Vicious Bitch

Dex went still. The principal kept talking beside him. Something about lockdown protocols, fire exits, parent pick-up procedures, and perhaps thanking him for the visit. Dex didn’t hear any of it. He watched the little boy rub his face with his sleeve, watched you reach into your cardigan pocket and produce a tissue because of course you had one ready, because of course you had walked through life expecting the world to hurt these precious little things and had prepared yourself to help.

“Reading slowly just means you get to spend more time with the words,” you told the boy. “That’s not a bad thing.”

The boy sniffled, and you smiled at him.

Dex felt that smile land in his cold heart, somewhere it had no business being.

It would have been easier if you were only beautiful. That would have been manageable. Uncomfortable, maybe, but manageable. Beauty was a fact. Beauty could be observed, catalogued, eventually put away. You were beautiful in a way that seemed unaware of itself, unpolished and terribly human. The cardigan sleeves falling too far over your hands, the loose strand of hair stuck to your cheek, the worn soles of your cheap flats, you smiling so easily for children who probably forgot to thank you for it.

Dex thought you were gorgeous with an alarmed resentment, as if his own body had betrayed him by noticing before his mind had given permission. Then you looked up at him.

Your eyes met his across the library, and for half a second, Dex forgot what face he was supposed to be wearing. You smiled politely, like he was just another adult in the building, not a man with a gun under his jacket teaching staff how to react in case of a school shooting.

“Hi,” you said. “Sorry, do you need the library?”

The principal brightened. “This is our librarian.”

You gave Dex your name. He repeated it silently once. Then again. Then a third time, because it felt like something he should store somewhere safe, somewhere no one else could touch.

“Special Agent Poindexter,” he said, holding out his hand.

You shook it, and your hand was warm. Dex noticed that there was a tiny paper cut near your thumb. 

You were still smiling at him. Not because he was FBI, and not because he was handsome, though he was. You smiled because you were kind.

Fuck. That’s inconvenient.

Pretty made him look, but good made him stay.

That first visit should have been the last. Dex knew that. There was no operational reason for him to return personally. The school’s safety review was a basic one. The principal had his notes, but the follow-up could have been handled by email. A junior agent could have dropped off the printed materials. Anyone could have gone.

But Dex went. That second time, he poked his head to the library, and said hi. You said hi back, right after you told two boys that no, the beanbags were not for wrestling, and yes, you were very impressed by the creativity of the attempt.

Dex couldn’t stop thinking about it for a week.

The third time, he told himself it was because the library’s rear exit needed another assessment. It was technically true. The lock was old, the corridor outside had basically no surveillance, and the staff entrance was too far from the main office. He made it seem like a legitimate concern, when really, it was a neat little justification. Dex was excellent at finding those.

You were reshelving books when he appeared in the doorway, balanced on the tips of your toes as you reached for the top shelf. The hem of your blouse lifted slightly at your waist. It was nothing indecent. Barely anything at all.

Still, his mind went briefly blank. 

He cleared his throat.

You startled, turned, and smiled. “Agent Poindexter.”

Dex liked the sound of it from you. That was inconvenient too.

“Sorry,” you added, stepping down. “Am I in the way?”

“No.”

“Good. Because if you were about to tell me my fiction section is a security risk, I might cry.”

His mouth twitched before he decided to let it. “I’ll leave fiction alone.”

“Very generous of the DOJ.” That’s when he realised you were teasing him. 

Dex looked at you and thought, you have no idea what a dangerous thing that was.

After that, the visits became a pattern.

Not obvious, because Dex was never sloppy when he could help it. He didn’t go every day. He didn’t stand outside the library staring like some lovesick idiot with no self-control. He knew how to make repeated contact look procedural. 

His supervisor barely looked up from the file the fourth time it happened. “Poindexter, you handled the school outreach last week, right?”

“Yes.”

“They’ve got some updated compliance questions. I can send Nadeem.”

Dex immediately shook his head. “I’ll take it.”

His supervisor paused, but Dex kept his face still. “I’m already familiar with the layout,” he said, and what a good excuse that was. 

The whole truth was that he had thought about you every day since the first visit. You came to him through triggers. When he saw children’s drawings in a hallway. A cardigan on a mannequin The smell of old paper. A mug with painted stars on it in a café window, because you had one on your desk.

You were good, and you were pretty, and that combination felt less like attraction and more like orientation. As if Dex had spent his whole life moving without a fixed point and then walked into a school library and found one.

So, yes, he came back to the school. And, yes, eventually, he followed you home.

The first time, he told himself it was because you were the last staff member to leave again and the car park lighting was poor, so he had to make sure you were safe. It had rained earlier, leaving the pavement slick and black. You walked out with a tote bag over one shoulder and an armful of books pressed to your chest, juggling your keys between your fingers. 

Dex sat in his car and watched until you pulled out of the lot. Then he followed. He learned the route to your apartment in fourteen minutes. He cleared that you lived in a building with a front door that did not latch unless pulled hard, that the hallway light on your floor flickered, that your window faced the street and your curtains were thin enough to turn your silhouette suggestive when you moved past them with nothing on.

He hated your building immediately. The lock was bad. The street was worse. Your neighbours were careless. The man in 2B smoked on the front steps and watched women walk past like a fucking creep. The laundry room was in the basement. The side gate did not close properly.

Dex catalogued every vulnerability, then sat in his car for twenty-three minutes after your lights went out and told himself this was a reasonable concern.

He was trained to notice risk, and you just had so much of it. You were too open, too trusting, too underpaid to live somewhere safe enough. 

He found out about the money without needing to try very hard.

He figured out your exact job title, your district, and salary ranges within twenty minutes. He knew what you could afford, what you probably couldn’t, what your grocery budget looked like if your car needed work or if the school asked you to buy supplies out of pocket again. And you did, apparently. He saw the receipts in your hand one afternoon when you came out of a discount store with construction paper, glue sticks, tissues, and children’s stickers paid for with your own money.

That bothered him more than it should have. It enraged him. Not because you were helpless. Dex didn’t think that. You were competent in the way good people often were, holding ten pieces of a room together while everyone else assumed the room simply stayed whole on its own. But you were tired and stretched thin. You loved your job, the children, the library with its peeling posters and overhandled paperbacks, but love didn’t pay rent.

I could, he thought. Dex could pay your rent without noticing. He could buy groceries without checking his account. He could fix the lock. Replace the car. Put you somewhere safe and close. That’s… a good reason to ask you out, right?

If he ever had the courage. 

By the fifth visit, you laughed when you saw him. “Again?”

Dex stopped in the library doorway, because he insisted to the bureau that some of the teachers were security risks. “Again.”

“Should I be worried about the state of our emergency preparedness?”

“No.”

“Should I be worried about you?” That caught him off-guard.  Your tone was teasing, but your eyes were warm and curious.

Should I be worried about you?

Yes, he thought. Probably.

Instead, he said, “No.”

You narrowed your eyes in mock suspicion. “I don’t know. Five visits to the school. Either we are extremely unsafe, or you really like laminated evacuation maps.”

Dex looked at the map beside your door. “It’s a good map.”

You burst out laughing.

Dex loved the sound immediately and started to memorise it so he could copy it when you made a joke. More than that, he wanted to be responsible for it. He wanted to know what your laugh sounded like in his car. In his kitchen. Against his mouth.

The thought came so suddenly that his teeth clenched.

You noticed. Your smile softened, and Dex had the devastating impression that you thought you had embarrassed him. “I’m sorry,” you said. “I didn’t mean to make fun of you.”

“You didn’t.”

“Okay.” You tilted your head. “Good.”

Good. The word followed him home.

So did you, though not physically. Not yet. But your image, your voice, the way you said his name after he told you to call him Dex, the way you remembered he took tea plain after seeing him drink it once in the staff room. The way you handed him a paper cup and said, “I made too much,” as if generosity was just something that spilled out of you naturally.

And then there were the guys around you.

He had watched a math teacher who lingered at your desk too long after school, making you laugh over some stupid story about a parent email. A divorced father at pick-up who asked whether you ever took private tutoring work and then smiled in a way Dex didn’t like. A man you met for coffee one Friday evening, two neighbourhoods over, at a café with steamed windows and terrible parking.

Dex hadn’t meant to follow you there. That was a lie.

He had followed you there because you had worn lipstick, the kind you probably put on in your rearview mirror after work, thinking no one would notice.

The date was unremarkable. The man was unremarkable. He wore a blue shirt, laughed too loudly, and checked his phone while you were talking. Dex watched from across the street with his hands still on the steering wheel and felt jealousy move through him.

The man was wrong for you.

He was careless, dull, and too impressed with himself. He made you pay for your own tea. That alone felt like a crime.

You left to do some off-the-clock work, and your date stayed. Dex waited until the man left to use the bathroom, then walked into the café and passed close enough to his table to see the phone he had left face-up beside his plate. He saw a message from someone named Laura lit the screen with a heart attached.

Dex smiled. That was useful.

The next morning, he sent an anonymous message to Laura. The following week, you didn’t see blue-shirt again.

You looked a little sad about it on Monday. Dex hated that. Then he hated the man more for making you sad. Then he told himself it was better this way.

It became easier to scare off your dates after that. All it took was an inconvenient scheduling conflict, a resurfaced truth, a gentle nudge. One man had an outstanding warrant for unpaid fines. One was married. One was simply easy to scare with the right look from the right federal agent in a parking lot.

By the sixth visit to the school, there was no reason good enough to fool anyone but himself.

A “Penultimate walkthrough,” he called it, before the final walkthrough next week. 

The principal seemed pleased, though you looked amused. “Penultimate?” you asked when Dex appeared outside the library.

“Yes.”

“Should I be honoured?”

“You should feel secure.”

“I do. The biography section has never been safer.”

He looked at you, and you smiled like you were proud of yourself. Dex couldn’t help but copy that smile back. Your expression changed when you saw it, going still for one second, like you liked him, too.

That day, he walked through the library with you while you pointed out doors and windows and places the children liked to hide during reading hour. This corner was where the overwhelmed ones went. That shelf had the books no one returned on time because they loved them too much. The lamp near the beanbag was too warm if left on all day, but you kept it anyway because the kids said it made the corner feel cozy.

“This is where they go when they need silence,” you said, gesturing toward a little space tucked behind a low shelf. A lamp. A basket of soft toys. Books with soft edges. A handmade sign that read: take a breath.

Dex looked at it.

You had made a place for children to be afraid safely. Of course you had.

“You did this?” he asked.

You shrugged, suddenly shy. “It’s not much.”

Dex looked at you. “It is.”

You met his eyes, and for a moment, the library noise faded behind you.

After that, he wanted to give you things. He wanted to give you better shoes. Better locks. A safer car. A warmer apartment. Groceries you did not buy with mental arithmetic running behind your eyes. A kitchen where your tea sat beside his coffee because it belonged there. A bed you didn’t have to assemble yourself. A life where you did not walk to your car alone. He wanted your life folded into his so completely that you never again had to stand unprotected in the world.

It was raining the day he finally asked.

The sky had turned the school windows grey, and the car park outside shone black under the streetlights. Most of the staff had already left. The corridors had emptied, and you were the last one in the library again.

Dex had lingered through a conversation with the principal he barely needed to have after the final walkthrough. He had checked the same exit twice. He had waited near the lobby until your light was the only one still glowing down the hall.

Then you came out with a tote bag sliding down your shoulder and a cardboard box of donated books pressed against your hip. Your umbrella refused to open, and you stared at it like it had stabbed you.

“Need help?”

You startled, then relaxed when you saw him. “Dex.” You laughed, breathless and embarrassed. “Do you just appear whenever I’m losing a fight?”

“Your umbrella is inside out,” he pointed out, before taking the box from you.

You tried to hold on. “I can carry that.”

“I know.”

“Then why did you take it?”

“Because it’s raining.”

You looked at him for a second, then smiled, soft and helpless and too fond for his sanity.

“Okay,” you said, as if letting him carry a box was nothing. As if it didn’t make a dark and pleased thought settle low in his chest.

He walked you to your car and put the books in the back seat. He noted the old jumper on the passenger side, the stack of overdue returns, the half-empty water bottle, the evidence of your life that was still not his.

You stood beside him under the broken umbrella, rain misting your hair.

You were gorgeous, he thought.

It struck him then in the stupidest way. No analysis or clinical separation. Just so pretty it made him feel young and strange and almost angry with himself.

“What?” you asked, smiling like you could tell he was staring.

Dex could’ve said nothing. He could have smiled, stepped back, wished you a good night, returned to his car, and come up with another reason to see you next week.

Instead, he looked at you and thought of your whole life together. Then he said it. “Have dinner with me.”

Your smile faded into surprise. The rain tapped against the broken umbrella between you. You blinked once. It wasn’t really a question, was it?  “With you?”

“Yes.”

“As in…”

“A date.”

Your cheeks warmed. Dex watched the colour rise and tilted his head.

“Oh,” you said softly. Then, after a second, you smiled. “Okay.”

Just like that, he got what he wanted. 

—

The first date was dinner at your favourite restaurant, though you couldn’t recall ever telling Dex that.

You paused outside the little place with the handwritten menu in the window, your hand tucked into the crook of his arm. “Oh,” you said, surprised. “I love this place.”

Dex looked down at you, calm as anything. “Do you?”

You laughed. “I come here all the time.”

“I didn’t know that.”

The lie was smooth, but Dex said it with such calm that you accepted it because you wanted to. So you smiled up at him and said, “Then we have similar taste.”

His eyes held on your face. “Maybe we do.”

“Maybe we belong together then,” you joked.

Dex’s brain went to a catastrophic halt.

You didn’t see it from the outside, not really. His face barely changed. Maybe his eyes went a little too still. Maybe his fingers pressed once, carefully, against your hand where it rested on his sleeve.

But inside him, his heart lit up white-hot. Belong together.

You had said it so lightly. Dex heard it like a verdict. Like the universe had leaned down and put a hand on his shoulder and said, yes, that one.

He opened the restaurant door for you and followed you inside with your words still burning through him.

You had no idea he had chosen this restaurant because he had followed you there three weeks before, parked across the street while you sat by the window with two friends and laughed over a bowl of pasta. You had no idea he had watched you order the same thing twice. You had no idea he knew which seat you liked, which dessert you split with your friend and pretended not to want more of, which route you took home afterward, how tightly you held your coat closed when the wind picked up.

But yeah, dinner was great. 

The second date was coffee because you were trying to take things slower.

He was already there when you arrived, sitting by the window with your drink waiting in front of the empty chair. Your exact order, right size, right syrup.  He claimed similar taste innocently again. 

You should have been alarmed. Instead, you chuckled and sat down.

Coffee turned into a walk. The walk turned into him standing beside your car, close enough that your shoulder brushed his sleeve. He looked at your mouth once, then back at your eyes. “Can I kiss you?”

You didn’t even answer. You just stood on your tip toes and kissed him, carefully at first. But his hand came to cup your face, so you made a hum into his mouth and felt him unravel. 

When he pulled back, his eyes were dark. You smiled, dazed. 

The third date was dinner at his apartment.

He cooked for you, because apparently Dex did everything like it was a mission and feeding you was no exception. His apartment was neat  and perfectly arranged, but then you were there with your jacket on the back of his chair and your laugh in his kitchen, and he kept looking at those little disruptions were worth you being here.

The food was good, so you smiled and pushed a little harder. “You’re very good at taking care of me.”

Dex went still, and you could’ve sworn his ears went pink. 

After dinner, you kissed him on the couch. That was all it was supposed to be: A kiss.

Yes, maybe Dex made it feel a little too deep. Maybe it was too hungry. Maybe it was a little reckless, considering this was only the third date and you weren't the kind of woman who did things like this. You didn’t tumble into a man’s bed after three dates and let your body make decisions your brain would have to defend in the morning.

Your brain was trying, to be fair. The little voices there had formed a whole committee meeting about it.

This is too fast. This is insane. You have work tomorrow. You barely know him.

Unfortunately, Dex was kissing you, open-mouthed and desperate, his hands tight on your waist, breathing against you like every second of restraint physically hurt him, and your body didn’t seem particularly interested in attending the discussion.

You climbed into his lap because there was nowhere else you wanted to be.

Dex let out a breathy moan when you settled over him,  his head tipping back against the couch. His shirt was still on, but you had already pulled half the buttons open, enough to get your hands on skin, enough to feel his chest rise under your palms every time your mouth found his again.

Your skirt was hiked high around your thighs, his fingers trembling at the hem of it.

Dex, who could easily take what he wanted, sat beneath you with his hands on your thighs and waited for you to tell him he was allowed.

You kissed him harder for it.

His mouth opened under yours immediately, wet and so eager that you felt your stomach twist. You threaded your fingers into his hair and tugged once, just to steady yourself, just to feel him closer.

Dex sighed into your mouth.

“Oh,” you whispered, breathless.

His eyes opened, fixed on you. You smiled because you understood then that Benjamin Poindexter liked being told what to do.

He wanted to be good for you. He wanted to earn every sound you made.

You shifted in his lap, and his whole body reacted. His fingers slid higher under your skirt, then stopped again.

“Dex,” you breathed.

His throat worked. “Tell me.”

You leaned down, your lips brushing his as you spoke. “Touch me.”

He obeyed so fast it made you gasp.

Your panties were pulled to the side with clumsy, shaking urgency, his pants shoved down just enough because neither of you had the patience anymore. It was filthy how desperate it was. There was no time for the bedroom, no careful undressing, no pretending this was slower than it was. It was you in his lap, his open shirt under your hands, your skirt bunched around your waist, both of you panting into each other’s mouths like you had been struck by fucking lightning.

He was so intense you expected him to take over. Because he could’ve flipped you under him. He could have pinned you to the couch and made you forget every thought you had ever had. He had the body, he had muscles, he had the skills. 

Instead, he looked at you like he needed permission to breathe. “Like that?” he breathed.

You nodded, nails dragging over his chest nodding frantically. “Don’t stop.”

He didn’t.

Dex listened like obedience was devotion, like your pleasure was a commandment, like the only thing in the world that mattered was keeping you exactly like this: skirt up, mouth open, shaking in his lap while he looked up at you like you were holy.

You knew this was too quick. You never had one night stands. Even three dates was way too quick, by your standards. 

But his hands were on your waist, his shirt was open, his breathing was breaking, and when you whispered, “Fuck, baby,” he shuddered so hard beneath you that all your remaining common sense died on the couch.

Afterward, you stayed folded against him, both of you warm and breathless, your face tucked into his neck.

Dex’s hand moved slowly up your back, careful now. 

You lifted your head enough to look at him. His hair was wrecked. His mouth was red. His eyes were softer than you had ever seen them, though there was still a frightening stillness underneath, satisfied and hungry and already too attached.

You touched his cheek. “I should probably go home.”

Dex went still.

He looked at you from beneath those dark lashes, still flushed, still breathing hard, still beautiful enough to make bad decisions feel like fate. “Stay the night,” he said, trying not to say please.

You swallowed. “I have work tomorrow.”

“I’ll drive you.”

“My things are at home.”

“You can wear something of mine.”

“I need my toothbrush.”

“I have a spare.”

A laugh slipped out of you, helpless and fond. Of course he did. 

Dex’s mouth barely moved, and it was always a smile.

He looked at you like he needed you to say yes and hated that you could tell. Like letting you leave after this would physically hurt. Like you had crawled into his lap and accidentally turned yourself into the centre of his orbit.

You should go home. Your sensible little inner committee was banging on the table now.

But Dex looked at you like he was unaware he had puppy dog eyes, and you couldn’t say no to that, right? 

So you kissed him once. “M’kay, baby,” you said.

Dex held you tighter then, giving an upbeat little whine as he peppered kisses on your collarbone.

Little did you know, there was no going back now. 

—

The next day, Dex picked you up from work, even though you hadn’t asked him to.

He had driven you that morning as promised, his hands on your waist while he kissed you goodbye like he was trying not to follow you into the school library.

You had spent the whole day after that with his shirt on, but it was terribly oversized on you. Still, you managed to make it look intentional under your blazer, tucked and adjusted just enough that no one could tell. You had pinned your hair neatly, put your librarian face on, and acted very normal. Very professional of you, honestly.

Then the final bell rang, the library emptied, and by the time you stepped out of the front entrance with your bag over your shoulder, Dex was already there, waiting by his car with a suit jacket on and badge hidden. 

You stopped mid-step. “Oh,” you said, lighting up.  Beside you, Jonathan stopped too.

Jonathan, the music teacher. Nice Jonathan. Harmless Jonathan. Jonathan who lived two streets away from you and always carried a canvas tote bag with an embarrassing number of reusable water bottles inside it. He had been walking with you because you didn’t have your car with you and he offered to drive you home because you were both headed in the same direction. 

Dex’s grip tightened around his keys.

You were still wearing his shirt, and this man wanted to take you home? Cute.

“Dex?” you called, surprised.

Dex barely spared Johnathan a glance. He came to you instead, handsome in that frightening l way, his attention fixed you that it made the other man feel like background noise.

“What are you doing here?” you asked.

“Picking you up.”

You blinked, then laughed softly. “Why?”

Because you were wearing my shirt. Because I spent all day knowing you were out of sight. Because I don’t like it when you’re not with me.

“Your car’s not here,” he said, and that was reasonable enough, right?

“Oh.” You glanced back. “Jonathan was going to offer me a ride. He lives a few blocks away, so—”

“No.” The word came out flat.

You tilted your head, confused. You tried to recover, sweet thing that you were, turning half toward the man beside you. “Dex, this is Jonathan. He’s the music teacher. Jonathan, this is—”

Dex opened the passenger door. “You’re coming with me.”

Jonathan stopped with his polite smile halfway formed.

You looked at Dex for a second, and your sensible little inner voice probably tried to say something about how this was strange. 

Then Dex looked at you, and you melted, because fuck! Some foolish, lovesick part of you found that endearing. He came all this way for me? 

“I’ll see you tomorrow, Jonathan,” you said gently.

Dex shut the passenger door after you climbed in and stood there for one extra second, hand still on the handle, the word burning through him. What did that mean?

He got into the car.

The drive started silent. You settled beside him, and Dex saw you cozy up one the corner of his eye and had to tighten both hands on the wheel.

“Tomorrow?” he asked finally.

You looked over. “Hm?”

“You said you’d see him tomorrow.”

A little smile pulled at your mouth. You leaned across the console and kissed his cheek, like you thought jealousy was cute when it came from him.

“We work together, Dex.”

Oh. Okay. Okay. That’s fine, right?

Normal boyfriends were fine with that, right?

Still.

Then, asked if you wanted to come over to his place again because he couldn’t help himself. Because having you in the passenger seat made it feel obscene to let you leave again. Because you were already dressed in his things and smelled faintly like his apartment and he couldn’t understand why the day had to end anywhere else.

You looked down at yourself and laughed. “Dex, I am literally wearing your clothes. I need to go to mine.”

He kept his expression calm, but his fingers went still on the wheel.

You noticed enough to furrow your brows. “I’ve got work stuff to do,” you said. “I’ll call soon, okay?”

He nodded. He could do that. He could be normal. He could drive you to your car and let you go back to your apartment with its bad lock and pathetic hallway light and no trace of him except the marks he had left under your clothes. He could.

He pulled up beside your car outside your building and watched you unbuckle your seatbelt. You said your goodbyes and were halfway out when he blurted out, “I love you.”

You stopped.

Fuck. Fuck! 

He had not planned it like that. Not in the car, and definitely not with you leaving. But there it was.

You turned back to him slowly.

For a second, you bit your lip in shock. 

It was quick. Too quick to say that. You’ve been going on dates for what? Two weeks? 

You supposed he’d been around the school for two months now with the outreach program. But even that didn’t really make sense, right?

So now, your inner committee was no longer holding a meeting. It was pounding on the table, screaming that this was insane, that love wasn’t supposed to arrive between a third date and a school pick-up, that normal people didn’t do this.

But Dex was looking at you like you hung the stars for him. 

So leaned back into the car and kissed him. Gently first, then deeper, because his hand found your jaw like he had been waiting for permission to touch you again since the school gates.

“I love you, too,” you whispered.

Oh. Oh.

You left before you could take it back.

Dex watched you wave from your door, hands resting on the wheel, mouth curved in a small, helpless smile he couldn’t seem to stop.

She loves me.

The thought repeated all the way home.

She loves me. She loves me. She loves me.

By the time he reached his apartment, he was still smiling.

Then he opened the door, and the smile vanished immediately because you were not there.

The apartment was exactly the same as it had been that morning, clean and perfectly ordered, but suddenly none of that mattered. The couch was empty. The kitchen was empty. The bed was empty. All those neat, controlled rooms had become useless because you weren’t inside them.

Dex stood in the doorway with his keys in his hand and felt his stomach in him turn over.

You loved him, so why were you not here?

The question sat in his head with terrible simplicity. 

You loved him. He loved you. He could take care of you. He had the space, the money, the locks, the discipline. Your apartment was unsafe. Your building was bad. Your neighbours were careless. Jonathan from music lived too close. The world kept touching you and taking from you and making you tired.

Here was safer. Here, it made sense. Here, he could see you.

The thought came fully formed before he knew to stop it.

He could go get you.

He could get in the car. Drive to your apartment. Knock. Tell you that you should change your mind. Tell you the city was unsafe. Tell you your lock was bad. Tell you to pack a bag. Tell you you belonged in his apartment. Tell you until you believed him.

If you said no, he could still bring you back.

He was stronger than you. Faster than you. He was trained. He knew exactly how to move you without hurting too badly. He could overpower you, get you inside his apartment, lock the door, hide the keys, take your phone just for a while. He’d you keep warm. Feed you. Talk to you until the panic passed. He’d do that just until you understood. Because you would understand.

You loved him, so eventually you would understand that this was not cruelty, right?  This was not punishment. This was him seeing the truth faster than you did. This was him making the hard decision because someone had to. This was him saving you from all the places that were not him.

It took him an embarrassingly long time to realise that was kidnapping.

Actually, legally, literally kidnapping.

Kidnapping. False imprisonment. Coercion. Felony. It was bad.

