That's why I always have to have you here, hoo!

She put her pen down, closed the blinds in hope that it would muffle the noises a little bit, and scoffed when she noticed you eyeing up her lunch leftovers; it didn't matter if it was food that you liked, anything unattended was soon eaten, usually with scraps and sauce and crumbs littering every surface as well as your face.

It seemed all too natural, sat in Ben Reilly's office, smoking a cigarette and trying not to listen to the ever growing noise that made your ears burn more and more every day; the overwhelming smells that left you pawing at your nose in hopes you would make it go numb.

The tapping of Janet's pen against the paper drawing a quiet, pained, howl from the back of your throat that you couldn't keep hidden, and she turned to you; apologetic and soft.

She was a good friend like that, she always thought that you were just some sweet pup that Ben had dragged in; you didn't owe her money like he did, and she felt bad that someone with your talents, your powers, would be in so much pain all the time. 

Everyone learned pretty quickly to put food out of your way, not that it helped, as you would sniff it out soon enough and sit near wherever it was whimpering until someone, usually Ben, caved and gave it to you.

He would roll his eyes, but even Janet could see the little bit of amusement and light in them that he tried to hide; he thought it was endearing and cute, she thought it was a little silly to see a fully grown man begging for food like a starving puppy.

She thought it was good for him to have someone like you around, she thought it was good for you to be around someone a little more serious... well, someone who knew when he had to be.

But the worst was Ben.

Robbie would encourage you to keep going, whether it was the begging for scraps, the whimpering at the door when Ben was late, the wailed howls when you heard a siren before anyone else did, the immediately getting violent when a stranger walked into the office.

He figured that, with your powers, it was probably wise to trust your instincts; they were raw and primal and natural, an immediate switch that flickered and caused you to jump into action.

He let you sleep at the end of his bed, curled up against his legs despite your constant complaints about your neck hurting in the morning; he let you come on cases with him to sniff out clues. He caved in when you begged and whimpered, he grew tense when you reacted to strangers; he soundproofed his whole flat just so you wouldn't beforced into pain from the noises outside, and made sure that the only thing you could smell was him.

He didn't bring you flowers, the smells were always too pungent, but he took you to the cinema, and he usually let you stick your head out of the window when you were in a taxi together. You were always sniffing around him like a stray, and he didn't just encourage it, he enabled it; at first out of pity, knowing how isolating it was to have powers like that, now out of something else. 

"You can't hide under my desk all day, pup."

You glanced at his desk, and got up, making sure to finish your cigarette and stub it out before you got underneath it and stayed there; you could smell his sweat against the wood, and everything else began to fade out of focus.

For what seemed like hours, it was the only thing on your mind as you closed your eyes and allowed yourself to drown a little bit in it. You only looked up when you felt a familiar hand on your shoulder, and heard the one voice that you had needed to all day.

You managed to smile, just about, as you nodded. "Everything's just-"

"Yeah, really loud," Ben nodded back, pulling you to your feet and clicking his fingers as he pointed to the chair slightly behind and to the left of his. "Sit. Good boy, stay."

"I figured," he was choosing his words a little too carefully for your liking, lighting a cigarette just to take a single drag and hand it to you. "It might be more comfortable with that on."

You waited there for a moment, watching his every movement; the slight jerk to his movements as if he was running on both elastic and hydraulic systems. The slight pause of every step as if feeling around to make sure he had his footing properly.

You noticed every single thing, from the way his breath hitched a little when he reached into his drawer, to how his hands shook with hesitation as he reached in and grabbed something that smelled like leather and metal. Your brows knitted slightly, wondering what the scent could have belonged to until he pulled out a collar and handed it to you; you put it on, and he smiled with a curt nod. It looked good, and the little tag with the office telephone number clinked gently.

You had to admit, he was right; the way the leather settled against your skin and how the steel buckle soothed the warmth from your body, it was comfortable. 

"As opposed to what?" You asked with a slight smile, tilting your head in that way that you knew made him weak. 

"You know what," Ben murmured, shaking his head for a split second. He cleared his throat, and sat with his legs spread, making you clench your jaw as you tried to resist the urge, the instinct. "We have a case... missing person, I could use your help."

"My help or my nose?" You hummed, leaning back a little. 

"Bit of both," he shrugged, swiping the folder from his desk and handing it to you. "Janet's looking at the local police reports and records. I thought me and you could take a trip-"

"To the park?"

"Downtown," he corrected. "See if we can find out where our man is."

You nodded slowly, flicking through what he had already gathered; a cheating husband, as always, and a wife who deserved far better than the scum she had wound up with. Suddenly she was missing, and you couldn't figure out what had gotten Ben's interest so bad; it seemed cut and dry to you, the obvious was there in black and white.

“Diana Nolan,” you read aloud with a curt nod. “Says here she never took her husband’s name…”

“So?”

"Good for her, but she ran off for a better life," you said. "Why are we taking it?"

"Her room was destroyed," he replied, "blood on the floor, husband hasn't been seen in days, either."

You nodded slowly, handed the file back to him, and growled softly as you scratched behind your ear, trying to think. "I dunno. We can give it a go, but it wouldn't shock me if it was a simple cut and dry thing."

『•••••••••••••••••••••✎•••••••••••••••••••••』

It was close to midnight when you and Ben made it to the house where Diana Nolan had allegedly disappeared from; something smelled off about the place, and with one sharp tug of Ben’s sleeve, he knew it, too. He glared at you for a moment, the way you tried to stick close, the way that your body tensed, and he couldn’t help but to squint a little as he tried to ignore the migraine beginning to form in the base of his neck.

