may

His therapist told him he needed a routine. He needed structure, he needed stability. So that’s what he’s been doing, day after day. Structure.

Wake up, breakfast, work out, work. Then he’d come home, make dinner, shower, read, listen to his tape and then sleep if he could.

Today on his day off though, he realized he needed more food for the week. He made a list, grabbed his wallet, keys and headed out.

He put on his fake persona, smiled at people when needed.

He was done with almost everything, all that was left was the produce. It was the one thing he hated, he always felt like he was bad at picking the better options. Always feeling like he picked the worst ones.

Dex stood there for a second looking at the avocados wondering which ones he should get. Wondering which were ripe enough, was it the firm ones? Or were they the soft ones? No not that one. Those are too soft right? He couldn’t remember which.

Just as he was about to reach for another one someone bumped into him.

He felt irritation creeping up on him. He turned to look at the ass who touched him. Who disturbed his peace, who interrupted his thoughts. His focus.

His eyes glaring down before they reached your eyes. Eyes that were wide, eyes that were soft. Your eyebrows frowned as your mouth moved. Words he could not hear as he was focused on your face. But the words slowly came through.

“Oh my god I’m so sorry. I didn’t mean to. My friend bumped into and I tried to avoid her. I didn’t realize my ankle would give out for a moment. I’m really sorry.”

What he didn’t know while he watched you ramble on and on was how you had been eyeing him. Whispering to your friend how hot he was. He didn’t see how they nudged you closer to him, accidentally pushing you a little harder than expected that resulted in this interaction.

Even if he knew that, it wouldn’t stop the switch that flipped within him. He didn’t know what it was, god, but maybe it was the way your eyes looked up at him in worry. How they had the sweetest apologetic look to them. So doe like.

So innocent. So pure. So good. Good.

You were good. You had to be good. Could you be his good? Could you be his North Star?

You had to have been, just look at you. Look at how much you worried about him. If he ever could show empathy, well he’d hope it was as well as you.

How he watched how you made a look at your friend as they giggled and made their way far from the both of you.

“I really am sorry. I hope I didn’t hurt you or anything.”

Dex chuckled lightly, his lip lifting just slightly in a half smile.

“You’re good. Don’t worry about it, it takes a lot more to hurt me than a love tap.”

His gaze shifted between your eyes to your lips and then back up. He watched how you tried hiding your smile, but it reached your eyes. Oh how he felt like he could get lost in them.

“Oh a love tap? Is that right? That’s a good one.” You then raised a hand hesitantly but decided to push forward. Your hand touched his bicep just lightly.

Oh how he felt electricity shoot through his body. It coursed through him as if he were a live wire. Even if your skin didn’t touch his, he could feel the heat radiating off onto his body. It was intoxicating.

He watched you, how you checked for him to pull back. For him to reject you. But how could he. No. No not you. It was all he wanted now. A little taste that he now desperately craved for more.

“But you’re right. With arms like these I doubt I’d do much damage to you.”

But you have. Somewhere in his sick twisted mind you did. Just the simple fact that you touched him, looked at him, spoke to him. You peaked his interest, and he felt himself wanting more.

“Hey uh-” his eyes shifting, your eyes, your lips, your hand. Eyes, lips, hand. Eyes, lips, hand. Eyes, lips, hands. He felt his mind racing, trying to find the right words. “Would you like to go get-”

Ring-ring

He felt himself holding back, feeling a whimper almost slip through his lips when your hand retracted.

You smiled at him and pointed to his pocket, “Aren’t you gonna get that?”

“No.” His response was too quick for his liking.

Vrrrr-vrrrr

“You sure? It seems like it’s really important.”

He pulled out his phone reluctantly, he looked at the called id before giving you a fake apologetic look. If he could he would give you an irritated one. But he didn’t want to scare you away.

He turned away slightly, answering the call with professionalism.

Dex shifted again just slightly, trying to get a peak at you.

But his heart dropped, you disappeared. Slipped from his line of sight. He fought the urge to yell at his colleague.

No no no no. He just found you. He just found his star.

His eyes scanned around, but you were no where near. Now how was he going to find you? How was he going to take you out? To let you be the one that helps him be the good person he desperately wanted to be.

He felt his irritation growing. He wanted nothing more than to yell over the phone and then hang up. Better yet he’d make sure to punch the man over the phone the next time he saw him.

His body tensed slightly, feeling a presence beside him again.

But it was you. Looking down at you he watched you smirk up at him. Focused intensely on your eyes, your hands. The pen that was in your perfect carved hands.

Hands that were sculpted for him. Hands that were sculptured to mold him. Mold him into becoming a better person.

He memorized your movements, memorized the sweet scent of your perfume as you stepped closer to him. Much closer than you had before. Your shoulder almost bumping into his chest as you grabbed his arm.

His gaze burned into your skin as he watched you in silence. Phone still to his ear as he let you do whatever you wanted. Let you pull up the sleeve of his quarter zip sweater. Letting you press the pen against his skin, letting you mark him with your number. As if it belonged engraved on his skin.

He felt himself smile when you looked back up at him. You softly pulled down his sleeve before waving goodbye.

He tried looking for you after his phone call. He really did. But to his dismay you were long gone. Just as sudden as you appeared in his life you were gone. He was glad he at least had your number right?

His day was ruined when he got home. Just as it began it quickly left. As he looked down at the last two numbers smudged he began to feel himself spiral.

No. Now he wouldn’t let this ruin it. No he had ways. He’s figure it out.

And he did.

How? Well working for the fbi had its perks.

He jumped through hoops for it. But he’d do anything for you. Anything to see you again. Anything to see you smile again.

Anything. Anything to feel your warmth, to be the kind of person you were. Good.

And he knew you were good. So good, he saw it in how you kept your apartment. Clean and organized. It felt like home, it felt like it could be his home. It invited him.

It felt like it wanted him to be there.

He could still remember the first time he watched you. He watched your routine just before you left. Watched how long it took for you to shower, to get ready, eat breakfast. How you closed the curtains, walked out the door, walked to work.

He wanted to see how you lived. In your own little world, but he noticed on occasion you’d look back. How sometimes you’d be on guard.

That was enough for him. He knew he had to keep doing this. He’d walk you to work. He’d keep you save from this distance. He’d be your protector.

Even if a man looked at you wrong in the slightest. He’d take care of it. It’s a dangerous world, he can’t have his North Star hurt. He couldn’t handle that.

And after, after he’d walk you to work he’d go back. Back to your apartment, back to his safe space. Your warmth. He’d always look how warm it felt after you felt.

How your cat had gotten accustomed to him. Always rubbing up against him.

Always lingering when he’d always go through your apartment. Looking at your bookshelf to see what book you were reading this week.

Looking through your fridge to see what meals you were eating this week. Sometimes he’d match his fridge to yours, wanting to taste the same foods you were eating. As if you cooked them together.

And some days. Some days he’d feel his temptation growing. He’d go through your drawers.

There it was. Calling his name. Screaming Dex Dex Dex Dex Dex over and over. Wondering how you’d sound screaming his name.

They were the prettiest panties he’d ever seen. He could just imagine you in them. Oh all the ways he’d want to have you in them. He stashed the black pair into his pants, knowing that later he’d use them. He’d rub them against his pink pretty tip until he cums on them. Until he’s groaning your name like a mantra.

When he’s feeling bold. He’ll do it in your apartment. He grabs your pillow, presses it against his face. Smelling your sweet shampoo lingering, the smell of your delicious lotion. Just you, All of you. He’s surrounded by you while he’s fisting his cock so hard.

He shakes, feeling himself rutting against his palm. Making sure he cums against his stomach so he doesn’t dirty your pretty sheets.

That day. That day in particular, was the day he felt like you’d know. All because he left at the wrong time. He didn’t time it correctly. That and because you changed your routine.

Just two minutes after he left your apartment. You found him. If you had come any sooner you’d see him walking out of your apartment complex. But this was easier, easier to explain that he just so happened that to be outside of your complex.

“Hey.” You smiled up at him. Oh he hadn’t felt that smile directly at him in months.

But there was something in your eyes. He could see it. What was it?

He smiled back, “Hey.”

Still panicking. He tried masking it, he hoped he’d do it well. He couldn’t lose you, he couldn’t have you find out.

“You never called.”

There it was. Disappointment.

You were disappointed in him. Oh he desperately wanted to tell you the truth. That he was there, the whole time. For months, watching you, protecting you. He just had to make sure, that you’d love him. Want him, want the good man he was molding himself to be.

So he lied as best he could. Really it was half lie.

“I know. I’m sorry. When I got home the number was smudged. So I couldn’t really call even if I wanted to.”

You hummed, as if you didn’t believe him.

“Let me make it up to you. Let me take you out to dinner.”

“I’ll have to see. I might be busy this week.”

Oh he knew weren’t. But he’d let you flirt, let you think you weren’t desperate for him. He’d indulge in your antics.

“What about next week?”

“Maybe.” He could see the smile you were trying to force down. “Here, give me your phone. I’ll put it in there this time. This way you don’t lose it.”

And he does. He’ll do anything you tell him.

You want him to kill somebody? He’ll do it. You want him to fix something? So less. You want him to fuck you? Don’t need to ask him twice.

After that day he had to pretend. Pretend like he didn’t know where everything was in your apartment. Like he didn’t know your cat. A cat that wasn’t particularly warm to strangers at all.

And you’d pretend too. Pretend that that day you found him outside of your apartment complex you didn’t notice the tissue in the trash. The white substance that wasn’t there when you left. That your sheets were freshly washed, the strong fabric softener giving it away.

Pretend that your favorite pair of panties weren’t missing. Pretend that your pillows weren’t out of place by just centimeters.

That when you’d invited him in that same night, your all man hating cat was in love with him after seeing him once.

Pretend like your controller wasn’t just a few places off. Or how your room door was closed just slightly. You hadn’t left it that way.

Or how the book you were currently reading was sticking out just slightly. Not noticeable by anyone other than you.

You’d keep it a secret from him, even after a couple years of dating. You wouldn’t tell him that you knew. How you had an inkling the moment you’d found him that day.

How the scent suddenly showed up in your apartment. A hint of something.

Of him. The day of the supermarket it was there. And it lingers in your home. It lingered of him. Of musk, sandalwood and amber.

Something in you told you to be scared. The right part of you told you to run. But how could you.

You felt safe.

He made you feel safe, like home.

So you’d keep it a secret. Because you’d forgive this man, how could you not? He loved you. So so so so much. And you loved him.

How could you ever be mad at him? No not him. Not your sweet Dex.

She didn’t mean for it to be this way, but honestly, she couldn’t imagine anything better than Frank kneeling in front of her, lapping away at her cunt as she tried to cook dinner. Frank wasn’t a loud man. She’d been around him long enough to know that he preferred peace and quiet over most things. Nevertheless, it surprised her just how loud he’d get when his head was crammed between her legs, eating like a man who’d been starving for weeks. 

She struggled to focus on the task at hand – chopping vegetables for the stew she was supposed to be cooking for dinner. Her dad had specifically requested it. He had claimed that it was Frank’s favorite dish of hers, though she knew better than that. Frank’s favorite dish was her pussy, and it had been for a long time. 

Her dad didn’t know – of course he didn’t know – that she was fucking his oldest friend. They’d been the most discreet about this arrangement, sneaking around the house when her dad was away, and they never intended on getting caught. He’d probably have an aneurysm if he could see them now.  

Frank’s tongue circled her cunt again, sending a shiver down her spine. He was so damned good at this part. She knew he was detail oriented because of his job, but she hadn’t anticipated how focused he could be when he was determined to get things done. His current obsession was making her come as many times as humanly possible in the hour before her father got home from work.  

He was working on number three now, gripping the back of her wobbling knees to hold her steady. She watched the knife shakily chop another carrot, feeling a million miles away from the girl in the kitchen. Her vision swam as heat coiled in her core. The calluses on his palms scraping against her bare thighs is what did her in. Frank greedily drank her third orgasm of the afternoon, smirking into her cunt. 

He pulled away, watching her resolve crumble. She sighed, closing her eyes as waves of pleasure overtook her senses. The knife she’d been cutting with was flat against the cutting board, squished beneath her palm. He eyed the sharp blade, but didn’t say anything. He didn’t want to ruin her high. 

When she finally blinked down at him, it was with flushed cheeks. He loved that about her. She’d never been able to hide her feelings from him. He wanted to do it all over again – lift the skirt of her dress up and plunge into her again with his tongue – but she pressed her palm into his cheek and tutted. 

“Greedy,” she muttered, running her fingers through his hair. 

He leaned into her touch, squeezing her ever-wobbly legs. Yes, greedy was a good word to describe how he felt about her. He couldn’t get enough, and she was ever so generous. They were perfectly matched in that department. 

“How long do we have?” He asked, inching his fingertips up the back of her thighs. 

“Not long enough,” she replied, glancing at the clock on the wall. 

A car door slammed somewhere nearby, sending a shock through both of them. They’d lost track of time. Her dad was home and would be walking through the kitchen any second now. They glanced at each other for a single moment, wide-eyed and frantic, before moving in unison. 

Frank unfolded from his stooped position, wincing when his knees popped in protest. If they weren’t in such a hurry, she’d giggle and call him old. She cursed, running her hands through the wrinkles on her dress. 

“Dinner’s not ready yet,” she murmured, pulling her hair back into a knot at the nape of her neck. 

Frank, who was normally much more coordinated, crashed into the bar stools on the other side of the kitchen in his attempt to put some distance between the two of them, causing alarm to flit across her face. She opened her mouth to chastise him when the door swung open, revealing Frank’s oldest friend. Her father moseyed through the door carrying a briefcase, a day-old coffee mug, and the coat he’d worn out the door that morning. 

The thing about her father was that he really wasn’t a terrible guy, just busy. He’d raised his only child by himself, making sure she was taken care of and well-fed, even when his empty belly ached at the dinner table. He hadn’t a lot of money, but he had a lot of love, and he, like all great parents, made do with that until they figured it all out.  

Frank felt sick to his stomach every time he came face to face with him. He didn’t mean to fall for his best friend’s daughter either, but it didn’t seem like his choice. Their budding relationship seemed inevitable from the moment she returned from college, eager to help her dad out around the house. Frank didn’t know she would be so...agreeable. 

“Hey, old man,” her dad said, patting Frank on the back with a wide grin. He eyed his daughter, focused solely on the carrot that had surpassed sliced a while ago and was approaching pulp-ish. “Hi, honey.” 

“Hey, how was work?” She replied awkwardly, flicking her gaze from the vegetable to her dad, then to Frank and back to her dad. “I’m almost done with dinner.” 

She turned back toward the cutting board, listening to him recount a story about one of his students forgetting to cite his sources in his semester essay. It was almost Christmas. She felt like maybe the student deserved a break, but she wasn’t a college professor, so what did she know? 

“I’ll go get ready for dinner.” Her father finished his story, turning towards Frank. “D’ya want something to drink? I raised her to host better than that, y’know.” 

He shot her a pointed look, amusement clear in his eyes. She blushed. While that was true, she didn’t think Frank minded that they’d chosen to forego drinks and jump straight into oral when he’d arrived. 

“She always takes good care of me,” Frank cleared his throat, sending another shiver down her back. She threw the vegetables in the stew, choking on the gasp that had lodged itself in her throat. 

“Right.” She nodded, trying to play it cool. “I offered earlier, dad.” 

She finally let her breath loose when her father disappeared deeper into the house. Frank smirked. 

“Frank-” 

He brought his finger to his lips, reminding her to keep her voice low. 

“You’re awful! He’s going to catch on!” She whisper yelled across the kitchen. Frank was already closing the gap between them, unable to keep himself away from her. Her hips were a magnet for his hands. He had no power over it. 

“He won’t suspect a thing.” Frank smirked, wicked thoughts clear as day on his face.  “Will there be any dessert? I already know what I want.” 

She rolled her eyes, giggling. 

“Not if you can’t keep your terrible mouth shut during dinner!”  

She nudged him towards the table, turning back to her stew moments before her dad rejoined them in the kitchen, none the wiser. 

When dinner was done, she piled pots, pans, and plates into Frank’s hands at the sink. He always insisted on helping her clean the kitchen. She knew it frustrated him that her dad never offered, but those complaints were met with firm shushing from her. It wasn’t his business what her father did or didn’t do. 

“Same time next week?” She asked as she walked Frank to the front door. 

He’d been sitting with her dad in the study for an hour, joining him only after the dishes were completely washed, dried, and put away. She didn’t mind sharing him with her dad. Frank was the only person who came around anymore besides solicitors and the occasional girl scout. It made her feel less guilty for stealing all of Frank’s attention.  

“Same time as always,” Frank said, tapping her nose with a wink. “Thanks for dinner.” 

She knew what he meant. In a few hours, she’d be plundering across the lawn, bundled against the cold with a very specific destination in mind. Frank’s back door was always unlocked. She’d know her way from stoop to stoop with her eyes closed.  

Her father joined her at the window as she watched Frank mosey down the street, hands tucked in his pockets.  

“You’re nice for letting him come over early, honey. I don’t think he talks much to other people. Mrs. Cross said he spoke to her in mostly grunts at the workshop the other day.” 

“Was Mrs. Cross trying to talk her way into free repair?” She pressed, arching an eyebrow. 

