k4marina

The Targaryens believe that they have the fire of dragons coursing through their veins, but you aren't certain that it's true. If they did, you don't see how they could get anything done, at all. Because right now you do, and it's agony.

Everything hurts. From your head to your toes it feels like your body is filled with venom, burning beneath your skin, your muscles all convulsing in waves of destruction that leave you all but incapacitated. Milk of the poppy does not help, and nor does wine. If you were delirious it would probably be more bearable, but unfortunately your mind is devastatingly sharp. It feels like you have even more awareness of everything than you normally do— your skin is so hypersensitive that you can feel every fibre of your sweat-drenched chemise, and you can feel the temperature of every breath you take as it fills your lungs. The lights are too bright, sounds are louder, flavors more vibrant on your tongue. Every little thing that is happening around you gets filed into your mind so that you feel, in no uncertain terms, like you could fight an entire army yourself and survive. If you were able to move beyond the pain.

You've really done it this time. You didn't believe that the potion was anything dangerous; otherwise you wouldn't have put it in your wine. You were under the impression that it was just a little charm, something cooked up by a wise woman to make lovesick people sleep better at night. You expected it to put a gleam in your eye and a skip in your step, but not this.

"Put this in your wine and watch your love blossom like a rose in bloom," the old lady had told you as she pressed the vial into your outstretched hand. She had taken your coin readily enough and ignored the skeptical look that your lady's maid, Mircalla, had given her. "Drink deep. Enjoy the fortune of love."

Fortune of love, indeed. You're dying. You can tell just by the look on Maester Florin's face as he tests the remnants of the bottle in the corner with some convoluted apothecary setup he's constructed on your vanity table. You feel as though you have one eye on the bubbling beakers, and another eye on Mircalla as she sits by your bedside and dabs a damp cloth over your forehead.

"Is there anything I can get for you?" she asks quietly, and you know that she means well, but you have to physically stop yourself from smacking her hand away. The cloth is too rough on your forehead, scratching and squelching in your ears with the sound of the water, which smells of ale and sour fruit. Perhaps the bucket she used to bring the water in previously had been used to brew cider, but now it just makes the water stink.

"Nothing else, please," you croak at her with as much grace as you can muster. You lightly grab her wrist, squeeze it. "Thank you, Mircalla. Your services won't be needed anymore today, I think. I would not want you to see this any further."

"I am not certain that I should—"

"No. Go, please—" You just barely manage to turn your head away before a spasm of white-hot pain rips through your body, and you scream as you plant your face into your pillow. Both Mircalla and the maester jump at the shrillness of it.

"They're happening more frequently," you hear her mutter to him as she carries the bucket toward the door. "Shall I send for someone? A septon, perhaps?"

"Not yet, thank you. I must discuss the lady's affliction with her privately."

You close your eyes as if to block out the rush of sound that comes from the hall upon Mircalla opening your chamber door. You know that most— if not all— of your own family members, have retreated to other areas of the Red Keep. You assume that it's because you've been screaming loud enough to wake the dead, but perhaps there are other things happening in the castle that are more important than you managing to poison yourself.

"Maester," you grumble out dryly, your voice crackling in your throat. Now that the water is gone you aren't being assaulted by the smell of old cider, but the air still reeks of incense and acrid fumes from whatever his alchemy wrought. "I know I am dying. Just tell me why."

Maester Florin clears his throat and shifts on his feet, holding the little glass vial in his fingers. "My lady. You say that you bought this from a market stall?"

"Yes."

"And… did the seller tell you precisely what it was?"

"She said it was a potion," you tell him, tensing as a wave of pain swells up but then recedes before it can hit its peak, "to bring fortune in love. Nothing more."

There is a long silence, and you wonder if the maester has gone back to his work. You open your eyes a crack to look at him, but he is still standing in the same spot, seemingly deep in thought. Finally, he chances, "It is… not for me to ask what use you have of this potion…"

You groan, and it has nothing to do with the pain coursing through your body. You can't even gather the strength to cover your face in embarrassment, so you simply close your eyes.

It is common knowledge within the castle walls that Prince Daeron refused your hand in marriage after you were presented to him. He cited 'conflicting personalities' as the reason for his refusal— however, you had never had a complete conversation with Prince Daeron. There was no possible way that your personalities could be in conflict; you'd barely met him. Which meant that there was another reason for his refusal.

You knew that neither the King, nor the Crown Prince or his brother were pleased about it. It caused immense trouble for House Targaryen; your own family is one of the Targaryens' greatest allies, so it would only cause a rift between the two households if you were to be turned away with no good reason. House Targaryen could not afford to lose your family's alliance, and so you were asked to remain in King's Landing for another two weeks— or, to put it more plainly, until Prince Maekar or another of the Targaryens could convince Daeron to change his mind.

All of the muscles in your abdomen lock up, and what feels like a roaring hot fire rushes through your body all at once. You scream again, your back threatening to arch off the bed with your convulsing. It hurts so much. How could it possibly hurt so much? How could this little vial of fluid be enough to make you feel like you're burning alive from the inside out? You can hear your own scream ringing around the stone walls of the chamber, loud enough to startle a couple crows off of the eaves outside the open window.

While you're still curled into a ball on the bed, catching your breath, you hear a swift knock on the chamber door before it creaks open. There, you catch a whiff of spice and musk, rich and full. Your eyes fly open in horror as the source of the scent steps into the room with all the lordly grace of the seven kingdoms.

"Maester Florin," comes Prince Baelor Breakspear's voice, usually grounding and calming, but right now it hits you like a lightning bolt in the chest, knocking the very wind out of your lungs. "There seems to be much commotion. May I inquire as to how the lady is faring?"

Maester Florin bows. "Your Grace, I—"

"No."

The word tumbles out of your mouth before you can even stop it. Everything was manageable, more or less, until the Crown Prince entered the room, but now… now, his scent fills your lungs, his words are in your ears, you can practically taste him on the air, like peppercorn and sweet juniper. Your heart pounds in your ribcage like it's trying to escape, your blood singing with fire and your skin prickling with sweat.

You don't want to think about Prince Baelor right now. Each time he comes to mind, it's with an enormous wave of pain ripping through your entire body, as though the very thought of him causes the affliction to double its efforts to end you. Even so, in your mind you see the image of the Prince's concerned face when he stepped into your sick room one day ago, to make the same inquiry and send for a maester to attend you.

You have to get out. You have to leave before the next wave of pain kills you.

You're so tense that when you try to flop over on the bed, you look like a cockroach trying to right itself. "No. No no no no—" In spite of the pain in your muscles, you grab the corner of the goose down mattress and pull yourself toward the edge of the bed, until your upper body hangs off the side, limp as a wet rag.

"My lady, that is inadvisable—" Maester Florin rushes towards you as soon as your fingers meet the stone floor. "You will hurt yourself without assistance."

"Has she been like this the entire time?" Baelor's voice remains steady, but there is a newer, sharper quality to it: he's displeased. If you were to chance a look at him, you would see the carefully concealed worry beneath his practiced diplomacy, but you cannot bring yourself to look his way for fear that it might end you.

Instead, you continue trying to throw yourself from the bed, while Maester Florin actively tries to put you back in it. "No, Your Grace. Aside from the— the screaming—"

Florin's hand connects with your shoulder, and you just about punch him, the pain is so excruciating. Instead, you whack your hand against the front of his robes and bunch them in your fist to pull him close to your face.

"I asked you a question, Maester," you growl at him with a livid expression, watching his eyes widen at your sudden outburst. "Why is this happening?"

"You consumed a powerful aphrodisiac." He swallows, his eyes nervously flitting in Baelor's direction.

You make the grave mistake of following Florin's gaze, and you look at Baelor. The Hand of the King stands at the foot of your sickbed, his eyes focused on you, and only you. His face remains impassive, yet his fingers twitch as though he is contemplating what he can do to intervene.

You push Maester Florin away and begin frantically clawing your way back up the bed towards the headboard. You can feel it: the next wave of heat and pain, building in your toes and hands, inching down your limbs. "Nonono— Maid and Mother's fucking tits."

You manage to plant your face in the pillow before you let out another scream, but this time it seems worse, like you might actually split in half from the pain. You don't know how much more of it you can take. You've drenched your threadbare chemise in sweat, to the point that it doesn't really preserve your modesty anymore. All it does is stick to your damp, oversensitive skin, irritating you and making the sensory overload that much worse.

Once the pain subsides, you begin to rip at the offending garment in an attempt to draw it over your head. You're babbling nonsense, fragments of sentences and profanities that you don't even remember having in your repertoire, but you can still hear Maester Florin as he rattles off technical explanations to his Prince.

"—was purchased from a market stall— seems to be a tincture of moonbloom and gilliflower— another ingredient I have not yet identified—"

Before you can manage to muscle the useless chemise over your head, a hand settles on your back directly between your shoulder blades.

"Don't do that, my lady."

Baelor's voice is directly over your shoulder, gentle but stern. His hand presses solidly between your shoulders, holding the fabric of your chemise against your overheated flesh. You blink, seeing nothing but the headboard of the bed and cream colored linen, but feeling surrounded by him. His scent, his touch, his voice, so close and so strong, should hurt. It should hurt, because until now the barest touch has been agony, exacerbating the pain and torment.

But Baelor's touch does nothing. It's the oddest thing, enough to make you stop moving and tensing up for just a moment. You are still too hot, your skin is still too sensitive, but the only warmth and sensation that Baelor's hand brings is… comforting. Relief emanates from the single point of contact, bleeding through your body in tangible ripples that seem to stretch out down your spine and along your limbs.

That is, until the relief settles low. And then it becomes something else, something arguably worse than the pain. Your core muscles draw up tight and aching, and the heat and agony is replaced with devastating, almost crippling arousal.

You gasp, your back arching dramatically like that of a frightened cat, and you practically throw yourself away from Baelor with all the grace of a scared animal. Or, at least, you try to leap from the bed, but your body is sluggish, and Baelor Breakspear is nothing if not a quick combatant.

As soon as you try to take off, bouncing up like one of the crows into the air, Baelor's arm comes around your waist and drags you back down to the mattress. Try as you might to wriggle free and fling yourself to the floor, Baelor is strong, a force to be reckoned with.

"Stop this at once." Baelor's voice is still just as firm, but the gentility with which he orders you is… it's awful. He commands you with kindness and patience. "I will not abide you hurting yourself."

"Already hurts," you argue, although it's more of a lie the longer Baelor holds you.

It's as though he has the cure to your ailment within his very palms. But, while he holds you down, cradling you with your back to his chest, your arousal grows to a horrifying degree. You can feel your core muscles contract and release, the wetness between your legs smearing your thighs. There is a very likely chance that you may cum without any other form of stimulation, and you will not be able to survive that amount of humiliation. Perhaps he cannot abide you hurting yourself, but you cannot abide acting like a whore in the Prince of Dragonstone's arms.

You make a small, frantic noise in the back of your throat, and whimper, "I have to go. Let me go. Please. Please— Please. My lord, let me go. I have to go."

The small skirmish nears its end as you plant your hands on his forearm and try to push it away, but your hands are too weak and his arm is like a steel belt holding you down.

"Go where?" His voice is too close to your ear. You shiver in his arms, clamping your thighs together to stave off the new waves of heat coalescing between them. Goosebumps break out across your skin, and you feel your eyes widen. He sounds so fucking calm when he says, "There are several flights of stairs to descend before you reach the ground floor. Your only other option is the window, and you will break every bone in your body no matter which way you decide to go, unless you can walk. Can you walk?"

Only if you're touching me. You grit your teeth. "I have to try."

"No." It's Baelor who says it this time, and in spite of all your fighting, you can't seem to drum up any more of it.

You have to admit that it's a relief to not be in pain anymore, even if you have an entirely different set of problems to contend with, now. You slump forward in his arms, hanging your head as you dumbly squeeze at the fabric of his sleeve. "It is not proper for you to be holding me this way, Your Grace."

"I fear that it would be less proper of me to allow you to throw yourself from the window," Baelor explains rationally. Still, he releases his arm from around your waist, only bringing a hand up to move your hair away from your face. You have to physically fight not to press your overheated cheek into the cradle of his hand, like a cat seeking out affection. He pauses, and then says, "Maester, you said that you had not identified an ingredient of the tincture. Could it be dragon's breath?"

"No, Your Grace." Maester Florin speaks from across the room, where he retreated back to his apothecary setup. "With respect, I am familiar with dragon's breath. I would have been able to identify its presence with relative ease."

"She smells of it." Baelor does not say it unkindly.

"It is possible that while the tincture is in her system, the aphrodisiac effects may occur outwardly as well." Florin pauses, then clarifies, "That is, it will cause her to look, smell, or sound in ways that… some may consider… attractive, Your Grace."

Baelor remains silent. The implication hangs solidly in the air. You notice almost immediately that the maester did not include taste in that assessment, although it lingers in the subtext. The Prince is being effected by your presence, even if it is not to the same degree that you are being effected by his.

"You never answered my question, Maester," you finally interject. "Why is it killing me?"

You feel Baelor's fingers tense on your shoulder just slightly at the question, but he doesn't say anything. Instead, he waits while Florin seems to flounder for a moment, and then gently supplements, "Please answer the lady's question."

Florin looks deeply uncomfortable. "Your Grace, it's… of quite a delicate subject matter. I hesitate to cause yourself or the lady any offense—"

"Seven above, just spit it out, already!" You swipe your arm across your sweaty forehead, desperate to put an end to the hedging about. "I've been laying here dying for ages! What is it, what?"

"That's enough, now." Baelor holds a hand up to silence you, and you almost think you might bite it, except that he has such beautiful hands. You wouldn't want to mar them. You stare unabashedly at his silver ring and the lines on his palm, and you start… salivating.

Gods be good. You're going to eat him.

Florin hesitates only a second more. "This aphrodisiac… although the recipes differ across various regions, it is normally intended as a… a temporary cure for impotence and infertility. It is… I believe it is primarily used in brothels, to make— er… intercourse more— ehm. Pleasurable?"

You blink. "If it's meant to be pleasurable, then why does it hurt so much?" You still refuse to admit that you're already experiencing the so-called pleasurable function— that is, you're soaking the mattress with it the longer Baelor keeps his hand on your shoulder.

"Well, it is usually taken with the intention of… ehm. Using it for its innate purpose, you see. The aphrodisiac will remain in one's system until it has been expelled during copulation."

Baelor drops his hand from your shoulder and takes a step back. You feel the loss like a punch in the gut— quite literally, all of your muscles tighten at once, and you double over in pain.

Through clenched teeth, you say, "So, you mean I have to… to have sex?" The look on the maester's face says everything you need to know. "Or what? What if I don't? I'm— it hurts so much, I can't— I wouldn't be able to do anything… not on my own."

Your face burns at the admission. The humiliation— the irony of it all is unbelievable. The little lady took a love potion and now can't fuck herself properly enough to get it out of her system. The only hand she reacts to is the one she can't have, because it belongs to the Realm.

Florin chews on his lip while he thinks, and then explains, "This particular recipe seems more aggressive than most. That is likely due to the unidentifiable ingredient. The potion is, essentially, a slow acting poison. If it is not used for its intended purpose… I suppose, generally, there will be immense pain and fits for… three days after ingestion. Delirium sets in after about two days. And then—" His eyes flit from you, to Baelor, and back. "Then, my lady, I'm afraid you will die."

One Week Earlier

Admittedly, you knew it wouldn't work the minute you saw Daeron. He looked green about the face, his eyes so red and bleary that you thought he would keel over at any moment. If you hadn't heard him called 'Daeron the Drunken' behind closed doors, you would have tried to somehow politely ask if he was ill. Instead, you just assumed he'd had one too many before showing up to your presentation in court.

No, you aren't surprised that he turned down the offer of marriage. You were, however, surprised that he did not deliver the news himself. Instead, he sent a servant with a note while you were eating breakfast, and left you to bring it before the King. The entire meeting went over about the way you expected. Prince Maekar went to find Daeron, Prince Baelor apologized for his nephew's rudeness and the inconvenience, and the King assured you that all would be made well.

The truth of the matter is that you have no interest in Daeron, anyway. You do not want a husband who refuses to talk to you, even if his drunkenness was not an issue. Daeron has given you no reason to desire him— at this point, the prospect of the marriage would be a matter of your family's social and financial standing, and your own status as a Princess.

Now that the castle is sufficiently in an uproar about Daeron's refusal, you have made your gracious retreat to the gardens. You don't want to be in the castle any longer than you have to. Your family has already suggested leaving King's Landing in two days' time, and even so, it feels like too long to wait.

From the gardens, you look out over Blackwater Bay, watching ships disappear one by one over the horizon. You have no idea how long you sit there, but the sun slowly creeps lower and lower in the sky, until golden light filters through the leaves of the trees.

"My lady." For how large of a man Baelor is, he is light on his feet. You hadn't heard him approach, and so you jump when he addresses you, spinning around to find him standing a respectable distance away from your bench. When you stand to curtsy, he gives you an indulgent smile. "It appears that you've been out here for some time. I only wanted to ensure all was well."

You fight not to raise an eyebrow at the Prince. "You must have been watching me closely, then, Your Grace."

He squints, then pivots to peer up at the Tower of the Hand, looming over the Red Keep. "Not so close, I should think."

You snicker at that, casting your eyes away from him. Baelor is a handsome man, and kind. You find your awareness lingering on him above all others, and you're beginning to fear that your crush is becoming obvious. You feel nervous in his presence in only the best way, as though you may trip over your own tongue and say something entirely unbecoming just as soon as you open your mouth. That feeling is… refreshing, in the right company. But Baelor is heir apparent to the Iron Throne, Protector of the Realm, and you are simply a noble lady much younger than him, with the prospect of marrying his nephew. Any fantasies you indulge can only be that.

"May I join you a moment?" Baelor asks, and despite your internal angst, you cannot bring yourself to refuse him.

Perhaps it would be more proper to have your lady's maid here with you, but Mircalla has other things to be doing now, and so you sit a respectable distance away from Baelor on the bench while staring out to sea and wishing it was not respectable at all.

"In my week at court, I've discovered that I quite like this view," you say after a beat, to puncture the tight shroud of silence that settles between the two of you. "I enjoy watching the waves. I wonder what it's like to be one of them, sometimes. Rolling always towards the shore."

"Or dashing upon the rocks?"

You hum. "At least they know where they're going, rocks or no."

You retreat back into silence with him, and watch him out of the corner of your eye as he twirls his silver ring around his finger idly. He seems to be thinking hard about something, eyes fixed on the horizon with a purpose. It gives you just a moment to admire his profile— his strong, twice-broken nose, his furrowed brow, the touches of silvery gray in his close-cropped dark hair. The small freckle on his cheekbone. The stretch of his neck from beneath his collar, begging for a pair of lips or a tongue to lavish it.

"My lady, allow me to extend my apologies once more for my nephew's behavior," Baelor says finally, and you turn your eyes quickly back out to sea. "It is not the first time Daeron has been irresponsible with delicate matters. Although, it is also the fault of we who expect responsibility from him, that there must be an apology."

"I don't think it's unreasonable to expect responsibility from a prince," you answer without thinking, and then suddenly remember who you are speaking to. "…Your Grace."

"No. On that, we agree." There is a light chuckle in his voice, a slight humor that you imagine is meant to make you feel more at ease. "I do not imagine that Daeron will take long to rectify his behavior, however."

You feel a girlish temper flare within you at the idea that Daeron could rectify anything. You take a long, sobering breath, smelling sea salt and garden flowers on the air.

"You were married, Your Grace. You know quite well how to approach a—" Woman. You want to say it, but you feel it would be too forward. You reconsider, and continue instead with, "a betrothal. Do you believe that anything Daeron has done makes for a… a loving marriage?"

Baelor considers your question with the attention you would expect from the King's Hand. Then, he answers, "I would not hazard a guess as to the sincerity of Daeron's feelings toward you, my lady. Only he can truly know the answer to that. Though, it may bring you some comfort to know that…" He pauses thoughtfully. "My own marriage was not for love. It was arranged, as duty demanded. But, in time, I do believe Jena and I came to love one another, as well as a match made in service to the Crown would allow. Perhaps your marriage to Daeron would be the same."

You sit with his words. Enter into a loveless marriage, having already been besmirched by the man who you would bind yourself to, and hope that love will come in spite of it all. It sounds like a fool's errand.

"Be that as it may, I believe Daeron has already done some irreparable damage to my reputation." When you see Baelor turn his head just barely toward you, you supplement, "My lady's maid, Mircalla, shares with me the gossip I would otherwise be protected from. Sometimes, it can be… harsh. She is honest with me, which is a quality I admire most, you understand." You look down at your hands to find yourself tearing at your own cuticles in your nervousness. "She told me some hours ago that there are rumors floating about as to why— why Daeron would refuse me. Some speculated that we fought upon first meeting. Others suggest that I am pregnant with another man's bastard. Or— Or that we have already slept together, and that Daeron was not pleased with me. Can you imagine…?"

Your voice fades out on a horrified whisper. Although none of these rumors are true, each of them deal a blow to your reputation in turn. Your eyes sting with tears the longer you think of the different stories concocted about you.

"Although it may satisfy me to have Daeron grovel and beg forgiveness, it makes no difference. From now on I will be known as the whore that Daeron refused."

Out of the corner of your eye, you catch Baelor pressing his lips together tightly, raising his chin just a tick. The Prince is quiet for a moment, while you bite back your tears and turn your face away from him.

"You say that honesty is a trait that you value," Baelor remarks, and waits until you nod at him in response. "Then please trust me to be honest. I cannot imagine that anyone would truly believe that of you, my lady. You see, I have had the privilege of knowing you during your time at the Red Keep, and I find you to be exceptional in every way. I can't imagine it, because I cannot fathom anyone viewing you as anything else."

You finally turn to fix him with a watery stare, and find him looking back at you with such solitary focus that you practically wither beneath his gaze. For the first time, you notice that Baelor's eyes are two different colors. The castle is not brightly lit inside, and you have never been close enough to him to notice it, until now. One brown, one violet, they lend even more of a sense of mystery to his handsome features. You have a mind to mention it— you open your mouth to tell him that they're beautiful, but then you think better of it.

He's the Prince of Dragonstone. The Hand of the King. There is nothing that could bring you together.

Baelor holds a hand out to you, his palm facing upward. You peer down at it for a moment before placing your hand delicately in his. Baelor's thumb gently brushes your knuckles, his hand practically dwarfing your own. His palm is so warm, and when he places his other hand atop yours, your skin feels engulfed in flames.

"However," Baelor says, and locks you in his stare, "I can believe that rumors abound. It is an unfortunate effect of being highborn that many will speak on what they know nothing about. But rumors seldom bear any truth. They reflect nothing of your true nature. I assure you that House Targaryen, Daeron included, will understand that."

You blink down at your hand, enveloped in both of his. Daeron. Of course, all of this is to convince you not to lose hope, that Daeron will change his mind, that Daeron will decide to marry you.

"I… thank you for your kindness, Your Grace," you respond, for lack of anything else to say. You know that he's being as fair in his judgment as possible, but he has a duty to the King and to House Targaryen. Gently, you withdraw your hand from his as you add, "Unfortunately, I regret that my family are displeased with Daeron's refusal. I understand that they have designs on leaving King's Landing in two days' time. While I know that both you and Prince Maekar are quite persuasive, I doubt that it provides ample time for Daeron to change his mind. I imagine he wanted to refuse me the moment he saw me."

"Why do you imagine that?"

You look out across Blackwater Bay, thinking back to your first meeting with Daeron. When you curtsyed, the princeling looked as though he was going to either throw up or faint, or both. At the time, you blamed it on the drink. Now, you're not entirely sure.

"I believe he finds me ugly."

Baelor huffs a short laugh through his nose, so quiet and subtle that you would not have caught it if you weren't sitting so close to him. You turn to look at him, appalled, and find him with a soft, reserved smile on his face.

"Well, don't laugh."

"Apologies, my lady." Still, Baelor's mouth curves up at the edges as though he just can't help himself. You watch him tongue the inside of his cheek, half-amused. "I mean no jest. I just find it rather unlikely, to be frank."

"I can't think of another reason why," you explain, finally letting your true emotions ring through. You're hurt. You had given Daeron no reason to dislike you; you had been agreeable and good-natured whenever you spoke to him. "He sent his refusal via courier. He wanted not to speak to me, and he has been quite avoidant throughout my entire visit."

"It's true," Baelor replies smoothly. "Daeron has behaved abominably. But I do know him to be kind, and mannerly when given the opportunity."

You had given Daeron plenty of opportunities. You don't want to argue with Baelor, but you think that he is viewing your situation only from the position of a Prince of the Realm.

"How many hours in the day are there? How many days in a week? Daeron could have come to me during any of them, and I would have recieved him. Kind and mannerly though he may be, Your Grace," you say, looking over at Baelor Breakspear with a challenging fire in your eyes, "no one can force a man to want, any more than they can force a horse to drink."

Baelor's expression remains frustratingly unreadable. You gaze into his mismatched eyes as though they will tell you something, anything about what he's thinking, but there is nothing there to betray him.

"Daeron would be a fool not to want you," Baelor tells you, his voice low and edged with a finality that makes you want to take it for fact. "Whether he is or is not, I cannot say. Only time will tell."

"Do you say that as a man? Or as the Hand of the King?" you ask him more pointedly than you should.

"Both."

You gaze at each other for a long time, long enough that the breeze picks up and sweeps your hair up in its gust. You watch Baelor's jaw work— as small of a gesture though it is, it is the only thing about him that tells you he's contemplating something. He is no open book, your Prince, and it frustrates you as much as it seduces you. It sets you daydreaming, watching him openly in the cool evening air as his mouth curves vaguely toward a frown. Down by his knee, he worries the silver ring on his finger.

Then, Baelor lifts his hand, and with a touch so featherlight it's almost inconsequential, he brushes your hair away from your brow and tucks it behind your ear. His skin barely even meets yours— you can explain it away as him just being chivalrous, just keeping your hair from flying into your eyes. But it's enough to make your heart lurch up into your throat, nonetheless.

"It's late," you mutter, now that the sun has dipped below the horizon and the garden is bathed in shadow. You swallow the lump in your throat, trying to regain your composure as you drop your gaze.

"It is."

"It's getting dark."

"Yes," Baelor agrees, then finally looks away from you. He squints out across the bay, staring into the distance at the absence of sun. "The dragon's breath will be blooming, now."

"Dragon's breath?" You shake your head. "I'm sorry, Your Grace, I have not heard of it."

"I'm not surprised. It's a night-blooming flower, native to Dorne. There is a crop of them not far off, if I recall. Come, I can show it to you." Baelor stands and offers you his hand once again, and this time, you do not hesitate to take it.

He leads you, arm-in-arm, down the garden path toward the godswood. Just as the treeline begins to thicken in the gloaming, Baelor brings you to a stop.

"Just there," he murmurs, guiding you to investigate a shrub low to the ground, littered with trumpet-shaped red blooms. As he stoops to pluck one from the shrub, he says, "Dragon's breath. They are sweetly fragranced, but do not be mistaken. They can be quite deadly if eaten."

"I'll make sure not to put them in my tea, then," you tell him as you take the flower he extends to you. It smells slightly of jasmine and woodsmoke when you hold it beneath your nose, careful not to let it touch your lips. "It's lovely."

"Yes," Baelor says, watching you closely. His eyes linger on yours for an extended moment, a gentle smile curving his mouth. Then, a serene look crosses his face. "It is said that the First Men would ingest it to convene with the old gods. Whether or not this is true remains to be seen, but I would not advise it, at any rate."

"No, I'd imagine not." You spend a second twirling the little red blossom, the same shade as the red thread in his doublet, the colors of House Targaryen. Quite suddenly, you observe, "They're your favorite."

Baelor is quiet for a moment. "What makes you so certain?"

"You thought of them first. You could have shown me anything in the entire Keep, but you showed me these. Obviously, they're important to you." You peer up at him, and you can't bite back your smirk. "I'm right, aren't I?"

Baelor huffs a small laugh, the second one you've managed from him. The sound of it warms the pit of your stomach. "You're rather sure of yourself."

"That isn't a 'no.'"

"Mm. It's not a 'yes,' either."

You crack a grin. "Okay. Don't tell me, then. But I'm right."

This time, when Baelor tilts his head downward, you catch him smiling, a flash of teeth and a dimple indenting his bearded cheek. It is imperfect, crooked and so very human. He hides it well, but you're able to see it before he gentles his face into a careful mask once again.

He doesn't know that you see it. It will remain your secret, a fascination to look back on when you're in need of comfort. You made the Prince of Dragonstone smile. A real smile.

"Thank you, Your Grace," you tell him quietly, still pinching the blossom in your fingers. "For your company. And your hospitality."

"The pleasure is mine." Baelor looks as though he may leave the conversation there, but then he adds, "One more word before we part, my lady, if you please?"

"Certainly." You step a touch closer to him. A cricket sounds somewhere in the brush. The night is beginning to wake around you, the longer you linger with the Prince. You wonder if you could draw the moment out long enough to see the dawn.

Baelor does not seem overly concerned about it. "I should like to extend an invitation to your family, if you believe they would be willing. Perhaps, rather than departing King's Landing in two days' time, they would agree to remain another fortnight?"

You blink at him. Another two weeks? For what, exactly?

Baelor answers your unasked question, as though he can see directly into your mind. "So that we may have ample time for Daeron to correct his mistake. Of course."

"Of course," you echo. You feel clean out of air in your lungs, stunned for something to say. "Your Grace, I— I would say that my family would have to answer that invitation for themselves. I cannot speak for the lot."

He affords you the most patient of smiles. "I would like to hear your answer before all, if you don't mind."

"Oh."

Another two weeks at the Red Keep. Two weeks for the rumors to spread, to converge and morph into even worse ones. Two weeks for Daeron to insult you by ignoring you, tarnish your reputation by refusing you a second time. Conversely, two weeks for Daeron to decide that he may tolerate your company and accept you.

You look down at the flower in your fingers. Two weeks to search for the sight of Baelor in the halls and in the councils. Two weeks to speak to him again. Two weeks to indulge in that wickedest of fantasies: that you might fall in love with Baelor Breakspear.

"Yes," you tell Baelor, quiet enough that it threatens to be spirited away on the breeze. "Yes, if my family is willing. I would be glad to stay another fortnight, at Your Grace's pleasure."

Baelor nods at you graciously. "Then I will see to your family's response in the morning. Thank you for your acceptance, my lady."

"Thank you for your invitation." You tilt your face towards the sky. "It is quite dark. I fear that I will have trouble on my way back, should I remain any longer."

"Indeed. The fault is mine, entirely. Allow me to walk you to the holdfast."

You make the journey back to the holdfast in comfortable silence. You find that you do not feel even remotely unsafe as long as Baelor is near; otherwise, you would never chance to linger outside the holdfast, even within the castle walls, after dark. But Baelor's presence is a relief. You would trust him with your life. You would probably trust him with even more than that, given the chance.

"My Prince."

You pause in the golden torchlight, only bright enough to illuminate the bridge over the dry moat. Down in the pit there is nothing but blackness, and a sense that if you stepped too close it would suck you in. Turning to Baelor, you have the dragon's breath blossom still in your fingers, and lift it to your face to take in its scent again— sweet, smoky, like a garden aflame. You can understand why he is taken with this particular flower.

Baelor watches you expectantly, a respectable distance away again, as though every part of your conversation this evening had been a diplomatic mission. Cleaning up his nephew's mess. Doing what is right for the Realm.

The idea rattles you. It cuts you deep and hits something within that you thought you'd left in your girlhood— covetousness. The desire to be shown favoritism, attention. To be wanted, not simply tolerated. You are not a girl anymore, but the King's Hand seems to bring her out of you as though it were second nature. You feel the urge to try to bring the boy out of him, which may be an insurmountable task. He is a prince, a warrior and a lord of refined poise and sophistication. But you have never been one to shy away from a challenge.

You step closer to him. Baelor does not move away, but follows you with his eyes, a reserved expression on his face. Perhaps he is trying to anticipate what you may do, but he does not show any signs of backing down. You imagine that he wouldn't, even if you threw yourself at him unceremoniously. If you kissed him like you desperately want to, open-mouthed and wet.

But you are not improper, or desperate. You are a lady, and well-versed in flattery and elegant flirtation. You take the dragon's breath, and you tuck the green stem into the gap between the silk fabric of his doublet and the Hand of the King pin that adorns his chest. It flares up from the pin, as though the fingers of the hand were holding it tight to his heart.

"Keep this safe," you say, your smile hiding your desirous stare. Your fingers rest against his chest for just a second longer than is proper, but you pull them away quickly enough, you think. "I would hate for it to go to waste."

Baelor's eyes soften. "Certainly, my lady."

"You are quite a wonderful man, my Prince." Your innermost thoughts become physical things, they turn balmy on your tongue. "If you may pardon my saying so. I have wanted to for some time, but… the opportunity did not present itself."

Baelor's brows raise just the slightest, but he does not admonish you. "I thank you for the compliment, my lady. You are very kind, indeed." A pause, a breath on the wind. "Lovely."

You stay there, held captive in his gaze. One violet, one brown. Finally, in spite of your sense of self preservation, you tell him, "Your eyes… They really are very beautiful, you know."

You do not wait for his answer or reaction before you bid him goodnight, and all but flee into the holdfast. And so, you are not able to see the way he watches after you with a lingering smile, and a longing gaze in those very eyes.

Present

Baelor sends Maester Florin away with an order to return on the morrow, and to alert the servants that you should not be disturbed. It is not without your notice that after he ushers the maester out the chamber door, he bolts it with a final clang that reverberates in your oversensitive ears.

You lay on the mussed bedsheets, curled into a ball. You are sideways in the bed; there is no point in putting yourself to rights, because the moment the next wave of pain hits you will become a writhing animal once again, a slave to the torrents of agony. Through the stringy, damp strands of your loose hair, you watch Baelor's back.

He leans against the door with both hands pressed flat to the wood, head bowed in thought. Or, is it distress? Perhaps both. You don't quite know what to make of his reaction to your situation, at all.

What you do know is that you feel a wave of heat flash through your body so fast and so sharp that all of your muscles tense at once, and you yelp from the blast of pain. Your head pounds as though your heartbeat originates from it.

Baelor turns at the sound of your anguish, and his face pinches at the sight of you, a small, trembling heap on the bed. "I will fetch Daeron."

"No."

"My lady, please."

He approaches the end of the bed, but you can't do more than follow the sight of his face with your eyes, until it passes too far into your periphery, and you must drop them to his belt. The sight of Baelor's belt inches away from your face is not something that helps your situation at all, however, and so you shut your eyes before your body manages to torment you further.

"Daeron is… unreliable, yes. And irresponsible. I know that you harbor wounded feelings towards him at the moment, but…" Baelor hesitates. Clearly, he knows that he is not making the best case for his nephew. His eyes roam your disconsolate form, and then he finishes, "But he is your best chance at survival. I am certain that he will be agreeable, at least in this pursuit."

"Do you even know if his cock works?"

Baelor is eerily silent. You don't open your eyes to look at him until you feel the mattress shift, and you find that he's sat on the foot of the bed, his back to you once again. His hands loosely grip the edge of the mattress on either side of him, and his posture betrays no real emotion. It is only when you notice the redness of his ears that you realize your words must have unnerved him.

"I would not know, my lady," Baelor answers quietly, after a moment. "Daeron has sired no bastards, as far as I am aware. His drunkenness may prove an issue, but questionable odds are better than none."

"I don't want Daeron. He doesn't want me."

"He is to be your betrothed." Baelor's words are flat, even. Clinical. "I understand that if he had not refused you, then perhaps you would not have resorted to… other methods—"

"I didn't take the fucking thing for him," you finally snap, gritting your teeth against the pain throbbing in your head and in your abdomen.

Baelor's voice surrenders to something inquisitive. "Then, why did you take it?"

Another moment of silence. Baelor is too still, his hand pressed flat to the mattress in front of your face. You stare, unblinking, at the glint of the silver ring on his finger, bearing the insignia of House Targaryen.

"I thought… perhaps there was someone else for me." You take in a shallow breath. "Although, I think my rash decision making outweighs my judgment."

Baelor turns and gives you the most indulgent smile you think you've ever received, even though there is immense pain behind his eyes.

"If you will not have Daeron… perhaps I can call another for you. Ser Duncan may be willing," he suggests, his voice just above a whisper. "Ser Duncan is a good and honorable man. I trust him with my life, and I would trust him with yours."

You stare at him in shock for a moment. "Oh… Oh, yes, of course. Ser Duncan. Ser Duncan. Why didn't I think of that? Ser Duncan the Tall." Baelor remains stoic, nonplussed at your sarcasm. Your stomach cramps up as you blather, "Or, better yet, why not call Ser Donnel as well? The entire King's Guard, even? Drag me down to the Great Yard, maybe they can take turns, pass me off—"

"Enough," Baelor finally snaps, shooting you a stern look. "I will hear no more of that sort of talk from you."

"Or what? Your Grace," you return with a wicked glare. "I will not be foisted off to the first man you think of."

Lit up with the fury of a thousand suns now, and sweating enough to show it, you push yourself up on wobbly limbs and tumble off of the bed onto the bearskin rug on the floor. You land on your aching stomach with a loud, "OOMF," and all the air painfully leaves your lungs.