Something was off, your senses knew it, his senses knew it. Something was not right about the place; the house wasn’t well kept, ivy dangling from every windowsill and every scrap of roof tiling as well as the balcony on the right hand side. Rot began to seep in through the wooden walls and onto the porch that lead to the steps seeping onto the pavement outside; the grass, dense and thick with green and yellow hues, had grown up and over the stone wall that had contained it.

You clenched your jaw, and tugged Ben’s sleeve again. 

“We’re being watched,” you muttered. “Ben, can we just go? Can we leave? Something ain’t right and-”

It felt like something was watching you, something lurking in the dark and counting every step and every move that you made as you shook your head and begged him to turn back and to drop the case; but Ben smiled, shaking his head in reassurance as he pointed out that it was only putting you on edge because it was dark and the house looked like something out of a Boris Karloff or Bela Lugosi film.

You wanted to be reassured, wanted to believe what he had said, but something was still telling you to run; you could feel breath against the back of your neck, and could faintly smell something musky and damp, and it wasn’t the sweat beading on the back of his neck. You shook your head, a soft whimper coming from the back of your throat. 

“You’ll be fine, pup,” he told you, slowly making his way to the steps. “Don’t forget, things go south, The Spider will come and save you.”

You grumbled under your breath, but cautiously followed him, constantly looking over your shoulder and baring your teeth when your eyes caught the shadows; something was in the dark, something was lurking, wanting to keep you away from its territory, and you didn’t like it one bit.

But when Ben made it to the door where the paint cracked and peeled away from the wood, you sat on the edge of the porch, watching the bushes nearby; your heart could have stopped right there when you caught the sight of the moon; it was so bright, glaring at you as if to warn you that you were not in the right place and you were not there at the right time either.

You tugged at Ben’s trouser leg, looking up at him as you shook your head, not wanting to go inside; he lit a cigarette, and handed it to you, hoping and thinking it would calm your nerves even a little bit. Knowing that it probably wouldn’t; Janet usually said you had a sixth sense about things like that, like his spider sense but a little bit more instinctual.

You had never been so nervous on a case before, and maybe he should have caved into your instincts, but the money being offered was a lot more than he could turn down; maybe he should have taken you home and come back when you fell asleep, but he knew better than to think that you wouldn’t wake up and immediately come to sniff him out. 

You were about to take another drag from the cigarette when you saw it, some kind of shadow zipping through the bushes nearby, stalking, but not you; it had no interest in you with its bright yellow eyes that flashed underneath a nearby streetlamp and glittered underneath the glaring moon.

It moved close to the ground, hunched shoulders and a crouched position, and although you tried to scream to alert him, something caught your tongue, and forced the noise into the back of your throat instead; you dropped the cigarette, and before it could pounce, you pushed him onto his back against the rotting porch, panting heavily as you shook your head.

You kept him there, growling under your heaving breath as your eyes went wide and a million different reasons pulsated through your mind; Ben simply stared for a moment, his migraine getting worse, feeling like he was being watched, all too aware of your fingers digging into his shoulders and your hands pressing into his bones as you listened carefully and sniffed the air. You were onto something, he didn’t know what, but he knew it was something big if his senses were flaring up as much as yours. 

“Ben!” You pounced at him from the bushes, quick to drag him away and ushering him towards the door as much as you possibly could. “Ben, there’s fucking something in the fucking-”

He didn’t have time to react when you were ripped away from him, frozen for a moment as he looked around; the bushes rustled, and he scrambled to his feet as he stared in the direction the sound had come from.

Fuck.

You had been looking at him right in the eyes, and some kind of shadow had just suddenly dragged you off, and he knew then that he should have listened to you from the beginning.

Shit.

He jogged over to the noise, calling your name as the fear began to eat away at him, the same failure; the same fucking failure all over again even when he had promised that he wouldn’t let it happen, when he just fucking thought that he was beginning to get better from it. He had let it happen all over again and-

“I know,” he said with a harsh breath, more relieved than anything else when he saw that you were mostly unscathed. A few nicks to that nice new collar, a few tears in your trousers where you had been dragged, but alive. You were still alive, and that meant more to him than he could ever say. “Shit. I’m sorry, I-”

“Doesn’t matter, it’s gonna come back!” You all but howled. “We gotta fucking get out of here and-”

He was quick to agree that time, a little more spooked than he would have liked to have admitted by the turn of events; it gave him the worst possible thrill, seeing you dragged away from him so quickly, knowing that he had been too late once again, dreading what would have happened for those seconds that seemed to trickle by like years until you had rushed out of the bushes.

It was a fear he had only felt once before, and he never wanted to feel it again; that same old crunch in his chest and the drop of his heart into his stomach. After finally opening himself up again like he had done… like he did once before, he wasn’t sure if he would know how to cope with having to do it all over again; he wouldn’t be able to cope if something had happened to you. He knew he wouldn’t have been able to. 

If he had… the fact that he wasn’t quick enough to save you from the beast about to strike, the fact that he could have lost you so quickly and so easily; Ben didn’t know what could have happened if he had decided to stick around and keep investigating. He didn’t want to know.

He had been too slow then, what if it happened again when you were in the house?

What if he had been too slow a second time, and something worse had happened?

No, he wouldn’t put you through that, he wouldn’t put himself through that kind of loss again; he couldn’t do it, he couldn’t bear the thought of it as it weighed heavily on his shoulders. 

『•••••••••••••••••••••✎•••••••••••••••••••••』

The entire way back to his flat, he had felt like he was fighting for his life; fighting to keep you as close as possible, fighting to make sure that it wouldn’t happen again. Maybe it was just a coyote or something, but he knew that it couldn’t have been. It was too powerful, taking down a fully grown man like that, and you had been right from the moment that you had paused outside and told him that you didn’t feel right.