Frank often vented to her about the jobs that people in town tried to get him to discount. Mrs. Cross was a steady regular for him, but she was the cheapest lady he’d ever met. Frank had worked on almost everyone’s house in town at one point or another. He was the resident-fixer-upper, and he also happened to be one of the only handsome bachelors in town. Women hired him all the time to do random things around their house when their husbands weren’t home. Frank hated it, but it paid the bills. 

“She must’ve left that part out,” her father conceded, sipping his whiskey. “Still, I think he’s a little lonely.” 

“I think he gets on just fine,” she murmured, adjusting the curtains over the window once Frank was out of sight. “Besides, don’t you think people say the same about you?” 

Her father had been a bachelor just as long as Frank, prioritizing work and raising a child over developing a relationship with someone new. Women hounded the widowed professor almost as much as they hounded Frank. Still, having a grown daughter living with him seemed to keep them off his back. Mostly. 

“Never.” He shook his head. “I have you, remember?” 

She nodded, half-smiling as he made his way down the hall to his study. He did have her, but he wouldn’t always. She’d have to grow up someday. They both would. 

When her father had finally lost his battle to whiskey and sleep, she found herself creeping into Frank’s dark house, removing her shoes by the door. He always made fun of how quiet she forced herself to be, knowing that the only person in the house was him, but it was a force of habit. She’d been quietly tiptoeing around her house for years. 

It always went something like this. Every night, she made her way up the stairs, overly familiar with his house, and inched the bedroom door open. Every night, Frank met her at the door, shirtless and oh-so-fuckable, tugging her lips against his in breathtaking swiftness. Every night, they tangled themselves in the sheets and each other, deepening their connection and furthering their affair. 

Inbetween kisses, he gasped into her mouth, “What took you so long?” 

Inhale. Kiss. Exhale. Kiss. 

“He was doing the crossword. You know Thursdays are the trickiest-oh!” 

In one sweeping motion, he’d lifted her off the ground bridal-style and chucked her on the blanketed bed, erasing any thoughts of gridded puzzles.  

“Thought you weren’t coming,” he said, hovering over her frame. 

“I’ve been here every night for months,” she replied, running a cool fingertip down his exposed bicep. “I’ll always come.” 

“Always? Promise?” 

He winked at her, barely visible in the dim light of his bedroom, but it sent another flurry of butterflies through her core. Smitten was a good word to describe her. Smitten and damned, because she didn’t care how wrong it made her feel. 

“I promise,” she said candidly. 

And she really believed she meant that. 

x 

Frank had quite the stamina for an older guy. It’d been almost an hour, edging himself closer and closer to coming every time another orgasm tumbled from her lips. She was currently on her stomach, wedged between him and the comforter. Her arms were crossed behind her back, held tightly by Frank’s large hand as he pounded into her. Hot, pleasurable tears streamed down her cheeks.  

She arched against his weight, trying to stave off another orgasm, but it spurred him further. He slammed into her with such force that an unsolicited moan forced its way from her throat. 

“Frank,” she started, swallowing thickly. 

His hand met her throat, tugging her head back even further. She groaned at the new position. He was somehow even deeper inside than he’d been before. 

“What do you need, baby?” He cooed, breathing into her ear. Goosebumps skittered down her spine in response. 

“P-Please,” she whined. 

“You’re doing so good for me, sweetie. Can you give me one more?” 

“Frank-,” she mewled into the comforter, muffling the sound. 

“Just one more, baby,” he coaxed, pressing a kiss to her hair. “You can do it.” 

She wasn’t sure she could. Frank had enticed more orgasms out of her over one evening than she’d ever had in her life. Even so, the familiar heat coiling in her core told her she’d be trembling with pleasure again soon.  

“You look so pretty like this,” he murmured, rutting into her. “Wish I could keep you in my bed forever.” 

It had taken her a while to get used to Frank’s praise. He was relentlessly flattering, and what’s worse is he meant everything he said to her. She’d spent most of her life trying to understand the people around her; hours spent deciphering the words they used when they meant something completely different. Yet, Frank’s words were always genuine, and she never doubted their truth. 

“C’mon, baby,” he whispered, kissing down the slope of her spine, “I know you want to.” 

She really, really did. Frank was an all-consuming, overwhelming force taking her exactly where she wanted to go. He squeezed her throat, eyes lighting up as a slew of curses left her lips. She was already gone, lost in a haze of pleasure reserved only for Frank. She relished in the sturdiness of his body, pressed against her in a way that made her feel whole.  

Finally, he let go of the leash he’d been holding on himself, bucking forward and holding himself deep inside of her. His delicious groan pushed her even further over the edge. A beautiful cacophony of heavy breaths and moans surrounded the two of them. 

When she finally blinked her eyes open, Frank was coaxing her back to life with gentle kisses down her spine. She relaxed into his touch, heart pounding.  

“You’re perfect, sweetheart,” he breathed, rutting into her a final time for emphasis. “I can’t believe how perfect you are for me.” 

He dropped to the bed next to her, still breathing heavily. She couldn’t wipe the goofy grin off her face. He really was the most handsome bachelor in their town. 

“Do you ever wish that I was older?” She asked, suddenly shy in front of the man that had seen her naked in a multitude of positions. 

His gaze snapped to hers. 

“What do you mean?” He asked. 

“I just mean- Like if I was older, maybe we wouldn’t have to hide it from everyone.” She said, gnawing on her bottom lip. 

“I don’t care how old you are,” he shook his head, sitting up. “I care about hurting your dad, hurting you, but I don’t care about the rest of it. I’m not hiding you because of that.” 

She nodded, understanding but still disliking it. She wasn’t sure her dad would ever come around to the idea of Frank and her together, and she was too much of a coward to tell him about it. 

“Are you thinkin’ about telling him?” Frank asked, arching an eyebrow at her. 

“No.” Shook her head. “The opposite actually. I don’t think we’ll ever be able to tell him.” 

He ran his hand along her back, soothing the anxiety before it could bubble into something worse. 

“And that makes me sad,” she murmured, eyes glossy. 

“I know it does, baby,” he said, pressing a kiss to her shoulder. “ ‘m sorry we can’t be more open about us.” 

His quiet whisper broke her heart. She’d never been this enraptured by another person. Frank was kind and didn’t make her feel weird for being herself. It was unfair that she couldn’t publicly celebrate the only person in the world who knew her. But her dad wasn’t a progressive man, to say the least, and he’d likely try to kill Frank for even looking at her in a suggestive way. 

“Do you ever think about running away?” She asked, curling against Frank’s side and relishing the warmth that radiated from his skin. 

“With you?” He sighed. “All the time.” 

“Me too,” she said, closing her eyes and imagining it. 

They could go anywhere, but she knew they’d end up near the ocean. She was hundreds of miles away from one, but they’d figure it out. 

“We could get a house on the beach,” she said, smiling. “I could take you out and not have to worry about running into anyone we know. I could show you off, like I want to do now.” 

Her heart ached at the thought of it. She knew Frank was hurting too. It was all a silly, out of reach dream that they had. The world was much smaller than they wished it to be. It didn’t matter how they felt about one another if her father wasn’t okay with them being together. 

“I’ll buy you that house on the beach one day, sweetheart,” Frank sighed again, running his fingers up and down her back, “And we’ll run away together; have a life outside of the four walls of this bedroom.” 

“You promise?” 

She looked up at him with sadness in her eyes and hope in her heart. Everything about their situation was troubling, but she couldn’t possibly end it. She loved Frank, even if it meant isolating herself from the rest of the world. 

“I promise,” he said. 

And she really believed he meant that. 

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@fxlsealarm@kiwiharrykiwi@telepathay@itwasthereaminuteago@dumb-fawkin-bitch@carolinaxvz@wistericals@lucienofthelakes@zomtart@agirlwithmanyloves@myguiltypleasures21@alexxavicry@hallecarey1@km-ffluv@lilyevans1@22carolina08@aynsleywalker@queenofthenoobs@ostricx@horrorflix@charmed-asylum@xleiaorgana@blackwidownat2814

“Shit!”  

The taxi driver waved a sorry as his cab sped past you on the asphalt. You watched as the last chance at a lift home disappeared around the corner. Huffing, you glanced around and tried to think of a better way to get home than walking 15 blocks in heels. 

Your best friend was getting married, which is how you ended up on the sidewalk outside a club in the upper east side at two in the morning. Her bachelorette had been fun, but it was entirely too late for you to be walking around New York City by yourself. 

A chuckle startled you out of your thoughts, instantly putting you on alert to a person standing behind you. Swinging around, you groped in your purse for the knife Frank had gifted you for your birthday. You halted your movements when you realized it was Frank’s amused face staring back at you. 

“What are you doing here?” You said, immediately forgetting the knife and the sense of dread that had begun creeping up your spine. You grinned, walking into his open arms with glee.  

“You didn’t think I’d let you walk home alone, did you?”  

His arms wrapped tightly around you, pulling you close to his warmth. His hands drifted across your lower back, fiddling with the texture of your dress.  

“You’re such a gentleman, Frank Castle.” You inhaled his scent, wishing you could drown yourself in it. He smelled of leather and lavender. It had quickly become your favorite scent in the world. 

Frank really was a gentleman. You were constantly surprised by the little things he’d do to make sure you were taken care of. There were always fresh flowers in your bedroom every week. You never had to worry about paying the bills at restaurants, though you still tried to win that argument every time you went out. You hadn’t even come close to touching a door handle in Frank's presence. That’s what happened when you dated older men, you supposed.  

Frank was certainly older than any man you’d dated before. Unlike the dreadful men your own age, Frank was experienced and kind. He treated you like a privilege, rather than something to obtain. You didn’t know a world like that existed until you’d run smack into Frank’s chest one night trying to hide from an obnoxious intern at the Anvil Security annual Christmas party. He’d taken your hand in his so gently that you couldn’t help but to be swept away from the rest of the world. You’d been smitten ever since. 

Frank showing up after your night out shouldn’t have been a surprise to you. He would always protect you. That was a promise he never intended to break. You felt it in the way he’d stroke your hair every night as you fell asleep on his chest. The way he’d press a gentle kiss to your temple and whisper stories about his family, who had died five years before you’d met. The way he held you tight after a nightmare. His anxieties surrounded you in a protective bubble, but you were happy to work through his worries with him whenever he was too anxious to relax. 

His appearance didn’t fix the problem you’d been stewing over moments before, though. 

“You don’t happen to have a car hidden somewhere nearby, do you?” You asked, looking up through your lashes at his handsome face.  

“I don’t,” he winced, “but I’ve been told I give pretty great piggyback rides.” 

He turned, stooping lower so you could jump onto his back. 

His strength was also something you were pleasantly surprised to learn about. He was not the typical older man you’d see walking down the street. Frank was in better shape than anyone you’d ever met. His muscles were downright droolworthy, even through the layers of clothing he wore when he did his work around Hell’s Kitchen. 

The walk back to your apartment was pleasant, and no one bothered you now that you had a beefy steed carrying you through the streets of New York. He hadn’t even broken a sweat when he set you down on your doorstep, grinning at the sleepy features that had overtaken your face. 

“It’s way past our bedtime.” You yawned, turning the key and stumbling through the doorway. Frank waited outside, watching you scramble for the light switch.  

“Frank, you don’t have to wait to be invited in every time.” You stated, dropping your purse on the table in the entryway. 

“I never want to assume,” he stated, though he quickly shut the door behind him. 

“You basically live here, anyway.” You glanced at the spot on the couch that he’d clearly been settled into while you were gone. The blanket had been folded and neatly hung across the back of the loveseat, which was your only indication that Frank had been here. If he hadn’t, it would still be the crumpled ball you’d left it in earlier. 

He nodded, smiling as you flopped into the loveseat and began clawing your heels off your sore feet.  

“I even have a key.” He observed, glancing at the door to make sure he’d locked both deadbolts. He’d shown up and installed the second one as a precaution after learning which neighborhood you lived in.  

“I don’t remember the last time you didn’t sleep here.” You pointed out, dropping your heels to the floor. He had an apartment, but you were pretty sure he hadn’t been there in months. 

He dropped onto the seat next to you, pulling your feet into his lap. His strong fingers began massaging the arches of your feet, eliciting a groan from your throat. 

“If you move in, I’ll let you do this whenever you want.” You sagged into your seat, allowing Frank to work the tight muscles with his dexterous hands.  

He chuckled, watching your eyebrows clench in both pain and relief.  

“I don’t know how I could pass that deal by.” He pinpointed the sore spot on your foot that was the cause of the pain, pulling such a filthy groan from your throat that you were pretty sure the temperature in the room rose 20 degrees. 

“You can’t make noises like that, sweet girl.” He cleared his throat, trying to refocus his thoughts. 

“Why not, Frankie?” You arched an eyebrow at him, suddenly feeling the urge to rip his clothes off. 

“You know why.” His voice was hoarse, a sure sign that you were working him up.  

His hands grazed over your calves, following the curve of your knee to the midpoint of your thigh before slowly returning to your ankle. His hands moved in a melodic pattern, slowly inching higher and higher up your legs with every pass. You watched his eyes darken as another groan slipped from your lips. 

“Sweet girl,” he warned, eyeing the fabric of your dress, which had risen so high you were probably on full display for him, “Where are your panties?” 

A wicked grin played on your face as you widened your legs for him.  

“I didn’t wear any.” You stated, watching his jaw tick.  

“Why not?” His voice was so hoarse. You couldn’t help the pounding in your core as his eyes glazed over.  

“I didn’t want to.” You shrugged, stifling a groan as his fingers grazed your inner thighs, feeling the wetness waiting for him there. His eyes were so dark they looked black as he glanced from your wet pussy to your innocent face. You blinked at him, shy at his intense stare. 

“You’re perfect.” He mumbled, running a finger through the mess he’d already made, even though he’d barely touched you. You gaped as he slowly brought the finger to his lips, tasting your desire. A carnal desire to be on top of him surged through your body, and you suddenly found yourself straddling his waist. His hands gripped the back of your thighs tightly. Whimpering, you slowly arched into him, grinding against the hardness you felt through his jeans. 

“I’m going to ruin your jeans.” You observed plainly, but you couldn’t stop even if you tried. His thick cock was barely contained in his jeans, and you were already close to coming. You couldn’t believe he was still clothed.  

“I don’t mind, sweetheart.” He grunted, fisting the fabric that had bunched at your waist.  

You groaned, grinding against him even harder. His hands guided you against him, watching as you came undone on top of him. You came so hard that you saw stars, gasping for air as heat enveloped your body. Your ears rang as you continued to grind against him, albeit a little slower as you came down from your high.  

A satisfied grin played on Frank’s face as he lifted himself from his seat, holding you tightly against his torso as he walked you toward the bed you shared every night. Your legs wrapped around his waist, and you couldn’t stop yourself from surging forward to kiss him as he carried you. 

His tongue met yours in a heated joining. The little air you had left in your lungs whooshed from your body as he laid you down on the bed, unwilling to separate himself even for a moment. When your lungs eventually barked at you, you finally broke away, gasping for air as he towered above you.  

His jeans were soaked where you’d come undone on his lap. Frank shot you a wicked grin when he saw the damage you’d done. A whine slipped from your lips when you realized he was no longer touching you. Frank, ever the gentleman, slowly pressed a kiss to your forehead before pulling the bunched fabric of your dress over your head.  

The heat in the room was not enough to stop your nipples from pebbling as he slowly removed his shirt and unbuttoned his jeans. You whimpered as his cock finally sprang free, instantly sending another wave of heat to your core.  

Frank grinned as he leaned down to plant another kiss to your forehead. He left a trail of kisses down your body, nuzzling against your breasts. His warmth washed over you, leaving you begging for more contact as he slowly worked his way down your torso, peppering kisses along the curve of your hips. He nipped at your inner thigh, eliciting a gasp from your quivering body. 

“Baby,” His hands wrapped tightly around your legs, pulling you towards the edge of the bed., “Can I taste you?” 

He asked so politely that you almost giggled. Even when you were splayed out in front of him, a feast willing and able to be eaten alive by the man in front of you, he was gently asking for consent.  

“Please, Frankie.” You mumbled, biting your bottom lip in anticipation. 

“My pleasure.” He grunted, immediately attacking your core with his tongue. Your back arched involuntarily, a groan crawling out of your throat as he swiped his tongue across your clit.  

“Oh!” You breathed, clenching your eyes shut as he licked your pussy with the ferocity of a starved man.  

Your breathy moans catapulted out of you. Pleasure overtook your being, and the only thing keeping you on Earth was the man currently feasting on your pussy. Frank ate pussy like no man you’d met before. It was his privilege to eat you out, and he took the opportunity every time it was presented to him. He was so skilled at it that you almost felt shame for how awful your sex life had been before him.  

Frank shifted, pinning your writhing body to the mattress below him. He grunted against you as you let out another filthy moan, seeing stars for the second time in less than 20 minutes. A wave of heat washed over you at the sound of his desire, sending you over the edge.  

Vision blurred, ears ringing, you came all over his bearded face. The sight of it had Frank gripping your hips so tightly they’d probably be a little bruised, but you couldn’t find it in yourself to care. Frank was the only man who could get you this worked up, and you loved it. 

“There you go baby.” He peppered kisses across your inner thighs, smearing the mess he’d made even further. “You did so good, sweet girl.” 

You gasped for air, blindly searching for his warmth as you tried to figure out which direction was up and which one was down. He eagerly met you halfway, pushing his weight onto the mattress has he hovered over your pleasure-soaked body. 