“Oh,” he whispered. Then, after a beat, “Shit.”

His breath went wrong. The heat in him snapped into panic so quickly he nearly staggered. He saw himself then, not as a man in love, not as someone protecting his girlfriend, but as exactly the kind of thing you would need protecting from.

No.

No, no, no.

He backed away from the door like it had opened onto a cliff.

He loved you. He loved you. He wasn’t going to make you afraid of him. He wasn’t going to put his hands on you. He wasn’t going to lock you inside his life and pretend that was the same thing as being chosen.

Even if some awful part of him wanted to. Especially because some awful part of him wanted to.

Dex went to the drawer with shaking hands and pulled out the tapes.

Dr. Eileen Mercer’s voice filled the apartment through a soft crackle of static. “Your internal compass isn’t broken, Dex. It just works better with a North Star to guide you.”

Dex sank onto the couch.

North Star.

That was what you were.

Of course you were. You, with your kind heart and your gentle voice and your stupidly good heart. You, making safe corners for children. 

He had simply made the catastrophic mistake of falling in love with the star.  Which complicated things.

Because you were supposed to guide him, not belong to him. You were supposed to be fixed above him, untouchable enough to follow. Not in his apartment. Not in his bed. Not wearing his shirt and saying I love you in his car like you had any idea what those words would do to a man like him.

Dex pressed the heels of his hands over his eyes and forced himself to breathe while the tape kept playing through the static.

The apartment was still wrong without you. His hands still shook. The need to leave and get you didn’t disappear just because he had named it correctly. The desire sat there, dark and patient, waiting for him to mistake it for devotion again. But he stayed where he was.

He stayed on the couch with his teeth clenched so hard it ached, listening to the tape like it was the only thing holding him in place.

He loved you. That had to mean something better than possession. It had to.

So Dex sat in the empty apartment and tried, breath by breath, to become the kind of man who could love his North Star without building a sky small enough to trap her.

—

Dex barely made it through the week by hearing your voice through the phone.

You were busy with the school, chaperoning a trip, dealing with children and permission slips and packed lunches and museum gift shops, so he did the good thing, the normal thing. He didn’t show up. He didn’t follow the bus route. He didn’t appear outside your apartment just because he knew you would be exhausted.

Well. Maybe he just did it once, but he didn’t even stop! He just took a quick peek around the block to make sure you got home safe. 

After that, he took it one day at a time.

At night, he lay in bed with the phone pressed to his ear and listened to you talk when you called. You told him about the children, the chaos, the little girl who tried to correct the tour guide, the boy who cried because his sandwich got crushed in his bag.

He hated that he couldn't tell if you were warm enough. Hated that you sounded exhausted and he wasn’t there to put a blanket over your shoulders or press his mouth to your temple or make the world stop asking things of you for five minutes. But he behaved.

When you said, “I’m so tired, baby,” he closed his eyes like the world wrapped a hand around his throat.

When you said, “I miss you,” he pressed his fist against his mouth until the feeling passed enough for him to answer normally.

“I miss you too.” An understatement so violent it almost made him laugh.

Then you came back to regular life, and started spending more time with him. 

And naturally, you started spending more nights at his place.

It was easy. His apartment was closer to the school. His shower was better. His fridge always had food you liked. Your tea was already in his cupboard. Your toothbrush was still in his bathroom from that first night, and the spare charger by his bed somehow became yours without either of you discussing it.

One night a week became two. Two nights a week became most of the week.

Your laundry ended up in his machine. Your favourite cardigan stayed folded in his bedroom. Your substitute teaching papers got graded at his kitchen table while he made dinner. Your commute became easier because he drove you when he could, and when he couldn’t, he made sure your car had petrol, the tyres were checked, and the weird noise under the hood had been fixed before it became a problem.

It was dangerous, how much easier he made your life.

Dangerous because you were a school librarian on a school librarian salary, and Dex had big boy FBI paychecks and paid for groceries without mentally rearranging the rest of the month around it.

You tried to argue about that once. He looked genuinely offended.

“I should help,” you said.

“You do.”

“I mean with bills.”

“You buy supplies for children who are not yours because no one else will. Let me pay for dinner.”

That shut you up, not because it was fair. But because it was kind. Or because it sounded kind. Or because, with Dex, the difference had started to blur.

Your car made a noise; he had it checked. Your shoes wore thin; a new pair appeared by the door. You mentioned once that you were out of your favourite cereal, and the next morning there were two boxes in his cupboard.

By five months, you were barely at your own apartment.

You still paid rent. You still had mail there. Technically, you still lived there. But most nights, you went home to Dex.

Then one night, while you sat at his kitchen table grading reading logs and wearing one of his shirts under your cardigan, Dex said, “You should move in.”

You looked up. “What?”

“You should move in here.”

He said it so calmly. Like he was pointing out the weather. Like he had not been waiting weeks to say it. Like he had not already measured the space in his closet, looked up your lease date, and made sure there was room for your books.

You felt your inner committee rise from the dead.

Babe. What the fuck. Five months. Are you actually considering this? What’s wrong with you? Huh?

So you pushed back, but not very well.

“Dex,” you said, looking around his apartment. “We’ve been dating for five months.”

“I know.”

“Moving in would be very quick.”

“I know.”

But would it? You were at his kitchen table in one of his shirts, your papers stacked on his coffee table, your mug in his sink, your shoes by his door. Half your life was already there.

Suddenly, Dex leaned down and kissed you before you could keep arguing.

He did it because he had seen men do it in movies when they wanted to calm the woman they loved. 

That was how affection started with him, really.  He imitated touch. He put a hand on your waist because that was what boyfriends did. He rubbed circles over your hip because that was what loving partners did.

But then you melted under his hands and sighed into his mouth. Your fingers curled lightly into the front of his shirt.

And Dex thought, oh. So that was what it was supposed to feel like.

So after the first time, it no longer felt like pretending. It was no longer fake, no longer a costume he wore to convince you he could be normal.

He liked this. He liked the warmth beneath his palms. Liked the trusting weight of you leaning into him. Liked that touching you made him feel whole.  His thumbs kept moving in slow circles at your hips, more because he wanted to than because he remembered he was supposed to.

“I love you,” he murmured.

You closed your eyes like the words had done exactly what he hoped they would. “Dex…”

“You love me too.”

You laughed softly. “That is a terrible argument.”

“It’s my best one.”

Unfortunately, it was.

You hummed, but you were smiling now, and Dex felt his whole chest go warm.

He kissed you again, a little braver this time, still rubbing those gentle circles into your hips like he had finally found a love language that made sense in his hands.

You sighed, and he smiled against your mouth. It surprised him, even after five months, how much he wanted to be good at this. 

“Okay,” you whispered.

Dex went very still.

You opened your eyes and looked up at him, soft and doomed and already half his. “Okay, baby. I’ll move in.”

—

People got weird when you told them you had moved in with Dex.

Your friends did that careful-smile thing. Your mother went quiet on the phone before saying, “Already?” like the word had three question marks and a police report attached. One coworker just blinked at you over her mug and said, “Wow. That’s… fast.”

You kept giving the same answers. My lease was ending. His place is closer. It makes sense financially. He takes care of me.

Jonathan was the most obvious about it.

You told him in the staff room, after he was complaining about one of his classes committing recorder-based psychological warfare. “I moved in with Dex,” you said, trying to sound casual.

Slowly, he turned around. “Your fed boyfriend?”

“He has a name.”

“Agent Intense?”

“Dex.”

“Right. Your fed boyfriend.” He stared at you. “That’s so fast.”

You sighed. Here we go again. “My lease was ending.”

“You’ve known him for six months.”

“If you count his school outreach, seven actually.”

“That’s not better.”

You crossed your arms, already defensive. “He’s not bad.”

“I didn’t say bad,” he shrugged, “I think more like…  creepy.”

“Jonathan.”

“What? He once looked at me like I was trying to steal you because I offered you a ride home.”

“He’s just protective, that’s all,” you huffed.

“I’m gay.”

“I know that.”

“Does he?”

“He does now,” you said.

“Does he care?”

You opened your mouth and closed it. Because no, Dex didn’t care when you told him. Johnathan was still just another person standing between you and him, platonic or romantic or whatever. Jonathan could have been gay, married, celibate, and allergic to women, and Dex still would have watched him with that flat suspicion the second he stood too close to you.

Jonathan pointed his teaspoon at you. “Exactly.”

Your phone buzzed before you could answer.

Dex: Did you eat lunch?

You smiled and held up the phone like evidence. “See? He’s sweet.”

Jonathan looked at the message, then at you. “Sure,” he said carefully. “Sweet.”

You texted back yes, baby, and when Dex replied within seconds, Jonathan sighed. You ignored him.

After all, Dex cared. That was all.

—

The people who thought the move-in was quick were in for a treat, because one month after you moved into Dex’s apartment, he asked you to marry him in the back seat of his car.

See, you had shown up because summer holidays had made you stupid with missing him. You were bored. You had no school, no library chaos, no children asking where the glitter glue went. Just too much free time and the embarrassing realization that you had become the kind of woman who missed her boyfriend at eleven-thirty in the morning like an addict running out of nicotine patches.

So you brought him lunch and went to his workplace. That was a normal girlfriend thing, right? Except the lunch did not get opened.

Dex had barely gotten the car door shut before you were kissing him, and he had barely made it through the first breath of your mouth before his hand slid under your thigh and dragged you into his lap in the back seat.

“Dex,” you laughed into his mouth.

He made a low and lewd sound into his mouth. Then his hands were on you again, pushing your skirt up around your hips with a little too much force, a little too much need, until the seam gave with an unmistakable rip of fabric.

Dex stared at the torn fabric in his hand with the horrified focus of a man who had committed a federal offence against cotton blend. “I’ll buy you another one.”

“That is not the point,” you chuckled.

“I’ll buy you five.”

You should have been annoyed. But his eyes were black with want, and there was something so obscenely flattering about Benjamin Poindexter accidentally ruining your clothes because he needed you too badly to be careful. So you tightened your fist in his tie and pulled. “Later,” you whispered.

Dex obeyed, because liked it when you pulled him by it. He liked the pressure, the direction, the filthy little reminder that he was still half-dressed for work while you were undoing him in the back of his own car. His mouth opened under yours, hands clamped on your hips like he was trying not to lose the last piece of his mind.

Your inner committee, exhausted from the moving-in situation and still technically on unpaid leave, attempted to return to service.

Babe. This is his workplace. This is a federal garage.

Babe, your skirt is ripped.

Babe, we cannot keep replacing clothes every time this man gets horny and emotional.

Then Dex kissed down your throat and the committee immediately lost quorum.

By the time you were done and either of you remembered he had to go back inside, the windows were fogged at the edges. His hair was ruined from your hands. His tie was loose and crooked. His shirt was open at the collar, your lipstick low enough on his skin that he would need to button all the way up and pray no one noticed. His mouth was swollen. 

You sat in his lap, skirt torn and shoved badly back into place, one hand still looped lazily around his tie. “You have to go back in,” you whispered.

His forehead rested against yours. “I know.”

“You look…”

His eyes lifted to yours.

You smiled. “Compromised.”

Dex’s mouth twitched. His thumbs moved on your thighs, circling through the thin fabric of your ruined skirt.

You tugged his tie gently. “I should let you go.”

His hands tightened, only barely.

“Marry me,” he said suddenly, as if he would die if he let you leave without saying it first.

For a second, you just stared at him. Somewhere inside your head, your inner committee walked back into the room, saw the situation, and immediately considered retiring.

Babe, no. Babe, absolutely not. Babe, stand up for yourself!

“What?” you managed to choke out.

“Marry me,” Dex calmly, like the idea had been sitting in him for weeks, waiting for the right opening, and apparently the right opening was you flushed and breathless in his back seat. 

“Dex.”

“I love you.”

Oh, for fuck’s sake. Your inner committee sighed so hard the lights flickered.

“I love you,” he said again, quieter. “You love me. We already live together. It gives you legal protection. If something happens to me, you’re taken care of. If something happens to you, they call me first.”

“You are making a case,” you realised, though you shouldn't have been surprised.

He just shrugged. “I don’t see why we shouldn’t get married.”

There it was, the simple Dex logic of it: I love you. You love me. Why wouldn’t we?

It was reasonable if you ignored the fact that he was clearly halfway to losing his mind and had probably been planning this long before he said it out loud. Because sure, the practical reasons were true. But underneath all that, there was the darker, sweeter logic he kept tucked behind his teeth: If you were only his girlfriend, you could change your mind. You could wake up one morning, decide he was too much, pack a bag, and walk out before he had time to kiss you and remind you how gentle he could be when he was trying. A girlfriend could leave in one terrible conversation. A wife had to take steps.

And Dex loved steps. You’d have to go through lawyers, papers, and waiting periods. A marriage would buy him time, and time meant he could come to you, he could hold your face, and remind you that you loved him as much as he loved you. He would never hurt. But if the law could slow you down long enough for him to convince you that leaving was a mistake, Dex couldn’t help loving that, too.

He didn’t say that, though. He only looked at you with his hair mussed and his mouth ruined and said, “It makes sense.”

Your inner committee made one last brave attempt: Babe. Please. We JUST moved in.

But you banged the gavel at the head of your imaginary table and pouted. But look at him! He’s so hot! 

In the real world, Dex was looking at you like you were already his wife, like the ring was only a formality. Then he kissed you, tenderly this time.

“I love you,” he murmured against your mouth.

The committee dropped their clipboard. Fine, you win, they seemed to say, Whatever you say, handsome.

You laughed weakly into the kiss, and Dex pulled back just enough to look at you.

“What?”

You touched his face, thumb brushing over his cheekbone, and felt him lean into it like affection was still new enough to surprise him.

“Yes,” you whispered, hand tightening in his tie. “Yes, baby. I’ll marry you.”

For a second, he looked almost scared by how happy it made him. Then his arms locked around your waist and pulled you close, his face turning into your neck, breath hot and uneven against your skin.

“But you really do have to go back inside,” you whispered with a chuckle.

Dex lifted his head. He looked ruined, happy, and possessive in a way that should have made you run but somehow only made you kiss him again. “I have ten more minutes.”

You giggled and pulled him in by the tie.

Your inner committee walked directly into the sea, never to be seen again.

—

Dex let you pick the rings.

The engagement ring first, because he said you were the one wearing it, so you should love it. Then the wedding bands, including his, even though he tried to act like he didn’t care what his looked like. That lasted until you slid a simple band onto his finger in the shop and watched his whole face go still, almost overwhelmed.

A month later, you married him at the courthouse.

It was too soon for anyone around you to feel truly comfortable about it. Your family came anyway. Your friends came anyway. Even Jonathan, looking like he had accepted his role as the last remaining voice of reason, and still failing anyway. On Dex’s side, there was a couple of coworkers standing near the back in neat suits, polite and reserved, present more like witnesses than family.

Dex had no parents, no siblings, no cousins, no childhood friends with embarrassing stories. No one who could say they had known him when he was young. No one who could reassure your parents he was a good person through and through. Just coworkers, Ray congratulating him as the rest of his coworkers stood on the courthouse hallway while your side filled the room with nervous affection and badly hidden concern.

You saw the way your mother looked at him. The way your friends glanced at one another when they realised there was no one on his side who really belonged to him. It made them uneasy, and because you loved him, you rushed to explain it in your head before anyone even asked. His parents were dead. He grew up alone. It was complicated. He didn't have people the way other people had people.

You said little pieces of that aloud, as if it explained half of it away. Maybe to you, it did. Maybe that was a teeny part of the reason you kept choosing him. Dex had no one, and then he had you. But it was also tender, in its own damaged way. He stood across the room in his suit, eyes finding you every few seconds as if checking that you were still real, still walking toward him eventually. He looked alone until he looked at you.

The problem was not that Dex didn't love you. Anyone with eyes could see that he clearly did. That was half the horror, really. 

He loved you devoutly, too much for such a small courthouse. His attention followed you like a sniper scope. When someone hugged you, his eyes moved there. When Jonathan made you laugh, his face soured. When you looked at him, though, everything in him relaxed so completely that even your worried friends had to see it.

The ceremony itself was almost absurdly short, just a few legal words. A few signatures. Then came the ring that he slid on to your finger with a reverence that made your throat ache. His thumb lingered over the band once it was in place, brushing the metal like proof, like possession he was trying very hard to make gentle.

Your family saw it. Your friends saw it. Ray probably saw it too. But no one said anything anymore. They had tried to warn you. They had tried to tell you it was fast, intense, worrying. They had tried to point out all the red flags. But standing there, with Dex looking at your ring like the world had finally given him permission to keep the one good thing he had found, you knew why none of their warnings had worked.

Because you knew they were not entirely wrong. You just loved him anyway.

When Dex kissed you, it was gentle enough to make your mother cry. His hand came to your cheek, and his mouth touched yours like he was afraid of doing it wrong in front of everyone. But you felt the restraint beneath it, the hunger and devotion. The way he kissed you softly because that was what you deserved, even when every dark part of him wanted to hold on harder and bruise and mark his territory.

—

Two years later, Dex was in prison.

Jonathan tried not to say I told you so. To his credit, he really did try. He stood in your apartment after everything went public, arms folded too tightly, mouth pressed into a line while the news tore the FBI corruption apart in digestible pieces. Even family and friends looked at you like this was the ending they had feared from the start.

But you knew better.

Not because Dex was innocent. He wasn’t. You loved him too much to lie about that. He had done terrible things. There were parts of him that had always been hungry for direction, always been too easy for the wrong man to use.

And Fisk had used him perfectly.He had found every fracture in Dex and pressed his thumb into it. The instability, the need to be useful. The desperate, obsessive love Dex had for you. 

Fisk kept you in a basement beneath one of his shell properties and let the world mourn you.

That was the cruelty of it: Fisk did not need you dead. Dead was final. Dead meant there was nothing left to use. But alive, hidden in a cold and windowless place? That made you useful. That made you leverage. Fisk could keep your body locked away while giving Dex a grief designed to break him.

So Fisk staged your death. He built the lie piece by piece. He staged an accident, a fire. The reports say that the body burned beyond recognition was yours, and even had an urn with someone else’s ashes in it with your paperwork attached just in case people started asking questions.

Dex believed it, because why wouldn’t he? Fisk made sure every piece fit. Even Matt believed it for a while. Everyone did.

So when Dex found it, he carried the urn like it was alive. He thought he figured out that Fisk was manipulating him, which was correct. He thought that Fisk had killed you, which was false.

He put the ashes in the passenger seat. He drove to the hotel with one hand on the wheel and the other reaching over sometimes, hovering near the metal like it might feel lonely. He talked to it in that broken voice of his, the one he would have been humiliated for anyone living to hear. He told the urn things. He apologised. He told you he loved you.

Then Dex’s spine broke.

And you were found by the cops shortly after, alive. Bruised, starved, shaking under a blanket in the basement Fisk had buried you in, still asking for Dex before your voice had fully come back.

So when they told you he went into surgery under guard, he had fought your way into that hospital room on the only ground no one could deny: you were his wife, his next of kin, his legal family. You should be allowed in, and you eventually got what you wanted. 

During recovery, he looked wrong under hospital lights. The tubes and monitors and bandages made him look less like the terrifying thing the news kept replaying. Guards stood by the door. His wrists were shackled to the bed rails, his ankles too. You scoffed at that but couldn’t do anything about it, really. 

When his eyes opened, he came back fighting. His hands jerked against the restraints, chains snapping taut with a hard metal sound that made one of the guards shift forward.

“Don’t,” you said quickly. “Dex, don’t.”

His head turned and saw you. Suddenly, thoughts halted to a stop.

You had seen Dex angry. Jealous. Focused. You had seen him desperate in your bed and gentle in your kitchen. You had seen him worshipful, frightening, almost boyish with love.

You had never seen him look like that. Like he was staring at a ghost and trying to decide whether believing in it would kill him.

His mouth parted, but sound came out.

You stepped closer, hands trembling. “Hi, baby.”

Dex’s breath broke. “You’re alive.”

Your chest caved in. “yeah.”

“No.” His voice cracked in disbelief. “No, I saw— Fisk said—”

“I know.”

“You’re alive,” he said again, louder now, almost frantic. “You’re alive. You’re alive.”

“I’m here.”

The chains snapped tight again when he tried to reach for you. Pain tore across his nerves, but he barely seemed to feel it. His eyes stayed locked on yours,wild and terrified, like if he looked away, you would vanish and the whole nightmare would become true again.

“I thought you were dead,” he whispered.

“I know, baby.”

You moved to him before anyone could stop you. Your fingers found his hand where the shackle allowed, careful around the bruised skin. His grip closed around yours instantly, weak but desperate, like even broken he could not help trying to hold on.

Your wedding ring caught the light. It was a reminder that he was still yours, you were still his, and whatever was left of him seemed to collapse under the proof.

“You’re alive.”

—

Dex was incarcerated after he healed enough to be moved.

Not rehabilitated. Not treated. Incarcerated.

They put him in solitary confinement like that could contain him. Like isolation would ever make him better. Like locking him away from voices and faces and human contact would somehow fix a man whose worst injuries had always come from being left alone too long with his own head.

You hated it. So for three years, you fought to get your husband moved somewhere that might actually help him.

Three years of forms, lawyers, psychiatric evaluations, and rejected petitions. Three years of people looking at Benjamin Poindexter and seeing only what he had done, three years of people looking at you, Mrs. Poindexter, as if you were insane because you still loved him. Three years of explaining, again and again, that solitary confinement was not treatment. And Dex had always been dangerous when he was quiet.

Your old school library job no longer paid enough to carry the life Fisk had torn apart, so you took a better job at a public library. It's a better salary, but longer hours. More responsibility. You now had to think about staff rotas, community programmes, council meetings, difficult patrons, funding cuts, late nights under fluorescent lights while you built displays and answered emails with your wedding ring flashing every time your hands crossed the keyboard.

Every other day, you went to the prison.

Sometimes straight from work, your blazer wrinkled, your tote bag full of library paperwork, your lipstick faded from too many cups of coffee. Sometimes on your days off, when you could pretend the visit was the centre of the day instead of an activity squeezed between legal calls and grocery shopping and a life you had never wanted to live without him in it.

Dex always noticed when you were tired before you said it. He noticed when your shoes were new. He noticed when you had cut your hair, even slightly. He noticed when you had skipped lunch and lied about it. Even in prison uniform, even under the dead light of the visiting room, Dex was still your husband in all the ways that made people uncomfortable and all the ways that kept you coming back.

You told him about your days. You told him about the elderly man who came into the library every Wednesday to read the newspaper and complain about the chairs. The little girl who asked for “a book with a dragon but not a mean dragon because mean dragons have bad vibes.” The teenager who pretended not to care about poetry and then checked out three collections when his friends were not looking. You told him about staff meetings, leaky ceilings, broken printers, new shelving systems.

There were visits where he barely spoke. But even then, his eyes stayed on you. Even then, his fingers moved toward yours. Even then, when you said, “Baby,” parts of him came back to the surface.

You kept fighting because he needed help.

Then one afternoon, after three years of pushing against walls that did not move, one finally gave. The blip, after all, freed some space up. Though you really shouldn't celebrate such a tragedy, it was hard to ignore the fact that this time, it worked in your favor. That day, you carried the news into the visiting room.

His eyes moved over your face, your hands, the folder tucked beneath your arm. “What’s that?” he asked.

You smiled, biting your lip, “I have good news.”

You reached across the table. This time, they let you hold his hand. It was a small mercy. His fingers closed around yours immediately, like he could feel the tremor in you and wanted to steady it without frightening it away.

“A facility we applied to reviewed your case,” you said. “It’s looking good. The transfer is pending final approval.”

Dex didn’t move. You kept going before fear could steal the words from you.

“It’s a secure psychiatric institution. It’s not freedom, I know that. But it’s not solitary. You’d have doctors, actual treatment, scheduled therapy, medication reviews. You wouldn’t be in shackles.”

His face remained controlled, but you knew him too well. You saw the tiny shift in his breathing. 

“It’s going to be better,” you whispered. “Okay? Not perfect. Not easy. But better. You won’t be alone in a box, and we get longer visitation hours, okay?”

Dex was quiet for a long moment. Then he nodded once. “That’s good.”

Your laugh came out broken, because part of you still found that endearing. “That’s good? That’s all you have?”

His mouth almost softened, guilty at the thought of offending you. “It’s very good,” he amended.

You squeezed his hand, and for one rare second, the visiting room didn’t feel quite so much like a cage. It felt like a door opening somewhere far away.Then Dex looked up again. “But I hope my request gets approved before I get moved.”

“Request?” You blinked. “For what?”

He held your gaze with the seriousness of a man discussing nothing more important than bills. “A conjugal visit.”

For a moment, your mind simply stopped. “What?”

“A conjugal visit,” he repeated, as if you might not have heard him the first time.

You stared at him. Of course he had thought of that.

In three years of legal petitions, medical reviews, prison visits, and fighting to have him treated like a person instead of a weapon, you had somehow not allowed yourself to think about that part. About being his wife in that way still. About how long it had been since he had touched you without guards and tables and rules between you. Dex had, though.

“Dex,” you said softly, rubbing slow circles on his hand.

“What?”

“You are in solitary confinement.”

“I know.”

“You’re probably not getting approved for a conjugal visit.”

“Probably not.”

His expression didn't change, but he squeezed your hand and your stomach turned over despite yourself. You leaned forward as much as the table allowed. The guard near the door shifted, but you ignored him. You kissed the edge of Dex’s mouth, brief and soft, but still enough to make his breath catch.

“Let’s focus on this, yeah?” you whispered.

His eyes stayed on yours. For a second, the hunger in him quieted, almost obedient. He nodded once. “Okay.”

Your hand stayed in his until the guard told you time was up. Dex didn’t let go until he had to.

—

He got approved. Somehow, Benjamin Poindexter got approved for a conjugal visit.

You read the notice three times in your kitchen, work bag sliding off your shoulder, lanyard still around your neck, your shoes aching from a long day on your feet. The letter was painfully plain and administrative. But it was approved nonetheless.