He was beating himself up, and you could smell it on his breath and hear it in the way that his heart thudded against his chest; he had been given more of a fright than you had, and you felt awful for putting him through that. 

“Stay,” Ben growled out as you sat at the edge of his bed, watching him expectantly. “Be a good boy, stay.”

You took note of every movement he made, that almost hydraulic jerk to his movements as he made his way to the bedside table; you tilted your head, curious and interested just to know what he was doing, fighting instinct and obedience as you whimpered softly, all but restless as you raised your brows slightly, your ears perked as you caught a whiff of something all too familiar that made your heart race a little harder than it had done a moment ago.

If you had a tail, there was no doubt that it would have been thumping against the mattress in excitement as you sniffled, hoping to catch a better smell. 

The moment that he sat down next to you with a lead, you were on him; hands on his shoulders, mouth on his neck, nuzzling and kissing at the skin as you whimpered under your breath, grinding into his leg and making him stifle a groan as he tried to pull his focus back.

You always did look good when you were humping his leg, so eager and so happy to please him, looking at him with those puppy dog eyes and- no. No, he wasn’t going to let you do that tonight, he just needed you to get your weight off of him, needed you to settle down ever so slightly so he could make it up to you; so he could rectify his mistake of not reacting in time earlier. 

“Easy, pup,” Ben whispered hoarsely, shaking his head. “Let me be sorry properly, would ya?”

Ben knew your every move, just like how a tarantula knew which of its webs were soft and which were sticky, and he almost couldn’t bear the thought of stopping you when you softly cried out his name in a stifled beg; already so needy, so easy to wind up, so easy to get all excited. It made him almost lose his resolve as he clipped the lead to your collar, and gave it a firm tug.

You followed it immediately, getting on your hands and knees and tilting your head to the side; quietly asking him what he wanted you to do, always putting him above yourself. Always choosing him first. Shit. 

You nodded, trying to push down the anticipation, trying to push down the excitement as you groaned softly; you were already aching, your cock pressing against your trousers a little too much to be comfortable, you needed him so fucking bad and your mind was going cloudy just thinking about it. 

Slowly, Ben undressed you, each time asking if he could remove the fabric until you were left in nothing but the collar, and he almost couldn’t understand it; you were good looking, mid twenties, you could have had anyone - but you chose to be with a poor, washed up, detective-slash-superhero a little more than twice your age, instead. You chose him, instead of the plethora of people you could have had; it rarely made sense to him, but he wasn’t going to mind it too much.

He laid you on your back, kissing and biting at the skin and licking a trail down from your collarbone to your hip bone just to see you shudder and hear you whimper his name; you bucked your hips, and for a moment, Ben thought maybe he was just being stupid.

Maybe you were just using him, maybe you were just trying to piss someone off or to prove a point; most men who had younger partners were not with them because they actually cared, but you weren’t like most men, he had to admit. You were loyal and obedient and in tune with him; you were kind and gentle when you were with your own, you were protective and jealous and easy to wind up. Smart and funny and talented. 

“You okay with this?” He asked, settled between your legs and softly running a hand up and down your sides. 

Besides, he had to admit, it was kind of fun to watch you easily seduce other men when you had to for his sake; charming a bartender here and there when he got a little bit too drunk to handle and started a fight.

Knowing where to touch and dropping your voice enough that you could get information out of men for cases; you could get them willing and waiting for you in bed with just a few short words, and Ben always thought it was fun to watch you do it, knowing that you would always come home to him. Knowing that, like right now, he was the only one who could kiss and touch and lick at your skin until you were shivering and whimpering his name.

The dog and the spider were a better match than what most people would have thought. 

You nodded eagerly. “I’m okay. Do what you please, I have the stuff that you want. I am the thing that you need.”

You were looking deep into his eyes, making sure that he knew that you meant every single word, and fuck, if it didn’t make Ben’s head spin, instinct taking over as he bit down and sucked at the side of your neck; leaving his marks all over you as you bucked your hips and tried to pull him closer, little moans leaving your mouth as you tried to encourage him, tried to tell him not to stop as you felt his cock press against you.

You needed it so bad, needed to feel it inside you as he fucked his cum into you until you were too far gone and couldn’t pull your mind away from it for even a split second; you needed him so fucking bad, adrenaline mixed with excitement bubbling into your veins as you tilted your head back to give him better access. Begging him not to stop with those breathy little noises.

“There’s no turnin’ back,” you murmured when he pulled away. “C’mon, Ben, need you so fucking bad… need you stretching my ass out and-”

You couldn’t help it, sliding your hand between his body and yours, pawing and palming at his cock as you let out a shaky breath; so hard and so needy that the ache was only getting worse.

You needed him so bad, and you could feel his cock straining against the fabric of his trousers, and it only made your heart race and your head spin as you bucked your hips, able to feel him moan against your neck as he placed one final, more than visible, mark before pulling away and kissing you until you couldn’t think. His tongue slipping past your lips and letting him swallow your moans as you tried to rut against him. 

“I got you, pup,” he murmured, a well placed kiss to your jaw following as he sighed. 

He could spin a web and create one strong enough to hold you up so you could lie down next to him when he crouched on the edge of buildings; but you had trapped him so much that he started to wonder if you had spun your own just for him. 

Sometimes, he had to wonder, if you would have felt the same if he were someone else; if he were a singer in a jazz band, would you still have been begging for him then? 

He was penniless and destitute now, sure, but what if he was rich and famous? 

Would you have been with him for the money? 