“Frank,” you gasped, still breathing hard, “Has anyone ever told you how amazing you are at eating pussy?” 

He grinned, tapping your lips with a tsk.  

“Wicked girl, you have such a filthy mouth.” 

You smiled up at him. 

“You love my mouth.” 

“Yes,” he nodded curtly, lowering himself to his elbows and allowing his warmth to wash over you. 

“Can I use my filthy mouth on you, now?” You asked, watching the carnal desire in Frank’s eyes. 

“No.” He shook his head once, chuckling at the frown that played on your face. “I love your mouth, baby, but I can’t go another second without being inside of you.” 

Understanding dawned on your face as you shifted your hips, allowing him easy access. He nudged at your entrance, searching your face for any hesitation. You surged forward, pulling him into a deep kiss as your answer, which of course was not enough for Frank. 

He pulled away, chuckling at your eagerness.  

“I need words, sweet girl.” He nuzzled his forehead against yours, patiently waiting for you to allow him the honor of ravishing you whole. 

“Frankie,” you breathed, wrapping your arms around his neck and pulling him in for another kiss. “Please, please, please, fuck me.” 

He didn’t hesitate as he slid into you, groaning at the warmth. You moaned with him, suddenly feeling the weight of his cock inside you. A growing pressure built in your core, already begging for release. 

Frank slowly began moving, sliding in and out at a torturous pace. You knew he was waiting for you to adjust to his size, but you were tired of waiting. You wrapped your legs around his waist, pulling him into you hard, eliciting a groan from deep in your chest. 

Frank huffed a laugh, cradling your head as he began pounding into you. The slickness of your pussy was enough to make him crumble. He watched pleasure overtake your features, grunting at the tightness around his cock. The bed beneath you was shaking so violently you thought it might break. You held on to Frank’s strong arms, digging your nails into the muscles cradling your face. 

“Oh, Frank.” You mumbled, breathing hard as he shifted his weight, sliding into you from a deeper angle. 

“I love you,” he grunted, pressing his forehead against yours as he pounded into you even harder. “More than anything.” 

It was enough to be your third undoing this evening. His love and adoration washed over you as you came, arching your back into his body. He watched as you clenched your eyes shut, holding on for dear life. He’d never forget the look on your face when you came around him. He’d never seen anything as beautiful as you. 

You breathed hard as you came back down to Earth, grinding your hips against Frank in an unsteady rhythm. His jaw ticked as he held himself back from ruining your high with his own. He wanted to live in that pleasure with you. He’d torture himself all night if it meant he got to see that look in your eyes. 

You pulled him in for another kiss. It was never enough. You needed Frank more and more every time you saw him. It would never be enough. You were pretty sure the feeling was mutual.  

Frank kept a steady pace of slamming into your sensitive pussy. You couldn’t help but push your weight against him, rolling him onto his back as you continued grinding on top of him. You knew Frank would draw your pleasure out for as long as he could, but you wanted to see him crumble in indulgence too.  

Frank sat up with a gratified grunt, wrapping his arms around your waist. His strong arms guided your pussy against him. A noise lodged in your throat at how sensitive you were after Frank had thoroughly wrecked you, but you kept moving, determined to see his pleasure through. 

He grinned as you writhed against him, groaning when you pushed your tongue into his mouth. One hand remained on your hip, while the other gripped your hair in a tight fist at the column of your neck. The small moan that slipped through his lips was indication enough that you were winning this fight. 

The hand gripping your hip tightened enough to extract a breathy moan from your mouth, sending him over the edge. Warm cum shot deep inside you, and you couldn’t stop smiling as Frank struggled to get a grip on his pleasure. You rested your head against his, relaxing into his strong frame as you drank in as much pleasure as you could. Frank was nothing if he was not a giver in the bedroom, but you could get drunk off the look on his face when he came. 

The room quieted, moans fading into silent breaths as you entangled yourself into him even further. His hands slowly rubbed at your hips, easing the pain he’d caused earlier with his grip. 

“I think I will move in, if that’s okay with you.” He said in an exhausted mumble. 

You straightened, leaning back to look at his tired face.  

“Of course it’s okay with me, Frankie!” You smiled, glee overtaking the sleepy peace you’d been enveloped in moments before.  

“Good. I haven’t even been to my apartment in weeks. I think I’m paying the rent for a family of mice.” He chuckled at the sorry state of his apartment. At least rent was cheap in Hell’s Kitchen. 

“I love you.” You grinned, pulling him into a kiss. 

“I love you too, sweet girl.” He grinned back. One hand held you steady as he reached toward the nightstand that held towels for this exact scenario. 

Gentleman, indeed.  

tag list:

@fxlsealarm @kiwiharrykiwi @telepathay @itwasthereaminuteago @dumb-fawkin-bitch @carolinaxvz @wistericals @lucienofthelakes @zomtart @agirlwithmanyloves @myguiltypleasures21 @alexxavicry @hallecarey1 @km-ffluv @lilyevans1 @22carolina08 @aynsleywalker @queenofthenoobs @ostricx @horrorflix @charmed-asylum @xleiaorgana @blackwidownat2814

ex!frank castle who doesn’t call anymore like he used to, but still sometimes sends short texts that feel like they weren’t meant to open conversation, just confirm you’re alive "you good?” he writes once at 2:34am, and when you don’t answer right away he doesn’t follow up, but you know he’s still awake anyway.

ex!frank castle who acts like the breakup was final in every way that matters, but still remembers you too precisely to really mean it. he notices when you change your routine even months later, like you switching coffee brands or walking a different route home, and it bothers him in a quiet, private way he never admits to anyone, so instead he just watches from the distance.

ex!frank castle who doesn’t show up at your door often, but when he does it’s never random - it’s always late, always after something has gone wrong that you don’t yet fully know about, and he never explains it properly, just stands there for a second like he’s checking if you’re real, then says something simple and rough like “you weren’t answering,” and he pretends that’s the reason he came.

ex!frank castle who doesn’t ask for you back because he thinks he doesn’t deserve to, but also doesn’t fully move on because something in him refuses to treat you like you’re gone, instead he exists in this strange in-between where he’s no longer yours but still not fully away.

ex!frank castle who you notice him once and your eyes meet across too much space and too many unsaid things, he doesn’t come closer, because he promised he wouldn’t, but he also doesn’t leave right away, because something in him can’t bear how permanent distance is when it’s real.

ex!frank castle who understands, logically, that you’re not coming back, that you shouldn’t come back, that he already made the decision that keeps you safer without him, but emotionally still fails to accept the shape of it.

ex!frank castle who keeps his distance like he promised himself he would, but his eyes give him away every time - staying on you a second too long, softer than he allows himself to be anywhere else. if he looks long enough something impossible might change, even though he already knows it won’t.

ex!frank castle who doesn’t ask if you need help anymore, he just notices when something is wrong and quietly fixes it in the background of your life, like replacing a broken lock on your door without telling you, or making sure the hallway light outside your apartment actually works again after weeks of it flickering.

ex!frank castle who keeps his distance when you’re in public but still positions himself in ways that mean he can see you, always, like standing across the street longer than necessary or sitting in the back of places you might pass through, just making sure you’re there and okay in the only way he lets himself be now.

you dragged yourself through the front door after a day that seemed determined to wring every last drop of energy out of you. your feet ached, your shoulders felt heavy, and all you wanted was the comfort of your familiar apartment and a few hours of peace.

for a moment, that was exactly what you expected to find. the distant sound of rain against the windows. the warm glow of the lamp in the corner of the living room. everything appeared normal until your eyes settled on the coffee table. immediately, your exhaustion vanished.

sitting there, perfectly centered as though it had been carefully arranged for you to notice, was a silver necklace. your pulse skipped. you hadn’t left a necklace there. you lived alone. nobody should have been inside your apartment. yet the evidence was right in front of you.

as you stepped closer, the small charm attached to the chain caught the light, and your stomach twisted when you recognized the symbol. a target. bullseye. for a long moment, you simply stood there staring. the room felt strangely still around you, as if even the air itself was waiting. outside, rain slid down the glass in slow trails, blurring the city lights into hazy streaks of gold and white.

somewhere in the distance, a siren wailed before fading into silence. your apartment suddenly felt different than it had only minutes ago because the necklace wasn’t just a gift. it was proof that he had been here. proof that while you had been working, someone else had stepped into your private space without permission.

someone who knew exactly where you lived. someone who always seemed to find a way inside no matter what you did. the realization should have terrified you. it did terrify you at least a little.

you sank onto the couch and leaned forward, elbows resting on your knees as you stared at the necklace. memories surfaced one after another, impossible to ignore. the bouquet of your favorite flowers that had appeared in your kitchen a few days ago. the chocolates left beside your coffee machine after a particularly awful day. the novels that somehow always matched the exact books you’d been planning to buy.

at first you’d convinced yourself they were coincidences. but eventually you’d been forced to accept the truth. someone was leaving them. someone was paying attention.

every gift had revealed another impossible detail about him. he listened. he remembered. he noticed things. tiny things. insignificant things. the kind of things nobody else seemed to pay attention to. every present felt like evidence that he knew you better than he should.

you knew what he was. you knew the stories. you knew the headlines and the rumors and all the reasons you should want absolutely nothing to do with him. yet every time you tried convincing yourself to hate him, your mind betrayed you.

the person who somehow knew your favorite author, your favorite chocolates, your favorite flowers. it was ridiculous. completely ridiculous. your mind knew that. your heart apparently hadn’t gotten the message. that realization settled heavily in your chest as you leaned back against the couch cushions.

you pressed a hand over your eyes and let out a frustrated laugh. what kind of person develops feelings for someone they’ve never properly known? what kind of person spends days worrying about an intruder and then catches themselves smiling whenever another gift appears? apparently, you.

the necklace continued to glimmer softly beneath the lamplight while the storm deepened outside. shadows stretched across the apartment walls, turning familiar corners into unfamiliar shapes. the rain grew heavier, tapping steadily against the windows.

you felt suspended between two worlds: the comfortable reality you’d always known and the strange one that seemed to revolve around him.

every answer you found only created more questions. why you? why the gifts? why did he keep coming back? and perhaps most troubling of all, why did part of you secretly hope he wouldn’t stop? the thought sent another wave of guilt through you. you knew you should be angry. you knew you should be frightened. maybe you should even call someone.

instead, you remained exactly where you were, staring at the necklace while your thoughts spiraled endlessly in circles. outside, the city carried on as if nothing had changed. inside, however, it felt as though something invisible had shifted, leaving you alone with a silver necklace, a stormy evening, and feelings you weren’t quite ready to face.

eventually, your thoughts became too exhausting to keep entertaining. the necklace remained on the coffee table, untouched, while you forced yourself through the motions of your evening routine. you changed into comfortable clothes, tied your hair back, and tried convincing yourself that tomorrow would somehow make more sense than today.

it didn't work. every room you entered felt haunted by unanswered questions. even as steam filled the bathroom from your shower, your mind kept drifting back to the silver necklace and the impossible feelings tangled around it. by the time you finally emerged and climbed into bed, the rain outside had intensified.

water streaked across the windows while distant thunder rolled across the city. you had just started settling beneath the blankets when a sudden knock echoed through your apartment. sharp, deliberate. coming from the window. every muscle in your body locked instantly.

another knock followed. your pulse began hammering as you slowly pushed yourself upright and stared toward the dark outline of the fire escape beyond the glass.

the moment you pulled back the curtain, your breath caught. there he was. standing on the fire escape as casually as if he belonged there. rain soaked through his clothes, dark hair plastered against his forehead while city lights reflected faintly off the metal railing behind him.

you simply stared at each other through the glass. he lifted a hand in what might have been an awkward greeting. after everything that had happened, after weeks of gifts and secrets and unanswered questions, he was standing outside your bedroom. you started shaking your head before he could even speak. absolutely not. no chance.

but then your eyes dropped lower. beneath the rainwater staining his clothes was something darker, blood. there was more of it than you initially realized, smeared across his sleeve and disappearing beneath his jacket. despite yourself, concern twisted sharply through your chest. he noticed where you were looking and gave a small, dismissive shrug. unfortunately, that did absolutely nothing to make you feel better.

against every instinct screaming at you not to, you eventually unlocked the window. dex climbed inside carefully, tracking rainwater onto your floor as he stepped into your apartment. suddenly the space felt much smaller than before.

he looked exhausted. pale beneath the dim lighting. there were bruises along his jaw and a cut near his temple. up close, the blood looked worse. "sit down," you said before you could stop yourself. the words came out sharper than intended. he obeyed surprisingly quickly, settling onto the edge of your couch while you disappeared to retrieve your first aid supplies. neither of you spoke much at first.

the apartment filled with silence and rain and the occasional rustle of medical supplies as you cleaned the wound on his side. every time he winced, your stomach tightened. every time you remembered who he actually was, you forced yourself to harden again.

"you're scared of me."

his voice cut through the silence so unexpectedly that you nearly dropped the bandages. you glanced up and found him watching you carefully. not smug. not amused. just observant. "I don't blame you," he continued quietly. "I know how this looks." a humorless laugh escaped your throat. how this looks? the understatement nearly made you angry on its own.

you continued wrapping the injury without answering. after a moment, he spoke again. softer this time. "I know you probably think I'm some monster that just showed up in your life one day." his gaze lowered briefly toward the floor. "but I've never wanted to hurt you. I never will."

your hands paused. the words lingered heavily between you. under different circumstances, maybe they would've sounded reassuring. maybe they would've meant something. but all you could think about was the fact that he'd spent days entering your apartment without permission.

probably months watching you closely enough to know your favorite flowers and books. months deciding what information you deserved to know about him. the more you thought about it, the less comforting his explanation became.

anger arrived slowly, it settled beneath your concern and your confusion until it became impossible to ignore. you finished securing the bandage and leaned back, staring at him in disbelief. "you don't get to say that like it fixes everything," you finally said. the frustration in your voice surprised you.

dex opened his mouth, but you weren't finished. days of uncertainty came spilling out all at once. "do you have any idea how insane this is? showing up in my apartment? finding out someone has been inside my home whenever they feel like it? finding out you've been lying to me this entire time?" your chest felt tight. your hands trembled slightly.

across from you, dex remained silent for once. outside, rain continued pounding against the windows while thunder echoed somewhere beyond the city skyline. neither of you looked away. the tension stretched painfully between you because for the first time since he'd entered your life, concern was no longer the strongest thing you felt, anger was. judging by the expression on his face, he knew it.

the silence that followed felt suffocating. rain continued tapping against the windows while the freshly opened first aid supplies remained scattered across the coffee table between you. dex sat motionless on the couch, one arm resting carefully at his side where you'd finished bandaging him.

for once, he didn't have a clever response ready. he simply watched you. you hated how difficult it was to read his expression. part of him looked exhausted. another part looked almost regretful. but none of that changed the knot of frustration sitting heavily in your chest. you crossed your arms tightly and turned away, needing distance even though there was barely any space between you.

after everything you'd learned tonight, after months of secrets and confusion, you didn't know what he expected from you. forgiveness? understanding? because he certainly wasn't getting either.

"one date." his voice broke through the silence so unexpectedly that you almost laughed.

you turned back toward him slowly. "what?"

"one date," he repeated. "that's all I'm asking."

for a second, you genuinely thought he was joking. the absurdity of it nearly left you speechless. here he was, bleeding on your couch after revealing himself as the criminal who'd been secretly inserting himself into your life for months, and somehow his solution was a date. the more you thought about it, the angrier you became.

"absolutely not." your answer came immediately, firm, final. dex nodded once as though he'd expected that response. but then he didn't leave. he didn't drop the subject. instead, he leaned forward slightly.

"just hear me out." you rolled your eyes so hard it almost hurt.

"no."

"one evening."

"no."

"one chance."

"still no." every answer became sharper than the last. every attempt he made only seemed to fuel your irritation further.

the conversation spiraled quickly after that. each time you refused, he found another argument. not aggressive. not demanding, because he sounded completely convinced that if he explained himself properly, you'd eventually understand.

"you don't get to decide that one nice evening magically erases months of lying."

"I'm not asking you to forget anything."

"then what are you asking?" your voice rose despite yourself. frustration had finally boiled over into genuine anger. "it sounds like you want a reward for finally telling the truth." the words hung heavily between you. dex visibly flinched. not dramatically. just enough for you to notice.

you stood abruptly and began pacing the room. your emotions felt tangled together into something impossible to separate. anger. confusion. disappointment. concern. all crashing into each other at once.

the apartment felt smaller than ever. the storm outside had intensified, casting occasional flashes of pale light across the room. finally, dex exhaled quietly and looked down at his hands. when he spoke again, his voice lacked the confidence it had carried before.

"I'm not asking you to trust me." that made you pause. "I know I haven't earned that." another silence followed. "I just." he hesitated.

"I wanted one chance where you could actually see me. not the headlines. not the rumors. not whatever version you've built in your head." his gaze lifted briefly to meet yours. "if you hate me afterward, fine. I'll leave you alone."

there was no argument attached this time. no clever remark. no attempt to push harder. for the first time, he sounded uncertain, almost nervous.

you closed your eyes briefly and rubbed your temples. this entire night felt unreal. every instinct told you this was a terrible idea. an objectively terrible idea. yet another part of you remembered the flowers. the books. the notes. the countless questions that still remained unanswered. maybe that was the problem. despite everything, you still wanted answers.

when you finally looked at him again, he was watching you carefully but saying nothing. waiting. giving you space to make the decision yourself. "one date," you muttered.

dex blinked. "what?"

you immediately regretted speaking. "one date," you repeated, louder this time. "that's it. one." a warning pointed finger followed immediately. "and if you do literally anything suspicious, anything at all, I'm leaving." for the first time all evening, something softened in his expression. not triumph. not smug satisfaction, genuine relief.