"Stop this, now." Baelor sounds weary, as though he's bored of a game you're playing.

"No. Leave me." You crawl clumsily across the rug towards the chamber window. "I'm not going to lay there, dying in agony and— and losing my mind. I'd rather throw myself out of the tower. Let me die with quiet dignity and grace."

"Quiet dignity and grace," he eventually repeats, incredulous. He hasn't even gotten up from the end of the bed, but just watches you, fascinated with your display. "You know, I fathered two boys. Theatrics don't impress me, especially when negotiating."

"Yes, remind me again of how you're so amazing at everything, like— fathering sons, and— negotiating," you growl, huffing with the exertion of your endeavor. "Because you're— you're so fucking perfect and chivalrous. The Hammer. With your— fucking— giant, veiny— host of Dornish spearmen."

"My, you're verbose."

It's only when you threaten to tip the table by the window, as you attempt to haul yourself up to your feet, that Baelor rises. He reaches you in three quick strides, snatches you about the waist and throws you over his shoulder, just to carry you back to the bed. Your small amount of spite-fueled energy spent, you merely hang on him like a sack of straw.

Baelor lays you down so that your head hits the pillow, your hands thrown above your head. "Are you quite finished?" he asks sharply, looming over you, his eyes boring into yours. His jaw set, he states, "I am trying to save your life."

"And I am no one's whore." You stare defiantly up into the eyes of Baelor Targaryen, willing him to yield.

And, to your surprise, he does. His eyes soften, his jaw untensing as he lets out a slow, defeated sigh. "No, you are not."

He sits back, his hands still pressed into the mattress on either side of you. You miss his proximity like a lost limb.

"Forgive me. I have been presumptuous in my suggestions. I would never force you into any situation against your will or desires." A pause. "But I cannot sit idle and let you die. I beg you, my lady. Name someone, anyone, who you would trust in this matter. Someone who you would accept. I will bring them to you without question."

You gaze up at him tearfully, and feel another wave of heat blooming in your hands and feet. You press your tongue to the back of your teeth and take in the sight of him, so poised and regal, even when faced with an unmanageable task.

"Baelor."

Your hand— small, clammy with sweat and shaky from the fatigue in your limbs— reaches out and finds his— large, warm, grounding. You pull at his hand, and he lets you. His head turns just slightly, watching you as you cradle his large palm in your two hands and press it firmly against your chest, just below your collarbone.

Whatever this magic is, be it gods sent or gods cursed, it reacts the second his skin touches yours. Your entire body sparks alive with sensation— but rather than the unrelenting heat and pain of the poison coursing through your veins, it's solace. You let out a soft moan at the feeling, like gentle sunlight flooding through your body the moment that his fingers lace with yours.

"My Prince," you whisper shakily, and feel his fingers flex just slightly against your chest. Your heart pounds against your ribcage so hard that you know he feels it. He can probably feel the unbelievable heat radiating off of you. "It's— I feel so much pain. I hear the voices of the guards on the ramparts and I taste— I taste the salt from the sweat on your brow. I feel as though I will rip in two when the waves come, and nothing has made it better except— except you. When you touch me. Your hands on me… it's you."

Baelor is quiet, listening to your rambling speech. Tears stream from your eyes. It is both a relief and a terror to confess what you feel to him.

Then, Baelor removes his hand from your chest and brings it to cup the side of your face. The tenderness of his touch strips you to the bone. You feel like you're breathing only for him, like he commands the very air that gives your body function. His thumb brushes your damp hair away from your face, wiping away your tears with it, and he gazes down at you with such care, such affection.

He says your name softly, but there's a touch of sadness in it. He closes his eyes, breathes in long and slow through his nose. "I cannot do what you ask. You must name another."

"Please." You make a frail noise in the back of your throat, feeling as though you may begin sobbing in a moment. You shake your head, lifting one hand to clutch at Baelor's wrist.

"I cannot," he insists, although he doesn't pull his hand away from you. You don't know if he is bearing in mind what you told him— that his touch is the only thing that keeps the pain from tormenting you. There is palpable tension in his expression, his brow furrowed and his mouth set in a firm line. "I am the King's Hand and heir to the throne. If you were to be gotten with my child, it would cause a scandal."

"I am already rumored to be pregnant, remember? House Targaryen has weathered far worse than a bastard child," you remark weakly.

"But you have not. I would not dishonor you in such a way." When you pout and look as though you may argue, he continues, "Whatever rumors circulate about you, we need not give them merit."

"So you would have me carry another man's bastard, instead?"

Baelor snaps his mouth shut, his expression turning suddenly guarded. He makes as though he may pull his hand back as he turns away from you, and your stomach drops.

"Baelor, no."

You clap your own hand over his, turning to nuzzle into the warmth of his palm. On instinct, you plant your lips against his skin, and it's as though something savage bursts alive within you. Some greedy, desperate thing takes hold as your eyes drift shut, with each breath tasting the warmth and spice of his skin as though your tongue were flush to it.

"Don't let go," you whisper into the cradle of his hand. "If you let go of me the pain will return, and I can't— I can't bear it anymore, Baelor, I can't—"

"I know. I won't let you go, darling." He sounds strained even as he reassures you, but he doesn't remove his hand.

There is a long silence, while you practically lose yourself in the feeling of just… giving in. You relax into the glowing feeling, hot pleasure sweeping through your body, up your limbs and into your core, replacing any pain that had been there before. It's glorious. It distracts you, pulls your mind away from the reality of the situation— that you cannot simply have him hold your face and hope that the poison works its way out of your system on its own.

Without meaning to, you drag your parted lips along his fingers, as though exploring them just with your mouth. His fingers are so long. Slender and dextrous, calloused from hours of sword training. You feel each bump and ridge against your mouth and you're trying so hard not to sink your teeth in. Your lower lip catches on the band of his silver ring and draws back, letting the smallest flash of your teeth graze his skin.

You hear his breath catch, and your eyes fly open, suddenly aware of what you're doing. Baelor watches you from the corner of his eye as you press your face into his touch, his jaw locked up tight, his free hand a fist where it rests on his knee.

You feel as though you should apologize, but you can't bring yourself to. Apologize for what? For desiring him? Wanting him? He's so handsome. His differently colored eyes study you, a painful reminder of it. You stare back at him, imagining what it would be like to trace his face with your lips, as well.

"You told me once that Daeron would be a fool not to want me," you say, and you take a purposefully slow breath, because if you don't you may start heaving for air. "Are you a fool, my Prince?"

Baelor lets out a soft sigh, and looks quickly away from you. His fingers twitch slightly against your cheek. He's silent for a long time, long enough that you begin to fear you've misread him, confused his kindness for something deeper.

But then he tilts his head down, and without looking at you, he says quietly, "I am not, my lady. Though, whether my desire in itself is foolish, I have no idea. I may be doomed for it."

"Then… perhaps we are both doomed," you admit, your eyes practically dancing over his features. "I can't think around my desire for you. All I know is that you— you are all that I want in the world. Scandals and suspicious potions be damned."

"Gods above." You watch Baelor roll his eyes toward the ceiling. When he returns his eyes to you, it's with a look of solemn admiration. He strokes his knuckles along the curve of your jaw. "I'm beginning to believe you exist simply to torment me."

You allow yourself to fashion a wobbly smile. "Me? Torment the Breakspear? Never."

Baelor huffs a quiet laugh, looking away from you in a manner that is almost… shy. You can see his jaw flex beneath his short beard and a rosy flush come over his face, and—

You just made Baelor blush.

You lay with that, watching him in the silence. His hand drifts from grazing your jaw to resting flat against your collarbone again, and you lift your own to trace your fingers languidly along the back of his palm. You can hear his breath come out shaky at the light contact, and it's just enough to give you the clarity to really, truly think about this.

His hands on you could be enough, you realize. You practically came the moment that he touched you, and if this magic can just be expelled from your system by an orgasm, it might be that he doesn't need to do anything more than just… put his hands on you. It feels good enough as it is— the heat of him, the smell and the feeling of him, are all adding to the pleasurable fire burning in your core. But, if you felt his hands go… down…

"Baelor."

His name comes out of your mouth faster than it should, and he snaps his eyes to you with a look of sudden concern, as though he expects to find something wrong. But nothing really is wrong— at least nothing that hasn't been wrong to begin with.

"What if—" You bite your lip, trying hard not to move your hips in any way that could startle him off. Your cunt throbs just at the thought of feeling his hands on your body with no barrier. "What if you just… touched me?"

Baelor seems to think your question over, searching your face for any kind of deception. But you simply stare at him openly, your eyes pleading, heart pounding as you feel his thumb stroke once over the hollow of your throat.

And then, his eyes drift down. They linger on the swell of your breast, heaving under the thin, practically sheer linen of your chemise. Everything is too intimate, too bright in the mid-afternoon sun slanting through the open window, illuminating you. Gods, it feels like you're already naked before him with the way he just stares, undressing you in his mind. It hits you directly between the legs, and you clench your thighs together to stave off the rush of arousal.

Your breath hitches, and Baelor snaps his eyes back up to your face, as though he's just remembered himself. "I am touching you."

"Y-You—" Your breath hiccups in your chest with how hard you're trying not to gasp for air. "You don't know how cl-close I am to— to—"

You clap your hands over your face, feeling a flush of heat throughout your body that has nothing to do with his hand on you. It's hard enough to be begging him for some kind of stimulation, but to tell him how close you are to an orgasm just from his touch is mortifying.

Not for the first time, Baelor seems to be able to see inside your mind without you voicing your thoughts. "Tell me," he plies gently, his thumb sweeping across your damp skin. He remains so composed, even when you feel like dissolving into thin air. "What is it that you feel… when I touch you?"

He's still hesitant, but his voice holds a curiosity that he hadn't made manifest before now. Everything in you winds up tight at the sound. He's not just indulging you, he wants to know. You know that he's trying to be proper— Baelor is a man of restraint, of infinite patience and regard for honor and decency. You know that he's clinging to his morals even while trying to rationalize the problem set before him.

But he bolted the chamber door, you remember. Behind your closed eyelids, beyond the sound of your heavy breathing and his, more measured, you can hear the clang of the bolt reverberate in your ears all over again. His hands pressed to the solid oak, his head bowed in thought. Why would he have locked you in together? Unless…

"It feels like sunrise after a frost." Your voice is muffled behind your hands, because you refuse to look at him while you say such things. You don't think you could bear to see his face, as you confess, "It is as though all of this poison in me changes, and it becomes heavenly. I feel… when you touch me… as though my body is not my own, but yours to— to do with as you please. To mold to your whim. And I would let you, my lord, I— I would have you do anything that you desired to me, and I would ask you only to do it again. I could glut myself on your touch and it would not be enough, it undoes me in ways I cannot explain, I… You set your hand upon my back and I thought… I thought I was going to c-cum—"

You choke off on a quiet, humiliated sob. So there it is, out in the open now, with no way to take it back. Baelor is still frustratingly silent, but you refuse to pull your hands away from your face to look at him, because you can't find it within yourself to be clever or brave anymore.

"You wouldn't even need to— to deflower me," you continue, blathering now, unleashing any thought that comes to mind as a way to fill the silence. "It would hardly even be anything that would be significant to anyone, just— just lay your hand upon me, and I might— I could—"

"Where?"

All things stop at once. Your thoughts, your breath, your heartbeat. You freeze up like he has just found a way to completely obliterate you with one word. You take a sharp inhale to kickstart your lungs again, and hesitantly curl your fingers away from your eyes to look at him.

Baelor's eyes are transfixed on your face, unwavering, his expression open and earnest. He waits for you to answer him, but when it becomes apparent that you can't, he supplements, "Show me where you would have me touch you."

You consider him for just a second, just long enough for the gravity of his words to register. He wants you to show him. It occurs to you to tell him that he could touch you anywhere beneath your chemise— your stomach, your hip, your knee— and it may yield the same results. But you don't.

You take Baelor's hand, the one resting on your chest so steadily, and you move it. He allows you to, watching you all the time, the pupils of his mismatched eyes blown wide. With one hand you pull at the fabric of your chemise, tugging it up your legs, while you guide his own beneath it. As soon as his hand touches the plush skin of your thigh, you both gasp in tandem— but for different reasons.

For you, it's the burst of sensation, the sharp arcing pleasure that shoots up your spine and grips at something tight and cruel in your core, making you stifle a moan. You were right. The proximity of his touch to where you want it most makes all the difference— you fist at the gathered fabric in your hand and try not to rock your hips toward his touch, but your pussy throbs threateningly at the heat of him so close to it.

Baelor is simply startled. His brow shoots up, his jaw slack as he breathlessly murmurs, "Oh, my sweet girl."

You're drenched down your thighs, a fact that you had failed to mention to him. His fingers slip through the wetness there, feeling it against your skin, and his breath leaves him in shock.

"I— I wasn't like this, before." You take a shaky inhale, and tremors travel through your entire body. "Before you."

It's as though something within him cracks, and all of his inner turmoil is laid bare before you, etched across his features like a carving on stone. The fear, the worry, the frustration, all manifest in his pinched brow and the dip of his mouth, the tremble of his breath. But there is something else there, too— raw desire, sharp as a knife's edge. It's in his eyes, in the way that his shoulders draw tight, in the set of his jaw. It's in his hands, the way that his fingers shift and press into the pillowy flesh of your thigh.

Baelor's thumb sweeps along the curve of your inner thigh, the same affectionate, instinctive gesture that it had been as he laid his hand on your chest. But on this part of your body it is more suggestive, and perhaps ill-advised. His thumb glides too close to the core of you and, quite by accident, he discovers that you are bare of any smallclothes.

Your gasp is sudden and loud. The brush of his finger against your bare sex is enough to make you jump, your hand clamping down on his wrist desperately as pleasure dances like pure dragonflame over your nerves. Your cunt pulses, and a feeble moan breaks from you. "Baelor, please."

He halts, and something changes in his expression. Call it the end of resolve, or a breaking point. There is no hiding anything from him now, you know. He has seen everything, knows what you are laying with.

"No more begging," Baelor finally says, and it's a gentle order. This man who has led armies, who has killed and fought to defend his realm, speaks to you with infinite tenderness. "I have you now, darling. I am for you. You need not beg anymore."

I am for you. He is your knight, upholding his vows, taking up his sword to defend you.

You shiver to feel his grip on your thigh tighten just a bit, a final test of his resolve before he moves it. There is a shift beneath the white linen of your chemise, and then Baelor's knuckle drags slowly through your soaked folds.

Your breath stalls in your chest as your mouth drops open. His touch turns you golden. Your body seems to light up from the inside, fresh heat blooming low in your stomach. Heart pounding in your chest, you stutter, "Oh, fuck— fuck, Baelor, this— this is too much, you don't have to—"

He shushes you, and the look in his eyes threatens to undo you more than his finger tracing a line through your cunt. There is a fire in his eyes that was not there before. The fire of a dragon, of a Targaryen. His gaze feels almost like a physical caress as he says, "Hush, now. I do this willingly."

Fuck. His voice is deep, rich and soft as velvet as he stares at you with that unwavering intensity, touching you between your legs. Your Prince. Touching you between your legs. It completely arrests your ability to think. He is slow, methodical in his movements as he is with everything; he glides the length of his finger through your pussy without rush, letting you feel each bump and ridge as they pass over your clit.

With your heightened senses, you can hear how wet you are, and the salacious sound of his fingers gliding through the mess you've made is enough to drive you up the wall. He begins drawing circles around your clit with the tip of his finger, and you melt into the mattress. You feel as though your pleasure and your need have turned you inside out, bitten chunks from your sensibilities.

He's too beautiful. The thought plagues you more and more. Baelor is too handsome, too competent with his strong hands and too gentle with his lust-roughened words. Gods above, you feel like you could cum— you should have cum by now, with how badly your cunt spasms under his attention, how hypersensitive your clit is as he continues tracing languid circles around it.

Then Baelor dips down and sinks a single finger into you, where you leak and ache desperately for him. Your thighs widen to give him more room, and he takes it, pushes in to the knuckle and gives you a practiced crook of his finger.

A sound rips from you— something animalistic and completely unfamiliar, a moan from the very depths of your fevered being. You tighten a fist in the tangled bedsheets and turn your face to the side, trying to hide from him while he makes you unravel at the seams.

"Look at me, darling." At the hushed rasp of his voice, your cunt clamps down hard on his finger. He pauses, halting all movement until you turn your head to open your eyes to him.

What you find in his face is enough to move the endless soul in you. You have spent two weeks etching Baelor's face into your memory— his careful, poised demeanor, the way he steadies his expression to keep it neutral, tactful. You know his cautious smiles, and you know his deeper one, the one that you hold tight to your chest like a secret. You know his kindness, and you know his disappointment.

But you've never seen this. This unbridled lust, his every feature touched by the amount of desire he has for you. He gazes at you like he feels everything you do, and more. Baelor inclines his head, and he appears so composed, as he always does, but his chest is heaving— you can see it and you can hear it, in the rattle of his inhale, in the obvious rise and fall of his shoulders.

"I will have you look at me when I do this," Baelor tells you, his eyes so dark and hungry that the very glint in them is wicked. It unnerves you, runs quick and hot through your veins. "I will have you see all that I give, and know it is yours to keep. Only yours. Do you understand?"

You swallow hard. "Yes, my lord."

"Baelor." His voice is quiet when he corrects you.

"Baelor."

He flexes his finger within you and your face crumples, your thighs shaking where they lay spread on the mattress. His free hand comes to rest on your thigh and makes to pull your legs further apart, prevents you from moving it back to center. It is not a rough or demanding move, but it conveys his message. Stay. Don't move away.

Baelor whispers something in a language you don't understand— High Valyrian, most like, but it makes no difference that you cannot speak it. It sounds warm, seductive in his throat, and a tremble rolls through your body at the sound of it.

Soft moans fall from your lips as he adds a second finger beside the first, and your hips nearly leave the bed. You take him in so easily, a quiet breath of disbelief leaves him, and he shifts, giving you strokes that have you fighting to keep your eyes open and fixed on him. A gentle back and forth, a hot press against the wall of you. Your body doesn't know how to react— hot then cold, trembling and then still, rocking against him and then backing away as though it's too much and not enough all at once.

His silver signet ring grazes you, hard to offset his softness. You're so close, you can taste your release on the back of your tongue like the entire ocean is rising within you. You grab at the pillow beside your head, ripping at it between fingers that don't know what to do with themselves. Your eyes clench shut at the sudden onslaught, your head tilted back on the pillow.

"Look at me," Baelor reminds you, his voice gently commanding.

Quick as he says it, you snap your eyes open again and find his fixed on you, dark and fathomless. There is a sudden surge, a quickening in your breath. "Oh, gods, Baelor—"

It looms like some wretched, evil thing come to destroy you. You snatch at his forearm frantically, trying to warn him, but unable to form words.

"I know. I feel it," he soothes, a palm moving sweetly against your thigh. He squeezes you there, a reassuring touch even while his other hand takes you apart. "You don't have to hold on anymore. I've got you. I've got you."

Your hips lurch towards him, your vision whiting out. His fingers hit a spot both perfect and devastating inside of you, and your mind's focus is whittled down to a fine point, aimed at him.

"Cum for me, lovely girl," Baelor orders. So you do.

He remains constant. Even when the wave rises and breaks within you, even when you writhe and let out a ragged cry, the sound torn from a hidden, previously unknown part of you. Through the seemingly unending torrents, Baelor remains your anchor. He does not change. He does not move. He does not let you go.

You turn pliant in the aftershocks. He gentles his movements— he does not stop them altogether, but turns them lighter, slower. His thumb brushes over your clit, and you jolt hard enough to convince him to finally withdraw his hand.

Baelor watches you closely, his darkened eyes focused on yours, but that familiar tenderness is returning, creeping across his features. The span of his fingers curves around the meat of your thigh, measured breaths leaving parted lips. His other hand is drenched with your fluids, still held cautiously between your legs as though hesitant to pull back entirely.

"How do you feel?" He asks then, softly.

You blink at him, and then up at the canopy over the bed. You're still shaking, your brain fizzling and humming from the orgasm he'd given you. "I don't… I don't know, I— that's the first time anyone has ever— done that…"

Baelor stays quiet for a beat, a small, affectionate smile curling the corners of his mouth. Then, he clarifies, "Do you think that it worked?"

"Oh." Yes, that. You had somehow forgotten that there is an ulterior motive to all of this, that it is not just sex for the sake of sex. "We… We could check?"

The words leave your mouth meekly. You don't want him to let you go. You don't want him to go away. Yes, you want the poison to be gone from your system, but you are greedy. You want him to stay with you and take you until morning. You want him to keep looking at you like that, like he'd swallow you whole, bones and all.

Unfortunately, Baelor listens. He slowly lifts his hands away from you, leaving you entirely. For a few calm seconds, nothing happens. Your body is still awash with the remnants of your orgasm, your skin still tingling with the memory of his touch. You lay there for a moment, thinking, was that it?

But then you look at Baelor again. He stares down at his hand— the one drenched in your arousal. It shines in the mid-afternoon light, strings of it threading between the parting of his fingers as he… feels it. Rubs his fingers against each other to test the silkiness, pulls them apart just to watch it web across the gap in thin strands.

You watch, wide-eyed, as he returns his gaze to your face. And he lifts his fingers to his mouth to suck your wetness from them. His eyes, amber and violet, trained on your expression until they flutter shut, and he groans.

"Oh— gods on fire."

Your whole body tenses up with the fury of it. The pain. It assaults you worse than before, with a ferocity that scares you. There's so much of it that it is not enough to scream— you can't even breathe for it. You curl into yourself and roll, the muscles of your stomach and core pulling taut.

"No. No no no— Baelor." You whimper, blindly throwing your hand back to grab at him. You find a wrist— left or right, you don't know— and pull so that his hand smacks down onto your flank with a lewd sounding slap. "Didn't work. It didn't— fuck."

"All right. All right, my love. Come here." Baelor's hand slides around your waist to gather you into his lap. You slide across the bedsheets with your spine bent into a crescent, knees pulled to your chest. "I've got you. I'm right here, just relax." You jerk involuntarily in his hold, an elbow catching him in the ribs. He grunts, adjusting his arm around you, curling himself over you like a shield. "Relax. Relax."

You will the tension in your muscles to release one by one. You imagine yourself absorbing into him, your head resting on his strong thigh as you allow your body to feel him. The rise and fall of his chest as he breathes, the distracting warmth radiating from the space between his legs. The smell of him there, strong and sweetly arousing. The taste of something on the back of your tongue— sweat and something muskier, something more masculine.

Him. The taste of him, through silk, through smallclothes. Your head spins, and you fight not to turn your head further into his lap, not to nuzzle into the crotch of his breeches and just breathe him into your lungs.

"Stupid fucking sex potion," you mumble angrily once the pain recedes. "Secret ingredient. Bullshit."

"All right," Baelor says again to quiet you, laying his hand on the crown of your head soothingly. You imagine that he understands what you're feeling, though, because he doesn't argue.

"What do we do?" Your voice is thin, a barely-there thing in the quiet.

"We continue."

You turn your head. Baelor is gazing down at you, eyes glittering with affection. He exudes a calmness that you cannot feel, even though your overwrought body relaxes into him. "You want to… continue?"

"We need not stop at one." Baelor pets your head, shrugs a shoulder. "I wouldn't, even under normal conditions."

You stare at him, aghast. "Your Grace."

He gives you a wry smile. "We don't know what this 'secret ingredient' is. Perhaps it needs… more. We can continue until it takes." Another pause. "You'll have to forgive me for my choice of words. It's my first time experiencing the… joys of a sex potion, as well."

You snort incredulously, trailing your fingers along his clothed forearm. "And what if it… takes?"

You don't need to elaborate. What if you become pregnant with his child, like he suggested you might? What happens if you bear the heir apparent a bastard, and still end up married to his nephew? What if you cause a scandal?

"Then… we continue," he repeats. "Come what may." Baelor takes your hand in his, presses a kiss to the back of your palm. You are filled with so much adoration for him that it almost wounds you. It sets up a home in your body, right below your heart. "Whatever happens, it makes no difference. You may have anything that you want from me."

"Even your hand?"

"Especially that."

"In marriage?" Your chest tightens up in anticipation. You gaze up at him, willing him to accept you, clutching his hand like he might pull it away, recoil in disgust. If he were to turn you down now, you think that it might just kill you before the poison does.

Perhaps he feels how hard you tense up in your nervousness. He pulls back just the slightest bit and peers at you, taking in your expression, before his own turns into something open, genuine. His eyes crease at the corners as he traces a single finger down the part in your hair, and he replies, "Yes. I will marry you, darling girl. I should have, the moment I was able to. I should have begged you on my knees."

You smile at the mental image that provides. The Hand and Heir on his knees for you. "I would have liked that."

He gives you the fondest look. "I have no doubt."

You fiddle with his hand. His skin is soft, prominent veins running up the back and to the knuckles. You fit your hand to his like a question, examining the difference in size and shape. The ring on his middle finger, still damp from where it's been. In you. In his mouth.

"Why did you do that?" You don't mean to ask the question aloud, but it comes out anyway.

"Do what?"

You glance at Baelor and determine that he's only asking because he wants to hear you say it, and not because he's really confused as to what you mean. He looks coy, which is not something you've ever seen on him before— but you think that it suits him.

"Taste it." The words feel sharp in your mouth. "You didn't have to. I wouldn't have expected you to."

He breathes in deeply, and exhales on a long, low hum. Then, his eyes find yours again. "There are few pleasures in this world that compare to the taste of a woman. I wanted to."

Your heartbeat thrums in your ears. "And?"

"And you taste divine." A deft finger twists in the hair just at the very top of your head, twirling it around and around in hypnotic circles. "I would taste you again, if you would allow me."

It's your turn to hum. You hold his one hand in both of yours, tracing the details of them with your fingertips. Your thumbs map out the dip of his palm, the raised, sword-strengthened calluses beneath his fingers. The meat of his hand, where it connects to his wrist.

Without pausing to feel embarrassment or shame, you bring his hand to your mouth. You brush your lips over his fingers just barely, before you take them in and suck on them. You hear a shudder in Baelor's breath, but you don't stop. It is an intimate thing, to have his fingers stroke your tongue, to taste yourself on him, to know that his own tongue had been in the exact same place moments ago. You whimper and draw them in deep, your lips fitting around the silver ring against his knuckle, your eyes falling shut. He watches you, allowing you to take his swordsman's hand and fit his fingers between your teeth, trusting you not to bite down.

You sigh as you release them, dragging your tongue along the ridges and dips of his fingers on their way out. "I wanted to do that," you admit to him quietly. "For a while."

"You like my hands, it seems," he muses, a note of approval in his voice.

"Very much." You blink at him, suddenly feeling shy under the intensity of his gaze. "I'll let you have me however you want, my Prince. I only ask that first… you kiss me."

"Is that so? Only a kiss?" You nod, and Baelor smirks. He drags the tip of his pinkie finger gently down the slope of your nose. "You drive a hard bargain. If I kiss you now, I fear I may never stop."

"Don't stop."

Baelor lets out a short breath, and then scoops you up into a sitting position. You grunt in surprise, grabbing for his shoulders at the sudden movement, but you settle with his arm tight around your waist. Your heart skips a beat when he cradles your head in his palm, his fingers tangled in your hair.

"I don't think you understand just how wonderful you are," Baelor whispers, his mouth so close to your that the warmth of his lips practically touches yours. He hovers there, a breath away, and it's torturous to hold back. "You'll be the death of me."

With a shaking hand, you rest your palm against his cheek. You feel the scruff of his beard, the way that his jaw tenses the tiniest bit. "And if I don't kiss you, I'll die."

That seems to finally crack his composure. Baelor brushes your hair away from your face, strokes his thumb over your cheekbone, and closes the gap.

His kiss sends shocks of warmth through you, and you melt into him with a quiet sob of relief. Relief from the tension and swells of pain and fear. Relief at finally being able to hold him, to kiss him, open mouth to open mouth. You clutch at his shoulder, his neck, and swing your thigh over his to sit halfway on his lap.

He moves with you, his strong arms keeping you steady as you sink against him, groaning into you. Each point of contact feels bright, like if you opened your eyes to look you would find yourself glowing where he touches you. But his mouth moves against yours like silk, his tongue against yours, and he tastes like peace. It feels like the end of the storm, the answer to all your problems— even if it is only just the beginning.

Baelor's hand slides down to your lower back, holding you fast, splayed wide across your spine. His fingertips press into the flesh there, pulling you closer, until you're flush against him.

Your cunt grinds down onto the meat of his thigh, and you moan brokenly into his mouth. The sound of his name again, sweet on your tongue. He captures your lips with his, his other hand coming down to grip your hip. He rocks you against his thigh purposefully, swallowing the desperate sound that leaves you when your clit presses into the heat of him, through frustrating barriers of fabric.

You make a small, disgruntled noise, and your hand falls to the belt around his doublet. Nails scratching at the leather, you fumble with the buckle until it comes free. You feel beneath the cover of his doublet to find his soft linen shirt, warm from the heat of his body. Strong muscles tense beneath the lightness of your touch.

You huff a perturbed sigh against his mouth. "You are too clothed."

"You are too impatient," Baelor returns, but there is a huskiness to his voice that makes his words seem inconsequential. He shrugs out of his doublet to let your hands wander over his shoulders, down to squeeze the width of his arms. His beard tickles along your jaw as he presses kisses to your skin, trailing up to your ear. "Lie back, darling."

You recline on a pile of tangled sheets, chemise rucked up around your hips. Heat kisses your cheeks and pulses low in your core, your thighs instinctively wanting to close in on themselves, but they are stopped in their endeavor by Baelor's hips.

The mattress dips beside your shoulder where he leans his weight, hovering over you, a veil of security against the rest of the world. He drags his open mouth across your skin like this is not only for your benefit, but for his. You feel the flash of wet and warmth from his tongue, and your back arches up against him. He moves so slowly, savoring, his breath tumbling across your heated flesh like clouds of smoke.

It feels good. It feels so heavenly that you don't quite know how to accept it— you feel almost as though you should move away, but you would only be condemning yourself to more torment. You are bound to the bed by curiosity, an insatiable need to see what he does next. To feel his mouth touch more of you, places that you never thought to feel a pair of lips, teeth, or a tongue.

Baelor skims lightly over your breasts through the fabric of your chemise, while his hands find the curve of your waist. As he lowers, he ever-so-slowly tugs the fabric up, up, up, until you are bare from the waist-down and left open for his wandering mouth.

Your hands cling to him, one clawing against his back, the other gliding over the back of his head, cradling him to you. You gasp to feel the heat of his tongue on the skin just beneath your ribs. "Baelor…"

He hums in acknowledgement of his name, dragging his lips down over the curve of your stomach and lingering there. Baelor is thorough in a way that shouldn't shock you as much as it does— he lavishes you with his tongue and his lips, the quickest grazes of his teeth making you lurch against him with small sighs and moans. You are entirely alive with feeling, winding you up, until your whole body tenses and releases with it.

Then, he's moving. He passes over your pelvis and your aching, swollen cunt, and goes lower, settling between your knees. You make a little sound, a whimper of protest when you can't hold his head in your hands anymore.

He shushes you with his mouth against the inside of your knee, and then the wet swath of his tongue licks upwards in a way that takes you entirely by surprise. Bold, quick, his face so close and coming towards the most intimate part of you that you startle. "Gods—"

"Let me." It's a quiet plea, hushed against the skin of your inner thigh, one big hand cradling it to his cheek. There's the prickle of his beard, then the soft soothing of his tongue after. "My sweet girl. Let me taste you here."

"Yes," you sigh, even as he's already licking over the trail that your arousal has left, smeared across your overheated flesh.

The aphrodisiac effects may occur outwardly. The maester had said as much, and it becomes more and more apparent that, as Baelor lingers there, breathing in your scent and tasting you on his tongue, he is becoming intoxicated by the poison leeching from you. It's in the way his breath falls unevenly from his mouth, the way his gaze has gone a bit glassy with want, his pupils so wide that his beautiful, incongruous eyes are nearly black.

Baelor takes to you with a wide, flat stroke of his tongue that practically burns you alive. Your back leaves the mattress, your hands snatching at his head. Your cry breaks in your throat with its intensity and pitch, already taken to pieces by the single touch of his mouth to your cunt.

He groans into you— fully moans, as though this is entirely for his benefit and it is not something that he's doing in service to you. It is not a sound that you would have ever expected to hear from him, half-animalistic and far from the restrained, princely figure you've come to know him as. Large hands grasp at your hips and bring you further into his mouth, firm and consuming.

His name leaves you on a squeal. You're being too loud and you know it— through the open window, you can hear birds soar past, voices down in the courtyards. Any and everyone will hear you, and what the Prince of Dragonstone is doing to you, if you can't help it. You barely have the mental fortitude to let one shaking hand leave his head and clap over your mouth to stifle your cries.

He pulls back, releasing your clit from between his lips with a wet sound that makes your face burn. His eyes find yours, and you feel pinned beneath the weight of his gaze. "Do not silence yourself. Let me hear you."

You hesitate for only a second, but he doesn't move. Baelor's eyes remain fixed on your face as you reach forward, then stroke a hand over the crown of his head, a tentative and seeking touch. Then he returns to suck at your clit again, and you have to bite your tongue on a whimper.

He remains there for a long time. Long enough that you begin to think you may go delirious from the pleasure, and not from the poison throbbing and coursing through your veins, effecting him as he tastes you. He drags you to the precipice, to a place where reason and restraint don't exist anymore. There, you threaten to burn alive.

You cum into his mouth with a hoarse cry, your head tipped back on the pillows. It splinters through you like it may both destroy you and rebuild you anew at the same time— there's a rush, a flood between your legs that you don't expect, any more than you expect Baelor to stay there and take it, in all its viciousness.

You can't quite think. You feel him lingering there, his lips and tongue still on you, but it's as though you've been entirely unmade. He doesn't move, just remains solid and capable with his attention on your spent cunt, his tongue still lapping at the wetness that drips from you until you're certain— almost entirely certain— that this is not for the sake of the poison. This is not the potion at work. This is sex for the sake of sex.

"Baelor," you murmur, your voice a bit too high and airy in your throat. Your fingers dig at his scalp for something to make sense of. "D'you think— think it worked—?"

"Mm. You need another." Baelor answers you before you finish asking the question, his eyes narrowed as he rears back. His face is painted in your wetness, glistening around his mouth as he breathes heavily. "Let's not take any chances, shall we?"

"No, I wouldn't want to— to take chances— oh."

Baelor is climbing the line of your body, traversing over you like a panther on the hunt. His parted lips trail a wet line over your stomach, and he nudges your bunched up chemise back, further up your ribs. With trembling hands, you grab the useless fabric and pull it, tugging it frustratedly over your head so that you can throw it across the room.

"My beautiful girl," Baelor whispers into your skin, almost as though talking to himself more than you. His palm smoothes over the curve of your ribs and comes up to cup your breast, a reverent and tender touch, as though simply feeling the weight of it in his hand. "So stunning. Oh, I dreamt of this."

"You dreamt…?" You stutter out a gasp when his mouth closes hotly over your nipple, and your hands fly up to grasp the back of his head.

"I dreamt," Baelor repeats, moving his attention to your other breast with the same amount of care. "I wanted. I wished."

You pull him by the nape of his neck and he moves with your urging, lifting himself over you so that you can kiss him. The dampness of your arousal, still lingering in his facial hair, smears against your cheek as you lick into his mouth and taste yourself, oddly sweet on his tongue.

"Take your clothes off," you grumble against his lips, the slightest note of impatience lacing your tone as your fingers dig against his shoulders.

His linen shirt meets your chemise somewhere on the floor. Your hands find his chest, sliding down over hard muscle padded with soft flesh. He has a body befitting a man of his station— a soldier, hard and lean, bearing the scars of battle but unashamed of them. You trace a scar stretching across his ribs, trailing down towards his navel. Unhurried fingers dance over the trail of hair stretching downwards, guiding you towards the waist of his breeches.

"You're beautiful." It comes out more forceful than you mean for it to— but gods, do you mean it. You want to map out his body with your hands and your lips and your teeth, you want to learn every inch of him by rote, and still never stop once you know all. You try to convey it to him with your eyes, because you can't find any other words to express it. "You're so beautiful, Baelor, you must know."

He smiles, and it's that smile. The one that has haunted you since you saw it last, the one that you want to see over and over again. It causes a swelling feeling in your chest that… probably isn't healthy, but none of this is. It would be death to deny it now.

"You flatter me," Baelor says, his thumb stroking idly against your thigh, where his hand rests. His eyes are soft, flicking over you with so much adoration you struggle not to squirm beneath it.

"I tell the truth," you murmur, slipping two fingers just beneath the waist of his breeches to trace just below the fabric. His breath hitches, and you smirk. "I could always lie, but I imagine you'd see right through it, now."

"It would be very unladylike of you," he remarks, his smile turning sardonic.

"Hm. Can't have that." Even as you say it, your hands are untying his breeches, your fingers tugging until you're able to slip them down his hips. "We both know just how ladylike I am."

One boot comes off, then two, and his breeches shed to leave him in his smallclothes. There is no finesse to his movements— the seduction is over, leaving only sharp intent and the promise of what's to come. Desire wound tight like a spring, loaded to snap at a single touch.