You stared at it until the paper blurred. “What the fuck?” you whispered.

Because there was no way. There was no reasonable, lawful way that your husband, a convicted killer, a high-risk prisoner, had been granted that kind of access.

You knew then that Dex had done something. Nothing obvious enough to get the request pulled. He might have threatened a guard. Maybe Dex had mentioned a name, a detail, some small piece of information he shouldn’t have known and let them do the rest.

You should have been horrified. Mostly, though, you pressed the paper to your mouth and laughed once, breathless and disbelieving, because all you could think was: That’s how badly he wanted me. That’s how much he loves me.

—

When the day came, you waited in the room alone.

You had done the paperwork, gone through twenty locked doors to get here. You came knowing you had a couple of hours with your husband. And for the first time in three years, there would be no table between you, no visitor chair bolted too far from his. No guards close enough to hear every word. No one telling you not to lean too far across the table when all you wanted was to touch his face.

A couple of hours was not enough. 

You smoothed your hands over your blouse, then over your skirt, then clasped them together in your lap to make yourself stop fidgeting. You had dressed too carefully without really thinking about it. You had a white blouse, a nice skirt, because Dex liked seeing you in skirts. You were wearing the cardigan you were wearing when you met him.

You stared at your wedding ring until Dex stepped inside. For a second, neither of you moved.

He looked different. That was your first thought, blunt and stupid and immediate. He looked different, because of course he did. Years had happened. Prison had happened. Surgery had happened. His hair was shorter. His jaw looked sharper. But he was also bigger.

You noticed from your previous visits, of course, but seeing him a bit closer now, it was evident. His shoulders filled out the plain prison shirt. His arms looked stronger than they had in the hospital, muscle sitting heavy under institutional fabric, like all the recovery and physical therapy and whatever routines they let him have had made him sturdier.

You blinked before you could stop yourself. What were they feeding him?

Dex’s eyes found your face first, gaze locked onto you. For one fragile second he did not look like a prisoner at all.

He looked like Dex. Your Dex. Your husband, seeing you after being forced to miss you for too long.

“Hi,” you whispered.

His mouth parted slightly. When the door closed behind him, the lock turned, and whatever restraint he had used to walk in there like a normal person vanished.

You barely got to stand before his hands were on your face and yours were on his chest, and the first kiss was so clumsy it almost made you laugh. Your noses bumped. His mouth missed yours by half an inch and caught the corner instead. You made a tiny sound, half sob and half laugh, and Dex froze like he had done something wrong.

“No,” you said quickly, already smiling through the sting in your eyes. “No, come here.”

You took his face in both hands and kissed him properly, softly at first. Then again. And again.

These were little, ridiculous kisses. The kind you had imagined giving him in every prison visit where a guard stood too close. You kissed his mouth, the corner of it, his cheek. You kissed the line beside his nose, the skin under his eye, the edge of his mouth again.

Dex stood there and let you love him, as if he couldn’t believe you still did at all.

His hands stayed at your waist, almost uncertain, like after all this time he still didn’t fully trust that he was allowed to hold you without someone telling him to stop. But the longer you kissed him, the more his fingers settled. The more his body leaned into yours. The more the tension in his shoulders slowly started to melt.

“I missed you,” you said between kisses.

Dex’s eyes closed. “I missed you, too.”

“I missed you so much.”

“I know.”

“No, you don’t.” You kissed his cheek again, because apparently now that you had started you couldn't stop. “I missed you in the kitchen. I missed you in our bed. I missed you when I had to fix the shelf myself because you would have been so annoying about doing it better.”

His mouth twitched. “You fixed a shelf?” he asked.

“I tried to.”

His eyes opened with attentive focus you had missed so badly. “What happened?”

“It’s currently leaning.”

Dex stared at you, then he laughed. It wasn’t loudly, or freely. It was small, rough, and almost startled, like his body had forgotten how to make the sound and needed you to remind it. 

You broke a little. “Oh,” you whispered, smiling like an idiot. “There you are.”

His expression changed before he leaned in and kissed you again, not clumsy this time. A kiss that said yes, here, I’m here, I came back up when you called.

His arms moved around you properly then, and fuck, he was solid.

You had expected him to feel fragile, because part of you still remembered the hospital bed, the shackles, the bruised skin around his wrists after surgery. But this Dex was heavy and strong under your hands. When your palms slid over his shoulders, you felt muscle there making your stomach drop and go hot at the same time.

Still, he stayed sweet for a little while.

You had both expected the hunger. But before that, there was Dex touching your hair like he had thought about the texture of it more than once. There was you smoothing your thumb over his cheekbone, relearning him up close. There was him pressing his face into the side of your neck and breathing in once like he had been living on memory for years and memory had never been enough.

“I missed how you smell,” he said, voice muffled against your skin.

You laughed. “That’s creepy,” you said, but smiled into his hair anyway.

Your fingers drifted to the back of his neck, then lower, over the ridge of his shoulder. You felt him shiver when your touch found the edge of the scar beneath his shirt. You paused, but he shook his head against you. “It’s okay.”

So you kept touching him gently. Through the fabric first, then at the collar where your fingers could slip just beneath. The scar was there, and Dex’s breathing changed when you traced it. Not with pain, exactly. It felt more… intimate.

“My baby,” you whispered before you could stop yourself.

His hand flexed at your hip. This time, when his mouth opened under yours, the sweetness warmed.His body crowded yours a little more. His hands moved from your waist to your back, then down again.

“You got…” You swallowed, then laughed softly because there was no graceful way to say it. “You got big.”

Dex blinked. For half a second, he looked genuinely confused. Then his eyes dropped to where your hands were spread over his chest. “Big?”

“You know what I mean.”

“I had physical therapy.”

“That is a criminal understatement.”

His mouth twitched again as you dragged your palms over his shoulders, shameless now, because you had earned this. You had earned the right to be stupid about your husband’s arms after three years of prison visits and legal calls and sleeping alone.

“You’re very…” You squeezed his bicep lightly. “Recovered.”

Dex looked at you. “You’re flirting with me.”

You shrugged, but didn’t deny it.

The sound he made was almost an arrogant chuckle.

He kissed you again, and this time there was no mistaking the heat under it. Then, his hands settled on your blouse.

Not grabbing yet, but touching the fabric at your waist, thumbs moving slowly over the buttons as if he had only just realised there was something between his hands and your skin.

You were still smiling when his eyes dropped.

Suddenly, his eyes were fixed on the small gap where one button had loosened, where the fabric had shifted just enough to reveal a flash of black lace underneath.

Dex recognised it at the same time you remembered. “Is that…”

Your face burned hot as you nodded.

It was the black teddy he had bought you for your first wedding anniversary.It was sheer lace at the cups, delicate straps, a low satin-trimmed neckline. Dex remembered the first time you tried it on. You stood at the foot of your bed, pretending not to be shy, while he sat there ruined, looking at you like his brain had briefly stopped receiving oxygen. And now, you had worn it here.

Dex’s thumb brushed the edge of your blouse, right where black lace disappeared beneath it. His eyes darkened. “You wore my anniversary gift under your blouse,” he said.

Your stomach flipped. “When you say it like that—”

“How should I say it?” He demanded, and it was a little mean. But that always did turn you on.

“I don’t know,” you whispered. “Less like you’re about to lose your mind.”

Dex looked back up at you, too focused, too hungry. “I am.”

Oh.

Your hands tightened in his shirt.

The room felt smaller after that, less like a prison facility and more like the bedroom he remembered, the one with your knees pressed into the mattress and his hands shaking at your waist because he hadn’t known a piece of lace could make wanting feel that violent.

His grip settled firmer on your hips. “You have no idea,” he murmured, mouth brushing your ear. “What you do to me.”

Your eyes fluttered shut. There he was. Your husband, touch-starved, breathing against your neck like he had waited years to find out if he could still make you tremble.

You smiled, kind and doomed all the same. “Show me.”

Oh, he had a list.

Dex was undressed before you could blink, all broad shoulders and blown pupils, moving with a focused urgency that made the sterile little room feel suddenly too small to hold him. The white walls, the bolted table, the narrow bed, the chemical-clean smell of the sheets, and none of it stood a chance against the way he looked at you.

He had been counting down to this for years. Every prison visit, every supervised touch, every night alone in a cell had led into this exact moment.

His hands were already on your blouse, quick but not careless, tearing through buttons, ripping them off with a precision that would have been funny if his breathing had not been so rough. The black teddy appeared inch by inch beneath the fabric, lace and satin and memory, and Dex looked ruined. 

First on the list: his mouth between your legs.

You understood that the second he dropped to his knees. Dex had barely gotten the teddy off before his hands were already under your skirt, gripping your thighs.

Then his mouth was on you, and every thought in your head broke apart.

“Oh,” you gasped, one hand flying to his hair, the other twisting in the clean white sheet beneath you.

Dex made a sound against you that was almost a groan, almost a laugh. His hands tightened on your thighs, holding you open for him, keeping you there like he was afraid you might disappear if he let go. He was not gentle, like he used to be. He was focused, hungry, and touch-starved enough that every reaction you gave him seemed to make him worse.

“Fuck,” he breathed against you, voice rough and ruined. “You taste so fucking sweet.”

Your whole body went hot. “Dex—”

He didn’t let you finish. His mouth returned to you, and the room became nothing but the wet heat of him, the harsh sound of his breathing, the narrow bed creaking under the way your hips moved despite yourself. The sterile little room had no right to hold something this filthy. 

He was still so good, it was unfair.

Dex had always been terrifying when he focused. When he learned something, he learned it completely. And you realised, breathless and shaking, that he remembered everything. Every place that made you gasp. Every rhythm that made your hand tighten in his hair. Every tiny, helpless sound you tried to swallow and failed.

You tried to move back once, overwhelmed, but his hands slid under you and dragged you closer with a low, possessive sound that made your stomach twist.

“No,” he murmured. “Stay.”

So you stayed while he buried himself there like he could spend hours between your thighs if time were not an issue. You stayed while his fingers dug into your skin, while his mouth made you forget the guards outside, the transfer, the years, the ugly world that had kept him from you. You stayed while he took you apart with the kind of devotion that felt less like softness and more like obsession given a mouth.

At some point, you said his name too loudly, and Dex groaned like that was the point.

Of course he wanted them to hear. Of course he wanted the men outside that locked door to know that whatever they thought they had taken from him was still his. You were still his. 

When you finally broke, Dex did not stop right away.

He held you through it palms spread over your thighs, breathing you in like the end of the world had tasted sweet and he couldn’t make himself pull away.

Only when you tugged weakly at his hair did he lift his head.

Dex looked up at you like he had just crossed the first thing off a list and still had every intention of finishing the rest.

Number two on the list should have been obvious when he suddenly looked shy. 

“Can I ask you something?” he murmured.

Your breath was still uneven. “Dex.”

His mouth pressed briefly to the inside of your knee, like he needed one more second to gather himself. “I want your mouth.”

Oh.

Your stomach flipped so hard you almost laughed. Who were you to deny this man anything? 

You slid off the bed and onto your knees in front of him, and Dex went very still.

His hand came to your cheek, careful at first, thumb brushing your skin like he needed to touch you gently before letting himself want. His breathing changed when you looked up at him. His pupils were blown wide enough to make him look almost feverish.

“Baby,” he said, voice rough.

You smiled before giving him what he asked for.

Dex’s hand stayed in your hair, not forcing, not taking. His head tipped back. His throat worked. His eyes squeezed shut and opened again because he seemed to hate missing even one second of you.

He was big in every way you remembered and worse because you had missed him.

Too much, almost. Overwhelming enough to make your eyes water, enough to make your hands press at his thighs when you needed a second, and Dex stopped immediately each time.

His hand softened in your hair. “Too much?” he rasped.

You shook your head, breathless, stubborn, and a little ruined yourself.

Dex looked like that might kill him. Then you kept going, and he fell apart beautifully.

He moaned your name like a warning, like a plea. His hand stayed on your cheek against your cheek, his thumb brushing away the wetness at the corner of your eye with such tenderness that the gesture felt obscene in context.

“You’re perfect,” he whispered, voice breaking. “Fuck, you’re perfect.”

You felt him getting close, and you wanted nothing more than feeling him down your throat, but he pulled back, stopping himself so abruptly you almost protested.

Dex stared down at you, chest heaving, eyes wild, mouth parted like he had just survived something.

You blinked up at him.

He gave a rough little laugh, almost pained. “No,” he said, voice hoarse. “Not yet.”

You smiled slowly. “Not yet?”

His gaze darkened again. He reached down, thumb brushing your lower lip, still shaking from the effort of denying himself.

“I have two more things on the list,” he reminded you, making your thighs pressed together.

Dex helped you back onto your feet with hands that weren’t quite steady, then kissed you so deeply you tasted the restraint he had forced himself to keep.

“Bed,” he murmured against your mouth.

Number three on the list was taking you from behind, of course. 

He turned you toward the bed with hands that were still shaking his mouth at your shoulder, your neck, the back of your ear. 

He moved slowly at first, because even like this, rough and ruined and half-mad with missing you, Dex was still Dex. He still listened to every breath, every shift of your body, every little sound that told him whether you were overwhelmed or wanting more. The stretch of him made your hands fist in the sheet, your body tensing around the sheer shock of having him again after so long without. His mouth pressed to your shoulder. “Breathe,” he rasped. “I’ve got you.”

He took his time even though you could feel restraint burning through him. The way he cursed softly against your skin when you finally relaxed into him, when your body remembered him properly and pulled him closer.

“Fuck,” he breathed, voice breaking. “You’re so—”

He cut himself off with his mouth against your shoulder, like the words were too much, like saying them would make him less controlled than he already was.

Then he started moving. God, he hadn’t forgotten you, so of course you were loud almost immediately.

The first sound broke out of you before you could stop it, your whole face burning. Dex’s hand tightened at your hip, and the next lewd mewl came worse. He made a low sound behind you, smug and satisfied in a way that made heat crawl up your spine.

You bit down on your own wrist, trying to muffle yourself.

His hand slid up your body and gently pulled your arm away. “No,” he said, voice rough. “I waited three years to hear you.”

Your whole body went hot. “Dex—”

“Let me hear you.”

And then he made sure you did.

He got rougher, hungrier. His body covered yours, his mouth dragging over your neck while his hands held you exactly where he wanted you. The bed creaked under you. The sheet twisted beneath your fists. Your voice filled the room because he kept pulling it out of you, again and again.

At some point, there was a knock on the door, but unfortunately Dex didn’t have enough self control to stop.

You looked over your shoulder, cheek pressed flush into the sheets.

The little window opened and a guard looked in. They were worried, you realised. You had been so fucking loud.

The humiliation should have swallowed you whole. Instead, your stomach flipped.

“You okay?” the guard called. 

You could barely speak. “Hmmph, Y-yes!” you managed.

Dex’s hand slid over your stomach, keeping you pressed back against him.

The guard moved away when he realised what he was seeing, face red.

The second the shadow disappeared, Dex’s mouth was at your ear. “You liked that.”

You shivered.

“You liked him checking,” he murmured, darker now. “Liked him hearing what I do to you.”

You should have denied it, but you could not bring yourself to lie, Dex made a rough, broken sound against your neck and moved again, deeper into the heat, rougher now because he was jealous, because some stranger had seen even a glimpse of your face like that and Dex couldn’t stand it. He kissed your shoulder hard and held you like he could erase the guard’s eyes from the room by making you forget anything existed except him.

“Mine,” he breathed. 

You answered with his name, exactly how he wanted it.

Number four on the list started with him denying you an orgasm.

That was how you knew prison had changed him.The old Dex, the one who melted when you praised him, the one who went doe-eyed and obedient under your hands, had been buried under three of whatever this was.

Dex flipped you over before you could come undone.

Your gasp broke against his mouth as your back hit the narrow mattress, the white sheet twisted beneath you, your body sore in the best, most aching way. You were already too close and he knew it. Of course he knew it. He knew your body like he had studied it for a test he refused to fail.

“Not yet,” he murmured.

You made a helpless little sound, half protest, half plea. Dex’s hand slid up your waist, and he was inside you again in no time. 

Oh. you realised, he wanted to look at you when you came. That was all. So sweet. So cute. 

But then you felt him twitch, and you realised that he was close before he did. Or maybe he knew, and he was just too far gone to care about anything else.

“Dex—” Your voice caught. “Dex, I’m not— fuck, I’m not on birth control.”

He didn’t stop completely. His whole body stuttered above yours, rhythm faltering, breath punching out of him like you had hit him in the chest.

“Hmph—fuck.” His forehead dropped against yours. “I know.”

Your eyes snapped open. “You know?”

His hand slid over your stomach, possessive, and the sound that left him was almost pained.

“I know,” he said again, rougher. “I know, baby.”

The words should have sobered you, but you loved him, and you loved that he was still above you, still shaking, still so close you could feel every tremor of restraint tearing through him.

“Dex,” you gasped.

“I thought about it,” he said, voice low and wrecked. “Every night.”

Your body went hot. His hand pressed a little firmer over your stomach, not forcing, just holding there like the thought had been living in him for years.

“You in our apartment,” he murmured, words breaking between breathless little sounds. “My wife, wearing my old shirts. Sleeping alone. Fighting for me. Sitting across from lawyers and doctors while I sit in a– hmmphh— a fuckin’ box.”

“Baby—”

“And all I could think was… fuck—all I could think was I should have left you something.”

Your breath caught so hard it almost hurt.

A baby, he meant.

A living tether. Something that would tie you to him in a way no prison door, no court order, no transfer file could undo. And sure, if you were going to leave him, you would have done it already. No court in the world would blame you for divorcing a killer. No friend, no family member, no sane person would call you cruel for walking away.

But you stayed. And fuck, somehow, staying was still not enough for Dex. He needed proof that some part of him could still belong to you permanently. 

In his mind, twisted and tender as it was, this was not a trap. It was a gift.

His eyes locked on yours, blown dark and terrifyingly attentive even through the haze.

His mouth was against yours, then your jaw, then your throat, never settling anywhere long enough to be gentle. He kept touching you like he could not decide what he needed more: your face, your waist, your hips, the heat of your body. 

“You feel that?” he rasped, voice wrecked as you squeezed him a little. “How bad you want it?”

You did want it, but you could barely answer. Every breath came out wrong, caught somewhere between a moan and his name. Your thoughts had gone useless, scattered apart by the obscene tenderness of his palm resting low and possessive like he was already imagining the seed taking root there.

“Dex—” you sighed, trying to bury your face in his ned

“No, baby.” His mouth brushed your ear, rough and hot, as he pulled your hair back gently to look into your eyes. “Don’t get… shit— shy now. Not after that. N-not after the sounds you’ve been making ‘f me.”

Your face burned, but your hands only tightened on him.

His voice dropped lower, filthier, the words breaking between harsh breaths. “My pretty girl wants something from me, huh?”

Your whole body went hot.

Dex’s palm pressed a little firmer over your stomach. “S-she wants me to leave her with something.” His breath hitched, and for a second his voice almost failed him. “Wants to walk out of here carrying more than m-my… hmm— fingerprints.”

You made a helpless sound.

“There it is,” he murmured. “You like that, fuck! You like thinking about it.”

“Dex-please—”

“Yeah?” His mouth found yours, messy and desperate, before he pulled back just enough to look at you. His pupils were blown wide, his face flushed, his control hanging by a thread he was clearly ready to let snap. “My pretty girl wants my baby, huh?”

Your breath caught so hard it hurt.

Dex saw it the way your body answered before your mouth could.

His face changed, hunger folding into something sickly sweet, almost tender in the worst possible way. “Fuck,” he whispered. “You do.”

Your eyes stung.

You hated and loved how well he knew you all the same.

“Wants something of mine when they t-take me back,” he breathed, mouth dragging along your cheek. “Something they c-can’t put in a cell. Something that— hnghhh — still has me in it.”

You were shaking now, overwhelmed and aching and so far gone that language felt like a thing happening on another planet. Dex was talking to you like he knew exactly where every dark little want lived under your skin, like he had spent three years locked away with nothing but the memory of you and all the ways he wanted to make himself permanent.

“Say it,” he murmured.

You couldn’t, not properly. Dex’s eyes darkened further.

“C-can’t even talk,” he whispered. “That’s okay. I know you.” His thumb moved slowly over your skin. “I know what my wife wants.”

Your breath broke.

His forehead pressed to yours, and for one second, under all that hunger, he was shaking with the effort to hold himself back.

“But you gotta tell me,” he said, voice raw. “Tell me no and I’ll stop.”

The restraint from him was phenomenal. Your hands slid up to his face, holding him there, forcing him to look at you while you gave him the answer.

“D-don’t you fucking dare stop,” you whispered.

“Yeah?” he asked, like he needed it again, like one yes was not enough to survive on.

“Yes–Fuck! Yes, baby.”

His mouth crashed back to yours, swallowing the rest of your answer, and the room disappeared into heat and the terrible intimacy of choosing this with him. His hand stayed over your stomach the whole time, almost reverent, like the fantasy had become real the second you let him have it.

He kept talking against your mouth, the words coming apart as badly as he was.

How good you were. How much he had missed you. How he had thought about you every night. How he wanted to leave something behind. How you would be going home with him in a way no guard could take from you.

You clung to him through it, nails catching on his shoulders, then his back, then the scar along his spine. Dex shuddered when you touched it, a broken sound leaving him before he buried his face against your neck and held you closer, closer, closer, like he could press three lost years into the space between your bodies and make them disappear.

When he finally came with you, he did it with your name on his mouth and his eyes fixed on yours, like he needed you to see every second of what he was giving you.

His forehead dropped to yours afterward, both of you breathing too hard.

For a while, neither of you spoke. The guards outside were silent. The room was wrecked in small damning ways: twisted sheets, scattered clothes, your blouse half on the floor, the black lace halfway off the bed.  

Dex kissed your cheek. Then your jaw. Then the corner of your mouth.“I missed you,” he whispered, and this time it sounded almost broken.

You closed your eyes and held him there. “I missed you, too.”

—

The knock came fifteen minutes later, and you hated it. “Poindexter,” a guard called, “Time.”

Dex was still against you, face buried in your neck, one arm locked around your waist like pretending not to hear it might make the door stay shut. For a second, neither of you moved. His breathing was still uneven against your skin, and your fingers were still in his hair, and the narrow bed beneath you looked absolutely ruined.

Another knock. You touched the back of his neck. “Baby.”

“I know.”

He didn’t sound like he knew. He sounded like leaving you there might kill him.

You both moved in a rush after that, half-dressed and breathless, trying to put yourselves back together before the guards came in. The sheet was twisted. Your skirt was crooked. Your blouse was missing buttons because Dex had been too impatient, so you had to clutch the fabric closed with both hands while smiling like an idiot anyway.

Then the guards stepped in. One of them looked at the bed, then at you, then at Dex. His face went carefully blank.

“Hands,” he said.

You stepped forward before Dex could turn around.

The guard sighed. “Ma’am—”

“One second,” you said.

Dex bent instantly, like he had been waiting for permission. You kissed him once. Then again. Then to his nose, because one kiss was not enough and never would be.

“I love you,” you whispered.

He looked like he might cry. “I love you, too”

Then they cuffed him.

You hated the sound of metal around his wrists. It meant the world taking him back. At the door, Dex looked over his shoulder, and you stood there still holding your blouse together, still smiling, still ruined.

The guard muttered, “Filthy animals,” as they disappeared into the hall.

Then you heard Dex chuckle, low and rough and proud. Like being filthy with you was the best thing anyone had ever called him.

You stood there for a second, and then you laughed under your breath, too.

Because you loved it. You loved being disgusting with him. Loved that the room looked wrecked. Loved that the guards knew. Loved that Dex would carry that insult back to his cell like a compliment, and that you would go home with the same stupid, shameless pride in your chest.

Filthy animals.

Yeah. You smiled to yourself, still holding your blouse together. Maybe you were.

—

You were pregnant.

You found out before the transfer, while Dex was still in prison, still waiting to be moved to the secure psychiatric facility you had spent three years fighting for. For three days, you carried the secret around yourself like a forcefield. You went to work, answered emails, helped patrons at the public library. You smiled politely at everyone while your whole body felt like it had become a locked room with a miracle inside.

When you told Dex, he knew something was different before you even sat down. His eyes went to your face, then your hands, then the way you kept pressing your palm nervously against your stomach. “What happened?”

You laughed once, shaky and soft. “Nothing bad.”

Dex didn’t relax, so you reached across the table and took his hand as much as the cuffs allowed. His fingers closed around yours immediately. “I’m pregnant.” For a second, it was like the whole visiting room lost sound. Then his eyes dropped to your stomach. “What?”

You smiled through the tears already coming. “I’m pregnant, baby.”

The chair scraped back before the guard could stop him.

Dex moved toward you on instinct, cuffed hands reaching for your face, not violent, not thinking, just desperate to touch. The chain between his wrists caught on the edge of the table, but he barely seemed to feel it. His palms found your cheeks, and then he was kissing you across the table like the whole room had disappeared.

“Poindexter,” the guard snapped.

Dex didn't hear him. Or he did, and for one dangerous second, he didn’t care.

You kissed him back, crying into his mouth, fingers gripping the front of his prison shirt because this was your husband, your baby’s father, and he was making this broken sound against your lips.

Another guard came over. “Back. Now.”

They had to pull you apart. Actually pull you apart.

They had one hand on Dex’s shoulder, another on his arm, dragging him back while his cuffed hands strained toward you and yours reached for him across the table. His eyes stayed locked on your face the whole time amazed and almost frightened by the size of what he felt.

The transfer happened not long after.

The institution was better than solitary. You reminded yourself of that every day. He had doctors now. Treatments, structure. He was not locked alone in a box anymore.

But he still was not free. He wasn’t there when your stomach first started to show, but the institution had better visitation rules than the prison, and the first time you came in visibly pregnant, Dex was allowed to touch you. His hand settled over the curve of your stomach so carefully it made your throat ache, like he was afraid the smallest wrong movement might cost him the privilege.

He wasn’t there when the baby kicked for the first time either, but later, during one of those visits, the baby kicked beneath Dex’s palm. Dex went completely still, eyes dropping to your stomach.