"one date," he agreed. you groaned and dropped onto the couch.

"I can't believe I'm agreeing to this." outside, thunder rolled across the city while dex tried, and failed to hide a small smile. despite every sensible decision you'd ever made in your life, you had the distinct feeling that you'd just agreed to something that was going to change everything.

the tension in the room lingered long after the argument had ended. neither of you seemed entirely sure what to do with it. the first aid supplies remained scattered across the coffee table, forgotten in the aftermath of everything that had been said. outside, rain continued to drum softly against the windows, casting rippling shadows across the apartment.

dex finally pushed himself off the couch, moving more carefully than he wanted you to notice. despite his attempts to hide it, you could tell the injuries were bothering him. your gaze followed him automatically as he adjusted his jacket and glanced toward the window.

then his eyes flickered toward the fresh bandages beneath his shirt and something softened in his expression. "thanks," he said quietly. the sincerity caught you off guard. "for patching me up." you opened your mouth, closed it again, and finally settled on a simple nod. after everything else that had happened tonight, those three words felt strangely intimate.

he turned toward the window, clearly intending to leave the same ridiculous way he'd arrived. you watched him in disbelief before finally breaking the silence. "you know I have a door, right?" the corner of his mouth lifted immediately. "normal people usually use those." his smile widened slightly as he rested one hand against the window frame.

"good thing I'm not normal." despite yourself, a short laugh escaped your throat before you could stop it. the sound surprised both of you. for a second, the heaviness in the room seemed to ease. then your eyes met again, and the atmosphere shifted completely. the amusement faded. the silence returned. except this time it felt different. heavier. warmer. charged with something neither of you seemed willing to acknowledge out loud.

the rain outside blurred the city lights into streaks of gold and white beyond the glass while thunder rumbled faintly somewhere in the distance. dex's gaze remained fixed on you, unusually steady, unusually quiet. you couldn't look away. maybe it was because tonight had changed everything.

maybe it was because after days of mystery and unanswered questions, he was finally standing here in front of you, real and human and impossible to ignore. whatever the reason, the distance between you suddenly felt much more noticeable than before.

your eyes drifted downward without permission. only for a second. only for a moment. but it was enough. when you looked back up, you immediately knew he'd noticed. the look in his eyes had changed. not dramatically, just enough to make your pulse stumble.

your stomach tightened. every rational thought in your head began screaming at once. this was ridiculous. dangerous. stupid. yet your body seemed determined to betray you anyway. without realizing it, you took a small step closer. dex didn't move immediately, but something unreadable flashed across his face. the apartment felt unbearably quiet now.

neither of you looked away. your attention flickered between his eyes and his mouth before you could stop yourself. the same thing happened to him. the realization hung heavily between you. slowly, almost cautiously, the space separating you seemed to disappear. not because either of you consciously decided to close it, but because neither of you was backing away.

the tension built until it became almost impossible to think through. your heart pounded so loudly you were convinced he could hear it. then reality finally crashed back into place. you pulled away first, taking a step backward so quickly it almost startled you. heat rushed to your face as you looked anywhere except directly at him.

"no," you said quietly. your voice sounded far less steady than you'd intended. "that's. not a good idea." for a moment, dex simply stared at you. then he lowered his gaze and gave a small nod.

"yeah." the agreement somehow made your chest tighten even more. "yeah," he repeated softly. neither of you seemed particularly convinced, but neither of you argued either. after another long silence, he stepped backward onto the fire escape and offered one final look before disappearing into the rain.

you shut the window and just stood there, staring at your own reflection in the glass like it might have answers. your heart was still racing embarrassingly fast, your face felt warm, and every time your mind replayed those last few seconds, your stomach twisted itself into knots. what had you been thinking?

one minute you were yelling at him for breaking into your apartment and lying to you for months, and the next you were standing there looking at him like you'd forgotten every reason you were supposed to be angry.

you dragged both hands down your face and let out a groan of pure frustration. nothing about this made sense. not him, not tonight, and definitely not the fact that some part of you had wanted to close that distance.

"oh my god," you muttered to the empty apartment. "what is wrong with me?"

the entire evening felt surreal from the moment you stepped outside your apartment building. the sky above the city was clear, the storm from a few nights ago long gone, leaving behind crisp autumn air that carried just enough of a chill to make you grateful for the jacket draped over your shoulders. golden streetlights illuminated the sidewalk, casting warm pools of light across the pavement while distant traffic hummed softly in the background.

you stood near the entrance of your building, smoothing your hands down your dress for what had to be the tenth time in the last five minutes. every few seconds you found yourself checking your reflection in the darkened windows beside you. then immediately feeling ridiculous for doing so.

your stomach had been tied in knots ever since you'd started getting ready. what exactly was supposed to happen tonight? were you going to spend the evening interrogating him? arguing with him? laughing with him? somehow all three felt equally possible.

you remembered yesterday evening and the kiss that almost happened. every time you thought about it, your pulse sped up all over again. the low purr of an approaching engine pulled you from your thoughts. you looked up just as a sleek black car rolled smoothly to the curb in front of the building.

for a second, you simply stared. then the driver's door opened and dex stepped out. your breath caught embarrassingly fast. he looked unfairly good, tonight he looked polished, composed, and completely at ease in a dark suit that somehow made him look even taller than usual.

when his eyes landed on you, however, something in his confident expression disappeared. he actually stopped walking for half a second. the realization sent warmth rushing into your face. "woah," he said.

"don't start," you warned immediately, though there wasn't nearly enough conviction behind the words. a grin tugged at the corner of his mouth.

"I wasn't gonna say anything."

you rolled your eyes, but the smile threatening to appear was becoming increasingly difficult to hide.

the drive to the restaurant was surprisingly easy. you'd spent the entire afternoon preparing for awkward silences and uncomfortable conversations, yet somehow neither happened. instead, the two of you slipped into conversation naturally. occasionally teasing each other. occasionally arguing over completely meaningless topics.

at one point dex claimed he had excellent taste in music, which immediately started an argument that lasted three traffic lights. by the time he pulled up in front of the restaurant, you found yourself laughing despite every intention you'd had of remaining guarded. the building itself was beautiful. elegant without being overly flashy.

warm golden light spilled through enormous windows while people drifted in and out of the entrance dressed for an evening out. suddenly your nerves returned full force. before you could overthink yourself into disaster, dex rounded the car and opened your door.

"ready?" he asked. you glanced up at the restaurant, then back at him.

"nope."

he laughed. "good. me neither."

the warmth inside wrapped around you immediately. soft music drifted through the restaurant while conversations blended together into a comfortable background murmur. candles flickered atop polished tables and crystal glasses reflected the light like tiny stars. for a moment, you felt slightly out of place.

then dex lightly rested a hand against the small of your back to guide you toward your table. the gesture was brief and respectful, gone almost immediately, but your heart still managed to stumble over itself. you hated how aware of him you were. every glance. every smile. every small thing seemed impossible to ignore.

when the hostess seated you, dex pulled out your chair before taking his own seat across from you. the soft glow of candlelight danced across the table between you, making everything feel strangely intimate.

the menus arrived, giving you something to focus on besides the fact that your date was technically a wanted criminal. you immediately buried your face in yours.

"I'm pretending this is normal," you announced.

dex replied. "I'll pretend with you."

you peeked over the edge of the menu to find him smiling. not the cocky smile you were used to. something softer. before you realized what was happening, the two of you were debating appetizers and making fun of each other's food choices like you'd been doing this for years. the tension that had haunted every previous interaction slowly began melting away. not disappearing completely.

as your food order disappeared toward the kitchen and the conversation continued flowing effortlessly across the table, you found yourself thinking something dangerous: maybe agreeing to this date hadn't been such a terrible idea after all.

the conversation came surprisingly easily once the food had been ordered. for a while, neither of you touched the more complicated subjects. you talked about small things instead. the music playing softly through the restaurant. the ridiculous prices on the menu. a couple seated nearby who had clearly been arguing before arriving and were now pretending everything was fine.

by the time the appetizers arrived, some of your nerves had finally started settling. eventually, you set your glass down and leaned back slightly. "okay."

dex immediately looked suspicious. "that tone means I'm about to be interrogated."

"correct."

"wonderful."

you pointed your fork at him. "you wanted this date. you wanted me to give you a chance. so start talking."

his eyebrows lifted. "about?"

"your life." the answer came instantly. "the actual version this time." for a moment, he looked thoughtful. not defensive. just careful.

"there's not really a glamorous story." he glanced down at the table before continuing. "I grew up moving around a lot. never stayed anywhere long enough to get attached. spent most of my life figuring things out on my own."

you listened quietly while he spoke. the confidence he normally carried seemed muted tonight. "I've made a lot of mistakes," he admitted. "more than I'd like." a humorless smile tugged at his mouth. "some of them I'm still paying for." you studied him carefully.

"that's a very vague answer."

"I know."

"are all your answers like this?"

"only the uncomfortable ones." despite yourself, you smiled. after a moment, his attention shifted back to you. "your turn."

immediately you groaned. "why do I suddenly feel like i walked into my own trap?"

"you did." he looked entirely too pleased about it. "tell me something about yourself." you thought for a second before shrugging.

"there's honestly not much to tell. I work too much. I buy too many books. I spend half my weekends convincing myself I'm going to be productive and then end up watching movies instead."

dex nodded seriously. "interesting."

"that's not interesting at all."

"it is to me." the response was so immediate and sincere that you nearly forgot what you were saying. he rested his chin against his hand while watching you. "favorite movie?"

"that's impossible."

"favorite book?"

"also impossible."

"favorite flower?"

the question made you narrow your eyes. "you already know that one."

"okay, fair." his smile returned. "favorite memory?" this time the question caught you off guard. you looked down at your plate for a moment while thinking.

"when I was younger, my family used to take road trips every summer." a small smile appeared before you could stop it. "nothing fancy. just long drives and terrible roadside diners." dex listened quietly. "don't know why I remember them so much. I just do."

he nodded thoughtfully. "sometimes the small things stick." something about the way he said it made you wonder what memories he was thinking about. before you could ask, he spoke again. "what's something you've always wanted to do?"

after a second of thinking, you admitted, "I've always wanted to travel more."

his expression brightened slightly. "where?"

"everywhere."

the conversation continued like that for the next hour. questions and answers passing back and forth across the table. some serious. some ridiculous. you learned that dex hated olives with an unreasonable amount of passion.

the more the evening continued, the easier it became to forget how strange all of this actually was. yet every so often, you'd catch yourself looking across the table and remembering who he was.

remembering everything that had happened before tonight. and every time, you found him watching you with the same patient expression, as though he knew exactly what was going through your head. as though he understood that trust wasn't something he could ask for. only something he would have to earn, one conversation at a time.

the dinner eventually started to wind down in that slow, reluctant way neither of you wanted to acknowledge. empty plates were cleared away, replaced with a small check placed neatly at the edge of the table like a quiet reminder that the night had a timeline.

for a moment, you just stared at it, pretending you hadn't noticed it arrive, while dex reached for it at the exact same time you did. his hand paused midair when he realized you were also moving. "I've got it," he said simply.

"no," you replied just as quickly, without even looking up. he raised an eyebrow.

"are we arguing about a bill right now?"

"we might be."

"on a first date?"

"especially on a first date." despite yourself, your lips twitched.

before you could even fully commit to the argument, dex had already slipped the check from the table. you watched him sign it with an ease that made you narrow your eyes.

"you did that way too fast."

"practice."

"that’s not comforting."

he stood, offering you his hand out of habit more than necessity, and you hesitated only a second before taking it. the warmth of his fingers against yours lingered longer than it should have as he guided you out of the restaurant.

the night air hit you immediately outside, cooler than the warmth inside, brushing against your skin and pulling a soft breath from your lungs. city lights stretched down the street in glowing lines, and the world felt quieter out here, like the noise of the restaurant had been left behind in another life.

dex walked beside you with his hands loosely in his pockets, glancing over at you every few seconds like he was trying not to be obvious about it and failing completely. at one point, you caught him staring and immediately pointed it out.

"what?" you asked. he didn’t even pretend to deny it. instead, he just smiled.

"nothing."

"stop looking at me like that," you said, trying and failing to sound serious.

"like what?" he tilted his head slightly.

"you know exactly what I'm talking about." you rolled your eyes as you reached the sidewalk corner and slowed without realizing it, the end of the night suddenly feeling too close, too final. the thought hit you before you could filter it.

"I don’t want tonight to end," you admitted quietly, more to the air than to him. there was a beat of silence. then dex’s voice, lighter again.

"oh?" you glanced at him. he was already looking at you. "so you liked being on a date with me."

"don’t get ahead of yourself."

"that sounded like you liking it."

"it sounded like me being polite."

"you’re terrible at lying."

"you’re insufferable."

he laughed softly, shaking his head as he stepped closer to the curb. the tension from earlier in the evening had melted into something easier now, something almost comfortable. "good," he said finally. "because I know a place."

you narrowed your eyes immediately. "that might be the most suspicious thing you could’ve said, considering everything I know about you."

"fair." he opened the car door for you anyway. "but trust me." you hesitated only a moment longer before sliding into the passenger seat, still watching him carefully as he closed the door and walked around to the driver’s side. the engine started smoothly, and the city began to move past you in streaks of light as he pulled away from the curb. you turned slightly in your seat.

"so where are we going?" dex didn’t look over. instead, he just smiled faintly, hands steady on the wheel.

"you’ll see." and that, somehow, made your heart beat just a little faster.

the drive felt quieter than the rest of the night, but not in an uncomfortable way. more like a pause in the middle of something that had been moving too fast. city lights slipped past the windows in soft streaks, painting brief flashes across dex’s face as he focused on the road.

you kept glancing out your own window, trying to guess where he was taking you, but every street looked more or less the same in the dark. the uncertainty should’ve made you uneasy. instead, it just made you more aware of him sitting beside you.

the calm way he drove. the occasional glance he stole in your direction when he thought you weren’t looking. you crossed your arms lightly, leaning back into the seat. "you realize this is how people end up in horror stories, right?" you said eventually.

"I was wondering how long it would take you to say that."

"I’m serious."

"so am I." that earned him a skeptical look from you, which he clearly enjoyed.

when the car finally slowed and pulled to a stop, you immediately leaned forward, trying to see through the windshield. the building ahead wasn’t what you expected at all. warm light spilled from tall windows, and faint music drifted out whenever the door opened. it wasn’t a restaurant this time.

it was a bar, but not the loud, chaotic kind you’d imagined. inside, you could see soft lighting, wooden tables, and a row of billiard tables near the back where a few people were casually playing. for a second, you just stared. "a bar?" you asked, turning toward him.

dex unbuckled his seatbelt casually. "yeah."

"this is your mysterious plan?"

"you said you didn’t want the night to end." he stepped out of the car anyway, already walking around to open your door. "come on."

the moment you stepped inside, the atmosphere immediately wrapped around you. it was warm, dimly lit, and comfortable in a way that didn’t feel overwhelming. there was soft laughter somewhere near the billiard tables, the occasional clack of balls breaking apart, and music low enough that it didn’t drown out conversation.

dex led you toward a quieter table near the pool area and ordered drinks without hesitation, glancing at you only once as if confirming you’d agree. you raised an eyebrow but didn’t argue. a moment later, two glasses of wine were placed in front of you.

you wrapped your fingers around the glass instinctively, feeling the warmth of the room settle into your shoulders as the earlier tension from the night slowly loosened its grip.

you followed dex over to one of the empty billiard tables, watching as he casually picked up a cue like he’d done it a thousand times before. "I’ve never played this," you admitted, slightly unsure. that made him pause just long enough to look at you properly. then, almost immediately, he smiled.

"I’ll teach you." he stepped closer without touching you, adjusting the angle of your stance with simple instructions rather than actually grabbing you, his voice lower now, more focused. "relax your grip," he said. "like this."

you tried, failing immediately. "nope," you muttered.

"you’re doing fine."

"I am absolutely not."

he laughed softly under his breath, and the sound alone made your chest feel annoyingly lighter.

the next few minutes blurred into a mix of instruction, frustration, and laughter. every time you missed a shot, dex would give you a look that was half amusement, half encouragement, like he was trying very hard not to tease you too much.

every time you actually got close, he’d lean in slightly to point out what you did right, his voice brushing just close enough to feel distracting. at one point, you finally managed to sink a ball properly, and your immediate reaction was so dramatic that dex actually laughed out loud. "see?" he said. "you’re getting it."

"don’t sound so surprised."