That touch comes when you slip your fingers along the band of his smallclothes, a single, featherlight graze against the laces. Baelor's entire body goes rigid over you, as if you've held a blade to his throat. You guide them over his hips and down his thighs, until he snaps to and shirks them the rest of the way. He whispers your name, something between awe and guttural need forming the word in his throat.

"Baelor," you hum in response when your fingers find him and wrap around his cock. You freeze for just a moment— he's larger than you expected, and the prospect sends a little shiver through you. The Hammer, you think to yourself. Of course. He's hot to the touch, burning and throbbing against your palm, so hard it seems like it should be unbearable for him. But he bears it, for you. "Do you know how many women in the realm dream of this?"

He makes a small noise of warning, twitching in your grip.

Your grin turns wolfish as you pass your thumb over the head, flushed and leaking. "Do you know how many would kill for this? Would die to lie beneath you like this?"

"Heavens above." He shudders out a sigh as you stroke him, his forehead falling to rest against yours. "Don't— you mustn't say such things to me, my love, I— I have to be so careful with you. You have no idea."

So this is what it is, to have him lose his composure. No longer the Prince of Dragonstone, Hand to the King, heir to the Iron Throne— in your hands, he is simply a man. A man who wants, whose breath spills warm across your lips. Whose hips search for yours when you wrap your legs around his waist.

"Would you let me have you, my Prince?" you ask him, and your voice is light, inquisitive. It can't be anything else, because you are just as desperate as he is. You don't have it in you to be teasing, you are simply open with your need for him, allowing your innermost thoughts to surge to the forefront. Your forehead pressed to his, you look up through your lashes to find his eyes closed, squeezed shut in some vain attempt to hold on. "My love?"

His eyes snap open to meet yours, pressed so close that your noses touch. Baelor groans quietly when you guide him between your legs without waiting for an answer— it was a rhetorical question, after all.

But all the same, he replies, "Anything you desire."

Baelor drops his hips, enough to follow the guidance of your hand. He fills you in one fluid stoke, and together you take a long, deep breath.

"You are…"

"Perfect." He finishes your sentence for you, hushed and airy though it is. It feels as though you could be interrupted at any moment with the way he holds you, like a secret, like something that should never been spoken or heard about. Like you are only for him to know this way.

He presses his hips flush to yours, making you keen from the fullness, the exquisite stretch. The potion, for what it's worth, does make everything slicker, easier— you are so swollen and relaxed from his mouth, your body so attuned to his that there is no pain. Only the pleasure of his touch remains.

He moves, and it lights you up from within like wildfire. Your back arches towards him, your chest pressing up against his, and a sound unlike anything you've ever made tears from your throat. Arms blindly snatching for him, you wrap yourself around him as though he may try to move away.

He nuzzles his nose against yours, almost too tender of a gesture for the position you find yourself in. "That's it, darling. Take all of me."

Your mind clouds with pleasure as he rocks his hips into yours. You feel like you're drowning in the skin on skin, stripped to the skin and pressed flush to him. Your hand smoothes down his back, feeling rigid muscle and raised scars there, too.

He withdraws and presses forward, setting a slow, deliberate pace that drives you practically mad. He's so gentle and tender even when everything about him, about this situation, tells you that he wants to let go of his restraint. Widening your thighs on instinct, your hand cradles the back of his head, bringing his lips closer to yours.

"Don't hold back," you tell him, and you feel his breath pause where it fans against your cheek. Even though to try to be commanding, your voice cracks. "Baelor— stop holding back—"

Baelor presses a single, chaste kiss to your lips, and you are too caught up in the moment to realize that it's a warning, a subtle apology before he's shifting. He lifts your hips, planting his knees on the mattress before he pulls you into his lap, your back bent over the expanse of his strong thighs.

You slide down the mattress with an undignified squeak, hands scratching along the sheets for stability where there is none. And then you settle into your new position, gazing up at him with a stunned expression.

He's unbelievably gorgeous. His chest leaps with his breath, tanned and freckled skin glistening with a thin layer of sweat. He pants through parted lips, his eyes sharp and focused as they always are, cheeks flushed. He's a vision, and he's all yours.

Baelor splays his hand flat against your chest, running his palm over the skin where, beneath, your heart pounds a drumbeat loud as thunder in your ears. Then he drags his touch down, between your breasts, over the curve of your stomach. His hand settles warm and solid over your navel, thumb stroking you tenderly enough to make you let out a soft sigh.

But then he's sliding his cock into you again, a wicked thrust that punches all the air from your lungs, and his hand presses down. Your brows draw together, your mouth falling open on a silent moan as he hits something so devastating inside of you that it makes your eyes involuntarily roll back in your head.

"Feel that?" Baelor murmurs, his voice roughened with desperation as he does it again, and again. Pull back, push forward, press down. "Feel how deep I am inside you?"

It comes out so… possessive. Spurred on by the fact that he's the only one to do this to you, the only person to see you like this. Like he's staking a claim to you with each roll of his hips. His fingers rub back and forth over the soft flesh of your stomach, and you do feel it— the tip of his cock as he drives it into you, reaching so deep within you that it makes a faint bulge in your lower stomach.

You sob out an incoherent response, lights dancing behind your eyelids. Your hands, searching for something to hold onto as his thrusts gain momentum, find the pillow above your head. You squeeze it, pull blindly as though it will bring you some respite, and the downy soft padding of it covers your face, smothering the obscene moans that spill from your mouth.

Baelor's hand all but slams down on top of the pillow with a dull thump. You feel the impact through the feather stuffing, a slight bump against the tip of your nose before he's snatching it away from you and flinging the accursed thing across the room. It hits one of the open window shutters and falls to the floor.

"Do not. Hide." It's a snarl released from his throat, his hand coming to cup your chin and pull you to center. "Show me your eyes."

You blink your eyes open at him and bite your lip, trying to keep your whimpering at bay. You watch his core muscles flex with the movement of his hips, his chest dappled with golden sunlight, his jaw tightening with the effort to remain consistent, even when you told him to let go.

"There she is," Baelor whispers, a flicker of awe crossing his features. "My beautiful girl."

His thumb strokes across your lower lip, and without even thinking, you close your lips around it. The pad of his thumb, tasting of salt and the sweet musk of your own cunt, strokes against your tongue. A quiet groan breaks from him, his thrusts turning erratic and unmeasured when you suck hard.

Baelor drops his chin toward his chest, his face drawn in silent agony. "Fuck."

Your cunt clamps down hard around him at the sound of the swear falling from his lips. You don't know why the single word is enough to drive you crazy— probably because you've never heard Baelor curse before, and it's such a juxtaposition to the rest of him. The unshakeable prince brought to shambles by your lips around his thumb, your legs around his core.

Your orgasm mounts suddenly, and your teeth bear down hard on his thumb. It's enough to throw him off-kilter. He hisses through his teeth and pulls you with his free hand, seating himself deep inside you, his hips pressed flush to yours. He slides his hand from your waist downward, through the soft curls of hair on your mound. He finds your clit, brushing a circle around it with the tip of one, impossibly gentle fingertip.

You cum so quickly that the force of it turns blinding and sharp. Your cunt pulses on his cock with an urgency that wracks your entire body. But it is not enough for him that you lay there milking him— no, he has to escalate it.

Just as soon as it hits, Baelor's hand is gripping your thigh, pushing your leg up until your knee hooks over his shoulder, and he bends you. Your thigh presses tight to your chest as he moves over you, his cock hitting immeasurably deeper now. You claw desperately at his back, fingernails scratching, raking hard lines that will be too easy for his servants to notice, come morning.

He doesn't let up, even for a second. Still driving his hips, fucking you through the pulsing of your cunt, his body holding you down against the bed. His thumb slides from your mouth with a wet pop, spit smearing across your cheek as he cradles your face. Baelor replaces his thumb with his tongue, kissing you deeply, reverently, like he can feed all his devotion into you with it.

"Good girl," he whispers into your mouth, dragging his hips back slowly and then filling you back up even slower. You squirm, drowning between your legs from the oversensitivity and the entirely new angle he hits at. The sound that he makes is unbelievably erotic, something between a sigh and a rasping moan that cracks in his throat. "So good for me, my darling."

You cry his name, latching onto him with a trembling hand. "Fuck— Baelor. You need to cum. You should—"

"Don't." He shakes his head, fixing you with a heated look. He swallows, exhaling a stuttering breath. "Not— not yet, I don't—"

But you're nodding against him in retaliation, tightening your core muscles around his cock, squeezing him so hard that he makes a noise like you've punched him.

"Fuck," Baelor grits, hanging his head. "Oh, fucking Seven, you just— just can't stand to lose— can you—?"

Perspiration beads on his brow, and you have the sudden urge to lick it. So, you do. You pull him down by the neck, and he goes, following the urging of your hand like it's a command he's beholden to. You run your tongue across his temple, up and over his drawn brow, and he shudders.

In spite of everything— the overstimulation, the frightening possibility that you might cum again— you manage to break a small, breathless smile. Your mouth finds the shell of his ear, and your voice drops unexpectedly low. "Yield."

He plants his hips against yours, pressing your thigh so far against your chest that your knee almost touches your ear. He cums with an exquisite moan against your cheek, your tongue still pressed to his face to taste more of him, as though you can consume the very beauty from his skin.

You take his hand— the one against your thigh, holding it up around his waist— and guide it down between your flush bodies. Even while you feel him pulse inside you, he follows your guidance without question. He rubs a light caress against your clit, just enough to send sparks shooting up your spine.

You cum again for him, and it's gentler this time— like sunlight breaking through a storm. You give him a soft, relieved moan, while you pulse on his cock and your tense muscles release beneath him.

You both lay there in the feeling, letting the pulsations die down as you settle. And then, he stirs just a bit.

"Better?" Baelor murmurs, nudging his nose against yours.

"Much."

You feel him smile as he kisses you, his hand coming up to cup your cheek. You let him linger there, smiling into your mouth, for a few more seconds— and then you kick your heel against his shoulder, where your leg is still slung up and pinned against you.

He laughs at the disgruntled noise you make, lowering your leg and smoothing his palm up the length of it as he pulls it to rest against his hip. "My strong girl. You're quite the force when you want something, hm?"

"Don't you forget it," you grumble, but there's no real heat to it.

"I'm not likely to anytime soon."

You sigh when he withdraws from you, but only so that he can roll you both, gathering you into his arms. You lay with your head on his sweat-slick chest, his arm encircling your shoulders to hold you close. Relaxing into him, your body spent, you place a hand over his chest to feel his heart thundering beneath your palm.

Both naked, tangled up in each other, you remain like that for a while. Your fingers drawing idle shapes against his chest, gliding through the hair there as it rises and falls with his breaths as they even out.

He's yours. The thought flits through your mind, light as a feather. He's going to marry you. You'll be his wife. Many things about it make your chest tighten. That you'll be the Crown Princess in the process. That eventually, you will be expected to be Queen.

As quickly as your fears bubble up, one thing quells the flood. He's Baelor. He'll take care of you. He always seems to. You trust him to. You… you love him for it.

"You're staring."

You blink, and tilt your head to look up at him. You had been staring, directly at the mess you made between his legs, while your mind whirled in a dozen different directions. You should probably feel embarrassed at being caught, but there's mirth in Baelor's eyes. His hand pets affectionately against the back of your head.

"We're betrothed," you say, in lieu of an explanation.

"So we are."

"The King should probably know."

Baelor makes a short noise. It rumbles in his chest, against your cheek. "The King can wait until the 'morrow. I'm not terribly enticed by the idea of leaving you tonight." He turns his head slightly towards the open window. "After all, I'd imagine most of the Keep knows about it, by now."

You giggle, turning your face towards his chest. You nuzzle into the hair over his heart and breathe in, smelling the comforting scent of his skin. Remarkably, it is less strong than it has been all evening, no longer heightened to the point of overwhelm. You can't hear every damned thing in the Keep anymore— nor can you taste the saltwater on the air from the bay.

"Baelor."

"Mm?"

"I think it worked." You press a kiss to his sternum. "We did it."

"Good." A pause. Baelor heaves a deep sigh. "Do not. Ever. Drink another fucking sex potion. For the love of the suffering Seven."

You tut, a teasing smile quirking at your lips. "So I shouldn't use the second one I have in my drawers, then?"

Baelor's head snaps towards you. When you see the look of terror on his face, you dissolve into a fit of laughter, pulling yourself closer against his side.

He huffs a quiet chuckle, but you can't mistake the sound of relief underlying it. He lays a warm palm against your bare shoulder. "Troublemaker."

"Yes, I am." You bite your lip, trailing your hand down his stomach, your fingers grazing lightly enough that you watch his abdominal muscles tense beneath the touch. "But I want you like this all the time."

"Naked?"

"Unmoored."

You turn your head to find him regarding you with the same calmness you've come to expect from him, but with a fire burning within his gaze. He smirks slightly. "That shouldn't be too difficult for you to accomplish, I fear."

With a hum, you slip your leg over his hips and lift yourself to straddle him. His hands find your waist, steadying you. You raise yourself up, one hand braced on his chest, the other falling to one of his hands. Beneath you, you feel his cock begin to harden again as you place his hand on your breast.

"Then let me begin, my Prince."

The wedding is scheduled for three weeks later, at Baelor's behest. Long enough for the lords of the seven houses to arrive in due course, but not long enough for there to be question if you indeed are with his child.

You spoke about it at length, actually. He was very insistent, seeing as how he was trying to actively put one in you at the time.

On the day of your wedding, you sit in your vanity chair and fiddle with the cuffs of your dress. It is white and gold, of a fabric quality you've never been able to luxuriate in before. It feels stifling. You fear walking in it, breathing in it, doing anything that may damage it at all. You sit with your spine stiff and straight, allowing Mircalla to fix pins into your hair. Several other serving girls flit about the room, attending to various other chores.

When you feel you've just about had enough of the prodding of pins, a knock sounds at the chamber door. Your heart thuds in your chest, and you shift in your seat, hoping that it may be your husband-to-be, come to steal you away for a moment before the ceremony. It would not be unlike him— Baelor is a busy man, but attentive as often when he can be. Even if it is a mere kiss in an alcove, or a five minute interlude in the courtyard, there is always a time and a place that he can find to be with you, to show you his affections.

But the chamber door opens, and your guard steps a foot into the room. "Prince Daeron to see you, my lady."

Daeron? Your brow draws in confusion, but you rise from your chair, regardless. "Enter."

Daeron stumbles into the room with all the grace of a newborn deer. The maids all pause in tandem, and a hush falls over the room as he blinks up at each of them awkwardly, his blue eyes a bit less bleary than normal, his honey-gold hair tied back with a black ribbon for the festivities. "Apologies for my… intrusion?"

"No harm done, my lord." You clasp your hands anxiously behind your back, all the same. "What may I do for you?"

"I had wanted a word with you, my lady. Alone. For only a moment, if you wouldn't mind?"

You think that you would mind, very much. But the longer you regard Daeron, trying to cling to your vitriol, the less you can find any. You are about to be married to the Crown Prince, a gorgeous and honorable man who you are falling desperately in love with, to no one's surprise.

You cannot bring yourself to refuse Daeron— and so, you dismiss your ladies with a courteous nod.

As soon as the door shuts, Daeron is crossing the room and slumping into an armchair by the window. You do not move, but follow him with your eyes as he slouches, heaving an enormous sigh.

"Are you drunk?" you ask him pointedly.

"Always." He flashes you a sardonic smile. You give him an incredulous look. "Necessity compels. But I am here, and not at a tavern, at least."

"Better wine, I'd imagine."

"Mm, yes. Arbor red. An excellent choice, indeed." He pauses, his eyes flicking over you apprehensively. "I came to… apologize, my lady. I fear I have behaved rather badly towards you, and I felt I owed you an explanation."

You only blink at him. "Yes, you do."

"Right." He licks his lips, seeming to collect his thoughts. "Before you came to King's Landing… I dreamed of you."

"How romantic."

"No, not— not so much." Daeron takes a breath and pinches the bridge of his nose. "You see, my dreams… they have a tendency to come true. It isn't always a good thing." He pauses for a long moment, his eyes focused on the middle-distance, appearing to see something that you can't. "When I dreamt of you, it was… I saw you dying, my lady. I saw you on your death bed. And you cursed me for it."

You say nothing, but watch him as his shaking hands smooth against his pants.

"I didn't know what it meant. But I figured, when I saw you, that if I was going to be the reason for your death— in screaming agony— then it would needs be best for both of us if I held no relation to you. If I could refuse you and not speak a word, it would be… you wouldn't have died. And I wouldn't have been the cause."

"But, I have not died, my lord."

"No." Daeron lets out a short laugh, void of humor. "But, you had an affliction some weeks back, did you not? I heard it was rather a close call." He fixes his eyes on you, and he looks so deeply apologetic. Like a kicked dog, he peers up at you through his lashes. "If I was in any way responsible for— for any pain caused, I am truly sorry, my lady. My intentions were noble, I assure you. My execution, however…"

"Leaves something to be desired, yes." You close your eyes, breathe in slowly. Daeron reeks of alcohol, but you don't allow it to deter you from stepping closer to his chair. "In your dream, what was it that I said? How did I curse you?"

Daeron swallows, his eyes flicking around the room briefly. "You said… 'I don't want Daeron. He doesn't want me. I didn't take the fucking thing for him.'" Your face must betray your thoughts, because Daeron regards you closely before nodding solemnly, folding his hands in his lap. "Right. So, it was that."

Your heart pounds so hard that you swear it's trying to leap up into your throat. "Daeron. Whatever you think you saw—"

"It's not for me to pry." His eyes continuously move from your face to various areas of the room, like he doesn't want to look at you head-on. "What I know is that you are well now, and marrying my uncle. And I am happy for you, my lady. I truly am. It has been many years since I saw him smile the way he does, when you aren't looking." Daeron finally chances to look you directly in the eye, and he looks gravely serious. "Do not take this the wrong way, but I think that we would have been terrible for each other. Wouldn't you agree?"

For the first time since Daeron stepped into your chambers, a smile crosses your face. "You know, I think you're absolutely right. We would have killed each other."

Daeron lets out a sad chuckle. "Quite so."

He looks around, at a loss for a few seconds, before he heaves himself up and stands over you. He's quite a bit taller than you first thought— maybe it's because he isn't slouching as much, now.

"Forgive me, my lady. I've taken enough of your time. I wish you a long and happy marriage." He winks. "Only, one not to me."

That finally earns him a giggle from you, and Daeron smiles, before lifting your hand and pressing a chaste kiss to your knuckles. You watch him cross the room, narrowly avoiding bumping into your vanity chair as he moves.

At the door, Daeron pauses and turns back to you with a reserved smirk. "Just so you know. My cock does work. If the need should ever arise again."

He ducks out of the room before the pillow you throw can hit him.

The first proposal arrived on a Tuesday.

Baelor knew this because he had been in his mother's solar when the messenger came — had been in the middle of a sentence about grain yields in the Reach, which was not a subject that had ever previously caused him difficulty — when Myriah had accepted the sealed letter, read it with the pleasantly neutral expression she deployed when delivering information she intended to observe him receiving, and said: "Lord Ambrose Celtigar has written to your father regarding a match."

Baelor had finished his sentence about grain yields. He had said I see with the composure that had served him in war councils and throne rooms and every demanding context his life had presented him with. He had excused himself at a reasonable hour and walked back to his solar and sat down and looked at the wall.

Lord Ambrose Celtigar was thirty four years old. Not unpleasant looking, by general report. He held a respectable seat, had no significant character defects that Baelor was aware of, and was by every measurable standard a perfectly suitable match for a young woman of good family and accomplishment.

Baelor sat with this information for some time. He thought about it with the same thorough attention he brought to tactical assessments and pieces of legislation that required careful consideration. He thought about Lord Celtigar's seat and Lord Celtigar's reported appearance and Lord Celtigar's presumably functional absence of character defects. Then, against his better judgement and with the inevitability of a man who has been trying not to think about something for several moons and has finally encountered a reason he cannot maintain the effort, he thought about you. He thought about the particular way you laughed when something actually struck you as funny rather than merely requiring a polite response. He thought about all the moons of carrying something carefully that he had been meaning to do something about and had not yet done something about, and he sat with the full uncomfortable weight of that gap until the candles had burned considerably lower than when he sat down. Then he went to bed and did not sleep particularly well.

The second proposal arrived on a Thursday. Ser Willam Waxley — twenty eight, well regarded, good family, reportedly personable in the specific way that made Baelor briefly and irrationally consider what reportedly personable actually meant in practice and whether it was a quality you would find appealing, which was not a line of thinking he pursued to its conclusion because he had more self-respect than that. He received the information from his mother over correspondence review, said I see, finished his tea, and continued with the correspondence. It took longer than usual. He kept losing his place.

The third proposal arrived the following Monday, and Baelor heard it from one of his mother's ladies who mentioned it to another in passing while crossing the training yard without any awareness that he was within earshot. Lord Patrek Mallister — young, wealthy, the kind of man described by other men as having prospects, which was a phrase Baelor had always found vague and now found specifically aggravating. He held his sword incorrectly for the remainder of the session. His master at arms observed this with the expression of a man who had seen many things in training yards and had made a professional decision to comment on none of them today.

By the second week Myriah had stopped pretending she was telling him incidentally.

She told him directly now, with the pleasant composure of a woman delivering information she had every right to deliver, and watched his face with the specific attentiveness she had been applying to him since he was approximately four years old and had not, in the intervening decades, become any less accurate. "Lord Rowan," she said one Wednesday morning, in the same tone she might use to note the weather. "He sent a very thoughtful letter. Apparently he is an articulate man — the letter suggested genuine consideration of the match. He mentioned his gardens specifically. Considerable, by his account."

"How nice for him," said Baelor, examining his correspondence with the focused attention of a man who was absolutely reading every word and not at all conducting a parallel and involuntary assessment of whether considerable gardens were a meaningful advantage in the context of a marriage proposal.

"They are in the Reach," Myriah offered. "Lovely climate."

"I am aware where the Reach is, Mother."

"I am simply noting that Lord Rowan appears to be a man of—"

"I am aware," he said, with the measured evenness that cost him slightly more than it usually did, "of Lord Rowan's considerable attributes."

Myriah looked at him over the rim of her tea with the serenity of a woman who had already drawn her conclusions and was simply allowing the conversation to confirm them at its own pace. Across the room you turned a page of correspondence with your habitual focused attention, entirely unaware that a man three feet from your queen was conducting his seventeenth silent assessment of the morning of whether the Reach's climate was in any way a disqualifying characteristic in a prospective husband and arriving, frustratingly, at no useful conclusion.

The problem — and he had examined this problem with the thoroughness it deserved, sitting with it in his solar across several evenings while the candles burned and the city went about its business outside his window — was not that the proposals were coming. Of course they were coming. You were accomplished and intelligent and the kind of person who made rooms better by being in them, and proposals were the entirely predictable result of other people having eyes and using them. The problem was that he had been meaning to do something about a feeling he had been carrying for far too many moons and had not done something about it, and now other men were doing something about it, and the window in which doing something felt like a considered and deliberate choice was rapidly becoming a window in which doing something felt like a response to a crisis. He did not want to do something as a response to a crisis. He wanted to do something because it was right and honest and because he meant it entirely, not because Lord Rowan had considerable gardens and the Reach had a lovely climate. The distinction mattered to him. The distinction was, currently, making his life significantly more difficult than it needed to be.

The fifth proposal was from a lord whose name he forgot immediately upon hearing it, which concerned him more than anything else that had happened so far. He had a good memory. He did not forget names. He went back to his solar and sat with the wall for an hour before acknowledging that the wall had never once been helpful and he should probably stop consulting it.

Maekar found him on the battlements on a Thursday evening, which was not unusual — Maekar found him in various places occasionally and delivered his opinions without invitation, which was simply a feature of having a brother that Baelor had long since accepted. "You look terrible," Maekar said, by way of greeting, leaning against the stone beside him with the air of a man who had come here with a specific purpose and was not going to be deflected from it by pleasantries. Baelor thanked him with the composure of someone receiving a compliment and returned his attention to the city. The city, like the wall, was not particularly helpful.

"The proposals," Maekar said.

"I am not discussing this."

"You have been discussing it with yourself for two weeks. Loudly, in the sense that everyone can see you doing it even though you have not said a word." Maekar paused, with the brief patience of a man making a concession to tact before abandoning it. "She does not know. She has no idea — she sorts the correspondence and answers the proposals politely and has absolutely no indication that you are standing on battlements losing your ability to remember lords' names because of it."

"I did not forget his name."

"You called Lord Fossoway Lord Forrest twice in council," Maekar said flatly, "and his name is Fossoway and you never forget names. Do something about it."

"It is not that simple."

"It is exactly that simple. You consider things until other men act and then you consider the consequences of other men acting. Do something about it." He let that sit for a moment, then pushed off the wall and left with the decisive efficiency of a man who had said what he came to say and had no interest in discussing it further.

Baelor stood on the battlements for a while longer. He thought about Lord Fossoway, whose name he had apparently been calling wrong. He thought about Lord Rowan's gardens and Lord Lyonel Tyrell, who had not yet written but whose existence as a potential candidate Myriah had mentioned with the casual precision of someone planting a seed and fully expecting it to grow. He thought about you sorting correspondence with your focused attention entirely unaware that he was up here mangling names. Then he went inside, because the battlements were cold and the wall had already established it was not going to be helpful and Maekar was right, which was an irritating thing to have to acknowledge even internally.

The sixth proposal arrived on a Friday morning and was, by his mother's assessment delivered with a serenity that he found specifically challenging, the most serious one yet. Lord Lyonel Tyrell. Young. Wealthy. The heir to Highgarden.

He sat in his habitual chair and looked at the correspondence he was not reading and thought about Highgarden with the sustained focus of a man attempting to locate a flaw and being unable to find one. Highgarden had gardens that made Lord Rowan's look modest. It had resources and position and climate that were objectively difficult to argue with. Lord Lyonel Tyrell was, by every measurable standard, an excellent prospect, and Baelor was a fair enough man to acknowledge this even when the acknowledgment was deeply inconvenient.

You were at the correspondence table. You were wearing the blue dress — you always concentrated better in the blue dress, he had noticed this some time ago, something in the colour seemed to settle something in you. You had a small ink stain on your left forefinger from where the pen had slipped earlier and you had not noticed and he had noticed and had said nothing, because saying you have ink on your finger would have been a reasonable and unremarkable thing to say and for some reason this morning reasonable and unremarkable things felt slightly beyond him. He was going to lose you to Highgarden. Lord Lyonel Tyrell was going to take you to his considerable gardens and his considerable resources and you were going to sort his correspondence and make his rooms better by being in them and—

"Your grace."

He looked up. You were looking at him from the correspondence table with an expression of mild concern, which meant the expression on his face had apparently communicated something he had not intended to communicate. "Are you well?" you asked, and he said yes, and you looked at him with that observational patience that had always seen more than he planned for, and said he had been quiet, a different kind of quiet, and he told you he was perfectly well with the composure he had left and you returned to the correspondence and he looked at the window and thought, very clearly and very finally, that he was done thinking about Highgarden.

He stood up.

He crossed the room.

He stopped beside the correspondence table and you looked up and he looked at you — at the ink on your left forefinger and the blue dress and the expression that was currently hovering between curious and concerned — and he thought about Maekar saying do something about it with the bluntness of someone who had run entirely out of patience for watching things not happen. He thought about Lord Fossoway, whose name he had been mangling. He thought about Lord Lyonel Tyrell's gardens, which he was done thinking about.

"There is something," he said, "that I should have said some time ago."

You put down your pen.

"Alright," you said quietly, a light frown appearing on your face.

He looked at you — at your face, which was giving him its full attentive consideration the way it always did — and he thought about how he had wanted to do this properly. Considered rather than reactive. Chosen rather than pressured. He had wanted the moment to be right and he had been waiting for the moment to be right and the moment had apparently decided not to wait for him and had gone ahead and arrived anyway in the middle of a Friday morning over a correspondence table with an ink stain on your finger, and he found, standing here, that he did not mind this even slightly.

"I love you," he said. Quietly. Plainly. With the full weight of the words and several proposals in his mind and one brother's bluntness behind it. "I have loved you for some time. I had wanted to tell you when the moment felt properly considered rather than — I had wanted it to be right rather than reactive, and in attempting to ensure that I have apparently been calling lords by the wrong names and holding my sword incorrectly and consulting walls, none of which has been productive. It has been brought to my attention, with some force, that I consider things at the expense of doing them. I am attempting to correct this."

The solar was very quiet.

You looked at him for a long moment, something moving across your face through several registers — the attentive reading quality, and then something warmer and more wondering beneath it, and then something that was almost but not quite a laugh — and you said: "Lord Tyrell."

"Has excellent gardens," he said. "Yes."

"And Lord Rowan."

"Lovely climate."

"And Ser Willam Waxley and Lord Celtigar and—"

"Yes," he said. "All of them. I am aware of all of them in considerable detail, I have been aware of all of them in considerable detail for two weeks, and I would like, if it is at all possible, to stop being aware of them."

The almost-laugh became something more definite, and he stood beside the correspondence table and watched you laugh softly and found that the moons of careful management had nowhere left to go except simply — out. Released. Like something that had been held very tightly finally being allowed to exist without the holding.

"I was not going to accept any of them," you said, when the laugh had settled into something quieter and warmer. "I had no intention of accepting any of them. For reasons that I think are probably apparent."

He went still. "How long," he said.

"Longer than two weeks," you said softly.

The solar was warm and golden and entirely, completely quiet. He reached across the correspondence table and covered your hand with his — the one with the ink on the finger, the one he had noticed and said nothing about, the one he was done saying nothing about — and felt you turn your palm and close your fingers around his with the ease of something that had always been going to happen and had simply required a Tuesday and too many proposals for his liking and one correctly remembered name to arrive.

"I would like," he said, "to have a conversation that is considerably overdue."

You looked up at him with that real smile — the one underneath all the others — and said: "Are you going to consider it first, or simply have it?"

He looked at you for a moment. "Simply have it," he said.

Outside the solar a Friday morning in spring continued with cheerful indifference to the fact that Prince Baelor Targaryen had just resolved moons of careful management in approximately four minutes. Somewhere in the castle Myriah Martell set down her tea with the expression of a woman who had been waiting for this particular Friday since approximately the third moon and found it entirely satisfactory. In the adjoining corridor Maekar, who had absolutely not been listening at the door, walked away with the expression of a man who had said do something about it and had been correct and intended to bring this up at the earliest opportunity and every opportunity thereafter.

You were still holding his hand across the correspondence table. Baelor looked at that for a moment — at your fingers closed around his and the ink stain and the blue dress and the smile that was still present in the corners of your mouth — and thought that he intended to do something about that too. Properly this time. Without the walls and the battlements and the involuntary memorisation of other men's garden statistics. Simply and directly and without further delay, in the manner Maekar had recommended and that he was now prepared to fully endorse.

He was, after all, done considering.

A.N.: I have been sitting with this request for some time. Sorry for being this late, I have not been as inspired as I would have wanted to. Some people have noted that the AKOTSK is kinda dying (or dozing off) and I think I have the same feeling, idk. Guess I need to take it easy for a minute or two. Thank you all for your constant support, you are all champs <3

Taglist: @qardasngan @nerdyinfluencertastemaker @princessphilly @shyravenns @loveslide @dulcebloodhnd @caitlynluna @mongrelcryptid @sacha1slytherin @faithfullyvigilantsliver @alternarabuda @jjubilee-fluff

It started, as things with Baelor often did, with something entirely innocent.

He had texted you a photo of a page from a book — a passage he had found and thought you would find interesting, which he did occasionally now, with the easy frequency of someone who had stopped managing the impulse to share things with you — and you had responded and a conversation had started and it had been a perfectly normal Tuesday evening exchange about the historiography of late Byzantine administrative structures until—

Until you had not been able to help yourself.

I keep thinking about last week, you sent. Specifically the kitchen counter.

A pause.

Longer than his usual response time.

I think about it also, he sent back. Frequently.

You smiled at your phone.

How frequently, you sent.

Another pause.

More than is probably productive, he sent. I was in a meeting this afternoon and spent approximately ten minutes thinking about the sound you made when I— and then it stopped and you could see the three dots and then they disappeared and then appeared again and then: that was not a sentence I intended to finish in a text message.

Finish it, you sent.

That seems inadvisable, he sent.

Baelor, you sent.

A pause.

The sound you made, he sent, when I put my mouth on your throat. I have been thinking about that specifically.

You stared at your phone.

Just that? you sent.

No, he sent back, and the single word had a quality to it even in text. Not just that.

Tell me, you sent.

The three dots appeared and stayed for longer than usual this time, which meant he was writing something and reconsidering and rewriting, which was so Baelor that you smiled at the ceiling of your flat while you waited.

I think about the way you felt, he sent finally. Specifically the way you felt when I was inside you. The sounds you made. The way you said my name. A pause and then another message immediately after: I think about what you look like when you come. I have replayed that in considerable detail.

Your mouth had gone slightly dry.

Considerable detail, you sent.

I have a good memory, he sent. It is currently working against me.

How so, you sent.

I am sitting in my study, he sent, trying to read, and instead I am thinking about putting you on this desk.

You put your phone down and screeched.

Picked it up again.

Tell me what you'd do, you sent.

The three dots.

I would start, he sent, with your throat. Specifically the place where your neck meets your shoulder. I have been thinking about that place with a frequency that I find somewhat consuming. Another message: Then lower. I would take my time. I was not thorough enough last week and I intend to correct that.

Not thorough enough, you sent. Baelor you made me come twice.

I'm aware, he sent. I have specific intentions regarding three.

You made a sound in the privacy of your flat that you were glad no one could hear.

You can't just say that, you sent.

I just did, he sent, with a composure that translated remarkably well into text. You feel extraordinary, he sent, and the shift in tense — present, immediate — made something clench low in your stomach. I think about how you feel around me and I lose significant portions of whatever I was doing. This afternoon it was a budget meeting. I cannot tell you what was decided.

What were you thinking specifically, you sent.

Specifically, he sent, how tight you are. How wet you were. The sounds you make when I go deep. A pause. I think about your hands in my hair. I think about the marks you left on my throat. I think about the way you said my name when you came the second time. Another pause, shorter. I think about it and I am hard and I am sitting in my study trying to read Procopius and it is not going well.

Touch yourself, you sent.

A longer pause than any of the others.

That is, he sent, not something I have done while texting someone before.

First time for everything, you sent.

You are a terrible influence, he sent. And then, after a brief pause: I am touching myself. I want you to know that I find this situation faintly absurd and also that I cannot currently bring myself to stop.

You laughed and then immediately stopped laughing because the image of Baelor in his study with Procopius open on his desk and his hand in his lap because of your text messages was doing things to you that you needed to address.

Tell me what you're thinking, you sent.

You, he sent. Specifically you on this desk. Specifically the sounds you would make. A longer pause — you figured how difficult it'd be for him to reply while he was pumping his cock in his hand. Specifically what your face looks like when you come. Another long pause: I think about that most. Your face. The way you look at me. A longer pause and then: I think about the way you said my name. I think about it constantly. You have no idea what your voice does to me.

Baelor, you sent.

There, he sent immediately. Exactly that. God.

Are you close, you sent.

Yes, he sent. Tell me something.

I think about your hands, you sent. I think about how large they are. I think about the tattoo on your ribs. I think about the sounds you make and the fact that nobody else has ever heard them.

A pause.

Nobody else, he sent back, rough even in text, something stripped in it.

Nobody, you sent. They're mine.

The pause that followed was brief.

Yes, he sent. And then nothing for two minutes and then: that was somewhat more intense than I anticipated for a Tuesday evening.

You laughed properly this time while looking at your phone like an idiot.

Good? you sent.

Come over, he sent. Please.

Baelor it's eleven pm, you sent.

I'm aware, he sent. Come over anyway. A pause. I have specific intentions and a desk and considerably more patience than I demonstrated last week.

You were already looking for your keys.

I'll be there in twenty, you sent.

I'll make tea, he sent, and you could feel the composure returning in real time and found you did not mind because the composure was never really the point, the point was what was underneath it, and you had standing access to that now.

Baelor, you sent, at the door.

Yes, he sent.

The desk, you sent. Don't change your mind about the desk.

A pause.

I have a very good memory, he sent. I don't change my mind about things I've thought about in considerable detail.

You jumped in the place you stood a few times and locked your door behind you.

It started with a photo.

Not an explicit one. Just — you, at a friend's birthday, in a dress that you had purchased with complete innocence and had worn with complete innocence and had sent to Maekar because he had asked what you were doing that evening and you had said out, here's proof and attached the photo without thinking about it.

His response took four minutes.

When are you home

You stared at the message with the incipient smile of someone who had got exactly what they were looking for.

Why???, you decided to play oblivious.

When are you home, he sent again.

That's not an answer to my question, you sent.

Couple of hours tops, he sent. And keep that dress.

You looked at your phone with a full smile now.

What about the dress???, you sent.

Don't, he sent.

Don't what, you sent.

You know what, he sent.

You did know what. You smiled at your phone in the middle of your friend's birthday party and sent back: I genuinely don't know what you mean.

A pause that felt pointed even through a screen.

