist, mapping the landscape of her body with the same careful attention he gave to everything else. When his fingers brushed the underside of her breast, he paused for just a moment—a question, a confirmation—and something that might have been surprise flickered across his features when he realized she wasn’t wearing anything underneath.

She had changed in a hurry, grabbing the first soft things she could find and it hadn’t even occurred to her to put on a bra. Not for them. Not when she was so comfortable around them. It was the kind of casual intimacy that had defined their friendship for years—the ability to show up in sweatpants and oversized shirts, to raid their fridge at midnight, to sprawl across their couch without caring how she looked. She had never thought twice about it.

His hand cupped her breast fully then, his palm warm against her skin, his fingers spreading to encompass the soft weight of her. He gave a tentative squeeze, testing, learning and Y/N felt her nipple hardening into a peak that pressed insistently against his palm. The sensation was electric, her body responding before her mind could catch up and she found herself arching into his hand without meaning to. A soft moan escaped her lips, swallowed almost immediately by Eunwoo’s kiss and she felt rather than heard the low sound of satisfaction that rumbled in his chest.

“My turn.”

Jungkook’s voice was rough, edged with an impatience he had been holding back for far too long. His hand caught her chin, tilting her face away from Eunwoo’s mouth and toward his own with a gentle but undeniable authority. Before she could catch her breath, his lips were on hers—not the desperate crash from before, but something deeper, more deliberate. He kissed her like he had all the time in the world now that he knew she was staying, but there was still that undercurrent of hunger, that barely restrained need that made her head spin.

One of his hands found the hem of her shirt and in one smooth motion, he pulled it over her head and tossed it aside. The cool air of the bedroom hit her bare chest all at once, a sharp contrast to the heat of their bodies surrounding her and she shivered but not from cold, but from the sudden exposure, from the way both their eyes dropped to take her in. She was laid bare before them, no barriers left and the weight of their gaze made her feel vulnerable yet oddly safe.

Eunwoo’s hands found their new home on the newly exposed flesh of her chest, his palms settling over her breasts with a reverence that made her breath catch. His thumbs brushed across her nipples once, twice, watching her face with that keen gaze he always wore—except now there was something darker beneath it, something hungry and possessive that she had never seen before. He was cataloguing her reactions, learning what made her gasp, what made her moan, what made her fingers curl into fists in the sheets.

Jungkook captured her mouth again as Eunwoo leaned down and she felt the wet heat of his lips close around one nipple at the same moment Jungkook’s tongue swept against hers. Her back arched off the mattress instinctively, a broken sound tearing from her throat only to be swallowed by Jungkook’s kiss. Her hands flew up, fingers threading into Eunwoo’s dark hair, not pulling him away and not pulling him closer—just holding on, anchoring herself against the overwhelming tide of sensation threatening to sweep her away.

Eunwoo worked her with devastating precision, his mouth hot and insistent as he sucked gently, then harder, his tongue swirling around the tightened peak before he tugged with his lips. His fingers found her other nipple, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger in a rhythm that matched the movement of his mouth. He was watching her the entire time, his dark eyes fixed on her face, drinking in every flutter of her lashes, every bitten-off gasp, every involuntary arch of her body toward him.

She tried to speak—to say something, anything, his name or Jungkook’s or a warning that she was already so close to falling apart but Jungkook’s lips swallowed every sound, his tongue tangling with hers, his kiss growing deeper, more consuming. She was drowning in them, in the heat of their bodies bracketing her, in the relentless attention of Eunwoo’s mouth and fingers, in the way Jungkook held her face like she was something precious while his kiss stole what little remained of her composure.

She squirmed between them, her thighs pressing together in search of friction that wasn’t there. The sensations were too much—his mouth on her breast, his fingers on her other nipple, his lips claiming her mouth, his hands cradling her face. Every nerve ending in her body seemed to be on fire and she was caught in the middle of it, held between them, nowhere to go and nowhere she wanted to be except right here.

“Please,” she managed to gasp against Jungkook’s lips, though she wasn’t entirely sure what she was asking for. More. Less. Everything. Something. “Please—”

Jungkook’s fingers found the waistband of her shorts, toying with the elastic edge in a way that was both teasing and deliberate. His touch was featherlight at first, just the barest brush of his fingertips against the soft skin of her stomach, before his hand began to wander lower, inch by agonizing inch. The sensation was maddening, a slow burn that had her breath catching in her throat and her thoughts scattering like leaves in the wind.

Y/N broke the kiss with a gasp, her chest heaving as she struggled to recover the breath that had been stolen from her lungs. Her lips were swollen, tingling, still buzzing from the intensity of feeling his mouth on hers. She tilted her head back slightly, her eyes finding Jungkook’s over her shoulder and the look she gave him was almost pleading, wide-eyed and wanting and just a little bit overwhelmed, as if she was silently begging him for something she couldn’t quite put into words.

Jungkook took the opportunity without hesitation.

His fingers slipped past the barrier of her shorts, sliding beneath the fabric with a confidence that made her stomach flip. His hand moved slowly, deliberately, inching toward her inner thigh with the kind of patience that felt almost cruel. The pads of his fingers were slightly rough against her sensitive skin, calloused from years of guitar strings and gym equipment and the contrast made her shiver.

Then he swiped a single finger over her underwear and his smirk was audible even before she saw it.

“Fuck Y/N,” he murmured, his voice low and rough against her ear. “You’re absolutely drenched.”

Heat flooded her cheeks, a wave of embarrassment and arousal mingling so completely that she couldn’t tell where one ended and the other began. She could feel the evidence of her desire soaked through the thin fabric, could feel how wet she was even through the barrier of her underwear and the knowledge that Jungkook could feel it too made her want to bury her face in the pillow.

He hummed thoughtfully, considering his options. Part of him wanted to tease her—to draw this out, to watch her squirm and beg, to make her wait until she was practically sobbing with need. The thought was tempting, the idea of unravelling her slowly, piece by piece. But tonight, something else burned hotter in his chest. Impatience. Hunger. Years of wanting finally unleashed and he didn’t have the restraint to hold back any longer.

So, without warning, without giving her time to prepare, he dipped a finger into her slick folds.

Y/N’s breath hitched, a sharp gasp escaping her lips as he slid inside her with shocking ease. Her body welcomed him instinctively, her walls clenching around the sudden intrusion as pleasure sparked along her nerves like fireworks. But before she could adjust, before she could even process the sensation, Jungkook added another finger—pushing deeper, stretching her, filling her in a way that made her see stars behind her eyelids.

As if that wasn’t already too much, as if two fingers buried inside her while her two best friends loomed on either side wasn’t already threatening to undo her completely, Y/N’s body reacted on pure instinct. She tried to squirm away, to escape the overwhelming intensity of it all, her hips bucking against the mattress as she attempted to create some distance between herself and the source of all that pleasure.

But Jungkook held her close.

His arm tightened around her waist like a steel band, keeping her exactly where he wanted her. His fingers curled inside her, pressing against a spot that made her vision go white and his voice was low and dark when he spoke.

“You asked for it, sweetheart,” he said, and there was no teasing in his tone now—just certainty, just possession, just the unshakable truth of the moment. “So take it, hmm?”

Y/N whimpered in response, a desperate, broken sound that seemed to come from somewhere deep in her chest. Her mouth opened, whether to protest or plead she couldn’t say, but before any words could form, Eunwoo’s lips were on hers again—swallowing her sounds, consuming her whimpers, kissing her with a fervor that matched the chaos happening below her waist.

The kiss was all-consuming, his tongue sliding against hers in a rhythm that made her forget how to think. But even as he distracted her mouth, her body remained acutely aware of everything Jungkook was doing. His fingers pushed deeper into her heat, sliding in until his knuckles pressed against her entrance, filling her completely. He moved slowly at first, deliberately, watching her reactions with an intensity that bordered on obsessive—studying every twitch of her brow, every flutter of her lashes, every sharp intake of breath.

He wanted to learn her.

Every tilt of his fingers that made her gasp. Every change in pressure that made her arch her back. Every angle that made her nails dig into Eunwoo’s shoulders and her hips roll desperately against his hand. He was filing away the information like a scientist observing a particularly fascinating experiment. What made her tick. What made her twitch. What made her throw her head back against his shoulder and moan into Eunwoo’s mouth, her whole body trembling on the edge of something she wasn’t sure she was ready to fall into.

And somewhere in the back of his mind, Jungkook made a silent vow: before this night was over, he was going to learn exactly what made her scream his name.

Eunwoo broke the kiss just long enough to look down at her—flushed and panting and utterly wrecked beneath them both—and something dark and satisfied flickered across his usually composed features.

“Good girl,” he murmured, his thumb brushing across her swollen bottom lip. “Just like that. Let us take care of you.”

She could feel it building inside her—a slow, insistent coil forming deep in her lower belly, winding tighter and tighter with every relentless thrust of Jungkook’s fingers. The knot of pleasure grew more urgent with each passing second, each curl of his digits pressing against that spot inside her that made her see white behind her closed eyelids. Eunwoo’s mouth found her neck, lips and teeth and tongue working in tandem against the sensitive skin just below her ear and the combination was almost too much. The world narrowed to nothing but sensation—the stretch of Jungkook’s fingers, the heat of Eunwoo’s mouth, the weight of their bodies bracketing hers and the two men who had decided, finally and irrevocably, to claim her as theirs.

“I—I think I’m gonna—” Y/N mumbled, the words slurring together as her thoughts dissolved into static. She could barely form the sentence, could barely remember how language worked when every nerve in her body was singing with approaching release. She could feel Jungkook’s grin against her shoulder, could feel the way his fingers sped up slightly, intentionally pushing her closer to the edge.

And then, just like that, he withdrew.

The sudden emptiness was almost painful—a shocking absence where seconds ago there had been overwhelming fullness. Y/N’s hips bucked backward instinctively, chasing his hand, desperate for the contact that had been stolen from her. Her eyes fluttered open, unfocused and dazed and she let out a confused sound.

“Huh? Wha—?” she whispered, her voice small and lost, her body still trembling on the edge of a cliff she hadn’t been allowed to fall from.

Jungkook laughed—a low, dark sound that rumbled through his chest and sent a fresh wave of heat flooding through her. He brought his fingers to his lips, deliberately, making sure she was watching as he sucked them clean, tasting her with an obscene slowness that made her blush deepen to crimson.

“C’mon Y/N,” he said, his voice dripping with mock innocence, “you didn’t think the first time I’m going to make you cum is on my fingers, did you?”

