Forever Fangirling

ᝰ⋆.˚ from that day on he comes to the coffee shop almost every day, leaving tips so big they sometimes cover several of your shifts. he knows you’re working yourself to the bone just to pay for your life, so when you ask him not to spend so much, he just increases the amount, calling it “a little help.”

you smile at him, draw little cats and smiley faces on the cups, and every morning he finds himself wondering what it’s gonna be today.

but one tuesday everything changes: he sees you with tear-streaked cheeks, your eyes red and puffy. you brush it off, but he notices the angry manager who comes out after you. when the guy finally leaves, he quietly writes his number down and hands it to you.

“if you need help — and you do — call me. i’m always reachable.”

ᝰ⋆.˚ he invites you to one of those quiet, expensive restaurants with a panoramic view of the city when you finally call him after an exhausting shift and a fight with your boss. he watches you for a while as you look through the menu and tells you to order anything you want, no hesitation.

when it’s time for dessert and you’ve gotten used to him enough, he gently takes your hand into his warm palms and says he’d like to help you in any way he can, so you don’t have to wear yourself out with night shifts and constant exhaustion. when you ask if he does this kind of thing regularly, he just lets out a quiet laugh and shakes his head, saying he heard about it from a friend recently and immediately thought of you.

ᝰ⋆.˚ for your first trip together, he takes you to new york because he has an important deal there, and he’s dead set on you accompanying him that evening. at receptions and formal meetings, he doesn’t leave you alone for a second, always keeping a hand on your waist and proudly introducing you to everyone as his girl. he catches every glance you give him, and when you get tired of all the small talk, he checks on you and quietly leans in to whisper praise in your ear, unnoticed by the others.

ᝰ⋆.˚ when he finds out you’re preparing for a tough finals, he turns your studying into the most comfortable process possible: he sends his personal chef over to your place, drives you around all the time, and gives you advice whenever you talk to him about your lectures.

ᝰ⋆.˚ baelor sets one clear rule from the very first day: he’s never going to pressure you or push you into anything sexual.

and even if you’re grateful for it at first, now you’re practically losing your mind over how badly you want him.

i mean, he’s attractive, tall, rich, and built — who can blame you?

but he just smiles and shakes his head anyway, no matter how much you tease him.

ᝰ⋆.˚ sugardaddy! baelor who finally snaps when you come up to him in his home office and literally start rubbing against his thigh in those expensive pants, whimpering. "does my pretty girl need something?" he teases, moving your hips and literally making you ride his thigh until you come, leaving a wet spot.

"got so wet just from my leg, hm? what's gonna happen when my cock is inside you?" he spreads your knees wide, your skirt pushed up to your waist and your panties lying somewhere on the office floor as you come again, first on his huge fingers that barely fit inside you, and then on his heavy cock while he pounds into you balls deep. "is this what my baby wanted? for me to rip her sweet pussy apart?"

ᝰ⋆.˚ he absolutely loves spoiling you. for him, nothing matters more than your eyes lighting up when you get something you’ve wanted for a long time. it’s not always dresses or shoes, sometimes it’s the simplest things: a brand new coffee machine, a massage device because you once mentioned your back hurts from sitting all the time. he doesn’t know the word no when it comes to your comfort. if you look at something for more than five seconds, the next day it’s already yours.

ᝰ⋆.˚ sugardaddy! baelor who has you settled on his lap in the back room of a private jet, your legs spread wide over his, your back against his chest, while one hand holds you possessively as he’s in you up to his knuckles. his fingers are long and thick, pounding into you with smooth strokes, hitting that exact sensitive spot you could never reach on your own. "nngh! please, i need... please..." he just laughs and kisses your neck with open-mouthed kisses. "mmmh, good girls speak up about what they want."

your hips tremble and lift every time, but he pins you down with one hand. "come on, my baby, tell me what you want and i'll give it to you." "i wan— mmnh! please, i want to come, please please plea— ...haaaah!" "such a good girl for me, my sweetest baby, come on my fingers so i smell like you for a whole fucking week."

and when you come with a loud cry, he grabs your chin and turns your head toward him to pull you into a deep kiss.

ᝰ⋆.˚ baelor, who has to fly to singapore for work but can't go a day without seeing you. what starts as a normal chat turns into something entirely different when he switches to facetime. "put the phone lower... yeah, right there. now open those pretty legs and show me how much you missed me. use your fingers, baby."

he makes you say out loud how bad you want him inside you, how you miss his fingers and his mouth, making you blush and lose your breath in front of the camera.

he starts moving his hand faster, his cock is hard as fuck, breathing heavy while he watches you. he let out a low groan when you came, moaning his name. "fuccckk, you're not leaving the room once i get home."

ᝰ⋆.˚ he’s an eater. he claims it’s primarily for his pleasure, not yours. he loves leaving you naked on his silk sheets, slowly covering your thighs and stomach with a trail of kisses. he can spend hours worshiping you with his tongue, driving you to one orgasm after another until you start crying from the sensory overload, and then he just presses you against his hot chest, cradling you and whispering how lucky he is and how you make him the happiest man alive.

ᝰ⋆.˚ baelor, who seats you onto his cock, making you sit like that until he's finished with his reports. he loves the feeling — how your inner muscles stretch around him, trying to get used to his size, and how you squeeze him every time he moves even an inch. "can you sit still like this for me, princess?"

you start whimpering quietly from the fullness and the heat inside, trying to move just a little, but he only smirks and holds you tighter. "behave. you know good girls get whatever they ask for, right?"

you're literally dripping onto his dress pants, leaving a terribly awkward wet spot, but he doesn't give a shit. "look how you've messed me up, is being inside not enough for this little pussy? does it want more?" when you’ve turned into a complete mess, unable to do anything but moan and whimper, he tosses his pen aside and finally touches your swollen clit, slowly rolling it between his fingers. "okay, let's take care of my sweet baby."

ᝰ⋆.˚ maybe others think it's nasty, thinking you’re just fucking some old dude for money, but he treats you like a princess, spoils you to death, and fucks you until you're complete mess. and he's hot, so honestly, you couldn't care less.

masterlists.

You stood on the pavement outside the restaurant and looked at the entrance - the kind of entrance that had a person standing at it, a person in a jacket whose entire job was to hold the door, a door that was heavy, and dark, and framed in something that might have been brass, or might have been something more expensive than brass - and then you looked down at yourself.

You had done your best. Genuinely, sincerely done your best, and you wanted that noted somewhere, even if only internally. The nicest dress you owned was the dress that you had bought for your college graduation and worn twice since, and it was a perfectly good dress, and it fit you well, and the problem was not the dress. The problem was that the dress existed in a world where restaurant entrances did not have their own personnel, and the restaurant in front of you existed in a different world, and those two worlds were, as of tonight, briefly overlapping in a way that made the seams very visible. 

Good shoes - heels, low ones, the only pair you owned that qualified - were already making the balls of your feet aware of their feelings. Your coat was presentable from the outside. You had done your hair for forty-five minutes, and Julia had sent back a string of voice notes telling you to stop it and go, and here you were, and here the restaurant was.

He was out of touch.

The thought arrived plainly. Not unkindly - not as a judgment, just a fact, the clear simple fact of someone who had not had to think about whether a restaurant was within reach for a very long time, possibly ever. He had suggested it the way you might suggest a coffee shop, a known quantity chosen on the basis of quality, and the thought of whether it was the kind of place that might make you feel small had simply not entered the picture. Not from indifference. Just from the particular blindness of never having needed to consider it.

You took a breath, squared your shoulders, and went in.

He was already there, of course - he was always early, you had noted this across twelve Monday evenings, as consistent as his rolled sleeves, and his reading posture, and the way he held a wooden spoon. 

He was standing near the host's desk rather than sitting, because he had arrived and declined to be seated without you, which was correct and very him, and you registered it with a small, complicated warmth alongside the nervousness rather than instead of it.

He was wearing a suit. A very good suit, dark charcoal, with a tie that was deep burgandy, and a pocket square folded with apparent care, and he looked - you processed this with the slight remove of someone trying to see something clearly - extraordinary. 