The dress, he sent, is a problem.

How so, you sent.

I've been looking at that photo, he sent, for four minutes.

And? you sent.

And I'm going to be thinking about taking it off you, he sent, for the next couple of hours.

You excused yourself from the conversation you had been having and went to find somewhere slightly more private. Daeron looked at you somewhat confused, but when he noticed the way you were biting your lip, he just rolled his eyes and laughed.

Just thinking about it? you sent.

For now, he sent.

Tell me more, you sent.

A pause.

You first, he sent.

You looked at that for a moment.

I think about your hands, you sent. Specifically how they feel on my hips.

The response came fast: yeah

I think about your mouth, you sent.

Where, he sent.

Everywhere, you sent. Specifically my throat.

I left a mark last time, he sent.

I know, you sent. I liked it.

A pause that felt like him recalibrating.

How much, he sent.

Enough that I wore my hair up the next day so people could see it, you sent.

The pause was longer this time.

Christ, he sent.

Your turn, you sent.

The dress, he sent. Specifically what's under it.

What do you think is under it, you sent.

Not my mouth, he sent, and the three words landed with the flat certainty of everything he said and did things to you that three words had no business doing.

Maekar, you sent.

Come home, he sent.

I'm at a party, you sent.

I know, he sent. Come home anyway.

That's very demanding, you sent.

Yes, he sent.

You laughed.

Tell me what you're going to do when I get there, you sent.

A pause.

The dress comes off first, he sent. Slowly. I'm going to take my time. And then immediately: Last time I didn't take enough time. Another message: I've been thinking about that.

What specifically, you sent.

Tasting you, he sent, four words, blunt and direct and landing like a physical thing. Properly. Without the wall and the edging. A pause. Just you on my bed and my mouth on your pussy and nowhere to be.

You were gripping your phone considerably harder than the situation strictly required.

That's very specific, you sent.

I think specifically, he sent.

What else, you sent.

You on top, he sent. Like last time. I keep thinking about that. A pause that felt like him deciding something. The way you looked. The sounds you made. I think about that when I'm trying to sleep.

Does it work? you sent. For sleeping?

No, he sent. The opposite.

Are you hard, you sent.

Yes, he sent, as if it were an obvious question. Have been since the photo.

Touch yourself, you sent.

A pause.

I'm not doing that over text, he sent.

Why not, you sent.

Because, he sent, when I come I want to feel your pussy around me. I'm not settling for my own hand when I can have you.

You stopped, put your phone down for a second, looked at the sky above you, took a deep breath and tried not to scream in public.

Maekar, you sent.

Come home, he sent. I'll be here.

I have to say goodbye to a few people, you sent.

Fine, he sent. And then: wear the dress.

You being you, decided to rile Maekar a bit more just because he hadn't comply with your request of touching himself. Also because it was terribly fun to imagine him fuming at home, hard and not able to reprimand you for now.

You attached another photograph, one that a friend had taken that same day of Daeron and you laughing together earlier that afternoon, his arm around your waist in a friendly manner.

Maekar didn't answer for a whole minute. Then:

Tell Daeron to move his hand, he sent.

You laughed. Why??? He's your son.

I know who the fuck he is, he sent. Tell him to move his hand.

We were just— you did not get time to finish the message.

You're mine. He knows that. Get your coat and come here.

You would have screamed if you remembered how to breathe, which you did not.

Already getting my coat, you sent.

Good, he sent. I am having some words with Daeron tomorrow.

A pause.

And then one more message, sent with the flat directness of a man who said what he meant and meant what he said:

I'm going to make you forget your own name.

You said goodbye to approximately four people simultaneously, Daeron included, and left.

Yeah, so maybe there's a bit of personal projection here. Can you blame me tho?

Taglist: @qardasngan @nerdyinfluencertastemaker @princessphilly @shyravenns @loveslide @dulcebloodhnd @caitlynluna @mongrelcryptid @sacha1slytherin @faithfullyvigilantsliver @alternarabuda @jjubilee-fluff

You stared at the screen for a few seconds. You were wide awake, and you definitely didn’t have the energy to start on your own work.

You giggled at your own message before hitting send.

YOU: I sold it oops

The reply came before you could even exit the app.

UNKNOWN: stop fucking around man im not in the mood

YOU: I dont think this is the right number lol

A minute passed with the typing bubbles flickering on and off a couple times.

UNKNOWN: the fuck

YOU: If ur stuck on his class just check the 2022 archive

There was no response after that. You eventually drifted off to sleep, figuring that was the end of a weird interaction.

Four days passed, and you completely forgot about the random text until friday when you received a notification from the same number.

UNKNOWN: it worked

You blinked at the message, trying to remember who it even was.

YOU: Yeah

UNKNOWN: howd you know about that

YOU: I saw his desktop open with that site and took my chances

UNKNOWN: youre actually not michael?

YOU: No im pretty sure im not a guy

You thought the conversation would end there, but about ten minutes later, you got another text.

UNKNOWN: any other shortcuts u know about

YOU: Maybe

Over the next two weeks, the texts became a weird regular thing. It wasn’t a constant back and forth, but it turned into a daily routine.

You’d get a text in the middle of the afternoon about whatever, or you’d send a quick message about random things in your life.

You didn’t know each other. There was no pressure. You didn't have to put on a performance to try to impress whoever it was you were talking to.

UNKNOWN: what were u saying

UNKNOWN: just got to the gym

YOU: Tf didnt you just leave ur room

UNKNOWN: yeah

YOU: Is the gym right next to ur house or smth

UNKNOWN: the gyms downstairs

YOU: Oh you live in an apartment??

UNKNOWN: no

UNKNOWN: i have a gym in my house dumbass

YOU: Oh!!!!!

YOU: Different tax bracket

UNKNOWN: funny

You found yourself looking forward to those short, blunt messages. He was definitely arrogant, but he was always honest and that pulled you in.

By the third week, the conversations started stretching later into the night. You’d be lying in bed, messaging your friends, and a text would pop up at 1 AM.

👻: why the fuck are you awake

YOU: Im readingg

YOU: why are YOU awake

👻: driving

YOU: Ur gonna die

YOU: Get off ur phone

👻: You sound like my dad

👻: He’s the reason im driving

YOU: Shit is he at the hospital??

👻: no im clearing my head

YOU: Oh

YOU: You okay?

👻: family dinner was so fucking annoying

👻: just micromanaging my schedule like im some kid

YOU: I feel that, my parents keep controlling my life its so stupid

👻: exactly its pathetic

👻: honestly its weird talking to you

You: Ok whyd i catch a stray hello

👻: no i mean its off talking to someone who isnt trying to get something out of me

YOU: idek who u are so theres nothing to get

👻: keep it that way

Then during one morning, you walked into the lecture hall for Professor Davis’s class.

The room was already buzzing with students and you took your usual seat next to Tanselle who was busy drawing sketches on her paper.

“Did you finish the reading he gave last week?” Tanselle asked, not looking up from her page.

“Barely,” you muttered, pulling your laptop out of your bag. “I read like two pages.”

Down in the fourth row, right near the aisle, Aerion Targaryen was slouched back in his seat. He had his dark leather jacket slung over the back of his chair and was surrounded by his usual crowd.

One of them said something, and Aerion let out a short laugh. The guy looked around the group with triumph all over his face, proud that he managed to impress Aerion.

Just then, your professor began talking and it didn't take long for you to lose focus.

Bored out of your mind as Professor Davis started droning on about the text you guys were supposed to read, you pulled your phone out under the desk.

YOU: Im bored entertain me

You hit send.

You kept your eyes on your screen, but then out of habit, your gaze drifted back down toward the front of the room.

Down in row four, you watched Aerion reach into his pocket. He pulled out his phone, a small smirk tugging on the corner of his lip.

His jaw set as he read something, and his thumbs immediately typed out a fast response before he shoved the phone face down on his desk.

Your phone vibrated in your palm.

👻: go entertain yourself

Your breath hitched. You stared at the screen, your heart doing a weird thud against your ribs.

No way, you thought. The lecture hall is massive. At least forty people were on their phones. It’s a coincidence.

Your fingers hovered over the keyboard. You needed to be absolutely sure. You typed out a reply, keeping your eyes glued directly on the back of his silver head.

YOU: Ok unkind

YOU: So ur actually paying attention to class?

The exact moment your text delivered, you watched as Aerion’s head tilted down. He picked his phone back up, scoffing under his breath. His thumbs moved around the screen, typing quickly.

Buzz.

👻: no im looking at my phone because a dumbass is texting me

A cold wave of panic hit you.

Your eyes darted from the screen to the back of his leather jacket. Your mind was short-circuiting, trying to connect the dots.

Aerion Targaryen.

Aerion Targaryen who had a reputation for being, well, himself— was the exact same person who had been texting you until midnight.

You spent the remaining minutes of that lecture staring into the wall. Every time Aerion shifted, your eyes snapped straight to him.

When the bell finally rang, the sudden noise of chairs scraping against the floor made you jump.

“Thank god,” Tanselle muttered, slamming her notebook shut. “You coming to the library?”

“I don’t think so,” you replied after a beat, shoving your things into your bag.

At the front, Aerion was already walking. One of the guys threw an arm over his shoulder and Aerion swatted him off with a grin.

He didn’t look back once. He had absolutely no idea.

For the next three days, every time your phone buzzed, your stomach did a flip. You knew exactly who was on the other side of the screen now, while he remained clueless.

During a late saturday night, you were eating with your friends when your screen lit up.

👻: this movies terrible

👻: why would you recommend this

You stared at the text. Knowing it was Aerion, reading the texts felt completely surreal.

YOU: Ok my bad ill just die

YOU: Its good tho idk what ur on

👻: its not

You: Lol turn it off then

👻: im already an hour in

👻: wouldnt wanna hurt your feelings

YOU: Aww how sweet

YOU: Stubborn bitch…

You bit your lip as you sent the second message. No one would dare to call him that in person, it was thrilling.

👻: lmao

👻: what are you doing anyway

YOU: Eating cheesecake

YOU: Wait have u done the assignment due next week

👻: nah im dreading the partner assignment on monday

👻: if i get paired with one of the idiots im doing it alone

You swallowed hard, grabbing your glass to drink the strain away.

YOU: Maybe youll get someone decent

👻: doubt it

You closed your phone and pressed it onto your chest. He was so different in real life.

When monday came, the room was silenced as Professor Davis tapped his microphone, turning on the massive projector behind him.

“Alright, I’ve randomized the pairings for the research,” he announced. “Check the board, find your partner, and spend the rest of the period discussing with them.”

Your eyes scanned the list, stopping as you found your name near the center column.

Your lungs locked up.

Aerion Targaryen was written right next to it.

“Oh, jeez,” Tanselle said, looking at you with worry. “You got Aerion… Good luck babe.”

Down in row four, Aerion didn’t even bother looking back to find his partner. He simply opened his laptop, ignoring the rest of the room while his friends started moving around. He clearly expected whoever his partner was to come to him.

You took in a deep breath, grabbing your bag.

Walking down the steps felt like walking a plank. As you got closer to his seat, a couple of his friends looked up at you. One of them nudged the guy next to him to clear a seat for you, leaving an empty chair next to Aerion.

You gave them a light smile before sliding into the seat, setting your laptop on the desk. Up close, he smelled like expensive cologne and musk.

“You’re my partner?” he asked, his voice a careless drawl. He still didn’t look at you, opening a blank document.

“Yeah.” You kept your voice as even as possible.

“Type in your email,” he said, turning the laptop just an inch so you could see the screen. “I’ll do the body and everything else. You do the outline and introduction.”

You blinked at him, the contrast hitting you like a physical punch. No jokes, no banter, no casualty.

You were aware he had a reputation for being a ‘womanizer.’ So why was he so cold to you?

“Okay,” you mumbled as you awkwardly reached out to type in your email.

He didn’t say another word to you for the rest of the hour. You sat right next to him, occasionally looking at the side of his sharp profile, realizing this was the same guy who had texted you about the miserable movie you recommended to him just two nights ago.

By 10 PM that same day, you were sitting on your bed, staring at the shared Google Docs. He had already finished his sections before you did.

Your phone buzzed on your blanket.

👻: just wrapped up that history project early so i dont have to deal with it later

You read his message, a sour feeling building up in your chest. You picked it up, your expression hardening.

YOU: Lucky, im still doing mine

You lied.

👻: thats sad

Chewing on your inner cheek, your thumbs moved before you could stop.

YOU: Hows ur partner

The typing bubbles appeared immediately.

👻: its some girl in my section i didnt pay attention

👻: she didnt mess anything up, shes whatever

She’s whatever.

Your eyes fixed on his message until they blurred. You had spent weeks listening to him, laughing at his texts, sharing personal concerns to each other—and yet in real life, you were just a boring, insignificant whatever to him.

The irritation flared up. You tossed your laptop onto your bedside table and sat back against the headboard of your bed.

YOU: Cool

A minute passed without a response.

👻: just cool?

YOU: Yeah

👻: youre acting weird

You left the text on read. Not like it mattered, his read receipts were off. Throwing the phone somewhere in your bed, you didn’t reply.

For the next few days, you struggled returning to how you normally were.

He didn’t text you the morning but eventually did at night, and you left it unreplied for two hours before sending a short answer.

👻: you alive?

YOU: Yes

👻: ok whats wrong then

YOU: Nothing

👻: ???

YOU: What

👻: fine

It felt petty, but each time you looked at your phone, you remembered him sitting right next to you and not even glancing your away. You felt stupid, but his words hurt too.

If you were just a blank space to him in person, you figured it would be better if you were that way on every platform.

By the end of the week, the silence between your texts was heavy. He didn’t text you back after the last chat, and you definitely weren’t going to break first.

You were sitting in class when Tanselle walked in, settling in the chair beside you.

Professor Davis cleared his throat before speaking. “Alright, before we start today’s lecture, I’ve set up a group thread for the upcoming peer reviews. Click on the link and make sure you’re in it by the end of the day.”

You opened your phone to join the chat, then automatically shoved the phone back into your bag. You had no intention of participating.

The period of the lecture ended with a few minutes remaining and your phone started vibrating nonstop.

You tried to ignore it, but the constant noise was getting frustrating. You reached into your bag and pulled it out, looking to mute the group.

A new message popped up at the bottom of the chat. A classmate tagged your number directly because you hadn’t put your name on the sheet yet.

Too annoyed with the whole class to care, you swiped the app and locked your screen.

Then, your eyes subconsciously drifted toward Aerion. You watched as he pulled his phone out.

He was scrolling through the mass text thread when suddenly, he froze.

His head tilted slightly. Narrowing his eyes, he looked at the only text tagging a number. The number he’d been texting every day.

Up front, the classmate who had sent the message lost his patience. He turned around, looking up at where you and Tanselle were sitting.

The guy called out your name, his voice turning multiple heads in the quiet room. “I just tagged your number in the group, you need to upload your topic.”

The sound of your name echoed through the lecture.

Aerion’s head snapped up.

He didn’t look at the guy talking to you. His eyes darted straight up until they locked dead onto you.

The usual expression on his face dropped away. His eyes searched your entire face, his brows drawing in closer.

He saw the phone in your hand before going back to your face.

It clicked.

You stilled under his gaze, the blood rushing loud in your ears.

Beside you, Tanselle nudged your shoulder. “Babe. Babe? He’s talking to you?”

“Yeah,” you managed to choke out. Your fingers felt like wood as you uploaded the topic into the sheet. “Done. It’s in there.”

The classmate muttered a quick thanks and turned back around.

But Aerion didn’t.

He stayed shifted in his seat, his body turned toward your row. One of his friends said something, laughing and clapping him on the shoulder, but Aerion blindly shrugged the guy’s hands off without looking at him. His dark gaze remained on you.

You looked down at your screen, pretending to type, but you could feel the weight of his stare.

A quick glance back down confirmed it. He was staring at you like he was seeing you for the first time, his mind putting the pieces together.

Some girl in my section, she’s whatever. He finally understood why you had iced him.

When the bell rang, you instantly stood up, already packing your bag.

“Why are you in such a rush?” Tanselle asked, shaking her head with confusion.

You gave her a tight smile. “I just need to get back.”

You wanted to wait out the crowd, hoping he’d leave first, but Aerion was already standing by the row exit.

He leaned his back against the desk, ignoring his friends as they stood confused as to why he was still there.

Panic flared in your chest. You didn’t think this through properly.

Without thinking, you threw yourself into the small crowd shuffling through the other exit at the top of the hall.

You basically sprinted across the stone of the parking lot, your keys already clutched in your hand. Unlocking the car, you threw your bag into the passenger seat and slammed the door shut.

You slumped on the headrest, gripping the steering wheel as you finally let out a breath.

Then, your phone lit up with two notifications.

There were two missed calls and above them another notification popped up. It was a text.

Then the woman in 3C cleared her throat.

It was not an ordinary throat clear. It was a declaration of war wearing pearls, the sort of sound produced by someone who had been storing disapproval in her chest since boarding and had finally decided the cabin deserved access to it. You looked up and found her turned just enough in her seat to face you without fully committing to the indignity of twisting around.

 She was elderly, elegant, and stiff-backed, with a silver bob sprayed into submission, coral lipstick, a cream cardigan buttoned over a pale blouse, and a handbag resting in her lap like a judgmental pet. Her eyes swept across Damian’s sketchbook, Jason’s jacket, Tim’s half-dead posture, Cass’s stillness, Duke’s watchful amusement, Dick’s easy charm, and finally settled on you with the hard little satisfaction of a woman who had found the person she intended to make responsible for her discomfort.

You knew that look. You had seen versions of it in school offices, charity events, grocery stores, hospital waiting rooms, and once in a museum where Damian had been accused of “lurking with intent” beside a Monet. It was the look people gave when they saw your family and decided love had exceeded the legal occupancy limit.

You gave her your politest smile. “Can I help you?”

“I certainly hope so,” she said.

Damian’s pencil paused against the page.

Dick leaned slightly into the aisle with that bright, well-meaning expression that made strangers believe diplomacy might survive the century. “Is something wrong, ma’am?”

The woman glanced at him, seemed briefly inconvenienced by the power of his face, then recovered. “I was speaking to the mother.”

Jason turned a page without looking up. “Which one? We rotate emotional support adults.”

“Jason,” you murmured.

The woman’s lips pinched. “That is exactly what I mean.”

You folded your hands in your lap because if you gave them nothing respectable to do, one might drift toward Damian’s wrist in warning or Jason’s shoulder in preemptive damage control. “What do you mean?”

“The noise,” she said. “The whispering, the constant shifting, the atmosphere.”

Duke blinked. “The atmosphere?”

“Yes,” she said, as if he had personally released a weather system into first class.

The bleakest part is that no one had been loud. The Wayne children in public could be many things, but when they needed to, they went quiet. Not normal quiet. Dangerous quiet. Rooftop quiet. The kind of quiet that makes sensible people check the exits and wonder why their instincts have started ringing little silver bells.

“I’m sorry you’re uncomfortable,” you said. “We’ll be mindful.”

“Mindful would have been arranging yourselves properly before boarding,” she replied, lifting her chin. “Children should not be scattered across the cabin like loose change.”

Jason’s eyes lifted over the top of his book.

The air changed almost imperceptibly, and a silk thread pulled tight. Dick’s smile stayed in place, but the warmth thinned at the edges. Cass’s gaze moved to the woman with calm precision. Duke straightened a little. Damian lowered his pencil, his mouth flattening into the expression he wore when deciding whether a person deserved mercy or a footnote.

“They’re in assigned seats,” you said.

“They’re practically surrounding people.”

“We do that,” Tim mumbled, still half-asleep. “Family tradition.”

Cass gently shut his laptop the rest of the way.

The woman stared at him. “Is he ill?”

“Sleep deprived,” Duke said. “Very tragic. Very Gotham.”

“Then perhaps he shouldn’t travel.”

Tim opened one eye. “I suggested cargo. Nobody listened.”

“Tim,” you said softly.

The woman seized on that tiny crack of chaos with visible satisfaction. “You see? Disrespectful. Dramatic. And that one looks as if he is about to start a fight.”

She pointed at Jason.

Jason looked down at himself, then around the cabin, as if searching for whatever violent criminal she could possibly mean. “Me?”

“You know it’s you,” Dick said quietly.

Jason placed one hand over his heart. “I’m reading Austen.”

“That does not comfort people the way you think it does,” Duke murmured.

The woman turned toward Damian next, apparently determined to catalog every offense by row and blood pressure. “And that one has been staring at me.”

Damian looked up slowly, and the temperature of the cabin seemed to drop by several degrees. “I have not. I have been drawing my dog.”

“You looked at me twice.”

“You were in my line of sight.”

“Damian,” you said.

His jaw tightened, but he looked back down. “Apologies.”

It sounded less like an apology and more like a royal pardon delivered under protest.

The woman clearly mistook your restraint for permission. Some people did that. They saw courtesy and decided it was an unlocked door; they saw motherhood and mistook softness for a public utility. “Large families like this always think the world should accommodate them,” she said, loudly enough now for the nearest passengers to hear, but not quite loudly enough to admit she wanted an audience.

“We paid for our seats too,” you replied.

“Yes, but you chose to bring this entire… assembly.”

Dick’s smile vanished.

It did not vanish dramatically. It simply left his face like a light being switched off.

“Assembly?” he repeated.

“Dick,” you murmured.

“I’m just checking the vocabulary.”

The woman looked at him, perhaps sensing for half a second that she had stepped onto a floorboard with teeth beneath it, but then her attention returned to you. You were always the safer battlefield. Bruce was too imposing, Jason too visibly unpleasant when provoked, Damian too sharp, Cass too unreadable, Tim too dangerous in proximity to electronics, Duke too watchful, and Dick too charming until he was suddenly not charming at all. 

But you looked like the mother, the soft one, the one expected to absorb the blow and turn it into an apology. And in truth, you were their stepmother. It was a title that knew how to wear armor and softness at the same time, and you had learned to hold both, whether the world recognized the difference or not.

“I understand wanting to give children opportunities,” she said, her voice sweet in the way spoiled milk might be sweet if it learned manners. “But some children simply aren’t suited for public spaces.”

Jason’s book closed.

Not loud. Loud would have been less threatening. He closes it with one finger still marking his place, slow and deliberate, and lifts his eyes.

“Careful,” he said.

The woman recoiled, one hand fluttering to her pearls. “Excuse me?”

You looked at him. “Jason.”

“What?” he said. “It’s good advice. Lots of sudden drops on planes.”

“We are not doing this.”

A flight attendant named Maribel appeared in the aisle with the cautious smile of a woman who had smelled smoke before the alarm had started screaming. “Is everything alright here?”

The old woman turned to her immediately. “I’m being harassed.”

Jason made a sound like his soul had tripped over furniture.

Dick leaned forward. “No, she isn’t.”

“She is,” Tim murmured. “Being disagreed with.”

“Not helpful,” Duke whispered.

Maribel looked between all of you with admirable professionalism. “Can you tell me what happened?”

“I asked this woman to control her children, and they became rude and threatening.”

“Threatening?” Dick asked, and the word came out quieter than before.

“That one told me to be careful.” She pointed at Jason again.

Jason lifted a hand. “General safety reminder.”

“Please stop helping,” you told him.

“I have never helped once in my life.”

“That’s true,” Dick said.

“Do not defend my character right now.”

The woman turned back to you. “Are you going to allow this?”

Your smile thinned. “I’ve allowed a lot less than you think.”

Her eyes narrowed.

“I’m sorry if you feel disturbed,” you said, and though your voice stayed calm, you could feel your patience fraying beneath it, thread by thread. “But my children have done nothing to you.”

The words changed the cabin.

My children.

They were simple words, but they settled over the rows with a weight that made several of the kids go quiet in a different way. Dick’s expression softened for half a second, unguarded and young despite everything he had survived. Jason looked away, jaw working once as if the sentence had struck somewhere too private to acknowledge. Tim stared at his closed laptop. Cass’s gaze warmed with a softness that was nearly invisible unless you knew how to read her. Duke’s smile tucked itself away into something careful and touched. Damian’s pencil hovered above the page, unmoving.

The woman missed all of it, naturally.

“They’re not children,” she said. “Half of them are grown men.”

“Then stop tattling on them like they stole your crayons,” Jason muttered.

“Jason Peter Todd,” you said.

He winced. “That was unnecessary.”

The woman lifted her chin. “In my day, young people respected their elders.”

“In your day, planes had smoking sections,” Tim said, then looked immediately betrayed by his own mouth.

Duke covered his face with one hand.

Cass patted Tim’s arm.

The woman gasped. “Are you going to allow that?”

Tim looked at you with the doomed expression of a man who had wandered barefoot into a courtroom. “I may have over-participated.”

“You think?”

“Statistically, yes.”

The woman leaned back, offended dignity gathering around her like a shawl. “I don’t know what kind of household you run, but clearly these children have been given too much freedom.”

Your anger always arrives quietly. It isn’t fire, an explosion, or something that cracks through a room and demands attention. It gathers like weather over dark water, slow and heavy, giving people too many chances to mistake the horizon for peace.

“You can complain about the seats,” you said, voice low enough that the nearby rows had to fall silent to catch it. “You can complain about whispering, or atmosphere, or whatever else you’ve decided is unbearable about sitting near my family. But you will not talk about my children like they are burdens someone dragged onto this plane.”

The woman’s face stiffened. “I never said burdens.”

“You implied it.”

“I only meant,” she said, wearing a small, ugly smile now, “that it is generous of you to take on so many complicated young people. Though generosity does have limits.”

For a moment, no one moved.

The engines hummed beneath the floor. Sunlight flashed on the woman’s pearls. Damian went rigid beside you, and you felt the barely contained fury in him like a blade heating under cloth. Jason’s stare flattened into something cold. Dick’s hand tightened around the armrest. Tim was fully awake now, which was rarely a good sign. Cass became too still. Duke’s expression lost every trace of humor.

You reached over without looking and touched two fingers to Damian’s wrist.

“No,” you said softly. “It does not.”

Before the woman could answer, the cabin shifted.

You saw him first.

Bruce came through the curtain at the front of the plane with his dark hair slightly mussed, his suit jacket folded over one arm, his white shirt fitted across his shoulders in a way that made the aisle seem narrower by personal insult. He thanked the flight attendant near the galley, then walked back toward you with that quiet, controlled presence that made the world appear to straighten itself as he passed. No music swelled, no cape unfurled, no dramatic shadow fell across the cabin, though Jason would have paid actual money for all three. Bruce simply returned.

The woman turned because everyone else did.

Then she saw him.

And immediately went silent.

Not quiet. Silent.

It was the kind of silence that happened when someone realized the thunderstorm had a name, a jawline known to every gossip magazine in Gotham, and a very expensive watch.

Bruce stopped beside your row. His eyes moved over you first, always you first, and then over the children with a swift, practiced precision that missed nothing: Jason’s closed book, Damian’s clenched hands, Dick’s missing smile, Tim’s awake stare, Cass’s stillness, Duke’s sharpened expression, Maribel standing in the aisle with the fragile composure of a woman praying no one committed a felony at cruising altitude. Finally, he looked at the woman.

“Is there a problem?” he asked.

His voice was polite, even, and dangerous as a locked door.

The woman swallowed. “Mr. Wayne.”

Jason leaned back in his seat, delighted in the way only Jason could be when consequences arrived wearing cufflinks. “You were asking where our father was, right?”

“Jason,” Dick whispered.

“No, I’m helping.”

Bruce did not look away from the woman. “Were you?”

Her mouth opened, then closed. “There was a small misunderstanding.”

“A small misunderstanding,” Bruce repeated.

He glanced at you. You lifted one shoulder in a tiny motion that told him both nothing and everything. You could handle it. You had handled it. But Bruce looked at the children again, and something in his expression cooled.

“My wife,” he said, “is usually the most patient person in any room.”

The woman tried to smile. “Yes, well…”

“So if she became impatient,” Bruce continued, “I assume there was a reason.”

The smile died.

Maribel looked down, clearly fighting for her life somewhere behind her professional expression.

The woman clutched her handbag. “I didn’t realize this was your family.”

Bruce’s gaze sharpened. “That should not have mattered.”

Jason looked as if Christmas had arrived early and brought legal counsel.

Damian looked like justice had descended in human form and found the seating satisfactory.

The woman stared at her lap. “Of course.”

Bruce turned slightly to Maribel. “Has my family caused any disruption?”

“No, Mr. Wayne,” Maribel said. “They’ve been respectful.”

Bruce looked back at the woman. “Then I trust there won’t be further issues.”

It sounded like trust.

It was not trust.

“No,” the woman said stiffly. “There won’t be.”

“Thank you.”

Bruce sat down beside you and took your hand as if he had not just folded the entire argument into a neat little coffin and slid it beneath the seat in front of him.

For several seconds, no one spoke.

Then Jason whispered, “Dad voice still works.”

Dick exhaled a laugh, shaky with relief. “That wasn’t even full dad voice.”

Tim leaned back in his seat. “Full dad voice requires a first and middle name.”

Damian sniffed. “Father did not need volume. His disappointment was sufficient.”

Duke nodded solemnly. “Artisanal disappointment.”

Cass signed something with one hand that you couldn’t see fully from your seat.

Dick choked.

“What did she say?” you asked.

Dick grinned. “She said Bruce has resting principal face.”

Bruce looked at Cass.

Cass looked back, serene and merciless.

His mouth twitched. “Not inaccurate.”

You finally let out a breath, only then noticing how much tension had settled in your shoulders, tucked there like a smuggled knife. Bruce’s thumb moves slowly over your knuckles, hidden beneath the armrest where only you can feel it.

“What happened?” he asked quietly.

“She had opinions,” you said.

“About?”

“Our atmosphere.”

Bruce glanced around the cabin. “Our atmosphere.”

“Yes. Apparently we travel with a weather system.”

Jason muttered, “Accurate.”

You lowered your voice. “She said generosity has limits.”

Bruce’s hand stilled.

Damian looked up, his chin lifting with sharp, wounded dignity. “She implied we were burdens.”

“Damian,” you said softly.

“It is relevant.”

Bruce went very quiet.

Then he looked at them one by one. Dick, Jason, Tim, Cass, Duke, Damian. His expression did not transform dramatically, because Bruce’s face had always been a locked house with only a few windows lit, but something deeper moved beneath it, something heavy and certain and fiercely held.

“None of you are burdens,” he said.

The sentence landed gently, and somehow that made it heavier.

Tim looked down. Cass’s eyes warmed. Duke swallowed. Jason’s jaw tightened as he stared hard at his book. Damian glared at his sketchbook with ferocious concentration. Dick smiled faintly, the kind of smile that looked like it had been stitched out of old hurt and gratitude.

Bruce’s voice stayed low. “Not to me. Not to your mother. Not ever.”

Your throat tightened before you could stop it, because even when a truth was known, there were moments when hearing it aloud made it real in a new place.

The woman in 3C sat so still she seemed to be trying to become upholstery.

Maribel returned with drinks a moment later, giving you a quiet look of solidarity as she stopped beside your row. “More water, Mrs. Wayne?”

“Yes, please.”

“Anything else?”

“Coffee,” Tim said at once.

“No,” you, Bruce, Dick, Jason, Duke, and Damian said together.

Tim looked betrayed. “I need it to live.”

“You need sleep to live,” you said.

“I’ve tried sleep. We’re incompatible, swiped left.”

Cass accepted the coffee Maribel had already poured and placed it on her own tray table, far from Tim’s reach.

Tim stared at her with hollow despair. “Cruelty from the quietest corner.”

Jason reopened his book. “This family hates innovation.”

“This family hates whatever happens when you drink airplane coffee after thirty hours awake,” Duke said.

“Thirty-one,” Tim corrected.

Bruce looked at him.

Tim closed his eyes. “Allegedly.”

Slowly, your family settles back into its shape. Dick makes Maribel laugh with something kind and easy. Cass watches the clouds like they’re speaking a language she almost understands. Duke quietly guesses which passengers are afraid of flying and keeps being right every time. Tim actually falls asleep, mouth slightly open, protected from caffeine by Cass and whatever higher power is on duty. Jason goes back to reading Austen with the grim focus of a man determined to win an argument with a woman who will never know she’s part of it. Damian finishes his drawing and, after a small hesitation, tears it carefully from the sketchbook and hands it to you.

You took it with both hands. Titus stood in the center of the page wearing a cape and a tiny cowl, one paw planted on a defeated vacuum cleaner.

“He looks brave,” you said.

“He is brave,” Damian replied.

“Is the vacuum cleaner dead?”

“Subdued.”

“Of course.”

Jason leaned over. “Can Titus have a gritty reboot?”

“No,” Damian said.

“I’m seeing rain, vengeance, tragic kibble trauma.”

“Titus already has depth.”

“He eats socks.”

“That is a layered flaw.”

You laughed before you could stop yourself, and Bruce’s hand tightened around yours, his thumb brushing once over your skin like punctuation.

The old woman did not turn around again.

After a while, when the cabin had settled into that soft middle-of-flight hush and the clouds beyond the windows stretched white and endless beneath the wing, you leaned forward just enough for your voice to reach her. “I hope the rest of the flight is more comfortable for you.”

She turned slightly, embarrassed and stiff, no longer sharp enough to cut with. “Thank you.”

You sat back.

Jason stared at you. “You’re too nice.”

“No,” you said. “I’m exactly nice enough.”

Bruce’s gaze warmed. “Yes, you are.”

Damian frowned. “She did not deserve courtesy.”

“Courtesy isn’t always about deserve,” you said, watching the clouds glow like pale silk beyond the window. “Sometimes it’s about who you want to be when someone else is small.”

Damian absorbed that with the deep displeasure of someone who had asked for ammunition and received a philosophy lesson.

Jason groaned softly. “Great. Moral improvement at thirty thousand feet.”

“Hydrate,” you told him. “It’ll pass.”

Bruce lifted your hand and kissed your knuckles, the gesture hidden from most of the cabin by the angle of his body, but not from you. His lips were warm against your skin, brief and old-fashioned and tender in a way that made your heart ache.

“You were magnificent,” he murmured.

“I was irritated.”

“Magnificently irritated.”

You smile despite yourself and look around at your family, scattered across the cabin just like the woman said. Loose change, she called them, or close enough. But she was wrong, the way people are always wrong when they mistake what they can count for what they can understand.

Not loose change, you thought.

A constellation.

Bright, stubborn, impossible stars, scattered across the dark and still belonging to the same sky.

The text exchange with Valarr took approximately four minutes and was, you felt, one of your better performances.

going over to yours to drop something off for your dad

His response came fast.

oh I'm out with kiera actually, won't be back til late. can it wait?

You looked at the book on your kitchen table. A first edition — not ancient, not priceless, but specific. The kind of specific that required knowing what someone was looking for, and you had known what Baelor was looking for since the bookshop three weeks ago when he had mentioned it in passing, the particular rueful tone of someone who had been searching for something for a while and had mostly made peace with the search.

You had found it in a secondhand shop two streets from your flat on a Tuesday and had stood in the aisle for approximately thirty seconds before buying it.

that's even better 🥴

The three dots appeared. Disappeared. Appeared again.

wait are you OH MY GOD please tell me you're not about to he's my DAD

You were already putting your coat on.

I don't know what you're talking about I'm just dropping off a book

YOU BOUGHT HIM A BOOK

it's just a book Valarr

people don't just buy specific books for people they're JUST dropping books off for

I genuinely have no idea what you mean

I am begging you

have a good one with Kiera

You sent your final text, and turned your phone face down in your bag and left before he could respond.

Your phone buzzed four times on the tube.

You did not look at it.

Baelor answered the door in reading glasses.

Just one pair, which was almost worse — there was something about one pair of glasses that was considerably more devastating than two, something about the specificity of it, the domesticity of a man who had been sitting reading in his own house on a weekday evening and had answered the door without thinking to take them off. He was also in a dark grey jumper that was doing things it had no business doing and had clearly not been expecting anyone because the composed public quality was not fully assembled — just him, in his jumper and his glasses, looking at you on his doorstep with an expression that moved from surprised to warm in about two seconds.

"I found something," you said, and held out the book.

He looked at it.

You watched the recognition arrive — the specific title, the edition, the fact of it existing in your hand on his doorstep — move through his expression in stages. He took it with the careful automatic reverence he gave books he considered important and turned it over and looked at the back and then looked at you.

"Where did you find this," he said.

"Shop near mine. Tuesday." You shrugged. "You mentioned it at the bookshop."

"I mentioned it once."

"You mentioned it specifically," you said. "The 1987 Ashgate edition. You said it was difficult to find secondhand."

He looked at the book. Looked at you. Opened his mouth and appeared to reconsider what he had been going to say and said instead: "Come in. I'll make tea."

His kitchen was warm and slightly cluttered in the specific way of a house that was lived in thoroughly rather than managed for appearance — papers on the table, a second book open and face-down on the counter which made you want to say something about spines but you restrained yourself, a mug that had clearly been there long enough to be architectural.

He filled the kettle with the focused attention he brought to small tasks and you sat at the kitchen table and watched him and thought about what you were going to do and felt, underneath the planning of it, the warm uncomplicated fact of how much you liked being in this kitchen.

"The 1987 edition has the corrected footnotes," he said, to the kettle. "The original 1983 printing had an error in the bibliography that propagated through most of the secondary literature for about a decade before anyone caught it."