Y/N felt the blush creep up from her chest to her neck to her cheeks, setting her entire face ablaze with embarrassment and something else—something hotter, something that made her thighs press together in search of friction he had denied her. She opened her mouth to respond, to protest, to say something, but no words came. What could she possibly say to that?

Jungkook’s gaze lifted, finding Eunwoo’s across the trembling curve of her spine. Their eyes met and something passed between them—an entire conversation conducted in a single glance, the kind of wordless understanding that came from years of friendship, of partnership, of wanting the same thing and finally having permission to reach for it together. It was as if they communicated telepathically, and in that instant, they both understood exactly what this meant. What came next.

Jungkook’s hands settled on her waist, firm and unyielding, while Eunwoo backed away—not far, just enough to give them space, just enough to watch. Y/N turned her head, looking at him wordlessly, her eyes wide and questioning. What are you doing? she seemed to ask. Where are you going?

But Eunwoo didn’t answer. He simply smiled, that enigmatic, knowing smile that had always made her heart skip, and settled himself at the head of the bed where he could see everything.

In response to her unspoken question, Jungkook grabbed her.

The movement was swift and sure—his hands on her hips, manoeuvring her body like she weighed nothing at all. Before she could process what was happening, she was on all fours, positioned like a common cat, her knees sinking into the soft comforter and her palms flat against the sheets. Y/n squealed at the suddenness, a startled sound that was half protest and half something else entirely, but the protest died on her lips as she quickly realized where this was going.

Her heart hammered against her ribs, anticipation and nervousness tangling in her chest until she could barely breathe.

Eunwoo shifted forward, reaching out to hook his finger under her chin. He tilted her face up, forcing her to meet his eyes, but he didn’t speak to her. Instead, he looked past her, over her shoulder, his gaze finding Jungkook’s. And then he smiled—not the kind, gentle smile she had seen a thousand times, but something else entirely. Something devious. Something almost wicked.

“Careful with her,” Eunwoo said, his voice smooth as a blade and just as dangerous. The smile looked so out of place on his face—Eunwoo, who had always been the kind one, the sweet one, the graceful one who held doors open and remembered her coffee order and never raised his voice. Looking at him now, with that dark glint in his eyes and that crooked smirk on his lips, he didn’t look any less than the devil himself. “We don’t want to break her on our first go, yeah?”

Jungkook rolled his eyes so dramatically that it was almost comical, though there was nothing playful in the way his hands gripped her thighs, pushing them apart to make room for himself between them. He settled into the space he had created, the heat of him pressing against the back of her thighs, close enough that she could feel his breath on her skin.

“Yeah, yeah,” he muttered, waving a dismissive hand in Eunwoo’s direction without looking away from her. “You ain’t gotta give me the talk now of all times. Look at her.” His voice softened, dropped to something low and sensuous as he reached out to trace a single finger down her spine, following the delicate ridges of bone beneath her skin. He whisked her hair to the side, pushing it over one shoulder so that the long line of her neck was exposed, so that nothing blocked his view. She shivered at his touch, a full-body tremor that started at her scalp and ended at her toes and a soft, involuntary hum escaped her lips. “She’s such a big girl. You can take it, can’t you, baby?”

The word “baby” rolled off his tongue like honey, warm and sweet and possessive and Y/N felt it settle somewhere deep in her chest.

“He asked you a question, didn’t he?” Eunwoo’s voice cut through the haze, sharp and expectant. He tilted his head, that same devious sparkle still dancing in his dark eyes, but his tone had shifted—now it carried the weight of authority, of expectation, as if he was scolding a disobedient pet who had forgotten its training. The shift sent a jolt through her, something between fear and arousal that made her stomach flip.

Y/N nodded, her throat dry, her voice caught somewhere beneath her racing heart. She swallowed hard and tried again, forcing the words past her lips.

“Yes,” she said, and her voice came out steadier than she expected, though still thick with need. “Yes, I can take it.” The words came to her like second nature, as if her body had always known what to say even when her mind was spinning.

Eunwoo smiled—slow, satisfied and thoroughly pleased with himself. The expression transformed his usually gentle features into something sharper, more predatory and yet Y/N found herself unable to look away. He reached down and pulled his sweatpants down in one fluid motion, revealing his length with an unselfconscious confidence that made her mouth go dry. His hand wrapped around himself, stroking slowly at first, then with more purpose, pumping a couple of times as he watched her through half-lidded eyes. The muscles in his forearm flexed with each movement and Y/N found herself transfixed, her lips parting instinctively even before he brought himself closer.

He held himself to her lips, the tip brushing against them in a teasing tap—once, twice, three times—smearing the glistening bead of precum across her lower lip like a promise. The taste of him was salty and faintly sweet, unfamiliar but not unpleasant and it made something deep in her belly clench with anticipation.

“Open,” Eunwoo said simply.

The word was quiet, almost gentle, but it carried an unmistakable weight of command. Y/N’s lips parted without hesitation, her jaw going slack as she obeyed. It wasn’t her first time doing this—she had been here before, had knelt for others, had learned the mechanics and the rhythms and the tricks of the trade. But this whole situation, with both of them surrounding her, watching her, wanting her, had made her mind so hazy that she could barely remember her own name, let alone the muscle memory of how to do this properly.

Eunwoo slid himself into her mouth and a low hiss of satisfaction escaped his lips—a sharp intake of breath that spoke of months, maybe years, of imagining this exact moment. Y/N slacked her jaw further, trying desperately to accommodate him, to take all of him into her mouth, but there was only so much her throat would allow. Her eyes watered as he pushed deeper, her tongue flattening against the underside of his length and saliva began to dribble down her chin—warm and messy and utterly obscene. Eunwoo’s hands curled into her hair, not pulling but holding, anchoring himself to her as she worked to take as much of him as she could.

Behind her, Jungkook shifted.

“My turn,” he said, the words directed at no one in particular—perhaps Eunwoo, perhaps Y/N, perhaps the universe at large. His voice was rough, strained, barely containing the hunger that was simmering just beneath his skin. She felt him move into position behind her, felt the heat of him against the backs of her thighs, felt the broad head of his length nudging against her slick, aching core.

And then he pushed himself in.

Y/N almost screamed.

The sound was muffled by Eunwoo’s length still filling her mouth, but the vibrations travelled up his shaft and made him hiss sharply through his teeth. His hand tightened in her hair, not painfully but firmly and he patted her cheek with his free hand—a gentle, almost soothing gesture that contrasted wildly with the circumstances.

“Easy, sweetheart,” Eunwoo murmured, his voice strained but still controlled. “Easy.”

But there was nothing easy about this.

Jungkook was huge in his own right—thick and long and stretching her in ways that made her spots dance behind her closed eyelids. But it wasn’t just him. It was both of them at the same time, filling every possible space, overwhelming every sense until she felt like she might possibly be out of her depth. She had said she could take it. She had meant it when she said it. But now, with Jungkook buried inside her to the hilt and Eunwoo’s length pressing against the back of her throat, she wasn’t so sure anymore.

Her pussy stretched around him, walls fluttering and clenching as they tried desperately to accommodate his impressive length and girth. She was dripping onto him—she could feel it, the wet evidence of her arousal soaking into his skin, easing his passage even as her body struggled to adjust. But Jungkook definitely wasn’t making things easier. He was thick, impossibly thick and every inch of him felt like a challenge she wasn’t sure she could meet.

Y/N looked up at Eunwoo, her mouth still full of him, but the message in her eyes was unmistakable: Help. Please. I’m drowning.

Eunwoo let out a chuckle—a genuine, surprised sound at how utterly ridiculous the situation had become. Here they were, the three of them, tangled together in a way none of them had ever imagined and Y/N was looking at him like a deer caught in headlights while his best friend was buried inside her. The absurdity of it all was almost too much.

“Jungkook,” Eunwoo said, his voice carrying that particular tone of measured calm he used when mediating disputes at work, “you might want to go easier on her. She’s, uh... having difficulties.”

“Difficulties?” Jungkook’s voice was strained, almost incredulous. “And I’m the one here who feels like my circulation is gonna be cut off by how fucking tight she is!” He shrugged behind her, the movement shifting his length inside her and making her gasp around Eunwoo. “You try fitting into something that fucking small and see how easy it is!”

Y/N’s eyes flashed. Even with her mouth full, even with her mind spinning, she clearly looked like she had a retort to that. Eunwoo, reading her expression, withdrew his length with a wet, obscene sound—a string of saliva still connecting her swollen lower lip to the tip of him, stretching and glistening in the low light before finally breaking.

The moment she was free, Y/N whipped her head around to glare at Jungkook over her shoulder.

“Had you prepped me better, this wouldn’t be happening!” she shot back, her voice hoarse but fierce, her chest heaving with exertion and indignation.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” Jungkook snapped back, his hips giving an involuntary thrust that made her gasp and her fingers dig into the comforter. “God forbid a guy wants the girl he loves to cum on his dick instead of his fingers! What a terrible crime! Someone call the police!”

“I swear to fucking God—”

“And are you two seriously fighting?” Eunwoo interrupted, his voice laced with disbelief. He shook his head slowly, his shoulders beginning to shake with barely suppressed laughter. “Are you both genuinely, actually fighting? Right now? In the middle of sex?”

The question hung in the air and both Y/N and Jungkook fell silent. Y/N felt the heat rise to her cheeks, a wave of embarrassment washing over her as she realized how absurd they must look—her, naked and on all fours, Jungkook buried inside her, both of them bickering like children over who had caused what inconvenience. Jungkook’s ears had turned a telltale shade of pink and he was suddenly very interested in studying a spot on the wall.

Neither of them said a thing.

Eunwoo’s laughter subsided into a warm, affectionate smile and he reached down to brush a strand of hair from Y/N’s flushed face. His thumb traced her cheekbone, gentle despite everything, and something in his eyes softened.

“Now,” he said quietly, “shall we try this again? Without the arguing?”

Y/N looked up at him, her heart swelling with something that felt dangerously like love. She held his gaze for a moment, then let her lips part—slowly, deliberately, invitingly. She tilted her chin up and opened her mouth, a silent offer, a wordless plea.

Eunwoo’s smile widened and he took the invitation.

Finally, after what felt like an eternity of aching anticipation and careful adjustment, Y/N was able to take Jungkook fully. The initial stretch had been almost overwhelming—a burning pressure that had her gasping against Eunwoo’s skin but gradually, inch by agonizing inch, her body had yielded, learning to accommodate him in a way that felt less like invasion and more like completion. And then he started moving.