The suit fit the way expensive things fit when they have been made for a specific person and worn enough times to settle into the shape of them. The dark hair, the mismatched eyes, the correctness of his posture, all of it read differently here than it had in an amber-lit kitchen with flour on the counter and Rowan's voice cutting through the noise of several working stoves at once. 

Here, he looked like what he was - a very successful fifty-year-old man who had arrived early and was waiting. And here, in the nicest dress you owned, you looked like what you were, and the distance between those two things was something you were going to spend the next hour and a half being quietly aware of.

He saw you, and something shifted in his expression - moved through pleased and settled into careful, deliberate, the expression of a man managing himself, which you recognized because you were also managing yourself, and because it was genuinely strange to see him standing here when every memory you had of him involved chopping boards, and saucepans, and twelve Monday nights in the same warm kitchen.

"Hi," you said.

"Hello," he said, and offered you the flowers.

You had not expected the flowers. He was holding them with a slight self-consciousness that suggested he had made a decision some days ago, and was now committed to following through on it regardless of how it felt to stand in the entrance of a restaurant holding a wrapped bouquet while waiting - which was, you thought, simultaneously very formal, and very earnest, and entirely, specifically him. 

They were white and pale pink, ranunculus or something close, simply wrapped, nothing excessive. 

"They're beautiful," you said, and meant it, and took them, and the host appeared and said ‘right this way’, and you followed with the flowers in your arms into the restaurant, already working out that you would be holding them for the rest of the evening because there was simply nowhere to put them.

—-

The restaurant was the kind of place where the menus had no prices on your side.

You discovered this when you opened yours and scanned the left column with the practiced efficiency of someone who always checked prices first, and found that the left column said things like pan-seared halibut with a citrus beurre blanc and slow-braised short rib with truffle pomme purée without any numbers attached. You looked at it for a moment. You looked at Baelor, who was reading his menu with the same focused attention he gave everything and appeared entirely untroubled.

You looked back at your menu.

There was a small, uncertain beat in which you were not entirely sure whether to be offended. 

There was something about the menu-without-prices that felt like a particular kind of assumption - like the restaurant, and by extension Baelor, had decided on your behalf that numbers weren't your concern. You turned this over for a moment, fairly. 

It was the kind of restaurant that still did things this way because it had always done them this way, and Baelor had probably not chosen it because of that detail, had probably not thought about that detail at all. He had chosen it because he knew it, because the food was good, because when you had been on approximately no dates for however long it had been and you were trying to do this correctly, you defaulted to the version of correct you already had a template for. Which was, you suspected, the client dinner version.

The client dinner version. 

You sat with that for a moment - the suit, the menu, the careful correctness of the evening, the way he had been holding himself since you walked in with the slight tension of someone executing a procedure they had memorized and were determined to get right. 

He wasn't being dismissive. He wasn't being condescending. He was being the only version of a first date he had available to him, which was formal, and correct, and out of practice, and that was a different thing entirely.

"The halibut is very good here," he told you, over the top of his menu.

"Is it?" You asked.

"I've been here before. For a client dinner, some years ago." He set his menu down and looked at you with the same attentiveness - the full, direct kind. "I should have asked what you preferred. I defaulted to somewhere I knew, which wasn't -" he stopped. "I apologize, I should have asked your preference."

You looked at him for a moment, at the slight compression around his expression that was his version of discomfort, and you said, "It's a beautiful restaurant. I'm glad to be here." And you meant it - not as performance, just as the honest fact of where things stood. He had made a miscalculation with the restaurant. He had also noticed the miscalculation and said so, without being prompted. That counted.

He nodded once and picked up his menu again, and the waiter came, and you ordered the halibut because he had recommended it and because it seemed safe, and Baelor ordered the short rib, and the waiter disappeared, and you were left with each other, and the white tablecloth, and the quiet, ambient sound of a full restaurant on a Saturday evening.

"How was your week?" You asked him, because it was the conversational equivalent of a fire escape - functional, unglamorous, available in emergencies. 

In the kitchen it would never have been necessary; conversation had always found its own shape, driven by the task at hand, by the natural rhythm of working alongside someone toward something specific. 

Here, there was no task. Just the two of you, and a white tablecloth, and twelve weeks of Monday evenings that had apparently not prepared either of you for Saturday night.

"Busy," he said. "The new client -" a pause. "You don't want to hear about the new client."

"I do," you said, honestly.

He looked at you with a slight skepticism that was almost funny. "It's not interesting."

"You find it interesting."

"I find most things interesting," he said. "I'm not a reliable measure."

"Tell me about the new client," you said.

He told you about the new client. It was - well, it was not inherently interesting in itself, a complex estate dispute with multiple parties and a poorly drafted will being read three different ways by three different sets of lawyers - but the way he talked about it was interesting, the same way it had always been interesting, the way he organized a problem out loud with clean precision. 

You listened, and you asked questions, and he answered them, and for about eight minutes it was almost like the kitchen. The register was right, the ease was almost right, and you could see the shape of the person you knew underneath the suit and the careful posture.

And then the food arrived, and the conversation broke, and when it resumed it had lost the thread again.

The food was extraordinary, and you noted this with genuine appreciation alongside the helplessness of knowing that meals like this existed entirely outside your normal life - the kind you'd had maybe twice, at other people's expense, at occasions that required dressing up. The halibut dissolved. The beurre blanc was exactly what a beurre blanc should be, which you knew now, specifically, because of class, and that small knowledge sat pleasantly in the middle of the rather formal evening.

"The sauce," you noted.

Something shifted in his expression - a small, recognizing warmth, the kind that appeared when something from the kitchen surfaced here. "Yes," he agreed.

"We could make this."

"Something close to it," he said. "The technique would be the same. The fish would be less exceptional."

"Rowan would be proud."

"Rowan would take the credit," he said, with a dryness so entirely him that you laughed - a real one, not the polite kind - and he looked quietly pleased, the way he always looked pleased when he made you laugh, without making anything of it.

But then the laugh settled, and the restaurant reasserted itself around you, and the slight stiffness was still there in the set of his shoulders, still in the careful way he was handling the conversation. You thought about what he had said on the phone when you'd finally spoken, working out the date - it's been some time since I've done this - and what some time meant when translated from his particular register into ordinary language.

"Can I ask you something?"

He looked at you. "Yes."

"When was the last time you went on a date? Before tonight."

The pause was brief but real. He looked at his plate for a moment, then back at you, with the expression he had when he was choosing the true answer over the more correct one. "Before Jena died," he said. "We were together from law school, so the last time I dated anyone was before I was married." A pause. "Which was a while ago."

"How long?" you asked.

He considered it. "She passed nearly eleven years ago, and we were married for… well, for thirteen years before that, and we had dated a while before getting married.” 

You sat with that for a moment. His last first date would have been more than twenty-four years ago. He had put on his best suit, and brought you flowers, and chosen a restaurant he associated with the kind of occasion, and had been sitting across from you all evening trying very hard to do this correctly by the standards of a version of dating that was more than two decades out of practice, and the whole picture of it - the too-formal posture, the careful orchestration of the evening, the menu without prices - rearranged itself in your understanding into something that was not out of touch at all. 

It was just nervousness. 

It was just a man who did not know what he was doing and was covering it with the best tools he had, which were precision, and preparation, and the knowledge of where to find a good halibut.

"Okay," you said, because what else could you say?

He looked at you.

"I was just wondering," you said, mildly, "because you've seemed a little -" you looked for the right word. "Tightly wound."

Something moved across his face that he very quickly composed. "I'm not tightly wound."

"You've been holding your fork like it might combust if you set it down," you said.

He paused. He looked down at his fork. He set it down with a deliberateness that was somehow funnier than the original offense, and you pressed your lips together and looked at the tablecloth.

"I'm a little tightly wound," he admitted.

"It's okay," you told him. "I'm nervous too."

He looked at you with a faint surprise, as though this had genuinely not occurred to him - as though he had been so occupied with the propriety of his own side of the evening that your nervousness had simply not entered the picture. It was both very funny and unexpectedly endearing. 

"You don't seem nervous," he said.