Still, he wasn’t there for the smaller, lonelier things. He wasn’t beside you in the maternity shop when you cried because nothing fit right and you wanted him there so badly it hurt. He should have been there making some too-serious comment about proper shoes, back support, and whether the changing room bench was structurally safe enough for you to sit on.

But even then, you told him everything. Every appointment. Every craving. Every scan. Every tiny development you could turn into words and carry to him.

Then Leonard was born. Leo, for short, named for his father.

Dex wasn’t allowed to be there.

That hurt him in a way he didn’t know how to hide. You didn’t know this, but one of the nurses told you he had become erratic after the call came through that you were in labour. Not violent, but frantic, pacing, asking the same questions over and over, trying to negotiate with people who had no authority to give him what he wanted. By the end of it, they had to force a couple pills down his throat so he could just calm down.

So when you finally called, exhausted and crying, with your son against your chest, the silence on the other end felt too careful.

“He’s here,” you whispered. “He’s here, baby.”

Dex didn’t answer right away. For a moment, all you could hear was his breathing, thin and controlled, like he was holding himself together by force. Then, very carefully, he asked, "Are you okay?”

“Yes.”

“Is he okay?”

“Yes.”

You could almost picture him sitting there, hand curled too tightly around the phone, trying to make himself calm enough to deserve hearing this.

“Tell me,” he said.

You told him Leo had blonde hair. You looked down at the baby curled against you, tiny and furious, with pale hair against his head and features that already made your chest ache because there was no denying whose child he was.

“He looks like you,” you whispered.

Dex didn’t answer right away. When he did, his voice sounded stripped bare.

“He does?”

“Yeah, baby.” You smiled through tears, touching Leo’s tiny cheek. “He looks like his father.”

Still, after weeks, then months, then years of hearing about Leo through you, Dex began to know him in fragments.

Children were not allowed inside the institution, so Leo had never met his father. Dex knew him through the stories you told him in visitation rooms, through the photographs you were allowed to bring, through the change in your voice whenever you said his name. You gave him a picture of Leo asleep with one fist tucked under his cheek. Leo with blond hair and your eyes. Leo scowling at the camera in a way that looked so much like Dex it made him go silent the first time he saw it.

But he didn’t love Leo properly yet. How could he? He had never held him. Never felt the weight of him against his chest. Never smelled his skin, never rocked him through a cry, never watched him fall asleep in his arms. Leo was still partly an idea to him, a child made real through your love before Dex could reach him with his own.

But he loved Leo, in a way, because you loved him.

That was easier. You loved that baby, so Leo mattered. Your face relaxed when you spoke about him, so Dex learned to relax around the sound of his name too. And somewhere in the darkest, neediest part of him, he thought he owed Leo his life because he made you stay.

Leo was Dex’s gift to you, because he didn’t want you to be alone. 

So Dex loved Leo in the only way he knew how at first: because Leo was yours, because Leo was his, because Leo looked like him, and because Leo kept a piece of him in your life while the rest of him was locked away. He loved him for your sake, before he knew how to love him for his own.

—

Leo was three years old when Vanessa Fisk made Dex kill Foggy Nelson.

He was three, serious-eyed, stubborn in the exact way that made your mother sigh and say, “That’s probably his father,” under her breath. Leo had Dex’s watchful stare, Dex’s unnerving ability to go quiet when he was thinking too hard. But he was still a toddler, so the quiet never lasted long. One minute he would be silently studying the wheels of a toy truck like he was investigating a crime scene, and the next he would be shrieking because his banana had “broken wrong.”

He loved dinosaurs, but only “scary ones.” He refused to wear socks that had seams in the wrong place. He called the moon “the night light” and cried once because you explained he couldn’t take it home. He had Dex’s face in miniature and your habit of talking to himself while concentrating, which meant you spent most mornings watching your tiny blond child line up toy animals on the floor and whisper, “No, no, you go there. No, you not listening.”

You were a good mother. You packed snacks. You remembered nursery forms. You cut grapes in half. You kept emergency wipes in every bag you owned. You sang the same bedtime song three times if Leo asked, even when your throat hurt and your body felt hollow from work and worry and loving a man the world had never stopped punishing.

Dex knew all of that through you. Leo liked peas this week. Leo hated peas this week. Leo asked why cats had no eyebrows. Leo threw a shoe at the wall because bedtime was, apparently, “a bad idea.” Leo had asked about Daddy again.

You and Leo had become the one fragile architecture that kept Dex going. Vanessa understood that because Vanessa Fisk understood devotion, even when it was ugly. 

So when she found out about you and Leo, it was over.

She came to Dex with ammo in her metaphorical gun.

This was no way to live, she told him, taking away the meds. Was this what he wanted? To hear about his son in secondhand stories? To let you raise a child alone while other men opened doors for you, helped carry groceries, taught Leo to kick a ball, to ride a bike, to be brave? Raising a child was hard, wasn’t it? You were young. Lonely. Exhausted. Beautiful. How long before someone else started looking less like help and more like a replacement?

Didn’t he want to be a husband? A father? Didn’t he want to come home?

Then, she gave him a photo of you at home, hair tied back, Leo on your hip. How… did she get this photo?

Then she gave him structure: Kill Foggy first. Then he could go to you and Leo.

That was the order of how it went. It was a task, a reward, a way back to the only life he still cared about. And Dex had always been most dangerous when someone took his pain and turned it into a sequence.

So he killed Foggy Nelson. And afterward, when they dragged him back into court, you wanted to see him.

Not because you excused murder. Not because Foggy didn’t matter. But because you were his wife, and you knew that Dex didn’t kill like that out of nowhere.

He wouldn’t simply go on a rampage. He didn’t wake up one day and decide he would burn every bridge that led to you. He loved you too much for that. So you came to the conclusion that someone must've reached into the most frightened part of him, and aimed him again.

You knew that, but the court didn’t care. This time, the court issued an order. It was for your son’s sake, they said. An injunction, no contact. You and Leo were not to be in the same room as Benjamin Poindexter. Not in court, not in visitation, not anywhere a judge could prevent it.

You stood very still when they told you this.

Leo was at home with your mother, probably refusing lunch because the sandwich had been cut into triangles instead of squares.

You didn’t cry. Not when the injunction was read. Not even when Dex was sentenced for the second time. You just listened. Then you got to work.

Because crying would come later, probably in the shower, probably with one hand over your mouth so Leo wouldn’t hear. But right then, there were lawyers to call, motions to file, and records to request. You knew your husband. You knew what manipulation looked like when he was the one pointed like a weapon.

And after court, you went back to Leo. He was sitting on the living room floor in dinosaur pyjamas even though it was the afternoon, blond hair sticking up at the back, one sock on and one sock missing for reasons nobody could explain. He looked up when you came in, toy stegosaurus clutched in one hand.

“Mama,” he said seriously, “Nana said no more crackers.”

You knelt in front of him, your knees cracking with the exhaustion of the day. “Your grandma is probably right.”

Leo frowned like you had betrayed him on a legal level. “I need snacks.”

“You had a snack.”

“I need more snacks.”

“You need dinner.”

He considered that, then lifted the stegosaurus. “Dino needs crackers.”

“Dino can have pretend crackers.”

Leo stared at you with Dex’s eyes. For one awful second, you almost laughed and almost cried at the same time. Instead, you reached out and smoothed his hair down. It sprang back up immediately.

“Daddy has that face too,” you whispered.

Leo blinked. “Daddy?”

You had never lied to him. You told him Daddy was away. Daddy loved him. Daddy couldn’t come home yet. All true, and yet, none of it was enough.

“Yeah,” you said softly. “Daddy.”

Leo looked down at his dinosaur, then back at you. “Daddy like dinos?”

You smiled even though your throat hurt. “I think Daddy would like whatever you like.”

Leo nodded, satisfied by that, and shoved the stegosaurus into your lap. “Then Daddy like this one. He bite.”

You held the toy carefully, like it was evidence. “Yeah,” you whispered. “He bite.”

Leo climbed into your lap after that, all knees and elbows, and you wrapped both arms around him. He smelled like shampoo and the strawberry yoghurt he had somehow gotten on his sleeve. He pressed his face into your shoulder for exactly four seconds before wriggling away again because three-year-olds loved affection on their own schedule.

You let him go. You watched him return to his line of dinosaurs, babbling to himself, head bent in concentration.

You opened your notes app and started another list: Lawyer. Injunction appeal. Facility records. Contact restrictions. Dex’s medication logs. Visitor records.

You could be heartbroken later. Right now, you were Leo’s mother. Dex’s wife. And someone had used your family to turn your husband into a weapon again.

And you were going to find out why.

—

A year later, you were watching the news while Leo played on the carpet.

Not watching, really. You were letting it sit on in the background while you moved through the living room with half your attention split into a dozen places at once. Leo’s sippy cup was on the coffee table. His toy dinosaurs were arranged in a careful little line near your foot. A postcard Johnathan had sent from the Bahamas with his boyfriend on the fridge. There was a basket of laundry on the chair you had been meaning to fold since yesterday, and your laptop sat open on the sofa beside you, full of documents, court filings, old visitor logs, psychiatric reports, and all the research you had been collecting like ammunition.

You had been working for weeks. You had names, dates, transfer notices, facility records, connections that were too neat to be coincidence. You had followed the clues until your stomach turned. Dex was going to be moved into general population, and it was not an administrative error. It was not random. It had the Fisks’ fingerprints all over it, even if she was careful enough never to leave them where a normal person could see.

After all, it hadn’t taken you long to find out about the Red Hook charter. That part had been almost laughably easy. Child’s play, really.

The public library had a stack of old municipal records tucked away in the back, half-forgotten beneath outdated notices and donation forms. Someone had slapped a label on the box years ago — NEEDS TO BE SHREDDED — and then, by some miracle of underfunded bureaucracy, no one ever had.

So you had done the one thing you could think of and sent Matt Murdock an anonymous tip. You didn't give a signature or explanation. It was just enough information to make him look where he needed to look. It was just enough to prove to him that Dex was not acting on his own.

Matt went to see him that morning. You knew because you still had someone inside the prison willing to tell you what the official channels never would. A friend, barely. A contact, more accurately. 

Then, that night, the news broke: Benjamin Poindexter had escaped from prison and attempted to assassinate the mayor.

Your husband’s name was on every channel again. Your husband’s face was dragged back into the world as a threat, a headline, a monster with a body count and no context anyone cared to say out loud.

You stood frozen in the middle of your living room, remote in hand, while the news anchor spoke over footage you could barely process. On the carpet, Leo lifted his plastic stegosaurus and made it bite the sofa cushion.

“Rawr,” he said seriously.

You looked down at him and how completely unaware he was that his father had just broken out of prison and tried to kill a man.

Leo was too busy frowning at the stegosaurus with Dex’s whole face in miniature, pale brows pulled together, mouth pressed into a stern little line. “No,” he told the dinosaur, pushing its plastic nose away from the triceratops. “No bully.”

The stegosaurus apparently disagreed, because Leo made it chomp again. Then he gasped, offended by his own storyline. “No. Bully bad.” He picked up the stegosaurus, turned it toward the triceratops, and shook it gently. “You say sorry.”

You stared at him.

Leo bumped the stegosaurus’s head carefully against the triceratops. “Sowwy,” he said in a deeper voice.

Then he made the triceratops pat the stegosaurus on the head. “Okay. Be kind now.”

Your chest tightened so hard you had to sit down.

Leo looked up. “Mama?”

“I’m okay,” you said too quickly.

He stared at you with Dex’s eyes, unconvinced.

You turned the volume down, but not off. You couldn’t make yourself turn it off. You sat there with Leo at your feet and the whole city falling apart on-screen, trying to understand the sequence. Matt’s visit. The transfer. The Fisks. Dex escaping. The mayor. None of it random. None of it was out of nowhere, and you probably were the one to set this into motion the second you gave the anonymous tip.

“Mama,” Leo said again, holding up a toy. “Dino hungry.”

“Dino is always hungry,” you whispered.

“Need snack.”

“Okay,” you said, because your voice was already too close to breaking and arguing with a four-year-old about a plastic dinosaur felt like the one thing you could actually survive. “Let me check what we have.”

You stood and crossed into the kitchen, still listening to the news. The fridge light came on cold and white across your face. You stared into it without really seeing anything: half a punnet of strawberries, Leo’s yoghurt, and Leftover pasta. A little container of cut grapes.

The news anchor said Dex’s name again. Your hand tightened around the fridge door.

You reached for Leo’s yoghurt, then stopped because he had asked for a snack for the dinosaur, not himself, and for one absurd second that distinction mattered enough to make you laugh under your breath.

Then you realised that Leo was… silent. He wasn’t babbling. He wasn’t talking to his toys. Is he okay?

Worried, you looked back into the living room.

Leo was standing in the middle of the carpet, one dinosaur clutched in his hand, his small body frozen in a way that made the back of your neck prickle.

He was waving at the window.

No. Not the window. The fire escape.

Beyond the glass, half-hidden in the dark metal lines of the fire escape, was his father.

Oh.

Little did you know, Dex had already been there for fifteen minutes.

Fifteen whole minutes of being half-hidden in the dark, one hand braced against the cold metal railing while he looked into the life he had only known through your stories. At first, he watched you, moving through the living room with the television flickering against your face, beautiful and alive, one hand absently touching your wedding ring while you tried to hold the world together through the sheer refusal to give up on him.

But when his eyes found Leo, Dex forgot how to breathe.

He knew what his son looked like from photographs. He knew he had blond hair, serious eyes, and that little frown you always said was his. But seeing Leo in person was different. It was jarring, how much he actually looked like him. Leo was now a real person to Dex, sitting cross-legged on the carpet in dinosaur pyjamas, scolding a plastic stegosaurus for biting another toy.

Dex watched Leo make the dinosaur apologise. He watched Leo say that bullying was bad. He watched his son choose kindness with no one guiding him toward it.

Oh. Leo looked like him, but he was good in a way Dex had never been able to be without help. Dex had always needed a North Star, someone outside him to point toward right when his own internal compass spun uselessly in the dark. He would always need you that way, always look to you when the world blurred at the edges and everything started to feel lost.

But Leo did not need a North Star. Leo had one inside him. Leo had a functioning moral compass in a tiny body with Dex’s face and your kindness. Dex’s focus, but not his emptiness. Dex’s intensity, but not his fracture. Dex, if someone had loved him correctly from the start.

And that was when Dex understood that he loved him. And not in the distant, complicated love he had forced himself to. Not just because Leo was yours, or because Leo was his, or because Leo had kept you tethered to him while the rest of the world tried to take him away.

Now, he loved Leo because Leo was a good version of him. Because protecting Leo suddenly felt a lot like self-preservation. Like if Dex could keep this child safe, if he could make sure the world never reached into Leo and broke the compass before it had a chance to grow, then maybe some part of himself could be saved too.

Then Leo noticed him.

Dex saw the exact second it happened. Leo’s head turned, eyes lifting past the kitchen table, past the window, to the dark shape crouched on the fire escape.

For one breathless second, Dex couldn't move. He had been caught. Not by the police. Not by guards. Not by Daredevil. By a four-year-old boy. 

Leo didn’t scream. He didn’t cry. Of course not. He was your son, too. He was brave, like you. 

He only blinked, then lifted one small hand and waved.

Because Dex didn't want to scare him, because he did not know how fathers were supposed to wave at sons they had never held, Dex lifted his hand and waved back.

That was when you noticed.

And fuck, he couldn’t wait to be in your arms again.

The second you got the window open, Dex came through it, one hand catching the frame, the other already reaching for you. The sniper rifle was still strapped across his back, cold against the warmth of your apartment.

You barely had time to say his name before his hands were on you.

He pulled you into him so quickly your feet left the floor, spinning you half across the living room with a strength that startled a laugh out of you before it broke into a sob. His arms locked around your waist, your hands flew to his shoulders, and then his mouth was on yours. The kiss was clumsy in the way only grief and longing could be clumsy. He kissed you like every locked door, every court order, every year stolen from you both had narrowed into this one second.

He tasted like blood and rain. His lip was split. One of his teeth was missing. There were stitches along his forehead and dirt at the edge of his chin, but he was here. Your husband was in your living room with his body against yours and his hands on your back like he was trying to convince himself you were not another trick his mind played against him.

“I missed you,” you breathed against his mouth.

Dex made a broken sound and kissed you again. “I missed you.”

“No, baby,” you whispered, laughing and crying at the same time as you pressed kisses to his mouth, his cheek, the corner of his cheekbones, the scar you’ve yet to trace there. “I missed you. I missed you so much.”

His forehead dropped to yours. For a second, he just held you there, eyes closed, breathing you in like he had forgotten the world. His fingers moved at your waist, not quite gripping, not quite letting go, that old helpless need in him trying so hard to be gentle and failing only because there was too much feeling in one body.

Then a small voice behind you said, “Mama?”

It went through him all at once, the way a person remembered fire after touching a flame. His hands stayed on you, but his whole body locked up, breath caught, eyes opening with a kind of fear you had never seen in him. 

Because no, Benjamin Poindexter had no defence against a four-year-old boy in dinosaur pyjamas.

Slowly, you turned in his arms to see Leo stood in the middle of the carpet with one sock missing and his stegosaurus tucked under one arm. His round little face was serious, sleepy, and curious. He looked much like Dex, it made your chest hurt, but he was smaller, untouched by every cruel thing that had made his father into a weapon.

“Mama,” Leo asked, pointing the dinosaur toward Dex, “who’s this?”

Dex’s breath hitched, you felt it under your palm.

For a moment, you couldn’t answer. You had imagined this introduction a hundred different ways over the years. Maybe in a supervised visitation room. Or through a phone call. Maybe one day in some future where paperwork finally gave way and Leo was old enough to understand more than he should have to. You had not imagined Dex standing in your apartment with a rifle on his back, blood at his mouth, wanted by half the city, looking down at his son like the universe had placed his missing pieces in a boy that looked like a mirror.

You swallowed.“Leo,” you said softly, voice shaking. “This is Daddy.”

Dex inhaled like the word had gone straight through him.

Leo blinked up at him. “Hi daddy,” he repeated, testing the shape of it.

Dex was still trying to keep himself held together with force and habit and whatever discipline had survived. But a foreign emotion moved across him as you felt your own eyes fill again.

“Hi, Leo,” he whispered. His voice was wrecked.

Leo studied him with the grave suspicion of a child encountering an adult who looked both interesting and badly assembled. His eyes moved over Dex’s face. Then his little brows pulled together.

“Your teeth is missing,” Leo said.

You made a small sound, half laugh, half sob.

Dex blinked at him. “What?”

Leo took one step closer, stegosaurus still tucked under his arm like backup. “Your teeth is missing. Are you okay?”

And that was what broke him.

Not the years he had lost. Not even the word Daddy, though that had nearly taken his knees out. It was the concern in his son’s voice, the immediate, unprompted softness. The way Leo saw something wrong and, instead of flinching from him, asked if he was okay.

Dex lowered himself slowly to one knee, as if sudden movement might shatter the moment.

The rifle shifted against his back, so violently out of place beside your son’s little bare foot on the carpet. Dex seemed to realise it too. His hand moved as if to take it off, then stopped, uncertain, afraid to do anything too fast with Leo so close.

“I’m okay,” Dex said carefully.

Leo looked unconvinced. “Mama has plasters.”

Dex looked up at you.Your hand went to your mouth, and you cried properly then, because Leo had no idea what he was offering. No idea that his father had come through the window carrying a weapon and a history no child should have to understand. No idea that asking about a missing tooth and suggesting a plaster was the kindest thing anyone had said to Dex all year.

Dex looked back at him, and saw a person. A tiny person with Dex’s hair and Dex’s nose and Dex’s mouth, but he was human, in the way he never was. He was kind.

Leo was everything Dex had wanted to be and never knew how. Leo was a good version of him.

For the first time in Dex’s life, he looked at someone smaller than him and thought, with stunned humility, that he might have something to learn.

From his son, his better self.

Leo tilted his head. “You want Dino?”

Dex looked at the stegosaurus like it was sacred.

Then he held out both hands, slowly, carefully, letting Leo decide.

Leo stepped closer and placed the dinosaur into his palms.

Dex took it as if it weighed more than the rifle on his back. As if this battered little plastic toy had more power to undo him than any weapon ever made.

“Thank you,” he whispered.

Leo nodded, satisfied by the manners, then moved closer. His small hand lifted and patted Dex’s cheek, not quite where the scar was, gentle in the imprecise way of toddlers trying their best.

Dex’s eyes snapped to yours. There was panic there. Wonder. A silent, helpless question: What do I do?

You sank down beside them, one hand on Leo’s back, the other reaching for Dex’s face.  “You’re doing okay,” you whispered.

Leo patted him again, then leaned forward and, with the sudden trust only children could offer, pressed himself into Dex’s chest.

Dex stopped breathing. Then, slowly, so slowly it made your heart ache, his arms came around your son.

Leo fit against him like he had always belonged there, his same-colored hair tucked beneath Dex’s chin. Dex held him as if the whole room might punish him for wanting it too much, as if any wrong movement would prove he didn;t deserve this.

You watched his hand spread carefully over Leo’s back. The same hand that had hurt people. The same hand that had held weapons. That same hand that now shook from the effort of touching his son gently enough.

Leo looked up from Dex’s chest. “Are you cold?”

Dex swallowed. “A little.”

Leo considered that, then turned to you. “Mama, Daddy need blanket.”

You laughed through tears. “Yeah,” you whispered. “Maybe he does.”

Dex closed his eyes.

His face bent toward Leo’s hair, and for a second he didn’t quite kiss him, He only breathed there, close enough to smell the child he had made and never held. Shampoo. Crackers. Life. His son smelled like life.

When Dex opened his eyes again, they were wet. He looked at you over Leo’s head, and the room seemed to fold around the three of you. 

“I missed everything,” he whispered.

You moved closer, pressing your forehead to his shoulder, one hand covering his where it rested on Leo’s back. “You’re here now.”

It was not enough, you both knew that. It was nowhere near enough.

But Leo wriggled in Dex’s arms and said, “Daddy, Dino hungry,” with the complete seriousness of a child who had accepted this new adult into his world and immediately assigned him responsibilities.

Dex looked down at him. Then at the dinosaur. Then back at you, for instruction. You tilted your chin like, go on.

“What does Dino eat?” he managed.

Leo gasped, scandalised that his own father didn’t know. “Crackers.”

Dex looked at you, and you nodded, so he also nodded, “Okay.”

Dex knew now that he was meant to love Leo because Leo was his second chance in miniature. 

And Leo had no idea his father would burn the world to keep him safe. Because in the end, that's what makes him a good man, right?

—end.

Extra note : I keep getting distracted from my Dex x reader / ex!Bucky fic, but I promise it’s on its way. In the meantime, my immediate thought after writing this is a sequel where Reader and Dex finds out Leo has powers (is a mutant) and that’s why Dex starts killing anti-vigilante task force. Because he wants to protect his son. (No promises, but let me know if anyone’s interested!)

His arm was slung clumsily around your shoulders, and the full weight of his body leaning into yours made it significantly harder to drag him along the road leading to his apartment. Monaco still breathed the leftover heat of the day; the tiled streets were warm under your bare feet, each step further tattooing the memory of the sun into your skin. Drunk stragglers littered the road, trading laughter for the beating of a heart.

The muffled thump of music spilled from nearby clubs, weaving in with the distant hush of ocean waves. Trees along the French Riviera swayed lazily with the tepid breeze and amid all that balmy, quiet mess, your hand stayed firm against the sweat-slicked fabric of your best friend’s back.

“You’re heavy as fuck, you know that, right?” you huffed, the damp heat of his shirt clinging to your side.

Max mumbled something, low and gravelly, just clear enough to make through his inebriated haze. “You didn’t complain when I carried you out of that party in Miami…”

“You were sober then,” you shot back with amusement. “Now, you’re a glorified sandbag.”

“This sandbag won four championships!” he announced proudly, albeit loudly, stumbling a little as you adjusted your grip to keep him steady— and to avoid the perfidiously placed lamp post in front of him.

You snorted at his antics and at the little stagger in his steps as he walked. No matter how long you’d known each other, or how close you were, it was rare to see Max Verstappen—the Dutch Lion, Mad Max himself—in such a state: vulnerable and unguarded, with his emotions laid bare in the crack of his tone and the gleam in his eyes. “This sandbag,” you said, “is about five seconds away from face-planting into the gutter. Doesn’t exactly scream ‘champion’ to me.”

Max turned his head toward you, and only then did you realize how close he actually was. His nose grazed yours as you looked up at him, his breath, warm and laced faintly of citrus and tequila, ghosted over the indents of your lips. His hair was a tousled, sweaty mess of dirty blonde clinging to his forehead, and his gaze half-lidded, but still intense enough in the way the blue of his irises traveled from your eyes to your lips, sparkling with mischief as his mouth parted in a lazy grin.

Your heart wavered. So did your steps. 

Max was a good-looking man; this was never up for debate. But still, he was your Max.

You whipped your gaze forward again as his laugh split through the night air. “And yet, you’re still carrying me.” His tone was dipped in the same bratty, I-told-you-so lilt he used whenever he beat you at trivia games, almost child-like.

“Yeah, ‘cause you’re not in the capacity to actually make it home by yourself.”

He gasped. Gasped, with his hand on his chest and everything, and you really, really had to concentrate not to burst out laughing. “You could’ve left me,” he said with mock offense, “if I were too inconvenient. I am… plenty capable.”

Something scrunched up in your face at the notion. You gave him a look. “Max, you’re drunk, not stupid. You know damn well you’re not an inconvenience to me. If you were—” you hoisted him up straighter on your side, pausing at a crosswalk. The red light bathed the pair of you in a soft, hazy glow. “ —I’d have dropped you when we were 18 after you threw up in my kitchen sink, and made me tell my parents it was me.”

“That was an intense party,” he mumbled defensively. “And I didn’t wanna make a bad first impression on your dad.”