The first few thrusts were slow, deliberate, almost experimental, Jungkook testing her limits, learning the rhythm of her body just as he had mapped out the inside of her with his fingers. But then one of his hands slid from her hip, trailing around her waist until it pressed flat against her lower abdomen. His palm was warm and firm as he pushed down on a particular spot and suddenly Y/N understood why he had chosen to map her insides out first. Because now, with his hand applying pressure from the outside and his cock stroking against that same spot from within, he could feel himself hitting that perfect angle again and again. Every single thrust brushed against that bundle of nerves, sending jolts of electricity racing up her spine and making stars burst behind her closed eyelids.

Her mouth fell open in a silent scream, but Eunwoo was there to fill it.

He didn’t let up either. If anything, his pace intensified, his hands tangled in her hair as he used her mouth relentlessly, pushing deeper with every thrust of his hips. She could feel him at the back of her throat, could feel her body’s instinctive resistance and the conscious effort it took to relax, to open herself further, to let him in. He forced her throat to relax so she could take more of him and she obeyed because what else could she do? She was pinned between them—Jungkook behind her, driving into her heat and Eunwoo before her, filling her mouth until she could barely breathe.

She choked around his length, her throat bulging visibly as he thrust deeper and the sensation was so overwhelming that tears pricked at the corners of her eyes. But even as her body protested, even as her gag reflex triggered and her lungs burned for air, she didn’t pull away. She couldn’t. Every instinct screamed at her to keep going, to take whatever they gave her, to prove that she could handle this.

Jungkook and Eunwoo synchronized without a word—an unspoken rhythm that seemed almost choreographed, as if they had rehearsed this moment a hundred times in their minds. When Jungkook thrust forward, Eunwoo pulled back. When Jungkook withdrew, Eunwoo pushed deeper. They moved like two halves of a single entity, perfectly in tune and Y/N was caught in the middle of their harmony, a willing instrument played by two masters.

She could feel herself drawing closer to the edge, the coil in her belly tightening with every passing second. Her hips bucked involuntarily, desperate for more friction, more pressure, more of whatever it was that Jungkook was doing that made her feel like she was about to shatter into a million pieces. The only sounds that escaped her were choked gurgles and the wet, obscene squelching of their bodies moving together—no words, no coherent thoughts, just pure, animalistic sensation.

Some distant part of her brain, the part that hadn’t been completely drowned in pleasure, registered how embarrassing this might look. Her hair was a mess, tears streaked her cheeks, drool escaped from the corners of her lips where she couldn’t quite close her mouth around Eunwoo’s length. She was a wreck, completely undone and anyone walking in would see nothing but a woman being thoroughly and utterly claimed by two men who had no intention of letting her go.

But she didn’t have the time or the energy to care about how it looked. All that mattered was how it felt.

“You’re doing so well for us, darling,” Eunwoo muttered, his voice strained and breathless as he tapped her cheek gently—a surprisingly tender gesture given the circumstances. His pace slowed slightly, his hips stuttering as he pushed deeper, and the change in rhythm told her everything she needed to know. He was close. His release was building, his control slipping and even in her dazed state, she felt a surge of pride that she had brought him to this point. “That’s it. Just a little more.”

“I know, right?” Jungkook’s voice came from behind her, rough and gravelly with exertion. He punctuated every word with a thrust, slamming into her with a force that made her entire body jerk forward, pushing her further onto Eunwoo. “Look at how wet she is. Soaking my cock like it’s what she’s made for. Such a good little slut.”

The word should have stung. It should have made her recoil, should have triggered some defensive, indignant response. But instead, it washed over her like gasoline on a fire, igniting something dark and hungry that she hadn’t known existed. She whimpered around Eunwoo’s length, a desperate, needy sound that was swallowed by his skin, and her hips pushed back against Jungkook’s thrusts, meeting him with equal force.

Y/N’s mind was too dizzy to form a response, too clouded with pleasure to summon anything more than the most basic instincts. Her eyes fluttered shut, her lashes wet with tears, and she stopped fighting—stopped thinking, stopped worrying, stopped being anything other than a vessel for sensation. She could feel her own orgasm nearing, could feel it building like a wave rising higher and higher, preparing to crash over her and sweep her away.

She was so close. So close she could taste it.

And the two men who held her between them, who moved in perfect synchronization, who had claimed her body and her mind and her very soul in a single night—they knew it too. They could feel it in the way her walls clenched around Jungkook, in the way her throat relaxed around Eunwoo, in the way she surrendered completely to whatever they wanted to give her.

“Go on,” Eunwoo murmured, his voice a dark promise. “Let go for us, Y/N. We’ve got you.”

Jungkook’s hand pressed harder against her abdomen, and she saw white.

Eunwoo followed in suit, his composure finally cracking as he reached his peak. His hands tightened in her hair—not painfully, but with a desperate kind of grip that spoke of restraint barely maintained. A low groan rumbled from deep in his chest as he spilled himself deep in the cavern of her throat, the particular taste of him flooding her senses—salty and slightly bitter, warm ropes of release shooting down her throat in thick, pulsing waves. It was intimate in a way she hadn’t anticipated, the vulnerability of this act, the way he held himself above her with shaking arms and hooded eyes, watching himself disappear between her lips.

Y/n choked at the volume, her throat struggling to accommodate the sudden influx, tears prickling at the corners of her eyes from the effort. But she didn’t pull away. She didn’t stop. Instead, she swallowed—once, twice, three times—trying her hardest to take every last bit, to not waste a single drop of what he had given her. Her throat worked around him as she swallowed and the sensation pulled another shudder from Eunwoo’s body, his head dropping as he rode out the last tremors of his release.

When he finally pulled back, his chest was heaving, his hair now dishevelled and falling across his forehead and there was something raw and unguarded in his expression that she had never seen before. He looked almost shaken, as if the intensity of what had just happened had caught even him off guard.

Jungkook was next.

His hips pressed flush against hers, the skin of his thighs slapping softly against the backs of her legs as he buried himself as deep as he could go. She felt him everywhere—the stretch of him, the heat of him, the way his tip kissed her cervix with every thrust, sending sparks of pleasure-pain shooting up her spine. When he finally came, it was with a guttural sound that was almost a growl, his fingers digging into her hips hard enough to leave bruises as he spilled every last drop inside her.

He didn’t pull out immediately. Instead, he rocked against her slowly, lazily, coaxing out the last few drops, milking every second of contact before he finally withdrew. The absence of him left her feeling empty, strangely hollow, but that sensation was quickly replaced by something else entirely as he patted her sensitive, weeping folds with the flat of his palm.

She twitched with every pat, her body oversensitive and raw, each gentle impact sending jolts of electricity through her overstimulated nerves. Jungkook watched with fascination as she flinched and shivered beneath his hand, a grin spreading across his flushed face.

Then his gaze drifted lower, and something shifted in his expression—wonder, disbelief, a kind of primal satisfaction that made his eyes darken. There, just below her navel, was the faintest bulge in her stomach. A small, rounded swell from being so full of his cum, so thoroughly claimed and filled that her body had no choice but to show evidence of it. The slightest bit dribbled out from between her folds, pearly white against her flushed skin and Jungkook let out a bark of laughter that was half disbelief and half pure, masculine pride.

“Fuck,” he breathed, his voice rough and awestruck. He reached out to flick her swollen clit almost absently, making her twitch and gasp, a fresh wave of sensitivity washing through her. “It’s like my birthday came early.”

Eunwoo shook his head, a small chuckle escaping him despite his own spent state. He reached out to brush a strand of hair from Y/n’s sweat-dampened forehead, his touch impossibly gentle compared to everything that had just transpired. “Wouldn’t she be the perfect present?” he murmured, his voice soft with something that might have been affection, might have been wonder, might have been the beginning of something neither of them had a name for yet.

Y/n didn’t reply.

She couldn’t.

Not even a weak huff escaped her lips. Her tongue felt too heavy in her mouth, weighted down by exhaustion and the lingering taste of Eunwoo’s release. Her voice somewhere lost in the haze of pleasure that still clouded her thoughts. She lay there, limp and trembling, her body humming with the aftershocks of everything they had done to her.

And yet.

She didn’t know being used so thoroughly could feel so good. She had slept with people before—casual things, fleeting things, relationships that had started with promise and ended with indifference. But it had never been quite like this. Never quite so euphoric, so consuming, so completely and utterly transcendent. There was something about the way they handled her—not gently, not reverently, but with a kind of desperate hunger that made her feel wanted in a way she had never experienced. They didn’t treat her like something fragile to be protected. They treated her like something precious, yes, but also something strong enough to take everything they had to give.

And God, she wanted to give them everything in return.

“Let get a taste of her,” Eunwoo said, his voice casual despite the weight of the words. It wasn’t a request. It was a statement of intent, a simple declaration of what he wanted next.

Jungkook nodded without hesitation, already moving. His hands found her shoulders, gripping firmly as he pulled her back, rearranging her limp body like she weighed nothing at all. At the same time, Eunwoo grabbed her thighs, his long fingers wrapping around the soft flesh and pulling her toward him with an ease that made her head spin. The both of them manhandled her like it meant nothing at all—like she was theirs to position, theirs to move, theirs to use however they saw fit.

And honestly?

Y/n didn’t mind even a bit.

In fact, as she felt Eunwoo’s breath ghost over her inner thigh, as she watched Jungkook settle beside her with that satisfied smirk still playing on his lips, she found herself smiling—a small, secret, exhausted smile that spoke of surrender and satisfaction in equal measure.

She was exactly where she was supposed to be.

Jungkook tilted her head with a gentle but firm hand, angling her face toward his before capturing her mouth in a slow, lazy kiss. Unlike the desperate, hungry collision from earlier, this one was almost tender—his lips moving against hers with a languid rhythm, as if they had all the time in the world and he intended to use every second of it. His tongue brushed against her lower lip, coaxing her mouth open and she let him in without resistance, too dazed and overwhelmed to do anything but surrender.

Below her waist, Eunwoo buried his tongue between her swollen folds.

The sensation was electric, a jolt of white-hot pleasure that shot straight up her spine and made her entire body jerk. She was already sensitive—achingly, almost painfully so—still trembling from the edge Jungkook had pushed her to and then cruelly pulled her back from. Every flick of Eunwoo’s tongue against her oversensitive flesh sent sparks dancing behind her closed eyelids and her body twitched uncontrollably with each pass, caught somewhere between too much and not enough.

Jungkook broke the kiss just long enough to smirk, his lips brushing against hers as he spoke. “I can still taste you on her tongue,” he commented, his voice low and satisfied, as if he was sharing a particularly delicious secret. The words sent a fresh wave of heat flooding through Y/N’s cheeks, the implication sinking in—he could taste Eunwoo on her, could still feel the ghost of him on his own lips from the kiss they had just shared. The intimacy of it, the circular nature of what they were doing to her, made her head spin.