"I'm very good at seeming like I'm not nervous," you smiled. "I learned it somewhere along the line."

The look he gave you was different from the other, careful expressions of the last hour - quicker, unguarded, the kitchen look, and it lasted only a second before the restaurant settled back around you, but it was enough.

You finished dinner. The food was excellent throughout, and the conversation found a better rhythm in the second half - helped by the frank exchange about nerves, by the loosening that always came from naming a thing. It was not the effortless current of the kitchen, not quite, but it was better. More honest. He made a dry remark about the dessert menu. You told him something that had happened at work that made him press his lips together in the way he did when he was trying not to smile. 

It was good, genuinely good, and underneath it you were aware of the thing that was still slightly off - the production-of-a-date quality of the evening, the white tablecloth between you - and you were thinking about how to address it.

The waiter returned, and Baelor asked for the bill with the quiet skill of someone who had been planning to do so for the past several minutes, and when it arrived he positioned it on his side of the table with a naturalness that made very clear the conversation was not going to happen.

"Let me -" you started.

"No," he said.

Just that. Pleasantly, with the finality of a person who had already settled this question internally some time ago and saw no reason to revisit it. You looked at him. He looked back at you with a  mild steadiness, as though he were waiting for the objection to resolve itself.

"It's a very expensive restaurant," you protested.

"I chose it," he said. "So it’s only fair that I pay."

You could have pressed it. You looked at his expression and decided not to, and he signed the receipt without letting you see the total, which you appreciated, and put his card away, and that was that.

You were quiet for a moment, watching him, thinking. The evening had been good in parts and stiff in others, and you were not going to let it end on the stiff parts. Not when you knew - with the certainty of twelve Mondays behind knowing - that the Baelor from the kitchen was in there somewhere underneath the suit and the careful posture, and that what he needed was not a better restaurant or better conversation topics but simply something to do with his hands. A task. A shared, unstudied thing that neither of you was performing. That was what had always worked.

"We should get ice cream," you suggested.

He looked at you.

"There's a place two blocks from here," you said. "I passed it on the way."

He looked around, briefly, at the restaurant - the other tables, the candlelight, the dessert menu sitting unopened between you - and then back at you. "It's December.”

"I know."

"It's quite cold."

"I'm aware of the temperature."

"We're in a restaurant," he said, as though it were mildly absurd.

"A restaurant without ice cream," you replied. "I checked the dessert menu. They have something called a deconstructed opera cake and something called a warm valrhona chocolate fondant."

"Both of which are -"

"Fine," you said. "But I want ice cream."

He looked at you for a long moment, and the corner of his mouth did the thing it did. "Alright.”

—

The cold outside was sharp and immediate, the December kind that made itself known in the first breath and stayed known. You had your coat and your flowers, and he had his coat, and the street was quieter than the restaurant side of things - mostly offices, one late-closing stationery shop, the pavement lit at intervals by the street lamps. 

It was immediately better than the restaurant. Not because the restaurant had been bad - it had been, objectively, excellent in every way a restaurant could be excellent - just because this was unrehearsed. There was no tablecloth. There was no ambient propriety. There was just the cold, and the street, and him walking beside you.

You had noticed this about him over twelve Mondays. He was always more himself when he was moving, occupied with something with an end-goal. The best conversations had happened when there was a task - when the hollandaise needed watching, or the dough needed kneading, or the sauce needed reducing - the talking always easier when neither of you was thinking about the talking. 

Out here with the restaurant was already behind you, and with it the suit's particular weight, the stiffness of the evening began to ease from his shoulders in the way things eased when a person stopped performing a version of themselves.

He walked beside you with a distance that was careful and slightly formal, and you smiled into the cold air ahead of you.

"You're going to tell me it was a perfectly good restaurant with perfectly good dessert," you said.

"It was a perfectly good restaurant with perfectly good dessert," he said.

"And that ice cream in December is -"

"Inadvisable," he said.

"And yet."

"And yet," he agreed, dry and easy, and you felt something in your chest settle - the tight anxious note of the evening beginning to release.

The ice cream shop was small, and warm, and lit with the slightly excessive cheerfulness of a place that had committed fully to an aesthetic of aggressively cozy - string lights, a chalkboard menu, mismatched chairs, the smell of sugar and waffle cone so thick in the air you felt it physically when you pushed through the door. Two other couples, a group of teenagers in the far corner. No white tablecloths.

Baelor looked around the room, eyes flitting around it as he made a rapid assessment. "Welcoming," he decided.

"Very," you said. "What do you want?"

He looked at the chalkboard. Read it with the brief comprehensive attention he gave menus. "Vanilla," he said. "One scoop."

"Just vanilla?"

"Is there a reason it shouldn't be just vanilla?"

"There are forty-three options on that board."

"I know," he was looking up at the board. "Vanilla."

You got two scoops of something involving salted caramel and brownie pieces, which he looked at with the polite neutrality of someone choosing not to comment, and you took the mismatched chairs by the window because that was clearly the right place to sit, and he tasted the vanilla with the focused attention he had brought to everything else both tonight and during classes, and was quiet for a moment.

"That's good," he said, with what sounded like genuine surprise.

"Of course it's good."

"I didn't say I doubted it."

"Your face said you doubted it."

"My face," he said, "is perfectly neutral."

"Your face," you said, "said ‘I am a fifty-year-old man eating vanilla ice cream in December and I have reservations about this’, both literally and figuratively."

A pause. And then he laughed - not the small, quiet exhale that was his usual concession to amusement, a real laugh, brief and genuine, the laugh of someone who had been caught and was not unhappy about it. The sound of it in the warm, bright little ice cream shop after the careful orchestrated evening was so unexpectedly good that you felt it from your chest to your fingertips.

"To be fair," he said, composing himself, "the reservations were about the temperature, not the ice cream."

"And now?"

"The temperature remains inadvisable," he said. "The ice cream is very good."

"High praise."

"I'm selective with my compliments," he said. "Not stingy."

You ate. The teenagers in the corner were loud and cheerful about something on someone's phone. The couple nearest the door were sharing a sundae with the practiced ease of years. The string lights threw a warm, uneven light over everything, and the cold outside the window was visible as a darkness and a faint mist where the warm air from the shop met December.

"Tell me something," you said. "Something you haven't told me."

He considered it with the seriousness he gave most things, and you watched the slight movement of thought cross his face - the brief assessment, the selection. "I've been thinking about getting a dog.”

You looked at him.

"Matarys has been advocating for it for years," he explained. "When the boys were young, I always said no - impractical, hours too long, nobody home. And then they left, and the logic became that it was even more impractical." He turned the small cup in his hands. "But I made soup last Sunday, ate it alone in the kitchen, and thought about it."

"What changed?" You asked.

"The kitchen is different now," he said. "Since October." Simply, without emphasis, in the way he said things that were just true. "I'm in it more. It feels like a different room."

You sat with that for a moment and chose not to read into it too much. "What kind of dog?"

"Something medium-sized. Something that can keep pace when I run."

"Do you know anything about dogs?"

"Less than I knew about cooking in October," he said. "Which was very little."

"So your plan is to read several books and proceed methodically."

"That is generally my plan," he agreed.

"Has it worked out for you?"

He looked at you. The look had the quality of the one from the kitchen - unguarded, the kind that didn't bother composing itself first. "It has," he said. "On balance, fairly well recently."

"Does the dog have a name?" You prodded. "In your head."

He looked briefly surprised, as though this was a step he had not yet arrived at, and then the slight tell of someone disclosing something earlier than intended. "Arthur.”

"Arthur," you repeated.

"It's a good name."

"It is," you agreed. "For a very dignified medium-sized dog who runs."

"Exactly," he said, with a dry completeness. He had committed to this bit and was not backing down from it, and you laughed, and he looked at you the way he looked at you when he had made you laugh, which was quietly and without making any fuss of it, and the rest of the evening opened up from there.