You hummed. “It’s true that blaming me for projectile vomiting into our plumbing system is just so much better.”

“Your mom said the sink could handle anything!” Max dared to actually look offended.

“It’s a sink, Max. She meant, like, vegetable scraps. Not whatever diabolic thing you decided to ingest that day.”

Another laugh escaped him, this time soft as silk sliding over bare skin, and you found yourself punctuating his fit with a chuckle of your own. The memory was grotesque, sure, but it was something entirely yours. One of many.

When the laughter faded, the silence left behind was mellow. Without thinking, as some kind of reflex, you murmured. “You know I’d never leave you.”

And even though you can’t see his face, you know the usual sharpness in it has softened by the way his fingers loosen their grip on your shoulder, or how his body leans a little further into yours as the red light finally flickers to green. You’d mapped him out years ago.

“I know you wouldn’t,” he mutters back, and it almost feels like a secret he’s sharing with you, if there was any left to share. Something that said, Hey, I trust you. I know you. I know you wouldn’t leave me behind. 

And with Max Verstappen, trust has always been the rarest thing of all.

He exhales, letting his head fall on top of yours— well, more like it bonks it. You hiss in pain, but a laugh bubbles out of your lips before you can stop it. 

“God, I love your laugh,” Max whispers, as if to himself. Then, quieter, “I love you.”

Your thoughts all reels to a halt, leaving the words to seep into every crevice of your mind until it reaches your heart. They echo with painful precision: love, love, love, hammering in your chest so hard you could double over with the pain of your ribs breaking, a mantra trying to root itself into the space it left.

I love you.

He stumbles again, like the words cost him balance, and you barely manage to catch him in time. The wind brushes your skin, colder now, hitting you with a reality check: Max was drunk out of his mind. Nothing he could say right now would hold up in a court of law, much less in the court of morning light. Why would it matter?

You try to swallow it down as his apartment finally comes into view. The words you’d longed for years had been said. But they’ve been slurred, not meant. 

Such sweet hypocrisy. 

“...Right,” you mutter. Your finger flexes on the small of his back, trying to grasp something so desperately out of reach. “Let’s get you home.”

If carrying Max from the club to his home was an arduous task, getting him into bed was something of a Herculean effort. 

First, he became physically incapable of taking off his own shoes, preferring to sit inert on the shoe rack, rendered useless by tequila. Obviously, you had to crouch down and untie the shoelaces of the sneakers he refused to let go of. His only contribution was to absentmindedly play with your hair, twirling strands between his fingers with all the grace of a tipsy toddler.

“You have such pretty hair,” he’d mumbled, brushing a piece off your forehead and tucking it behind your ear. The movement was clumsy, somewhat hesitant, but so tender that the heat in your cheeks flared in your entire body, and had nothing to do with the sun that filtered through the open blinds all day. 

“I love it,” he continued, with the confidence of someone discovering poetry for the first time. “They’re so soft. It— it… flies. When you walk.”

You blinked up at him. “That’s the wind, Max.”

“No,” he squinted back at you. “You’re the wind.”

Right. Good luck figuring out what the hell that meant.

Then, no matter how sticky he was, he categorically refused to even look at the bathroom. You reminded him multiple times that he was coated in a ridiculous amount of glitter and sweat, and that he reeked like the obscure depths of a frat party, but it fell on deaf ears.

“If I go,” he said solemnly, placing both hands on your shoulders, “Will you go with me?”

Your eyes had shot wide open. “Max. I am not showering with you. Jesus. How many grams of alcohol are you operating on?”

He sighed and collapsed against your shoulder, completely defeated. “Then I don’t want to. I love being with you. I don’t want to leave.”

Classic Max Verstappen. Relentlessly stubborn, whether drunk or sober, so you dropped the issue. Arguing with him in such a state wasn’t a hill you were willing to die on. 

Every attempt to get Max to cooperate came with a new confession. You opened the door of his bedroom, something you’d done more times than you can count, and he loved that you always knew your way around his place. You dropped him onto the mattress, and he grinned up at you, told you he loved that you didn’t even need to ask what side he slept on. Apparently, post-drinks Max had an unlimited supply of love to give, as well as no filter. He loved your eyes, he loved your laugh, he loved your presence.

Not the kind of love that truly mattered, though, but you weren’t quite ready to pull that thread apart. 

You turned to grab a clean shirt from his closet and, behind you, all sense of gravity seemed to escape Max as he flopped onto his back, limbs starfish-spread. The mattress groaned under him in protest. You had to keep yourself from sighing.

“Max,” you called, holding up the soft white tee, “take off your shirt.”

He pushed himself up onto his elbows with the last of his strength. He tilted his head, a slow smile appeared on his lips, warm and undeniably pleased with what he was about to say.

“You do it.”

It wasn’t crass, nor was it sexual: the smile wasn’t a smirk, and his eyes didn’t dart at the hem of your skirt that rode up higher than necessary due to your efforts. Instead, something almost tender pulled at Max’s tone. All of a sudden, his room felt too intimate for the space taken by the friendship you spent a lifetime not to ruin.

Still, you sat down next to him. He was all obstinate limbs, you thought to yourself. There was no need to argue with him longer than necessary. You wouldn’t win this fight.

The bed recognized you out of muscle memory, sighing under your weight and the covers pooling around you like it memorized your shape from the many times you’d spent your nights next to him. You were close enough so that your knees brushed with the hesitancy of teenagers. In the charged quiet that settled between you, your pulse beat loud enough for two.

You reached out, silent, fumbling slightly with the first button of his shirt. The fabric was warm with the heat emanating from his body, and the soft linen slipped between your trembling fingertips.

Max didn’t move. However, his breath hitched when your nails grazed the skin of his neck, as if you’d burned him. His gaze was locked on your face like you were a shooting star in the middle of his ceiling, reminiscent of the glowing stars on yours when you were a child. His lips parted at your every movement, his intakes of air slowing down to match the motion of your fingers. You were sure he could hear your heart. That he could feel the hesitation shaking in your knuckles every time you brushed over a parcel of skin.

The second button took longer.

Max cocked his head, brows drawn together like he was trying to decipher you. “You’re so pretty,” he whispered. This time, he took his time enunciating it: none of the syllables were slurred, and each of them echoed clear as day in the hollow between your ribs.

You shook your head. “And you’re so drunk.”

His brow furrowed further in sheer incomprehension. You made your way to the last button as he struggled with words, opening and closing his mouth around silent consonants. Frankly, you didn’t want him to speak. You wanted him dressed and gone to sleep, so you could put all this false hope to bed with him.

You slipped the blue button up from his broad shoulders, careful about keeping your eyes away from his bare chest, but a small pressure on your wrist stopped you in your movements.

“You don’t get it,” Max insists. You froze at the intensity of his voice, the unbuttoned shirt slack in your hands. You could feel his frustration mounting—not at you, but at the way the words tangled before leaving his mouth.

“You don’t get it,” he repeated, slower now. “You’re so, so pretty. Like— you’re the wind.”

This time, an audible groan slipped past your lips. “Not this again.”

“Can you just— listen? For once?” he said, waving a hand as if you were the one interrupting. “I’m trying to tell you something very important right now.”

Knowing him, you knew that restless mind of his wouldn’t shut off until the thought clawing at his throat was out in the open and landed somewhere, preferably with you. With a soft sigh, you tossed the bundled-up linen shirt to the side, folding your arms across your chest as you gave him a single, begrudging nod. “Okay. Go on.”

He sat a little straighter, seemingly preparing for verbal battle. His spine wobbled with the effort. “Okay. So. The wind,” he stated, very seriously, and you had a hard time believing this metaphor was about to change your life.

“You are the wind.” Encouraged by your stunned silence, Max continued. “Like, you move through people. And places. You always belong everywhere and… and you make everything feel lighter, easier.” He waved his hand in a vague circle, trying to manifest the image. “You made me lighter, I think.”

It made some level of sense, albeit stumbly. Still, Max wasn’t done.

“I’m— fuck,” he curses, running a hand through his hair. “I’ve been carrying this around since I was seventeen, this feeling. It’s stupid. It’s heavy. You’re just— you’re there, all the time, and it’s a lot—”

“Thanks, Max.”

“No! No, not in a bad way. It’s— God. You’re so pretty,” he murmured, and his voice broke on the word. “And you’re kind, and smart, and you make me laugh, and you make me better, and— tonight, you carried me home and helped me take off my shoes and you’re literally changing my fucking shirt and I’m so in love with you it’s making me useless.”

Max leaned forward, forehead gently pressed to your collarbone. His breath was hot against your neck, his hand lax at his sides. He hadn’t noticed you had frozen still, or maybe he did but just didn’t care, too caught up in his own thoughts.

Slowly, almost sheepishly, his arms wound around your waist. His fingers, rough and calloused, found home brushing your sides and resting against your lower back, palm pressing delicately as if he was afraid you’d break. You couldn’t move: the thing you’ve been trying not to want for years was suddenly happening, it felt bittersweet, and you didn’t know how to breathe around it.

Max’s voice came muffled against your collarbone. “Can you stay?” Your heart gave a traitorous lurch. Faced with your silence, he continued, quieter. “Just like this.”

You exhaled a laugh, wet and shaking. The humor was barely present in it. “You’re going to regret this in the morning.”

“No I won’t.” There was the stubbornness you had grown to love, turned childish by the tangy aroma of mixed liqueurs. “Let me have this one.”

His earnest tone did something to your chest. A small stab blooming into a blood-colored rose.

You hesitated a second longer. You let your body move before your mind could catch up: softly, you maneuvered both of your bodies to fit into the middle of the bed. Reaching for the light covers bunched near the end of the bed, you tugged them over both of you with one hand while the other found its place on the slope of his shoulder. Max shifted so his arms swallowed your waist entirely, his face buried in the crook of your neck, and it felt like somewhere you should have been a long time ago.

“Five minutes,” you whispered, more to yourself than to him.

He was already half-asleep when he answered. “Five.”

But neither of you moved again. Not in five minutes, not in ten. Sleep came slowly, and you couldn’t recall which one gave in to the weight of the night first.

Max crossed the threshold of his bedroom door, looking like a man who had narrowly survived war. His hair stuck out at angles defying gravity, his under-eyes bore the haunting hollowness of the dehydrated, and the single second a shard of sunlight brushed his cheekbone, he physically recoiled.

Still, even in his pitiful state, he’d managed to throw on the clean t-shirt you had gotten out for him last night and a pair of sweatpants, presumably after successfully peeling off whatever clothes he’d passed out in. You noted, with quiet amusement, that his shirt was inside-out. Baby steps.

You, on the other hand, had been up for hours.

Waking up in Max’s arms had been… something. The blinds you forgot the shut had lit up the room bright orange too early, and the sudden feel of his arm still slung protectively around your waist had sent you into tachycardia. You’d disentangled yourself as gently as possible, pulled on some of his older clothes from the drawer he kept aside for you, and set about pretending the night before never happened. 

You made coffee and laid out the Ibuprofen, waiting for him to wake up like he was a ticking bomb.

Now, Max collapsed onto the couch with a groan, dropping his full weight into the cushions. You approached him quietly with a mug and a pill in hand, wordlessly handing them over, which he accepted without a hint of grace. He swallowed the tablet with a sip so long and grim you thought he might weep.

“I’m never drinking again,” Max muttered hoarsely. 

You snorted, easing yourself down next to him on the couch. “You sound like a broken record.”

He lifted the cup halfway to his mouth and, behind the rim, smiled.

You stared at the motion longer than you meant to. Your fingers twisted at the hem of his sleeve you were wearing. “Well,” you said, eyes fixed on the swirling steam of your untouched cup, “you’ll probably forget about that promise, like you forgot everything else about last night.” You offered it with a little shrug and a chuckle like it was nothing, while your heart thudded unevenly in your chest.

You were probing for answers, so you peeked at him.

Max was staring at the floor, his fingers tight around the coffee mug. His brows were pinched, like he was either trying to solve a complicated equation—or simply trying to wrestle down the lingering effects of alcohol amidst the fragments of last night. For a moment, you were sure he didn’t remember.

You braced yourself. It was fine. It was better like this, truly.

“Actually, uh,” he spoke up. “I do.”

Everything went quiet.

“I remember all of it.”

The cup between your fingers almost slipped from your grasp.

The words had the same effect on you as an earthquake would have had. It messed with your balance, breath catching with your throat as you catched Max’s eyes. You searched it, desperately, for a joke, or maybe something akin to regret. Yet, he simply looked back at you, with the same resolution he always seemed to carry.

You laughed, a tight, high-pitched sound that didn’t sound like you in the slightest. Carefully, you placed your coffee mug on the table. It clicked too loudly against the wood.

“Okay, don’t worry,” you began, waving a hand toward him to dismiss… whatever that was. “I know you were drunk and—”

“Y/N—”

“—you don’t have to feel bad or embarrassed, really, like, we all say dumb shit when we drink—”

“Y/N.”

“—I mean, God, remember that one time I told Willem Jansen I wanted to go on a date with him even though I only wanted to ask him the time and I panicked—”

Max’s fingers found your wrist, overly delicate, and all the memories of barely a few hours ago flashed before your eyes, snapping your mouth shut. The world stilled around his touch, anchoring you right in that little pocket of feelings you’d been avoiding. His thumb brushed over your pulse.

His eyes were clear of any haze this time around.

“I meant it,” Max said, voice low. “All of it. Drunk, sober, it makes no difference. I think the same thing.”

Your eyes searched his face, terrified of what you might find and even more terrified of what you wouldn’t. Max just held you like he was afraid you might be the one disappearing next.

And in the face of what you’ve been waiting to hear for years, all you could muster was a downright pathetic, “Oh.”

Max hummed, a small noise of acknowledgement. He probably expected more, or maybe he expected even less. You couldn’t know, but “oh” was all that could leave your lips at the moment. The silence that followed stretched long and tight, just a few seconds shy of turning awkward. Your fingers tapped once against the side of your cup. His did the same against the arm of the couch. 

Finally, Max broke the quiet.

“I think I drank more last night because it’s been a while since we went out together,” he recalled. “My schedule and all. And you looked…,” he paused, shaking his head. “Beautiful.”

He glanced at you out of the corner of his eye. “And I’ve, you know. I’ve been wanting to kiss you for a while. Years, actually. The feeling had just doubled. I thought if I drank enough, I’d stop thinking about it,” he lets out a sheepish laugh. “And if I stopped thinking, I’d stop wanting to kiss you.”

While your body was as stiff as a rock, your mind was the tornado centered around it. A whiplash of years spun through your head: the late nights, the race weekends, your shoulder against his on hotel couches, the way he always found you first in the crowd, how you’d make fun of all the older drivers scared of a teenager. The times you spent trying not to fall into the delusion that it might not be as unrequited as you made it out to be.

All those emotions, swirling and fighting, slipped out in a fashion unique to you. “You’re a twenty-seven-year-old man,” you blurted, tone more incredulous than scolding. “You’re pushing thirty. Wasn’t there a more mature way to… I don’t know, process that?”

Max barked out a full-bodied laugh, the ones you didn’t see all that often on camera. It was unashamed, not even a tad surprised or bashful, twisting a warm sensation in your stomach just because he looked so at ease.

“Well,” he said, turning his head to face you properly now. His mouth was curving in a way that made him even more stupidly handsome, and soft, just for you. “We met when we were seventeen, and I’ve loved you ever since. So I guess I tend to revert back to that when it comes to you.”

There it was.

Love, love, love. This time, the words thrummed behind your skin, rushing in your bloodstream and mixing with oxygen feeding into the beating of your heart. It got you drunk in a way alcohol never could, and there was the irony of it: it was the clearest confession you had gotten, from the most sober version of him. I love you. The unadulterated truth. It rendered you speechless.

Max mistook it for hesitation. You couldn’t blame him, you’d try to backpedal to save your dignity too if he had pulled the same move on you.

“I’d understand if you don’t feel the same,” he rushed out. “Yesterday must have been a lot for you. It won’t impact our friendship, I just wanted to be upfront with you—”

He didn’t get to finish his sentence.

You launched yourself toward him with a force that made him grunt as you collided, lips meeting with such strength it sent him sprawling back against the couch. His hands instinctively gripped your hips to steady both of you, but the momentum had already taken over. You were practically straddling him now, your hands cupping his jaw, threading into his hair, gripping the fabric of his shirt.

And Max. He kissed you back like a man starved, as if the last ten years had been a long inhale and you were the only thing that could let him breathe out. It wasn’t clean, or practiced. You were both messy and desperate, all tongues and teeth trying to scrape the part of the other that didn’t already reside in you. Max tasted like coffee, and you needed him like an addict.

When you finally pulled apart, both of you were flushed and panting, foreheads pressed together because parting seemed inconceivable.

“Don’t even think about implying I don’t feel the same,” you breathed out.

Max grinned, both smug and dizzy. “Jumping on me like that erased every other possibility. Even though my headache got worse.”

You let out a short laugh with the little air you could gather. You smacked his chest. “Being that hungover was not the perfect setting for a first kiss. You’ve only got yourself to blame.”

“Okay, yeah,” he winced playfully, thumbs rubbing circles into your waist. “Maybe not how I planned it.”

You raised an eyebrow. “You had ten years.”

“Fine, I didn’t exactly plan it,” Max admitted. He had given up all subtlety, his eyes flicking down to your lips. You couldn’t be more grateful for it. “But it’s fine. We can retry.”

He kissed you again, slower, more carefully. You savored the sensation of his lips gliding against yours as if it would be the last time, and quietly cursed him out when he stopped.

But soon enough, his lips found your flushed cheeks. “And retry,” he murmured.

This time, he pressed a kiss to your neck, just beneath your jaw. “And retry.”

You exhaled a shaky breath. Everything felt so much— his lips lingering on your skin, the way you were practically draped across him, your heart pounding. “Damn Max,” you whispered, the corners of your mouth pulling up as your fingers brushed a strand of hair from his forehead. “Take me out on a date first.”

“That’s a yes,” he states.

You huffed out a laugh, unable to help how your cheeks warmed. “It was a yes, just prefaced by human decency. You know, food, a table… clothes, even.”

He groaned in protest. “Max!” you snorted, burying your face in the crook of his neck. You were now fully lying on top of him, his arms wrapped around you. The smell of him grounded you. Warm skin, lingering traces of cologne… it was him, who was yours, now.

You felt his smile pressing against the top of your head. “I’ll take you out, you can name the time and place.”

“Tomorrow,” you said without hesitation. “The restaurant by the beach.”

There was a beat of quiet during which you both cradled the other’s presence like something breakable, as if the wind could break it. You figure you’d outgrow that phase, one day. Just not today.

The wind.

“Though,” you broke the silence. “One of the conditions is that I get some clarification about the wind metaphor.”

Max groaned, and hearing him just like that felt like you had physically wounded him, arms tightening around your shoulders in protest. You laughed, giddy, love stretching across your entire chest and further out, enveloping you both. You pressed a kiss to his neck.

Max could explain it to you later. Maybe over pasta, or wine, or whatever your mind will set upon as you hold his hand next to the menu and salt shakers. There’d be a plethora of other kisses and shared mornings, with no hangovers in sight, with plenty of other metaphors that made more sense waiting to be invented or unraveled.

Maybe he’d explain it to you tomorrow, or even the day after. You had a lifetime to figure it out, now. You were patient to wait for ten years, you could be a patient a little while longer.

That was two months ago.

Two months of Pietra's color-coded spreadsheets, vendor calls with Italian florists who didn't speak a lick of English, and approximately sixty-three emails about whether the napkins should be ivory or ecru. (They're the same fucking color. You didn't say that, though, you're a an actual professional.)

Now you're standing in Cifonelli, a tailoring house in London where the building is approximately 300 years old and the man at the door eyes you up and down about twelve times before letting you come in. You arrived fifteen minutes early because that's what professionals do, tablet in hand, ready to make sure Max Fewtrell doesn't accidentally pick the wrong shade of midnight blue and give his fiancée an aneurysm.

Max is already here, standing on the fitting platform in his shirtsleeves while a tailor who looks approximately one hundred years old circles him with pins. The groomsmen are scattered around the room—Max's his brother is scrolling through his phone in the corner, and the other three groomsmen are huddled by the window arguing about something that sounds football-related but you're not paying attention.

And Lando Norris, the best man, is in one of the leather chairs, legs stretched out in front of him, watching you.

He's been staring at you for the last twenty minutes while you've been in the checking suit orders. You felt it. Ignored it. Felt it again. Kept ignoring it, like a professional.

Now you've got his garment bag draped over your arm and you're done pretending you don't notice.

"Norris," you call out.

He doesn't move right away. Just lets his eyes drag up from wherever they were—unhurried, unbothered, like you've interrupted something he was very much enjoying. "That's me," he says, and the smile that follows is the kind that knows exactly what it does to people.

"Dressing room two," you say, already walking toward the hallway. "Let's get you fitted."

You hear him get up. Hear him follow. The hallway is quieter, away from the chaos of the main room, and dressing room two is all dark wood paneling, it's exactly the kind of place where people spend obscene amounts of money and feel good about it.

You hang the garment bag on the hook, unzip it.

"Jacket first," you say without turning around. "Then trousers. If the shoulders don't sit right or the sleeve length is off, don't adjust it yourself. Just tell me."

When you turn around, he's in the doorway. Not coming in. Just leaning against the frame with his arms crossed, watching you with this look—eyes slightly narrowed, mouth not quite smiling, like he's just confirmed something he suspected and now he's deciding what to do about it.

"You're very good at this," he finally says.

"At my job?" You raise an eyebrow. "Revolutionary concept."

"No." He pushes off the doorframe and steps into the room, slow, like the space belongs to him now that he's decided to enter it. "The whole—not looking at me thing." He tilts his head slightly. "You've been doing it since I walked in. It's very disciplined and I'm a little impressed, actually."

Your jaw doesn't move. Your expression doesn't either. "The suit, Norris."

"See, that." He stops close enough that you have to consciously not step back. Close enough that you catch his cologne—something clean and expensive and quietly devastating. He's taller than you clocked from across the room, and the way he's looking at you isn't rude, isn't aggressive. It's just certain, like he's already several steps ahead and he's being generous enough to wait for you to catch up. "That's the thing. You do this—" a small gesture toward you, vague, like he's indicating everything, "very professional, very unbothered. But you felt me looking at you."

"Everyone in the room felt you looking at me."

"Sure." The corner of his mouth pulls up. "But only you ignored it that hard."

The silence sits between you. He doesn't rush to fill it, just watches you with that quiet, completely unearned confidence, chin tipped down slightly, eyes steady, the kind of eye contact that doesn't shift or flicker, the kind that makes you aware of exactly where your hands are and whether your face is doing something it shouldn't be.

"Are you going to try this on," you say, "or are we wasting Pietra's fitting appointment?"

He reaches out and takes the jacket from the hanger himself. Doesn't look away from you while he does it.

"Quick question," he says and the pause that follows is long enough to be deliberate. "Are you single?"

You've got to be fucking kidding me. You shake your head, "That is not a quick question."

"It's three words." He shrugs the jacket on and takes his time with the second button. "Pretty quick to me."

You step forward and fix the collar before you've put any real thought into it. Professional and an awfully horrible fucking habit you've developed because right this second your fingers brush the back of his neck and you feel him go very still.

"Shoulders are good," you say, stepping back. This is absolutely fine. So absolutely not fine.

"You didn't answer."

"Because it's not relevant, Norris."

"To the fitting?" He turns to face the mirror, but his eyes find yours in it immediately. "Probably not. To me?" The corner of his mouth pulls again. "Little bit relevant."

You crouch down to check the trouser break. He looks down at you. You can feel it without looking up.

"You do this with all your clients?" he asks.

"Check the fit?"

"Go all quiet and professional when someone makes you uncomfortable."

You stand. "You're not making me uncomfortable."

"No?" He turns from the mirror to face you properly. You become aware of your hands. "Then why haven't you answered?"

The room feels smaller than it did five minutes ago. You're aware of the door behind him, the mirror to your left, the very small amount of air between you.

"The sleeve length is off," you say. It's a lie, but you reach for his wrist anyway.

He lets you take it, doesn't say anything while you pretend to check the cuff, while your fingers brush the inside of his wrist.

"You're single," he says.

You glance up and he's already looking at you, which is unfortunate considering how attractive the fucker actually is. His lip is quirked upwards at the corner, and his eyes are squinting in that specific way that tells you he is enjoying this very much.

"I didn't say that."

"You didn't have to." He's still letting you hold his wrist, still watching you with that same certainty. "You would've shut this down immediately if you weren't."

You drop his hand and step back. "The jacket fits."

"Good." He shrugs the jacket off, and you watch the fabric slide down his arms, watch the way his shoulders move underneath the sweater. He hangs it back on the hanger with more care than you expected, smoothing the lapels before turning to the mirror. His hands go to the hem of his sweater, tugging it down, adjusting it. The movement pulls the knit tight across his chest, his shoulders, and his eyes—those fucking eyes—find yours in the reflection.

He doesn't look away. Doesn't pretend he wasn't waiting for you to look. "So when are you free?"

Your throat is dry. "I'm not."

"For dinner." He's still watching you in the mirror. Still standing there with his hands resting at his sides like he's got all the time in the world.

"I know what you meant."

He turns around. The movement is slow, his weight shifts, his hips turn, and suddenly he's facing you instead of the glass. "That's not a no."

"It's not a yes either."

"But it's not a no." The smile that spreads across his face is different from before—softer, more genuine. It makes him look younger, less like him and more like someone who actually wants to know your answer. And somehow that's worse. "Which means you're thinking about it."

"I'm thinking about how to get you to try on the trousers."

His hands drop to his belt.

The metal clinks as his fingers work the buckle loose and you freeze. Actually freeze, every muscle in your body locking up as you watch his hands—tanned, long-fingered, confident—slide the leather through the silver.

"What are you—"

"Trying on the trousers," he says, like it's obvious. The belt slides through the loops with a soft whisper of leather against fabric, and his shit-eating grin only widens. "That's what you wanted, right?"

"You don't have to—" You turn around and face the wall. What the fuck is going on? "There's literally a changing screen right there."