"I’m not surprised," he replied, still smiling. "I’m impressed." that made you pause for half a second longer than necessary before you quickly looked away and took a sip of your wine.

somewhere between the easy conversation, the soft music, and the way he kept standing just a little too close while showing you how to aim, the night stopped feeling like something uncertain and started feeling almost comfortable.

familiar in a way that didn’t make sense yet didn’t feel wrong either. for the first time, you weren’t thinking about what he was. or what he had done. or what tomorrow might complicate. you were just here, laughing softly over missed shots, watching him lean against the edge of the table with that amused expression that never seemed to leave his face when he looked at you.

despite everything, you found yourself hoping this moment didn’t end anytime soon. the rest of the night at the billiards table faded into something soft and unhurried, like time had decided to stop rushing you for once. you found yourself watching dex more than the game, noticing the small things you hadn’t allowed yourself to register before.

the way he waited instead of interrupting when you were thinking. the way he adjusted his tone when you got frustrated, like he actually cared whether you were enjoying yourself. even the teasing felt gentle, never sharp, never mean. and somewhere between the laughter and the easy conversation, a dangerous thought slipped in without permission.

maybe he wasn’t just what you’d built him up to be in your head. maybe he wasn’t only the headlines or the warnings or the version of him that broke into your life months ago. maybe, in the strange quiet of this dim bar with soft music and warm light, he was just a person you were happy to be around.

you realized you were staring only when dex tilted his head slightly, catching your gaze. instead of calling you out immediately, he just smiled first, slow and knowing, like he had already caught you and was choosing to let you stay there a second longer.

"what?" he asked lightly.

"nothing," you said too fast. he hummed, unconvinced, but didn’t push in the way you expected him to. instead, he leaned back against the pool table, watching you with that same amused expression that had become far too familiar tonight. "you’ve been doing that a lot," he said.

"doing what?"

"looking at me like you’re trying to figure me out." you rolled your eyes, but there was no real bite behind it anymore.

"maybe you’re just confusing."

"or maybe you’re overthinking it." that made you huff a laugh despite yourself, turning your attention back to the table even though your mind was very much still on him.

when you eventually left the bar, the city had shifted into a quieter version of itself. the streets were calmer now, the air cooler, carrying the faint scent of night and distant rain that never quite arrived.

dex walked you back to the car without rushing, hands in his pockets, glancing over at you every so often like he still couldn’t quite believe you were actually there. the drive back felt different than the first one.

you leaned your head slightly against the window, watching reflections of streetlights slide across the glass while faint music played low from the radio, something old and smooth that felt like it belonged in another era entirely. when you asked him to change it, he only smirked and left it exactly where it was.

"it fits the mood," he said.

by the time he stopped in front of your building, the night had fully settled around you. you both sat there for a moment longer than necessary, neither of you immediately moving. the silence wasn’t awkward anymore. it was comfortable in a way that made you nervous if you thought about it too much.

eventually, you unbuckled your seatbelt but didn’t get out right away. "today was. actually fun," you admitted quietly, almost like you didn’t trust the words. dex turned slightly in his seat to look at you properly.

"actually fun?"

you narrowed your eyes. "don’t push it."

he smiled. "I’m taking it as a win." that made you shake your head as you finally got out of the car.

inside your apartment building, the elevator ride up felt slower than usual, like neither of you were in any rush to end the night properly. when you reached your floor, you unlocked your door but hesitated just long enough to glance back at him.

"you can come in," you said before you could overthink it. dex raised an eyebrow.

"inviting me in again?"

"don’t make it weird."

he followed you inside anyway, stepping into your apartment like it was no longer unfamiliar territory. the soft glow of your living room lights wrapped around both of you, and for a moment everything felt strangely intimate in its simplicity.

you slipped off your jacket and tossed it over the chair while he leaned against the wall, watching you with that same calm attention he always had when he was trying to read your thoughts without saying a word.

somewhere in the background, you turned on music without thinking about it too much, something soft and old and warm. dex tilted his head slightly as he listened, a faint smile forming. "this is your taste?" he asked.

"don’t judge me."

"I’m not judging," he said easily. "I like it." you paused at that, glancing at him again, and he only shrugged like it meant nothing. like everything about tonight meant nothing and everything at the same time.

"you know," he added after a beat, "for someone who thinks I’m dangerous, you’re getting really comfortable letting me into your apartment." you crossed your arms, trying to ignore how warm the room suddenly felt.

"don’t get used to it."

his smile widened just slightly. "too late."

the apartment felt warmer than it should have, or maybe it was just the way everything had softened after the long night. the low glow of the lamps cast gentle shadows across the room, and frank sinatra’s voice drifted through the speakers like it belonged there, like it had always been waiting for a moment like this.

you stood a few feet apart without really acknowledging the distance, as if neither of you wanted to be the first to break whatever strange quiet had settled between you. dex was still watching you, not in the sharp, analyzing way he used to, but something slower now, something that didn’t feel like he was trying to figure you out anymore so much as just staying there.

you reached for your glass of water out of habit, but forgot to actually drink it. your fingers tightened slightly around the glass instead. "this is. weird," you said quietly, almost to yourself.

"what is?" he asked. you looked up at him then, really looked, and immediately regretted how close he suddenly felt just by standing still.

"you," you said. "tonight. all of it." dex hummed softly, like he accepted that answer without argument. he took a small step closer, not enough to trap you, just enough that the space between you stopped feeling neutral.

"you could’ve told me to leave earlier," he said.

"I know."

"but you didn’t." your throat tightened slightly at that. you hated how calm he sounded when he said things like that, like he already knew what you were going to do before you did it.

you exhaled slowly, looking away for a second like it might help you think clearly. it didn’t. the music filled the silence instead, soft and slow, wrapping around the room like something old and familiar. when you looked back at him, he was still there, still waiting, still not pushing. that somehow made it worse. or better. you weren’t sure anymore.

"I don’t know what this is," you admitted, quieter this time. dex’s expression softened.

"we don’t have to figure it out tonight." that should have scared you, it didn’t. instead, it just made everything feel even more unreal, like the world had narrowed down to just the two of you standing in a living room that didn’t quite belong to reality anymore.

for a moment, neither of you moved. the air between you felt suspended, fragile in a way that made your heartbeat louder than the music. dex’s gaze dropped briefly, then returned to yours, and whatever restraint had been holding the night together finally felt like it was loosening.

you took a small step forward without thinking, then stopped as if you’d surprised yourself. he didn’t move away. if anything, he stepped closer in response, just enough that the distance disappeared without either of you fully deciding it should. the silence that followed wasn’t empty anymore. it was full of everything you hadn’t said since the moment he first appeared in your life.

and then, very quietly, the moment shifted into something neither of you could ignore anymore. the music kept playing. the lights stayed low. and whatever came next didn’t need to be spoken out loud.

his lips finally met yours, tentative at first, like he was afraid you'd pull away. but when you didn't, when your breath hitched and your hands instinctively rose to his chest, something in him melted.

the kiss deepened slowly, no longer frustrated or rushed but soft now. tender even. dex tilted his head slightly to fit better against you, the movement careful and deliberate.

his lips were warm and a little chapped from the cold outside earlier. they moved gently over yours. one hand lifted slowly into your hair, fingers threading through gently, just holding you close as if this moment mattered more than anything else right now.

you pull back first, not gently, not slowly, but like something inside you finally snapped back into place after being pulled too far. the air between you suddenly feels too sharp, too real.

your breath catches as you take a step back, fingers curling tightly at your sides like you’re trying to hold yourself together physically. the low music keeps playing, absurdly soft, absurdly normal, like it doesn’t understand what just changed in the room. dex doesn’t move at first, only watches you, confusion flickering across his face as if he’s trying to recalibrate the moment.

“what’s wrong?” he asks quietly.

that question makes something in you fracture further.

you shake your head once, then again, like you’re trying to dislodge the entire situation from your mind. “no, no, this is. this is wrong,” you say, voice rising before you can stop it. your pacing starts without permission, a few steps away from him, then back again, like your body can’t decide whether it wants distance or answers. “I shouldn’t be doing this. I shouldn’t even be here right now with you, I shouldn’t,"

you cut yourself off with a sharp breath, hands dragging through your hair in frustration. everything feels too loud inside your own head. too tangled. too fast.

dex finally straightens, his expression shifting from confusion into something more serious. “hey, slow down. talk to me.”

“don’t tell me to slow down,” you snap immediately, turning back to him. the words come out harsher than you mean them to, but you don’t stop them. “you don’t get to stand there like this is normal. like you didn’t break into my life and rearrange everything and then just, just act like I’m supposed to be okay with it.”

his jaw tightens slightly. “that’s not what I’m doing.”

“then what are you doing?” your voice cracks on the edge of it, anger and panic mixing until you can’t tell them apart anymore. “because I don’t know anymore. I don’t know what you are, i don’t know what this is, and I don’t know why I keep letting you get closer when every part of me knows I shouldn’t.”

dex takes a step forward instinctively, but you flinch back without meaning to. that movement alone says more than anything else. the silence that follows is sharp.

his voice comes out lower now, strained at the edges. “what are you so afraid of?”

that hits something raw in you.

you laugh once, but there’s no humor in it at all. your chest rises sharply as you stare at him, eyes burning with everything you’ve been trying not to say out loud. “I’m afraid of you.”

the words land heavy in the space between you.

for a second, dex doesn’t respond but then his expression changes, not anger yet, but something hurt cutting through the confusion. “me?” he repeats, quieter now.

that only makes everything in you boil over more. “yes, you,” you say, stepping forward again now instead of away, like the fear has turned into something sharper. “you show up in my life out of nowhere, you lie, you sneak into my apartment, you leave gifts like you own parts of my life you don’t even ask for, and then you sit here and look at me like I’m the one who’s supposed to be calm about it.”

your breathing is uneven now, your hands shaking slightly as you gesture without thinking. “I don’t know what you want from me. I don’t know if you’re dangerous or just. broken or what, but I do know I can’t tell the difference anymore when I look at you.”

dex’s voice rises for the first time, sharp enough to match yours. “and you think I don’t see how you look at me?”

he exhales sharply, frustration bleeding through now. “you act like I’m the only one doing something wrong here, like you haven’t been standing right there every time I show up, like you haven’t let me stay every single time you could’ve shut the door.”

your breath catches again, anger and confusion colliding so hard it almost knocks the wind out of you.

“don’t you dare,” you say, voice shaking now for a different reason. “don’t you turn this on me.”

“I’m not turning anything on you,” he fires back immediately, stepping closer again despite everything. “I’m asking you to tell me what this actually is, because right now you’re acting like you hate me and like you-" he stops, jaw tightening as if he catches himself before saying something he shouldn’t.

the silence that follows is heavier than anything before it. you both stand there, breathing hard, too close and still somehow not close enough, the music still playing softly in the background like it doesn’t belong to this moment at all.

and neither of you has an answer anymore that feels safe. the argument doesn’t really end so much as it collapses into silence, leaving both of you standing in the middle of the room like you’ve forgotten what to do with your hands, your bodies, your breathing.

you stare at him for a second too long, then look away, then look back again like you’re trying to reset your thoughts and failing every time. your chest still feels tight, your mind moving too fast to settle on anything coherent. every thought splits into another thought before you can finish it.

did you go too far? did he? why did you let it get this close? why does part of you still want to stay in the room instead of leaving it?

dex isn’t moving either. he’s watching you, but not in the confident way he usually does. it’s different now, slower, uncertain, like he’s replaying everything you said and trying to figure out where it shifted. his jaw is slightly tense, his hands loosely at his sides, like he’s resisting the urge to reach out or say something that might make it worse.

he looks confused in a way you haven’t really seen before, not about you exactly, but about the situation between you, like he’s lost the thread of something he thought he understood. that alone makes your stomach twist again, because it means he’s not as steady as he pretends to be either.

the silence stretches, and neither of you breaks it. it’s not comfortable silence, not even close. it’s the kind that makes you hyperaware of every small sound, the faint hum of the city outside, the soft crackle of the speakers, the almost,too ,loud rhythm of your own heartbeat.

you can feel yourself overthinking in real time, spiraling through every word you said, every expression you made, every step you took closer and then away. you don’t know what the right version of you in this moment is supposed to be anymore, and that uncertainty sits heavy in your throat.

dex shifts slightly, like he might speak, then stops himself. you notice it immediately, and that makes everything worse in a way you can’t explain. because now you’re both holding back at the same time, both unsure if the next sentence fixes something or breaks it further.

you glance at him again, and he’s already looking at you. neither of you says anything. neither of you looks away fast enough. and in that suspended, awkward quiet, it becomes painfully obvious that whatever this is, neither of you knows how to step back from it cleanly anymore.

a minute after, dex walked up to you fast, shoes thudding against the floor, shoulders tense under his suit. your chest was still rising sharply from yelling, eyes blazing with hurt and anger. you didn’t get a chance to react.

in one fluid motion, he closed the distance between you, his hands shot out like lightning and gripped your arms hard enough that it almost stung and his mouth crashed into yours.

lips collided violently at first: messy teeth clashing briefly before dex adjusted just enough to deepen it. he kissed you like he wanted control.

his breath came hot and uneven through flared nostrils as his mouth opened wider. tongue pressing forward aggressively while one hand left your arm only to fist tightly in your hair near the base of your neck

you kissed him back just as fiercely, no surrender, no softness. you were angry too. your hands flew up instantly: one gripping the front of his suit, the other tangling into his hair. you pulled him closer, refusing to let him dominate this kiss completely.

lips moved desperately against each other now. saliva mixed between open mouths as breathing turned shallow and uneven, the kiss was deep, messy, hungry. not romantic or sweet but raw like two people fighting through it instead of talking.

dex made a low noise in his throat, something between a growl and groan and suddenly he bit down gently on your lower lip before reclaiming your mouth even harder than before. the kiss finally broke, both of you breathing hard, lips swollen, chests rising fast. dex’s hands were still tangled in your hair and on your dress.

“I need you.” his voice shook slightly from how much he meant it despite everything you'd just fought about minutes ago.

your breath hitched as his words sank in. i want you. before you could even fully process it, the reply tore out of your chest.

"I need you too, dex."

you barely got the words out between panting breaths, nodding fast, eyes locked on his like a promise. dex didn’t smile. didn’t say anything sweet or romantic. he just moved.

in one fluid motion, he swept you up into his arms and carried you across the room, your feet barely touching the floor before he was gently lowering you onto your bed. the mattress dipped under his weight when he followed right after.

he hovered over you for half a second, dark eyes searching yours in that quiet way where everything unspoken passed between them and then his lips crashed down on yours again: hard, hungry, desperate like kissing was breathing now and there wasn’t enough air without it.

his mouth covered yours completely; warm and demanding at once, the kiss deepening immediately with wet heat as your tongues met eagerly. no finesse this time, just pure need pouring out through touch alone

his large hand slid up slowly along your jawline careful at first before gently curling around your throat. a firm press of his palm against your skin; possessive but controlled.

It sent a shiver through you. the sensation made him groan into your mouth, a low sound vibrating between connected lips as if holding you sent sparks straight to his core.

his lips moved against yours in slow, hot sweeps: biting your lower lip lightly then soothing it with his tongue; tilting his head to change the angle for better access. each shift made the kiss feel different, new angles sparking new sensations. still resting at your throat, thumb now brushing softly over your pulse point where it thudded rapidly beneath warm skin. dex could feel how fast your heart was racing.

his hands moved first to your dress, fingers gently tugging at the hem before sliding it up slowly. dex helped lift it off completely without breaking contact for too long, just a brief separation while fabric came away and then immediately returned to kiss you again: deep and slow, mouth warm against yours. your torso was bare beneath him.

dex didn’t waste time, he trailed kisses downward from jawline to neck, then collarbone, each one softer than last until reaching chest where he paused briefly.

then both palms came down lightly at first testing pressure as they covered each breast through thin bra fabric still clinging on skin. thumbs brushed over nipples. as soft little moans escaped your lips, dex exhaled sharply through nose like those sounds physically affected him somewhere low in stomach.

dex’s hands lingered on your chest, thumbs moving in slow circles over the fabric covering you, feeling the shape beneath, testing how responsive you were to every touch. when those soft moans slipped out again, his breath hitched almost imperceptibly through his nose.

without breaking contact dex shifted lower, his mouth leaving yours and trailing down instead along your throat. warm lips pressed lightly at first, a kiss just below jaw, then another right where pulse beat steady under skin.

he kissed slowly downward: collarbone, sternum, each press of lips gentle but deliberate like he was mapping every inch with purpose.

while kissing neck and shoulders dex’s hands wandered, palms sliding off breasts to explore further, one hand gliding down side of waist where it fit perfectly against curve of body; other hand followed similar path lower reaching hip bone.

dex’s mouth stayed focused on your throat, right beneath the shell of your ear where skin was sensitive and warm. his lips pressed there again and again: soft kisses.

his hands grew bolder now, no longer just exploring but claiming and both palms squeezed firmly at your waist first, thumbs digging slightly into soft curves where body met hipbone.

then down he went, one hand sliding over each thigh in slow strokes before gripping them fully; fingers pressing into plush muscle through fabric as dex rolled his hips upward instinctively, grinding against you.

dex’s mouth moved with quiet hunger against your skin, lingering beneath your ear where the warmth of his breath mixed with each soft kiss. he pressed his lips there again, this time adding a gentle nip before dragging them slowly downward along the side of your neck.

his hands never stopped moving either: both palms smoothed over every curve they could reach, squeezing lightly at first as if memorizing shape and texture through touch alone. when dex reached waist again he gripped tighter and thumbs rubbed slow circles into soft flesh there.

simultaneously dex shifted more weight onto you now, grinding upward gradually. steady pressure that created friction between bodies already aligned so perfectly on bed

dex’s lips stayed on your skin, but now between kisses came quiet words, mumbled right against your neck, low and rough with need. "god. I need you so bad," he whispered without pulling away fully.

each breathy confession slipped out between presses of his mouth: another kiss to collarbone, then a soft bite near shoulder followed by another murmur "fuck. been thinking about this all day."

you responded instantly, moaning softly as hands tangled in his hair and when you breathed out "I need you too dex. please," it unraveled something in him.

his eyes flicked open for half a second, dark pupils blown wide with want and then he was kissing you properly again: deep and messy this time; tongues meeting hungrily like they couldn’t get enough.

dex sat up slightly to start undressing, his movements quick but not frantic, just eager. he tugged his t-shirt off first, revealing the smooth expanse of chest and stomach underneath. warm skin met cool air briefly before your hands immediately reached out.

your palms glided over him. fingers tracing collarbone, then pecs, thumbs brushing his lower abs as dex breathed in deeper.

while you explored every inch of exposed chest with gentle curiosity dex focused on removing the rest: kicking off shoes first without standing up; then unbuttoning his pants. then his attention was back on you.

he took a quiet second just looking, drinking in how beautiful you looked beneath him right now, hair slightly messy, cheeks flushed, lips kiss, swollen.