You talked about nothing in particular and everything in general - the dog, Rowan, whether twelve weeks was enough to actually learn to cook or whether you were both just competent beginners with a certificate. Baelor maintained that Rowan would have strong opinions about the restaurant's halibut preparation. You maintained she would simply be pleased that someone was cooking. Neither of you was entirely wrong, and the argument was easy, and warm, and entirely without the stiffness of the restaurant, and at some point during it you became aware that this - the ice cream shop, the string lights, the cold outside the window, the easy back and forth of it - was the date you had actually wanted.

"You're different here," you said, eventually.

"Different from what?"

"From the restaurant." You turned your now empty cup in your hands. "At the restaurant you seemed like you were following a procedure."

He was quiet for a moment. "I wasn't sure what the right register was," he admitted, with a straightness. "I wanted to get it right. So I defaulted to what I knew, which was -"

"The client dinner version," you said.

He looked at you. "Yes," he agreed. "That's about right.”

"The right register," you began, "is just the one from the kitchen. That's the only one I wanted."

He was quiet for a moment, receiving this. "I wasn't sure it would be appropriate," he said. "For a first date."

"Why not?"

"Because in the kitchen we were - partners," he said. "Working toward something. I wasn't certain that translated, or whether you'd come tonight expecting something else entirely."

"It translates," you said.

He nodded, once, slowly. "Good," he said - which was, from him, as close to relief as the register allowed, and it was enough.

"Was that so hard?" You asked.

"Moderately," he said. "Yes."

You laughed, and he smiled - the real one, the one that changed his face briefly and completely - and you stayed in the ice cream shop until your cups were both empty and there was no particular reason to stay longer, and even then neither of you moved immediately. There was something about the evening, the way it had settled into itself in the second half, that neither of you seemed quite ready to close.

Eventually you got up, and the cold outside was a shock after the warmth of the shop, and you both pulled your coats closer and stood on the pavement for a moment while your eyes adjusted to the dark and your lungs adjusted to the temperature.

"The car's back this way," he told you.

"Ah," you said. "I came from the station."

You walked. The street was quiet in the way of Saturday nights that had passed their peak - a few other people here and there, a bar further down with music coming faintly through its walls, but mostly just the cold, and the lamps, and the pavement. Your shoes had made their feelings about the evening known since the restaurant, and you were walking with a slightly careful gait now, and at some point, without announcing it, he slowed his pace to match yours, which you noticed and said nothing about.

You still had the flowers. They had survived the restaurant and the ice cream shop and were still more or less intact, which felt like its own small achievement.

"Thank you for the flowers," you said, because you had said it when he gave them to you and meant it, and you still meant it now, differently - with the full weight of the evening behind it rather than just the surprise of the gesture.

He looked over at you. "You've been carrying them all night."

"I know. I don't mind."

"I didn't think about the logistics of -" he paused, with the slight compression of someone acknowledging a gap in their planning.

"It's fine," you nearly giggled. "They're ranunculus. They're hardy."

"You know what they are."

"I took a botany elective in my second year," you said. "Largely useless, but occasionally applicable."

He was quiet for a moment, an amused look on his face. The street lamp above you cast its yellow ring of light, and the cold was dry and still, and the walk back to his car was, you realized, one of the better parts of the evening - unhurried, unrehearsed, nobody performing anything.

"I had a good time," you said. "Tonight. The second half of it."

"The ice cream," he said.

"And before that. The restaurant improved."

"It had a low point," he said, plainly.

"You recovered," you said. "The deposition exhibit line was a low point."

"You asked me about that," he defended, and then thought for a moment. "I take your point."

"You set your fork down very deliberately afterward."

"I was recalibrating," he said.

"Is that what that was?"

"That is what that was," he said, and there was something in the way he said it - unbothered, not defending himself, just stating the case - that was so precisely the kitchen Baelor that you smiled at the pavement ahead of you and did not try to hide it.

His car was where he had left it, in a side street off the main road, and he unlocked it and looked at you before he opened the passenger side door to let you in. "I'll drive you," he said. Not as an offer exactly - more as a statement of what was going to happen, delivered in the same register as the temperature remains inadvisable and that is generally my plan, a settled thing that had already been decided.

"You don't have to," you said, though in truth the idea of the metro in December with an armful of ranunculus had limited appeal.

"I know," he said. "I'd like to."

You got in.

His car was warm, and quiet, and clean in the way his things seemed like they would be - the kind of car that had been maintained rather than just owned. He drove the way he did everything else, without rushing, with full attention, and you gave him the address and watched his face in the ambient light of the dashboard as the navigation resolved. 

He said nothing. The streets became narrower, the shops smaller, the general quality of the neighborhood shifting in the way it shifted when you crossed the invisible line between the parts of the city that were expensive and the parts that were not. He drove. He said nothing, and you were grateful for it, and you looked out the window at the streets you knew and thought that you were not ashamed of where you lived, not exactly, just aware of the metaphorical distance between where you were and where he came from, which had always been there and was simply more visible tonight.

He found parking without difficulty, which was more than you ever accomplished, and you were already getting out by the time he came around, which he registered and said nothing about.

The building was what it was. A converted Victorian terrace, imperfectly divided, your studio at the top of a narrow staircase with a window that leaked cold air around the frame in winter and a kitchen the size of a generous wardrobe. 

You had made it as nice as you could, the way you made everything as nice as you could with what you had, and you were not ashamed of it - not exactly. You were just aware of it, the way you were always aware of the other things that marked the distance between where you were and where he came from. The restaurant had made that distance very visible, and standing on this street, in this neighborhood, with him beside you, it was visible again in a different way. 

He looked at nothing in particular. Said nothing. He simply walked beside you toward the door, and if the neighborhood registered in any notable way in his internal accounting, his face gave absolutely no indication of it.

He walked you to the front door of the building, and you stopped on the small step under the shallow overhang, and the cold was close, and the street lamp behind him put his face in a half-shadow, and you stood there with your flowers.

He stood with his hands in his coat pockets, and neither of you said anything for a moment. The evening sat between you - the restaurant, and the ice cream shop, and the car, and the walk, and twelve Mondays before all of it, the whole accumulation of how you had arrived at this doorstep on this particular night - and it was very quiet, just the cold, and the lamplight, and the dark beyond it.

You looked at him.

He was looking back at you with an expression that was not any of the restaurant expressions, not the careful, restrained versions from the white tablecloth, not the unguarded ice cream shop version either. Something newer. Something with fewer edges. The direct, fully present quality was there - it was always there, it was one of the most consistent things about him, the thing that had been doing something to your chest since approximately week three and had not stopped - but underneath it was something that was not managed at all, something that had not decided yet what it was going to do with itself.

He was very still.

You were aware of his breathing in the cold air - visible, very slightly, each exhale a faint cloud in the lamplight - and the way it had slowed to something careful. You were aware of your own, which had done something similar, a quieting, a particular attentiveness, the body's involuntary response to proximity and something it recognized even when you were still deciding what to call it.

The street was very still. The cold was very still.

He had not moved. He was looking at you with an expression that held everything it had been holding for twelve weeks and was not, you thought, going to do anything about it on his own. 

That was simply not how he was built - he had told you as much, without saying so directly, in all the ways he had held himself back over the Mondays, in the careful control over every look that had lasted a beat too long, in the word alright said from somewhere that had finally stopped arguing rather than anything so active as a decision. 

He would stand here in the cold until the heat death of the universe before he reached for something he was not sure he was allowed to reach for.

That was all right. You had always known it would come to you.

You looked at him for a long moment, one beat, two, the length of a decision being made from somewhere past the arguing stage, somewhere simple and clear on the other side of all the weighing of it.

Then you leaned up, and kissed him.

It was deliberate - not sudden, not accidental, the product of a long pause, and a clear choice, and the knowledge of exactly what you were doing. His mouth was warm against the cold, and he was very still for just a moment, the stillness of someone receiving something unexpected and carefully not fumbling it, and then his hand came up from his coat pocket and rested at your jaw - just rested there, light and certain, the way he did things - and he kissed you back.

It was not a long kiss. It was not a complicated one. It was the kind of kiss that was a beginning rather than an arrival - careful, and real, and honest in the way he was honest about things, without embellishment, without anything unnecessary.

You stepped back.

He looked at you, his hand coming down from your face slowly, and his expression was the one you had no name for yet, something you had not seen before tonight, quieter than anything from the twelve weeks and very still.