He knew he shouldn’t have felt like he was doubting you, and he wasn’t, but something in him did wish that you didn’t want him the way you did; he didn’t want to put you at risk, didn’t want to put you in harm’s way because of him, because of The Spider, but you didn’t seem to care. You would have followed him and been with him no matter what, and you were always trying to show that to him. 

But then you called his name in a whimper so sweet, and Ben was suddenly back to reality, humming as he tilted his head and took just a second to admire how you looked; back to reality and admiring the man beneath him, the man who always came back to his shitty little town flat with everything but a wagging tail.

The man who adored him enough to stick with him no matter what, and through everything; but then he thought about earlier, and how he had nearly made a grave mistake, and he knew that he had to set things right. He had to show you that he was sorry for nearly making the same old mistake. 

He moved over, sitting with his back against the headboard and easily shrugging everything off before pulling you onto his lap; skin against skin and burning up as you panted and begged him to fuck you.

Begging him like a fan begging their favourite musician for a signature at the back doors after the curtains had gone down, begging for him like a dog after a bone until he couldn’t take it anymore and gave you what you needed; your hands on his shoulders, your ass clenching around his cock, your cock pressed against his stomach as you murmured his name quietly, whimpering out for him to move until he slowly started to thrust up into you. 

An idea came to mind, and he was quick to web your wrists together as you grinned, trying to fuck yourself on his cock as he let you rest your forearms on him, hands clasped together and against the wall as he grumbled softly, endless praises coming from the back of his throat as he bottomed out and ground his hips.

Sweat dripping down his skin, and you could smell it; it was sweeter than usual, something so sugary about it that you couldn’t help but to want a taste, wanting to sniff and lick at his underarms as you rolled your hips at the thought of it. His heart was racing, and you could smell something on him that was almost like whiskey to you; you could taste it on your tongue, the rise in his body temperature, the shift in his sweat.

It was better than any drink that you had ever had against your lips, and you needed more; so greedy as you begged him to fuck you, to make you scream his name. 

Ben couldn’t say no to such a thing, a little bit of a grin on his lips as he praised you softly, grabbing your ass until his fingertips almost bruised the soft flesh as he pounded up into you, groaning when he knew that he was hitting your prostate, milking your sweet spot as your body jerked and rutted in an attempt to keep up with him, burying your face against the side of his neck.

Every moan of his name, every whimper of “don’t stop”, every soft beg of “please don’t stop” sending shocks through his system, making him pick it up a little bit more again; the sound of skin smacking against skin, the little whimpers and howls that left your lips, it made him nearly lose his focus. Nothing would ever sound so sweet, nothing would ever match the shaky breaths that left you when you tried not to moan too loud. 

His cock bullying you as you clenched around him, the way everything seemed to just fit; your body against his, all too natural. The way you humped and rutted and rolled your hips all too fucking natural, all too good; his touch and his kiss and his praises keeping you stuck in the web you never wanted to leave. Everything with you came all too naturally, everything with you always felt like it was just right; Ben couldn’t believe he was so lucky, he knew he didn’t deserve you, he knew that you deserved better, but you kept insisting that you didn’t want better, that you only wanted him.

And fuck, by the way you so eagerly took his cock, by the way you moved and how you always chose him, he knew you didn’t want better, that you would always choose him. 

The sweet seducing sighs pulling him out of the night time in his head, the way everything felt like it was just some kind of deep rooted human nature; something about being close, something about the urge to be together and the need to express things physically.

Something about that kind of human nature that neither of you ever really understood, something about it being buried beneath arachnid and canid instincts and mannerisms too often, only able to come out when you were taking his cock and whimpering for him. Something about human nature. 

He wanted to love you, wanted to show you how much you meant to him, how much he adored his pretty perfect pup; you needed it, needed some of that tender loving care that you only wanted from him, that you only needed from him. He wanted to take you there, make you feel all those things that you wanted to, nothing could have stopped the burning desire to be with you, to chase you to the edge and push you off of it with a howl of his name.

The lights dimmed, the city outside so quiet for a change, overpowered by the slapping of skin, the grunts and the growls, the moans and the mumbles of praises; he gripped the collar, pulling you in for a kiss and letting his index finger rest against the side of your throat just to feel it vibrate when you moaned against his open mouth. Alone in the dark when you had met one another, and even with the dimmed lights and the streets outside getting darker, it still felt like the starlight had broken through tenfold. 

Desperate and needy as you licked his tongue and begged him to fuck you harder; Ben didn’t think twice, drilling up into you so hard and so fast that you couldn’t even react, just letting him use you like his own personal toy as you let out gasps of “yes”, “fuck”, “right there”.

His good pup, his perfect pup, taking his cock so well and doing so good for him; webbed up wrists colliding with his chest as you whimpered softly against his lips, brows knitted together as you grew more desperate, grew more needy. Mouth refusing to close as you pouted and softly whined, letting him swallow every noise the moment that he kissed you. 

You were his night-loving thing, happy to switch from diurnal to nocturnal at the drop of a hat if he needed you to, if he asked you to; adoring the nights like that when you could spend it being reminded of exactly why you loved him, exactly how he was the only man who could make you weak and needy without so much as meaning to.

His night loving thing that he could fuck until the dawn if he wasn’t so old that he couldn’t keep going that long anymore, no matter how much he wanted to; his night loving thing who made him weak and crumbled all the walls he had build up around himself with just a few well placed touches, a few well placed remarks and a couple of looks just for good measure. 

You were the freak he could taunt, Ben knew everything there was to know; how to make you weak and needy, how to get under your skin until you were begging and pleading with those soft whines and those quiet whimpers. He knew exactly what to do, how to make your head spin when he kissed you, how to lure you into his web for the night; a certain look, a touch in the right spot at the right time, a little physical affection in just the right place.