"That's genuinely horrifying," you said.

"It is." He turned around and leaned against the counter while the kettle worked and looked at you with the glasses and the jumper and the warm composure of a man in his own kitchen on a weekday evening. "How did you know which edition to look for?"

"You were very specific about it," you said.

"I wasn't trying to —" He stopped. "I didn't expect you to actually look."

"I wasn't not looking," you said.

A brief pause in which he appeared to process the grammar of that and arrive at the implication and choose, carefully, not to follow it all the way to its conclusion.

The kettle boiled.

He made tea.

You were on your second cup when you said it.

"Can I say something without it being weird," you said.

He looked at you over his mug. "Probably depends on the thing."

"I find it really attractive," you said, "when someone is genuinely obsessed with something. Like intellectually obsessed. The way you talked about Byzantine iconoclasm in the café — I find that really attractive."

The mug lowered slightly.

"Right," he said, in the tone of a man who was not sure where to file this information.

"History nerds specifically," you continued. "There's something about someone who cares that much about something that's just—" you let the sentence do its work without finishing it.

Baelor looked at you with the expression of a man who had received information he was attempting to process through several different frameworks simultaneously and was finding the process slower than usual.

"That's—" he started.

"And the glasses," you said.

He stopped.

"Men in glasses," you said. "I have a thing. I'm aware it's not a particularly original thing but it's a consistent thing."

His hand moved very slightly toward the glasses and then stopped, which was the best thing you had ever seen another person do, the specific gesture of a man who had momentarily considered taking them off and had caught himself and now needed somewhere to look that was not your face.

He looked at his tea.

"You should probably—" he started.

"You're very attractive," you said. "I've thought so for a while. Since before the café, actually."

The kitchen was very quiet.

Baelor set his mug down with the careful precision of a man performing an action slowly enough to buy time for his thoughts to catch up with the situation. He looked at the table. Then at you. Then at the table again.

"You're Valarr's friend," he said.

"I know."

"You're—" He stopped. Started again. "This is complicated."

"I know," you said. "I've thought about the complicated."

"And?"

"And I'm still sitting in your kitchen on a Tuesday evening having told you I find you attractive." You looked at him steadily. "So."

He looked at you.

The composure was there but it was doing less than usual — the edges of it uneven in the specific way you had first noticed in the bookshop aisle. His jaw moved once. He opened his mouth to say something.

You leaned across the table and kissed him.

Not tentatively. You had been thinking about this for three weeks and tentative had not featured in any version of the thinking. You kissed him with the clear intention of someone who had made a decision and was implementing it, and felt in the first half second the specific quality of his absolute stillness — the shock of it, the composure going offline all at once — and then in the second half second the moment he stopped being still.

He made a sound against your mouth.

Low and involuntary and nothing like the curator or the composed man in the doorway with his book. Just a sound, pulled out of him by the simple fact of your lips against his, and then his hand came up and caught the back of your neck and he kissed you back and every careful principled argument that had been assembling itself somewhere in his head simply didn't.

He pulled back after a moment. Breathing slightly uneven. Looking at you from very close with the glasses slightly displaced and an expression that was trying to locate the counterargument and finding nothing available.

"I was going to say—" he started.

"Was it a good reason?" you said.

A pause.

"I can't currently remember what it was," he said.

"That's probably fine then," you said, and kissed him again.

This time he did not pull back.

This time his hand slid from the back of your neck into your hair and he kissed you like a man who had found the counterargument and assessed it and decided it was insufficient, thorough and unhurried in the way he did everything, and you made a sound against his mouth that he swallowed and responded to immediately.

At some point the table stopped being between you.

There was a period of rearrangement that involved chairs and the brief navigation of the table's corner and his hands at your waist — and then you were against the kitchen counter and he was in front of you with his hands braced on either side and was looking at you with the glasses still on and the jumper and the expression of a man whose counterargument had not returned and did not appear to be coming back.

"On the counter," you said.

His brow furrowed slightly. "What about—"

You put your hands on his shoulders and pushed yourself up onto it. Something happened in his expression.

"Oh," he said quietly.

"Yes," you smiled and bit your lip.

He kissed you again and this time it was different — the composure fully gone, replaced by something more direct and more urgent and considerably less managed, his hands sliding from the counter to your thighs with a purposefulness that made your breath catch. You pulled at the jumper and he shifted to help you get it off and you pushed it up over his head and threw it somewhere and then—

You stopped.

His ribs. The left side. Dark ink against warm skin, the letters precise and deliberate and clearly old enough to have settled into him like they had always been there.

Γνῶθι σεαυτόν.

You stared at it for a moment. Then you looked up at him.

Something in his expression had shifted — a different quality of vulnerability, not the composure being stripped away but something more specific, the particular exposure of something private being seen for the first time by someone he had not planned to show it to and found he did not mind showing it to.

"How long have you had that," you said.

"Twenty years," he said. "Approximately."

"Know thyself," you said softly.

Something moved in his face. "You read Greek?"

"My grandmother," you said. "She had opinions about a lot of things."

He looked at you for a moment with that expression — the unguarded one, the one that kept arriving and staying longer each time — and then you reached out and traced the letters with your fingertips, following the curve of them against his ribs, and felt him exhale sharply at the contact.

You then pressed your lips to it.

The sound that left him was low and immediate and completely unmanaged, his hand flying into your hair, and you felt him shudder under your mouth and filed the knowledge away with the specific satisfaction of someone who had found something important and intended to return to it.

"You are going to be the end of me," he said roughly. To the ceiling.

"Not yet," you said, and pulled him back.

This time when he kissed you it was with the full unmanaged weight of someone who had stopped looking for the counterargument and had no intention of finding it. His hands worked at your shirt with a focus that was no longer patient in the unhurried sense but patient in the specific sense of a man doing something he intended to do thoroughly, and your shirt ended up somewhere and his hands were on your skin and he exhaled against your mouth like the contact had knocked something out of him.

"God," he said quietly. Not to you. To the situation. To the fact of his hands on your waist and yours on his chest and the kitchen warm around you.

"Still thinking about that counterargument?" you said.

"There is no such thing in my brain anymore," he said, and kissed your jaw and then your throat and you tipped your head back and felt his mouth open against your neck — warm and deliberate — and then he did something and you gasped and felt his teeth and his mouth and then the specific bloom of pressure that meant—

He pulled back. Looked at your neck, then looked at your face.

"I'm—" he started, the composure making one last valiant attempt to reassemble itself. "I didn't mean to — I should—"

You grabbed him by the back of the neck and pulled him down and bit his throat.

Not hard. But deliberate. Specific. In the exact register of what he had just done to you, your mouth open against the warm skin of his neck, your teeth grazing the muscle there, and you felt the full body shudder that went through him and heard the sound — low and rough and dragged from somewhere he had not given it permission to come from — and when you pulled back his expression had nothing of the apology left in it.

Just — gone. All of it. The composure, the apology, the counterargument, the curator.

"Right," he said. His voice was wrecked. "Alright."

The bra went somewhere. His hands cupped your breasts with a directness that made you arch into him immediately and he made a sound at that — low and immediate and specifically responsive, like your body's reactions were doing something to him that he had no management available for.

"You're—" he started.

"Tell me," you said.

Something shifted in his expression. The specific thing he had with praise that you suspected was right there, sitting just under the surface, and you had put your finger directly on it and he knew it and was not even slightly trying to deflect anymore.

"Beautiful," he said, rough and specific, his hands moving. "I've — since the café. Since the bookshop. I kept thinking about—" his mouth dropped to your collarbone and the sentence dissolved into the warm press of his lips against your skin— "this. Exactly this. Whether you'd—" he kissed across your chest— "whether you'd make sounds. What sounds you'd make."

"And?" you managed.

"Better," he said against your skin. "So much better than whatever I—"

He kissed your breast and his tongue found your nipple and the sound you made was immediate and unguarded and he groaned against you — a genuine moan, low and resonant, vibrating through his chest into yours — in direct and unmistakable response to the sound you had made, like your pleasure had a direct line to something in him that bypassed every system he had.

"There," he breathed. "God — there—"

"Baelor—"

"I know," he said. "I know, I—" another moan, lower, as you shifted against him— "you have no idea what you sound like. What you feel like. I've been — Fuck, I've been trying not to think about this for weeks and it's—"

His hands found your jeans.

He dealt with your jeans and your underwear with hands that were steady and purposeful and not entirely in his control — the steadiness of focus rather than composure, the focus of a man doing something he had thought about and intended to do properly. His fingers found your clit and you grabbed his shoulder and made a sound that echoed off the kitchen tiles and he moaned in response — low and broken and entirely involuntary, his forehead dropping to your shoulder.

"You're so wet," he said, rough. Wondering. Like the fact of it was doing something specific to him. "God. Already — I've barely—"

"The hickey helped," you said.

A sound that was almost a laugh and almost not. His fingers moved and your hips rolled forward and the almost-laugh dissolved into something lower and more wrecked. "I'll keep that in mind," he said, against your throat, and did it again — the deliberate press of his mouth to the mark he had already left, tongue tracing it — and the sound you made was embarrassingly immediate.

"Baelor," you said.

"Mm," he said, not stopping.

"If you keep doing that I'm going to—"

"I know," he said. Warm. Certain. His fingers working with the focused attentiveness of a man who had decided this was worth studying thoroughly. "That's the idea."

He learned you quickly and used what he learned without mercy — the specific pressure that made your hips roll, the rhythm that made your breathing go ragged, the precise application of his thumb that made you clench around his fingers and made him moan against your throat like your body's responses were the best thing he had ever encountered and he intended to catalogue every one.

"You feel—" he started.

"Tell me," you said again, because you had found the thing and you were not letting go of it.

His breath caught. "Perfect," he said, low and rough and deliberate. "You feel perfect. Every time you clench like that — every time you make that sound — I can't—" a low moan as you did it again— "I've been thinking about having you like this since — fuck, since before I should have been and I can't—"

"Don't stop," you said.

"I'm not stopping," he said.

He didn't stop.

You came with his fingers inside you and his mouth on the hickey he had left on your neck and his voice in your ear saying your name and then saying perfect, exactly that, god, you're— in a low broken stream that your brain was going to be replaying for a very long time, and he held you through every shudder of it with his free hand spanning your lower back, steady and certain, and the sounds he made while you came apart around his fingers suggested that your orgasm was doing as much to him as it was to you.

He was hard against your thigh and had been for a while and the specific evidence of it when you reached for him made him say your name in a way that had clearly been waiting to sound like that.

You got his boxers out of the way.

He made a sound that came from somewhere deep and his hips pressed forward into your hand involuntarily and he made another sound at that, lower, his forehead dropping to your shoulder while you wrapped your hand around his cock and felt him twitch and felt him breathe and felt the specific shudder that went through him when you moved your hand.

"Christ," he said.

"Good?" you teased.

"Don't be smug," he answered, voice completely destroyed.

"I'm not being smug," you said. "I'm asking."

"Yes," he said. "Obviously yes. You feel — your hand feels—" he made a sound that interrupted whatever he had been going to say and you filed the sound somewhere permanent. "I need to—" He stopped. Gathered himself with visible effort. "If you keep doing that this is going to be embarrassingly short and I have — I have specific intentions."

"Specific intentions," you repeated.

"I'm a thorough person," he said roughly.

You released him. He exhaled shakily.

Then he was between your thighs and positioned and looking at you with the glasses still on — crooked, both lenses catching the kitchen light — and the hickey you had left on his throat and the tattoo on his ribs and the completely dismantled expression of a man who had retired the counterargument and every system downstream of it.

He pushed inside.

The sound he made was—

Long. Low. Broken entirely open, dragged from somewhere below every layer of management he had ever built, arriving with the helpless totality of something that had been contained for too long and had finally, completely, stopped being contained. His head dropped forward to your chest. His jaw was working and his eyes were closed and he stayed there for a moment just — breathing, or attempting to, his chest rising and falling unevenly.

"Baelor," you said softly.

"Give me a moment," he said. His voice was unrecognisable as the café voice or the bookshop voice or any voice you had previously catalogued. "You feel — Christ, you feel — I need a moment or I'm going to—"

"Take your time," you said.

"I intend to," he said, and then he moved and you both made sounds simultaneously and the intentions became very clear.

He fucked you slowly at first, with the specific deliberateness of a man who had said he was thorough and intended to prove it, and made sounds that you were going to think about for the rest of your life — low and continuous and arriving one after another with complete disregard for composure or management or anything else he had previously used to keep himself contained. Every movement produced something from him. Every time you clenched around his cock he moaned — properly, openly, the sound resonating through his chest into yours.

"You feel—" he said, against your throat. A low moan interrupted him. "God. Every time you — when you do that — I can't — you're so—"

"Tell me," you said.

His breath caught.

"Perfect," rough and specific and chosen with the care of a man who selected words deliberately. "You feel perfect. Your pussy feels — god — every time you clench I can feel exactly—" another moan, longer this time, as you did it intentionally— "there. Exactly there. You have no idea — I've been trying not to think about this and it's so much — you're so much better than—"

"Than what," you managed.

"Anything I—" he started, and his hips found a rhythm that interrupted the sentence and made you grab his shoulder and hold on.

He fucked you on his kitchen counter with his hands on your hips and his glasses crooked and the Greek tattoo on his ribs catching the light and made sounds that belonged to nobody you had met before this evening — unguarded and unrestrained and arriving in response to everything, your sounds, your movements, your hands in his hair, every time you said his name which you did frequently and with purpose because of what it did to him.

"Say my name, please," he said at one point, breathlessly, against your jaw.

"Baelor," you said, deliberate.

The moan that left him at that was long and low and you felt it everywhere.

"God," he said. "Again."

You obliged.

"Fuck," he said, and his rhythm deepened and you stopped being able to say anything coherent for a while.

You came a second time somewhere in the middle of it, which you had not planned for but which arrived with the inevitability of something that had been building since the kitchen wall and the edging and the hickey and the tattoo and all of it, clenching around him with his name on your lips and your nails in his shoulder, and the sound he made at the feel of it—

Was the most undone thing you had ever heard from another person.

A long low broken moan that he pressed into your throat and that shook through his entire chest and that had absolutely nothing of the museum curator or the composed man on the doorstep in it — just Baelor, stripped entirely down, making sounds he had never made in front of another person because nobody had ever gotten past the composure far enough to find them.

"You feel so good," he said, rough and wrecked and honest. "When you come around my cock — fuck — I can feel everything — you feel so—"

"Baelor," you said, and pulled him closer.

He came shortly after with your name and then perfect and then something that was not quite a word pressed into your throat, shuddering through him completely, his hands holding you like you were the thing he was anchored to and he intended to stay anchored.

The kitchen was quiet after.

Both of you breathing.

His forehead against yours.

The glasses — still on, still crooked — catching the kitchen light in a way that made you feel something specific in your chest that you were choosing not to examine until you were in a better position to handle it.

You reached up and straightened them.

He looked at you.

The expression on his face was entirely, completely undone and entirely, completely unbothered about being undone, which was new from a man who had been managing his expression for as long as you had known him.

He reached up and touched the hickey on your neck. Lightly. Just his fingertips.

"I should probably—" he started.

"Don't apologise," you said.

He looked at you. You tilted your head and traced the one you had left on his throat. Something in his expression did something entirely unmanageable.

"Fair point," he laughed.

Your phone was in your bag. Valarr had sent approximately seventeen messages. You did not check your phone.

You traced the tattoo on his ribs instead and felt him exhale slowly against your hair.

Know thyself.

You thought, with the warm certainty of someone who had just watched a man find out something true about himself on his own kitchen counter, that he was getting there.

(i'm truly sorry i did not find a gif that vibed with the vibes)

Daeron was, by any reasonable metric, completely gone.

You had established this approximately forty five minutes ago when he had attempted to explain to you why the Fibonacci sequence was secretly a conspiracy and had made, briefly and alarmingly, a compelling case. Since then he had progressed through several distinct phases — philosophical, then mournful, then inexplicably delighted by a lamppost — and had arrived at the current phase which was primarily characterised by his inability to walk in a straight line and his arm around your shoulders being the only thing keeping him approximately vertical.

"You are," you told him, dragging him up the front path, "an absolute disaster."

"I am having," he said, with great dignity, "a very good evening."

"You can barely walk."

"I'm walking fine."

"Daeron. I am carrying you."

"That's very kind of you," he said, and attempted to pat your head and got your ear instead.

You rang the doorbell with your elbow.

The door opened after about thirty seconds and Maekar stood there in a dark t-shirt and jeans with the expression of a man who had been doing something else and had come to the door expecting approximately anything other than this specific situation.

He took in Daeron.

Daeron, to his credit, attempted to stand up straight. He managed about forty percent of upright before gravity reasserted itself and he leaned back onto your shoulder.

"Hi dad," he said.

The silence that followed had considerable weight.

"For the love of—" Maekar started, and then said several other things in rapid succession that were not appropriate for general audiences and that you were filing away for later because the specific combination and delivery was genuinely impressive.

"He's fine," you said. "Just drunk."

"He's absolutely hammered," Maekar said flatly.

"Okay he's absolutely hammered," you conceded. "But fine. He didn't do anything stupid, he just had about four drinks too many and started explaining mathematics to strangers."

Something moved through Maekar's expression that was exasperation and reluctant parental resignation in equal measure. He held the door open. "Get him in."

Getting Daeron up the stairs was a collaborative project.

You had his left side and Maekar had his right and Daeron contributed by providing commentary on the staircase, which he found architecturally interesting, and by stopping twice to make points about things that had not been raised.

"Dad," he said, at the second landing, with the abrupt subject change of the extremely drunk.

"What," said Maekar, in the tone of a man concentrating on a task.

"She thinks you're really sexy," Daeron said, conversationally, then turning his face to you. "That's the thing you said, right?"

You stopped walking.

"Keep moving," Maekar said, apparently to both of you.

"Like, really sexy," Daeron continued to you, with the relentless honesty of someone for whom the filter between brain and mouth had completely dissolved. "You told me. After the pipe thing. You were like Daeron— wait no that's me. You were like your dad is—"

"Daeron," you said, through your teeth.

"What? It's a compliment. I'm sure dad will take the compliment."

"I'm going to fucking kill you," you told him pleasantly.

"You're literally carrying me, you're not going to—"

"I will drop you on this landing."

"But you said—" Daeron started.

"He's fine," you said loudly, to Maekar, who was — you checked — focused entirely on navigating Daeron through the bedroom door with the focused efficiency of a man who was too irritated at his son to be processing anything else. His jaw was set in the specific way of someone managing several feelings at once and prioritising the most immediate one, which appeared to be get this man horizontal before he falls over.

Good.

Fine.

He had not heard. Or had heard and dismissed it because Daeron was drunk and Daeron said things and the more pressing concern was the logistics.

You were going with that.

You got Daeron onto his bed with the cooperative efficiency of two people who had identified a shared goal and were pursuing it without further conversation. He landed with the boneless satisfaction of someone whose relationship with gravity had become philosophical rather than practical, made a sound of profound contentment, and was asleep within approximately ninety seconds.

You both stood at the foot of his bed looking at him.

"He'll be fine," you said. "Water and paracetamol in the morning."

"I know," Maekar said, in the flat tone of a man who had done this before with various combinations of his six children. He reached down to pull the duvet up and his t-shirt rode up at the back—

You saw it.

Just the bottom edge of it — the tail, curling at the base of his spine, scales rendered in deep red and black with the fine detail of something that had taken serious time and serious money and serious commitment. The colour was extraordinary even in the low light of Daeron's bedroom, vivid and deliberate, and it disappeared back under the t-shirt when he straightened but it was too late.

You had seen it.

You were thinking about what was above it.

"Right," Maekar said, turning around and finding you with an expression that was still mostly parental irritation and some baseline tiredness and not whatever your face was currently doing. "Tea? Or I've got whisky if you need it after that."

"Whisky," you said immediately.

His kitchen was warm and quiet and he poured two glasses with the economical ease of someone who knew his own kitchen and did not need to perform anything in it, and you sat at the table and took the glass he set in front of you and felt the whisky do its immediate work and thought about the tail of a dragon at the base of his spine.

"He's an idiot," Maekar said, sitting across from you.

"He's your idiot," you said.

Something that was almost the almost-smile. "Unfortunately."

You drank your whisky. He drank his.

The kitchen was quiet in the specific way of two people who had just performed a task together and had not yet decided what happened next.

You were happy tipsy — the warm uncomplicated kind, the kind that made you feel slightly more yourself than usual rather than less — and the whisky was good and Maekar was sitting across from you in his t-shirt with the dragon underneath it and you had been thinking about this for weeks and Daeron had, drunk and disastrously, already said half of it anyway.

"He wasn't wrong, by the way," you said.

Maekar looked at you over his glass. "About what."

"What he said on the stairs."

A pause. The quality of Maekar's stillness shifted slightly — not the irritated-at-Daeron stillness, something more attentive than that.

"He said a lot of things on the stairs," Maekar said. "He said the banister was load-bearing in an interesting way."

"The other thing," you said. "I think you heard."

He looked at you, eyes doing that funny thing they do when they grow darker. You looked back.

"You're Daeron's age," he said.

You rolled your eyes. "You're not that old."

"I have six children."

"I know. I've met them. They're fine." You swirled the whisky. "That's not actually a reason not to."

"It's a context."

"Still not a reason, is it?."

His jaw tightened slightly. He set his glass down. "You should probably—"

"Probably what?" you said, and tilted your head, and watched him clock the tone and reassess.

There was a beat.

"Don't," he said. Flatly. The specific flat of a man who has identified a dynamic and is issuing an early warning.

"Don't what?" you said, with the complete innocence of someone who knew exactly what.

His eyes narrowed fractionally.

"You're being a brat," he said.

"I'm asking a question."

"You're being a brat," he said again, and this time it was not a warning exactly, it was something else — something that had arrived from a different place, lower and more specific — "and you know it."

You smiled at him over your glass.

Something shifted in Maekar's expression with the finality of a decision being made.

He stood up.

He crossed to your side of the table with the direct purposeful movement that characterised everything he did physically and you stood because sitting while he was standing felt suddenly like a tactical disadvantage and then you were both standing in his kitchen at a distance that was not a distance anymore and he was looking at you with those violet eyes that had stopped being the grumpy-at-everything eyes and had become something considerably more focused.

"Last chance," he said. Not a threat. Just — information, delivered with the flat certainty of a man who meant what he said.

"I don't buy it" you said staring directly at him.

He kissed you.

Not the way you had imagined it — you had imagined it various ways over various weeks — but harder than any of the imaginings, more immediate, with the specific quality of a man who had been holding something at arm's length for too long and had decided, definitively, to stop. His hand came up and caught your jaw and he kissed you like punctuation, like a full stop at the end of something, and you kissed him back with equal fervour and felt his other hand find your waist and pull you in and the size of him was—

There. Immediate. Real. His hands spanning you, his chest against yours, the specific overwhelming quality of being pulled against someone that much larger and feeling it in every nerve.

He broke the kiss and looked at you.

"Still being a brat?" he said, low.

"Oh, abso-fucking-lutely," you laughed.

His jaw moved. "Right."

His hands moved to your hips and walked you backward with a calm deliberateness that left you no input into the direction of travel, and your back met the kitchen wall with a solidity that was not rough but was very definite, and Maekar braced one hand beside your head and looked at you with the expression of a man who had made several decisions and was implementing them in order.

"Maekar—"

"You wanted to be a brat," he said. "Fine."

His other hand slid down your stomach and your breath caught.

"You can be a brat," he said, his mouth dropping to your throat, "and I'll teach you what happens."

His fingers found the waistband of your jeans and dealt with the button with one hand and the efficiency of someone who was not performing patience because he had the real thing, and then his hand was inside your underwear and finding your clit with a directness that made you grab his shoulder and make a sound that was embarrassingly immediate.

"There," he said, against your throat. Not pleased exactly — satisfied, in the specific way of someone whose assessment has been confirmed. "That's it."

His fingers moved and you stopped being able to think about much else.

He was — thorough. That was the word. In the way the garden spreadsheet had been thorough, in the way the pipeline had been thorough — focused and attentive and completely committed to the task with a patience that was somehow more intense than urgency would have been. He learned what made you gasp and returned to it. He learned what made your hips roll forward and used it deliberately. He paid attention with the same quality of attention he had given the raised bed and the isolation valve except directed entirely at your clit and it was — a lot. It was a frankly unreasonable amount.

"You're close," he said, low. Not a question.

"Yes," you managed. "Yes, keep—"

He stopped.

You made a sound.

"What—" you whined.

"Told you," he said, against your jaw. Calm. Completely, infuriatingly calm. "Brats don't get to come that easily."

"Maekar—"

"Mm."

"That's not—"

"Not what?" he said, and his fingers moved again, barely, just enough, and you grabbed his shirt with both hands.

"Not fair," you said.

"No," he agreed, and did it again — built you up with that focused relentless patience, got you to the edge with the specific efficiency of someone who knew exactly where the edge was and had decided to park you there indefinitely, and then stopped again.

The sound you made was not dignified.

He made a low noise against your throat that was the closest thing to satisfied you had heard from him and you were furious about how much you liked it.

"Maekar," you said, with feeling.

"When you're ready to stop being difficult," he said pleasantly.

"I am not being—"

"You walked into my kitchen at midnight and told me you knew exactly what you were doing," he said, pulling back enough to look at your face. His eyes were dark and completely focused and there was nothing grumpy-at-inanimate-objects about his expression now, just — direct, and certain, and very specifically aimed at you. "You were being difficult on purpose."

"Maybe," you managed.

"So." He tilted his head. The movement was so deliberate it made something in your stomach clench. "Consequences."

He edged you a third time against the kitchen wall.

By the end of it you were gripping his shirt with both fists and making sounds that had nothing to do with dignity and he was pressing his mouth to your temple and saying there, that's it, stay there in a low voice that was simultaneously the hottest thing you had ever heard and the most aggravating and when he stopped for the third time you actually whined.

"Please," you said when he removed his hand from your jeans entirely.

"Please what?" he said.

"Please, you absolute—"

He picked you up.

Not with ceremony, not with warning — simply put his hands under your thighs and lifted you off the floor with the casual ease of someone for whom this was not a significant physical undertaking and carried you out of the kitchen while you were still processing the fact that you were no longer on the ground.

"I hate you," you informed him.

"No you don't," he scoffed, and sat down on the sofa with you in his lap.

The living room was dark except for the light coming through from the hall and Maekar was solid and warm underneath you and you were straddling him and looking at each other and the aggravation had transmuted into something else entirely in the twenty seconds it had taken to get from the kitchen wall to here.

He kissed you again.

Slower this time. His hands on your hips, thumbs tracing small movements against the fabric, and you kissed him back and felt the kiss change as it went — finding its own depth, its own pace — and then you were pulling at his t-shirt and he lifted his arms and you got it over his head and threw it somewhere in the dark and—

You stopped.

The dragon covered his entire back. You could only see the front of him from where you sat but the tail curled around his ribs on the left side and there were scales at his collarbone and it was — in the living room dark with the hall light catching the colour — extraordinary. Deep red and black and the fine detail of something built over years, the kind of tattoo that had been added to incrementally, that had grown with him.

"How," you said.

"How what," he said.

"This." You traced the scales at his ribs. Felt him breathe in. "How does nobody know about this."

"People know," he said. "They just don't see it unless I—" he stopped, because you had leaned forward and pressed your mouth to the scales at his collarbone and his sentence dissolved.

"Unless you what?" you said against his skin.

"You're still being a brat," he said, low.

"Yes," you smiled, and kissed across his collarbone to the scales on his ribs and felt him exhale sharply, his hands tightening on your hips, and heard the low sound he made that was different from the gruff default and considerably better.

You pulled back and looked at him.

"Your turn," he said.

He dealt with your shirt with the same one-handed efficiency as before and unclipped your bra and looked at you with the direct thoroughness he brought to things he was assessing seriously, which should not have been as effective as it was.

You laughed at the way he was staring at you. "That look is getting dangerously close to a compliment."

"And you're getting dangerously close to being pleased about it," he said back, this time the smile almost coming fully to his face.

"Says the man who hasn't looked away from my tits."

"If I had looked away, we both know you'd be disappointed," he said, which was so flat and so Maekar that you laughed, and he watched you laugh with that fractional almost-smile and then pulled you in and kissed you and his hands were everywhere and you stopped laughing about anything.

Clothes ended up in various parts of the living room over the next several minutes — yours, his, everything — with the mutual efficiency of two people who had both been thinking about this and were done with the intermediary steps. His jeans went somewhere near the coffee table. Your underwear ended up on the arm of the sofa.

You were straddling him again, properly now, and he was looking up at you with those dark focused eyes and his hands were on your hips and the size of him was — there. Present. Impossible to be casual about.

"Well?" he said.

"Well what?" you mimicked.

"You wanted to be a brat," he said, low. The almost-smile at the corner of his mouth, barely there, completely deliberate. "Show me."

You held his gaze.

"You're a brat too, you know," you smirked.

"I know," he answered. "So show me."

You sank down onto him slowly and the sound he made was — long and low and entirely without the management of any of his usual composure, his head going back briefly, his jaw clenching, his hands gripping your hips with a pressure that was going to leave something and that you were entirely fine with.

"Fuck," he said. Rough. Genuine.

"That good?" you breathed, because turnabout was fair play and because you wanted to hear what he did with it.

His jaw tightened. His eyes, which had closed briefly, opened and found yours. "Don't push it."

"I'm just asking," you chirped sweetly, and moved, and the sound that left him then was—

Not managed at all.

You rode him with his hands on your hips and his eyes on your face and the low continuous sounds he was making against every instinct to contain them, and it was — the power of it, the specific pleasure of being the one setting the pace while he sat there and took it and made those sounds — was something you had not anticipated and intended to revisit extensively.

"You feel—" he started, low.

"Tell me," you said.

His jaw worked. His fingers dug into your hips. "You feel—" the words seemed to cost him, dragged out by the combination of the movement and something else, something more fundamental— "good. Christ, you feel—" he stopped. Made a sound. Started again. "Perfect. Exactly—" his hips rose to meet yours and you both made sounds simultaneously— "exactly what I—"

"What you what?" you said.

"Thought about," he managed roughly. "For weeks. Christ."

That was the most words you had ever heard Maekar say in a single emotional direction and you filed it somewhere permanent and moved again and felt his entire body respond.

One of his hands left your hip and found your clit.

"Oh—" you started.

"You're going to come," he stated, low and flat and completely certain. "And then you're going to come again. And we're going to see—" his thumb moved and you grabbed his shoulder— "how difficult you feel like being after that."

"Maekar—"

"Yeah," he said. The almost-smile. Devastating. "Yeah."

His thumb worked your clit with the same focused patience he had employed against the kitchen wall except now there was no stopping, no edging, just — direct and relentless and entirely committed, and you rode him and felt everything build simultaneously and heard his sounds and felt his hands and looked at the dragon scales on his ribs and came with his name in your mouth and your nails in his shoulder and everything clenching around him and the sound he made when you did—

Was the best thing you had ever heard from another person.

Low and rough and entirely wrecked, his head dropping back, his hands gripping you like you were the only fixed point available.

"Again," he said roughly. "You can—"

"I literally just—"

"Again," he insisted, and his thumb was still moving and you found out he was right.

You came a second time somewhere shortly after with less warning and more intensity and said something that you would have been embarrassed about if you had had any available capacity for embarrassment, which you did not, and Maekar said your name and then said there, exactly— and followed you over the edge with a roughness and a totality that shook through him completely and left you both in the specific stillness of people who have just dismantled something and are taking stock of the wreckage.

The living room was quiet. Your forehead was against his. His hands had moved from your hips to your back, large and warm and spanning you completely, holding rather than gripping.

"Still being a brat?" he teased.

His voice was completely wrecked.

"Ask me in a minute and we'll see," you said.

The almost-smile. Full this time. Real. Directed entirely at you in the dark living room with the dragon on his ribs and his hands on your back and the evidence of your underwear on the arm of the sofa somewhere to your left.

"Tea," he asked eventually.

"Yeah," you said.

"Then you're staying." Not a question. The flat certainty of a man making a reasonable determination.

"Feel like you'll need me again that much?" you teased.

He looked at you.

"Brat," he scoffed.

"You love it," you said.

He said nothing, but the almost-smile stayed.

The text came at half eleven the following morning.

You were in Maekar's kitchen drinking coffee while he read the paper with the focused attention of someone who had entirely recovered their composure and was pretending the living room situation had not occurred, which was belied only by the coffee he had made you without being asked and the way his hand had rested briefly on the small of your back when he passed.

Your phone lit up.

so daeron targaryen here your best friend??? who you dragged home last night??? and who apparently passed out in his room while something was happening on his sofa???? i have no memory of the stairs but apparently i said some things anyway i need you to know that i heard you last night specifically i heard you say [and then a direct quote of the thing you had said while riding his father that you were not going to repeat even internally] i just want you to know that i will never recover ever are you okay? are you alive? do you need extraction?

You looked at the message for a moment.

You looked at Maekar, who was reading his paper with his coffee and his recovered composure and that fucking hot dragon underneath his t-shirt.

You typed back.

get used to it i'll pay for your therapist x

And then you added an emoji that left absolutely nothing to the imagination.

Daeron's response was a string of increasingly unhinged capitalisation followed by what appeared to be genuine laughter rendered in text.

i literally cannot believe you okay fair enough is he making you coffee tho

You looked at the coffee.

yes why

He waited a few seconds to reply.

good he only makes coffee for people he likes. he made mum coffee every morning for fifteen years

daeron

I'm just saying

daeron

okay okay I'm going back to sleep my head is KILLING me

drink your water

Three dots. None. Three dots again.

yes mum also oh my god I cannot believe you rode my

You turned your phone face down on the table. Maekar looked up from his paper.

"Daeron?"

"Daeron," you confirmed.

He looked at you for a moment with those violet eyes and the recovered composure and the almost-smile sitting at the very corner of his mouth.

"How bad?" he asked.

"He'll be fine," you said. "Mostly horrified."

"Good," Maekar said, and returned to his paper. "He should have kept his mouth shut on the stairs."

You laughed and picked up your coffee.

Outside the morning continued with its business entirely indifferent to the fact that you were sitting in Maekar Targaryen's kitchen the morning after, drinking coffee he had made without being asked, while he read his paper and pretended to be completely normal about it.

You were both completely normal about it.

You were both, underneath the completely normal, not even slightly normal about it.

A.N.: listen i had a very productive day and couldn't stop writing. also, there's a little ✨extra✨ coming tomorrow (if i can proofread it). how do y'all feel about sexting Baelor and Maekar???

Taglist: @qardasngan @nerdyinfluencertastemaker @princessphilly @shyravenns @loveslide @dulcebloodhnd @caitlynluna @mongrelcryptid @sacha1slytherin @faithfullyvigilantsliver @alternarabuda @jjubilee-fluff @hrh007

Reid hums as he glances back down at his book. “Interesting how your clothing choices become statistically less practical in direct correlation to Hotch’s proximity.”

Your stomach flips. “Spence.”

He lifts one shoulder. “What? He’s not listening.”

You glance back at Morgan, whose eyes are glued to his phone, brow furrowed just slightly as he waits for the whirring coffee machine to fill his cup.

“That’s not the point, Spencer,” you mutter, turning back to him. “You need to—”

The conference room door swings open again and Hotch walks in—files tucked under one arm, the rest of the team trailing behind him.

“Morning,” he says, dropping the files on the table. “Hope everyone had a good weekend.”

Morgan snorts. “What weekend?”

“Yeah,” Prentiss mutters, dropping into the seat beside Reid. “I was here until five on Saturday finishing geographical profiles.”

“That’s because you alphabetise your paperwork,” you point out.

She gives you a look. “I enjoy being proficient.”

“Well,” you say lightly, leaning back in your chair “some of us managed to finish our paperwork on Friday and still have a very enjoyable weekend.”

Garcia gasps dramatically as she falls into the last empty chair, coffee in hand. “Ooh, look at you. Was there a man involved?”

You shrug one shoulder, biting back a smile. “I’m choosing to plead the fifth.”

Morgan points across the table. “That means yes.”

“Or,” Reid says without looking up from his book, “it means she enjoys making people speculate.”

“Aw, Spence,” you tease. “Don’t sound so bitter.”

He finally looks up from his book and fixes you with a look so flat it borders on threatening—because he knows what you’re doing. It’s what you always do. It’s how you manipulate their perception. How you keep your secret.

You perform.

You swipe through dating apps, talk about men, brag about your weekends without ever being too specific. You flirt with almost everyone on the team—Reid more than the rest, because he’s your scapegoat... and your best friend.

He’s the only one who can see through the charade. Not because he’s emotionally perceptive, but because he did the math. He noticed the pattern. He realised very quickly that every time Hotch walks into a room or says your name, you react in a way that can only mean one thing:

Hotch is the secret you’re trying so hard to hide.

Because if you give a team of profilers an easy explanation—harmless flirting with a messy dating life and a weakness for attention—they won’t notice the way your entire body betrays you whenever your infuriatingly gorgeous boss gets too close.

Hotch clears his throat. “Well, lucky for all of you, it’s a quiet week.”

Reid shuts his book and sets it on the table.