"Goodnight," you said.

"Goodnight," he said. His voice was very precisely even.

You went inside. The door closed behind you, and you stood in the entry for a moment in the warm and the quiet, with the ranunculus in your arms, and you were smiling, and the cold outside was very cold, and you did not mind it at all.

---

a/n: i posted this from my phone, so if there are mistakes... no there aren't

He was gentle that night. Nothing like what you had been warned of growing up. He treated you like a princess (which you now were) taking his time, putting his mouth to your cunt in hopes of making the main act less painful. It was the wedding night most girls could only dream of.

And dream you did. Every night after, every minute of every day, your mind conjured up the most sinful scenarios. You would zone out over dinner watching Baelors hands and he cut up his food. How they flexed, how precise they were. He would call out your name clearly concerned by the look in your eyes but you would always brush it off.

Sex was always amazing with him, but part of you wanted more. He was always so soft and slow with you, treating you like you might break at the slightest touch. But in your dreams you imagined his strong arms flipping you over like a ragdoll, his veiny hands spanking and groping at your ass, his velvety voice teasing and condescending you. You wanted The Hammer.

You laid in your shared bed and Baelor sat at the desk in the corner of your chambers finishing up some correspondence when you decided to act.

“Baelor,” You call out softly.

“Yes, my love?”

“Will you come to bed please? Im lonely.” You played it up a little, pouting your lips and fiddling with the bottom of your nightgown.

He sighed, signing off the letter he was writing before walking over to the bed and laying next to you. “Better?” He asks leaning in to kiss you gently.

“Much.” You take the opportunity to deepen the kiss, testing the waters by biting at his bottom lip. He smiles and follows your lead- his hands still moving much too carefully for your liking. You swing a leg over him and seat yourself in his lap never breaking the kiss and plucking his hands from your waist, placing them instead on the fat of your ass. “You know, I think of you all day, husband.”

“Mm.” He moans against your lips. You place your hands over his and encourage him to squeeze harshly.

“Things that a lady should never think about.” You pant against his lips as you speak. “It is all I think about Baelor. You, your hands, your cock. I wish for you to ruin me- completely.” He squeezes his eyes shut almost like your words hurt him physically. “I want you to be rough with me, do not treat me so gently. I am a Princess only by marriage, I will not break so easily.” You start grinding your hips against his hardening cock that presses against you through his breeches and kissing down the path of his neck.

“You could have told me this, my love.” He sounds breathless but still confident.

“I was scared you would think of me differently- but I cant keep it in any longer. I need you in every way imaginable, I want you to have your way with me.”

He flips you onto your back, hovering over you, mismatched eyes scanning over your body as hes done before only with a more hungry look in his eyes. “You will tell me if its too much?”

You nod frantically at the man above you. “Yes, I promise.”

He moves you again as though you are weightless, turning you on your front and lifting your ass up to meet his hips, smacking the soft flesh. “Good girl.”

As we enter my apartment I try to ignore my heart pounding in my chest and the way my fingers tremble as I turn the key. It is strange how I was this nervous. I had already been with Baelor. Him simply stepping into my apartment was not a big step. But it felt like it was. Besides, it was not just that. It was not just him stepping into my small apartment clustered with books and trinkets. It was knowing who he was. The picture of him had become more clear. And unfortunately it was a picture that I liked. I liked it a lot. 

“I’ll put the kettle on” I say and move to the kitchen, which to be fair is only separated from the living room and hallway with a kitchen island.

“So, this is your apartment," Baelor says, his voice smooth and low. When I glance his way I can see him looking at my bookshelf - and I curse at myself because I realize it had been ages since I had dusted it. 

“Yes, this is my apartment” and then my thoughts drift back to his so-called apartment. “Although compared to yours, this is more of a storage closet” He laughs at that and walks up to me, standing by my side at the kitchen counter while still keeping a small distance from me.

“It is more than that. It is very you” This makes me turn to him with an eyebrow raised. 

“Dusty shelves and a kitchen in need of a renovation?”

“No. It is warm and honest.” He flashes his smile at me and my breath hitches slightly in my throat. 

“Is that what I am?”

“Yes. I think so”

Then silence falls between us. The only sound coming from the electric kettle as I pull out my box of assorted teas. The silence with Baelor was just as easy and comfortable as conversation with him. Other people’s silence made me overthink and nervously blurt out something to fill the quiet. His silence did not. 

“So, I gather that you did not tell Kiera my name?” He says and breaks the silence.

“No,” I say and take out two mugs, trying to see if I had any that even slightly matched each other - I did not. All of my mugs were different and came from various thrift shops as well as museum gift shops.  “I didn’t tell her much of that night.”

In the corner of my eye I see his grin widen across his face. “You obviously told her something.” My face flushes red at that. 

“I will kill Kiera”

“You keep saying that and I might have to tip off the police” That pulls out an unexpectedly loud laugh from me. 

While I wait for the water to boil I inch myself closer to him. My gaze  being on his hand that he had placed on the kitchen counter. “For what it's worth,” my voice coming out quiet. “I did mean what I told her” 

He does not respond at once and despite my nerves screaming at me to blurt out an excuse, I do not. Instead I look up at him, his smile is gone and instead his eyes are looking at me with a darker gaze than he had earlier during the night. 

“Is that so?” he asks, his voice matching my quiet one. I only nod at first. Then the drinks from earlier during the night causes me to be bold.

“That night is all I’ve been able to think about these past weeks” I hear him do a sharp inhale at my words. My eyes meet his as I let my hand come up next to his hand, waiting to see if he will breach the distance.

He does. He puts his hand over mine, letting his thumb start moving in small circles on the back of my hand. “Then I am glad that I am not the only one haunted by that night” 

“Haunted is it?” My voice comes out smooth as I step even closer, smelling his cologne and smelling him again - sweet yet earthy. I already felt how wetness started to pool between my legs. 

“Yes.” He lets his free hand come up and tuck a strand of loose hair away from my face, then he lets his hand stay on my cheek. “I kept thinking of how I let something - someone - so wonderful slip through my fingers. Kept thinking that I’d never see you again. Kept thinking about what I’d do if I did.”

I feel his breath on me, yet neither of us leans in the last few centimeters. Instead we stay there, the warmth of our bodies meeting between us and only adding to the thick and heavy tension. 

“And what would you do then” the whisper lands in the space between us - and then he removes it. He crashes his lips on mine, the hand that was on my cheek is now in my hair, the hand on the counter goes to my waist - pulling me flush against him. The moan that falls against his lips is not something I can control. Not after two months of wanting. Not after two months of trying to forget him. Not after two months of touching myself at the mere thought of him.

After minutes, or hours for I could not tell you, we break the kiss with both of us breathing desperate breaths. He leans his forehead against mine and laughs. “I think the kettle was ready minutes ago.” 

“I do not care” I say and crash my lips to his again, letting my hands travel over the body that I thought I’d never get to caress again. Then my lips travel to his jawline covered in his grey beard, then his neck all while my hands went up to unbutton his shirt. A teasing smirk takes place on my lips as I leave kisses on his neck that he stretches out for me to give me more room. “Unless you’d rather drink tea?” 

“Absolutely not” His voice comes out low and gruff while his hands squeezes my hips. “You look stunning in this skirt and blouse” He says breathless while I undo the last button on his shirt. 

“Kiera said I looked like someone’s mom” I say while recalling my best friend’s brutal honesty when it came to fashion. 

“A gorgeous mom then, and-” I interrupt his sentence by licking at his pulse point and then biting down on it, causing him to whimper. My hands move on his now bare chest. Feeling the toned muscles underneath. Then I let my lips travel down from his pulse point to his chest and down to his stomach while dropping on my knees. When I reach his waistband I see his dark happy trail and I almost moan at the sight. I let my tongue slide along the dark hairs causing him to grip my hair while groaning my name. My eyes go up to him while my fingers toy with his belt. The question in them being clear - may I?