"There is." You hear the zipper, the metallic sound seems impossibly loud in the quiet room. Then fabric sliding down his legs, the soft rustle of denim pooling at his feet. Oh my god, oh my god. "But you're already in here."

Your stomach drops. Heat floods your face, your neck, your chest. You draw in a breath—too sharp, too quick—and try to compose yourself. Try to remember that you're a professional, that you've handled difficult clients before, that this is just a suit fitting.

Except it's not. You both know it's not.

"I will actually leave," you say.

"Why?" He sounds amused. You can hear the smile in his voice, can picture exactly what his face looks like right now without even seeing it. "You're the wedding planner. Don't you need to check the fit?"

Your face is on fire. Your hands are clenched at your sides and you're staring at the wood paneling on the wall like it holds the secrets of the fucking universe. "I can check it when you're dressed."

"I'm getting dressed right now." A pause. Then, quieter, "You can turn around. I'm not naked."

You shouldn't. You should walk out of this room, find another tailor, maintain some semblance of professionalism.

He's in his boxers, black Calvin Kleins that sit low on his hips, and that stupid cream sweater that's ridden up just enough to show a strip of tanned, toned stomach. The jeans are pooled at his feet and he's just standing there, holding the suit trousers, legs long and golden like he spends half his life in the sun.

Which he does. Because he's a fucking Formula 1 driver. And you're trying very hard to look at his face, at the trousers in his hands, at literally anything except the very obvious bulge straining against the black fabric of his underwear.

Your eyes drop. You can't help it. The Calvin Klein waistband sits just below his hip bones, and the fabric is doing absolutely nothing to hide how well-endowed he is. Or how hard he's getting. Jesus Christ.

"Well?" he says, and his voice has dropped lower, rougher. Like gravel and honey mixed together. "Should I put these on, or are you going to keep staring?"

Your eyes snap up to his face and the grin there is absolutely wicked. Victorious. He knows exactly what he's doing to you, knows exactly where your eyes just were, and he's loving every second of it.

"The trousers," you manage. Your voice sounds strange—tight and strained and breathier than it should be—and you quite literally want to rip your vocal cords out. "Put them on."

"Say please."

Your brain short-circuits. "Excuse me?"

"You want me to put them on?" He tilts his head, and the movement is casual, easy. Still holding the trousers in one hand, the other resting against his hip, thumb hooked into the waistband of his boxers. Still standing there like this is completely normal. Like he stands half-naked in front of wedding planners every day. "Ask nicely."

This is insane. This entire situation is insane. You're alone in a dressing room with a half-naked Formula 1 driver who's asking you to beg him to put his pants on while he's very clearly hard and very clearly enjoying watching you try not to look.

"Please," you say, and it comes out quieter than you meant it to. "Put on the trousers."

His grin widens. "See? That wasn't so hard."

He steps into them. One leg, then the other, and you watch—you can't not watch—as he pulls them up slowly and deliberately. The fabric slides over his calves, his knees, his thighs. Golden skin disappearing inch by inch beneath midnight blue wool. Over his hips. Over that bulge that's still very much visible, still obscenely obvious even through the suit fabric now.

He doesn't button them. Just leaves them sitting low on his hips, the zipper undone, the waistband gaping open enough that you can still see the black elastic of his Calvin Kleins.

"How's the fit?" he asks.

You can't speak. Your mouth is completely dry, your heart is pounding so hard you can feel it in your throat, and you're very aware that you need to actually do your job now. Need to check the hem and the break and the waist, which means getting close to him again. Means kneeling down in front of him. Means being eye-level with—

"I need to check the break," you hear yourself say.

"Go ahead."

You move before you can think about it. Drop to your knees in front of him, and the position is—it's—don't fucking think about it.

Your hands reach for the fabric at his ankle. The hem is perfect. You both know it's perfect. Pietra sent the measurements three times, the tailors here are the best in London, there's no way it's wrong.

You can feel him watching you. Can feel the weight of his gaze on the top of your head, on your hands, on the way you're very carefully not looking up. But you smooth the fabric anyway. Adjust it against his shoe. Check the length with fingers that are definitely not shaking.

"You know what I think?" he says, voice quiet.

You don't answer. Keep your eyes on the hem.

"I think you're single. I think you've been single for a while. And I think—" he pauses, and you feel him shift slightly above you, "—you're going to go to dinner with me tomorrow."

Something snaps into place in your head. A brilliant, terrible idea.

Fuck it.

You let your hand slide up from his ankle. Slowly. Palm flat against the fabric of the trousers, fingers spreading wide as you move up his calf. The muscle is solid beneath your touch, tense. You feel it twitch as you pass over his knee, and you keep going. Higher. You feel his leg go rigid under your touch. Hear his breath catch—sharp and sudden.

"You think so?" you ask, still not looking up. Your hand keeps moving. Up his thigh now, and he's gone completely still above you. Not moving. Not breathing. Just frozen.

"Yeah," he says, but his voice has gone rough. Strained. "I do."

Your hand reaches the very top of his thigh. You pause there and let the moment stretch. Then you slide your palm over the bulge straining against his trousers and squeeze.

He makes a sound—sharp, shocked, something between a gasp and a groan. You stand up slowly, keeping your hand exactly where it is. Keeping pressure. His hands come up like he's going to grab you, touch you, pull you closer, but he freezes when you press harder.

"Fuck," he breathes.

You're close now. Close enough to see his pupils blown wide, close enough to feel the way his breathing has gone uneven. His hips shift forward into your touch and you can feel how hard he is, how much he wants this.

"You were saying?" you murmur, tilting your head up. Your mouth is inches from his.

"I—" He swallows hard. Can't seem to finish the sentence. His eyes drop to your lips and you lean in closer. So close your breath ghosts across his mouth. Your hand moves slightly, rubbing through the fabric, and he actually groans this time.

"What was that about dinner?" you whisper.

"Tomorrow," he manages. "Eight. I'll—fuck—I'll pick you up."

"Mm." You lean in like you're going to kiss him. Let your lips almost brush his.

Then you let go, step back, and knee him directly in the dick.

Not hard enough to do real damage. But hard enough.

He doubles over with a choked sound, hands flying to his crotch, and you step around him calmly. You pick up your tablet from where you left it on the chair, and take one final look at Lando Norris.

"The trousers fit perfectly," you say, voice perfectly professional. "I'll let the tailor know we're done here."

You ignore Lando Norris for the rest of the fitting.

It's not difficult. He stays in the dressing room for a solid ten minutes after you leave, and when he finally emerges—fully dressed, thank fucking god—his face is doing something between amused and aroused and genuinely shocked.

You don't look at him. You focus on Max's final adjustments, on coordinating with the tailor about the timeline, on making notes in your tablet about pickup dates and alteration appointments. When Lando tries to catch your eye in the mirror, you turn away. When he opens his mouth like he's about to say something, you start talking to the elderly tailor about mother-of-pearl versus horn buttons.

Your hands only shake once you're in the car back to your flat. That evening, you send Pietra a follow-up email:

You don't mention Lando. There's nothing to mention, it was a fitting. He tried on a suit, everything went fine. Pietra responds within an hour with twelve exclamation points and a gif of someone crying happy tears. You close your laptop and don't think about Lando Norris for the rest of the night.

Or the next day.

Or the day after that.

Three weeks pass.

Three weeks of vendor calls and seating charts and a truly deranged argument with the florist about whether "white" and "ivory" roses are actually different. (They are, apparently.) Three weeks of normal, professional wedding planning work where you successfully do not think about Lando Norris or the fact that you kneed him in the dick in a Cifonelli dressing room.

You're good at compartmentalizing. It's a necessary skill in this job. You've dealt with difficult clients, bridezillas, grooms who show up drunk to their own rehearsal dinners. One overly confident racing driver who doesn't understand professional boundaries is nothing.

Except he keeps showing up in your email thread with Max and Pietra. Little comments on the group chain about the bachelor party planning, questions about the timeline, a truly chaotic suggestion that they do sparklers at the reception that Pietra immediately vetoed. You don't respond to him directly. You address Max only.

You're fine. Everything is completely fine. It's a Wednesday night—11:00 PM, to be exact—and you're on your couch in your pajamas with a pint of Häagen-Dazs Cookies and Cream that you've been working through for the better part of an hour. Some reality show is playing on your TV. You're not really watching it, too busy scrolling through the seating chart for the reception, trying to figure out where to put Pietra's uncle who allegedly had an affair with Max's aunt's best friend in 1987.

Your phone rings. Unknown number. London area code and you ignore it, taking another spoonful of ice cream. It rings again thirty seconds later. Same number.

You sigh, set the pint down on your coffee table, and answer. "Hello?"

"So, I've been thinking about you."

You freeze, spoon halfway to your mouth. That voice. You know that fucking voice. "Norris?"

"Lando," he corrects, and you can hear the smile in his voice. Hear the way he's settling into this conversation like he's got all fucking night to terrorize you. "And before you hang up—which I know you're about to do—I need to tell you something."

"How did you get this number?"

"Max," he says easily. "Told him I needed to coordinate some best man stuff. He gave it to me, no questions asked. Great guy, but a bloody terrible judge of character."

You close your eyes. "It's eleven o'clock at night."

"I know. I waited aaaaalllll day to call you." He pauses. "Didn't want to seem too eager, ya'know."

"You're calling me at eleven PM. That's the definition of eager."

"Fair point." He sounds amused. "Sooo, are you wearing panties right now?

You choke on your ice cream. Actually choke, coughing and sputtering into your fist while he laughs on the other end of the line. The pint nearly tips over on your coffee table and you have to grab it with your free hand, still trying to catch your breath. "Are you—" More coughing. "Are you fucking serious right now?"

"Completely serious," he says. "It's a yes or no question. Pretty straightforward."

You set the ice cream down. Hard enough that the spoon rattles. "I'm hanging up."

"No you're not." And the worst part—the absolute worst part of all of this is that he's right. You're still sitting here, phone pressed to your ear, face burning, while this man asks you about your underwear at eleven o'clock at night like it's a perfectly normal thing to do.

"Why are you like this?" you ask.

"Like what?"

"Insane. Mmm, iInappropriate, I don't know maybe the completely lack of boundaries."

"I prefer 'direct,'" he says. "And you still haven't answered my question."

"I'm not answering that."

"So that's a yes." He sounds pleased with himself. "Good to know."

"That's not—I didn't say—" You stop and take a breath. "What do you want, Lando?"

"I told you. I've been thinking about you."

"Then stop thinking about me."

"Can't." He says it simply, like it's a fact he's already accepted, like it's a facet that you're supposed to also accept. "Believe me, I've tried. Spent three weeks trying to forget about the dressing room. Didn't work. So now I'm calling you at eleven PM like a psychopath because apparently that's what you've reduced me to."

Your stomach does something stupid. You cannot do this right now. Seriously, you cannot. "I reduced you?"

"Yeah." There's rustling on his end, like he's shifting position. You picture him sprawled out somewhere—on a couch, maybe, or in bed—phone pressed to his ear, that insufferable grin on his face. "You put your hand on my dick and then kneed me in it. That's not something a person just forgets."

"You deserved it."

"I did," he agrees immediately. "Completely deserved it. I was inappropriate and pushy and I basically stripped in front of you. Very poor form. My mum would be horrified."

Despite yourself—despite everything—your lips twitch. "Your mum doesn't know?"

"God, no. She thinks I'm a perfect gentleman." He pauses. "She'd probably like you, actually. You seem like the type who'd keep me in line."

"No one can keep you in line."

"You did a pretty good job with your knee."

You close your laptop. Pull your knees up to your chest, phone still pressed to your ear, ice cream forgotten on the coffee table. This is insane. You should hang up. You should block this number and email Pietra tomorrow and tell her you can't work with her best man. But you don't, because despite every alarm blaring in your brain, you're enjoying this. "What do you actually want?" you ask quietly.

"Dinner," he says. No joke this time. No flirting, just honesty. "One meal. You pick the place, you pick the time. If you hate it, I'll never bother you again."

"You'll bother me anyway. You're the best man."

"Fine. Then I'll be professional. And completely appropriate. I'll call you 'ma'am' and everything."

"You're not calling me ma'am."

"See? You care." He sounds pleased. "That's progress."

"That's me stopping you from being weird."

"I can be weirder." He pauses. "Much weirder. Want me to prove it?"

"No."

"No, I think I can," he goes silent for a brief second. Then, "Uhhhhhhh, oohhhhhhh, mmmmm—" Your brain short-circuits. "What the fuck are you—"

"Oh god, yes," he moans into the phone, and it's so obscene, so deliberately pornographic that your face catches fire. "Just like that!"

"Stop!"

"Okay, okay! Say you'll will go with me!" he says in a higher pitched voice, clearly imitating you, before dropping back to that low groan. "Oh yeah, baby, just like that!"

"Oh my GOD, Lando!"

"Right there, don't stop, don't fucking stop."

"Goodbye, Lando!" You're already pulling the phone away from your ear, face burning so hot you might actually combust.

"Friday, eight PM!" he shouts before you can hang up. "Wear something nice! I'm taking you somewhere expensive!"

You hang up. Sit there on your couch, ice cream forgotten, staring at your phone like it personally betrayed you.

Friday comes too soon.

You spend Thursday trying to convince yourself to cancel. Draft three different texts saying you can't make it, that something came up with work, that this was a mistake. Delete all of them. Pietra sends you an email with fourteen exclamation points about linens. You have a call with the florist that somehow turns into a forty-minute argument about garden roses versus peonies. You confirm the string quartet for the ceremony and the DJ for the reception and the backup generator for the lights because Pietra is convinced there will be a power outage even though Villa d'Este has never had a power outage in its three-hundred-year history.

You don't think about Lando Norris. (You think about Lando Norris constantly.)

Friday morning, you have a dress fitting in Knightsbridge for another bride who can't decide between two nearly identical shades of white. Friday afternoon, you meet with a new client in Mayfair to discuss color palettes for their engagement party—"We're thinking sage and blush, but like, elevated sage and blush, you know?" You nod. You take notes. You smile and say yes, you can absolutely source elevated sage napkins.

You don't cancel. By the time you get back to your flat in Monaco—you live here because half your clients are here and the tax benefits are obscene and you can pretend it's a practical decision and not because you've always wanted to live somewhere beautiful—it's 6:47 PM and you have one hour and thirteen minutes to get ready.

You shower. Stare at your closet for fifteen minutes. Pull out four different dresses and hate all of them. Settle on a black slip dress that's simple and elegant and shows just enough without being obvious. Nice black Manolo heels, with your hair down and makeup that looks effortless but took thirty minutes. You look at yourself in the mirror and try to figure out what the fuck you're doing. Your phone buzzes at 7:52 PM.

After rushing down the elevator, you push through the glass doors and step outside into the warm evening air. And there it is.

A Porsche GT3 RS. Forest fucking green, parked directly in front of your building like it belongs there, which it absolutely does not. The engine is running, that distinctive Porsche rumble that turns heads even in Monaco where supercars are background noise. The driver's side door opens and Lando Norris unfolds himself from the car, and—fuck. He's wearing a white button-down, sleeves rolled to his elbows, tucked into dark trousers that fit him obscenely well. No tie. Top two buttons undone. His hair is slightly messy in that way that's definitely intentional, and when he sees you, his entire face lights up.

"Hi," he says.

You stop on the pavement. "How did you know where I live?"

His grin is shameless. "Max."

"Of course."

"Also—" he gestures at you, vague and all-encompassing, "—wow. You look incredible."

"Your selfie was terrible."

"I know." He doesn't look embarrassed. "But you responded, so it worked." He walks around to the passenger side, opens the door for you. The interior is all tan leather and you might come just from sitting inside of it.

"Shall we?" he asks.

You should turn around. Go back upstairs and text him that this was a mistake. Instead, you get in the car, he closes your door, walks back around to the driver's side. Slides in and the door shuts with that solid, expensive thunk that only German engineering can achieve.

"Seatbelt," he says, already reaching for his own.

You buckle in. The belt clicks into place and he's already pulling away from the curb, the Porsche responding to the slightest touch of the accelerator like it's been waiting for permission to move. The streets of Monaco blur past. He drives fast—not recklessly, but definitely confidently. Like he knows exactly what the car can do and exactly how far he can push it. His right hand rests on the gear shift, fingers drumming against the leather. The left is on the wheel, relaxed, assured.

Then his right hand moves and lands on your thigh. It rests there, warm and solid through the thin fabric of your dress. His fingers spread slightly, thumb brushing against the inside of your leg. You look down at it. Then at him. He's watching the road. Completely focused like his hand isn't currently on your thigh, like this is totally okay to do upon meeting someone for the second time.

"What are you doing?" you ask.

"Driving." He glances at you briefly, grin tugging at his mouth. "Why, what does it look like I'm doing?"

"Your hand?"

"What about it?" He squeezes gently, once, then goes back to that light, proprietary touch. "Problem?"

"Yes, actually."

"Hm." He doesn't move it. "Want me to stop?"

You should say yes. You should absolutely say yes. "I didn't say that."

His grin widens. "No, you didn't." He shifts gears and his hand moves with it, then returns to your thigh. Higher this time. Not quite at the hem of your dress, but close enough that you're very aware of how little fabric there is between his skin and yours.

"You're very presumptuous," you manage.

"Uh-huh," He takes a turn smoothly, the Porsche hugging the curve like it's on rails. "Also, you haven't moved my hand. So clearly I'm doing something right."

"You're doing something, that's for sure."

"Is it working?"

"Is what working?"

"This." His thumb moves, a slow stroke against your inner thigh that makes your breath catch. "Me being charming and forward and completely shameless."

Your face is burning. "You're not charming."

"Liar." He glances at you again, and there's something predatory in the way he's looking at you. Something that makes your stomach flip. "You wouldn't be in this car if I wasn't at least a little bit charming."

He's right. You hate that he's completely right. "I didn't agree to let you feel me up in your car."

"You didn't disagree either." His thumb moves again, and this time you can't quite suppress the small inhale. He notices, and you want to grab the wheel and crash the fucking car. "Besides, I'm being a gentleman. My hand is barely moving."

"Where are we going?" you ask, trying to redirect.

"Dinner." His hand stays exactly where it is. "I made reservations at Le Grill. You know it?"

"At the Hotel de Paris?" Your stomach drops. "Wait—aren't people going to see us?"

He looks at you. Actually looks at you this time, taking his eyes off the road for longer than is probably safe. "People?"

"You're—" You gesture vaguely at him. "You're you. You're Lando Norris. People know who you are."

"So?"

"So, we'll be seen together. You and I."

"Good." He says it simply, turning his attention back to the road. His hand doesn't move from your thigh. "That's the point."

"The point?"

"Of taking you to a nice restaurant. In public. Where people will see us." He shifts gears smoothly, accelerating through a turn. "I'm not hiding you in some basement bistro. You agreed to dinner with me, so we're doing it properly."

"I didn't agree to being photographed."

"Then don't smile at the cameras." He grins. "Or do. You'll look good either way."

"Lando, please."

"Relax." He squeezes your thigh again. "It's just dinner. People eat dinner all the time. It's a very normal human activity."

The light ahead turns red. He slows to a stop, turns to look at you fully. His hand is still on your leg, thumb still doing that maddening stroke against your inner thigh. "Besides," he says, eyes locked on yours, "I already told Max I'm into you. He laughed. Said I should go for it. So if anyone asks, we're just two single people having a meal. Nothing scandalous about that."

"You told Max—"

The light turns green. He's already accelerating before you can finish the sentence.

There were photos taken outside the Hotel de Paris. At least six people with their phones out, asking for pictures, calling his name. Lando handled it the way he probably handles everything—with that easy charm that makes people feel like they're the only person in the room, even when he's already moving on to the next one. His hand never left yours except to pose for photos, and when he was done, it came right back.

Dinner goes well. Too well, actually. The restaurant is all art deco elegance and Lando is—fuck, he's good at this. Charming without being smarmy, confident without being obnoxious. He orders wine without looking at the list, pulls out your chair, makes the kind of casual conversation that feels effortless even though you know it's not. He asks about your work, actually listens when you answer, remembers details from Pietra's emails that he has no business remembering. And he's gorgeous in the dim lighting. That's the worst part. The candles catch the sharp line of his jaw, the curve of his mouth when he smiles, the way his eyes crinkle at the corners when you say something that amuses him. His shirt is still unbuttoned at the collar and you keep noticing his throat, his collarbones, the way his hands move when he talks.

He catches you looking. Grins like he knows exactly what you're thinking. "See something you like?" he asks.

"Don't push it."

"That's not a no." His hand finds your knee under the table. Stays there through the rest of dinner. Through dessert—which he insists on ordering even though you're full. Through the coffee. His thumb traces lazy circles against your leg and you're very aware of every single point of contact. By the time you're back in the Porsche, it's past eleven and the streets of Monaco are quieter. He drives slower this time, his hand back on your thigh like it belongs there.

"I had a good time," he says.

"Shocking."

"You did too. Don't lie." You don't answer, and instead you look out the window instead at the city lights blurring past. He pulls up to your building too soon. Puts the car in park but doesn't turn off the engine.

"So," he says.

"So."

"Can I come up?"

You look at him. He's watching you with that same intensity, that same certainty, like he already knows what your answer is going to be. "That's very presumptuous," you say.

"I prefer forward." His hand squeezes your thigh. "And you haven't said no yet."

"I haven't said yes either."

"But you're thinking about it." He leans closer, and you can smell his cologne again, that same expensive scent that's been driving you crazy all night. "Aren't you?"

You should say no. You should thank him for dinner, get out of the car, go upstairs alone. "Just for a drink," you hear yourself say.

His smile is dangerous. "Just for a drink."

He turns off the engine and the encompassing sudden silence is loud. You hear your own breathing, hear the way his shifts slightly as he unbuckles his seatbelt.

"Come on then," he says finally.

You get out before he can come around to open your door. He manages it anyway, meets you on the pavement, and his hand finds the small of your back as you walk toward the entrance. The lobby is empty, just silence and the night security guard who nods at you as you pass. The elevator is at the far end, and your heels click against the floor with each step. Lando's hand stays on your back, warm through the thin fabric of your dress.

You press the button. Wait, and the elevator arrives with a soft chime. The doors slide open. You step inside. He follows anf the doors close and suddenly the space feels much smaller. You're very aware of how close he's standing, how you can feel the heat radiating off him.

"Which floor?" he asks.

"Seven."

He presses the button. The elevator starts moving.

You watch the numbers climb. One. Two. Three.

"You're quiet," he says.

"I'm thinking."

"About?"

You look at him. He's already watching you, leaning against the elevator wall with his hands in his pockets, looking entirely too comfortable. "About whether this is a terrible idea," you say.

"It definetly is." He doesn't sound concerned. "But you're still bringing me up."

Four. Five. Six.

The elevator slows. Stops. The doors open. You step out into the hallway. He follows, close enough that you can feel him behind you as you walk to your door. Your hands are shaking slightly as you dig for your keys in your clutch.

"Need help?" he asks, and his voice is closer now. Right behind you.

"I've got it." You find the keys. Unlock the door. It swings open into your flat—dark except for the light you left on in the kitchen. You step inside and he follows, closing the door behind him with a soft click that sounds impossibly loud.

He doesn't move further in. Just stands there in your entryway, hands still in his pockets, watching you. "Nice place," he says.

"You haven't even looked at it."

"I'm looking at you."

Your face heats. You turn away, set your clutch down on the console table by the door. Slip off your heels. The relief is immediate but also makes you shorter, more aware of how much taller he is. "I'll get us something to drink," you say.

"Sure."

You walk toward the kitchen. Hear him follow. When you glance back, he's looking around now—at the open floor plan, the windows overlooking the other buildings, your cream-colored Cloud couch and the art on the walls.

"Wine?" you ask, opening the fridge.

"Whatever you're having."

You pull out a bottle of white. Realize your hands are still shaking when you try to open it.

"Here." He's suddenly right behind you, taking the bottle from your hands. "Let me." He opens it easily. Pours two glasses then hands you one.

"Cheers," he says. You take a sip and the wine is cold and crisp and does nothing to settle your nerves. Lando leans against your counter, glass in hand, still watching you with that same look.

"You're staring," you say.

"I know."

"It's rude."

"I know that too." He takes a sip of wine. "But you look good so good right now, I can't help myself." He sets his glass down. "Come here."

It's not a question. Not quite a command either. Just—an invitation. A test and you should tell him to leave. Should remind him this is a terrible idea. Should do literally anything except walk toward him. You walk toward him and he doesn't move. Just watches you close the distance, watches you stop right in front of him. Close enough to touch but not touching.

"Hi," he says quietly.

"Hi."

His hand comes up. Slowly. Gives you time to move away if you want to. Cups your jaw, thumb brushing across your cheekbone. "I'm going to kiss you now," he says. "If that's not okay, you should probably say something."

You don't say anything and he leans in. His mouth finds yours and it's—fuck. It's nothing like you expected. Softer at first, almost careful, his lips moving against yours like he's learning you. His hand stays on your jaw, thumb stroking your cheek, and his other hand comes up to your waist, pulling you closer. Not demanding. Just guiding.

You kiss him back and feel him smile against your mouth.

"There she is," he murmurs, and then the careful is gone.

He kisses you harder, deeper, his tongue sliding against yours and his hand tightening on your waist. You make a sound—something embarrassing and needy—and he swallows it, uses it as permission to crowd you back against the counter. The marble is cold against your lower back but he's warm, solid, pressed against you from chest to hips.

His hand slides from your jaw to the back of your neck, fingers threading through your hair, angling your head exactly how he wants it. The other hand moves lower, gripping your hip, thumb pressing into the hollow there through your dress. You can feel how hard he is already, the thick length of him pressing against your stomach, and when you shift slightly he groans into your mouth.

"Fuck," he breathes, pulling back just enough to look at you. His pupils are blown wide, lips already swollen, and there's something feral in the way he's looking at you now. "Bedroom. Where's your bedroom?"

You point vaguely toward the hallway. Can't quite form words.