"so pretty." no teasing tone or sarcasm just pure sincerity dripping from voice the air between them felt thick with warmth, both from the quiet intimacy and the rising heat of desire.

dex’s gaze lingered on you for a few more heartbeats, completely mesmerized by how beautiful you looked beneath him: skin glowing faintly in dim light, breath coming soft and even.

then slowly, almost reverently, he leaned back down. his mouth found yours first: a slow kiss this time, deep but gentle. lips moving together like they had all night to explore each other. no rush now that clothes were gone; just two bodies close without barriers anymore.

as kissing continued one hand slid up your side again, palm warm against ribcage and then higher until fingertips brushed gently over your breast.

while other hand traveled downward along stomach, pausing briefly at navel before continuing lower still toward hip bone.

dex’s touch was feather, light at first, just a whisper of fingertips tracing the soft inner skin of your thigh, moving upward with agonizing slowness. every nerve there tingled in anticipation, and when his breath hitched slightly against your lips mid, kiss, a tiny sound you felt more than heard, it sent a shiver through both of you.

each new spot kissed made dex exhale softly through nose again like he couldn’t believe how good this felt.

dex’s mouth lingered on your breast for a few breathless seconds, lips warm, tongue flicking gently over sensitive skin, before the quiet moment shifted into something deeper.

there was no sudden roughness, but desire had built to a peak where waiting wasn’t an option anymore. dex lifted himself slightly above you again, eyes dark with need as they met yours, searching once more without words: this okay?

when you nodded or kissed him back, or maybe just arched up toward him in silent answer, that was all he needed.

slowly at first, carefully. dex aligned himself between your legs and pressed closer. there was brief hesitation only because this mattered so much. not rushing anything despite how badly both of them wanted it.

the moment dex pushed inside, you felt a deep stretch, slow and full, filling every space inside you in the most overwhelming way. it wasn’t painful or uncomfortable at all. just intense, like being completely claimed by warmth and presence.

your breath caught softly in your throat as you adjusted to the feeling: so much sensation all at once. not just physical but emotional too, this closeness, this intimacy after everything leading up to now.

pure, steady waves of good flooding through your core with each slight movement dex made instinctively, tiny shifts of hips adjusting deeper into you both finding rhythm together naturally.

you exhaled shakily, a quiet sigh laced with contentment and without thinking you wrapped your arms around his back tightly, pulling him closer still.

his hips rocked gently forward, then back, creating a soft, steady rhythm that filled the quiet room with nothing but shared breath and rustling sheets. each outward glide was smooth almost lazy in its calmness but when he pushed inward again, warmth spread deeper through your body like sunlight breaking through clouds.

each time dex sank into you fully his stomach brushed against hers lightly; skin-to-skin contact adding another layer of intimacy that made everything feel even more real.

and slowly gradually, the pace increased just slightly: still controlled but gaining subtle momentum now as bodies adjusted naturally together.

the soft moans spilling from your lips, quiet, breathy sounds full of pleasure, seemed to unravel something in dex. each one made his chest tighten and his movements grow slightly bolder.

between thrusts that were now deeper and more confident, dex leaned down just enough to whisper against your ear, voice low, rough with emotion and arousal:

"you like how I fuck you baby?" then without waiting too long, another quiet murmur came: "fuck. you feel so good. so tight."

each word came out ragged between breaths; not spoken smoothly but stammered almost like thoughts tumbling directly into speech because they wouldn’t stay inside anymore.

the gentle rhythm dex started with quickly gave way to something more urgent, more aggressive in the best way.

his hips began moving faster, deeper, each thrust gaining strength and purpose as pleasure built inside him. there was no harshness or roughness about it. but a raw, primal energy took over: his body responding instinctively to how good this felt.

grunts slipped from his lips now, short exhales through clenched teeth every time he pushed forward, low sounds of effort and enjoyment tangled together. each one came out rougher than before like they were being pulled straight from his chest.

"dex!" every moan that escaped you seemed to fuel him further, making dex bolder without realizing it. he leaned over slightly again, bracing one arm beside you head while other hand gripped hip tightly, not hard enough to hurt but firm enough for stability during these stronger movements.

he kissed down your jawline suddenly between grunts, biting gently at collarbone. the gentle rhythm dex started with quickly gave way to something more urgent, more aggressive in the best way.

his hips began moving faster, deeper, each thrust gaining strength and purpose as pleasure built inside him. there was no harshness or roughness about it. but a raw, primal energy took over: his body responding instinctively to how good this felt.

you felt the shift when dex’s hand slid down, warm palm gliding over stomach, then lower, until his fingers found you.

the second his thumb brushed against your clit in slow circles, a spark shot through you. it was gentle at first, testing, but so electric that your breath hitched instantly.

then he kept going, firm pressure building with each rotation, and the pleasure started rising fast. every nerve there lit up; body tensing slightly not from discomfort but anticipation.

your moans came louder now, unfiltered and honest, as hips lifted toward his touch without thinking. you wanted more friction, more of that perfect circle. and dex gave it to you: thumb moving faster now while thrusts continued deep inside.

each stroke of dex’s thumb on your clit grew more intense, faster, firmer, and the coil inside you tightened with every second. it wasn’t a slow build anymore; it was rapid, overwhelming.

your body tensed in waves, muscles along stomach and thighs coiling like springs about to snap. breath came in short gasps now. moans spilling out one after another: loud, desperate little sounds you couldn’t control.

without realizing it at first, your fingers curled into his back, nails digging lightly through skin as pleasure surged higher and higher. not enough to hurt but strong pressure from instinctive need for something solid to hold onto.

"dex, fuck-"

you scratched down slightly, just once or twice, as if trying to anchor yourself while everything else blurred around edges. the knot low in belly pulled tighter. the knot finally snapped.

a sudden, amazing wave of pleasure crashed through you, intense and all, consuming. your entire body locked up for a split second: back arching off the bed, thighs squeezing around dex’s hips on instinct.

warmth flooded every nerve; pulse throbbed between legs as climax hit hard, wave after wave rolling through you in quick succession. moans turned into breathless cries now, unfiltered, loud without meaning to be, but pure ecstasy pouring out from deep inside.

through it all dex stayed right there with you. his hand never stopped moving at first, thumb still gently circling even as orgasm crashed over you, but his voice came low and encouraging against you ear.

"that's it baby. so good, let go."

he whispered soft praises while he watched you come undone beneath him.

as the last pulses of your orgasm faded, body still humming with aftershocks, you melted completely into the mattress, breathing heavily, skin flushed and sensitive everywhere. dex slowed his thumb, easing up from your clit as he felt you come down. he pressed soft kisses along your jawline now: tender. affectionate.

you could feel dex’s rhythm shift, more urgent now, more needy, as he kept going without pause. your body was still buzzing from your own orgasm, oversensitive. just intensely aware of every movement.

his hips drove forward with steady force: deeper each time, faster, chasing that peak only he could reach now. you stayed beneath him, soft and pliant after coming so hard, letting him take what he needed while warmth spread between you both.

each thrust made his stomach press into yours slightly; skin on skin slick with shared heat.

dex’s breath came out in short bursts through nose, sharp little exhales that told you how close he was getting. one arm braced beside your head while other hand gripped sheet tightly. the final push hit dex like a wave, unavoidable and overwhelming.

his body tensed completely: shoulders locking, stomach going rigid, thighs tightening around yours where he knelt over you. for one suspended second everything stopped, breathing froze.

"fuck"

"dex, too much, too much-"

a low groan tore from his chest, deep and guttural, almost pained in its intensity, but pure pleasure underneath. hips jerked forward instinctively as orgasm ripped through him. heat flooded inside you instantly; warmth spreading deep within as dex came hard, pulse after pulse, completely lost in sensation with no control left.

he didn’t make loud noises. just that single long groan vibrating against your neck while his forehead dropped onto shoulder weakly. entire weight slumped slightly over you now, crushing you heavy with release.

the room was completely dark, lit only by the faint orange glow slipping through the curtains from the street outside. the fight felt far away now, though the tension still lingered in the quiet spaces between breaths. you were lying on your side, facing dex, your head resting against the pillow as you watched him.

his face was softer than it had been few minutes ago, stripped of all the sharp edges he'd carried during the argument. outside, the night was cold enough to make the window glass fog slightly, and every now and then the wind brushed against the building with a low whistle.

beneath the blankets, his hand found yours without looking, his fingers weaving through yours as naturally as breathing. the silence wasn't uncomfortable anymore. it was the kind that came after everything important had already been said. dex's thumb moved slowly over your knuckles, absentminded and warm.

when you looked into his eyes, you found him already staring at you. there was something vulnerable there, something he rarely let anyone see. "what?" you whispered, a small smile tugging at your lips.

he shook his head and moved closer, his forehead bumping lightly against yours. "nothing," he murmured. "just looking at you." after everything, those simple words settled deeper in your chest.

you shifted closer until there was barely any space left between you. the blankets tangled around your legs, trapping the warmth you shared. dex wrapped an arm around your waist and pulled you against him with quiet insistence, like he needed the reassurance that you were really there.

his chin rested on top of your head for a moment before he tilted it down to press a lingering kiss against your hair. the fight had been loud, messy, and exhausting, full of things neither of you had meant the way they sounded. but now, with his heartbeat steady beneath your ear, it felt impossible to remember why either of you had been angry in the first place.

"I hate fighting with you," he said eventually, his voice rough from disuse. you let out a quiet laugh. he groaned immediately, burying his face into your neck.

the sound that escaped you this time was warmer, softer. when he looked back up, there was a reluctant grin on his face, and you reached out to brush a loose strand of hair from his forehead. the gesture made him pause. for a second he simply leaned into your touch, eyes half-lidded, looking more peaceful than you'd seen him in days.

the room grew quieter as the hours slipped by. outside, the cold night stretched endlessly beneath a dark sky, but under the blankets everything felt sheltered and distant from the rest of the world. dex's arm tightened around you as sleep slowly pulled at both of you.

you glanced up one last time and found him watching you again, stubbornly refusing to close his eyes first. "go to sleep," you whispered.

"you first," he whispered back. neither of you moved. eventually you felt his laugh rumble softly through his chest, and when you settled closer against him, he pressed another kiss to your forehead and held you there, as if letting go wasn't even an option anymore.

“please,” he begs over the phone, “i’ll be good i swear. i’ll stop fighting just let me come home.”

from his tone you could tell he was just done crying and it just sounded pathetically beautiful.

“this is not your home. this is my house.” you coo as you stir your dinner. “stop calling me dex.”

you hang up without listening to the rest of his pleading. though less than 10 minutes later, he’s at your front door, begging again.

“baby,” eyes red and puffy, “i need you, i can’t breathe without you. please, please, don’t cut me off again, just—” he breathes as he ghosts his arm by your shoulders like he’s asking for permission. “can i please stay?”

you sigh and let him inside the house. he silently walks in, muttering a quiet thank you as he passes you. as soon as you close door and turn, dex is already on his knees.

“what the hell are you doing dex?”

dropping to his knees, his hands caress the backs of your thighs, dropping his head and burying it between them. gripping you tightly like he could bare letting go. “please take me back. nothing is good without you and it’s making me fucking sick, please,” practically blubbering at this point.

he was so strong and his biceps wrapped around you effortlessly. you could feel the strength just radiating off of him always, like an ever glowing essence.

you sigh, hand touching the nape of his neck and travelling up through his hair while he hums in contentment, “please stand up.”

the sound that he makes was teetering the line of desperation and relief. his lips press against the plush of your thigh while his hands rise to cup your ass. with your hand still buried in his hair, you pull him up with a slight tug, trying to get him to stand. though he keeps slowly rising, kissing up your side and dancing over your stomach, the fabric rising with every movement. a soft gasp escapes your lips and his touch slides up your spine, a shiver running through you. he stops just by your neck when you tug his hair harder and he hisses your name though one would argue it was a moan. you shove him gently and tell him to sit down, though you knew he could’ve stopped you.

you tend to his wounds and wipe his face and he watches you the whole time with puppy eyes. you share your dinner with him but you don’t touch again then, he only steals glances between bites.

within the span of an hour he’s inching closer to you on the couch and he’s watching you when he thinks you’re not looking. no one really cares about the news playing on the television as it repeats something about the AVTF.

his heavy hand rests just under your chest as he pulls you in and buries his nose in your hair, taking a long deep breath in. memorizing your scent like it gave him life.

by the end of night dex is situated between your legs, groaning like it hurts to part from you. he whispers soft thank you’s like he’s grateful for this meal you’ve provided. pushing your legs up higher over his head while you pant and squirm. but dex takes more control then, ignoring your pleas to slow down and dragging you closer to his mouth. maw slack and relentless as he laps and teases. his strong arms wrap and hook around your thighs. tongue teasing the sensitive bud for what felt like eternity. you’ll push his head away to no avail, weakly spent as you attempt it.

“dex, enough. i can’t,” you pant, voice bordering on barely concealed exhaustion and blissful satisfaction.

he shakes his head against you and that only makes you gasp again, throwing your head back.

“not until you promise hmm?” he says between his drunken moans, “you can’t leave me.”

crying out from overstimulating pleasure you nod, “okay, fuck— i won’t. you can stay.”

looking up at you through his hooded eyes, he smiles with them before kissing your inner thigh. he leaves gentle kisses to let you cool off, letting the feeling subside for barely a minute before diving right back into his ministrations. he lets you squeeze yours legs around his head and writhe as you say his name.

“now really try to suffocate me with these,” he says as he squeezes your thighs harder around his neck, turning his head to bite the plush of your thighs.

you know you’ll let him in again. you’ll always let him come back. maybe one day you’ll tell him how you follow him too.

The hallway is narrow and familiar, and you’ve walked it a thousand times, but tonight it feels like a corridor in someone else’s life. You keep the gun up, not waving it around, not shaking, just steady, and you listen with everything you’ve got. There’s no heavy breathing, no footsteps scuffing. That’s what makes your stomach tighten, because a drunk would stumble, a thief would rush, and a normal person would knock at your door.

The living room opens up around you, a patchwork of darker shadows where your furniture sits. The window by the fire escape is cracked open by a few inches, the curtain pushed aside like a hand slid it back and held it there. The air coming in is colder than the air in your apartment, and it carries the faint scent of city grime and rain. You take one more step in, muzzle tracking toward the window, and then you see him in the corner where the light from the street doesn’t quite reach.

He’s standing with his back close to the wall, like he chose a spot that gives him the whole room and keeps him out of the line of sight from anyone walking past outside. He’s dressed dark, of course, and he’s not moving like he’s trying to spook you. He’s still in that unsettling way that makes it feel like the apartment belongs to him now, like he’s been there longer than you have and he’s just waiting for you to catch up.

“Step into the light,” you say, and your voice comes out flat, the way it does when you’re forcing yourself not to feel something first.

He exhales, slow, and the sound is quiet but familiar enough to pull at something inside your chest. Then he shifts, and you get a glimpse of his face as he moves just enough that the streetlight catches the curve of his cheek and the pale line of his mouth. The light shows the tension in his jaw before it fades again as he settles back into shadow.

A pause, and then a voice from the darkest part of your living room, low and steady like he’s been standing there listening to you breathe. “You still sleep with it that close.”

Your grip tightens before you can help it. Your aim doesn’t wobble, but everything in you goes hot and cold at the same time, because you know that voice, you know the cadence, you know the way he makes the simplest sentence sound like he’s filing it into place. You take another step forward without meaning to, then stop yourself before you get too close. “What are you doing in my apartment, Dex?”

He says your name, and he says it like he’s allowed to, like he hasn’t earned the right to have it in his mouth. It hits you anyway, because your body is stupid and memory is worse, and there’s something about hearing him say it that makes your grip tighten on the gun until your knuckles ache. “I needed to see you,” he says.

“That’s not an answer.”

His shoulders lift a fraction, not quite a shrug. “It’s the only one I have.”

You keep the muzzle steady, aimed center mass, the way you were taught, the way you taught yourself when no one else was around to correct your stance. “How did you get in?”

He glances at the window. “You already know.”

“I want to hear you say it,” you tell him.