“You do not have to” he stutters out before closing his eyes. “But if you want to then, …please” I smile while unbuckling his belt and pulling down his pants. He helps me to free his length from his boxer briefs and when I see it again I feel like I am soaking through, not only my underwear, but also my skirt. I might actually be dripping right there on the floor of my kitchen. 

He takes my awe as hesitation and he adds: “I am clean. Regularly tested” Which causes me to laugh before biting my lip and looking up at him.

“Good. Me too. IUD too, if you wanted to know.” He goes to say something in response but before he can I let my tongue go across his length causing him to moan. Then I put my mouth on him, slowly taking each and every part of him until I feel him in the back of my throat. Tears are welling in my eyes and I could not care. Instead I move my mouth on him while letting my tongue work him, and gently putting my hands on his balls. 

I focus on the taste of him, salty but pure. I had never enjoyed going down on a man. But I quite enjoyed going down on Baelor, especially when it made him groan and let praises fall from his lips while holding my hair. You’re extraordinary. You undo me. You are so good for me. So so so good.

His praise only furthers the wetness pooling and I clench my thighs together to try to calm myself - it does not work. So instead I only moan in frustration against his length - causing him to twitch against my tongue. Then his hands in my hair yank me away. 

“I do not wish to be done yet, my sweet girl” The nickname could’ve made me finish right and there. I had dreamed of hearing him say it again. 

His hands go from my hair to my hands and he helps me to my feet before kissing me again - unbothered by the taste of himself on my lips. 

Without breaking the kiss I guide us into my bedroom and I push him onto the bed. He lays there, his shirt undone and length waiting for me hard and ready. “Take off the rest of your clothes” I say, not quite sure what came over me. I guess months of wanting the same man made me more demanding than I had ever been. He does not seem to mind this, instead he complies. 

I take off my skirt first, and then my blouse. As I stand there in the lace lingerie that I had worn in hopes that Kiera and Valarr actually would succeed in finding me a guy. I was very happy that they had not.

Baelor looks at me where he now lays naked on the bed, as he looks over my body he gulps before speaking. “Take it all of. I cannot wait anymore for you, sweet girl.” I listen to his words, but I do not rush

Instead as I reach for one of the straps of my bra I speak. “I tried to go on dates these weeks without you.” I say, my eyes never leaving his. “Each time was more horrible than next.” The strap falls and I move to the other. “All I could do was compare them to you.” Letting my fingers move slowly before dropping the next one as well. “Every time i came home all alone and all I could do was think of the night with you.” Unclasping my bra and letting it fall. Then my hand goes to the waistband of my lace panties that were completely fucking soaked. “And each night I would have to settle with my fingers instead of you.” He groans at my words while my panties drop to the floor and I go to settle in his lap.

I lean down to kiss him and his hands go up to my hips, holding them with a grip that is sure to leave a mark. He pulls away from the kiss and lets his lips travel down to my now naked breast. His lips go to suck on one of my nipples while the other got the attention from one of his hands. 

“Baelor-” I moan while grinding my hips down on his thighs, making him leave a delighted sound against my nipple before pulling away from it with a wet sound. 

“You are soaked my sweet girl.” His hands move to my hips and guides me as I rut against his thigh. “Here you took your sweet time teasing me, all the while you were desperate.” 

“Please Baelor I-”

“You were clean?” he interrupts me by asking and I nod while telling him of the last time I was tested. “IUD?” I nod at that while still rutting at his thigh, leaving a wet mess. “Do you still want to use a condom?” His voice falling into a more soft tone.

“Fuck no” I say before crashing my lips against his. While his tongue enters my mouth, I feel how he guides his tip against my entrance and when he is positioned I slowly inch down. I take all of him, and then sit to slowly adjust to his size. 

“You are doing so well for me, my love” he says while rubbing circles on both of my hips. “I didn’t use my fingers or mouth and you are still taking me so well” I cannot answer him, the only sounds from my mouth are small whimpers at feeling him filling me completely. One of his hands goes up to my clit and starts moving in the pattern he had learned worked on me the last time. “Move when you feel ready, sweet girl” 

I do. I move up and down, finding a pace that makes my name slip from his lips. My hands go up to his dark chest hair, gripping onto them while riding him. My eyes are on his face, seeing his eyes watching me on top of him. But then, my eyes drift downward to his arms. The bicep on the arm whose hand is on my clit, is slightly flexed - showcasing just how strong it is. The thought is barely formed when I lean down, my lips kissing the skin of his bicep before sucking on it. He moans at the contact and his circles on my clit go a little faster while I am still grinding on his length. 

I let my tongue drag on his bicep where small beads of sweat had started to form. Then I let my teeth come out and bite the muscles causing him to twitch inside of me while a groan leaves his mouth.

“You sure do love biting, sweet girl” 

“Only you” I say against his skin, causing him to stir under me. He sits up and pulls me closer in his lap.

“Is that so?” He says while I move against him and drop my forehead against his - our eyes meeting.

“Yes” The word comes out somewhere between a breath and a moan. The new angle makes him hit the soft spot inside of me and I feel how a tight coil is already forming in my belly. “Gods, Baelor I am close”

He does not respond with words. Instead he drops his head and he goes to suck on my breasts while still moving his hand in circles on my clit. 

“Baelor I-”

“I know my love, let go” He says against my nipple and then bites down on it. The sting of it causes the feeling in my belly to burst and I finish right then and there. He helps me through it by meeting my pace with upward thrusts. 

When my trembles still he goes up from my breasts and kisses me, deep and thorough. Then his hands go to my waist and lift me slightly to then guide me to lay down on the mattress. He turns me so I lay on my side and then he lays behind me.

“Lift your leg, sweet girl” I obey, and feel his chest against my back as his length pushes at my entrance again. “I have missed you so much” he murmurs against my neck as he pushes in his length. The feeling of him being inside of me again causes me to let out a sound that is as much of a sob as it is a moan. 

“I’ve missed you too,” I say while he starts to rock into me while his hands caress my body. “Every day” 

My words make him pick up his pace, his hips slamming into my backside while his length repeatedly touches the spot inside me that makes me insane. His hand goes to my front to rub circles on my sensitive bud again. 

“I want you to cum again before I finish” he says while moving against me. “ You can do it, sweet girl. I know you can”

My head falls back against him as I feel the familiar coil in my stomach already forming. The sounds of our moans and our skin slapping together echoes against my bedroom walls and the sounds alone make the coil tighter and tighter. He moans my name against my neck before sucking down on it and that is what makes me fall apart again. 

 “There we go, so good for me” He says while continuing to slam into me - his thrusts picking up speed. “Where do you want it?”

“My mouth” My words surprised me as I said it. ” Please, Baelor”  My begging is what makes him pull out and I move quickly to make my mouth ready for him. He pulls at his length in fast strokes and then he cums and my mouth is on him right away. I swallow every drop of it. The salty taste being addictive. 

He puts his hands on the sides of my face and kisses me softly, while gently dragging his thumb across my flushed cheeks. “I am so glad I got stood up that night” he whispers against my lips.

“I am so glad Valarr got you to pick us up tonight” I whisper back and  he laughs against my lips before bumping his nose with mine. 

…

When the sun cascades on me through the window I feel Baelors breath on my neck, his arm slung across my waist. We had stayed tangled all night and although I had appreciated his breakfast last time, I much preferred to wake up next to him. 

I turn in his arm so that my face meets his. I look at how soft his face looks while sleeping next to me. Besides his grey hair, he looked younger like this. One could hardly believe that this man sleeping on my flower-pillowcase was a CEO of a tech company. I let my lips meet his cheeks, in a soft and gentle kiss. Then I move them across his face causing him to stir underneath my lips. 

“This is the best wake up I have gotten in years” his voice being gruff and low. I only hum in response while continuing to kiss down his neck before laying my head down on his chest. One of his hands goes to stroke my head while his arm around my waist pulls me closer. “I guess you have to uncross that item on your list.” I lift my head and look at him. “It’s not a one night stand anymore” he says wearing a crooked smile. 

“I do not care” I say laying down on his chest, right above his beating heart. “ I’ll take it off the list. I don’t really feel the need to have one any more” 

This makes his arm pull me tighter while kissing my hair. “Good” he mumbles against my head. We lay there together, the quiet taking over us as we simply enjoyed each other’s presence. That is, until both of our phones started buzzing with text, after text, after text. 