"Show me." You take his hand. Lead him down the hall, past the bathroom, to your bedroom door. It's dark inside but you don't turn on the light. Don't need to. The city lights through the windows give enough illumination to see the bed, to see him closing the door behind you with one hand while the other pulls you back against him.

He kisses you again. Hungrier this time, one hand fisted in your hair, the other sliding down your side, over the curve of your hip, gripping your ass through the silk. He walks you backward toward the bed, doesn't break the kiss even when your legs hit the mattress.

"This dress," he says against your mouth. "Been thinking about taking it off you all night."

"Then take it off."

His hands find the zipper. Slides it down slowly, deliberately, knuckles dragging against your spine. The dress loosens, falls open, and he peels it off your shoulders. It pools at your feet and you step out of it, standing there in just your underwear—black lace, matching set, the expensive kind you told yourself you definitely didn't wear for him.

He steps back. Looks at you.

"Jesus Christ," he says quietly.

You reach for his shirt. Start unbuttoning it, fingers fumbling slightly because he's watching you so intently and it's making your hands shake. He lets you get three buttons undone before his patience runs out and he pulls it over his head, sends it somewhere across the room. And—fuck. You knew he'd be fit, he's an athlete, but seeing it is different. Tanned skin, defined muscles, the sharp V of his hips disappearing into his trousers. You put your hands on his chest, feel his heart racing under your palms, feel the way his breathing has gone uneven.

"Your turn," you say, fingers going to his belt.

He doesn't help. Just stands there watching you unbuckle it, unzip his trousers, push them down his hips. He steps out of them and then it's just his boxer briefs—black, tight, doing absolutely nothing to hide how hard he is. You look up at him. He's grinning now, that same cocky grin from the dressing room.

"See something you like?"

"Shut up."

"Make me." You kiss him again and he makes this sound—low and pleased—before his hands are on you, one sliding up your back to unclasp your bra while the other grips your ass, pulling you flush against him. The bra falls away and then his mouth is on your neck, your collarbone, trailing lower.

"Bed," he says against your skin. "Get on the bed."

You do. Climb onto the mattress, lie back against the pillows, and watch him watch you. He hooks his thumbs into his boxer briefs, pushes them down, and—

Oh. He's—fuck, he's big. Thick and hard and already leaking at the tip, and when he wraps his hand around himself and strokes once, you forget how to breathe.

"Still want to tell me to shut up?" he asks, climbing onto the bed, caging you in with his arms.

You can't speak. Can only stare at him—at the way his muscles shift as he moves, at the cocky tilt to his smile, at the heat in his eyes. His hand slides up your thigh. Slowly. Taking his time. Fingers tracing patterns against your skin until he reaches the edge of your underwear.

"These," he says, snapping the lace against your hip, "need to come off."

He doesn't wait for permission. Just hooks his fingers into the lace and drags it down your legs, tosses it somewhere behind him. Then his hands are on your thighs, spreading them apart, and the way he's looking at you—hungry and focused and completely shameless—makes heat flood through your entire body.

"Fuck," he says quietly, almost to himself. "Look at you."

His fingers trace up your inner thigh, feather-light, getting closer and closer to where you need him. But he doesn't touch you yet. Just keeps tracing these maddening patterns against your skin while you try very hard not to squirm.

"Lando—"

"Yeah?" He's grinning now. Knows exactly what he's doing. "Something you need?"

"Touch me."

"I am touching you."

"You know what I mean."

"Do I?" His fingers move higher, so close now you can feel the heat of his hand. "You might need to be more specific."

You grab his wrist. Guide his hand where you want it. His palm cups you and you both make a sound—yours is relief, his is something darker. "Fuck, you're already wet," he says, and then his fingers are sliding through your folds, finding your clit, circling it with just enough pressure to make your hips jerk. "Is this what you've been thinking about? All through dinner?"

You can't answer. Can only arch into his touch as he works you with his fingers, slow and deliberate, learning exactly what makes you gasp.

"Answer me," he says, leaning down to kiss your neck. Teeth scraping against your pulse point. "Have you been thinking about this?"

"Yes." It comes out breathless. "Yes, fuck—"

"Good." He slides one finger inside you and you both groan. "Because I've been thinking about it since the fucking dressing room."

He adds a second finger, curls them just right, and you see stars. His thumb finds your clit and works it in rhythm with his fingers, and you're already embarrassingly close, already fisting the sheets because it's too much and not enough all at once.

"That's it," he murmurs against your throat. "Let me feel you."

You come hard, sudden and sharp, your back arching off the bed. He works you through it, fingers never stopping, prolonging it until you're shaking and trying to push his hand away because it's too sensitive. He pulls his fingers out slowly. Brings them to his mouth. Sucks them clean while maintaining eye contact.

"Jesus Christ," you manage.

"We're not done." He's already reaching for his trousers, digging through the pockets. Pulls out his wallet, then a condom. "Not even close."

He tears it open with his teeth, rolls it on, and then he's positioning himself between your legs. The head of his cock presses against your entrance and you both freeze for a second.

"You good?" he asks, and there's something almost vulnerable in the question. Like he actually cares about the answer.

"Yeah." You pull him down into a kiss. "I'm good."

He pushes in slowly. Just the tip at first, letting you adjust, and fuck—he's thick. Thicker than his fingers, stretching you in a way that's just on the right side of too much. "Breathe," he says against your mouth. "Just breathe."

You do. He pushes in deeper, inch by inch, until he's fully seated inside you and you both have to take a moment because it's overwhelming. He feels enormous like this, filling you completely, and when he shifts slightly you make a sound that's almost pained.

"Okay?" His hand cups your face, thumb stroking your cheek. "Talk to me."

"Move." Your hands grip his shoulders. "Please move."

He does. Pulls out slowly, pushes back in, sets a rhythm that's measured and deliberate. His eyes don't leave yours, watching every reaction, every gasp, adjusting his angle until he finds the spot that makes you cry out. "There?" he asks, doing it again.

"Yes—fuck—there—"

He grins. Picks up the pace, driving into you harder now, and the bed frame starts hitting the wall with each thrust. His hand slides down between your bodies, finds your clit again, and the combination of his cock and his fingers is going to kill you.

"Come on," he says, voice rough. "Want to feel you come on my cock."

You're already close, can feel it building at the base of your spine. His rhythm never falters, just keeps hitting that spot inside you over and over while his fingers work your clit, and when you come this time it's harder than before, your whole body seizing up as you clench around him.

"Fuck—" He groans, hips stuttering, and then he's coming too, burying himself deep and grinding against you as he rides it out.

For a moment, neither of you move. Just breathe hard against each other, hearts racing, skin slicked with sweat. Then he pulls out carefully, disposes of the condom, and collapses next to you on the bed.

"So," he says, still catching his breath. "That was—"

"Don't."

"Don't what?"

"Whatever you're about to say. Just—don't."

He laughs. Rolls onto his side to look at you. "I was going to say that was worth the three-week wait."

Despite yourself, you smile. "It was pretty good."

"Pretty good?" He looks offended. "I just made you come twice."

"Twice isn't that impressive."

"Give me ten minutes." His hand slides up your thigh. "We'll go for three."

For a second, you just lie there, staring at the ceiling, trying to piece together last night. The restaurant. The car. Your apartment. Your bed. Lando.

You sit up. The sheets are tangled, your dress is still pooled on the floor by the door, and there's a dull ache between your legs that confirms last night definitely happened. But Lando's not here. His clothes are gone. His shoes. The only evidence he was ever here is the faint smell of his cologne on your pillows and a note on the nightstand.

You reach for it. Hotel de Paris stationery, which means he had it in his pocket.

You shower. The hot water does nothing to settle the uneasy feeling in your stomach. When you get out, you pull up his contact—the number he texted you from with that blurry selfie—and type out a message.You hit send. The message sits there for a second, then: Not Delivered

You stare at it. Try again. Not Delivered

He blocked you. Or his number's disconnected. Or something. You wait a day. Try calling. It rings once, then straight to voicemail. The generic kind.

"The person you are trying to reach is not available." You hang up. Stare at your phone and think, what the fuck?

The weeks blur together in a haze of spreadsheets and vendor calls and forcing yourself not to think about Lando Norris.

You throw yourself into work, you finalize the floral arrangements for the ceremony—white roses and peonies, exactly as Pietra specified. Confirm the string quartet for cocktail hour and the DJ for the reception. Coordinate with the Villa d'Este staff about the timeline, the seating chart, the fucking napkin placement. You email Pietra approximately four hundred times about details that probably don't matter but keep you busy enough that you don't have time to feel pathetic.

You don't tell anyone what happened. Not your friends, not your assistant, definitely not Pietra. What would you even say? I slept with the best man and then he ghosted me? It sounds stupid even in your head. You see his name in the email threads. Max and Pietra's group messages about the bachelor party, about travel arrangements, about the rehearsal dinner. Lando responds to everything—quick, efficient, and never directly to you. Always just replies-all to the group.

You stop trying to text him after the first week. Stop checking his Instagram after the second. By week three, you've almost convinced yourself it was just a one-night thing that you both silently agreed to forget about.

Almost. Then Pietra sends the email.

Wonderful, this is going to be absolutely fucking wonderful.

You arrive at Villa d'Este on Sunday afternoon with your tablet, three different backup chargers, and a determination to be so fucking professional that Lando Norris will feel like an absolute idiot for whatever game he's playing.

The villa is stunning—which is not surprising given that Pietra wouldn't settle for quite literally anything less. Terracotta and cypress trees and Italian sunshine that makes everything look like a painting. The staff greets you at the entrance, and you're shown to your room: a corner suite with a view of Lake Como that would be romantic if you weren't here to work.

You unpack. Check your timeline. Confirm with the florist about tomorrow's delivery. Send Pietra a message letting her know you've arrived. She responds immediately with approximately forty heart emojis. The welcome dinner is at 8 PM on the terrace. You spend an hour deciding what to wear, which is stupid because this is a work event and you should just throw on something professional and call it done. Instead you try on four different dresses before settling on a linen midi dress in cream—elegant, appropriate, and coincidentally (totally not planned) makes you look incredible.

At 7:38 PM, you step onto the terrace. It's exactly as beautiful as you expected. String lights overhead, long tables set with flickering candles, the lake shimmering in the background. Pietra spots you immediately and practically runs over, pulling you into a hug that smells like expensive perfume and champagne. "You're here! Oh my god, thank you for coming early, I know it's a lot but I just—I needed you here, you know?"

"Of course," you say, and you mean it. Pietra's one of the good ones. "Everything's going to be perfect."

"I know. Because you're here." She squeezes your hand, then gets pulled away by one of her bridesmaids. You grab a glass of wine from a passing server. Scan the terrace. Max is by the bar with his brother. The bridesmaids are clustered near the railing, taking photos. And then—

There.

Lando's at the far end of the terrace, leaning against the stone wall with a beer in his hand, laughing at something one of the groomsmen just said. White linen shirt, sleeves rolled up, hair messy like he's been on the beach. Even from here you can see the way the fabric pulls across his shoulders when he moves. Beautiful bastard.

He hasn't seen you yet. You turn away and head toward the opposite side of the terrace. You can do this. You can be in the same space as him for one week without it being a thing. You're a professional for fucksake.

"There she is!"

Max appears at your elbow, grinning. "The woman who's going to make sure my fiancée doesn't have a breakdown over napkin colors. We owe you our lives."

You laugh despite yourself. "Just doing my job."

"Well, you're doing it incredibly well." He gestures toward the bar. "Come on, let me introduce you to everyone. Well—everyone you haven't met yet."

Your stomach drops. "Max, I've already—"

But he's already steering you across the terrace, toward the group of groomsmen, toward the bar, toward him. "Lando, mate, have you met—" For half a second—just half—something flashes across his face. Something that looks almost like oh fuck. But then it's gone, smoothed over, replaced by that easy smile, and he's extending his hand like you're strangers.

"Don't think we've been properly introduced," he says. His voice is perfectly friendly. Perfectly casual. "Lando."

You stare at him. At his outstretched hand. At the complete absence of acknowledgment in his eyes. "I know who you are," you say.

"Right. Wedding planner." His smile doesn't waver. "Pietra talks about you constantly."

He's still holding out his hand. Waiting. You shake it. His grip is firm, professional, and he lets go immediately—no lingering, no recognition, nothing. Max is already talking. Something about the bachelor party itinerary, about the boat they rented, about someone's girlfriend who couldn't make it. You're not listening. You're looking at Lando, at the way he's nodding along to Max's story like this is completely normal, like he didn't fuck you three months ago and then disappear.

"—right?" Max finishes.

You have no idea what he just said. "Absolutely."

"Perfect! I'll let you two sort out the logistics." Max claps Lando on the shoulder and wanders off toward Pietra, leaving you standing there with a man who's currently pretending he doesn't know what you look like naked.

The silence stretches. Lando takes a sip of his beer. You grip your wine glass hard enough that you're mildly concerned it might shatter. "So," he says finally. "Bachelor party logistics, huh?."

You stare at him. "Are you fucking serious right now?"

"What?" He has the audacity to look confused. Concerned, even. "Did Max not fill you in on the timing? I can send you the—"

"Stop."

He stops. The casual mask slips just slightly—something sharper underneath, something that looks almost like guilt but you're not sure because it's gone before you can name it. "You blocked my number," you say quietly. The terrace is loud enough that no one else will hear, but you keep your voice low anyway. "You left a note that said you'd call. And then you blocked my fucking number."

"I didn't—" He stops. Looks away. Jaw working. "It's complicated."

"Complicated." You laugh, and it comes out brittle. "Right. So complicated that you couldn't send a single text that said 'hey, this was a mistake' or 'I'm not interested' or literally anything besides complete silence for three months."

"It wasn't like that."

"Then what was it like?" You step closer, and he actually takes a step back. Good. "Because from where I'm standing, you spent weeks pursuing me, convinced me to have dinner with you, fucked me, and then disappeared. So please, Lando, tell me what it was actually like."

His hand tightens around his beer bottle. "Can we not do this here?"

"Oh, now you want to talk?"

"I—" He glances around. The terrace is full of people, but no one's paying attention to you. "Yes. Just—not here."

"Why not?"

"Because—" He stops. Runs his free hand through his hair, and there it is—the first crack in the facade. He looks actually frustrated, like an actual fucking human being. "Because Max and Pietra don't know. About us. About—" He gestures vaguely between you. "Any of it."

"There is no us," you say. "There was one night. That you pretended never happened."

"I'm not pretending."

"Then what do you call this?" You gesture at the space between you. "The handshake? The 'don't think we've been properly introduced'? What the fuck was that?"

"I was trying to—" He stops. "I didn't know what else to do."

"You could've been honest, Lando."

"Yeah, well, I'm trying to be honest right now."

"Three months late."

"I know." He steps closer and his voice drops, quiet enough that it's just for you. "I know, and I—look, can we please just talk about this somewhere that isn't the middle of Pietra's welcome dinner with forty people around us?"

You open your mouth to tell him no, to tell him there's nothing to talk about, to tell him he had three months to have this conversation and he chose silence instead. But before you can get a single word out, someone calls his name.

"Lando!"

You both turn. There's a woman walking toward you—tall, blonde, short hair, absolutely stunning in a lilac slip dress. She's smiling, bright and easy and completely unaware that she's just walked into the middle of something, and when she reaches Lando she rises up on her toes and kisses his cheek like it's the most natural thing in the world.

Your stomach drops so fast you actually feel dizzy.

"There you are," she says, her hand landing on his arm. The touch is light, casual, but it stays there, definitely stays there. "I've been looking everywhere for you. Pietra wants to do a champagne toast before dinner and she's panicking because she can't find the speech she wrote."

Lando's face does something that looks like dread and resignation and guilt all at once. "Magui, I—"

And that's when it clicks. When your brain finally catches up to what you're seeing, to who this is, to what this means. Magui. Magui Corceiro. Portuguese model, Lando's ex-girlfriend, and—according to Pietra's meticulously organized bridal party spreadsheet that you've reviewed approximately three dozen times in the last two months—the maid of honor. She turns to you now, still smiling, still completely oblivious to the fact that you're currently having an out-of-body experience. "Hi! You must be the wedding planner. Pietra showed me all your photos of the ceremony setup—it's going to be absolutely gorgeous."

You can't speak. Your brain has completely short-circuited because Lando's ex-girlfriend is standing in front of you being lovely and friendly and probably a genuinely nice person, and she has no idea that you slept with him three months ago. That he left a note on your nightstand and then blocked your number. That he's standing here right now looking like he wants the terrace to open up and swallow him whole.

"Hi," you manage. Your voice sounds strange, like it's coming from very far away. "Yes. The planner."

"I'm Magui." She extends her hand and you shake it on autopilot, and her grip is warm and her smile is genuine and you kind of want to die. "I'm so excited for this week. Pietra's been planning this wedding since I met her, I swear."

"Yeah," you say. Very articulate. "She has."

Magui's hand is still on Lando's arm. She's not holding on tight, not being possessive, but it's there—a casual point of contact that speaks to history, to familiarity, to the kind of comfort you only get with someone you've known for years. And suddenly, with a clarity that makes you feel physically sick, everything makes sense. The Hotel de Paris, where he took you to dinner. Where people saw you together, where phones came out, where he very deliberately chose somewhere public and high-profile instead of some quiet bistro where you could've had privacy. The ghosting that came after. The blocked number. The three months of complete silence. He took you there to make her jealous. He fucked you and then he went back to her. And you were stupid enough to think it meant something.

Wow, what a fucking joke.

You look at Lando and he's staring at you like he knows exactly what you're thinking, like he can see the entire realization playing out on your face. There's something desperate in his expression now, something that looks almost like panic, and his mouth opens like he's about to say something, like he's going to try to explain or defend himself or ask you to just wait, just give him a second to—

You don't wait. "Excuse me," you say, and your voice comes out perfectly level, perfectly professional. "I need to check on the seating arrangements."

You turn and walk away before either of them can respond. You don't run—running would draw attention, would make it obvious that something's wrong—but you walk fast enough that you're through the terrace doors and into the villa's cool interior within seconds. The hallway is blessedly empty. You make it around the corner, out of sight of the terrace, and then you stop. Just stop, press your back against the wall, close your eyes, and try very hard to remember how to breathe.

Fuck.

You avoid Lando Norris for the next four days. Monday is vendor deliveries and a conveniently timed florist crisis. Tuesday is spa day for the bridal party, which you skip because you're "confirming final counts with catering." Wednesday is the rehearsal dinner and you plant yourself next to Pietra the entire night, keep Max's brother between you and Lando during dinner, and do not make eye contact. Not once. Not when he gives his speech and everyone laughs. Not when you feel him watching you from across the table. Not when Magui's hand is on his thigh and you have to pretend you don't see it, don't care, aren't replaying that night in your apartment on a fucking loop.

It works. For four days, it works.

Then it's Thursday night—the night before the wedding—and you're alone in your room. You've showered, changed into an oversized t-shirt, pulled your hair into a messy knot. Your tablet is open on the bed next to you, tomorrow's timeline pulled up even though you've memorized every minute. Ceremony at 4:30. Cocktail hour at 5:45. Reception at 7:00. Everything is confirmed, everything is perfect, and you should be asleep because tomorrow is sixteen hours of nonstop work.

Instead you're staring at the timeline trying not to think about the fact that tomorrow you'll have to watch Lando stand at the altar in that Cifonelli suit. Watch him give a speech about love and commitment while Magui sits at the head table looking beautiful and oblivious.

There's a knock at your door. 11:47 PM. More likely than not, it's Pietra panicking about something last-minute, or hotel staff with towels you didn't ask for.

It's one of the groomsmen. Tom, maybe, or the one whose name you keep forgetting—one of Max's childhood friends who has been aggressively normal all week and therefore completely indistinguishable from the others. He's still in his dinner clothes with his tie loosened and he's holding his phone out to you.

"Sorry, do you have the groomsmen timeline for tomorrow? Mine cuts off after the ceremony and I can't find the—"

"Yeah," you say. "One second."

You go back to your tablet. Pull it up. AirDrop it to him. The whole thing takes forty seconds. "Brilliant, cheers," he says. "Sorry for bothering you."

"It's fine."

You close the door. Stand there.

The room is exactly as you left it. Tablet on the bed, timeline pulled up, lamp on the nightstand casting the same warm light it's been casting for the last two hours. Nothing has changed. Everything is fine and confirmed and in its place and you did not just spend the walk to the door composing your face into something that wasn't—

You were going to fix your hair. Your hand was actually moving toward your hair. You go back to bed. Turn off the lamp and stare at the ceiling for a while in the dark like a normal person who is completely fine and definitely not lying in a five-star suite on Lake Como having feelings about a man who couldn't be bothered to text.

You're asleep by one. Probably.

You're up at six. The florist calls at 6:04 because she's psychotic, and there are, apparently, too many peonies. You stand on your balcony in yesterday's t-shirt and handle it, because that's what you do, and also because handling it means you can't think about anything else, which is the closest thing to a coping mechanism you have right now.

By eight you've redistributed the surplus flowers, confirmed the string quartet's arrival, talked Pietra down from a weather spiral (partly cloudy is not rain, it has never been rain, clouds are not an emergency), and eaten something standing over the sink. By ten you're in your dress and moving through the villa with your tablet and your timeline and your entire personality held together by a thread.

It works. Right up until the ceremony. The groomsmen are already at the altar when you do your final sweep from the back of the terrace. You're checking sightlines. Checking the musicians. Checking that the flower girl hasn't eaten the petals out of her basket again.

You find him anyway. You weren't looking and you find him anyway, which is really just your life now. The suit fits exactly as well as you knew it would. You stood in that dressing room and checked every seam yourself. Midnight blue, peak lapels, the mother-of-pearl buttons Pietra specified in the email she sent at 11 PM on a Tuesday. His hair is neat for once. He's laughing at something Max just said, head tilted, and he looks, well, he looks beautiful.

You look back down at your tablet. He looks up. You feel it without seeing it, that same thing you felt across the room at Cifonelli four months ago, and you keep your eyes on your screen and breathe.

The ceremony starts one minute late. You note it and say nothing. Pietra comes down the aisle and she looks so genuinely, stupidly happy that something in your chest does a thing you weren't prepared for. Ten meters of Italian lace and she's crying already and Max looks like a man who cannot believe his luck, and you're standing at the side of this terrace with your tablet and your earpiece and your professional remove, and it still gets you. It always gets you. It's the only part of this job that still surprises you every single time.

You watch from the periphery, same as always. That's where you live at weddings—just outside the frame, making sure everything inside it stays perfect. You check the musicians. Check the timing. Check that the rings are where they're supposed to be.

You don't mean to keep finding him in the crowd. It just keeps happening. He's watching Max the whole time. That's the thing—there's no performance to it, no awareness of how he looks. Just him, actually present, actually feeling something, and when Max's voice breaks slightly on his vows Lando looks down at his shoes for a second like he's trying to get it together.

You write 4:47—ceremony concluded in your notes.

When they kiss the whole terrace erupts and Lando is the loudest, clapping with his whole body, grinning like an idiot, and Max grabs him first before Pietra and they do that thing men do where they hug and immediately try to make it funny and Pietra throws her arms around both of them and the photographer is getting all of it and you are standing fifteen feet away writing transition to cocktail hour—on schedule.

Completely fine. Cocktail hour is yours. This is where you live—moving between vendors, checking the canapé timing, making sure the string quartet transitions correctly, solving the three small disasters that happen at every single cocktail hour without exception. You're good at this part. You're good at all of it actually, that's the whole problem, because being good at your job means you're always just present enough to notice things you'd rather not.

Like Lando, at the edge of the terrace, with a drink in his hand, not talking to anyone. You notice it the way you notice everything—peripherally, catalogued, filed away. He's been stopped twice for photos, laughed at something Max's brother said, done a full loop of the terrace. But right now he's standing at the stone railing looking out at the lake and he looks like someone who is also trying not to look at something.

You go check on the canapés. The reception starts at seven on the dot, which you will feel smug about for at least a week. The room is everything Pietra wanted and you knew it would be—candlelight and white flowers and the lake through the open doors, and when the bridal party is announced and everyone floods in you let yourself have exactly four seconds of satisfaction before you're back on your tablet checking the dinner service timeline.

You're at the coordinator's table near the kitchen entrance. Good sightline, close enough to intervene, far enough to be invisible. You've eaten half a bread roll. You have a glass of water and a glass of wine and you've touched neither of them in forty minutes. This is normal. This is what weddings look like from your side of them.

The speeches start at eight. Max's father goes first. Then Pietra's sister, who cries through the whole thing in a way that is genuinely charming and gets the room crying with her. Then the maid of honor—Magui, composed and warm and funny in exactly the right measure, and you watch her at the microphone and feel nothing except a vague and distant acknowledgment that she is, irritatingly, very likeable.

Then Lando stands up. The room shifts the way rooms do when someone walks into them with a specific kind of energy. He gets a cheer before he's even said a word, someone whoops from the back, and he grins and waits for it to die down with the patience of someone who has been in front of crowds his entire adult life.

"Right," he says. "So I've been told to keep this under ten minutes."

Someone shouts something. He laughs. "Which is generous, actually, because I had a whole thing prepared and then Max told me Pietra's sister was going first and I watched her speak at the rehearsal dinner and I've scrapped it completely because there's no following that."

More laughter. Pietra is already crying again. You are looking at your tablet. "I've known Max since we were kids," Lando says, and his voice shifts—still easy, still him, but quieter now. This was more real. "And I can tell you that for a long time he was the most annoying person I'd ever met, which is saying something because I work with some genuinely difficult people—"

Laughter.

"—but the thing about Max is that he has never once, in fifteen years, pretended to be someone he isn't. Not for anyone. And I always thought that was just—I thought that was just who he was. That it was easy for him."

He pauses. Looks at Max.

"And then I watched him meet Pietra."

The room has gone very quiet. "And I realized it wasn't that it was easy. It was that he was waiting. For someone who made it—not easy. Just—worth it." He picks up his glass. "I've never said this to your face because you'd be insufferable about it, but you're my best friend and I love you, mate. And Pietra." He turns to her. "Thank you for making him this annoying to be around. He smiles all the time now, it's disgusting, we all hate it."