Eunwoo huffed a laugh against her pussy, the warm burst of air ghosting over her clit in a way that made her whole body convulse. A high-pitched whine escaped her throat, desperate and broken, and her fingers curled into the sheets beneath her, knuckles going white with the effort of holding herself together.

“Come on, baby,” Jungkook teased, his fingers still carding through her hair, his touch soothing even as his words pushed her closer to the edge. “You can give Eunwoo one more, right? You know you want to.”

Eunwoo’s eyes flicked up to watch her from between her thighs, his tongue moving languidly over her clit in slow, deliberate circles. He wasn’t rushing—he didn’t need to. He seemed content to draw this out, to unravel her piece by agonizing piece. His dark gaze held hers, watching every expression that flitted across her face, memorising every gasp and moan and whimper like precious artifacts he wanted to remember forever.

“ ‘S too much,” Y/N whined, her voice barely recognizable as her own. She could feel herself trembling, could feel the overwhelming pressure building again despite her protests. “I can’t. I can’t.”

But even as she said it, she didn’t try to stop him. Her hips rocked slightly, instinctively seeking more of his mouth, betraying her words with the language of her body. She wanted this—wanted it more than she could articulate—even as her oversensitive nerves screamed that it was too much, too intense, too everything.

“Can’t,” Eunwoo repeated, pulling his mouth away just long enough to speak, his lips glistening and his voice almost playful. There was a teasing lilt to his words, a knowing smile curving his mouth that made her want to both kiss him and smack him. “Or won’t?”

Y/N whined again, a frustrated, needy sound that seemed to come from somewhere deep in her chest. “Can’t,” she insisted, though even she could hear how unconvincing she sounded.

Jungkook’s hand moved from her hair to her cheek, his palm warm against her flushed skin, his thumb brushing away a tear she hadn’t even realized had fallen. His expression was soft, almost tender, in stark contrast to the dark intensity burning behind his eyes. He cooed softly, the sound meant to soothe even as his other hand pressed her hips down, holding her in place for Eunwoo’s relentless mouth.

“Aww, it’s okay, baby,” he murmured, his voice dripping with false sympathy, the kind that knew exactly how worked up she was and was enjoying every second of it. “I’m sure you can manage one more. You’ve been so good for us so far. Don’t you want to be good?”

Y/n let out a sound that quickly dissolved into an incoherent string of curses and whimpers as Eunwoo’s tongue resumed its work, faster now, more insistent. The pleasure built and built, a wave gathering strength somewhere deep in her belly and despite being so spent—despite feeling like she had nothing left to give—she could feel another orgasm taking shape. The coil wound tight once more, threatening to snap and she knew, with a certainty that settled in her bones, that she wasn’t going to last much longer.

Her hips bucked against Eunwoo’s face, no longer trying to escape but chasing the sensation instead, every shred of dignity abandoned in favour of the pleasure he was giving her. Her moans filled the room, loud and unrestrained, and she stopped caring about who might hear, stopped caring about anything except the two men who had taken her apart and were now putting her back together in a shape she barely recognized.

“Please,” she gasped, though she wasn’t sure what she was asking for. More. Less. To stop. To never stop. “Please, please, please—”

The word dissolved into a scream as the wave finally crashed over her and she shattered beneath them both, fragments of herself scattered across the sheets like stars across a midnight sky.

Eunwoo lapped up every last drop with an unhurried reverence. His tongue moved in slow, deliberate strokes, cleaning her skin with a tenderness that belied the intensity of what had just passed between them. When he finally sat back up, Jungkook’s arms remained wrapped firmly around her, holding her upright against his chest as if she might dissolve into nothing without his support. Her body was still trembling faintly, aftershocks of pleasure rippling through her muscles like the last echoes of a thunderstorm.

Then Eunwoo leaned in and planted his mouth on hers.

The kiss was deep and searching, his tongue sliding against hers in a rhythm that felt both familiar and entirely new. It took her a dazed moment to realize what he was doing—sharing her own taste with her, letting her sample the evidence of her release. The flavour bloomed across her tongue: salty and slightly acidic, with an undercurrent of something earthier, more intimate. It should have embarrassed her. It should have made her want to hide her face. Instead, it made her feel claimed in a way she hadn’t known she craved, marked and owned and utterly seen.

When Eunwoo finally pulled back, his lips brushed against hers with every word, his breath warm and sweet despite what he had just tasted.

“All we need,” he murmured against her mouth, his voice low and certain, “is just the three of us.”

Y/N felt her lips curve upward before she could stop them, a slow smile spreading across her face like sunrise after a long night. The words settled into her chest, warm and heavy and true, and she realized with a start that she believed them completely. She didn’t need anyone else. She didn’t want anyone else. Whatever this was—whatever they were building together—it was enough. More than enough.

“Damn straight,” Jungkook said from behind her, his voice rough and immediate, lacking Eunwoo’s poetic restraint but carrying just as much conviction. Before she could respond, he had tilted her chin with one finger and stolen a quick kiss of his own—messy, hungry, over almost before it began. He tasted like her too, she realized dimly and the thought made her head spin.

The three of them sat there for a moment, tangled together in Eunwoo’s bed with the sheets twisted beneath them and their heartbeats slowly returning to normal. Y/N looked between them, her gaze traveling from Jungkook’s dark, satisfied eyes to Eunwoo’s soft, knowing smile and back again. Something bubbled up in her chest, light and fizzy and almost giddy, and before she could stop it, a coy little giggle escaped her lips.

“So,” she said, her voice still slightly hoarse, her smile turning mischievous, “I thought it was supposed to be the three of us. But technically, that was two on one.” She raised an eyebrow, letting the implication hang in the air. “Bit of a numbers imbalance, don’t you think?”

Jungkook looked at her for a long moment, processing her words. Then he shrugged, his expression shifting into something almost playful as he turned to meet Eunwoo’s gaze. “Why not?” he said simply, as if the idea had been sitting there all along, waiting for someone to say it out loud.

Eunwoo gave a small nod of agreement—barely a dip of his chin, but unmistakable. His dark eyes held Jungkook’s for a moment longer than necessary, something passing between them that Y/N couldn’t quite name. Understanding, maybe. Permission. Or perhaps just the quiet acknowledgment of two people who had loved each other in their own way for years and were finally allowing themselves to explore what that might mean.

Then Jungkook reached out, one hand cupping Eunwoo’s face with a gentleness that seemed almost out of place given everything that had just happened. His thumb traced along Eunwoo’s cheekbone once, twice, as if memorizing the shape of him and then he leaned in and kissed him.

Y/N watched, her breath catching in her throat.

There was something almost hypnotic about the sight—Jungkook’s intensity meeting Eunwoo’s restraint, fire and ice colliding in a kiss that was exploratory and tender and surprisingly sweet. Jungkook’s hand slid from Eunwoo’s face to the back of his neck, fingers threading through dark hair, while Eunwoo’s hand came up to rest on Jungkook’s chest, not pushing him away but not pulling him closer either just feeling. Just being.

A strange giddiness bubbled up inside her, warm and effervescent, as she watched her two best friends kiss for the first time. Somehow, impossibly, nothing had changed and everything had changed all at once. The three of them were still the same people who had laughed over takeout and bickered about movie choices and fallen asleep on each other’s couches a hundred times before. But now there was this too—this new layer, this deeper connection, this thing that she hadn’t known she needed until it was already hers.

Most people were lucky to have the people they loved and their best friends be the same person. Most people spent their lives searching for that kind of alignment, that perfect intersection of romance and friendship and trust. And here she was, not with one, but with two—two men who knew her better than anyone, who had seen her at her worst and stayed anyway, who had decided that she was worth the risk of changing everything.

When they finally broke the kiss, both of them looking slightly dazed in a way that made her heart swell, Y/n threw her arms around both of them as best she could. The embrace was awkward and lopsided and absolutely perfect—her left arm hooked around Eunwoo’s neck, her right draped across Jungkook’s shoulders, pulling them both close until they were a tangled knot of limbs and warmth and something that felt dangerously close to forever.

“I love both of you so much,” she said, the words muffled against Jungkook’s shoulder but no less sincere for it. “I love you. Both of you. I don’t... I can’t even...” She trailed off, laughing softly at her own inability to articulate what she was feeling. But she didn’t need to finish. They understood.

Jungkook pressed a kiss to the top of her head, his arm tightening around her waist. Eunwoo’s hand found hers, their fingers interlacing like they had done it a thousand times before.

“We love you too, Y/n,” Eunwoo said quietly, his voice carrying the weight of years of unspoken feelings finally given voice. “We both do. We have for a long time.”

“Too long,” Jungkook added with a soft huff of laughter. “Way too long. We’re idiots, honestly. Both of us.”

Y/n laughed, the sound bright and genuine, and pulled them both closer. “Yeah,” she agreed, pressing her face into the warmth of them. “But you’re my idiots.”

╰ ┈➤ A/n 2.0: Also no hate to Mingyu. I love him and seventeen. I just needed a guy THE jungkook and cha eunwoo could get jealous of 😭😭

╰ ┈➤ Masterlist

© cheriecelestial - arabelle | 2026

Katniss, practical and weary of the Capitol’s lingering shadows, had chosen to retire to the familiar shores of District 12, to the woods and the quiet life she had always longed for. Finnick, however, had decided to stay. It wasn’t only duty that kept him here, though that was part of it. There were other reasons—more personal, more complicated—that anchored him to this glittering, haunted city. But in the end, it was his choice. He had volunteered for this life. And he would see it through.

“That’s all for today, Susan,” he said, leaning back in his chair and rubbing the bridge of his nose. His voice was calm but there was a thread of weariness beneath it. His secretary looked up from her notes and gave him a small, knowing nod before gathering her things and slipping out of the room. Unlike most days, work had ended early. Not that it made the day any less tiring; the fatigue clung to his bones like salt spray to skin. But at least the evening stretched before him now, dark and open.

His car was already waiting outside the government building, engine humming softly in the cool Capitol air. He slid into the back seat and let his head rest against the window as the city blurred past in streaks of neon and shadow. He watched the lights flicker—advertisements, streetlamps, the glowing spires of buildings that had once belonged to the decadent and the cruel. He hated the Capitol. He had always hated it, even as a boy, even when he had been paraded through its streets as a victor, smiling for cameras that devoured his pain like candy. Back then, he used to return to District 4 whenever he could—to the salt breeze, the wooden piers, the honest, unpolished lives of the fishermen and their families. But as the years passed, those visits grew fewer, then rarer still. The sea began to feel distant, like something from a half-remembered dream. Now, the Capitol was all that remained of his waking life.