“No active cases as of this morning,” Hotch continues. “Which means we’ll be catching up on consults, court reports, and the mountain of paperwork everyone’s apparently been neglecting.”

His eyes meet yours for the briefest second, and your pulse skitters.

“I’m bored already,” Morgan sighs, leaning back in his chair.

Hotch ignores him. “We’ve got two local consult requests from Fairfax County and a follow-up review from the Richardson case. Dave, I’ll need your notes finalised by this afternoon.”

Rossi nods once. “You’ll have them.”

“Garcia,” Hotch continues, “the Milwaukee office wants that digital forensic review by Wednesday.”

Garcia gasps softly, pressing a hand to her chest. “But I already colour-coded my entire week. That review wasn’t supposed to be due for another fortnight.”

Morgan blinks. “You colour-code your schedule?”

“Obviously,” Garcia says. “How else would I maintain my sparkling personality under crushing institutional pressure?”

Reid straightens. “Technically, organising information activates the same reward pathways as—”

“Don’t,” Prentiss says immediately.

Reid frowns slightly. “I was just going to say gambling.”

You snort softly before you can stop yourself, covering it quickly with your hand. Reid shoots you a look. Prentiss just shakes her head. And when your eyes finally flick back to the front of the room, Hotch is already watching you.

Not the team. You.

Your stomach twists.

That signature Hotchner scowl should not be as hot as it is. It shouldn’t make you cross your legs a little tighter or make your heart race the way it does. You should be used to that scowl by now. You’re on the receiving end of it often enough—whenever you crack a poorly timed joke or flirt a little too hard with Morgan.

Yet somehow, you still feel like you can’t breathe until his gaze finally shifts.

“Moving on,” he says evenly, “JJ will forward the consult details after the meeting.”

He spends the next thirty minutes briefing the team on consults and court appearances while you do your best to stay focused—but it’s hard. It’s hard because every time you look at him, your gaze drops to his mouth and your mind fills with all sorts of filthy ideas. Then he starts moving his hands as he explains something and you can’t help but wonder what they might feel like wrapped around your waist, your thighs, your throat.

His voice is a low rumble at the back of your mind, warm and firm, but you have no idea what he’s actually saying. All you can do is think about how that voice might sound, wrecked and rough, telling you how pretty you look when you—

“The briefing ended three minutes ago,” Reid says.

You blink hard. “What?”

He closes his notebook with a sigh. “The meeting’s over. You can stop internally monologuing now.”

You frown. “I’m not—”

He gives you a look.

“Ugh,” you groan. “You’re so annoying.”

You push up from your chair and walk out of the conference room without waiting for him, but you’re not surprised that he’s right behind you by the time you reach the bullpen. You drop down at your desk with another indignant huff, watching Reid do the same from the corner of your eye.

Everyone else is already settled at their desks—keyboards clicking, pens scribbling—and there’s a fresh stack of files next to your computer with a sticky note on top that reads: Fairfax files. Prioritize pages 12–18. – Hotch.

You want to laugh at the little sign-off, as if anyone else would have put these files on your desk. Your fingers trace over the note once before you peel it off and stick it to the bottom corner of your computer screen.

Reid snorts. “You know most people throw those away, right?”

You glance sideways at him. “I don’t want to forget the page numbers.”

He hums. “Sure.”

“You know,” you say, turning your chair to properly face him, “you’re being particularly judgemental today. What’s your problem?”

He stares at you for a moment, then glances back at the sticky note still attached to your monitor.

“I’m experiencing prolonged second-hand embarrassment,” he says plainly. “And repeated exposure tends to increase irritability.”

You roll your eyes. “Yeah, well—you’re increasing my irritability.”

He nods. “Good.”

You frown.

“I’m attempting corrective behavioural conditioning.”

Your eyes narrow. “By being annoying?”

“Exactly,” he says, already turning back to his computer.

You glare at the side of his head for a long moment, searching for a comeback—but your mind is completely blank. So with another irritated sigh, you turn back to your own screen, scoot your chair into the desk a little harder than necessary, and settle in for what’s shaping up to be a very boring Monday.

The next two hours pass by in a blur of interview transcripts, witness statements, and crime scene photos. The Fairfax County PD files detail the death of a woman in her late thirties who accidentally overdosed in her Reston home early last week. No prior history of substance abuse, financial instability, or high-risk behaviour—until forty-eight hours before her death.

In just two days, she withdrew a large amount of money, missed work without explanation, visited several bars she’d never been to before, and bought herself thousands of dollars’ worth of expensive jewellery and lingerie.

To anyone else, it might look like some sort of breakdown—an impulsive spiral that led to the kind of recklessness you can’t come back from. But to you, the behaviour feels too... artificial. As if someone is trying to construct the narrative of a troubled woman—checking all the right boxes to give investigators an easy explanation for a tragic overdose.

Only there isn’t enough concrete evidence to support your instinct. No stalker. No ex. No clear unsub who could have orchestrated this kind of ruse to cover what might actually be homicide.

You sigh. “Reid.”

“Hm?”

“Tell me if I’m overthinking this.”

Reid pushes back from his desk and scoots across the narrow stretch of carpet between your workstations. He doesn’t stop until his chair bumps the side of your desk, causing your pen cup to topple over and spill across the files you’ve got carefully laid out.

“Oops,” he says absently, pushing the pens aside.

You roll your eyes and start gathering them while he scans the files.

“The behavioural shift feels manufactured,” you say, dropping the pens back into their cup. “But there’s enough legitimate stressors here that I can’t tell if I’m forcing a pattern because it’s too clean.”

Reid examines the highlighted timeline for another few seconds.

“You’re focusing too much on the existence of the stressors,” he says. “Stress explains escalation. It doesn’t explain inconsistency.”

You frown slightly.

“She suddenly becomes impulsive socially, financially, and sexually, but her organisational habits never change.” He taps the timeline. “She still pays bills early. Still meal preps. Still attends a dentist appointment two days before her death. Real behavioural deterioration isn’t usually selective.”

Your brows lift. “So, I’m right?”

Reid nods, leaning back in his chair. “You’re right.”

“What’s she right about?”

You nearly jump at the sound of Hotch’s voice—low and even, a little rough around the edges in that way that always makes your stomach tighten.

“She thinks the behavioural shift is staged,” Reid says. “And I agree.”

He scoots back slightly as Hotch leans in, one hand braced on the back of your chair while the other pulls the file closer so he can read it properly. His tie falls forward, brushing lightly against your thigh—and suddenly, you can’t breathe.

He’s close. Way too close. You can feel the heat of his breath on your skin. Smell the bitterness of coffee beneath his cologne. Hear the quiet creak of leather from his belt as he leans in further.

“It’s too compartmentalised,” Reid says, his voice more distant than it was just a second ago. “Real behavioural spirals usually bleed into every aspect of a person’s routine. Sleep disruption, missed payments, changes in grooming habits, social withdrawal—something.”

Hotch lifts his hand off the desk and presses his thumb to the tip of his tongue—then flips the page.

Your pulse jumps so hard it almost hurts. Heat crawls up the back of your neck. Your whole body feels too hot, your clothes suddenly too tight, the bullpen too small—but you can’t move. Not with Hotch’s hand still on the back of your chair.

“But this is curated,” Reid goes on, tapping the timeline with the end of his pen. “The impulsive behaviour escalates while the foundational routines stay completely intact, which suggests intentional narrative construction.”

Hotch turns his head just slightly, dark eyes finding yours. “You caught that?”

You clear your throat. “I just... thought the escalation pattern felt off.”

“Her behavioural analysis is spot on, actually,” Reid says. “I can’t find a flaw in it.”

Hotch hums quietly as his eyes move back over the file.

“Good girl,” he says absently.

Your entire nervous system short-circuits.

“Keep it up,” he adds, smoothing his tie as he straightens.

You don’t say anything as he turns and walks away. You couldn’t even if you wanted to.

Reid just sits there, hands folded in his lap as he watches Hotch disappear into his office before slowly turning back toward you.

“You know,” he says thoughtfully, “the age-gap preference is actually more interesting than the authority fixation.”

You finally blink. “What?”

“Because the authority thing makes perfect sense. High-pressure careers tend to reinforce attraction to competence, decisiveness, emotional restraint—especially in workplace environments where leadership qualities become psychologically linked with safety and stability over long periods of exposure.”

You frown. “What are you—”

“But the older man preference is statistically more complicated because you don’t actually display the attachment markers usually associated with paternal absence or instability.”

Your eyes go wide. “Spencer—”

“You have a healthy relationship with your father, no documented authority issues, and relatively secure interpersonal attachment patterns, which suggests the preference is less psychologically compensatory and more rooted in behavioural reinforcement.”

“Reid.”

“For example,” he goes on, ignoring you completely, “you spent your formative professional years surrounded almost exclusively by older men in positions of intellectual and behavioural authority. Gideon, Rossi, Hotch—which likely created a reinforcement pattern where emotional competence became unconsciously associated with attraction, arousal, and sexual interest.”

You freeze. “Reid, I swear to—”

“You don’t react this strongly to older men generally,” he continues. “You react strongly to Hotch because he’s emotionally controlled, professionally authoritative, intellectually intimidating, and—”

He pauses, tilting his head.

“Very obviously your type.”

You glance frantically around the bullpen, scanning the desks for the rest of your team.

Morgan has his headphones on, completely focused on whatever report he’s typing. JJ’s desk is empty, as usual—she’s probably with Garcia. And Prentiss is only halfway back from the kitchen, still stirring her fresh cup of coffee.

Your gaze cuts back to Reid. “You are so lucky no one heard that, Spencer.”

He shrugs. “Wouldn’t matter if they did.”

Your brows pull together. “What’s that mean?”

“You’re good at redirecting attention,” he says, slowly pushing his chair back toward his desk. “You’re less good at hiding physiological responses.”

Your hand flies up to your cheek, palm pressing flat against the burning skin.

“Whatever,” you mutter. “It’s warm in here.”

Reid glances around the bullpen. “It’s sixty-eight degrees.”

“I hate you.”

“No you don’t.”

You shoot him one last glare before turning back toward your computer, aggressively waking up the monitor with your mouse.

You stay chained to your desk for the next few hours, finishing up the victimology report for the Fairfax files before taking them to Rossi for final review. Then you head out with JJ to grab a late lunch from the deli down the street, and when you get back, there’s a brand-new stack of files on your desk—only this time, with a tall takeaway cup of coffee set on top.

“Hotch got dragged into some last-minute Section Chief meeting across town,” Morgan says, pushing his headphones down. “Said he needs those cross-referenced before tomorrow morning.”

“Great,” you mutter, dropping into your chair.

Morgan chuckles softly as he pulls his headphones back up, turning back to his own pile of reports.

You grab the coffee from the top of the files and find a sticky note stuck beneath it—written quickly but still in his unmistakable handwriting: I owe you one. – Hotch.

Your stomach flips.

God. That’s pathetic.

You peel the note off and drop it into the top drawer of your desk, not wanting another psychoanalytic lecture from Reid if he were to spot that note stuck to your monitor.

The rest of the day passes the way every other caseless Monday afternoon does. JJ’s the first to head out—not long after five—taking advantage of the slow week to spend a little extra time with Henry. Rossi leaves about an hour later, announcing to the bullpen that he’s got a date with a bottle of wine and reruns of his favourite medical drama. Morgan manages to clear the files on his desk before seven, finally putting his headphones away before bidding the rest of the team farewell.

Prentiss and Reid linger until nearly nine, and only when the motion sensor lights blink out does Prentiss finally glance up, realising how late it is. She gathers her things and nudges Reid, who’s been firmly stuck in hyperfocus mode despite the rest of the world quietly slowing down around him.

“You coming?” he asks, adjusting the strap of his satchel.

You look up slowly, your brain buffering as it untangles itself from the files spread across your desk.

“Not yet,” you reply, blinking tiredly. “Hotch needs these by morning.”

Reid tilts his head. “Want me to wait?”

You wave a hand. “Nah, go ahead. I’ll get security to walk me to my car.”

“Alright,” he says, already turning away. “Just remember that positive reinforcement loses effectiveness when the subject becomes emotionally dependent on it.”

You glare at his back. “I’m reporting you to HR.”

“You’d have to explain the context,” he calls over his shoulder.

You roll your eyes as you turn back to the last file on your desk, taking a deep breath and flipping it open.

With the bullpen almost completely silent and the promise of sleep so close you can taste it, you manage to get through it in record time. You even give it a quick second pass to make sure you didn’t miss anything glaringly obvious in your tired state—but you’re used to working through sleep deprivation, and by ten p.m., you finally start packing up.

You organise the files back into a neat pile, then open the top drawer of your desk for Hotch’s note. You stick it to the top file and grab a pen, scribbling just below the words he wrote: Dangerous thing to promise me.

And, just as he did, you sign off with your name.

Then you gather the whole stack in your arms and cross the bullpen toward his office. Unlocked, as usual. You nudge the door open with your foot, warm lamplight casting an orange glow over the quiet space. It smells faintly like coffee and his cologne—enough to make your heart start racing the second you step inside.

You set the files neatly on his desk, trying not to linger on the quiet traces of him scattered throughout the room.

There’s still half a mug of cold coffee abandoned beside some paperwork, and the cashmere sweater he’d been wearing beneath his jacket this morning is draped haphazardly over the back of his chair. Quiet evidence of just how suddenly he’d been called away.

It makes you feel a little better knowing you really have helped him out.

You adjust the files until they’re perfectly straight, then take the sweater from the back of his chair and fold it neatly before setting it on the chest of drawers beside his desk. You hesitate for just a second before grabbing the mug of cold coffee and heading out of his office, straight for the break room. You empty it, wash it, dry it, then return to his office, placing it back on his desk exactly where you found it. Then you switch the lamp off on your way out, pulling the door most of the way shut behind you—the way it’d been before you stepped inside.

It doesn’t take long for you to gather your things, head down to security, and badge out. One of the guards escorts you to the parking garage, waiting until you’re safely inside your car with the engine running before he takes the elevator back up.

Once home, you quickly feed the yowling Leia—your cat, who’s very unimpressed by your late arrival—take a quick shower, change into your comfiest, threadbare sleep shirt, then crawl into bed with your laptop balanced on your knees. You know you should just try to get some sleep, but you’ve been ignoring a few personal messages and emails for a couple days now, and you know that if you don’t get to them soon, you’ll start to feel guilty.

You open your emails, reply to a couple, then pull up a new browser tab and type in the login address for the dating site Garcia set you up for. Not that you couldn’t have set up your own profile if you’d really wanted to.

No—this profile is just the unintentional byproduct of your ongoing attempt to redirect attention.

One slow Thursday evening in the bullpen, while you’d been loudly complaining about how impossible it was to meet men with a job like yours, Morgan had the brilliant idea of making you a dating profile. Garcia immediately lit up at the idea, pulling the site up on her computer while Reid launched into a rambling statistical analysis about the probability of finding genuine compatibility online.

Hotch hadn’t contributed to the conversation, but you’d known he was listening.

That had been the whole point. You always perform a little harder when Hotch can hear.

The site finally loads and you type in your credentials, waiting a few seconds for your profile to pop up.

Twelve notifications.

You click on the ‘messages’ tab and start scrolling. There are a few old conversations that fizzled out and you’ve long since decided not to reply to. There are a couple of messages from people you never intend on starting a conversation with. Then there are two new messages—ones you’d seen pop up on your phone but couldn’t be bothered to engage with over the weekend.

After all, you’re not actually looking to date anyone.

But one of the messages catches your eye.

DCRunner00: You seem like the kind of person who’s either very funny or very mean. I’m willing to risk it.

You snort, then type out a reply.

You: Unfortunately for you, those traits aren’t mutually exclusive.

Just as you hit enter, Leia leaps up onto the bed.

“Hey, sassy girl,” you coo, moving your laptop to reach for her.

Your fingers graze her soft coat, and she gives you an incredibly disapproving look.

You roll your eyes. “Alright. Sorry for loving you.”

You settle back against the pillows as she makes her way to the other side of the bed, curling up as far as she can possibly get from you.

Ping! Ping! Two more messages pop up.

DCRunner00: That’s probably the best possible answer you could’ve given. DCRunner00: So what’s your worst personality trait? I feel like that’s more interesting than hobbies.

That answer comes a little too easily.

You: Workaholic. You? DCRunner00: I get bored easily. DCRunner00: Which usually means I either start running or annoying people for entertainment. You: Sounds like a public safety issue. DCRunner00: Depends who you ask. DCRunner00: You should probably get some sleep, Workaholic. It’s late.

You glance over at Leia as she rolls onto her side, stretching her front legs, and only then do you realise you were actually smiling at your screen.

You shake your head, typing quickly.

You: Yeah, I should. You: Night, Running Man.

Then you shut your laptop before he can send another message.

TUESDAY 9:50AM

“Morgan, you’re with me at district court this afternoon,” Hotch says, closing the file in front of him. “The defence attorney’s pushing back on the Richardson testimony, so we’ll need to review our timeline before the hearing.”

He’s wearing a grey suit today.

You can never think straight when he’s wearing a grey suit.

Morgan sighs dramatically. “Nothing says excitement like four hours in a courthouse basement.”

Hotch ignores him completely.

“JJ, I want the media requests filtered through Strauss’s office before lunch. Reid, finish the geographic overlays from the Fairfax case and send them to Rossi when you’re done.”

He glances once around the table.

“If anything urgent comes in, you’ll be notified. Otherwise, continue using this downtime to catch up on reports.”

Then he gathers the files into a neat stack and stands, turning toward the door.

The rest of the room starts moving slowly. Morgan mutters something to JJ about the court hearing, Prentiss turns to Reid, asking something about a case you don’t quite catch, and Garcia is already explaining something on her laptop to Rossi, who’s watching the screen with quiet concentration.

Which leaves you to shamelessly stare at your boss’ ass as he walks out of the room.

“You should probably blink.”

Your head snaps toward Reid, frown already forming. “I’ll blink when I want to blink.”

He presses his lips together to keep from laughing, and you know he’s fighting the urge to launch into some deeply unwanted psychoanalysis of your behaviour—but thankfully, the rest of the team is still too close for him to risk it.

Eventually, everyone starts filing out of the conference room and back into the bullpen. You end up being the last to leave, behind Reid and Garcia who are chatting animatedly about some new phone app they’re both obsessed with.

You’re just about to pass Hotch’s office door when—you hear your name.

You turn your head, and he gestures for you to come in.

Reid glances briefly over his shoulder, an irritatingly knowing look on his face as you turn and step into Hotch’s office.

You clear your throat, stopping a few feet from the desk. “Sir?”

“How late were you here last night?” he asks.

You lift a shoulder. “About ten.”

His jaw shifts as he leans back in his chair. “That’s late.”

“Morgan said you needed them done by the morning.”

“I didn’t mean first thing,” he says, smoothing the end of his tie. “You could’ve finished the rest before lunch.”

You blink. “Oh.”

His gaze holds yours for a second too long.

“You don’t need to stay late to impress me.”

Your eyes widen slightly before you force out a small, awkward laugh. “Oh—uh—good to know.”

He glances briefly at the navy-blue cashmere sweater still folded neatly on the chest of drawers.

“Still,” he says, lower this time. “I appreciated it. The files, and… everything else.”

Your breath catches softly in your throat.

“Anytime, sir,” you manage.

He nods once, then drops his gaze back to the paperwork on his desk.

You don’t need any more of a dismissal than that, so you turn quickly and step out, pulling the door shut behind you. He prefers it closed, even if he won’t admit it because he doesn’t want the team to think he’s shutting them out. He’s just more comfortable in private—it helps him focus.

By the time you get back to your desk, everyone else is already settled and working quietly. Not even Reid glances up or offers a teasing remark.

You drop into your chair and wriggle your mouse, grabbing your phone while you wait for the screen to wake up.

Two new messages from DCRunner00.

DCRunner00: Running Man? DCRunner00: Great book. Slightly concerning nickname, though.

You can’t help yourself, so you type out a quick reply.

You: Better than ‘Workaholic’. You: You read Stephen King?

“Hey, you busy?”

You glance over at Reid. “Aren’t we all?”

He tilts his head. “You’re on your phone.”

“I could be working.”

“Are you?”

“No.”

“Good,” he says, shuffling the files on his desk. “Hotch wants us to prep the full geographic and timeline package for the Fairfax files in case it turns into an active investigation.”

You sigh, already pushing back from your desk. “And by ‘us’ you mean...?”

“I could use your help.”

“Fine,” you mutter, setting your phone down.

He scoots over as you roll your chair toward his desk, settling in beside him. The files are all laid out, including your victimology report with Rossi’s few annotations. There are crime scene reports, autopsy summaries, witness statements, geographic overlays, and maps—everything needed to justify escalating the case into a full BAU investigation.

“Where do you want to start?”

“I’m trying to rebuild the geographic timeline digitally,” he says, “but half the field reports were logged out of sequence and now the movement patterns don’t align.”

You nod. “Okay, walk me through where it stops making sense.”

Three hours later, you feel like your eyeballs are bleeding. You’ve read the same witness statement at least twenty times now, but with every pass it only makes less sense. How could Annabelle Hutton possibly be placed in two different counties less than forty minutes apart?

“It’s physically impossible,” you mutter, rubbing your eyes.

Reid hums quietly beside you. “Not necessarily.”

You stare at him. “Care to elaborate?”

“Well, depending on traffic conditions, inaccurate timestamp reporting, and the reliability of eyewitness memory retention, there are at least four scenarios where the timeline could still technically work.”

You sigh, leaning back in your chair and staring up at the ceiling. “If you know so much, then why can’t you figure this out?”

He still doesn’t turn away from his screen. “I will. Eventually.”

You groan softly, dragging both hands down your face just as a familiar voice cuts through the quiet bullpen.

“No, listen to me carefully.”

Both you and Reid glance up automatically.

Hotch is walking slowly past the desks with his phone pressed to his ear, expression calm but impossibly stern in a way that immediately makes heat crawl beneath your skin.

“You don’t need to explain the problem again,” he says evenly. “You need to tell me how you’re fixing it.”

He pauses briefly beside Reid’s desk, listening.

“Then prioritise the transfer first,” he says. “If the paperwork isn’t filed before opposing counsel reviews discovery, the timeline becomes vulnerable and the entire testimony gets picked apart.”

He rests a hand on the partition between the desks, gaze fixed somewhere distant as he listens to the person on the other end.

“No,” he says after a moment, voice lower now. “I’m not asking you to stay late. I’m telling you this needs to be finished tonight.”

Your stomach flips.

This absolutely should not be as hot as it is.

“Good,” he says calmly into the phone, straightening again. “Call me when it’s done.”

Then he keeps walking, cutting through the bullpen before turning sharply toward his office.

You stare after him, the thought slipping out before you can stop it. “Do you think he talks you through it?”

“Probably,” Reid says, turning back to his screen. “High-control personalities usually prefer maintaining verbal direction in intimate situations because it reinforces predictability and compliance dynamics.”

You go still. You hadn’t actually expected an answer.

“Someone like Hotch would probably place a pretty high psychological value on responsiveness,” Reid continues. “The immediate compliance aspect reinforces authority, which means verbal direction would likely become part of the overall intimacy dynamic rather than just communication.”

Your face heats.

“Especially because he’s not impulsive enough to rely on unpredictability. He’d want constant awareness of how the other person is responding emotionally and physically, so talking them through things would help maintain control of the situation while also reinforcing trust.”

Oh my God.

“And honestly,” Reid goes on, “people with highly structured leadership personalities usually develop pretty strong positive associations with obedience because it confirms stability, attentiveness, emotional investment—” He pauses briefly. “Which means he’d probably find it disproportionately attractive when someone follows instructions immediately or responds well to praise because it validates both the authority dynamic and the emotional trust beneath it, so statistically speaking he’d—”

He stops.

Then slowly turns toward you.

“...I crossed a social boundary somewhere in there, didn’t I?”

You nod slowly, your voice coming out unnaturally high. “Just a couple.”

He sighs, dropping his chin slightly as he turns back to his screen.

You huff out a breathless laugh and lean back in your chair again. You need a minute to recover from that, because now you’re hot all over and the only thing you can think about is your boss hovering over you, praising you in that low, steady voice while his hand settles around your throat—

Fortunately, it doesn’t take Reid long to start rambling about geographic overlays again. You do your best to focus on what he’s saying, but after another hour of scrutinising the timeline inconsistencies, you decide you need an actual break.

You grab your phone and your jacket and head out of the office, sending a quick text to the team chat asking if anyone else would like a coffee from the cafe down the road. It’s a thousand times better than break room coffee.

When you step out of the elevator on the ground floor, you bring up your messages with DCRunner00. You’re not sure why, because normally you only check your profile when you feel like you need to keep up the act, but something about this guy keeps making you want to reply.

DCRunner00: I’ve read a few. DCRunner00: What does a workaholic do for fun?

You type your reply as you step out of the building.

You: Work, mostly. You: And sleep.

By the time you return to the office with a tray of four coffees, you have two new messages—but you can’t reply to them until you set the tray down at your desk.

“Thanks, pretty girl,” Morgan says as he takes one, flashing you a grin.

You smile back. “Anything for you, gorgeous.”

Then you pull your phone out of your pocket and bring up the message thread.

DCRunner00: What’s your schedule even like? DCRunner00: You strike me as an “answers emails at midnight” type of person. You: Nah. That’s my boss. You: My schedule is chaos, though.

“Thanks,” Reid says as he takes his coffee, leaving only two.

You set your phone down and take the last two coffees out of the tray, leaving one at your desk before taking the other to Hotch’s office. You can see through the window that he’s not on the phone—for once—so you knock twice on the slightly ajar door before stepping inside.

He glances up, his brows pulling together slightly. “I didn’t ask for coffee.”

“I know,” you say quickly. “But it’s almost three, and you always need another coffee around three, and I figured you probably didn’t answer the team message because you still feel bad about me staying so late last night, which you shouldn’t, by the way.”

He straightens, brows drawing tighter.

“And I know you’ve got court with Morgan this afternoon, and you’re going to try to leave early, but someone’s definitely going to call at the last second and derail that plan, so you’ll only have enough time to get to the courthouse—not enough time to stop for coffee.”

You set the cup down in front of him.

“So,” you tilt your head, “coffee.”

He leans back in his chair, studying you for a second.

“That’s some pretty solid profiling, Agent.”

Your face heats instantly.

“Well,” you say, backing slowly toward the door, “maybe now you owe me two.”

The corner of his mouth lifts, just slightly, but it’s enough for the butterflies in your stomach to explode. You can’t help but grin as you turn away, slipping quickly out the door before your lungs forget how to work entirely.

You spend the rest of the day at Reid’s desk, finishing the case package for the Fairfax files and complaining about unreliable witnesses. Hotch and Morgan head off to court just after three, announcing to the rest of the team that they won’t be back. JJ is the first to head home again around five, followed by Prentiss, then Rossi—then you and Reid finally decide to call it a day just after six.

Which is also when you finally check your messages again.

DCRunner00: Chaos how?

You type a quick reply while you wait for your car’s AC to warm up.

You: Long hours. You: Weird hours. You: And a deeply unhealthy relationship with caffeine.

Then you tuck your phone away and head out of the parking garage.

Leia is already yowling by the time you step through your apartment door. She’s always hungry, even though she has an automatic feeder for dry food—but apparently that isn’t good enough. She prefers the wet stuff.

You quickly peel open a packet of fishy-smelling chicken jelly sludge and drop it into her bowl before washing your hands and moving into your bedroom. You flip the ensuite light on and start the shower, pulling your phone out of your pocket while you wait for the water to warm.

DCRunner00: Ah. So you’re one of those people. You: Rude.

He replies almost immediately.

DCRunner00: Accurate, though? You: Unfortunately.

You drop your phone on the bed and start undressing.

Ping!

DCRunner00: What do you actually do?

You hesitate. It’s not like you can just say you’re in the FBI. Contrary to what some people might think, real FBI agents can’t just go around bragging about their highly classified work status. It’s dangerous.

You: Mostly admin. You: Governmental stuff.

You toss your phone back onto the bed and turn into the steamy ensuite. You shower quickly, dry off, run product through your damp hair, then pull on a shirt and a pair of sweatpants before heading back out into the kitchen.

You’re not in the mood to cook tonight, so you grab a protein bar out of the cupboard and start boiling the kettle while you check your phone for what feels like the hundredth time.

DCRunner00: Sounds boring. DCRunner00: Do you get days off, though?

You drop a teabag into your mug before typing out a reply.

You: Sort of. You: But if my boss calls, I answer.

He replies instantly again.

DCRunner00: I’m starting to think you secretly enjoy being overworked. You: I think I’d get bored otherwise.

You pour the boiling water into your mug and watch his next reply pop up.

DCRunner00: That sounds suspiciously unhealthy. You: Probably. What about you? What do you do?

You tuck your phone into your pocket, then grab your tea and protein bar and head to the couch. There’s nothing you’re really interested in watching—since you don’t usually have the time to keep up with any shows—so you turn on the nightly news before grabbing your laptop and pulling up a new browser.

He’s already replied by the time you log in.

DCRunner00: Run. DCRunner00: Read. DCRunner00: Annoy people professionally. You: That sounds made up.

You open your protein bar.

DCRunner00: It mostly is. DCRunner00: So your boss actually calls you outside work hours?

You hesitate at the sudden redirection. Most men on dating apps prefer talking about themselves. Their jobs, hobbies, gym routines, childhood dogs—whatever makes them seem interesting—but this guy seems far more interested in observing than being observed.

You type out a vague response.

You: Sometimes. You: Occupational hazard, I guess. DCRunner00: And you always answer? You: Pretty much. You: He’d only call if it mattered.

His next reply takes almost two minutes to come through.

DCRunner00: Hm. DCRunner00: I’m starting to think your boss gets more attention than I do.

You almost choke on your tea.

That’s... weird.

Maybe you have mentioned your boss a little more than strictly necessary, but he’s the one asking all the questions about your job. It’s a little hard not to mention your boss when your life practically revolves around him—in more ways than you care to admit.

You: Jealous already, Running Man? DCRunner00: Should I be?

You sit up straighter, suddenly a little nauseous.

You: I think you’re spending too much time talking to strangers online. DCRunner00: Maybe. DCRunner00: You still replied, though.

“Okay,” you say, startling Leia who was half-asleep on the other end of the couch. “That’s enough.”

You: I’m going to sleep. You: Try not to spiral while I’m gone.

His last message pops up just before you shut your laptop.

DCRunner00: No promises.

WEDNESDAY 8:10AM

“Come on,” you mutter, mashing the elevator button for the doors to close.

You’re a whole thirty minutes earlier than usual this morning. You didn’t even make a coffee in your travel mug before running out the door. You just woke up, brushed your teeth, checked your messages—and decided you needed to talk to Garcia immediately.

“Hey—woah.” Reid steps out of your way as you rush into the bullpen. “You’re early.”

You drop your bag on your desk and quickly shrug off your jacket.

“Is Garcia in yet?”

He frowns slightly. “I think so. Why?”

You pull your laptop out of your bag.

“I just—I need her.”

You’re already walking away before he can press any further, moving back through the bullpen with your laptop hugged against your chest. You’re just about to round the corner toward the elevators when—

“Hey—” Hotch stops short just as you nearly run into him. “Slow down. You alright?”

His hand is hovering near your waist—not quite touching, but close enough for you to feel its warmth.

You blink up at him. “Sorry. Yeah. Uh—totally fine. Just going to see Garcia about... a case.”

His brows pull together slightly.

“Alright, well, Garcia’s not going anywhere,” he says evenly. “Take a breath.”

You nod slowly, already stepping around him.

“Right,” you mutter. “Breathing. Got it. Sorry, sir.”

You can almost swear you see the corner of his mouth lift—but then the elevator dings behind you, and you have to hurry to slip through the doors before they slide shut.

It feels like an eternity before they finally open again, but once they do you practically sprint down the hall to Garcia’s lair and burst through the door without warning.

She startles so hard she nearly drops her coffee. “Sweet mother of encryption, knock first!”

“Sorry,” you say, breathless. “I need you.”

“Well, obviously,” she mutters, checking her shirt for any spills. “I’m the backbone of this entire operation.”

You drop down into the spare chair and open your laptop, setting it on her desk.

“You cannot judge me for what I’m about to show you.”

She glances up, brows lifting. “Oh. So this is serious?”

You grimace. “I don’t know.”

“Okay,” she says slowly. “Slightly less reassuring than I was hoping for. Tell me what’s happened.”

You take a deep breath, then let it out in a rush.

“You remember the dating profile you set up for me?”

She nods.

“Alright, so, I won’t lie, I haven’t really met anyone on there yet, but I check the messages occasionally. When I’ve got time, you know? And I don’t have a whole lot of ongoing conversations, but this one guy sent me something that was kind of funny, so I responded, and the conversation was pretty normal for the most part. I couldn’t reply all that quickly, but he didn’t seem to mind.”

You shift awkwardly, scooting your chair closer to her desk.

“Nothing really felt out of place until—well, he wouldn’t talk about himself much, which is strange because most people on dating apps are usually more interested in presenting themselves than gathering information. He kept asking questions about my job, actually. Not that my job is on my profile, but he was really curious about my schedule, or—I guess—lack of schedule.”

You wince.

“So now that I think about it, that was probably the second sign something might be off. Or maybe he just wanted to meet up, I don’t know.”

You hesitate.

“But then he sent me this message at like... two a.m.”

She squints at the screen.

DCRunner00: Bet you answer your boss faster than you answer anyone else.

“Mmm. Nope. Don’t love that,” she says, shaking her head. “That is not a normal amount of emotional investment for a stranger.”

You sink back in your chair. “That’s what I thought.”

She starts scrolling back through the messages.

“Have you told Hotch?”

“Nope.”

She glances at you from the corner of her eye. “You answered way too fast for that to be a normal response.”

“Because the answer is no,” you say firmly, leaning forward again.

“Mm-hm.” She keeps scrolling. “Okay, well... technically this could still be nothing. He could just be some lonely basement cryptid with Wi-Fi and poor social skills.”

You groan, dragging both hands over your face.

“You do mention Hotch kind of a lot.”

Your head snaps up. “He’s my boss.”

Garcia gives you a long look.

“Okay,” she says slowly. “Sure.”

“Garcia.”

“I’m just saying, if a man talked about a woman this much online, we’d all be making faces.”

You point at the screen. “Focus.”

“Right. Yes. Creepy internet man. Sorry.”

Her expression settles into something more focused as she turns back toward her array of monitors.

“Okay. Here’s what we’re going to do. Don’t block him yet.”

You sigh. “I don’t love that idea.”

“Neither do I, babycakes, but if he’s routing through the website normally, I might be able to pull connection data if we keep him talking long enough.”

You frown. “In English?”

She gives you another look. “Timestamps, login patterns, regional pings, possible VPN usage, device signatures if he slips up—basic digital stalking fun.”

“Oh, of course,” you say sarcastically. “Normal stuff.”

“For me, it is normal.” She points toward the laptop. “Now reply to him. Something casual. I want to see if he responds immediately again.”

Your fingers hover over the keys for a second before you type out your reply.

You: I thought I told you not to spiral.

He replies so fast that even Garcia flinches.

DCRunner00: Relax. It was a joke. DCRunner00: Mostly.

She stares at the screen. “Okay, I officially don’t like him.”

You lean back in your chair again, nausea twisting low in your gut. “I feel sick.”

Garcia’s expression softens slightly. “Maybe you should tell—”

“No.”

She sighs quietly. “Okay. Fine. Can you keep replying from your phone?”

You nod.

“Good. Don’t overdo it, just enough to keep him engaged.” Her fingers start flying across the keyboard. “I’ll work my magic down here and call you if I find anything.”

You push yourself out of the chair, clutching your phone a little tighter.

“You’re the best, Pen.”

“I know.” She waves a hand without looking away from her screens. “Now go pretend to be emotionally stable upstairs.”

By the time you get back to your desk, almost everyone is already in the conference room ready for the morning briefing. You drop your phone beside your keyboard—too anxious to have it with you during the meeting—then quickly unpack your things and grab a notebook before making your way up.

Reid nods at you from his usual seat, gesturing to the empty one beside him.

“Hey,” you mutter as you drop down next to him.

His brows pull together. “Everything alright?”

You nod. “Yeah. Fine. I’ll explain later.”

Hotch keeps the morning briefing quick. He goes over yesterday’s court hearing, outlines the Fairfax briefing package in case it escalates into an active investigation, then gets JJ to run through the highest priority consultation requests.

You spend most of it toying with a loose thread on the cuff of your blouse. You’re pretty sure it’s the first briefing in years where you haven’t spent at least part of it staring at Hotch instead of your notes—and when the room finally relaxes and everyone starts to filter out, Reid turns to you.

“Okay, now I’m concerned,” he says.

You glance at him. “Why?”

“You didn’t look at Hotch once during that entire meeting.”

You roll your eyes. “Spence—”

“Something must be seriously wrong.”

You let out a long exhale, glancing briefly around the almost empty room. Only Morgan and Rossi are left, halfway to the door, deep in discussion about something that happened at the court hearing yesterday afternoon.

“Okay,” you say quietly, turning back to Reid. “I’m having some... trouble, I guess, with a guy.”

His brows shoot up. “A guy—”

“Online,” you add quickly.

He tilts his head. “I’m confused again.”