That extra bit of command to his voice that he usually reserved when he was acting as The Spider; a little sincere praise, holding you and pulling you a little closer at just the right time. He had seen enough films to know how to do it all, and it led him right there; with you on his lap letting his cock bully your ass, a collar on your neck with tags leading back to him, calling his name. 

There was no such thing as going too far with you, you were almost always begging for him to go harder, to get more physical with the way he manhandled you and used his webs; there was no such thing as too far, because what he considered far, you were begging for more almost immediately.

Nothing was ever too much for you, nothing was ever too physical, too rough; you were adamant about it, constantly pushing your limits, and Ben loved every moment of it. Being wrapped up in you and taking you to right where you wanted to be; hearing you call his name when you came, feeling your cum against his skin.

Fuck. 

Fucking yourself on his cock until you felt it creep up on you, pressing your body against his as you howled, almost screaming, his name; that familiar warmth on his skin as you came, those familiar little whines that only his pretty precious pup could make until he broke the webs on your wrists, and let you fall against him; his hand running up and down your back as he offered little words of reassurance. 

You were his everything, just as he was your everything, but to him, you were bigger than the stars that he watched on the cinema screen; you were brighter than the silver screen stars, bigger than them, and more brilliant than they could ever want to be. You were everything, and he had never thought that he would think that way about someone again, he never thought he would have felt like that about anyone; but you had come in, torn up his newspapers, howled at sirens, and changed his entire world for the better.

And when you smiled at him, eyes blown with lust and tongue hanging from your mouth, Ben almost couldn’t take it or hold back. He had been a permanent guest at the Heartbreak Hotel, and now you were there, pulling him out of it and driving him to the edge more than he could say; he wasn’t going to last long, and you knew it when you got that little spark in your eyes that he knew all too well.

He was in dangerous territory, trying to keep up but knowing that he couldn’t as his thrusts began to get sloppy, little puffs of hoarse breaths leaving his lips and fanning across your exposed tongue until he finally stilled completely, chest heaving and trying to fuck up into you whilst you simply carried on.

You did so well for him, you did so good for him, you were always his good boy, his good pup.

When you got your breath back, you pushed yourself up a little, sweat dripping down your skin as you grinned and tilted your head to the side, curious. “Ben?”

“Yeah?” He was already reaching over for his cigarettes. 

You stole one from him with a grin. “What’d I do to deserve that?”

『•••••••••••••••••••••✎•••••••••••••••••••••』

And there it was.

The question he couldn’t, and never wanted to, answer properly; you would know if he lied, and he hated that. He could try to hide it, but there would be no mistaking it when it came to your senses picking it up; he chose not to answer, lighting your cigarette and letting you blow the smoke into his mouth when he kissed you softly just to distract you. Or at least hope to.

“What?”

It was daytime when you and Ben went back to that creepy house where Diana Nolan had last been seen, but for whatever reason, you didn’t get the same feelings as you did last time; you sniffed around before pausing at a set of what looked like pawprints on the ground, tilting your head and closing your eyes for a moment.

It was musky and damp and almost salty, like a mix of wet fur and sweat, but you couldn’t think of anything that would match such a scent; you turned to Ben, a little distracted as he stood there smoking and looking around for anything that could be a clue, and you cleared your throat. 

You gestured to the pawprints on the ground and hummed. “I can’t pinpoint the smell.”

Ben furrowed his brows, slowly approaching as he glared at you; you had never not been able to identify a scent before, even when it had attempted to have been hidden you had always been able to get it. For you to say that you couldn’t, it worried him more than he could say; he thought about it for a moment, wondering what kind of ghoul could have possibly been responsible for such a scent.

He couldn’t pick it up, even when he squatted next to you and tried his best; he could only smell the dewy grass and the rain in the air. But not a single other scent. 

You shook your head, shrugging as you glared at him. “I don’t know… whatever it is, maybe it killed Diana.”

“What do you think it is?” He asked, refusing to look at you for fear that he would break and call the entire case off.

He couldn’t do it. He needed to pay Janet, he needed to pay his rent, he couldn’t refuse a single job, and the case of Diana Nolan would be enough to cover just about everything, plus food and everything else for a couple of weeks; maybe a little more if he could stretch it somehow.

He couldn’t risk losing out on the money, but all the time, the thought of risking you was almost too much for him to want to carry on; whatever was out there, it had hunted. It was a predator, and it had you in its sights. 

“Can you follow it?”

Ben thought about it, and it certainly seemed possible; maybe the cheating husband had decided that he couldn’t live with her leaving him and decided to commit one of the most selfish acts possible.

Maybe it was a burglary that had gone wrong, and some poor desperate fool was out there with blood on their hands; but neither of those things would come close to explaining that thing that had dragged you into the bushes. Neither of those things accounted for the strange smell that you had picked up; against his better judgement, and against his better instincts, Ben could only come up with one question.

“I can hold you tight when we go inside,” Ben deadpanned, and you bared your teeth at him. “C’mon, you’re my brave pup, you can do it.”

You nodded, waiting for him to clip the lead onto the collar before you did your best to focus on the scent; you could pick up several, from the rain in the air through to a fox that had a burrow about five minutes North, oil, smoke, coal, and… it was leading back towards the house.

You pulled against the collar, following it blindly as you grumbled under your breath and stopped at the door, looking at the chipped and peeling paint as you frowned; whatever the scent had come from, it was inside that house, and you despised the fact that it was not just something in a singular spot. 

“It’s like fucking midnight in here,” you muttered, shaking your head. “I don’t like it.”