The car pulled up outside his building—a towering structure of glass and polished stone, elegant in the way old money often is. He stepped out into the cool night air and walked into the lobby, where the staff greeted him with practiced smiles and murmured welcomes. He returned them with a small, polite smile of his own—a reflex, nothing more—before stepping into the lift. The doors slid shut and he watched the numbers climb in silence. When the lift dinged open, he stepped into a long, narrow hallway, its floor covered in dark marble that reflected the soft glow of wall sconces. At the far end stood the only door: a grand, imposing thing of rich mahogany, polished to a mirror-like shine. The apartment had once belonged to a Capitol noble—a wealthy sympathizer of the old regime, someone who had turned a blind eye to the Games while hosting lavish parties on the upper levels of the city. Now, it belonged to Finnick. A trophy of a different kind. Not the first one he had been given anyway.

The lock clicked open with a soft electronic chime as Finnick pressed his thumb to the sensor. For a moment, he hesitated, his palm still resting against the cool metal of the doorframe. Then he pushed the door inward and stepped across the threshold into the quiet darkness of his home. The silence wrapped around him like a second skin—thick, immediate and deeply unusual. No soft steps padding toward him. No gentle murmur of greeting. Just the low hum of the city filtering through the reinforced windows and the distant whisper of the ventilation system. Without a word, he dropped his bag by the coat stand and kicked off his shoes, sighing audibly as his bare feet met the smooth, cool floor.

He stood still for a long moment, letting his eyes adjust to the dimness. The apartment stretched out before him in shades of grey and shadow. The quiet was almost oppressive—heavy in a way that felt wrong, like a room holding its breath. He could hear his own heartbeat settling into a slower rhythm, could feel the tension in his shoulders beginning to unspool. But still, something was off. Something was missing.

He walked toward the living room, his footsteps muffled by the plush carpet. The only sources of light were a single distant hallway lamp, its glow weak and amber and the cold flickering of the Capitol’s night skyline pressing against the floor-to-ceiling windows. The city sprawled endlessly beyond the glass—a constellation of ambition and excess, beautiful and rotten all at once. Finnick paid it no mind. His attention was drawn instead to the far corner of the room, where a familiar shape waited in the half-darkness.

A cage.

It was a large one, ornate and unsettling in its beauty. The bars were gilded in gold that caught the faint light and threw it back in soft, fractured gleams. Inside, a thick mattress lay on the floor, a little over half the length of a standard human bed. Along the inner walls, were arranged a small collection of plushies: soft, childish things with button eyes and stitched smiles, their cheerful faces at odds with the cold metal surrounding them. And there, curled in the centre of it all, was her.

She was asleep. Or had been. Her breathing was slow and even, her body tucked into a loose curl on the mattress, one hand resting beneath her cheek. The soft glow from the city outside caught the curve of her shoulder, the pale line of her neck, the delicate braid of her light blonde hair swept to one side—exactly the way he preferred it. Even in sleep, she wore what he had chosen for her that morning: a sheer baby doll slip, translucent as morning frost, layered over black lingerie that left little to the imagination. Around her throat sat a matching collar, sleek and dark, with a silver tag that caught the light as she breathed. He didn’t need to read it to know what it said. Property of F. Odair. Attached to the collar was a silver leash, its end coiled loosely on the mattress beside her.

Finnick took a slow step closer, then another. He reached out and tapped his knuckles against one of the golden bars. The metallic rattle cut through the stillness like a bell. She stirred almost immediately—a soft, sleepy sound escaping her lips as consciousness pulled her back to the surface. Her eyes fluttered open, unfocused at first, then found his face in the dim light. Recognition struck her like a physical blow. She shot upright in a frantic scramble, her head connecting hard with the top of the cage with a sharp thunk that made her wince.

“Master, I—” Her voice was small, breathless, laced with panic. “You’re back? I didn’t hear—I mean, I thought—” She was already crawling out of the cage on her hands and knees, her movements hurried and ungraceful, the leash dragging behind her like a silver serpent. She knelt on the carpet before him, her eyes wide. There was little light in the room, but Finnick could see everything he needed to see: the fear pooling in her gaze, the trembling of her lower lip, the way her fingers twisted anxiously in the thin fabric of her slip. She was terrified. And she should be.

Finnick regarded her in silence for a long moment, letting the weight of his presence settle over her. His expression was unreadable—not angry, not cold, simply patient. As if he had all the time in the world. As if her fear was a slow wine he intended to savour.

“Why weren’t you at the door to greet me?” he asked at last. His voice was calm, almost gentle, but there was no mistaking the expectation beneath it. It wasn’t that he was offended or even particularly angered. It was simply a matter of duty. She had a role to play, a set of responsibilities she had accepted the moment she entered this arrangement. And tonight, she had failed in one of the most basic ones.

“I’m sorry, Master.” The words tumbled out of her in a frantic rush, her voice cracking at the edges. “I thought you’d be back later. You’re usually—I mean, work ended early today, right? I didn’t mean to fall asleep, I was waiting, I swear I was, but it got so quiet and I just—” She was trying to talk her way out of it, weaving excuses like thread through a loom, hoping to stitch together some version of events that would soften his response. Her hands were shaking now, clutching the fabric of her slip until the delicate material creased under her fingers. “I didn’t mean to, I—please, Master, I—”

Finnick bent down slowly, deliberately and took the end of the silver leash in his hand. The metal links chinked softly as he wrapped the length around his palm once, twice, until there was no slack left between them. Then he tugged. It wasn’t a hard pull—not yet—but it was sharp, sudden, enough to make her body lurch forward with a startled squeak. Her knees scraped against the carpet and she caught herself on her hands, her breathing gone shallow and rapid. A soft whimper escaped her throat as more excuses began to form on her tongue, her lips parting to let them spill out once more.

But Finnick was too tired for any of it. The day had been long, the meetings endless, the weight of the Republic pressing down on his shoulders like a stone mantle. He did not have the patience for a litany of pleas and justifications. He silenced her with a single look, a flicker of something cold and unyielding in his sea-green eyes and she closed her mouth immediately, her whole body going still except for the fine trembling he could feel traveling up the leash and into his hand.

“What’s my number one rule?” he asked. His tone carried a note of finality, the quiet authority of someone who expected an answer and would not ask twice.

“Always greet Master when he comes back,” she whispered, her voice barely audible. Her gaze had dropped to the floor, her lashes casting small shadows on her cheeks.

“And number two?”

“No excuses.” The words came out as a whimper, small and broken.

“And what happens to bad puppies who break rules?” Finnick tilted his head slightly, watching her. The city lights painted silver lines along the edge of his jaw, catching the gold of the cage behind her. He looked almost serene, almost pitying. But there was little softness in him tonight.

She was quiet for a moment, her hands bunching so tightly in the fabric of her slip that her knuckles went white. When she finally spoke, her voice was scarcely more than a breath, fragile as spun glass.

“They get punished.”

The silence that followed her words was heavier than any punishment Finnick could have spoken aloud. It stretched between them like a held breath, thick with anticipation and the faint, electric taste of fear. Y/n remained motionless on her knees, her head bowed, her blonde braid slipping over one shoulder to hang like a pale rope against the dark lace of her lingerie. She didn’t dare look up. She didn’t dare move. The only sign of life was the rapid rise and fall of her chest beneath the translucent slip, and the occasional tremble that coursed through her slim frame.

Finnick watched her for a long, deliberate moment. His thumb traced the cool links of the silver leash idly, back and forth, back and forth—a small, almost unconscious gesture that seemed to calm him while it wound her tighter. The golden bars of the cage gleamed softly behind her, their open door a silent reminder of where she belonged. The plushies inside stared out with their blank, stitched eyes, witnesses to whatever came next.

“Look at me,” he said finally. His voice was quiet, but it cut through the stillness like a blade through silk.

Y/n hesitated for only a fraction of a second before lifting her gaze. Her eyes were glassy, caught somewhere between terror and desperate hope. Tears had not yet fallen but they clung to her lower lashes like morning dew, threatening. She searched his face for mercy, for leniency, for anything that might soften what was to come. Finnick’s expression, however, gave nothing away. His features were carved in shadow and moonlight, beautiful and unreadable. He had learned long ago how to hide everything behind a pleasant smile. Tonight, he wasn’t smiling.

“You know I don’t enjoy this,” he said, and there was something almost tender beneath the words, almost gentle. “But you also know that rules exist for a reason. Structure. Order. Without it, there’s only chaos. And chaos—” He tugged the leash again, just a fraction, just enough to remind her of its presence. “Chaos is dangerous for little things like you. Isn’t it?”

“Yes, Master,” she whispered. A single tear slipped free and traced a slow path down her cheek. She didn’t wipe it away.

“Do you remember the last time you broke a rule?” Finnick asked, tilting his head. The question was soft, almost conversational, but his eyes held her captive. “Do you remember what happened?”

Y/n swallowed hard. Her throat bobbed visibly above the collar. “Yes, Master,” she said again, her voice even smaller now.

“And did it help you remember?”

“Yes, Master.” A second tear joined the first. “I’ve never forgotten.”

“But you forgot tonight.” Finnick sighed, a long, slow exhale that seemed to drain some of the tension from his shoulders. He looked tired suddenly—not just physically, but something deeper, something bone-weary. The weight of the Capitol, of the Republic, of all the ghosts that followed him like shadows—it pressed down on him even here, in the sanctuary of his own home. He ran his free hand through his hair, the bronze waves falling back into place almost immediately.

“I don’t want to punish you tonight,” he admitted and the honesty in his voice was startling. “I’m exhausted, Y/n. I’ve spent the entire day listening to people argue about grain quotas and district tariffs and whether the train lines to Seven should be repaired before the winter. I’ve smiled at people I despise. I’ve shaken hands with men who would have watched me die in that arena and called it entertainment.” He paused, his jaw tightening. “I came home because I wanted peace. I wanted you. At the door. Where you were supposed to be.”

Y/n’s lower lip trembled violently now and more tears followed the first two, streaming freely down her cheeks. She didn’t make a sound but her shoulders shook with the effort of containing her sobs. Her hands had released her slip and now lay flat against her thighs, palms down, fingers spread—a posture of utter submission.

“I’m sorry,” she breathed, the words barely audible. “I’m so sorry, Master. I’ll do better. I promise. I’ll—I’ll never fall asleep again. I’ll wait by the door every single night, no matter how late, no matter how tired. I swear it. Please—”

“Shh.” He released his grip on the silver leash, letting it fall to the carpet with a soft clink. His movements were careful, measured—like someone approaching a skittish, frightened animal that might bolt at any sudden motion. Then, instead, he reached out and cupped her chin between his thumb and forefinger, tilting her face upward so that she had no choice but to meet his eyes. His thumb brushed slowly across her cheek, wiping away the wet tracks of her tears with a tenderness that felt almost cruel in its gentleness. His touch was warm, almost tender, a stark contrast to the sharp authority in his voice. “Don’t make it any harder for me, hmm?”