You sigh. “Remember that dating profile Garcia set up for me?”

“You mean the profile you allowed Garcia to create as part of your increasingly unsustainable performative dating strategy?”

You glare at him. “Yes. That one.”

“Then yes, I remember it very clearly.”

“Well,” you mutter, pinching the bridge of your nose, “I had this guy message me a couple days ago. It was normal at first but now it’s gotten... weird. So, I’m getting Garcia to look into it.”

His forehead creases. “Have you told—”

“No.”

“Maybe you should—”

“I said no.”

“Alright.” He raises both hands in surrender. “Okay. I’m dropping it. It’s just…”

You narrow your eyes at him.

“Well, statistically speaking, the majority of uncomfortable online interactions don’t escalate into actual stalking behaviour. Most people displaying premature emotional fixation online are socially isolated rather than violent.”

You lift a brow, waiting for the punchline.

“However,” he adds, “cyberstalking offenders also tend to develop parasocial attachments disproportionately quickly because the perceived emotional intimacy bypasses a lot of normal social barriers, which means escalation patterns can become highly personalised in a very short period of time.”

You stare at him.

“In cases where the fixation becomes grievance-oriented, the offender is usually highly organised rather than impulsive, so the behaviour tends to be significantly more deliberate and psychologically targeted.”

He pauses, frowning faintly.

“That was supposed to be reassuring.”

“…Thanks, Reid,” you mutter, turning away from him slowly. “Now I feel so much better.”

When you get back to your desk, you decide it’s time to reply again. You grab your phone and bring up the messages, taking a minute to think about what to type—knowing Garcia will be seeing the conversation too.

You type out the only mildly casual response you can think of.

You: You’re weird.

He replies just as fast as usual.

DCRunner00: You disappear a lot. You: Workaholic, remember. You: I told you my schedule was chaos.

You’re about to turn your phone over on your desk when a different notification pops up—from Garcia.

Garcia: If this is your version of flirting, baby girl, I think I just figured out why you’re still single.

You snort softly, typing out a quick reply.

You: Trust me, that’s not the reason. Garcia: So there IS a reason? You: Shh. I’m working. Garcia: Boo!

You huff another quiet laugh as you turn your phone over, nudging it toward the edge of your desk in the hopes that you might be able to focus on work rather than creepy internet man for at least a few hours.

It doesn’t work.

Barely half an hour later, you lift your phone to check for another notification—but there’s nothing there. You pull up the message thread again and scroll up, checking the timestamps to see if he’s ever gone quiet on you before—but he hasn’t. Not really. So you type another message.

You: You went quiet. Should I be concerned?

It’s a calculated move. If he’s paying attention to response patterns—and at this point you’re pretty sure he is—then following up first helps maintain the illusion that nothing has changed. No sudden distance. No obvious discomfort. No reason for him to think you’re pulling away.

If he is dangerous, the last thing you want is for him to feel rejected.

An hour later, Rossi drops a legal pad onto your desk, asking you to take another look at a witness timeline that doesn’t feel right—which keeps you occupied for a good forty-five minutes. Then Morgan leans over the partition between your desks, asking if you can translate Reid into English. That takes up another hour of your day, and by the time you grab your first afternoon coffee, you’ve got three notifications.

One is a missed call from Garcia. The other two are from creepy internet man.

DCRunner00: Depends. Are you worried about me? DCRunner00: Blue looks good on you, by the way.

Your stomach drops. “Oh my God.”

You immediately call Garcia back.

She answers on half a ring. “Are you wearing blue?”

“You saw me this morning.”

“I can’t remember,” she says. “Are you?”

You drag a hand through your hair. “Yes.”

“Holy shit,” she whispers. “You’ve got to tell—”

“No.”

“Are you insane?”

“Maybe, but—” You squeeze your eyes shut for a second. “Okay, just—hear me out. Blue is a statistically safe guess. It’s a neutral professional colour with high frequency in workplace attire, especially in government buildings.”

Garcia goes quiet for a second.

“And does this unsub know you work in a government building?”

“Don’t call him that,” you snap. “And—well, kind of. I didn’t tell him exactly, but I said... government adjacent.”

“I swear to God,” she mutters, “if I have to identify your body next week, I’m going to kill you.”

You press your free hand against your forehead.

“You won’t,” you say firmly. “Alright? We’re getting ahead of ourselves.”

Garcia scoffs loudly.

“Seriously,” you insist. “It could still be nothing. A weird coincidence, maybe an awkward guy with boundary issues and too much free time. We deal with actual predators every day. I can handle a few creepy messages.”

The line goes quiet again—then she sighs.

“Why are you so against telling Hotch?”

“Because I don’t want to bother him,” you say quickly. “We’ve got a quiet week, he finally seems slightly less stressed, and I don’t want to cause a whole fuss over something that might turn out to be nothing.”

She sighs again, louder this time. “Fine. I won’t go to Hotch.”

Your shoulders sag. “Thank you.”

“On one condition,” she adds. “I’m sleeping over tonight.”

You nearly choke. “What?”

“Non-negotiable.”

“Penelope, that’s insane.”

“No,” Garcia says firmly, “what’s insane is you trying to casually explain away potential stalking behaviour while actively refusing to inform your unit chief.”

“He is not stalking me,” you protest, keeping your voice low.

“Mm-hm.”

“You’re overreacting.”

“And yet,” Garcia says, “if you die, I become morally complicit because I knew about creepy internet man and failed to intervene.”

You frown. “…Morally complicit?”

“Accessory to murder-adjacent,” she corrects. “And my guilty conscience requires eight hours of sleep minimum, so congratulations. We’re having a slumber party.”

You let out a long sigh. “Okay. Fine.”

She hums, satisfied.

“I need to reply to him again.”

“Well, don’t ask me,” she mutters. “You’re the one who’s apparently fluent in creepy internet freak.”

You laugh despite yourself. “Thanks, Pen.”

“Mm-hm. And just so we’re clear, tonight we are watching wholesome romantic comedies and eating enough sugar to kill a Victorian child.”

“I was actually thinking psychological thriller marathon.”

“Absolutely not.”

You smile faintly, leaning back in your chair. “Fine. Romantic comedies it is.”

“Good,” Garcia says firmly. “Now hang up before I change my mind and march upstairs to Hotch’s office myself.”

You roll your eyes as you hang up, then open the message thread again. You don’t have to think too hard about what to type. You don’t want to escalate or accuse him, but you need him to stay engaged. You want him to explain himself to see how he reframes the behaviour.

You: Lucky guess.

The next few hours slip by in a strange blur of routine tasks and fragmented conversations.

At about three o’clock, Prentiss drops a file on your desk and asks if you can double-check a victim timeline while she’s stuck on the phone with Chicago. Then Rossi calls you into his office to sanity-check a profile theory he’s working through out loud—which means fifteen minutes of listening to him argue with himself while you sit there trying not to focus on Hotch’s voice through the wall.

When you finally get back to your desk, Reid spends twenty minutes walking you through a probability model nobody asked for but everyone somehow ends up listening to anyway. He only stops when Hotch appears, carrying a stack of files from the Richardson case he wants Morgan to look over before he signs them off—and for the first time in God knows how long, you don’t stare shamelessly at his ass as he walks out of the bullpen.

By six p.m., JJ and Rossi are gone, Prentiss is helping Morgan with the Richardson files, and Reid is building a tiny tower out of paperclips while he reads over a file Rossi dropped on his desk before he left.

At exactly six-fifteen, your desk phone rings.

“Hello?”

“Pack your things, baby girl. Your government-issued sleepover is about to begin.”

You snort softly. “Alright. I’ll see you soon.”

You hang up the phone and start clearing your desk, organising paperwork into piles and packing away stationery while you wait for your computer to shut down.

“See who soon?” Reid asks.

You glance at him. “Garcia.”

He tilts his head.

“She’s staying over tonight.”

His brows lift. “Because of your stalk—”

“Girl’s night,” you interrupt, eyes widening. “That’s all.”

His gaze narrows. “Should I be worried?”

You scoff. “About me? Never.”

You slide your arms into your jacket then finally pick up your phone, finding two new notifications from creepy internet man waiting for you.

“Really?” Reid asks, turning his chair to face you. “Because you’ve spent most of the day staring at your phone like it’s a bomb, you spent most of Rossi’s profile discussion peeling the label off your water bottle instead of contributing, and you reorganised the same stack of paperwork three separate times.”

You pause mid-motion.

“Also,” he continues, “you usually correct Morgan when he misquotes case statistics and today you let him do it twice, which honestly might be the most concerning—”

“Okay!” you cut in quickly, slinging your bag over your shoulder. “Good talk. Love the observational skills. Bye.”

He doesn’t say anything else as you walk away, murmuring goodbyes to Morgan and Prentiss as you pass, but you can still feel him watching you. You’re just about to press the button for the elevator when—

“Agent.”

You stop automatically, turning to find Hotch with a file tucked under one arm and that signature frown etched between his brows. Only this time it isn’t frustrated or disapproving—it’s curious.

You force a small smile. “Sir.”

His eyes move over your face briefly. “You alright?”

You nod once. “Of course.”

He takes a step forward, his voice dropping lower. “You sure?”

Your breath catches.

He’s close now. Too close. You have to tilt your head back to meet his eyes. You can smell his cologne, feel his warmth, count the beauty marks dotted across his cheek.

“You’ve seemed distracted today,” he says.

You swallow hard. “Uh—no. No. Sorry, I just—I didn’t get much sleep last night.”

His brows draw a little tighter, and he opens his mouth as if he’s about to say something else—press harder, maybe—but then seems to think better of it.

“Alright,” he murmurs. “Get some rest tonight.”

Then he nods once and steps back, his jaw tightening for just a second before he turns away.

You don’t move immediately. You can’t. Your mind is reeling, your pulse is still hammering, and your breath is caught somewhere between your ribs while your lungs try to remember how to work.

“Hello?” Garcia calls from behind you. “I cannot hold these doors forever, babycakes.”

You shake your head. “Shit. Sorry.”

You turn and hurry into the elevator, slipping in beside her just before the doors slide shut.

For a moment, neither of you says anything.

Then—

“So, that thing you said earlier about there being a reason you’re still single…”

You shut your eyes. “Penelope.”

“I’m just saying,” she continues lightly, “unless I hallucinated whatever just happened in that hallway, I’m starting to develop theories.”

You ignore her, watching the numbers on the elevator slowly descend like counting down the days you have before the entire team figures out your secret. Because if this guy really is a creep, if you do have to tell Hotch, then it’s only a matter of time before the BAU are dissecting your dating life and realising what a ruse it really is.

And you know better than anyone that once these profilers start looking too closely at something, they rarely stop until they’ve pulled it apart completely.

The second you step through the door to your apartment, Garcia rushes past you to sweep the place. Leia startles almost immediately, running from the couch to your bedroom while Garcia complains about the fact that Leia is the only cat she’s ever met that doesn’t like her.

“Leia hates everyone,” you tell her, kicking your shoes off by the door. “Even me.”

Garcia just rolls her eyes, continuing from room to room to check the window locks and balcony doors.

Once she’s satisfied that everything is secure, she sets her laptop up on your kitchen counter and starts running a program that looks like hieroglyphics to you.

“Have you seen his latest messages?” she asks.

You shake your head, setting your phone on the counter. “No.”

She opens your laptop and logs into the dating site—because apparently she knows your password now.

DCRunner00: Maybe. DCRunner00: Or maybe you’re just easier to read than you think.

You type out the first response you can think of, not wanting to seem like you’re overanalysing this.

You: Or maybe I’m just not trying so hard to be mysterious.

Garcia then spends the next ten minutes trying to explain her process to you in terms that almost make sense. So far she’s managed to narrow him down to a general region through login patterns and routing behaviour, but she still can’t lock onto a direct IP address. Not because she can’t—apparently that part would actually be pretty easy—but because doing it properly would mean running requests through systems that leave a trail. And right now, this definitely isn’t an official investigation.

“The second I start pulling the fun federal strings,” Garcia says, typing furiously, “there’s paperwork, access logs, oversight, and approximately twelve thousand ways for this to become a whole thing.”

You lean against the counter. “We don’t want that.”

“Not yet.” Her expression sharpens slightly. “Also, if creepy internet man is more sophisticated than he seems, there’s always a chance he’s monitoring for targeted tracing attempts. If he realises someone’s looking too closely at him before we know who he is, he could disappear completely.”

Your stomach twists. “Or escalate.”

You spend the next couple of hours keeping creepy internet man engaged while Garcia rambles tech jargon that makes less sense the longer the night wears on. At some point, you order pizza, then you migrate to the couch, and eventually you both end up sitting through the credits of Two Weeks Notice while waiting for one last reply in the hopes that he might finally answer something about himself.

DCRunner00: Refreshing DCRunner00: Most people hide too much. You: Depends what they’re trying to hide. DCRunner00: What are you trying to hide? You: Besides the fact that I’m exhausted? Nothing. DCRunner00: You seem distracted tonight. You: Long day. DCRunner00: I noticed. You: How was yours?

You wait until almost midnight before finally deciding to call it a night.

Garcia checks all the windows and doors again while you brush your teeth and change into pyjamas. When you step back out of your bedroom to say goodnight, Garcia is trying her hardest to lure Leia onto the couch with her, but Leia is very stubbornly curled up beneath the TV unit.

“Night, Pen,” you murmur, rubbing your eyes. “Thanks again... for everything.”

“Night, gorgeous,” she calls, peering over the back of the couch. “Wake me up if you hear literally anything suspicious. Or if Leia finally decides it’s my time.”

You laugh softly, blinking slowly as you turn back into your room and fall face first into bed.

THURSDAY 6:45AM

You’re not sure whether to be relieved or concerned when you wake up to no new messages from creepy internet man. He hasn’t gone quiet for this long before—but if he is just a normal, slightly awkward guy with boundary issues and an internet connection, well... it’s not that hard to believe he might just be sleeping.

Garcia is already up making coffee by the time you step out of your room, trying to bribe Leia out from under the couch with a tube of tuna paste.

The second she sees you, she jumps up and launches into another long-winded explanation about login activity and movement patterns across different access points. Apparently, creepy internet man logged in from three different geographical locations over the course of a few hours last night—which is normal, right? That means he was out doing normal human things, not just lurking in his mother’s basement, stalking women online.

Garcia isn’t entirely convinced that him moving locations is enough to get him off the hook as the BAU’s next unsub, but it at least shuts her up until you’re both back at the office.

“Hey,” Reid says as soon as you walk into the bullpen. “You haven’t been murdered.”

You frown slightly. “Good morning to you too, Spence.”

Morgan glances up from the file on his desk. “Uh—why are we getting murdered?”

Reid gestures vaguely in your direction. “Because she’s potentially being cyberstalked by a—”

“Oh, wow, look at the time,” you interrupt, glaring at Reid. “Wouldn’t it be such a shame if we all started minding our own business right about now.”

Prentiss turns in her chair, brows raised. “Cyberstalked?”

“Nobody is cyberstalking anybody,” you say as you drop into your chair. “And nobody’s getting murdered—but great start to the morning, everyone. Love the energy. Now leave me alone.”

Morgan chuckles quietly. “Damn. Thought you said you got laid last weekend.”

Your hands slip off the desk as you try to pull yourself closer.

“Technically,” Reid says, “she only implied it by refusing to answer Garcia’s question during Monday morning’s briefing.”

“Ah.” Morgan leans back in his chair. “I knew this was a drought issue.”

You scowl at him. “A drought issue?”

“Statistically speaking,” Reid adds, “people experiencing prolonged romantic or sexual dissatisfaction often display lower frustration tolerance and increased agitation in familiar social environments.”

Morgan looks at him. “Man, just say she needs to get laid.”

“Oh my God,” you snap. “I do not need to get laid. I am having a completely normal amount of sex already, thank you very much—and frankly I think it’s deeply inappropriate that you’re all this invested in whether or not I’m orgasming regularly.”

Reid tilts his head. “You’re having sex?”

Morgan’s brows shoot up, Prentiss chokes on her coffee, and you open your mouth to fire back at him when—

Someone clears their throat behind you.

Heat crawls violently up your neck—but you don’t turn around. You can’t.

“Briefing room. Five minutes,” Hotch says, his voice dangerously even. “JJ’s got an update on the custodial interview with Wallace.”

Morgan presses a fist against his mouth, trying—and failing—to smother the strangled sound of laughter.

Very slowly, you turn in your chair.

Hotch is standing at the edge of the bullpen with a coffee in one hand and a file in the other. His expression is almost perfectly composed, but there’s something dangerous lurking beneath it—something suspiciously close to amusement in the tightness of his mouth.

“Be right there, sir,” you blurt, lifting two fingers to your forehead in the most ill-timed attempt at a salute the FBI has ever seen.

Hotch just looks at you, the muscle in his jaw jumping once before he turns away.

You want to die.

The second his office door clicks shut behind him, Morgan drops his fist and smacks his palm flat against the desk with a choked laugh.

“Oh, you are never recovering from that,” Prentiss mutters, smirking behind her coffee cup.

Morgan leans back in his chair, grinning. “Baby girl, that was painful to watch.”

You drop your head into your hands.

“You somehow escalated the situation at every possible opportunity,” Reid says thoughtfully.

“I hate you all,” you mumble into your palms.

You spend the next half hour with your nose buried in your notebook, avoiding eye contact with the entire team while JJ explains the month-long back-and-forth that it took to finally get approval for the Wallace interview.

Apparently, the prison is limiting the interview to a single hour and reserving the right to terminate it early if the inmate becomes uncooperative—which Rossi thinks is less about policy and more about Wallace trying to dictate the terms of the interaction.

It’s not ideal, especially considering you were the one who convinced Hotch to push for the interview before Wallace is transferred to death row. His case was one of the first you ever studied during the BAU training programme, and there isn’t much you wouldn’t give to pick the sociopath’s brains. One hour with him feels dangerously short—that is, assuming Hotch actually picks you to be in the interview with him.

“We don’t have enough time to waste managing personalities in the room,” Hotch says, gathering the files in front of him. “I’ll decide on a second agent and send out the interview schedule later today.”

Chairs start scraping back almost immediately, files and notebooks snapping shut as everyone gathers their things and starts filtering out of the room—but you don’t move. You stay firmly planted in your seat, chewing thoughtfully on the inside of your cheek while you debate whether to follow Hotch into his office and ask to be part of the interview. You don’t even have to be asking the questions, you just want to be there. You were the one pushing for it in the first place.

But then your brain very helpfully reminds you that Aaron Hotchner heard you say the word orgasming less than an hour ago and suddenly, being on death row yourself feels infinitely preferable to making eye contact with your unit chief.

“You alright?” Reid asks, lingering beside you.

You sigh heavily, finally closing your notebook. “Yep. Just thinking about how I’ll probably have to fake my own death and change my name after this morning.”

He shrugs. “Hotch probably isn’t even thinking about it anymore.”

You glance up at him hopefully.

“Morgan definitely is, though.”

You roll your eyes, letting out another resigned sigh as you stand up and follow him out of the briefing room.

The rest of the morning manages to pass without incident. You stay chained to your desk, reviewing reports and processing any files that come your way while very deliberately not glancing up any time Hotch steps out of his office. At around eleven, Morgan and JJ head out to the cafe down the street and come back with coffees for the whole team. Then there’s a printer jam that gives the rest of the office a rare glimpse at just how angry Emily Prentiss can get when frustrated.

It isn’t until just before midday that you finally get up to go to the bathroom, and when you return to your desk, there’s one new notification in your inbox.

From: Aaron Hotchner Subject: Wallace Interview You’re with me next Thursday. We leave at 0700.

Your stomach flips.

“Wow,” Reid says, suddenly standing right beside your desk. “He picked you pretty quickly.”

You shoot him a warning look. “Spence.”

“I’m just saying, he usually deliberates longer.”

You glance back at the screen, rereading the first five words that make your pulse skip a little faster.

“You and Hotch do work unusually well together in confined conversational environments,” Reid adds.

You turn back to him, frowning.

He tilts his head. “That sounded more suggestive than I intended.”

You open your mouth to tell him how deeply unhelpful he’s being when your phone buzzes twice against your desk—like it does several times a day, but something about it feels different this time. Wrong.

You reach for it slowly, your stomach twisting tighter as you turn it over.

Two new notifications from creepy internet man. The first since last night.

You open the message thread—and your stomach drops.

DCRunner00: [Image attachment] DCRunner00: Did you and your friend have fun last night?

The image is of your apartment building. It’s grainy, slightly crooked, clearly taken from somewhere across the street—but your living room windows are unmistakable. Warm light glowing through the glass. The blurred silhouette of someone inside.

Ice floods your bloodstream.

You stop breathing.

“Is that... your apartment?” Reid asks, leaning over your shoulder.

You don’t answer him. You can’t.

The bullpen dissolves into white noise around you.

Until—

“I’m done!” Garcia’s voice cuts through the static. “I can’t do this anymore!”

She’s marching right toward you, your laptop—that she’d still been monitoring—tucked under one arm.

Reid gasps. “Wait. Is that—”

Morgan straightens in his chair. “What’s happening?”

“Hotch’s office,” Garcia says, her expression dangerously stern as she stops beside your desk. “Now.”

You nod slowly, your shoes almost slipping against the carpet as you push your chair back. Reid steps aside just enough to let you stand, but before he can get too far, you reach out and wrap your fingers around his wrist, silently dragging him with you as you follow Garcia back through the bullpen.

Hotch glances up the second Garcia pushes open his office door.

“What’s going on?”

His tone is calm, automatic, already slipping into that low, calculated cadence he uses when he’s trying to talk someone down from the ledge. His gaze moves from her to you—and something in his expression shifts. Hardens. That muscle in his jaw ticking just once before he turns back to Garcia.

“What happened?” he asks, sharper now.

Garcia crosses the room quickly, opening your laptop and sitting it on his desk while you hover uselessly in the doorway with Reid still caught in your grip.

Hotch glances at the screen, his eyes flicking through the messages.

Then he looks back up—right at you—and something unreadable settles across his face. Something dangerous.

“Who sent this?”

Garcia spends the next five minutes explaining the entire situation at hyper speed while you just... stand there, leaning slightly against Reid like the whole world has tilted on its axis.

It’s funny how you can spend years building a career around finding bad people. Thinking like them. Predicting them. Profiling them. But the moment something happens to you—something real—that’s when all the theory suddenly stops feeling theoretical. And maybe it’s because you know exactly what people like this are capable of, or how quickly situations like this can escalate once someone decides they’re emotionally invested in you.

Or maybe it’s just the horrifying realisation that some part of you knew where this was heading all along. And you still didn’t do anything about it until now. Not until you put yourself—and your friend—in danger.

“Get everyone in the briefing room,” Hotch says the second Garcia finishes. “Now.”

Garcia nods once before slipping back out the door, and only then do you finally let go of Reid’s wrist—making a mental note to apologise later for the excessive physical contact.

Hotch’s eyes drop down briefly, following the movement almost automatically. Something tightens in his expression for half a second before his attention snaps back to the laptop still open in front of him.

“Reid,” he says. “Print the entire message history and document everything. Full timeline, screenshots, attachments—all of it. I want copies ready for the team in ten.”

You swallow hard. “The—the entire message history?”

“Yes,” Hotch says simply. “Every message.”

Could this day get any worse?

Fifteen minutes later, you’re back in the briefing room with the entire team flipping through printed copies of your dating profile and messages. It almost feels like an out-of-body experience. Like one of those mortifying dreams where you watch everything unfold from above without any real ability to stop it.

“Okay,” Prentiss says. “Where do we start?”

“Victimology,” Morgan answers immediately—then he glances at you. “Sorry, baby girl.”

You wave him off. “Reid’s been profiling me all week. Go for it.”

There’s a quiet ripple of laughter around the table, but Hotch barely blinks. He’s sitting on the opposite side, between Prentiss and JJ, with his arms folded tightly across his chest and gaze fixed on the copies spread out in front of him like he’s trying very hard not to look directly at you.

“We need to be careful building a victimology this early,” he says evenly. “Especially considering how well we know the victim. Personal familiarity creates bias.”

Reid tilts his head. “Normally, yes. But stalking crimes are often highly individualised.” He starts flipping through the printed messages as he talks. “Statistically speaking, stalking victims are usually targeted for a very specific reason. The motivation is generally rooted in either resentment, fixation, revenge, or romantic obsession.”

You grimace. “Fantastic.”

“Most victims also know their stalkers,” Reid continues. “Approximately seventy-five percent of stalking cases involve some form of prior relationship or perceived emotional connection.”

“Okay,” JJ says carefully, looking toward you. “Is there anyone you can think of who might hold a grudge against you? Someone you arrested, rejected, testified against—anything like that?”

You snort quietly. “Does every criminal I’ve ever interviewed count?”

The room goes still for half a second.

“Wait,” Prentiss says, sitting forward slightly. “Actually, that makes sense.”

Hotch’s eyes flick up as Prentiss pushes one of the printouts into the middle of the table, tapping the page.

“This escalation happened fast. Less than a week. That’s not somebody slowly building emotional trust from scratch—that’s somebody who already came into this interaction emotionally invested.”

“Or angry,” Morgan adds.

“Exactly,” Prentiss says. “He doesn’t lash out until she has Garcia over. That’s jealousy. Possessiveness.”

You sink lower in your chair.

“And he starts reacting every time she brings up her boss,” Rossi says, flipping through the printouts. “That’s territorial behaviour. He’s fixating on a prominent male figure in her life.”

“Not the only one fixating on him,” Reid murmurs beside you.

You elbow him immediately.

“Ow.”

Hotch glances up sharply. “Something to add, Reid?”

Reid straightens. “Uh—no. No, I think Rossi covered it.”

Hotch’s eyes narrow slightly, like he knows there’s something he’s missing, but he lets it go.

“Garcia,” he says instead, “tell me you found something useful.”

“Oh, I found things,” Garcia says immediately, the rapid clacking of her keyboard echoing loudly through the conference room speaker. “Deeply unsettling things. Our creepy little internet goblin has been very busy.”

Prentiss frowns slightly, mouthing ‘internet goblin’ across the table to JJ.

“Okay, so—profile was created nine days ago using a burner email and a VPN bouncing between three different states, which normally would make me want to set my computer on fire, but our boy got sloppy.”

Hotch leans forward slightly. “How sloppy?”

“Sloppy enough that one login pinged off a public Wi-Fi network less than six blocks from her apartment last night,” she says. “And before anybody asks, yes, I’m already pulling traffic cams.”

Hotch nods once, already shifting into command mode.

“Morgan, Prentiss—start canvassing within a ten-block radius of her apartment. Garcia will feed you anything useful from the traffic cams. JJ, coordinate with local PD and see if there’ve been any complaints of suspicious activity in the area. Peeping, prowlers, stalking complaints—anything that fits this escalation pattern. Rossi, start pulling names from old cases. Anybody with a history of fixation, stalking behaviour, or inappropriate attachment to investigators. Garcia, keep digging and keep me posted.”

Everyone starts moving immediately, papers shuffling and chairs scraping back as the room shifts into motion.

“I want to help,” you say suddenly. “This is my mess, let me fix it.”

“You can help,” he says evenly, “by going home, locking your doors, and staying there until we know exactly what we’re dealing with.”

You open your mouth to argue.

“I mean it,” he adds, voice low.

“I’ll take her,” Reid offers immediately.

“No,” Hotch says, gathering the printouts into one neat pile. “You go with Morgan and Prentiss.”

Then his eyes flick up, meeting yours.

“I’m taking her home.”

The next hour is one of the strangest of your life.

Hotch tells you to take your laptop back down to Garcia, who’s already in full FBI investigation mode—her screens covered in maps, metadata, CCTV stills, and enlarged screenshots of your own dating profile staring back at you in horrifying definition. When you finally make it back to your desk, Rossi spends twenty straight minutes walking you through every violent offender you’ve interviewed in the last three years, forcing you to revisit dozens of interactions you’d long since filed away as routine.

Somewhere in the middle of it all, Morgan drops a schematic of your apartment building onto your desk and starts questioning you about entrances, exits, blind spots, and security cameras while Reid quietly replaces the coffee you forgot existed an hour ago. It isn’t until Morgan leaves and JJ immediately takes his place beside you that you realise nobody has let you out of their sight for more than a few minutes at a time.

Then, finally, Hotch steps out of his office—files in one hand and his go-bag in the other, like he fully intends on staying the night if necessary.

“Ready?” he asks, stopping beside your desk.

You stare at the go-bag for one long, deeply horrified second.

“Yep,” you manage, voice tight as you slowly push out of your chair.

Hotch drives. You don’t even try to argue. You just sit in the passenger seat with your knees pressed together and your heart beating out of your chest. It’s not like you haven’t been in the car with him before. You have, plenty of times. This just feels... different.

Neither of you speak until he cuts the engine in the parking garage of your building, and you have to try very hard not to dwell on the fact that he hadn’t asked for directions the whole way here.

“Wait,” he mutters before climbing out of the car.

He grabs his bag from the back, then moves around the car and opens your door.

It takes an embarrassingly long time for you to unbuckle your seatbelt—your hands are shaking and your pulse is still pounding hard enough to make you dizzy—but once you finally do, you slip out of the car and lead him toward the fire stairs.

He never leaves more than a foot of distance between you. Never checks his phone. Never glances down. He stays glued to your side like a real protection detail. And thanks to your avid and wildly inappropriate imagination, you’ve already mentally written an entire bodyguard romance plot starring Aaron Hotchner and yours truly by the time you finally reach your apartment door.

“I—uh—wasn’t really expecting company,” you say as you push the door open. “Sorry.”

The second you step inside, Leia leaps off the couch with a loud, rumbling trill—probably wondering why you’re home before dark for the first time in years.

Hotch pauses, his brow furrowing slightly. “You have a cat.”

You glance back at him as you kick your shoes off and nudge them out of the way. “Is that really the most surprising thing you’ve learned about me today?”

He watches Leia for another second before glancing back at you. “It’s unexpected.”

You roll your eyes, trying to ignore the way your heart skips when he quietly toes off his shoes beside the door without even asking. Like he already expects to stay awhile.

Leia chirrups again as she pads through the living room toward you, no doubt about to demand an early dinner—until she catches sight of Hotch and abruptly stops short. Her ears flicker, her tail waving from side to side as she assesses the new man in her apartment.

Hotch crouches slightly, holding one hand out toward her.

“Oh, she doesn’t really like people,” you say quickly. “So don’t take it personally if she—”

Leia immediately walks straight up to him. She sniffs his hand once before pressing directly into his palm with a loud purr rumbling through her entire body.

Your eyes go wide.

Traitor.

Hotch’s mouth twitches faintly as Leia leans harder into his hand.

Oh my God. Are you jealous of your cat right now?

He gives Leia one final scratch behind the ears before straightening, the softness in his expression fading almost immediately as he slips back into work mode. He scans the apartment briefly before setting the files down on your tiny dining table and shrugging his jacket off, draping it over the back of a chair.

You stand there for a second longer than you probably should, watching him move through your apartment with the same calm focus he brings to crime scenes and briefing rooms and interrogation tables. He checks the windows, the balcony doors, glances briefly—thank God—into your bedroom, then double-checks the locks on the front door.

The whole thing feels weirdly surreal. You’ve imagined Aaron Hotchner inside your apartment a thousand times in a thousand different ways—just not like this. And nothing you imagined could have possibly prepared you for the reality of it. The way everything feels so much smaller. Warmer. More exposed.

Every object in every room suddenly feels mortifyingly personal.

If he lingers long enough in your kitchen, he’s going to notice the unusually empty trash can and realise you survive almost entirely on caffeine and convenience. If he looks too closely at your bookshelf, he’s going to find an unhealthy collection of romance novels with more trigger warnings than plot points. And if he looks into your bedroom again and turns his head just a little more to the right, he’s going to see your vibrator sitting on the nightstand—and then you’ll actually have to fake your own death.

Because you’ve spent years carefully curating a version of yourself that keeps people from looking too closely. Flirty. Casual. Detached enough to joke about bad dates and hookups and sex without anybody ever realising that none of it means anything. It’s easier that way. Easier to let everyone assume your attention is scattered in every direction instead of fixed very specifically on the one person you absolutely cannot have.

But this?

This feels dangerously close to being found out.

The next couple of hours pass in strange, uneven waves of normalcy and low-grade psychological torture.

Hotch sits at your tiny dining table without complaint, dwarfing it as he hunches over files and asks careful questions about your routines, your neighbours, and whether anyone in the building has seemed overly interested in you recently. His phone rings a lot, which isn’t unusual, and every time he answers it you spend almost the entire conversation staring unashamed at the way his shirt pulls tight across his back when he reaches for another printout.

Which is wildly inappropriate considering the circumstances, but you can’t really help it. You’re strung out, on edge, and, as Morgan so helpfully pointed out this morning, severely under-fucked.

And Leia, unfortunately—but not unsurprisingly—remains no help whatsoever.

By seven o’clock she’s fully abandoned you in favour of draping herself across Hotch’s lap while he reviews new data from Garcia, completely oblivious to the fact that you haven’t been able to breathe normally since he walked through the door.

“Are you hungry?” you ask eventually, moving back into the kitchen as if you have anything in there to offer.

Hotch glances up from his laptop, one hand resting absently against Leia’s back while she purrs in his lap.

“I’m fine.”

You lean a hip against the kitchen counter, folding your arms tightly across your chest. “Any updates?”

He glances back down at his screen. “Garcia narrowed the traffic footage down to three vehicles that stayed in the area longer than they should have—Morgan and Prentiss are running the plates now. And Rossi’s pulling relatives connected to your previous cases. Family members who attended trials, sentencing hearings, interviews. Anyone who might’ve had access to your name outside the official reports.”

You nod slowly, silence settling again for a moment before you exhale sharply.

“Are you sure sitting here doing absolutely nothing is really the best use of me right now?”

His eyes flick back up, that signature Hotchner scowl set between his brows.

“You think this is nothing?”

His voice stays calm, but there’s something firmer underneath it now.

“You’ve spent the last four days being threatened, surveilled, and followed by someone we still haven’t identified,” he says. “Morgan, Prentiss, and Reid are out chasing leads because somebody targeted you. Rossi’s pulling case files because somebody targeted you. Garcia’s been at her desk for six straight hours because somebody targeted you.”

His jaw tightens slightly.

“My job right now is making sure nothing happens to you,” he says quietly. “Let me do that.”

Your breath catches, something warm and uncomfortably familiar twisting in your chest as Aaron Hotchner just sits there watching you like he hasn’t said anything unusual at all.

Which, to him, maybe he hasn’t.

He’s just doing his job. Looking out for his team. He’s not here because he wants to be. He’s here because someone threatened one of his agents.

That’s all.

You clear your throat, pushing away from the counter before the silence stretches too long. “I’m—uh—I’m just going to shower quickly. If that’s alright.”

He nods once. “Want me to clear the—”

“No,” you say immediately. “God, no. No. It’s fine. Totally fine.”

His brows pull together slightly, confusion flickering briefly across his face before you turn and hurry into your bedroom, shutting the door a little harder than necessary behind you.

Then you take the longest shower known to mankind. You stand beneath the scalding spray for at least ten minutes before even touching anything. Then you scrub, exfoliate, shave, condition, rinse twice, and stand there for just a little longer before finally gathering the courage to step out. All the while trying desperately not to think about the fact that your unit chief is only two thin walls away while you’re dripping wet and completely naked.

You rummage through your dresser until you find an oversized sweater that isn’t totally threadbare and a clean pair of pyjama shorts. Technically, they’re just striped flannel pants you cut into shorts, but at least they’re not as short as the rest of your pyjama collection that definitely needs replacing.

If only you actually had time for things like shopping... and emotional stability.

“No, wait for Morgan before you approach,” Hotch says as you step quietly back into the living room, phone pressed against his ear while he paces slowly beside the dining table. “If the registration’s fake, I don’t want you making contact until we know exactly who’s inside.”

He pauses, expression sharpening slightly.

“Alright. Keep me updated.”

He lowers the phone slowly before looking over at you for the first time since you re-emerged—and for half a second, he visibly loses his train of thought. It’s only tiny. Barely there. Just a brief pause before his expression shutters back into place.

“Garcia tracked one of the vehicles from the traffic footage to a motel outside Arlington,” he says, glancing back down at the files scattered across the table. “The driver’s been masking his activity through multiple VPNs, so she couldn’t pull a clean trace from the motel Wi-Fi, but only one room in the motel was actively using the network.”

Your stomach tightens.

“The name on the reservation was fake,” he continues, “but the room was paid for using a credit card belonging to Daniel Mercer.”

The name hits you immediately.

“Ethan Mercer’s brother,” you say quietly.

Hotch nods. “Rossi confirmed it about twenty minutes ago. Morgan and Prentiss are waiting for local PD before they move in.”

You nod slowly, your pulse fluttering anxiously in your throat as you move toward the kitchen. Not because you actually need anything in there, but because standing still feels almost impossible right now.

“Ethan barely spoke during the trial,” you murmur, folding your arms as you lean back against the counter. “I don’t think I ever even met his brother.”

“You wouldn’t need to,” Hotch says, already gathering the files into a neat pile. “People build attachments to investigators without ever interacting directly. Especially when they’re looking for someone to blame.”