We look at each other and we both reach the same conclusion. “They were fine when we dropped them off” I say while trying to ignore the continuous buzzing of text messages rolling in. 

“Well, things turn quickly for them” he says and kisses my head before we both move toward our phones. 

Our suspicions had been correct. Kiera was now bombarding me with messages about a fight she was having with Valarr. I sighed as I put on my underwear, as well as Baelors shirt before moving out into the living room and calling her. 

As soon as she picks up she starts ranting about what Valarr had done. All I could do was hum and listen to her - for she did not waste a single breath. This was how it always was when the two of them fought. She called angry, ranting about how wrong he was. Then her rants started to get slower and slower and suddenly she is  crying about how wrong she is and how much she loves him. Then she hangs up saying an “I love you girl” and I respond saying the same thing.

I walk into the bedroom where Baelor still has the phone against his ear and I hear him say a quick goodbye to Valarr on the other end. He hangs up and puts it on the bedside table. We look at each other and smile as I climb onto his lap. 

“They really love each other” I say while settling on his thighs, his hands coming up to my hips.

“In a very intense way, yes” he say while laughing before pressing a kiss to my lips.

My hands go up to his hair - disheveled from the night before. “Have you ever had a love like that?” I say quietly while scratching his head, causing him to hum in satisfaction.

“In the beginning with Jena we were like that. We were teenagers so it was hard not to be all intense emotions and passion” He says while letting his hands move from my hips to my thighs and giving them a squeeze. “Then we had Valarr and Matarys and when you have kids you can’t live your life that way anymore. It’s not sustainable in the long run.” He moves his head slightly to kiss one of my wrists while I am still scratching his head. “And you? Have you had a love like that?” 

“Yes.” I say my hands dropping from his head and moving down to his shoulders, resting them there. “It was the longest relationship I had. It was intense and as we got older I realized that we couldn’t keep doing it. So, I tried to talk to him instead. Have discussions instead of arguments.” I swallow as a lump forms in my throat when I think back to the relationship. “He was not ready for that. So, each time we had an argument he responded with the opposite to my approach - he gave me the silent treatment.” My eyes drop to my hands on Baelor’s shoulders. His thumbs move in circles on my thighs as I continue to speak. “It started with a few minutes, then hours and then finally days. The longest was 10 days. And each time he came back he said the same thing. Did you think about what you did?”I shake my head at the memory. “He said that every time and I just accepted it because the silence made me believe that I was the only one that was guilty. Overthinking everything I had ever done until I convinced myself I was horrible.” A tear escapes me and one of his hands goes up to gently brush it away. “Kiera helped me realize that it was not a healthy relationship. She helped me leave.”

“Thank you for trusting me with that” he said, his voice quiet between us, while his hand still caressed my cheek and I leaned into it. “You deserved better than that” I kiss his hand while smiling down at him.

“Thank you” 

We sat there for a while until we both agreed that we should get some breakfast. He makes a french omelette while I make coffee that he said was “dangerously strong”. Before he left we exchanged numbers. This goodbye was different than the last time. Now there was a promise of more. A promise that we would see each other again. Although, we did agree not to tell anyone yet. Baelor had never introduced another woman to his sons  after their mother’s passing. Even though they were both grown up now he still did not want to rush things. Especially when the thing between us was still unnamed. I had no issue with the secrecy, if anything I did not mind keeping him and the memory of the night to myself. 

…

The following weeks Baelor was on several business trips. They were introducing new tech which Baelor had explained to me while on facetime but I had gotten distracted cause he was wearing his glasses which made him - somehow- even sexier. He was constantly in different time zones meaning that calls would always be in the middle of the night for one of us - causing them to be way too short since we both had work in the morning. 

Texting made it all easier. Telling each other about our days and what we wanted to do when he got back. My favourite thing was whenever Baelor sent pictures because they were so quintessentially him. He would send a picture of a park in the city he was in and simply write: Very good morning stroll. Wish you were here. The fact that he used periods in his sentences should cause me to overthink - it did whenever someone else used them. But not with Baelor. Because I knew that he did not even think twice about being grammatically correct and it made my chest warm at the thought.

 There would also be other pictures: of coffee that he said was almost as strong as mine, of book stores where they had a ‘very good selection’ and anything else that he said made him think of me. I would also send pictures to him. Small things in my everyday life - like the book I had finished that I wanted to lend him, or the dinner I had made off the recipe he had sent me. The only thing was that there was something lacking in our texts - we never sent selfies. Not a single photo of ourselves could be found in the conversations. I planned to change that. 

That night Kiera was coming over to have a girl’s night. Our girl’s night always meant the same thing: wine, old rom-com’s, gossip and wearing pajamas. Usually I wore my old set of pajamas that I’d had for way too long. Now, I had bought a new one. A night gown in silk that was still appropriate to only wear as pyjamas but still could have other purposes. I stand in front of the mirror and take a selfie and send it to him, adding the text: Ready for girl’s night. His response comes almost immediately: You look beautiful, my sweet girl. Then a few minutes pass before he sends a picture - this time a selfie of him. He is wearing his work clothes, his hair is fixed and he is smiling at the camera. The text reads : Ready for yet another meeting where I will be thinking of you. 

It made me smile and I heart the message going to respond something else when I hear Kiera knocking profusely at the door. 

…

“I am not saying you are a bad friend if you don’t come, I am just saying I would be severely disappointed in you” Kiera says while painting her toe-nails.

“Yeah,  but you also made it clear that since I do not have an invite that I’d have to be someone’s date” 

Kiera wanted me to come to a charity fundraiser thrown by the Targaryen corporation. She said that each time they were at one of these events that Valarr would be pulled into different business conversations, leaving her alone and bored. However, you could not just simply arrive at one of these things. There had to be an official invite - or you’d have to be a plus-one. 

“Not someone’s date, Valarr’s cousin Daeron’s date.” She said as if that was somehow supposed to persuade me. “He won’t try anything. He won’t be rude. If anything he will just be grateful that his father won’t berate him for bringing along someone the family deeply disapproves of.” 

I simply sigh before taking a sip of wine. I did want to go. To  find an excuse to be near Baelor - since the fundraiser was held the night after he came back. But I did not want to go as his nephew’s date. I wanted to go as his. But I knew I couldn’t

The phone call happened the day after. It was late and I had already tucked myself in when he called me - his voice smooth on the other end. The conversation is no different than our usual conversation. Everything flows effortlessly and a smile is on my face the entire time. That is until he clears his throat and his tone changes.

“I need to tell you something” he said and my heart drops. “There is a charity fundraiser when I come back”

“I know, Kiera told me” I thought that was it, but I heard in the exhale he did that there was more. My heart started beating faster in my chest. 

“My father is making me attend it with Margot Lannister.” I go still. Everyone knew of the Lannister family. Rich and gorgeous and always in the tabloids. “But I just hope you know that it is completely professional. I have no desire to actually be with her. I hope you know that.” 

I listen to his words. I knew that being in his position there were certain politics and games involved. This was one of them that I wish were not included - but alas, it was. When I do not say anything he says my name. 

“I’m here, I hear you” Because I knew he did not want her. If he did he would not bother calling me. “Kiera wants me to go as Daeron’s date”

Silence and then, “You should.”

“You think so?”

“Yes, then I get to see you that night.” His tone  getting warmer on the other end. “Besides, I think my brother will be ecstatic that his son brings a young woman like yourself as a date.” His words make me blush and I hesitate at first before responding.

“You know what? I’ll go.”

“Good.” he responds.

The next day I called Kiera and she screamed for several minutes before stating that she was going to become my personal shopper since I could not wear my “teacher clothes” to an event like this. She was not wrong. If Baelor was going to stand next to a Lannister I wanted to wear something that would make his eyes only be on me.

…

The woman looking back at me in the mirror did not look like me. Or she did but if my life did not consist of grading papers where students had completely ignored the instructions and then wondered why their grade was not higher.