Y/n choked on a sob, her throat tightening around the sound until it came out as a strangled, broken thing. She tried desperately to blink back the tears that kept welling up despite her best efforts, her vision blurring and clearing in uneven waves. But she nodded—a small, jerky motion of her head, submission bleeding into every line of her body. She took a deep, shuddering breath, filling her lungs with the cool air of the apartment and forced herself to steady. Her hands unclenched from the fabric of her slip, then clenched again. She knew what was coming. She had known the moment she woke up to find him standing over her cage. And some part of her, the part that had been trained and conditioned and slowly reshaped, had already accepted it.

Finnick raised his hand. There was no hesitation in the movement, no second-guessing. It was clean, precise, almost clinical. His palm landed against her cheek with a sharp, ringing crack that echoed off the walls of the silent living room. The sound was startlingly loud—a single, perfect note of punishment that seemed to hang in the air long after the impact had faded. Y/n tried her best to stay upright, to hold herself straight and still the way she had been taught, but the force of the blow was a bit more than she expected. Her body twisted sideways, her shoulder hitting the carpet as she caught herself on one trembling arm. A soft gasp escaped her lips, more surprise than pain at first, before the sting bloomed across her cheek like fire spreading through dry grass.

Before she could recover, Finnick’s other hand found its way into her hair. His fingers tangled in the light golden blonde strands, fisting firmly but not cruelly and he pulled her back upright. The motion was neither gentle nor brutal—simply efficient, like a fisherman hauling in a line. She winced as the tension pulled at her scalp, but she made no sound of protest. Her eyes were wide and wet, fixed on his face with an expression that hovered somewhere between fear, pain and desperate, aching devotion.

“What do you say after this?” His voice was calm, almost conversational. As if he had asked her about the weather, or what she wanted for dinner. But his eyes held hers with an intensity that allowed no evasion.

“I’m sorry, Master.” Her voice came out raw and wavering, but she forced the words out one by one, shaping them carefully. “I failed my duty and deserve to be punished.”

It was the right answer. The only answer. She had repeated it so many times now that it had become a kind of prayer—a litany of guilt and atonement that she whispered to herself in the dark hours of the night. The words settled into the space between them, heavy and fragile all at once.

Another slap landed on the same spot. This one was softer, restrained, almost perfunctory. A reminder rather than a punishment. But still, Y/n whimpered—a small, wounded sound that escaped despite her best efforts to stay silent. The lingering tenderness from the first blow made the second one feel sharper than it actually was and her cheek throbbed in dull, rhythmic pulses. A tear slipped free despite her attempts to hold it back, tracing a hot line down her flushed skin.

“This is the last time that I’m letting you off this easy.” Finnick’s voice hardened slightly, the gentleness of before giving way to something sterner. He released her hair and instead raised his hand, tapping her forehead with the middle of his index finger—once, twice, three times, each tap landing with a light but insistent pressure against her brow. “You need to get it through that dumb little head of yours, hmm?” There was no cruelty in his tone, precisely. But there was no softness either. Only the flat, matter-of-fact authority of someone who had repeated this lesson many times before and was growing weary of the repetition.

Y/n nodded solemnly, her chin dipping toward her chest. She swallowed hard, her throat bobbing beneath the dark collar and murmured, “Thank you, Master.” The words came automatically now, ingrained so deeply that she no longer had to think about them. Gratitude for the correction. Gratitude for the punishment. Gratitude for the fact that he still cared enough to discipline her, to shape her, to mould her into something better than what she had been before.

Finnick studied her for a moment longer, his sea-green eyes roving slowly over her body with an intensity that made her feel like she was being taken apart and examined piece by piece. He looked at the reddening mark on her cheek, at the tears still clinging to her lashes, at the way her chest rose and fell with shallow, uneven breaths beneath the translucent babydoll. Then his gaze drifted downward, catching on the silver tag that hung from her collar. The dim light from the city outside caught the engraved letters, illuminating them in soft, ghostly white: Property of F. Odair. He stared at the words for a long moment, his expression shifting through something unreadable—a flicker of possessiveness, perhaps, or satisfaction, or something darker and more complicated that he would never put into words.

Then, slowly, he exhaled. The breath seemed to carry something out of him—tension, maybe, or the last remnants of the day’s exhaustion. He cupped her face again, this time with both hands, his palms warm and dry against her tear-stained cheeks. He tilted her head up gently, forcing her to meet his gaze one more time. Her eyes were red-rimmed and swollen, but she didn’t look away. She never looked away when he asked her to.

Without another word, Finnick’s arm wrapped around her waist, his hand splaying across the small of her back. He pulled her closer, guiding her body between his legs as he shifted and sat down fully onto the floor, his back resting against the cold bars of the cage behind him. The metal pressed into his spine through his shirt, but he didn’t seem to notice—or if he did, he didn’t care. He drew her into the vee of his thighs, her knees bracketing his hips, her body flush against his chest.

He didn’t waste any time. One moment he was looking at her, studying her and the next his lips were on hers. The kiss was not gentle, but it was not harsh either. It was hungry, demanding, a claiming as much as a caress. His mouth moved against hers with a confidence born of familiarity and she responded instinctively, her lips parting beneath his, her body melting into his hold. His hands slipped under the hem of her babydoll, finding the warmth of her bare skin beneath. His palms were rough and calloused in places—remnants of a life lived before the Capitol, before all of this—but his touch was sure, almost reverent. He caressed her waist, his thumbs tracing slow circles against her ribs, then slid his hands higher, then lower, traveling up and down her midriff in a lazy, possessive rhythm. She shivered against him, caught between the chill of the room and the heat radiating from his body.

His hand moved up with deliberate slowness, fingers ghosting over her ribs before coming to rest against the soft curve of her breast. She let out a small, needy whine that seemed to travel straight through him and Finnick smiled against her lips—a slow, satisfied curl of his mouth that held no warmth, only possession. He could feel the rapid flutter of her heartbeat beneath his palm, the way her breath hitched and stuttered as he applied the slightest pressure. His fingers found her nipple through the delicate layer the lingerie bra, rolling it gently at first, then with a little more intent, just to watch her react. She never disappointed. Her responsiveness had always been one of her most endearing qualities—every touch, every whisper of sensation seemed to light her up from the inside, her body answering his before her mind could even catch up. Her hips twitched involuntarily and a deeper, more breathy sound escaped her throat, swallowed by his mouth.

Finnick exhaled slowly, feeling something shift within him. The tension of the day—the endless meetings, the sterile conference rooms, the weight of a nation pressing down on his shoulders—began to unspool, thread by thread, as her lips left his and began to trail down the sharp line of his jaw. She kissed her way lower, her mouth soft and warm and impossibly eager, pressing small, open-mouthed kisses to the column of his throat. She nipped at the skin just above his pulse point, exactly where he liked it, with exactly the right amount of pressure. Then she soothed the spot with her tongue, a practiced rhythm that spoke of long nights and careful instruction. She knew precisely where to kiss, where to bite, where to linger until his breath caught in his chest. She moved like a creature trained to perfection or perhaps one that had simply learned that her survival depended on knowing every inch of him.

His free hand drifted lower, brushing against the damp heat at her core through the thin lace of her panties. Even through the fabric, he could feel the growing wetness, the unmistakable evidence of her arousal soaking through. His fingertips pressed more firmly, circling lazily, and he felt her shudder against him.

“You’re so wet, puppy,” he murmured, his voice a low, velvet rumble against her hair. “Were you good while I was gone?”

“Yes, Master.” The words came quickly, breathlessly, pressed against the hollow of his throat between kisses. She sounded sincere. Earnest. Desperate to please.

Finnick hummed thoughtfully, his fingers continuing their lazy exploration, teasing at the damp fabric. “Then how are you so wet so quickly, hmm?” His tone shifted into something lighter, almost playful—a sing-song lilt that danced on the edge of mockery. There was amusement threaded through every syllable, the quiet confidence of someone who already knew the answers to the questions he was asking. “Are you sure you didn’t touch yourself while I was away? I know how desperate you get when you’re left alone too long.”

At that, Y/n straightened abruptly, pulling back just enough to look him in the eye. Her gaze was wide and imploring, the raw intensity of her need to be believed. Her lips parted as she shook her head with such fervour that a few strands of her braid came loose.

“Master, I would never,” she said, her voice steady despite the quiver in her chin. “No matter how desperate I get—no matter how much I ache, or how long the day feels—I always wait. I always wait for Master to come back so he can touch me. I would never break that rule. I promise. Please, you have to believe me.”

Finnick studied her for a long moment, his sea-green eyes unreadable. Then something in his expression softened—not with mercy, exactly, but with something that looked almost like approval. He tilted his head, his lips curving into a faint smile.

“My, my,” he said softly, almost affectionately. “You really are such a good puppy, aren’t you?”

She nodded eagerly, a small, hopeful sound escaping her throat. And that was all the confirmation he needed.

His hand moved with sudden, deliberate purpose. He shifted the damp lace of her panties to the side—just enough—and shoved two fingers inside her without any warning, without any preamble, without even the pretence of gentleness. Y/n let out a sharp, startled squeak, her entire body jolting as her hands flew to his shoulders for purchase. Her nails dug into the fabric of his shirt as her thighs began to tremble violently. She gasped, her mouth falling open in a silent O and Finnick watched her with hooded eyes as he began to move.

He pumped his fingers in and out of her heat with a steady, unforgiving rhythm—deep, deliberate strokes that left no room for doubt about who was in control. The sounds that spilled from her lips were obscene filling the quiet apartment like a confession. She was no longer trying to hide her reactions; there was no point. Her head fell back, exposing the pale column of her throat and the dark collar wrapped around it, her silver tag catching the distant city lights and throwing them back in fractured gleams.

“That’s what I like about you,” Finnick said, his voice low and nonchalant, as if he were commenting on something casual rather than the way she was falling apart around his fingers. He curled them suddenly, mercilessly, against a particular spot deep inside her—one that made her entire body arch like a bow and her head snap back even farther, a broken cry tearing from her lips. He smiled then, slow and satisfied. “You’re a dumb, dirty little pup. But you’re willing to learn. And you’re,” he curled his fingers again, harder this time, pressing and rubbing in tight circles against that devastating spot, watching her eyes roll back, watching her mouth hang open on a soundless scream, “so responsive.”