He shifts again, and this time he steps out far enough that you can actually see him. The light catches more of him now: the shape of his shoulders under the jacket, the tired set to his eyes, the faint shadow of bruising that’s either healing or never fully fades when a body’s been through too much. He looks leaner than you remember, like prison carved away whatever softness he had left, and he looks too controlled for someone who just climbed up to your window in the middle of the night.

“I came up the fire escape,” he says, and then his eyes flick down for a second, to the gun, and back to your face. “You didn’t change the latch.”

Your pulse jumps, not because he’s wrong, but because you hate that he knows. You hate that he’s cataloging details like he’s always done, like he can’t help it, like your life is a pattern and he’s already traced the lines. “You could’ve knocked,” you say.

He gives you a look that’s almost dry, almost amused, and it doesn’t belong on his face after everything. “Would you have opened the door?”

You don’t answer that, because the truth is complicated and ugly and it doesn’t deserve to be spoken out loud with a gun between you. “What happened?” you ask instead, because something had to have pushed him here. “Did someone follow you? Is this some kind of—” You cut yourself off before you say trap, because saying it gives it more shape than you want to hold in your head.

He shakes his head. “No one followed me.”

“Then why are you here?” you repeat, and you keep your voice sharp enough to cut. “Why now?”

His mouth opens like he’s going to say something, then closes again. For a second he looks almost… careful, like he’s choosing words in the same way someone chooses where to step on thin ice.

“I got out,” he says finally, and his voice stays quiet, but there’s a roughness under it that wasn’t there before. “And the first night I was out, I didn’t come here. I didn’t come anywhere near you. I went somewhere else and I sat there until morning, because I told myself if I made it through one night, I could make it through the next.”

You don’t let yourself soften at the sound of him trying. You keep the gun up, because you remember the things he’s done and you remember how quickly trying can turn into something else when it’s Dex Poindexter doing it.

“How many nights did you make it through?” you ask.

His gaze holds yours, steady as the muzzle pointed at him. “Not enough.”

Your breath comes out harsh. “So you decided to break into my apartment.”

He doesn’t flinch. “I decided to see you.”

“You don’t get to decide things for me anymore.”

His expression shifts at that, something tightening behind his eyes like he’s swallowing down a reaction. “I’m not asking for permission,” he says, and then he adds, almost softer, “I’m here. That’s all.”

“That’s not all,” you snap, and the gun wavers a fraction before you force it steady again. “You don’t show up like this and pretend it’s nothing. You don’t get to stand in my living room like you didn’t—”

The words knot in your throat and refuse to come out, and Dex watches you with that awful focus that makes you feel seen in a way you never asked for.

He takes one step closer.

“Stop,” you say immediately.

He stops, but the fact that he moved at all sends heat crawling under your skin. He’s closer now, close enough that you can see the faint scar on his cheek you don’t remember from before, close enough that you can see how his pupils look too wide in the low light. His hands hang at his sides, relaxed but not casual, and he keeps them visible like he knows you’ll put a bullet in him if you have to.

“You’re shaking,” he says.

“I’m not,” you lie, and it’s stupid because he’s right. The tremor is small, but it’s there.

His mouth twitches. “You used to shake when you were angry.”

“Don’t,” you warn him.

He doesn’t stop, because Dex has never been good at stopping once he’s latched onto a thread. “And you used to hate it when I noticed,” he continues, and his voice is almost gentle now, like he’s trying to smooth something over with tone alone. “But you always let me.”

“I don’t let you do anything,” you say, and you lift the gun a fraction higher, aiming for his head this time because you want him to understand you mean it. “Take one more step and I’ll put you down.”

He looks at the gun, then back at you, and then he does the most infuriating thing he could do: he steps forward anyway, slow and deliberate, like he’s approaching an altar instead of a weapon. You don’t move, because you refuse to give ground in your own home, and the next second the barrel meets his forehead with a soft, undeniable bump.

He doesn’t jerk away, he doesn’t blink fast, he just leans in until the pressure is firm, and you feel it through the gun, through your arm,, straight into your chest. “There,” he says, voice low. “That’s better.”

Your stomach flips, half disgust and half something you don’t want to name. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

He breathes out through his nose, and you can feel it in the space between you. “A lot.”

“Back up,” you order, but he doesn’t move an inch. Your grip tightens again. “Dex.”

His eyes stay on yours, and there’s something in them that’s so naked it makes your throat go tight. It’s not a plea, not exactly, and it’s not a threat. It’s need in its purest form, stripped of all the lies he usually wraps around it.

You hold the gun steady even though your arm is starting to ache, and you hate that he can stand there with the barrel pressed into his skin like it’s a point of contact instead of a warning. He stays close enough that you can see the faint sheen of sweat at his hairline, close enough that you can feel his breath when he exhales, and he doesn’t do the decent thing and back away.

“On your knees,” you say, and you make your voice mean it.

For a beat he doesn’t move, not because he’s refusing, but because he’s watching you like he’s memorizing the exact set of your mouth, the angle of your wrist, the way you’re not stepping back. Then he nods once, slow, and he lowers himself like he’s trying not to startle a wild animal. His knees touch the floor with a quiet sound that makes your stomach twist, because the sight of him down there is wrong in a way that feels too right, and his hands lift up beside his head with his palms open.

“Like this?” he asks, and the question comes out calm, almost polite.

“Don’t talk to me like you’re doing me a favor,” you say, and you keep the muzzle angled down at him, not because you’re easing up, but because the geometry changes when he kneels. “You don’t get to play nice now.”

His eyes flicker, and something tight pulls at the corner of his mouth like he wants to smile and doesn’t trust himself to. “I’m not playing,” he says. “I’m doing what you said.”

“Good,” you tell him, because you need something solid to hang onto. “Stay there.”

He stays there, hands still up, shoulders squared even on his knees like posture is another kind of armor. The streetlight catches his face better now, carving shadows under his cheekbones and making his eyes look even darker, and you hate how familiar he still is. He looks at the gun, then at you, and he doesn’t look away from either like he’s proving he can take it.

“You shouldn’t be here,” you say. “You shouldn’t even know where I live anymore.”

“I didn’t forget,” he answers, and he says it like it’s a simple fact instead of a confession. “I missed you.”

You swallow and your throat aches, because you can hear the old softness threaded through the words and you don’t want it. You don’t want the version of him that sounded like that when he was in your bed, when he’d tuck himself behind you and pretend the world couldn’t touch him if he had you in his arms.

“Don’t,” you say again, and this time it comes out quieter than you meant it to.

His gaze lifts to your face and he holds it like he’s holding onto a ledge. “I missed you, baby,” he repeats, and he doesn’t push the nickname like a knife. He says it the way he used to say it when you’d fall asleep mid-sentence, the way he’d say it when he was trying to be gentle.

Your breathing shifts, shallow for a second before you force it back into something steadier, and the gun stays in your hand even though your fingers tighten around it like you’re afraid it will disappear if you loosen your grip. “You don’t get to just show up,” you tell him. “Not after everything.”

He doesn’t argue, and the lack of fight is almost worse than if he’d tried. His shoulders rise and fall with one slow breath, and his hands stay up where you can see them. “I know.”

“You don’t get to stand in my living room and look at me like that,” you add, because anger is easier than the other thing pressing up behind your ribs. “You don’t get to say you missed me like it means something.”

His throat works like he’s swallowing down something sharp. “It means something to me,” he says, and he says it like he hates himself for it. “I’m not asking you to forgive me.”

“You should be,” you say. “If you had any sense left, you’d be begging.”

His mouth opens, then closes, and for a second he looks almost like he wants to laugh and can’t find the sound. “Do you want me to beg?” he asks, and his voice stays even, but there’s a tremor under it that makes your teeth clench. “If you tell me to beg, I will.”

Your hand trembles just enough that you feel it in your wrist, and you hate that he notices because he always notices. His eyes flick to your hand, then back to your face, and the intensity in his stare doesn’t change, but his posture does. It’s small, careful, and it makes your skin prickle, because his hands lower a little from beside his head to hover closer to his shoulders like he’s testing whether you’ll stop him.

“Hands up,” you order immediately.

He freezes with his hands halfway down, and he lifts them again without complaint. “Okay,” he says, soft.

You take a breath that scrapes, and you try to keep your voice sharp enough to protect you. “You think you can come back and act like this,” you say. “You think you can walk right into my life and—what? Remind me of how it felt? That’s your plan?”

“I don’t have a plan,” he says, and his eyes flicker with something that looks like frustration, not at you, but at himself. “If I had a plan, I wouldn’t be here.”

“That’s the first smart thing you’ve said all night,” you mutter.

He shifts his weight slightly on his knees, the motion controlled, and the gun tracks him on instinct. He notices that too, of course, and his gaze drops to the muzzle for half a second like he’s checking where it is, like he’s measuring distance in his head the way he measures everything. When his eyes lift again, they’re too steady, too direct. “You’re still holding it like you mean it,” he says.

“I do mean it.”

“I know,” he replies, and he sounds almost relieved by that. “That’s why I came.”

Your jaw tightens. “What do you mean?”

He doesn’t move his hands, but his fingers flex once like he’s fighting the urge to reach. “You don’t lie to yourself,” he says. “You never did.”

“That’s not a compliment,” you tell him.

“I wasn’t trying to compliment you,” he says, and then he adds, quieter, like it costs him to say it out loud, “I needed something real.”

You stare at him, and the room feels too small for the two of you, because he’s taking up all the air with that gaze and you’re letting him. The gun is still there between you, still a line you can draw any time you want, but your arm is tired and your hand is shaking just a little, and you’re furious that he can make you feel anything other than disgust.

“Get up,” you say, and your voice is steady again because you force it to be. “Slow.”

He watches your face like he’s waiting for you to change your mind, and then he rises in the same careful way he knelt, one measured movement at a time. His hands stay up for a moment even when he’s standing, palms open beside his head, and the sight is almost absurdly intimate, like you’re the one holding him in place with nothing but a word.

When he’s upright, you lower the gun just enough that it’s not pressed against him anymore, but you don’t put it down. It stays in your hand, pointed between you, not quite aimed at his heart now but still close enough that he understands what it means. He steps closer anyway, not quickly, not like he’s trying to take it from you, but like he’s following a gravity he can’t resist.

“Stop right there,” you say, even though you don’t move back.

He stops, so close that your breath hits him you exhale. His hands are still raised, and you notice the tension in his forearms, the way he’s holding himself back on purpose. His eyes flick to your mouth and back up, and the movement is so fast you almost miss it, but you don’t. You never used to miss it.

“This doesn’t fix anything,” you say, and it comes out harsh, like you can say it hard enough to make it true.

“I know,” he answers immediately, and the speed of it makes your throat tighten because he isn’t pretending. “I’m not here because I think it fixes it.”

“Then why are you here,” you demand, “if you’re not here to fix it?”

His voice drops, and it’s barely above a breath. “Because I couldn’t stand not knowing if you’d look at me.”

Your fingers curl tighter around the grip. “You’re looking at me right now.”

He shakes his head once, tiny. “You’re looking back,” he says.

You hate the way your body reacts to that, the way heat crawls under your skin like an old reflex waking up. You hate that you want to slap him and kiss him in the same breath, and you hate most of all that he’s watching you like he can see every ugly thought as it passes through you.

“Don’t,” you whisper, and you don’t even know what you mean by it, because it’s too late for a dozen different kinds of don’t.

He holds still like you’ve pinned him there with your voice, and then he leans forward just enough that his forehead almost brushes the gun again. He doesn’t touch it this time, like he’s learned the boundary you’re actually holding, and he stays in the thin space you allow. “Tell me no,” he says, and his voice is steady even when his eyes aren’t. “Tell me no and I’ll go.”

You stare at him, and the word sits in your mouth like a coin you can’t swallow. You could say it—you should say it, but you don’t.

Dex’s breath stutters once, like he felt your silence land. His hands are still above his head, still open, and for a moment the two of you just stand there with the gun between you and the air too thick to breathe. Then you step in, because you’re tired of being the only one pretending you aren’t about to do something you’ll regret.

You kiss him.

It isn’t gentle, and it isn’t sweet, and it isn’t anything like an apology. It’s hot and angry and familiar in the worst way, like your mouth already knows his and your body already remembers the shape of him. His hands stay up for one strangled second like he doesn’t believe he’s allowed, like he’s waiting for you to shove him away, and that pause makes your pulse kick hard.

“Don’t—” you start, pulling back just enough for the words to hit his mouth, but you can’t finish because he swallows the rest of it when you kiss him again.

“I’m not,” he murmurs against you, and it’s breath and sound, barely a sentence. “I’m not.”

His restraint breaks in slow motion. One hand lowers first, hovering near your waist without touching, and he waits like he’s asking permission without using words. When you don’t flinch, his palm settles against you, warm and firm, and the contact sends a sharp shiver through you that makes you hate yourself.

Your other hand is still holding the gun, angled down now, forgotten and not forgotten at the same time, because you can feel its weight even as you drag your free hand up his chest. Your fingers catch on his jacket, then slide up to his collar, and when you fist the fabric there his breath turns rough.

Dex makes a sound that he tries to swallow, and his other hand comes down to your side, then your back, pressing you closer. He doesn’t force you, he just follows the contact like he’s starving for it, like he’s been holding himself together with rules and silence and the idea of you, and now you’re here and his hands don’t know how to be anything except reverent and desperate at the same time.

You break the kiss long enough to glare at him, your mouth still close to his. “This isn’t—”

“I know,” he says again, and his eyes flick to your lips like he can’t stop himself. “I know.”

“Say it like you mean it,” you challenge, because you need something that hurts more than this does.

He nods once, and his voice comes out rougher. “It doesn’t fix anything,” he repeats, and there’s no argument in him, no illusion. “It just… makes it quiet.”

Your chest tightens at that, and you should step back, you should put the gun away, you should make him leave, you should do a hundred sensible things. Instead you kiss him again, slower this time, and he sinks into it like he’s been waiting for permission to breathe.

His hand slides up to your jaw, thumb brushing your cheek with the kind of careful touch that makes your stomach flip because it’s so gentle it feels wrong coming from him. Your fingers tighten in his collar, and you feel the tremor in him when you do, like he’s trying to hold himself to a line he’s drawn and you’re daring him to cross it.

“Look at me,” you say, because you want to see if he’s still there in his own eyes.

He does, immediately, and he doesn’t pretend to be anything other than what he is. “I’m looking,” he says, and his voice is low, steady, too intimate for the middle of your living room with your gun still in your hand.

You don’t answer with words. You answer by pulling him back into your mouth, and his hand tightens at your waist like he’s anchoring himself, like you’re the only thing keeping him from floating apart.

When the kiss deepens again, it’s messy in the way you remember, not because it’s out of control but because it’s full of everything you haven’t said. His hands roam—your side, your back, up to the base of your neck where his fingers curl like he’s afraid you’ll disappear if he lets go—and he keeps checking you with tiny pauses, tiny hesitations, like he’s still waiting for you to push him away and he’s bracing for it even as he kisses you like he can’t live without it.

You don’t push him away; you keep him close, gun still hanging loose in your hand and angled toward the floor, because you haven’t decided what any of this means and you’re not going to lie and pretend you have.

Dex stays pressed to you like he’s afraid you’ll vanish if he blinks, and when he kisses you again it’s slower, heavier, like he’s trying to memorize the shape of your mouth. He pulls back just enough to breathe, his forehead hovering near yours, and his eyes search your face like he’s bracing for the part where you tell him to leave. “Tell me to go,” he murmurs, voice rough, like it hurts to offer you the out.

You swallow, your grip on his collar tightening, and the words come out low and sharp like you’re daring him to believe you. “Don’t go.”

For a second he looks stunned in a way you almost never see on him, and then something in him gives with a quiet, relieved exhale. His hands tighten at your waist like he’s anchoring himself, and he kisses you again like he’s starving, like he’s been holding back for days and you just cut the last thread.

“Thank you, baby,” he breathes against your mouth, the nickname soft enough to make your chest ache. “I missed you.”

extra notes: one, i'm thinking of making a dex taglist, so if you want to be added, let me know! (here or on my taglist post). secondly, writing that last line made me realize that dex is the kind of guy that would ask to go down on you and say thank you when you let him... yeah

The hallway is narrow and familiar, and you’ve walked it a thousand times, but tonight it feels like a corridor in someone else’s life. You keep the gun up, not waving it around, not shaking, just steady, and you listen with everything you’ve got. There’s no heavy breathing, no footsteps scuffing. That’s what makes your stomach tighten, because a drunk would stumble, a thief would rush, and a normal person would knock at your door.

The living room opens up around you, a patchwork of darker shadows where your furniture sits. The window by the fire escape is cracked open by a few inches, the curtain pushed aside like a hand slid it back and held it there. The air coming in is colder than the air in your apartment, and it carries the faint scent of city grime and rain. You take one more step in, muzzle tracking toward the window, and then you see him in the corner where the light from the street doesn’t quite reach.

He’s standing with his back close to the wall, like he chose a spot that gives him the whole room and keeps him out of the line of sight from anyone walking past outside. He’s dressed dark, of course, and he’s not moving like he’s trying to spook you. He’s still in that unsettling way that makes it feel like the apartment belongs to him now, like he’s been there longer than you have and he’s just waiting for you to catch up.

“Step into the light,” you say, and your voice comes out flat, the way it does when you’re forcing yourself not to feel something first.