Your skin prickles. “You really think it’s him?”

“It fits,” Hotch replies evenly. “Established emotional investment, personal motive, no prior record. Which explains the inconsistency. The escalation without follow-through. The long gaps between contact attempts. He knows enough to be cautious, but not enough to stay controlled.”

He straightens, turning back toward you—and for the briefest second, his eyes drop to your bare legs before snapping back up to your face almost immediately.

He clears his throat. “This probably isn’t something he’s done before. But his brother has.”

The apartment falls quiet again after that. Hotch returns to collecting files while you stare absently toward the dark balcony doors, your pulse still refusing to settle beneath your skin.

“Well,” you mutter eventually, gripping the edge of the counter to hoist yourself up. “On the bright side, I still think I’ve dated worse.”

The joke leaves your lips lightly enough, the same way they always do—easy, detached, halfway between genuine and ironic so nobody ever pauses long enough to look too closely.

Except this time Hotch does pause.

“Why do you do that?”

You frown. “Do what?”

“Deflect.” He straightens again, one hand still holding a stack of printouts. “Every time something gets too serious, you make a joke. Or you flirt. Or you say something just inappropriate enough to throw people off balance.”

You lift a shoulder. “Maybe I’m just charming.”

“No.” His eyes narrow slightly, brows pulling together. “No, because it changes depending on the situation.”

Your pulse stutters.

“With Morgan it’s competitive,” he continues, setting the papers back on the table. “You tease him because he pushes back and it keeps conversations superficial. Garcia gets exaggerated stories because she responds emotionally instead of analytically. Half the things you say to Reid are specifically designed to make him flustered enough to stop examining what you actually mean.”

“Wow,” you murmur, shifting your weight against the countertop. “Starting to feel a little attacked here.”

But Hotch doesn’t seem to hear you.

“The dating profile doesn’t fit,” he says, almost to himself. “Neither does the apartment.”

Your stomach twists as his gaze moves briefly across the room. The bookshelves. The carefully organised clutter. Leia now curled up asleep on the couch.

“You project someone impulsive. Social. Sexually confident. But nothing in here supports that.” His eyes flick back toward you again. “You live like someone who protects their space carefully. Even the cat.”

“Leave Leia out of this.”

“She doesn’t like strangers.”

“She likes you.”

The words slip out too quickly, and something in his expression shifts.

“You keep people at a distance,” he continues slowly, close enough now that you can hear the quiet rasp beneath his voice. “Even the team. You let people think they know you because it keeps them from looking closer.” He hesitates, brow furrowing. “Except Reid.”

Your fingers tighten instinctively around the edge of the counter.

“You trust him,” Hotch says. “Not just socially. Behaviourally. You anchor yourself to him when you’re stressed. Physical proximity. Eye contact. Redirecting conversations through him.” He pauses, watching you carefully now. “And earlier you said he’d been profiling you all week.”

Oh God.

“Which means Reid already noticed the pattern.”

He goes quiet for a moment, his expression tightening almost imperceptibly as he looks back over the last few months—years—in real time. You can practically see it happening behind his eyes. Every interaction. Every joke. Every look you thought you’d hidden quickly enough.

“You track me.”

The words come quieter now. Less certain. Like he’s still realising them.

“You know my routines,” he continues slowly. “You anticipate questions before I ask them. You look up when you hear my office door open even when you can’t see me.” He steps closer again. “You know when I need coffee before I do. You watch my reactions before anyone else in the room.”

Your breath stutters.

And Hotch notices immediately.

His expression shifts slightly as his eyes flick across your face, your posture, your hands still locked around the edge of the counter hard enough that your knuckles have gone pale beneath the kitchen lights.

“Your breathing changes when I get too close to you,” he says quietly.

He takes another slow step forward, close enough now that you have to tilt your head back slightly to keep looking at him.

“You stop fidgeting,” he continues. “You go completely still.” His gaze drops briefly to your hands before lifting again. “Like you’re afraid movement alone is going to give you away.”

Your heart is beating so hard now you’re half-convinced he can hear it.

“You lose verbal fluency,” he says, voice lower now. “You trip over words you normally wouldn’t. Your pupils dilate. Your heart rate increases. And every single time I get close to noticing it—”

His eyes lock onto yours.

“You redirect.”

You can barely breathe now.

He’s standing right in front of you, close enough that the heat rolling off him sinks straight into your skin, close enough that one more step would put him between your knees where you’re perched on the counter.

And somehow the worst part is that he still sounds calm. Thoughtful. Like Aaron Hotchner is profiling you with the same careful focus he’d bring to an unsub—except this time the thing he’s slowly uncovering is the fact that you’ve been hopelessly in love with him this entire time.

You swallow hard, your gaze catching just briefly on his mouth before you drag it back up to his eyes, pulse hammering so hard you can barely think straight.

“Figured it out yet, Agent Hotchner?” you ask softly.

He goes still for half a second, something unreadable flickering across his face as his eyes drop to your mouth before lifting back to your eyes again.

The apartment suddenly feels oppressively quiet.

His throat shifts slightly.

And then—

His phone rings.

He steps back immediately, his expression shuttering back into something careful and unreadable.

“Hotchner,” he says, pressing his phone against his ear.

You don’t hear much after that. Not really. You recognise Morgan’s muffled voice, but you can’t quite hear what he’s saying. Not while Hotch slowly paces your living room. You catch fragments of the conversation. Questions. Short answers. The low, steady cadence of his voice slipping effortlessly back into work mode while your own nervous system continues actively collapsing in on itself.

Because holy fuck.

Holy fuck.

What the hell just happened?

“They got him.”

Your head snaps up. “They what?”

Hotch moves back to the dining table and starts gathering his things.

“It was him. Daniel Mercer,” he says. “Morgan and Prentiss found him in the motel room with multiple burner phones, printed screenshots from the dating profile, and enough surveillance material to establish intent.”

“Oh.”

“Local PD recovered notebooks too,” he continues. “Names, schedules, work addresses. Everyone connected to Ethan Mercer’s conviction. Judges, prosecutors, witnesses. You were first because you were the arresting agent.”

A cold shiver slips down your spine.

“Garcia also confirmed the motel Wi-Fi matched the same VPN chain used to access the dating profile,” Hotch adds. “Once Mercer realised the Bureau was involved, the direct contact stopped. After that he shifted to surveillance. Morgan said the room was covered in trial material. Photos. Notes. Newspaper clippings. He’d been building the grievance for months.”

He pauses, then looks at you.

“But they got him.”

“Good,” you say quietly.

Hotch nods once before turning back to the dining table, slipping his laptop into his bag with careful efficiency before gathering every file and printout into one neat pile.

“Local PD will hold Mercer overnight until federal transport clears,” he says, sliding the papers into his bag. “Garcia’s already started coordinating with the U.S. Attorney’s Office. You’ll need to give an additional statement tomorrow regarding the dating profile.”

You nod. “Okay.”

Hotch reaches for his jacket, draping it over one arm.

“There’ll still be additional officers patrolling the area tonight,” he says. “And if you don’t want to be alone, I can have Reid or Garcia stay here.”

“I’ll be fine,” you mutter, glancing down at the kitchen tiles. “You can stop babysitting me now.”

Hotch stills.

Then slowly, deliberately, sets his jacket on the table.

“Babysitting?” he repeats.

“You know what I mean.”

He steps toward you, brows drawn. “I don’t think I do.”

“You solved the case,” you mutter, heat crawling up the back of your neck. “You profiled me. Thoroughly. So congratulations, I guess. You figured out the whole sad little secret, the weird avoidance issues, the entire personality disorder cocktail—” You let out a short, humourless laugh. “You can go back to pretending none of this ever happened now.”

He closes the distance between you before you even fully realise he’s moving, stopping directly in front of the counter again. Exactly where he’d been when you asked him if he’d figured it out. Close enough that you can feel his warmth. Close enough that you can see the day-old shadow of stubble lining his jaw.

“You’re being deliberately provocative now because you’re embarrassed,” he says. “But embarrassment isn’t actually your primary response here.”

His gaze drops to your mouth again, and your pulse stumbles.

“If it was,” he adds quietly, “you wouldn’t still be looking at me like that.”

Your breath catches in your throat.

You want to say something. Anything. Another joke. Another deflection. Something sharp enough to cut through the tension in the air and stop him looking at you like this. Exposing you like this.

But you can’t.

All you can do is stare at him. At the steady intensity in his eyes. At the way his tie has loosened slightly over the course of the night. At the slow rise and fall of his chest beneath the white shirt you’ve spent an embarrassing number of years picturing on your bedroom floor.

You swallow hard, and he notices. Of course he does.

Something shifts in his expression then. Something softer. Less guarded.

His hand comes up beneath your jaw, his thumb pressing gently into your chin as he pulls you closer. You fall forward without hesitation, and he leans in, dark eyes still searching yours as if he isn’t entirely sure he has permission yet.

Then he kisses you.

It’s not rushed. Not messy. If anything, the first press of his mouth against yours feels almost unbearably controlled, like he’s still holding himself back even now.

But the restraint doesn’t last long.

Your hand catches his tie, tugging him closer, and something rough slips from the back of his throat as he steps in, his hips slotting between your thighs. His hand slides from your jaw into your hair, fingers tightening just enough to tilt your head back exactly as far as he wants it.

Your lips part against his with a broken sound, and he deepens it slowly, his tongue moving against yours like he has all the time in the world. Tasting you. Learning you. Mapping every small sound and ragged exhale with the same focused intensity he brings to everything—and somehow that’s what undoes you the most. Not urgency. Attention.

His breath mingles with yours, hot and uneven, and when his teeth catch your bottom lip it’s deliberate, measured—a sharp little spark shooting straight through your spine. Your hips roll toward him without permission, and his answering groan rumbles through his chest, vibrating beneath your palm and making you ache everywhere you’ve been starving for him.

Then he pulls back just enough to look at you properly again. His hand still tangled in your hair. Thumb dragging once across your jaw. His eyes move over your face with the same intensity he uses in every debrief, every case, every crisis, except right now you are the thing he’s making sure of.

Like he needs to be absolutely certain this is real.

“Aaron—”

“Bedroom,” he says immediately, voice low and rough enough to send heat crashing straight through you. “Now.”

FRIDAY 6:15AM

Your alarm blares somewhere beside the bed, startling you awake hard enough that your heart immediately starts pounding. You reach for it blindly, determined to silence it before it wakes—

Oh God.

The second your hand hits the snooze button, you freeze.

Your heart is beating faster now, your pulse thrumming in your throat as you turn slowly—so slowly—toward the other side of the bed, where Aaron fucking Hotchner stirs sleepily.

Your stomach swoops.

You slept with your boss last night.

With a shallow, shaky breath, you carefully start to move. His arm is heavy at your waist, but you manage to slip out from underneath it without fully waking him. You shove the covers off and shiver at the sudden exposure, leaning over the side of the bed to find your discarded sweater. You pull it over your head before quietly padding toward the ensuite, refusing to glance back at your very hot, very naked unit chief still tangled in your sheets.

You only just make it around the other side of the bed before something tugs at the back of your sweater. You stop, glancing back to find Hotch half-awake, eyes half-lidded with one hand caught at the hem of your sweater.

“Do you really get up this early?” he asks, voice rough with sleep.

“Yeah,” you murmur. “Most days.”

His brows pull together slightly. “Why?”

You let out a small, breathless laugh. “Because my boss is kind of a hard ass about punctuality.”

Something that almost resembles amusement flickers across his face.

“Sounds like a terrible boss,” he murmurs.

Then he tugs on your sweater again—hard enough this time that you let out a startled laugh as you stumble backward onto the mattress and into him. He catches you easily, one arm wrapping around your waist before you can even fully recover, pulling you back against the warmth of his chest.

“Yeah,” you murmur, laughing softly as his mouth brushes beneath your ear. “He’s awful. Very demanding.”

He hums, breath warm against your skin.

“He’s really hot, though,” you add, smiling despite yourself. “So I like having time to put in a little effort, you know? Hope he notices.”

“Oh, he notices.”

Your stomach flips. “Really?”

“Mhm.”

His arm tightens around your waist. “He notices the skirts.”

Heat floods your face. “Aaron—”

“He notices the tights.” His mouth brushes against the nape of your neck. “The ones with the seam up the back.”

“Oh my God.”

You try to turn your face into the pillow, but he just holds you tighter, pressing his lips firm against your neck.

“And the red bra,” he murmurs.

Your breath catches.

“Noticed that so much I had to wait until everyone left the conference room before I could get up.”

You let out a strangled sound, squirming in his arms, but it’s no use. His chest vibrates against your back, something suspiciously close to laughter.

“My washing machine broke that week,” you whine. “It wasn’t my fault.”

“Mm, sure.”

You twist around immediately. “I’m not lying.”

The corner of his mouth twitches, like he doesn’t quite believe you, but before you can protest again—he kisses you. Warm, slow, sleep-soft. His mouth moves against yours almost lazily, his hand tightening slightly at your waist when a pathetic little whimper slips out before you can stop it.

“Careful,” you murmur, breathless against his mouth. “Don’t want to be late.”

You feel his lips curve.

“Good thing I’m the boss.”

10:35AM

You made it to work well on time. Even after three orgasms, a shower, and an awkward attempt at a ‘What Now?’ conversation—that ended in the aforementioned third orgasm. Because fortunately for your rapidly fraying nervous system, Hotch hadn’t even hesitated when you’d finally asked what happens next. In fact, he’d answered a little too quickly.

The first thing he’d asked was whether you’d be comfortable keeping things quiet for a while. Not because he’s worried about the team finding out—he trusts them. Trusts you. The concern is Strauss, and the Bureau, and keeping you in the BAU while he figures out exactly how much trouble the two of you have just created for yourselves. At some point he’d even started muttering about reporting structures and supervisory chains, half-thinking out loud while pulling on his tie. Something about possibly moving your reporting line over to Rossi. Something else about needing to review the Bureau’s fraternisation policies before making any moves.

That was when you kissed him—effectively, and very quickly, kicking off round three.

Because he’d clearly been thinking about this for a while, which means Aaron Hotchner has been noticing a lot more than just short skirts and inappropriately coloured underwear. It means that the second he decided to kiss you in your apartment last night, he’d already known exactly what he was getting himself into.

“Alright, gorgeous,” Morgan says, startling you as he raps a knuckle against your desk. “They’ll be ready for you downstairs in ten.”

You glance up at him, brows drawn—and it takes an embarrassingly long second for you to figure out what he’s talking about.

“Oh.” You blink. “Right. Yeah, I’ll head down soon. Thanks.”

Prentiss looks over from her desk. “You gonna be okay?”

You lift a shoulder. “Sure. What’s another case report?”

Morgan frowns, dropping into his chair. “It’s not exactly every day you’re the victim, baby girl.”

“Yeah, but nothing really happened.”

Morgan and Prentiss both stare at you.

“Because of the team,” you add quickly. “You guys caught him before he actually did anything. So... you know, nothing bad happened.” You plaster on a smile that feels reasonably convincing. “Thanks for that, by the way.”

Prentiss narrows her eyes, but before she can say anything else, Reid appears.

“You’re in a remarkably good mood for someone who was being actively cyberstalked twelve hours ago,” he says, stirring his second coffee of the day.

You turn back to your screen, trying to ignore the heat creeping into your cheeks. “Maybe I just have a newfound appreciation for life.”

Reid studies you for a moment, clearly unconvinced—but he doesn’t push. He just moves slowly back toward his desk, setting his coffee down with unnecessary care while the rest of the team turn away, finally deciding to mind their own business.

You force your attention back to the report in front of you, determined to at least look productive for the next ten minutes—when a familiar voice cuts through your concentration.

“Rossi’s taking Wallace with you next week,” Hotch says, setting the file down on your desk.

You blink up at him. “I thought you were leading the interview.”

“I was.”

Something in his expression tightens briefly before he lowers his voice.

“Wallace has a long history of using sex, intimidation, and emotional targeting to destabilise people during interviews,” he says. “Especially women.”

You frown. “Hotch, I—”

“And if he says something to you in that room,” he continues evenly, “or looks at you the wrong way, I need to know the agent sitting beside you is still capable of thinking objectively.”

Your stomach flips as his eyes meet yours—steady, intense, devastatingly honest.

“Right now,” he says quietly, “I’m not sure that’s me.”

Then he’s gone. Moving through the bullpen back toward his office like he hasn’t just set your pulse racing and your head spinning. You watch after him for a moment before shaking your head, glancing back at your computer screen as if you’d been focused on it at all in the first place.

“…Huh.”

You turn toward the sound and find Reid staring at you again. Not rudely. Just watching with the same focused curiosity he’d been wearing since your suspiciously cheerful comment about cyberstalking.

He tilts his head.

Then—

“Oh my God.”

You close your eyes. “Spencer… don’t.”

"i consult here," still, you rolled off your leather couch and straightened up your vest. your smile contradicted every annoyance you had about having to fly all the way out to missouri. not like it was a long flight but still. it was the easiest case that had come across the desk in a while and yet somehow it was a BAU case. something about the local police department not having a clue, probably. you picked up the small black travel bag you kept beside your couch and moved into step beside hotch.

he walked alongside you through the bullpen with a stoic look on his face, his eyes dead ahead and not once glancing over at you. "the unsub—"

"—is targeting young adults in the hazelwood area. the link between the eight victims is that they all grew up in the same children's home but the cops can't find anything that connects them to the staff that worked there, or the foster parents, etcetera . . . what?" you questioned like an afterthought when you caught hotch's side-eye, "i like to read."

you hadn't been at the briefing because you knew you'd hear it all over again on the jet anyway. you had snagged one of the files that garcia put together before it made it to the circle table and spent ten minutes scanning through the documents for all the relevant information before tucking the manila folder in your go-bag.

"clearly," hotch hardly raised an eyebrow.

"and if you read the case properly then you would also know what i know," you finally looked at him, flashing a blinding smile with a little skip in your step.

"which is . . ."

"the unsub is one of the kids from the home." hotch held the glass door open and you nodded in thanks as he held the door. once you were through, he let go and followed after you until he fell back into step.

"that doesn't fit the profile," hotch denied immediately. "this unsub isn't immature or displaying signs of trauma or mental illness. there's not even signs of revenge, which would've showed up in at least the first two victims. it's unlikely another one of the kids." he paused for a moment; you had a smile on your face as you listened to him ramble. "and, if it was, the first victim would've certainly been one of the caregivers."

when he finally finished, you spoke once again. "i think you're wrong," was all you said, smile turning tight-lipped. not another word was spoken on the way to the airfield.

"OUR UNSUB IS A white male in his late thirties," rossi said aloud to the surrounding hazelwood police that crowded in the bullpen. "he's going after this specific group of kids here." pointing to the board where a photo from a group home was printed out, now nine of the fifteen children in the photo were dead. the victims now were all roughly in their mid-twenties, as would be the remaining people in the photo that were under police protection across the town and the surrounding area. "which leads us to believe he was someone who either worked at the home during this time, or he could potentially be someone who lived at the home ten-ish years prior to these kids here."

you sat there shaking your head while sipping at your cup of tea. leaning back on one of the chairs, your feet were kicked up onto the desk belonging to chris, one of the quieter local cops that had been rather nice to you since you showed up. usually you clashed with the local cops because they had opinions on why you were wrong and unprofessional. chris had been the opposite, listening to every word you said and even writing some of your theories down in his little notebook.

honestly, you found it a little off-putting that he seemed to care about your opinion so much, but it was a nice change. not even your coworkers seemed to be as interested as he was half the time. something about you being an unqualified scam-artist or something, who cares?

"we're looking for anyone who has ever had a link to this home, but refine your search around anyone that worked there from 2003 to 2007," hotch added on. it was almost electric how he commanded a room. you noticed everyone else's eyes focused in on him like he was an authoritarian leader of the most obedient regime.

"gardeners, teachers, therapists, guidance counselors, social workers, nannies, cooks," emily listed off clearly, raising her hands as she spoke. she said it just slow enough for the cops to scribble it down in their notes. "it might not be anyone that had direct contact with these kids, it could be someone who noticed them from afar, for example."

reid cut in. "37.4% of child abuse perpetrators in this scenario are institution staff, and 36.5% are foster parents," he sported a tight-lipped smile that you only ever noticed from him when he shared his knowledge with the class. "it's more likely they are our unsub."

"what about the other, like, twenty percent?" you asked aloud, swirling the remaining tea around the too-white coffee mug. you had found it in the back of the cupboard in the break room because it had been the only clean mug. it was probably because it had some ex-cop's ex-wife on it (so you had been told via chris), but it didn't smell like coffee or have dead moths in it, so it was good enough to drink out of.

reid turned to look at you. "relatives of the victim."

one of the local cops snorted. "doubt that's the case here." one of his buddies scoffed out a laugh at the joke.

standing up, you hummed to yourself as hotch delivered the rest of the very wrong profile. you understood it, you weren't going to cut him off in front of so many people, but you knew it was false. all you had to do was wait for more evidence to fall into your lap to change the team's mind. you ignored the few sets of eyes on you as you made your way to the board that all the photos had been taped up on when reid went over victimology and the geographical profile with emily.

the one photo that stood out was the photo rossi had mentioned before. it was taken like a class photo, with all the kids, nine of whom now had a bullet messily lodged in their brain, lined up with the two primary carers stood at either end. morgan had been covering the faces of those who had been murdered with circular magnets to make it easier to see who was left when there were so many potential victims. six of them were still smiling brightly, their face free from a magnet, so full of life and an innocence that stole oxygen from your lungs.

one face in particular stood out, he had since the very first time you saw the image printed out in the case file back in quantico but you kept that to yourself. there was no convincing hotch unless you had a concrete enough case; he knew you could be right but he wanted to see that you could prove your theory first. and right now you had absolutely nothing but a very convincing gut feeling.

"penny for your thoughts?" rossi's voice had you blinking away your thoughts. the cops had scattered to canvass once the profile ended, and looking to your left, you noticed that emily and morgan were being instructed by hotch, probably to go visit the ninth crime scene, before he turned to talk to reid and jj.

you grinned at him, "my thoughts are worth way more than that, agent rossi," you said airily, waving your hand as you walked away to go sit back in chris' chair. he just shook his head like he seemed to always do whenever you opened your mouth.

the sun was setting on their second night in hazelwood. today had been profiling and chasing leads and dealing with the increasingly antsy police captain.

you didn't know his first name but his badge read 'andrews' loud and proud. he was the 'crime doesn't exist until it's in my neighbourhood' type, which was strangely counterintuitive considering he was a cop, but then again crime wasn't a huge part of life in this town. usually petty theft and traffic incidents were the most common . . . something like murder was an entirely different ballgame.

"where's your team?" andrews hadn't stopped pacing for ten minutes and thirty-seven seconds. the watch on your wrist had been your focus for that duration of time, watching him walk back and forth and mutter to himself like a madman. "why aren't you with them?"

you shrugged carelessly. taking a sip of unremarkably mediocre tea, you set the mug back down on chris' desk. he had gone with morgan and reid to comb through the first crime scene again, and that had been hours ago now. that only added tension to andrews' shoulders. everyone else was off doing their part. jj had set up a press conference for tomorrow and in the mean time was picking up takeout for dinner since it was going to be a long night. she had refused to be the only one heading back to her hotel room when the rest of the team was still working on the case, and thus she settled for making sure everyone was fed.

had you been given the option like she had, you'd be back in your hotel room by now. you had attempted it already but hotch's gaze was stern and that had you lowering yourself back down into chris' chair. the sudoku puzzle in front of you had kept you occupied for the past half an hour, and every now and then your concentration would be broken with someone asking for your opinion. you were fairly certain that opinion was just to keep you involved in their theories rather than your own, so you humoured them and minded your business.

"i've seen the crime scenes," you waved your hand, disinterested, "don't need to see 'em again. ah," you grinned to yourself, drawing a 2 into one of the boxes of your sudoku grid, "there it goes."

something in andrews turned red hot. "do you even care about this case, agent?" he scoffed, crossing his arms over his chest. you slowly set your pen down on top of the open page of your puzzle book. "all you've done is parade around acting like you fuckin' know everything; haven't seen ya be helpful once."

not an agent, you thought, for once thinking better than to correct him.

apparently you minded your business a little too well. you leaned back in your chair and stared up at him. his face was flushed with anger, the type of anger that had his forehead creasing and his knuckles turning white from how aggressively he was crossing his arms.

"and don't get me started on your psychic bullshit. get real, kid, that shit's complete bullshit," he carried on, each syllable getting louder than the last. you noticed hotch's back straighten, his words failing him as he cut himself off from talking to the rest of the team when he overheard andrews. "you're useless, only here to waste my time. we have a killer to catch, goddamnit!"

upon noticing the captain was losing his shit with you, hotch shed his blazer over the chair like he absentmindedly did every time someone questioned his team. you weren't sure he even knew he did it. and if he wasn't wearing a jacket, he would roll his sleeves up like he was about to prosecute.

you paid little mind to him, staring up at the captain and waiting for him to finish his little rant. "now that is where we agree," you nodded compassionately, "psychic's aren't real, glad we're on the same page."

that only seemed to infuriate him more. he took a step closer, his fist slamming down on the desk you were sitting at. the cop across the desk from you jumped but you remained still, not breaking eye contact with andrews once. not even when your tea splashed over and spilled across half of your puzzle book, and certainly not when hotch crossed the space in a matter of strides.

hotch pushed himself between where you were sat and where andrews stood, all diplomatic but his eyes burned with a rage you had never seen before. it was no secret hotch hated people being disrespectful towards his team, his family, but it was something you had never really thought extended to you. the team had been together for so long now and you sat parallel to the outside, not quite in but not quite out either. hotch had stuck up for jj a few weeks ago on a case in georgia, and then again for garcia in quantico when they had to consult the organised crime unit and one of their agents belittled her. hell, you watched hotch stand up for reid constantly. everyone had each other's backs . . . but this was all new.

"that's enough," his voice was firm. you could only assume it was his prosecutor voice that he kept locked away for moments such as this. he was calm, very professional, and yet kept all his emotions hidden behind a wall. including the anger you could see flaring his nostrils and ticking his jaw. your eyes flickered to hotch a little too swiftly. "you don't talk to my team that way, do you understand me?"

silence.

this was agent aaron hotchner, who had little faith in your skills, standing up for you on behalf of said skills. god, was the world caving in?

"i asked you a question," hotch spoke with a coldness that left little room to argue. not that anyone would dare to argue with a man as articulate as him. the air seemed to become scarce, sucking the warmth out of the room and leaving everyone to gasp in carbon dioxide in their final breaths. "do you understand me?" he left a pause between every word, his eyes narrowing into andrews' skull with enough pressure to melt his brain into mush. you couldn't help but bite the inside of your cheek, forcing your gaze off hotch and back on the shrinking police captain.

". . . yes . . . sir," andrews gulped so hard you swore you heard it. his adam's apple bobbed uncomfortably, his throat constricting like a python. he forced the words out like he didn't really mean them, but the sheer fact that hotch had gotten him to fold so quickly was admirable. he didn't utter an apology to you, not that you were looking for one, but he did scatter while clearing his throat rather quickly.

you spun in your chair to properly face hotch. he was barely a few inches away from your legs. his shoulders were tense, his shirt tight in specific places just enough to see the faint outline of his muscles hiding underneath. "i'm surprised," you drawled slightly, a gentle smile tugging your lips upwards like it always did. he wasn't sure if every smile was real. he couldn't read through you but he could work out that smiling was your first line of defence in every situation. "thought you also thought everything i did was bullshit."

maybe you were imagining things but you swore the corner of his mouth quirked upwards for a split-second, just enough to drive you insane. "i don't let people talk to my team like that," he answered in that professional manner he always did. maybe taking a sledgehammer to his tone would break through to something new, something he kept hidden deep down. "especially not the people we're helping out on this case."

"he ruined my puzzle book," you muttered, reaching for a tissue and dabbing it at your ruined sudoku puzzle. you hadn't even gotten the chance to finish the one you were working on yet.

"i know," was all he said.

"well," you bravely reached your foot out just enough to knock against his on the floor after an additional moment of silence. he didn't move, much like you figured would happen. "thank you."

it was the best you could think to say to him in this situation. hotch didn't believe in everything you did and that was okay, you were used to that, and so he hadn't defended you because of that, you were pretty sure, but because of the entitlement from andrews.

well, you were at least pretty sure that was the case. there was no way hotch had a sudden change of heart and suddenly thought your ex-scam artist skills and lack of qualifications made you an important asset to the team. that would be silly. and unrealistic. and very strange.

"jj's brought dinner," were you imagining it or was his voice softer this time? "go get someting to eat." he walked away before you could answer. you found your feet moving before your brain did, sliding out of the chair and heading over to where jj was already smiling at you.

she nudged your shoulder like she knew something you didn't. "i don't know what you did but i've never seen hotch look all soft," she whispered, impressed. "good for you, girl."

for once, you had absolutely nothing to say.

"WHERE ARE WE GOING?"

"for a drive," you said like it was obvious. as if you weren't currently behind the wheel of the SUV emily had the keys to. your two options had either been grab hotch's keys or convince emily, and the latter was one thousand percent easier than the former because that way you didn't get chewed out for stealing the keys again.

"hm, yeah," emily rolled her eyes at the obviousness. "a drive in a very conveniently located neighbourhood . . ." she checked her little notebook, "the neighbourhood belonging to travis kern."

hence why emily had been the perfect choice: she had a better attitude towards your skillset than the rest of the team did (reid not included, he had grown to value you but you also knew he would dob you in to hotch and rossi the second you asked), and that was why she so far hadn't tried to get you to stop the car.

travis kern was their serial killer. he was a twenty-six year old, antisocial personality that lived in a nice home on the edge of hazelwood. he had done well for himself since he turned eighteen and left the group home — had gone to college for computer science and coding and to this day worked from home. he made more money than the rest of the kids he grew up alongside, and considering their bodies had been found robbed, travis had been ruled out of being a suspect. that theory had been solidified when no missing money or jewellery was found in his house.

none of that was the reason you suspected him. no, it was the tears and the pleading with law enforcement to do something as if that meant a thing. going to his house would be the final step in you determining whether or not he was hazelwood's serial killer.

"felt like going for a late night drive," you smiled over at her, and then pulled into travis' driveway. the sun had long set on your third night in hazelwood and really didn't want to spend another night here. small towns weren't really your thing, not after spending so long enjoying city life. it was also really uncomfortable how everyone seemed to know everyone . . . mary who worked at the grocery store on the one side of town should not need to know carol's daughter's second-cousin twice-removed by name and home address on the other side of town. that was too odd for you to comprehend.

"this is just a social visit, right?" emily asked. she looked hesitant but in a way in which she didn't fully care. three days in, emily just wanted to head home to virginia and flop into her comfy bed. the motel beds had hard springs and a weird smell to them; if you knocking on travis' door solved the case, she would gladly tag along just for the chance to go home.

"totally," you nodded, turning the car off and hopping out. staring out at the house, you noticed the upstairs light turn on through the blinds. "keep that thing holstered," you gestured to the gun strapped to her waist. "we're just having a friendly chat."

"mhm," emily hummed, staring at you incredulously. the last friendly chat you had with a suspect led you to being momentarily held hostage for running your mouth. "sure thing."

you let emily knock on travis' door, and the moment it opened, you wedged your way through travis and the ajar door to get inside. emily sighed and travis spluttered.

"where's your security?" you asked, glancing around the inside of the main foyer. not a single picture frame was in sight, and the further you walked in through to the lounge room, you noticed just how bare it was. everything felt so devoid of life. not a single photo or accomplishment hung on the wall, not even any artwork. the one couch was bare, no pillows or throw blankets, and the coffee table only had the tv remote on it. you hummed softly to yourself before turning around.

"shift changeover," travis said, eyebrows furrowing together. "sorry, is there a reason you're here?"

"ah, sorry," you grinned, closing the gap between travis and yourself and holding your hand out for him to shake. he did so with a gentle tremor in his hand. "thought you'd want an update on the case."

it was like something changed in travis at your words. his shoulders lost their slight tension and his expression looked a little off. surely knowing that you're a potential murder victim wouldn't let you feel this calm so suddenly.

"yes, please," he let go of your hand and shoved them back into his pockets. emily shut the front door behind her, and the three of you migrated into the lounge room where you had just been snooping.

he sat down on the one end of the couch, and emily sat down on the other end. you remained standing on the other side of the coffee table, far enough from emily so that she couldn't drag you out of the house to silence you like morgan usually did. "we've found our suspect," you said it simply, like it had no weight to it whatsoever. "case closed."

emily's lips parted like she wanted to tell you to stop, but a quick look from you had her closing her mouth.

"really?" travis sighed in relief, dropping his head into his hands. "oh thank god," he glanced between emily and you. "thank you, thank you. oh my god . . ."

you wondered if emily could see what you could see.

"yep, case closed," you rubbed your hands together. "agent prentiss here will fill you in on all of the details . . . where's your bathroom?"

apparently you had broken down travis' resolve enough to get him to wordlessly point out the direction of the bathroom down the hall without a second thought.

emily cleared her throat, her glare coming down hard on you. all the details you had told her, and she was angrily cursing you for putting this on her to deal with. there weren't any details for her to run with because the killer hadn't been caught. improvising wasn't necessarily her strongsuit but you knew she'd make it work.

you walked down the bland hallway. it was tinged with yellow from age but otherwise it was as pristine as the rest of the house. it was strange; it felt more like a display house than a home.

the bathroom was on the right and you completely bypassed it for the door shut at the very end of the hallway. silently, you twisted the doorknob slowly, taking a quick peek inside through the tiniest crevice you could find.

there you found kaitlyn jones, one of the others from the group home, her hands and feet tied with rope, and duct tape over her mouth. she noticed the door open and her eyes blew wide, but you quickly silenced her by placing your index finger over your lips to silence her. you were just glad that she had recognised you from when she had originally come into the police station two days ago. she could've only been in travis' house for two hours since the police checked in that everyone was safe two and a half hours prior . . . something that travis would've known. brusining was starting to form up her arms, blooming at the base of her throat in a pattern that looked suspiciously like handprints. this MO was different from the others; none of them had been reported with any bruising.

this was something more personal, but that would be for the rest of your team and the local cops to determine in their interviews.

grimacing at her, you made a silent promise that you'd be back and hoped that she understood. as quietly as you opened it you shut the door, reaching into your pocket and pulling out your lipstick to leave a little note for emily to find. it was better the armed woman be the one to find kaitlyn rather than you.

you wrote 'EMILY' in large letters, thankful that you hadn't brought a nicer lipstick with you today, before retreating back down the hall, making a pitstop in the bathroom to flush the toilet and wash your hands before walking back out.

travis looked so incredibly at ease that he probably assumed he was in the clear. whatever emily had said worked terrifically.

"okay," you clapped your hands together as you entered the lounge room. emily's head snapped up to catch your gaze. you gave her a very subtle wink before travis could turn to look at you. "we're gonna head off . . . em," you looked back at her pointedly, "you said you wanted to go to the bathroom before we left?"

emily stood up, blinking rapidly. "yeah . . . yeah!" she nodded in understanding, "won't be a sec, sorry."

your shook your head at her as you took her spot on the couch. looking at travis, you waved your hand at him, "long drive, small bladder, you get it," you lied rather fluently.

emily pretended she didn't hear that.

you waited roughly two minutes, your gaze continuously drifting to your watch, until emily came back into the lounge room, this time with her gun unholstered and aimed directly at travis. "travis kern, put your hands where i can see 'em."

you quickly hopped up from your seat and moved away from travis, only stopping when you were behind emily. peeking out from behind her, you watched travis grunt and begrudgingly stand up, his hands behind his head, his fingers interlocked. "ha! see, emily?" you didn't mean to gloat but you were currently enjoying being right. "i told you all it was him!" you looked back at travis. "i knew it was you the second i met you. you have the house of a psychopath too, c'mon."

emily said your last name with enough conviction that you shut up. "yes, you were right," she rolled her eyes, but you weren't blind to the ghost of a smile across her lips. "call hotch."

"with pleasure," you stepped away and pulled your phone out of your pocket, hotch's contact the first one in your list of recent contacts.

the phone rang three times before he picked up. "hotchner."

"hotch, i have fantastic news for you," you gushed into the phone. emily had travis handcuffed and was leading him outside into the car. "y—"

"does it have anything to do with the reason you and prentiss aren't here?" his voice was lower than usual, riddled with tiredness and something like annoyance.

". . . potentially," you sounded sheepish. "i promise it's worth it! we'll meet you at the station."

"you arrested kern, didn't you?"

the call lapsed into momentary silence. "okay," you said slowly, "i didn't arrest him, emily did! i just . . . kinda had a feeling it was him and then i found kaitlyn jones tied up in his spare room—"

he cut you off by deadpanning your first name. that silenced you immediately — hotch never called you by your first name. it was strangely warm in the cool tones of his voice. "we'll talk about this later," he left no room for argument, and your smile slipped for just a moment. the mask cracked. "but good work." he fell silent. then, begrudgingly, "you were correct . . . the profile was wrong."

you smiled warmly, a smile different to your usual one. "can you say that again?" you asked, quietly this time. "i wanna record it."

he didn't humour you. "i'll meet you at the station." but you swore you heard an uplift in his tone before he hung up.

good work.

you were correct.