Her nails raked down his shoulders—sharp, desperate crescents of sensation that left pale trails blooming into red. Her thighs clenched tight around his hand, a reflexive, involuntary grip, as though she could anchor herself to him and keep from being swept away entirely. Her whole body bowed to the rhythm he set, arching and trembling and yielding all at once, a creature of instinct now rather than thought. Every breath she drew came in ragged gasps. Every muscle in her frame quivered with the effort of holding on. And Finnick simply watched. Patient. Unhurried. His sea-green eyes never left her face—the flush spreading across her cheeks, the way her lips parted around sounds she couldn’t suppress, the flutter of her lashes as she fought to keep her gaze on his. He controlled everything: the pace, the pressure, the very air between them. And she surrendered to it because surrender was all she had left.

Outside, the Capitol glittered on, indifferent and eternal. A thousand lights flickered across the night skyline—buildings that had once belonged to Snow’s allies, streets that had once run red with the blood of tributes, now polished and pristine and pretending at innocence. The city never slept. It simply reinvented itself, shedding old skins like a snake, forgetting as easily as it breathed. But Finnick did not forget. Even now, with her soft sounds filling the quiet apartment and the weight of the leash still coiled loosely in his free hand, his mind drifted backward. Not to the arena. Not to the ocean. Further than that. To the chaos that had followed the fall.

The old regime had crumbled like a rotten pillar, finally unable to support the weight of its own cruelty. Coriolanus Snow was dead. The rebellion had swept through Panem like wildfire and from its ashes, the New Republic had risen, still unsteady on its feet, still learning how to breathe without tyranny strangling it. The parliament had set to work immediately on two fronts: reform and the punishment of those who had committed crimes against the people. Tribunal after tribunal was convened. Names were dragged into the light. And among the accused, one name stood out not for what she had done, but for who she was.

Y/n Snow.

The prized granddaughter of the late President. Something of an “it-girl” in the Capitol’s glittering, poisonous social scene—though that phrase hardly captured the truth of her existence. She had worn the finest dresses, yes, silks and velvets that cost more than a District 12 family earned in a year. She had eaten the finest foods, had been photographed at every pompous event with her grandfather’s cold hand resting on her arm like a brand. She had smiled for the cameras, had recited the gracious, empty pleasantries expected of a Snow. But had she ever been free? Had she ever been anything more than a decoration, a prop, a pretty thing to be displayed and discarded at the former president’s whim?

“She should be executed!” The memory of that voice still echoed in Finnick’s mind—sharp, furious, a District 7 representative whose family had lost someone to Snow’s machinations. “Are we forgetting all that she did? She stood beside him. She smiled for him. She wore his jewels and ate his food and never once lifted a finger to stop any of it!”

The chamber had erupted into chaos, voices overlapping in a storm of anger and grief. Finnick had sat in his seat, silent, watching. He had seen the girl in question seated in the defendant’s alcove, her hands folded in her lap, her face pale as marble. She had not spoken. She had not defended herself. She had simply sat there, waiting, as though she had already been sentenced a thousand times in her own mind.

“I must remind you,” another voice cut through the noise—softer, but no less firm. Tigris. The former president’s own cousin, her face altered by years of self-inflicted surgeries, her loyalty to the rebellion unquestioned. She had harboured fugitives. She had fed the resistance. She had risked everything to help bring down her own family’s terrible legacy. “That my grandniece was used by that man to better his reputation. The girl had no part in the atrocities that he committed. She was a child—a pawn—no different from any other tribute paraded in front of cameras to make Snow look magnanimous.”

A murmur rippled through the parliament. Some nodded. Others scowled, unconvinced.

“And what of her brother?” A District 1 representative rose to his feet, jabbing a finger toward the defendant’s alcove. “Cornelius Snow knew. His list of crimes wasn’t short either—in fact, it was longer and more grotesque than most. Shall we pretend she knew nothing of that as well?”

Cornelius Snow. The name alone was enough to darken the room. Unlike his sister, Cornelius had been no decoration. He had been an active participant in the regime’s ugliest excesses—a notorious rapist and abuser, known for assaulting female tributes and district women alike with impunity. Rumour had it that he would take women from the districts in small groups, keep them in his private wing of the Snow mansion and use them for his pleasure until he grew bored. After that, they were either killed—silently, without record—or tossed out into the streets with nothing but the clothes on their backs and scars that would never fully heal. He had also served as a Game Master, designing tasks and arenas for the Hunger Games with particular sadism. The traps he created were not designed simply to kill, but to prolong suffering, to turn death into performance art. Few tributes who entered one of Cornelius Snow’s arenas died quickly. And none died kindly.

“He is dead,” Tigris replied, her voice cool but strained. “Cornelius is dead. His crimes died with him. Why do you want to punish a girl for her brother’s sins? For her grandfather’s sins? Y/n Snow was kept in that mansion like a caged bird. She was rarely let out unless Snow needed her for his schemes—a smile here, a wave there, proof that the Snow family was civilized, cultured, worthy of power. She was not given a voice. She was not given a choice. She was as much a prisoner as any tribute.”

The chamber fell silent. Finnick remembered the weight of that silence—how it pressed against his ears, how he had shifted in his seat, how his gaze had drifted back to the pale girl in the defendant’s alcove. She had finally looked up, just once, and her eyes had met his across the room. There was no defiance in them. No pride. Just exhaustion and something else—something that looked almost like relief. As though she had been waiting, for years, for someone to finally see her for what she was.

Not a predator. Prey.

“Then what do you propose?” another voice asked. “We cannot simply let her walk free. A Snow is a Snow. Her name alone is a weapon.”

The chamber erupted again before Tigris could form a reply. Another man shot to his feet—a broad-shouldered counsellor from District 6, his face flushed with the particular righteousness of someone who had waited a long time for vengeance and could taste it now on the back of his tongue. His voice boomed across the hall, carrying a rawness that silenced the murmurs around him.

“I suggest we make a whore of her. The way her brother and grandfather did to so many of our sisters and daughters.”

A ripple went through the room—shock, yes, but also something uglier. Approval. Men began thrumming their hands against the heavy wooden tables, a low, rhythmic drumming that built like thunder before a storm. The counsellor, emboldened by the response, pressed on, his words growing sharper, more vicious with each syllable.

“Put her in a brothel. For any man to fuck as they please. She wants to atone for her family’s crimes? Fine. Let her do it in the only fucking way she knows how. The Snows took our bodies for generations. Let theirs be taken in return. That’s justice.”

“Mind your words, counsellor.” Tigris’s voice cut through the din like a blade—low, dangerous, barely contained. Her features twisted into something almost feral, her golden eyes glinting with a cold fury that reminded everyone present that she, too, had once been a Snow. That she had turned against her own blood at great personal cost. That she had earned the right to speak. But her voice was drowned almost instantly beneath the rising tide of agreement—the thrumming of hands, the shouted approvals, the ravenous sound of a crowd that had found its scapegoat.

Y/n did not look up. She couldn’t. Her eyes remained fixed on the polished floor, tracing the patterns as though it might open up and swallow her whole. How could she lift her gaze? How could she meet the eyes of people who had already decided she was a demon to be exorcised, a stain to be scrubbed away? They did not see a girl, raised in gilded captivity, fed poison disguised as privilege. They saw a surname. They saw a symbol. They saw all the pain the Snow family had inflicted and they wanted to return it tenfold. There was nothing she could say. Nothing she could do. Her words would be ash in their mouths before she even spoke them.

Beside Finnick, a familiar figure shifted in her seat with an exaggerated groan. Johanna Mason—former victor, former tribute, former prisoner of the Capitol’s darkest chambers—rolled her eyes so hard it was almost audible. She had suffered more at Snow’s hands than most people in this room could imagine. Her family had been slaughtered. Her sanity had been stripped and rebuilt into something jagged and sharp. And yet, even she seemed weary of the bloodthirst filling the chamber.

“Ugh. I can’t believe this,” she muttered, loud enough for half the row to hear. Then, without waiting for a response, she leaned forward, tapped her microphone with a fingernail and began to speak.

The parliament fell silent the moment her voice cut through the noise. Johanna Mason had that effect on people. She was not beloved—she was too raw, too honest, too sharp-edged for that but she was respected. Feared, even. Because she had survived things that would have broken anyone else and she had emerged not softer, but harder. An axe honed by fire.

“Why can’t we just kill her and put the other one in the Capitol Hunger Games?”

A murmur rippled through the chamber. The “other one.” Lucia Snow. Y/n’s younger sister, barely fourteen years old, still a child by any measure. She had been found hiding in a servant’s quarters during the fall of the mansion, trembling beneath a bed, clutching a tattered stuffed fox to her chest. Unlike her older sister, Lucia had never attended the galas. Never posed for photographs. Never been paraded on her grandfather’s arm. She had been kept hidden—some said because she was shy, others because she was illegitimate, others still because even Snow recognized that one innocent granddaughter was useful, but two was a liability. Now, she sat in a separate holding cell, her fate tied inexorably to Y/n’s.

Johanna, of course, had her own reasons for suggesting the Capitol Hunger Games. She had been one of the loudest voices advocating for a reversal—Capitol children in the arena, district children as spectators. An eye for an eye. A taste of their own medicine. But Katniss had refused to endorse it and without the Mockingjay’s blessing, the proposal had died stillborn.

Y/n looked up.

For the first time since the proceedings began, she raised her head and let her gaze sweep across the room—the rows of representatives, the judges, the spectators, the victors, the rebels. Her face was ashen, her eyes red-rimmed, but there was something else there now. Not defiance. Not pride. Something fragile. Something more desperate.

“Please,” she said, and her voice cracked on the word. “Please, no. I—I’ll do it. Anything. Whatever you want. Just don’t—”

“Silence, girl.” Tigris’s voice was sharp, but there was something beneath it—fear, perhaps. Or pity. She knew what her grandniece was about to do and she knew it would not help.

But Y/n shook her head, a small, frantic motion. Her hair came loose, strands of pale blonde hair falling across her flushed cheeks. She was trembling visibly now, her whole body vibrating with the effort of staying upright.

“No. I know I am at fault. I know that my ignorance came from a position of privilege that most people my age were never granted. I know that I ate while others starved. I know that I smiled while others screamed. I know all of it.” Her voice grew stronger as she spoke, though it never lost its tremor. “And I will pay for my family’s crimes. For all of them. For my grandfather’s. For my brother’s. Even Lucia’s share. Please. I accept whatever punishment you see fit. Just don’t harm her. She is a child. She didn’t know anything. She never even left the west wing. Please. Please grant her mercy.”