He exhales, slow, and the sound is quiet but familiar enough to pull at something inside your chest. Then he shifts, and you get a glimpse of his face as he moves just enough that the streetlight catches the curve of his cheek and the pale line of his mouth. The light shows the tension in his jaw before it fades again as he settles back into shadow.

A pause, and then a voice from the darkest part of your living room, low and steady like he’s been standing there listening to you breathe. “You still sleep with it that close.”

Your grip tightens before you can help it. Your aim doesn’t wobble, but everything in you goes hot and cold at the same time, because you know that voice, you know the cadence, you know the way he makes the simplest sentence sound like he’s filing it into place. You take another step forward without meaning to, then stop yourself before you get too close. “What are you doing in my apartment, Dex?”

He says your name, and he says it like he’s allowed to, like he hasn’t earned the right to have it in his mouth. It hits you anyway, because your body is stupid and memory is worse, and there’s something about hearing him say it that makes your grip tighten on the gun until your knuckles ache. “I needed to see you,” he says.

“That’s not an answer.”

His shoulders lift a fraction, not quite a shrug. “It’s the only one I have.”

You keep the muzzle steady, aimed center mass, the way you were taught, the way you taught yourself when no one else was around to correct your stance. “How did you get in?”

He glances at the window. “You already know.”

“I want to hear you say it,” you tell him.

He shifts again, and this time he steps out far enough that you can actually see him. The light catches more of him now: the shape of his shoulders under the jacket, the tired set to his eyes, the faint shadow of bruising that’s either healing or never fully fades when a body’s been through too much. He looks leaner than you remember, like prison carved away whatever softness he had left, and he looks too controlled for someone who just climbed up to your window in the middle of the night.

“I came up the fire escape,” he says, and then his eyes flick down for a second, to the gun, and back to your face. “You didn’t change the latch.”

Your pulse jumps, not because he’s wrong, but because you hate that he knows. You hate that he’s cataloging details like he’s always done, like he can’t help it, like your life is a pattern and he’s already traced the lines. “You could’ve knocked,” you say.

He gives you a look that’s almost dry, almost amused, and it doesn’t belong on his face after everything. “Would you have opened the door?”

You don’t answer that, because the truth is complicated and ugly and it doesn’t deserve to be spoken out loud with a gun between you. “What happened?” you ask instead, because something had to have pushed him here. “Did someone follow you? Is this some kind of—” You cut yourself off before you say trap, because saying it gives it more shape than you want to hold in your head.

He shakes his head. “No one followed me.”

“Then why are you here?” you repeat, and you keep your voice sharp enough to cut. “Why now?”

His mouth opens like he’s going to say something, then closes again. For a second he looks almost… careful, like he’s choosing words in the same way someone chooses where to step on thin ice.

“I got out,” he says finally, and his voice stays quiet, but there’s a roughness under it that wasn’t there before. “And the first night I was out, I didn’t come here. I didn’t come anywhere near you. I went somewhere else and I sat there until morning, because I told myself if I made it through one night, I could make it through the next.”

You don’t let yourself soften at the sound of him trying. You keep the gun up, because you remember the things he’s done and you remember how quickly trying can turn into something else when it’s Dex Poindexter doing it.

“How many nights did you make it through?” you ask.

His gaze holds yours, steady as the muzzle pointed at him. “Not enough.”

Your breath comes out harsh. “So you decided to break into my apartment.”

He doesn’t flinch. “I decided to see you.”

“You don’t get to decide things for me anymore.”

His expression shifts at that, something tightening behind his eyes like he’s swallowing down a reaction. “I’m not asking for permission,” he says, and then he adds, almost softer, “I’m here. That’s all.”

“That’s not all,” you snap, and the gun wavers a fraction before you force it steady again. “You don’t show up like this and pretend it’s nothing. You don’t get to stand in my living room like you didn’t—”

The words knot in your throat and refuse to come out, and Dex watches you with that awful focus that makes you feel seen in a way you never asked for.

He takes one step closer.

“Stop,” you say immediately.

He stops, but the fact that he moved at all sends heat crawling under your skin. He’s closer now, close enough that you can see the faint scar on his cheek you don’t remember from before, close enough that you can see how his pupils look too wide in the low light. His hands hang at his sides, relaxed but not casual, and he keeps them visible like he knows you’ll put a bullet in him if you have to.

“You’re shaking,” he says.

“I’m not,” you lie, and it’s stupid because he’s right. The tremor is small, but it’s there.

His mouth twitches. “You used to shake when you were angry.”

“Don’t,” you warn him.

He doesn’t stop, because Dex has never been good at stopping once he’s latched onto a thread. “And you used to hate it when I noticed,” he continues, and his voice is almost gentle now, like he’s trying to smooth something over with tone alone. “But you always let me.”

“I don’t let you do anything,” you say, and you lift the gun a fraction higher, aiming for his head this time because you want him to understand you mean it. “Take one more step and I’ll put you down.”

He looks at the gun, then back at you, and then he does the most infuriating thing he could do: he steps forward anyway, slow and deliberate, like he’s approaching an altar instead of a weapon. You don’t move, because you refuse to give ground in your own home, and the next second the barrel meets his forehead with a soft, undeniable bump.

He doesn’t jerk away, he doesn’t blink fast, he just leans in until the pressure is firm, and you feel it through the gun, through your arm,, straight into your chest. “There,” he says, voice low. “That’s better.”

Your stomach flips, half disgust and half something you don’t want to name. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

He breathes out through his nose, and you can feel it in the space between you. “A lot.”

“Back up,” you order, but he doesn’t move an inch. Your grip tightens again. “Dex.”

His eyes stay on yours, and there’s something in them that’s so naked it makes your throat go tight. It’s not a plea, not exactly, and it’s not a threat. It’s need in its purest form, stripped of all the lies he usually wraps around it.

You hold the gun steady even though your arm is starting to ache, and you hate that he can stand there with the barrel pressed into his skin like it’s a point of contact instead of a warning. He stays close enough that you can see the faint sheen of sweat at his hairline, close enough that you can feel his breath when he exhales, and he doesn’t do the decent thing and back away.

“On your knees,” you say, and you make your voice mean it.

For a beat he doesn’t move, not because he’s refusing, but because he’s watching you like he’s memorizing the exact set of your mouth, the angle of your wrist, the way you’re not stepping back. Then he nods once, slow, and he lowers himself like he’s trying not to startle a wild animal. His knees touch the floor with a quiet sound that makes your stomach twist, because the sight of him down there is wrong in a way that feels too right, and his hands lift up beside his head with his palms open.

“Like this?” he asks, and the question comes out calm, almost polite.

“Don’t talk to me like you’re doing me a favor,” you say, and you keep the muzzle angled down at him, not because you’re easing up, but because the geometry changes when he kneels. “You don’t get to play nice now.”

His eyes flicker, and something tight pulls at the corner of his mouth like he wants to smile and doesn’t trust himself to. “I’m not playing,” he says. “I’m doing what you said.”

“Good,” you tell him, because you need something solid to hang onto. “Stay there.”

He stays there, hands still up, shoulders squared even on his knees like posture is another kind of armor. The streetlight catches his face better now, carving shadows under his cheekbones and making his eyes look even darker, and you hate how familiar he still is. He looks at the gun, then at you, and he doesn’t look away from either like he’s proving he can take it.

“You shouldn’t be here,” you say. “You shouldn’t even know where I live anymore.”

“I didn’t forget,” he answers, and he says it like it’s a simple fact instead of a confession. “I missed you.”

You swallow and your throat aches, because you can hear the old softness threaded through the words and you don’t want it. You don’t want the version of him that sounded like that when he was in your bed, when he’d tuck himself behind you and pretend the world couldn’t touch him if he had you in his arms.

“Don’t,” you say again, and this time it comes out quieter than you meant it to.

His gaze lifts to your face and he holds it like he’s holding onto a ledge. “I missed you, baby,” he repeats, and he doesn’t push the nickname like a knife. He says it the way he used to say it when you’d fall asleep mid-sentence, the way he’d say it when he was trying to be gentle.

Your breathing shifts, shallow for a second before you force it back into something steadier, and the gun stays in your hand even though your fingers tighten around it like you’re afraid it will disappear if you loosen your grip. “You don’t get to just show up,” you tell him. “Not after everything.”

He doesn’t argue, and the lack of fight is almost worse than if he’d tried. His shoulders rise and fall with one slow breath, and his hands stay up where you can see them. “I know.”

“You don’t get to stand in my living room and look at me like that,” you add, because anger is easier than the other thing pressing up behind your ribs. “You don’t get to say you missed me like it means something.”

His throat works like he’s swallowing down something sharp. “It means something to me,” he says, and he says it like he hates himself for it. “I’m not asking you to forgive me.”

“You should be,” you say. “If you had any sense left, you’d be begging.”

His mouth opens, then closes, and for a second he looks almost like he wants to laugh and can’t find the sound. “Do you want me to beg?” he asks, and his voice stays even, but there’s a tremor under it that makes your teeth clench. “If you tell me to beg, I will.”

Your hand trembles just enough that you feel it in your wrist, and you hate that he notices because he always notices. His eyes flick to your hand, then back to your face, and the intensity in his stare doesn’t change, but his posture does. It’s small, careful, and it makes your skin prickle, because his hands lower a little from beside his head to hover closer to his shoulders like he’s testing whether you’ll stop him.

“Hands up,” you order immediately.

He freezes with his hands halfway down, and he lifts them again without complaint. “Okay,” he says, soft.

You take a breath that scrapes, and you try to keep your voice sharp enough to protect you. “You think you can come back and act like this,” you say. “You think you can walk right into my life and—what? Remind me of how it felt? That’s your plan?”

“I don’t have a plan,” he says, and his eyes flicker with something that looks like frustration, not at you, but at himself. “If I had a plan, I wouldn’t be here.”

“That’s the first smart thing you’ve said all night,” you mutter.

He shifts his weight slightly on his knees, the motion controlled, and the gun tracks him on instinct. He notices that too, of course, and his gaze drops to the muzzle for half a second like he’s checking where it is, like he’s measuring distance in his head the way he measures everything. When his eyes lift again, they’re too steady, too direct. “You’re still holding it like you mean it,” he says.

“I do mean it.”

“I know,” he replies, and he sounds almost relieved by that. “That’s why I came.”

Your jaw tightens. “What do you mean?”

He doesn’t move his hands, but his fingers flex once like he’s fighting the urge to reach. “You don’t lie to yourself,” he says. “You never did.”

“That’s not a compliment,” you tell him.

“I wasn’t trying to compliment you,” he says, and then he adds, quieter, like it costs him to say it out loud, “I needed something real.”

You stare at him, and the room feels too small for the two of you, because he’s taking up all the air with that gaze and you’re letting him. The gun is still there between you, still a line you can draw any time you want, but your arm is tired and your hand is shaking just a little, and you’re furious that he can make you feel anything other than disgust.

“Get up,” you say, and your voice is steady again because you force it to be. “Slow.”

He watches your face like he’s waiting for you to change your mind, and then he rises in the same careful way he knelt, one measured movement at a time. His hands stay up for a moment even when he’s standing, palms open beside his head, and the sight is almost absurdly intimate, like you’re the one holding him in place with nothing but a word.

When he’s upright, you lower the gun just enough that it’s not pressed against him anymore, but you don’t put it down. It stays in your hand, pointed between you, not quite aimed at his heart now but still close enough that he understands what it means. He steps closer anyway, not quickly, not like he’s trying to take it from you, but like he’s following a gravity he can’t resist.

“Stop right there,” you say, even though you don’t move back.

He stops, so close that your breath hits him you exhale. His hands are still raised, and you notice the tension in his forearms, the way he’s holding himself back on purpose. His eyes flick to your mouth and back up, and the movement is so fast you almost miss it, but you don’t. You never used to miss it.

“This doesn’t fix anything,” you say, and it comes out harsh, like you can say it hard enough to make it true.

“I know,” he answers immediately, and the speed of it makes your throat tighten because he isn’t pretending. “I’m not here because I think it fixes it.”

“Then why are you here,” you demand, “if you’re not here to fix it?”

His voice drops, and it’s barely above a breath. “Because I couldn’t stand not knowing if you’d look at me.”

Your fingers curl tighter around the grip. “You’re looking at me right now.”

He shakes his head once, tiny. “You’re looking back,” he says.

You hate the way your body reacts to that, the way heat crawls under your skin like an old reflex waking up. You hate that you want to slap him and kiss him in the same breath, and you hate most of all that he’s watching you like he can see every ugly thought as it passes through you.

“Don’t,” you whisper, and you don’t even know what you mean by it, because it’s too late for a dozen different kinds of don’t.

He holds still like you’ve pinned him there with your voice, and then he leans forward just enough that his forehead almost brushes the gun again. He doesn’t touch it this time, like he’s learned the boundary you’re actually holding, and he stays in the thin space you allow. “Tell me no,” he says, and his voice is steady even when his eyes aren’t. “Tell me no and I’ll go.”

You stare at him, and the word sits in your mouth like a coin you can’t swallow. You could say it—you should say it, but you don’t.

Dex’s breath stutters once, like he felt your silence land. His hands are still above his head, still open, and for a moment the two of you just stand there with the gun between you and the air too thick to breathe. Then you step in, because you’re tired of being the only one pretending you aren’t about to do something you’ll regret.

You kiss him.

It isn’t gentle, and it isn’t sweet, and it isn’t anything like an apology. It’s hot and angry and familiar in the worst way, like your mouth already knows his and your body already remembers the shape of him. His hands stay up for one strangled second like he doesn’t believe he’s allowed, like he’s waiting for you to shove him away, and that pause makes your pulse kick hard.

“Don’t—” you start, pulling back just enough for the words to hit his mouth, but you can’t finish because he swallows the rest of it when you kiss him again.

“I’m not,” he murmurs against you, and it’s breath and sound, barely a sentence. “I’m not.”

His restraint breaks in slow motion. One hand lowers first, hovering near your waist without touching, and he waits like he’s asking permission without using words. When you don’t flinch, his palm settles against you, warm and firm, and the contact sends a sharp shiver through you that makes you hate yourself.

Your other hand is still holding the gun, angled down now, forgotten and not forgotten at the same time, because you can feel its weight even as you drag your free hand up his chest. Your fingers catch on his jacket, then slide up to his collar, and when you fist the fabric there his breath turns rough.

Dex makes a sound that he tries to swallow, and his other hand comes down to your side, then your back, pressing you closer. He doesn’t force you, he just follows the contact like he’s starving for it, like he’s been holding himself together with rules and silence and the idea of you, and now you’re here and his hands don’t know how to be anything except reverent and desperate at the same time.

You break the kiss long enough to glare at him, your mouth still close to his. “This isn’t—”

“I know,” he says again, and his eyes flick to your lips like he can’t stop himself. “I know.”

“Say it like you mean it,” you challenge, because you need something that hurts more than this does.

He nods once, and his voice comes out rougher. “It doesn’t fix anything,” he repeats, and there’s no argument in him, no illusion. “It just… makes it quiet.”

Your chest tightens at that, and you should step back, you should put the gun away, you should make him leave, you should do a hundred sensible things. Instead you kiss him again, slower this time, and he sinks into it like he’s been waiting for permission to breathe.

His hand slides up to your jaw, thumb brushing your cheek with the kind of careful touch that makes your stomach flip because it’s so gentle it feels wrong coming from him. Your fingers tighten in his collar, and you feel the tremor in him when you do, like he’s trying to hold himself to a line he’s drawn and you’re daring him to cross it.

“Look at me,” you say, because you want to see if he’s still there in his own eyes.

He does, immediately, and he doesn’t pretend to be anything other than what he is. “I’m looking,” he says, and his voice is low, steady, too intimate for the middle of your living room with your gun still in your hand.

You don’t answer with words. You answer by pulling him back into your mouth, and his hand tightens at your waist like he’s anchoring himself, like you’re the only thing keeping him from floating apart.

When the kiss deepens again, it’s messy in the way you remember, not because it’s out of control but because it’s full of everything you haven’t said. His hands roam—your side, your back, up to the base of your neck where his fingers curl like he’s afraid you’ll disappear if he lets go—and he keeps checking you with tiny pauses, tiny hesitations, like he’s still waiting for you to push him away and he’s bracing for it even as he kisses you like he can’t live without it.

You don’t push him away; you keep him close, gun still hanging loose in your hand and angled toward the floor, because you haven’t decided what any of this means and you’re not going to lie and pretend you have.

Dex stays pressed to you like he’s afraid you’ll vanish if he blinks, and when he kisses you again it’s slower, heavier, like he’s trying to memorize the shape of your mouth. He pulls back just enough to breathe, his forehead hovering near yours, and his eyes search your face like he’s bracing for the part where you tell him to leave. “Tell me to go,” he murmurs, voice rough, like it hurts to offer you the out.

You swallow, your grip on his collar tightening, and the words come out low and sharp like you’re daring him to believe you. “Don’t go.”

For a second he looks stunned in a way you almost never see on him, and then something in him gives with a quiet, relieved exhale. His hands tighten at your waist like he’s anchoring himself, and he kisses you again like he’s starving, like he’s been holding back for days and you just cut the last thread.

“Thank you, baby,” he breathes against your mouth, the nickname soft enough to make your chest ache. “I missed you.”

extra notes: one, i'm thinking of making a dex taglist, so if you want to be added, let me know! (here or on my taglist post). secondly, writing that last line made me realize that dex is the kind of guy that would ask to go down on you and say thank you when you let him... yeah