The door creaked with a screaming protest, enough to make your ears ache as the sound pierced you; you whimpered, a sharp pain refusing to go away until you stepped into the house. It was disgusting.

Dust had settled on everything, including cobwebs, coating everything in darkness as if it was still the middle of the night; the paint on the walls was peeling and swollen from water damage, the lights were all blown out and broken. But there wasn’t a single shard of glass on the floor, and although you tugged towards the door, you knew that you couldn’t leave; Ben needed the money, he needed to eat and pay his rent, and Janet needed to do the same.

You couldn’t give up, as much as your instincts were telling you to. 

Ben hated hearing you say it, knowing that you were scared and knowing that you were right to be so; you had been through too much because of the case already, and you were trying to power through as much as you could for his sake, but he needed to get shit paid and he needed money.

He didn’t want you to be scared, though, and he distinctly remembered on film he had watched; like the detective on the screen so long ago, Ben dropped his hand, and laced his fingers with yours. The tension immediately dropped from your shoulders, and he watched you relax a little bit as you sighed and shook your head. 

“I ain’t fucking going down there,” you told him. “That’s a spider-y job, not a dog-y job.”

Creatures of all sorts, from spiders to worms to millipedes and cockroaches, were crawling around on every surface that they could; you searched every room, the musky and damp smell a little bit tainted by the smell of damp and mould and dust on every single surface, but you were certain that you had found it when you came across the basement door.

You whimpered, tugging at Ben’s hand as you nodded at the door in the floor; you grumbled under your breath, using your free hand to scratch behind your ear as you tried to muster up the courage to go down there. That feeling of being watched coming back to you as you looked at him nervously and swallowed hard. 

“You’ll be fine,” Ben told you with a shake of his head. “I’m right behind you.”

Slowly, you lowered yourself down, eyes refusing to adjust to the almost lightless room; cold stone walls trapping you as they dripped with moisture and wetted the moss clinging to any pores and grooves that they had. Ben fell from the ladder, landing on his back with a grunt as he pulled his knees to his chest and bent his arms so his hands were just below his chin. His eyes squeezed shut for a moment as he tried to come back to his senses; you waited for him, trying to pick up the scent until you were knocked off of your feet. 

You were slammed to the ground, chest smacking against the floor and forcing all the air in your lungs out through your mouth; you choked for a minute, coughing quietly until you reached for something and the light above began to flicker.

Between the harsh flashes of solid white light, you managed to crawl over to Ben, flipping him onto his side as you collapsed next to him, trying to catch your breath; he was up before you, stepping in front of you and trying to ignore the migraine in the back of his skull; something tried to get him to the left, so he shot out a web, but it only splattered against cold stone. 

“Can I let go?” You asked, your voice muffled as you looked up at him with those innocent puppy dog eyes. 

It tried to grab him, but he jerked his knee at just the right time to keep it away from you; between the flashing light and pitch darkness, Ben couldn’t see a thing, squinting as he slowly started to rely on his senses. He was quick to pull you up when he heard you move, keeping you behind him; it didn’t work, as when the grisly ghoul charged at him, you jumped, and pinned it to the ground with your teeth around its neck; you could taste something coarse and firm, like a double coat of hair, against your tongue as you cringed and bit down a little harder.

It stunk, the stench not unlike that of something that had been hidden for thousands of years and had rotted throughout all of them; you winced, feeling it thrash and smack against you; it only stopped when Ben grabbed the light fixture, twisted the bulb, and the light stayed on.

Screaming. So much fucking screaming as you turned away; you heard the snap of flesh, the wet slap of it against the stone, and when you turned back, your jaw dropped. 

Ben nodded, quick to pull you behind him as he looked at the pitiful creature on the floor; elongated fingers that turned into blunt claws, hands that were calloused and swollen into pads on the palms and covered in thick, dark, hair on the back and all the way up the arms.

A fluffy mane of black and grey melted into the skull, showing off the rounded, dog-like, nose and the sharp carnivorous teeth. Yellow eyes glaring right at you as you furrowed your brows, wondering what the fuck you were looking at; you looked at Ben, and he held his hand up as he lit a cigarette. 

“I take it you’re Diana Nolan,” Ben hummed, helping the dishevelled and blood-soaked woman up to sit as she nodded. “Ben Reilly, this is my partner, you can call him Mister Reilly.”

“We’re not-” you glared at Ben. “Not yet.”

She nodded, looking between you and Ben for a moment before she cleared her throat and shuddered. “I am so sorry… this… I don’t… I can’t control it…”

You glared at her, and slowly lowered down to sit beside her as you put your hand on her shoulder and smiled kindly; instinct took over as you offered her a cigarette and gave her your coat, keeping your hand on her shoulder until she took it in her own and sighed heavily. “You wanna tell us what happened?”

“Your sister’s paying us a lot of money to find you,” Ben pointed out. “Something happen between you and your husband, Miss Nolan?”

She nodded again, her fingertips trembling against your hand as she looked at you for a second before furrowing her brows. “You’re… you’re… you smell… almost like me.”

You shook your head. “I’m not.”

Ben took a step back, watching you carefully and letting you take the lead as he pulled out his cigarettes and lit one up. 

“Your voice…” she whispered. “I’m so sorry, it’s just… you’re like me, but you’re not one of me.”

You shook your head. “Do you want to tell us what happened?”

“Right…” she nodded, and sucked in a harsh breath. “I don’t remember when it happened… I just… I found out he had proposed to this lounge singer… you know, down on Michael Road… and I… he’s… I buried him in the gardens… and I was so scared that it’d happen again… it never happened before-”

“You attacked my partner,” Ben growled out. “He nearly-”

“I didn’t,” you growled back, shaking your head. “So, you can’t control it, Miss Nolan?”