Kiera had done my hair and makeup, but what really made me look elevated was the dress. A long satin emerald dress that was backless. Kiera claimed that this dress was like me - business in the front and party in the back. 

“So I am a mullet?” I ask her as I put my heels on.

“No” she says while fixing her dress in the mirror. “You are all professional and good girl when someone first meets you. Then with time you start showing your lil freaky side” She say smiling at me.

A knock is heard and Valarr steps in wearing a tailored tuxedo. “Look at you ladies” he says with a smile before walking up and kissing Kiera. Then when they break away he looks at me. “Daeron is gonna be one happy guy” Causing Kiera to slap his chest. 

“Don’t say that! She might back out.”

I did not back out. Instead we meet up with Daeron who looked me up and down with an already drunken haze. He did not give me a compliment, instead he simply gave me a thumbs up and then let his hand go to my lower back. To anyone else it looked like a gentleman guiding his lady into the fundraiser. But in reality it was him leaning his body weight against me so he would not fall on his ass. 

When we enter the gala it does not take long until I see Baelor with his date. Margot Lannister was close to his age - only two years younger. She used to be a model in her twenties and now she worked at one of the more prestigious fashion catalogues. 

I knew that they were only together here as a professional agreement. Yet I could not help but feel a sting as I saw him standing next to her. Because they made sense. They were the same age. They both had been married before. They were both incredibly successful. On paper she was a better choice than me - a fact that made a pit in my stomach grow larger and larger. 

Then his eyes meet mine. He gives me a small smile, so small that no one else would catch it. But I do. Then his eyes travel down to where Daeron’s hand is - on my lower back that was exposed by the cut of the dress. His eyes do not go up to meet mine after that, instead they turn to whatever man stood in front of him now. 

Time passed as I stood with Kiera and Daeron, drinking champagne while I tried to understand what charity this event was even for. Then my phone buzzes in my purse. I take it up and see that it is from Baelor: Take the elevator to the 11th floor. My office is in the end of the hallway - you cannot miss it. 

I manage to slip away and find the elevator, pressing the button and feeling how my pulse quickens. I had not seen him in so long. 

He was right about not being able to miss his office. It was at the end of the hallway and when I entered he was standing with his back to the door - looking out through the panoramic windows at the city below. 

“Hi” I say and he turns, as soon as he sees me he smiles his toothy big smile - the one that made his fangs show at the corner of his mouth. 

“Hi” We meet each other halfway and his hands go up to grab my waist. “You look absolutely beautiful, my sweet girl”

“You don’t look so bad yourself” Because gods know he did not. Wearing a suit that looked like it was made for him especially - probably because it was. 

His hands move toward my back and as he slides his fingers across my exposed back I shiver from his cold rings.

”This dress…” he says while his eyes go over me.

”Kiera’s work” I say while letting my lips form into a smirk.

”I must thank her then” he says while his hands squeeze me and then his lips to go my neck, causing my breath to hitch. 

”You didn’t seem to be pleased about it downstairs” the words coming out of me before I can think them over. He lifts his head from my neck and my eyes meet his mismatched ones.

”I was pleased about the dress” his voice is low as he says it. ”Just not about where my nephew had his hand on you”

”Is the great Baelor Targaryen jealous?” I say, a grin taking place on my face. 

”Yes” he answers and then his lips go up to the shell of my ear. ”And were you not jealous of Margot Lannister?”

The grin falls from my face. ”I wasn’t jealous” He raised his eyebrows at that” Okay perhaps a little jealous but mostly I was just…” my eyes fall to the floor while my fingers go to play with the fabric of my dress. ”She makes more sense than me” I whisper.

”What do you mean, darling?” He whispers, one of his hands going up to my cheek and lifts my head up so our eyes meet again.

”She is stunning, and rich and… your age” I say and bite my lip after the confession is out of me. 

”Listen to me, my sweet girl” he says while letting his thumb stroke my cheek. ” She may be all those things. But she does not talk to me the way you do. She does not care to listen to my talks of pottery. She made fun of my puzzles. She could not carry an intelligent conversation nor make me laugh.” He drops his hand and puts it back around my waist while his lips go to my neck. ”She does not make me feel intoxicated as soon as I touch her” Kiss. ”She has not kept me awake” Kiss. ”You do all these things to me, my sweet girl” Kiss. ”You are beautiful, and smart and you undo me each and every time we meet” Kiss.

I pull his face up from my neck and kiss him, moaning against his lips while tasting him again after all this time apart. His hands travel on my naked back and occasionally drops to squeeze the curve of my ass. As his tongue enters my mouth I can feel his length pressing against my thigh through his trousers.

”Please tell me that there is no one else on this floor” I whisper against his lips and he smiles.

”No, but we will have to be quick, my love” he says, as one of his hands comes up to touch my nipple through the sheer fabric of my gown. ”Keep our clothes on, simply pushing them aside - okay?” I nod before pulling him down in another kiss.

One of his hands travels up my dress while he guides me to his desk. His long and slender fingers find my slick folds - bare. He pulls back, his eyes dark. ”No underwear?” 

”They were too visible in the dress” Which was only a half-truth. For I had wanted the night to end with Baelor. I only did not expect all of this to happen while the event was still on-going.

He smirks at my words before kissing me - deep and hungry. His thumb goes to my clit while one of his fingers pushes in and when he presses I feel the cold metal of his ring against my sensitive folds - causing me to gasp against his lips. 

He pulls out his finger quickly. ”Sorry I forgot the rings I can-”

”No, Baelor” I say and grip at his arm,”Keep the rings on” I say before kissing his Adam's apple. He groans before letting his digit enter me again, stretching and making me ready for another. I can feel the coldness of the metal and I feel with each thrust how more and more of my juices cover them. ”Gods, Baelor”

He works his fingers up to a speed, his thumb circling my clit. Then he moves his lips to my ear, nibbling at my earlobe before whispering. ”You are the only one I want, my sweet girl. The only one I wish to touch like this”

His words, his fingers, his rings. All of it becomes too much and I finish - loudly. The sounds echoing in his office. He does not stop moving his fingers in me until I catch my breath. He kisses me and against my lips he whispers. ”Turn around, my love”

I turn around and I feel him lift my dress, then I hear his belt being unbuckled. He puts the tip of his length against my sore and aching entrance. Both of his hands go to my lowerback, he grips at it - surely leaving a bruise. ”I will have to teach my nephew not to touch you like that again”

I go to respond but then he pushes in and all that can leave my lips are moans while I lean across his desk. 

He waits a few seconds for me to adjust and then he starts slamming me into the desk. His length hitting parts of me I was not even sure existed. While he moves at a fast pace he keeps his strong grip on my lower back.

”You are mine, my sweet girl” he says. It is not said as ownership, but reassurance. Reassurance that although we do not make sense on paper. Although our dates tonight both seemed like more appropriate matches - we belonged to each other. 

”I am yours” I moan, while my face is pressed against some papers on the desk. ”And you are mine”

”Yes I am” he says, twitching inside of me. ”Can I please finish inside of you, my love”

”Yes” I groan. The thought of it making my second orgasm approach faster. ”Please, Baelor”

That is when he spits down on my lower back, pressing his spit on my skin while simultaneously picking up his pace. The sensations of it all bringing me closer and closer.

”Baelor I-”

”Cum my sweet girl, you can do it. I got you” And I cum once again on his hard length. ”So good my girl, so so good for me” he says while still pumping inside of me. It does not take long until I feel him twitch and then spill all of his seed inside me as he buries himself completely while saying my name over and over again.

He stays inside of me for a while, leaning over and kissing the back of my neck. When he pulls out I whimper at how empty I feel, then I feel how our mixed juices start running down my thighs.

”Please come over tonight” he says while we both fix our clothes before heading downstairs. ”I want to talk to you and be next to you” He kisses my cheek and I smile.

”Of course I’m coming over Baelor”

”Good” he removes a smudge of mascara from underneath my eye before kissing me again.

The rest of the gala was spent apart but at the end of the night I got a cab to his apartment. We fell asleep together that night, after starting to do one of the puzzles he had bought while he was away. Perhaps we did not make sense on paper, but the best things in life rarely were.