The chamber fell silent. Not the angry silence of before, but something deeper—a held breath, a collective pause. People had expected arrogance. They had expected a Snow to scream, to curse, to demand better treatment. They had expected pride, defiance, a refusal to bend. They had not expected this. A broken girl, offering herself up like a sacrifice, asking only that her sister be spared.

Johanna rolled her eyes again, though there was less venom in it this time. More exasperation. She didn’t like being made to feel things. She leaned back into her microphone, her voice flat and tired.

“Okay, so what will it be? Whore or death? Cast your vote.”

The chamber moved to vote before Tigris could refute, before anyone could call for a recess, before cooler heads could prevail. Paddles rose. Counts were taken. Voices called out yea or nay. And through it all, Y/n Snow stayed in her alcove, hands clasped in front of her, eyes fixed on the floor once more. Waiting.

In the back of the room, Katniss watched it unfold. Her hand found Peeta’s under the table—his warm, solid, scarred fingers interlacing with her own. She didn’t like this. None of it. Her jaw was set, her grey eyes stormy. She had not fought a war, had not killed Coin, had not sacrificed so much, only to watch the new government turn into the old one by another name. But she was one voice among many and the people wanted vengeance. They would accept payment only in blood.

She had suggested house arrest with monitoring. Life imprisonment. Even exile. Each proposal had been voted down with increasing hostility. The parliament had decided that mercy was an insult to the dead. And that was the horror—and the boon—of democracy. Once the mob decided on something, innocence became subjective. Truth became flexible. Justice became a word you used to dress up revenge in nice clothes.

Finnick sat beside Johanna, his expression unreadable. He had not voted yet. His hand hovered over his paddle, his gaze fixed on the her. She looked so small from here. So fragile. Like a bird that had flown into a window and was still trying to understand how the sky had betrayed it.

The vote was cast. The numbers flickered across the large screen at the front of the chamber—a cold, digital verdict that carried the weight of a life. Death had been swift and brutal, a simple matter of a firing squad or a hanging, a clean end to a dirty legacy. But the other option had won. Not by a landslide, but by enough votes to matter. Enough to seal her fate. Enough to condemn her to something far worse than death in the eyes of those who had cast their ballots.

“Whore” had beaten “death” by a margin of seventeen votes.

“I knew it.” Johanna shook her head slowly, a bitter, knowing smile twisting her lips. She didn’t bother to hide her disgust—not at the decision itself, but at the predictable hypocrisy of it. She turned to Finnick, her voice low enough that only he could hear over the murmurs rippling through the chamber. “Of course they’d pick that option. Have you seen her? Looks like a fucking angel, that one. Golden hair, doe eyes, that whole innocent, untouchable thing she’s got going on.” She gestured vaguely toward the defendant’s alcove, her hand slicing through the air with dismissive disdain. “Who wouldn’t want to put their hands on her? They’ve been thinking about it for years. Now they’ve got permission.”

Finnick said nothing. He simply looked back at Y/n Snow, still in her alcove with her hands clasped in front of her. And Johanna wasn’t wrong. The girl was extraordinarily beautiful—the kind of beauty that stopped conversations, that made people forget what they were saying mid-sentence, that lingered in the mind long after she had left a room. She had what the Capitol commentators used to call “Snow features”: high cheekbones, a delicate jaw, skin that seemed to hold light rather than reflect it. Her hair was the colour of spun gold, so pale it was almost white in certain lights, falling in soft waves around her shoulders. Her eyes were pale blue—the colour of ice melting in spring or of a sky just before dawn. And her proportions were the stuff of classical sculpture: slender but not fragile, curved but not overstated, every line of her body suggesting grace and carefully cultivated perfection.

It was no accident. President Snow had ensured that whenever his granddaughter appeared in public, she was dressed in the most flattering garments imaginable—custom pieces designed to appeal to both men and women alike, to make her seem desirable and untouchable in equal measure. She was a tool of propaganda, a living symbol of the Snow family’s refinement and benevolence. Look, the Capitol could say. We have such beautiful things. Such civilized people. We are not monsters. We are patrons of beauty. We are worthy of power.

The thought made Finnick’s stomach turn. He had seen that same machinery at work in his own life—the way the Capitol had dressed him up, preened him, sold him to the highest bidder. The way they had made him into something desirable and then punished him for it. He looked at Y/n now, truly looked at her and saw that she was not staring at the floor anymore. She was staring at Katniss.

Tigris stood beside the Mockingjay, her spotted, weathered face close to Katniss’s ear, whispering urgently. Whatever she was saying, it seemed to be having an effect. Katniss’s expression shifted from grim resignation to something harder—something more determined. She straightened her shoulders, pulled her hand free from Peeta’s grip, and rose to her feet. The chamber quieted almost immediately. Even Johanna leaned back in her seat, arms crossed, watching with narrowed eyes.

“I acknowledge the decision of this parliament,” Katniss began, her voice steady and clear, carrying to every corner of the room. “On humanitarian grounds, however, I do not approve of it. What will make us any different from Snow if we do this? What separates justice from revenge if we stoop to the same tactics he used?”

“So what? We let her go?” Johanna interrupted, her voice sharp as shattered glass. She didn’t bother to wait for an acknowledgment before pressing on. “Just because she begged for her sister’s life doesn’t make her innocent. She’s still a Snow. Tears don’t wash that away.”

A chorus of voices rose in agreement—some from District 2, where families had lost daughters to Cornelius’s appetites; others from District 11, where Snow’s agricultural policies had starved entire communities; still others from the Capitol’s own reformists, who wanted every trace of the old regime scrubbed clean, no matter the cost. The chamber buzzed with anger, with grief, with the particular ugliness of people who had been hurt and were now lashing out at the nearest available target.

Finnick understood Johanna’s ferocity better than most. He knew what Cornelius Snow had done to her—not just the public humiliations, but the private ones. The ones that left scars on the inside. Cornelius had developed a “special liking” for Johanna during her years as a victor and whatever that had entailed, it had left her with a hatred so deep it could never be fully excavated. Unfortunately, in the absence of Cornelius—dead by his own hand during the fall of the mansion—that hatred had found a new home. Y/n was close enough. Y/n shared his blood, his features, his last name. And for Johanna and many more, that was enough.

This was a dangerous moment for Katniss and she knew it. The Mockingjay’s power had always been symbolic, not political. She could inspire but she could not command. If she appeared to sympathize too openly with Y/n Snow—a woman the people had already convicted in their hearts—she risked losing the fragile authority she still held. And yet, Katniss had never been one to back down from an impossible position.

“No,” she said, raising her voice over the noise. “I know that I alone cannot single-handedly overturn a decision taken by this body. I am one voice among many and I respect the will of the parliament even when I disagree with it.” She paused, drawing a breath, steadying herself. “So, I propose a condition. An amendment, if you will.”

The chamber settled into wary silence. Even Johanna stopped fidgeting.

“She will still be punished. The parliament’s decision will be carried out. But not in a brothel.” Katniss’s eyes swept the room, daring anyone to interrupt her. “She will be bound to the service of a single individual. One keeper. One master. Someone appointed by this body, subject to our oversight and approval. She will still serve her sentence. She will still atone for her family’s crimes. But she will not be passed from hand to hand like—like meat.”

She stumbled over the last word, her voice catching slightly. But she recovered quickly, her jaw setting in that familiar, stubborn line that had carried her through an arena, a war and the murder of a president.

Behind her, Tigris bowed her head in a small, grateful nod. The Republic had wanted her grandniece punished. The districts had wanted Snow blood. Tigris had wanted the girl saved. This was not salvation—not really—but it was something. A reprieve. A crack in the wall. She would take it.

“And who exactly will take her?” Johanna asked, her tone dripping with skepticism. She leaned forward, elbows on the table, chin propped on her hands, playing along for now. “Who gets the honour of owning a Snow? Drawing straws? Auction? Or should we let her choose her own master like some kind of twisted dating game?”

A few people laughed—nervous, uncomfortable laughs. Katniss’s expression did not change.

Before she could answer, the counsellor from District 6 rose to his feet. He was a broad, thick-necked man with calloused hands and a florid face, the same man who had first proposed the brothel solution. His eyes were fixed on Y/n with an intensity that made Finnick’s skin crawl—a possessive, hungry look that had nothing to do with justice and everything to do with lust and appetite.

“I’ll put my name forward,” he said, his voice thick with barely concealed eagerness. “I proposed the punishment. It’s only fitting that I should be the one to—to administer it.”

He smiled. It was not a kind smile. His gaze roamed over Y/n’s figure—the curve of her hip, the slender line of her neck, the way her hands trembled at her sides and Finnick felt something cold settle in his chest. That man would not keep her as a servant. That man would not treat her with even the barest shred of dignity. That man looked at her the way a predator looks at prey it intends to eat alive, slowly, savouring every moment.

Finnick wanted to believe the counsellor wasn’t a bad person. Perhaps, in another life, he had been a decent man—a father, a husband, a worker who simply wanted justice for wrongs committed against his district. But the glint in his eyes told a different story. It was the same glint Finnick had seen in the eyes of Capitol patrons who had purchased him for the night. The same glint he had seen in Cornelius Snows eyes when the man had looked at Johanna. It was the glint of someone who wanted to tear another person apart and call it punishment.

Finnick looked back at Y/n.

She was staring at him.

Not at the counsellor. Not at Katniss. Not at the floor. Directly at him. Her pale blue eyes—those strange, light eyes that seemed to hold whole worlds of sorrow—were fixed on his face with an expression he couldn’t quite name. It was haunted, yes. Sad, certainly. But there was something else beneath it, something that looked almost like recognition. As though she was trying to reach out to the version of him that existed in a dream long ago. As though she was asking him, silently, without words: Will you let them take me?

His breath hitched. His chest tightened. And suddenly, without fully understanding why, he was standing.

The chair scraped back behind him with a sound that echoed through the suddenly silent chamber. Every head turned. Every eye fixed on him—Finnick Odair, the victor, the senator, the man who had been sold more times than he could count, who had worn the Capitols chains and learned to smile through them. He stood tall, his sea-green eyes clear, his voice steady despite the hammering of his heart.

“I’ll take her.”

╰ ┈➤ A/n 2.0: I took a bunch of references from real life events and people for this fic and do let me know if you wanna know about it. And this Finnick is very ooc ik but it'll be explained better in the coming parts, trust.

╰ ┈➤ Masterlist

╰ ┈➤ Tags: @avantlilies @joekitsu @sarabelllah @lil-mex-child @themischievousher @iloveyou3000morgan @saoriixbjh @fnimln @gmiasa03 @foulkingtree-101 @doll-parts111

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