Diana shook her head as her bottom lip began to tremble, still wet with red blood from where her teeth had changed. “I don’t know how… I just… when he said about his affair-”

“I get it,” you nodded slowly. “What do you want us to say to your sister?”

She thought for a moment, then sniffled. “Could you tell her that I’ve gone to Jackson Street? She’ll know what I mean…”

You nodded a final time, and then gestured with your head to Ben as you smiled at her. “I’ll have a word with my partner, see what we can do for you, alright?”

“Okay,” she whispered. “I’m… I’m gonna lie down…”

You were quick, taking your coat back just to fold it up and put it beneath her head before you pulled Ben aside and shook your head. “We can’t… y’know… I think we should help her.”

“After what she did?” He asked. “You want to help her?”

You nodded. “You helped me learn how to control and deal with mine when I came to you. We can still get paid, I mean, she said if we tell her sister she’s at Jackson Street-”

“Fine,” Ben grumbled, swiping a hand down his face and sighing heavily. “We’ll help her.”

“See,” you grinned. “Reluctant hero, but still a hero anyway.”

『•••••••••••••••••••••✎•••••••••••••••••••••』

Diana’s sister paid double when you told her about her going to Jackson Street, which had meant there was plenty of money leftover after it had been divided between you, Ben and Janet; Robbie had been given a new story in the process, as Janet had found out there were a bunch of supposed wolf attacks around the same area.

It was a win-win all around, and you felt good knowing that Diana had gotten a happy ending; too many people like her didn’t, too many people like her ended up dead or worse. But she was safe, and no one was going to look for her. No one was going to think that she had anything to do with her husband, as when the police found his body, they chalked it down to a wild animal; she was going to be safe, she was going to get her happy end like she deserved. 

“Touch me and I feel on fire, ain't nothin' like a love desire, ooh, I'm melting, I'm melting like hot candle wax. Sensation, oh, sensation, lovely where we're at, ooh, so let love take us through the hours. I won't be complainin', ooh, cause this is love power. ooh. Keep on, with the force, don't stop, don't stop 'til you get enough.”

The idea to go and try out the new jazz club on Moon Walk, just a few blocks from Ben’s flat, was yours, and you had decided that you would pay and hear nothing of it; but even still, as he nursed a cigarette and a whisky and felt you lean against his arm with your head on his shoulder, Ben couldn’t keep the smile from his face.

The lounge singer that they had hired was great, as she stepped forward in a red gown that had black stripes on the shoulders and the waist, large pads on her shoulders as well and her hair beautifully curled; he felt you hum along to the music, and rolled his eyes a little. It wasn’t his kind of thing, but he could live with it; even if he wasn’t overly keen on the men who looked at you every time that you got up to get a fresh pair of drinks. 

For a second, Ben thought he was getting tired, and thought about heading home, but then he felt you pull away from him, and he was quick to follow you outside; you said you just needed some air, and he was fine with that as you leaned against the wall and let him trap you in with his hand beside your head.

All thoughts of being tired left him, but the thought of going home didn’t when you pulled him close, kissing him until he could taste the liquor on your tongue and feel the heat radiating from your hands at the back of his neck before one crept up to the back of his head, lacing into his hair as he groaned and pressed you against the cool bricks. 

All thoughts of being tired had completely left his mind, and he thought about how much he hated sleeping alone, and how much he needed you there; how much he wanted you to grin and ask if he would take you home for the night.

You knew exactly what you were doing, how wild you were driving him as you let one hand slip down, pawing at his cock at you groaned softly, grinding your hips as you murmured his name with such a lustful growl that he could hardly think; he couldn’t help it, letting his hand creep round, pulling you off of the wall a little as he grabbed your ass and brought you a little closer.

Exchanged body heat making the world rock with the rhythm.

“I should call Janet,” he murmured. “She’s probably wondering where we are.”

The one thing he didn’t have to worry about was you getting worried about him, pacing and whimpering at the door until he walked through it; he hated leaving his perfect pup at home, and having you there with him, encouraging him to grab you a little harder, to get you all riled up already, it was making his world rock.

He was so glad he could call you his, despite all his worries about putting you at risk because of what he was, despite all his little doubts that he was too old; you didn’t care about any of those things, just wanting him to give you everything that he possibly could.

Shit.

He couldn’t get enough, always needing to have you close. 

You shook your head, whimpering softly as you tugged at his shirt and pouted. “Ben… it can wait. She’ll be okay. I promise. She knows I’m with you, she’s not gonna worry, and neither is Robbie. Don’t worry.”

“I’m all yours,” you murmured, and he was gone. Completely at your beck and call as he grunted under his breath and let out a shaky murmur. 

He thought about it, but then you nuzzled into the side of his neck and he couldn’t think anymore; completely lost in you as he nodded and agreed quietly, all thoughts of letting the others know where you were and what you were doing gone from his head, especially when you started to kiss his neck and tell him all those dirty little things you wanted, needed, him to do to you.

You didn’t care if someone saw, the alley was a good enough place, and fuck, if he wasn’t tempted; if he wasn’t tempted by the way you bucked your hips and tried to hump him, if he wasn’t tempted by the way you whispered his name like that. 

Fuck it. 

It was the way you were desperate enough to fuck in an alleyway, the way you were so eager that you couldn’t control yourself; the way that you were letting your instincts and your urges get the better of you. It was driving him wild, making his head spin in the best way as he tried not to break his focus; but what was he supposed to do?

Was he supposed to reject the man he adored enough to let some kind of deep rooted human nature come to the surface?

Was he supposed to make you wait when you were already so needy for him that you were begging?

Ben couldn’t do that, he didn’t want to.

You were about to drop to your knees, when he stopped you with a shake of his head and a soft tug at the collar hidden underneath your coat; your eyes got that spark, and fuck, he was weaker than he thought.

You had everything he wanted, and you were the thing that he needed as he kissed you hard before forcing himself to think quickly; he laid you down on a pile of boxes, standing between your legs for a moment as he palmed at his cock just at the sight of you trying to wriggle out of your trousers until they were around your ankles; a few good strokes, a little bit of spit, some angling, and he was easy at your puckered hole as he groaned and leaned over to kiss you.

A quick question, a quicker answer, and he was bottoming out inside you as he kept you at just the right angle for it to be easy, a little awkward of a position, but easy enough as he rutted into you.

You gasped his name against his lips, the freak he could taunt and his perfect night loving pup as you held onto his arms and tilted your head back; his mouth on one nipple, his hand on the others as he tugged and rolled them between hard strokes that made your cock jerk and your body shake as you begged him to keep going.

He felt so fucking good feeling you clench around his cock and squirm to try and get more, so eager to take him there; that deep rooted human nature sparked as the city lights drifted into the alley.

Little praises falling from his mouth as he moved onto your neck, kissing and sucking and biting as you begged for more and more, already so greedy.

His hands were on your hips, keeping you steady with a bruising grip as you tilted your head back, reaching for him as his teeth sank into the side of your neck; more bruises and bite marks across your skin. A need so bad that it couldn’t be wet to cool down or burned to turn it to ash to get rid of it. 

An insatiable burning desire that nothing could stop, needing to be free from the burning yearning as every stroke hit the loving spot in your ass that made you yelp his name before laughing softly and trying to fuck yourself on his cock; he was drilling into you, his belt clinking as it hung loosely around his trousers at his knees, huffed breaths in your ear as your eyes rolled and you tried to pull him closer despite knowing it wasn’t possible.

Every harsh thrust taking you that little bit closer to paradise, the way he held you making you warm enough to melt for him; it was like magic, so easy to come undone and tap into the more carnal, primitive, side of yourself. The urge and need to fuck and to breed taking over as you pawed at his shoulders; he couldn’t stop himself, using that little bit of super strength that hadn’t worn entirely away to lift you up, fucking up into you as he held you closer in his arms before pinning you to the wall.

You grinned, wicked and mischievous and enough to make him crumble; he had to put you down, turning you around and making you face the wall before he slammed into you again, making your ass sting a little from the force before you started to beg again. Needing to be so fucking full that you couldn’t think, that you couldn’t speak; the drive and the urge taking over as you rolled and snapped your hips, pushing back against him between every stroke and every rut.

It needed to be soothed, and Ben knew exactly how you needed it; desire that couldn’t be wasted, the truth of lust, an open door that only he had the key to as he fucked into you. Grunting your name against the shell of your ear; there was just something about you that made him want to give it to you, an ache that needed rubbing.

There was no denying it, and he didn’t want to when he was with you; you needed him, and he couldn’t leave you whilst you were growling and whimpering for more, for him to be harder, to leave bruises across your ass cheeks. He knew exactly where to touch, where to make the move, making you all needy and desperate with every hard thrust until you were reduced to nothing but noises and soft tugs at his skin to keep him close; tears in your eyes as you refused to keep it under control. Burning up for him and lost in the lust as it kept washing over you with ease. 

The feeling was all too good, the fever and rising temperature only spurring you both on as you tried to fuck yourself on his cock; the urge to fuck and to breed taking complete control, and you didn’t want it to stop until you had had enough and you were a whimpering, sobbing, mess on the floor and so spent that Ben would have no choice but to carry you home in a cradle of his webs.

Fuck, the thought of it made your head spin as you felt him tug at the collar, using it to keep you steady as he softly smacked your ass; you felt like you were on fire, the desire making you melt like hot candle wax against him, the sensation all too good that you never wanted it to end. Needed it to last forever. You could feel him hitting your prostate with almost every other stroke of his cock, bullying you with it as you allowed the choked back tears to fall; begging him to keep going, begging him to be harder and faster, so fucking greedy and needy that you were going to cry from the lust alone. 

It never felt so good before, never made you feel like your entire body was burning with a simple need; nothing beat the way that he held you, the way that he fucked you against the wall and panted against your ear. You would have been happy to die like that, so fucking close to the edge and knowing that it was a dirty place for a fuck but needing it so bad that you couldn’t help yourself. You couldn’t be blamed for that.

You had instincts and urges, and so did Ben, it was just acting on them was all; in the best fucking possible way. The way he praised you, the way he whispered all those lovely things in your ear that made you realise that every time he wanted to tell you that he loved you, it was whilst his cock was buried in your ass and bringing you to the edge. 

He froze, telling you what a good boy you were, what a good pup you were for him and for taking his cock so well, feeling it dribble down his shaft as he stilled for a moment before fucking into you for just long enough to see himself through. 

You couldn’t hold on, your eyes rolling back as you quickly grabbed your cock to aim it at the wall; your toes curled in your boots, your body shook as you froze up completely, eyes tightly shut and mouth wide open as you whimpered his name so softly.

Ben praised you, smiling a little as he webbed your hands together and put them above your head over the wall; you begged him to keep going, to make your ass leak with his cum, and he wasn’t about to say no. Partly to ride you out through it, partly because he was too far gone and knew he wasn’t going to be far behind; watching and hearing you cum for him and then begging him to keep going was enough for him to get to where you were. 

With a thud, Ben’s hand splayed on the wall beside yours, his breath hot enough to make you shudder as you grinned and tried to catch your breath.