Pietra laughs through her tears.

"To Max and Pietra." The room rises and you raise your water glass and you do not look at him and your throat is doing something completely unreasonable that you are going to ignore. By nine-thirty the dancing is in full swing and your job has mostly become logistics maintenance—checking the cake is ready, confirming the late night snacks are on schedule, fielding a minor situation involving someone's elderly aunt and the wrong seat assignment. Small things. Manageable things.

Which means you have too much space in your head. You slip out through the side door onto the smaller terrace, the one that wraps around the north side of the villa. It's quieter here, just the music drifting out from the reception and the lake below and the night air which is warm and still and completely wasted on you. You lean against the railing and look at the water and let yourself have five minutes of not performing.

You hear the door behind you. You know before you turn around and turn around anyway. Better to get it over with. He's loosened his tie at some point, top button undone, and he's holding two glasses of wine which is either presumptuous or optimistic or both. He holds one out to you.

You take it. You're too tired not to. He comes to stand next to you at the railing, not close enough to be a thing, just—there. Looking at the lake. You look at the lake too. The music from inside is muffled out here, something slow, and the water is doing that thing it does at night where it looks completely still even though it isn't.

"Good speech," you say, because you're a professional and it was.

"Thanks."

Silence. Not uncomfortable exactly. Just weighted. "The flowers looked incredible," he says.

"They did."

"Pietra cried when she saw the ceremony setup. Like, before anyone arrived. Just walked in and started crying."

"I know. I was there."

"Right." He turns his glass in his hand. "You're always there."

You're not sure what to do with that so you don't do anything with it. The lake does its thing. The music does its thing. You finish half your wine and let the silence sit because you're too tired to perform and apparently so is he.

"Magui and I have been on and off for four years," he says finally. Not looking at you. Looking at the water. "On when it was easy, off when it wasn't, back on because it's familiar and familiar felt like enough when you're never in the same place for more than two weeks." He pauses. "It wasn't enough. It hadn't been for a long time. We both knew it."

You don't say anything.

"The night I took you to dinner," he says. "We were off."

There it is. "And after," he says. "When I left yours. We were still off." He pauses. "And then I got back and she called and we were," he stops. "We were on again. By the time I thought to reach you it had been two weeks and I didn't know how to." He exhales. "There's no good version of this."

"No," you say. "There isn't."

"I should have told you. Before dinner, before any of it, I should have told you it was complicated and let you decide if you wanted to be anywhere near it." He turns his glass in his hand. "I didn't because I didn't want you to say no."

The music inside swells for a moment then settles. Someone laughs, loud and bright, and then it's quiet again out here.

"So right now," you say. Carefully. "You and her."

He doesn't answer immediately, which is its own answer. "It's complicated," he finally says.

"You said that already. At the welcome dinner."

"I know." He looks at you then. Really looks at you, and you wish he wouldn't because it's much easier to be angry at someone when they're not looking at you like that. "I'm sorry. For the record. Not because I need you to forgive me or because we're stuck at the same wedding. Just—you didn't deserve any of it. The dinner, the note, the silence. None of it was fair to you."

You look at him for a long moment. He means it. That's the worst part. He's standing here in the suit you watched being fitted four months ago and he means every word of it and it doesn't change a single thing.

"No," you say. "It wasn't. You should sort it out," you say. "Whatever it is. Just—sort it out."

You mean it as exactly what it is. Not an opening, not a door left ajar. Just the truth—that four years of on and off is no way to live and you can see it on him and whatever else he is he doesn't deserve that either.

You pick up your tablet. Turn toward the door.

"Hey."

You stop. He's stepped closer. Not by much—just enough that you're aware of it, the same way you've been aware of him all night, all week, across every room you've had the misfortune of sharing. His tie is loose and his eyes are doing the thing they do and he has absolutely no business looking like that.

"What," you say.

"Nothing." The corner of his mouth pulls up. "Just — you look really good tonight."

"Lando."

"I'm just saying."

"You're just saying," you repeat.

"The dress is—" he gestures vaguely, "— it's a good dress." You look at him. At the half smile and the careful eyes and the very deliberate closing of distance that he's doing so slowly you're almost supposed to not notice.

"Don't," you say.

"I'm not doing anything."

"You're doing something."

He takes another half step. You don't move back, which is either confidence or stubbornness, and at this point you genuinely can't tell the difference. He's close enough now that you can smell his cologne, the same one from the dressing room, from your kitchen, from the one night you've been trying to stop replaying for four months.

"Sort it out first," you say quietly.

He stops. Something moves across his face. The half smile fades into something more honest, and he looks at you for a long moment in the dark with the lake behind him and the music leaking through the doors and forty people thirty feet away who have no idea.

"Yeah," he says finally. Quietly. "Okay."

You hold his gaze for one more second and then you go back inside.

The cake goes out at nine fifty-two, eight minutes behind schedule, which you will think about for days. Pietra doesn't notice. Nobody notices. The room is candlelight and dancing and white flowers and everything she asked for, and you stand at the edge of it with your tablet and your earpiece and watch it all run exactly the way you built it to.

Max dips Pietra on the dance floor and she shrieks and the whole room cheers.

You write 2147—reception on track in your notes. You don't look for him. That's the thing—you don't look. And somewhere between the cake and the late night pizzette and the moment Pietra throws her bouquet directly at her maid of honor's face, you realize you've stopped bracing for it. Stopped waiting for him to appear in your peripheral vision. Stopped doing the thing where you feel him in a room before you see him.

Maybe that's something. Maybe that's enough for tonight. You're in the car to the airport by noon on Monday. Your inbox has forty-three unread emails, a voice note from Pietra that is mostly crying and the word perfect repeated several times, and nothing else.

You fly home. You make coffee. You open your laptop.

You don't check for anything specific.

He calls on a Wednesday. Three weeks after the wedding, 9 PM your time, and you answer on the second ring which you will think about later with some irritation.

He calls two weeks after that, and then two months later.

It's October when you finally have the balls to properly ask.

You don't mean to. You've been on the phone for forty minutes about nothing—his race in Japan, your nightmare client in Paris, an argument about whether peonies are actually better than roses which you're winning handily—and it just comes out.

"Are you and Magui still off?"

Silence. Two seconds, maybe three.

"Yeah," he says. "We're off."

"Okay."

"Okay," he repeats, and he's quiet again

Neither of you says anything for a moment. "The peonies thing," you say. "I'm right."

"You're not right."

"I'm always right."

"Okay, you're right about flowers and wrong about everything else."

"Name one thing."

"You told me Austin was always loud and last weekend it was completely fine actually!"

You're laughing before you can stop it and he sounds pleased about that, insufferably pleased, and you talk for another twenty minutes about nothing and when you hang up you sit with yeah, we're off for a long time in the dark.

He doesn't call for another two months.

You don't call him either. That's the thing you come back to, later—you could have. You have his number, he has yours, there's no rule that says it has to be him. But you wait, and he doesn't call, and you tell yourself it's fine because it is fine, it was always going to be fine, you knew what this was.

You get through November on spreadsheets and a particularly chaotic engagement party in Cannes. December on a destination wedding in Marrakech that nearly kills you professionally but produces the best photographs you've ever seen. January on sheer spite and very good coffee.

He calls in February. A Sunday, 11 AM, like no time has passed at all.

You answer on the third ring. Progress.

"Hey," he says.

"Hey."

"I'm in London."

"Okay."

"It's raining."

"It's always raining."

A pause. "I know I went quiet."

"You don't have to do this, Lando."

"I know I don't have to." His voice is even. "I just wanted to say it. I went quiet and I'm sorry."

You look out your window at Monaco in February, grey and still, the harbour flat and cold.

"Is everything okay," you ask.

"Yeah." A beat. "It's getting there."

You believe him. You always believe him, which is its own problem.

"I have a bride in Tuscany," you say. "She wants the entire wedding in shades of terracotta."

"Is that bad?"

"It's not bad it's just—it's a lot of terracotta, Lando."

He laughs and something in your chest unknots quietly and you talk for an hour about nothing and when you hang up you don't sit with it this time. You just go make coffee and open your laptop and get on with your day.

He calls the following Sunday. And the one after that.

By spring it's just—a thing. Your thing. He calls on Sundays when he can, Wednesdays when he can't wait until Sunday, random Tuesday nights from airports when his flight is delayed and he's bored and you're the person he wants to talk to apparently, which you have filed under not my problem and left there.

You know his schedule better than you mean to. You know Bahrain is always chaos and he hates the Monaco GP for reasons he won't fully explain and that he's been trying to learn to cook since January with limited success.

"The pasta was fine," he says, from his kitchen in Woking on a Wednesday in April.

"You said that last time and then you told me you ate cereal for dinner."

"The pasta was fine and then I had cereal for dessert. Two separate things."

"That's not what dessert means."

"That's exactly what dessert means."

"Lando."

"What, it was good cereal."

You're smiling at your kitchen table over a glass of wine and you are absolutely not thinking about what this is.

He doesn't call on Sunday.

Or the Sunday after that. You don't call him either. You tell yourself you're busy, which is true—there's a wedding in Vienna in November and a corporate event in Paris that's somehow become your problem and a bride who has changed her color palette four times in three weeks. You're busy.

You're always busy, so it's fine.

October becomes November. November becomes December and you're at your parents' house on Christmas Eve standing in the kitchen when your phone rings.

Your stomach does the thing before you've even looked at the screen.

"Merry Christmas," he says.

"It's not Christmas until tomorrow."

"Merry Christmas Eve then."

"That's not a thing."

"I'm making it a thing." A pause, warm and easy. "Are you with your family?"

"Yes."

"Good." Simply. Warmly. "Good."

You're standing in your childhood kitchen with two glasses of wine in you and Lando Norris is wishing you a Merry Christmas Eve from wherever he is and you are so far from fine it's almost funny.

"Merry Christmas Eve," you say.

He laughs. Soft and real. You talk until your mum calls you for dinner. You hang up and go and you don't think about it and you are not fine and that's just where you are now apparently.

He doesn't call in January.

Or February. Or March. Or April or May.

You stop expecting it around March, which feels like its own small achievement. You get through February on a wedding in Marrakech and sheer stubbornness. March on a nightmare engagement party in Geneva and very good chocolate. April on nothing in particular, just the ordinary machinery of your life clicking along without him in it, which is how it was before and how it will be after and that's fine.

You're fine.

It's June. A Thursday afternoon, sun coming through your kitchen window at that specific Instagramable angle, coffee going cold on the counter. You have fourteen unread emails and a call with a florist in an hour and approximately zero feelings about anything.

Your laptop pings.

You stop. Go back.

Read the CC line again like it's going to say something different the second time.

It doesn't.

You close the laptop.

Sit there.

The florist call is in thirty-eight minutes. The seating chart is still a disaster. Your coffee is cold and the sun is coming through the window and Monaco is doing its thing outside completely unbothered by the fact that you are sitting at your kitchen table doing the math again and this time it's adding up to something very fucking specific.

Six months of silence and this is what he was sorting.

You sit with that for a while. Let it go where it needs to go. The Christmas Eve call. The easy Wednesday. Sort it out first. Him saying yeah, okay on a terrace in July like it was a promise.

And maybe it was. Maybe this is just what okay looked like from where he was standing.

Your laptop pings and you open it without thinking.

From: Lando Norris To: You Subject: Re: Wedding Planning Inquiry

One line.

I can explain.

You stare at it for a long time.

Then you close it. Open a new email. Type:

Hi Magui, lovely to hear from you—congratulations on your engagement!

He can fucking wait.

They stared at you in stunned silence… then laughed. “Stop imagining men, love,” your aunt said, patting your shoulder like you were a child.

That only made you double down. You insisted he was real . You promised he would come. And somehow, against all odds, they believed you.

Now you had three weeks to find a real, handsome, British man willing to pretend to be your boyfriend for an entire weekend.

You tried everything.

You drafted a ridiculous post you almost uploaded somewhere. You looked up actors for hire and nearly cried at the prices. You asked around at work, but almost everyone was married or taken.

You even stopped strangers on the street one desperate afternoon, only to realise halfway through the conversation how insane it sounded.

Days slipped by. The wedding got closer.

With only a few days left, you met your best friend at her apartment, looking like you hadn’t slept in a week.

She pulled out a notebook with a determined expression.

“Okay. Let’s be systematic. Handsome British man. Height?”

You sighed, rubbing your temples. “I don’t know… taller than me is fine. I don’t care.”

“Eye colour?”

“Whatever. It doesn’t matter. This is my fake boyfriend, not my future husband.”

She scribbled notes, humming to herself. Then she looked up, eyes sparkling.

“I’ve got our guy.”

You raised an eyebrow. “Please don’t tell me this is Tinder on paper.”

“Lando Norris.”

“No. Absolutely not.”

“Yes,” she said firmly. “You saved his ass five years ago. He owes you a favour. And I heard he’s back home right now.”

“That was forever ago. He won’t even remember me. He’s a world champion now.”

“Exactly. A favour is a favour. No matter how many championships he wins.”

You argued for nearly an hour. You overthought it for another hour after she left. But in the end, lying in bed staring at the ceiling, you typed the message with shaking fingers.

You : Hi Lando, it’s Y/N. I don’t know if you still remember me, but I really need that favour you promised me years ago. Could we meet up and talk?

You didn’t expect a reply anytime soon.

But he answered in under ten minutes.

You met at the old café you used to visit together years ago. It was quieter now, with only a few customers scattered around. He looked the same, but older. More confident.

The first few minutes were painfully awkward. Small talk about the weather, how long it had been, what you both did these days. Then you took a deep breath and told him everything.

You explained the family teasing. The lie. The wedding. The fact that you had painted him as this perfect British boyfriend.

When you finished, you stared at your coffee, cheeks burning.

“I know this is completely insane. You don’t have to say yes. I just… I didn’t know what else to do.”

Lando was quiet for a long moment. Then he let out a soft laugh, shaking his head.

“I was expecting something way worse when you said ‘favour.’ Like hiding a body or something. This? Pretending to be your boyfriend for a weekend? Yeah. I can do that.”

Relief flooded through you so strongly you almost cried. The next few days became a whirlwind of planning.

You built your story carefully: you had known each other years ago, reconnected a few months back when you ran into each other by chance, went on a date, and things had slowly turned romantic. It wasn’t entirely a lie, which made it easier to sell.

But your family was suspicious by nature. They would want proof.

So you spent an entire afternoon taking photos. You changed outfits, hairstyles, makeup, locations : park, your apartment, even a quick walk by the river. You made sure the pictures looked like they’d been taken over weeks, not hours.

At one point, after the tenth outfit change, you collapsed onto your couch.

“Lando, go buy flowers,” you said.

He was sprawled across your living room floor, looking exhausted. “Why?”

“Because you’re supposed to be a romantic boyfriend who spoils me. We need one last photo. Big bouquet. Make it convincing.”

He groaned but went anyway. When he came back with the biggest, most ridiculous bouquet you had ever seen, you couldn’t help but laugh. You added an empty gift box for good measure and took more pictures.

The hardest part came later that evening.

You fidgeted with your phone, avoiding his eyes.

“We… should probably practice kissing too. My family notices everything. If it looks awkward in front of them, they’ll know something’s wrong.”

Lando rubbed the back of his neck, but nodded slowly. “Yeah… you’re right.”

The first kiss was hesitant and stiff. You both pulled away, laughing awkwardly. The second was better. By the fifth or sixth, something shifted. The kisses grew slower, deeper, more natural. When you finally stepped back to check the photo you’d taken, your heart was beating way too fast.

Lando cleared his throat. “Your family… they don’t actually work for the FBI, right?”

You smiled weakly. “Sometimes I wonder.”

***

The flight and the car ride home were exactly as terrifying as you expected.

Your dad picked you both up from the airport and spent the entire drive asking Lando questions: about his job, his family, his intentions. Lando handled it well, but you could see the overwhelm in his eyes.

The next two days were a marathon. Every relative wanted to meet him. Every meal turned into an interrogation. Your aunt was the worst.

At dinner on the second night, after Lando had excused himself to rest, she leaned in.

“He’s lovely, really. But let’s be honest… he’s so out of your league it almost hurts. A famous, handsome, rich athlete… and you’re just you.”

You forced a smile and stayed quiet. You didn’t want drama before the wedding.

The wedding itself was beautiful. Soft blue tones everywhere, just like you’d told Lando. He wore the new suit perfectly. He held your hand, kissed your temple, danced with you like it was the most natural thing in the world.

Somewhere between the fake affection and the real laughter, the lines blurred. You caught yourself forgetting it was pretend more than once. And you were pretty sure he did too.

Then came the bouquet toss. You stood near the back, not even trying to catch it… and it landed straight in your arms.

Your cousin ran over, beaming. “The next wedding we’ll be celebrating is yours!” she said, looking between you and Lando.

You smiled tightly and nodded. Lando just gave you a small, amused look.

The next morning, as you packed to leave, your mum pulled you aside while your dad and Lando loaded the bags into the car.

“I’ll admit it,” she said softly, “I thought you might have made him up just to shut us up. But seeing you two together… I’m so happy for you, sweetheart. He looks at you like he really loves you. You deserve this.”

The guilt twisted in your chest.

On the plane ride home, you were quiet. When you reached your apartment, Lando carried your bags all the way upstairs, even though you told him he didn’t have to.

At your door, you turned to him with a tired smile.

“Thank you. Seriously. You can stop pretending now. No one’s watching anymore.”

He nodded, but didn’t move right away. For a few seconds he just looked at you, something unreadable in his eyes.

Then, as he started to turn away, he paused.

“Y/N?”

“Yeah?”

He gave you a small, almost shy smile.

“Do you want to go on a real date sometime?”

◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤◢◤

Sure, he had great reaction time, was athletic, could probably match a beat, but dance? Being out of his element, Max could only make a few demands: nothing that required him to be flexible, nothing that would make him make a fool of himself on camera. That's how they landed on some kind of ballroom dancing, but it didn't settle the strange feeling in Max's stomach that arose anytime he tried something truly new. 

"You ready?" Some assistant says, leading him down the hallway of some fancy Dutch dance school. They'd rented out a studio for three days, arranged some high-up dance instructor to help him. Three days, he tries to remind himself as he takes in the walls lined with trophies and photos and ignores the rare dancer giving him odd looks as he passes.

It would be three long, hard, weird days, but at least he reasoned, it wasn't ballet, or anything fancy, and it was only three days. "Mr. Verstappen!" An elderly woman greets him, happily extending a hand for him to shake. "We're so excited for you to join us this week." 

"I should warn you, it's going to be a long week," Max laughs, knowing the cameras trailing him are on. "I'm not exactly a dancer." 

"Nonsense," The woman says warmly, patting his arm. "Everyone can learn to dance, no matter the age." 

The door across the hall from them bursts open and a group of young dancers tumble out, laughing and whispering as they move their way down the hall, and Max is transported to a memory. There used to be a dance studio in the same parking lot as Max's old karting track, and on the nights when karting ran late, Max used to be able to make out the image of the backlit little dancers through the large, glass windows. It was the sort of memory Max hadn't thought of in a while, and it did nothing to ease his churning stomach. "Putting me into the junior level, hm?" 

"Ah, they're just excited because they had a special visitor today. One of the best dancers in Europe is here! She just finished an international ballet tour." A moment later, a woman appears in the doorway, and Max almost recognizes her. Perhaps he'd seen her advertised, somewhere, seeing as she was some famous ballerina. Her eyes turn to him, and the moment their gazes lock, Max is sent back to a chainlink fence on a cold, dim night. 

You.

"Max?" 

-

Max hadn't meant to wander away from the track, but sometimes, and only sometimes, he felt bad when his dad was yelling at people. Tonight it was some attendant who did something wrong, again, and Max had decided to wait out the growing storm by the back fence, where, to his surprise, a princess sat on the other side, picking at the flowers and weeds. 

"Oh." Max says, and you look up, a matching sour expression as his. "What are you doing here?" 

"Waiting for my mom to finish yelling at my instructors." You answer softly, and Max found himself smiling as he plopped himself down across from you. He knew that feeling well. "What are you doing here?" 

"Waiting for my dad to finish yelling at the attendants." You smile back, and it looks like his. He wasn't used to people relating to him, especially not princesses. "You look like a princess." Max says, and you adjust your skirt so as not to let any dirt get onto it.

"You look...cozy." You say, gesturing to his suit. "Like strange pyjamas." 

Max gasps, clutching his hands to his race suit. Pyjamas! These were fireproofs, the thing that kept him safe from accidents, the things that were his second skin at this point.

They were very cool.

Did they really look like pyjamas? "They are not! It's my racing suit." 

"Racing suit?" He gestures behind him to the dimly lit track. 

"For karting. You know about karting?" You shake your head, and it's a shame, really, that not everyone knew about karting. Max loved it, the speed, the fun, the hard work. It was a lot of hard work, but his father had shown him that it was worth it, all the yelling and energy and time away from everyone else. He was already winning trophies, travelling around Europe to race against people older and bigger and more powerful than him.

Though he wasn't supposed to boast, he always won. 

You rip up a handful of grass, and in an attempt to show solidarity, Max does the same. "All I do is dance." 

"All I do is kart." You look at him, and Max shoves the grass he ripped up through the fence, and it falls onto the ground beside your hand. You pick it up and shove it back through the fence, and the two of you do that back and forth, giggling, until Max realizes how strange it is. He wasn't supposed to be wasting time, talking to random people through fences, but he'd never done it before. He had a very small circle, so meeting someone new, who was truly new, was different. "Do you like dancing?" 

"I like certain kinds of dancing." You answer properly, all-knowing about the subject, and Max happily took your word for it. Looking back on it, Max thinks you were probably just trying to show off. "I like ballet, and ballroom dancing, and sometimes jazz. Do you like karting?" 

"I'm going to do more than karting some day. I've going to race actual cars." The side door to the dance studio opens, casting a harsh orange square across the lot and onto you, and Max squints up at an angry figure. 

"What on earth do you think you're doing?" You scramble to your feet, using the fence to rise, and in his own fleeting attempt to avoid getting in trouble, Max does the same, and ends up putting his hand over yours through the fence. The person he assumes to be your mother doesn't really notice him, face scrunched up as she glares at you. Max knew what that felt like, too. He'd think parents would be nicer to princesses, but his father wasn't any nicer to him for being a champion, so he supposes you have that in common. "I told you to wait in the car! You're going to get grass stains everywhere." 

You turn to look back at Max, hands still touching, and you offer a small smile. "Good luck with your racing." 

"Good luck with your dancing." Then, because he realizes he never introduced himself, "I'm Max." 

"Let's go!" You leave before Max can catch your name, and he returns to the garage before his father can yell at him like that. 

-

"Oh." Max responds somewhat dumbly, taking in the grown-up version of you. You were wrapped in a black leotard and skirt, a stark contrast to the pale pinks he used to remember you in. You had matured, though your features were still as soft as his memories, something peaceful, almost sad about you. You were pretty, but Max had always thought that about you.

When boys used to talk about crushes and how far they'd gone with girls, way back when, he used to brag that he'd held hands with a girl before, only he left out the part that it was accidental, and through a fence, and that he was maybe 8 years old. "You know each other?" The woman asks, and you finally smile, and Max thinks he might melt into the floor beneath him. 

"My old dance studio used to be in the same lot as one of his old karting tracks. We haven't seen each other in..." Years, enough that he can't count them all. He'd sort of wondered about you, every so often, on clear nights and in parking lots. He'd picture you on a stage somewhere, and considering you'd just got back from some international tour, it seems you both achieved your dreams. "In a long, long time." You finally settle on as your eyes take him in, slowly scanning his body, and he's terrified of what you see. He was most certainly grown, compared to his chubby and then lanky childhood self, but the hair, the stubble, he had no idea if he had matured as gracefully as you had, and he finds himself awkwardly rubbing at his cheek to disguise the patchiness of it. "What are you doing here?" 

It takes Max a minute to realize it's a question he can answer. "F1 is partnering with different arts...things. They want me to learn how to dance. I race for Formula One, now." 

"I know." It had felt stupid to say, but he wasn't sure you'd have any interest in the world of racing, outside of knowing him. But you knew that he'd made it, and that little smile you're giving him is making him feel like a young boy again. You glance around him and clue in that there are cameras on you, and Max watches something change in you, a performer coming out to take the place of who he used to know as you politely wave at the camera. "Well, you're in the right place for it. It's a wonderful school. What are they making you do?" 

"Ballroom." The woman answers, and you shake your head with a fake smile, and Max had never realized how quickly he was able to pick things up about a person, let alone one he hadn't known for a long, long time. 

"You'll want a waltz, then." You answer easily. "I'm not sure about teaching you to tango." 

"Would you want to?" Both of your heads whip to stare at the woman, who smiles blindly back. "I mean, if you already know each other, you'd be better suited than I would be. Plus, I'm sure Mr. Verstappen wouldn't mind a younger, better dancer to teach him." 

You turn to look at Max, facade slipping, and he wishes he knew what you thought when you saw him. "Well?" Max finally says, trying to keep his voice steady. "For old times sake?" 

"Well." You answer slowly, as Max realizes how much he's asking of a stranger. You didn't really know each other, didn't really have much to do besides stare at each other strangely in a hallway, but it felt like more. It felt like it should mean more. "For old times sake." 

-

As much as Jos had been hard on Max, your mother had been hard on you. She was some famous dancer in another life, some great performer who travelled the world and took plenty of lovers and brought you into the mix. You don't remember much of your early life on the road, but you do remember when she first enrolled you in a dance class.

You hadn't stopped since. It had been one goal after another: get into a good dance school, get into a good company, build up your resume, get into a prestigious company, travel the world, get out of her hair and be a pawn for her to brag about. It was one stage after another, another audition, another rehearsal; it was a constant cycle that never ceased, and no one ever really knew how you felt. 

Except Max.

Some random boy you only saw in parking lots, who took over the world of racing by storm, whose father yelled when your mother did. 

And now, he was sitting on a studio floor, awkwardly trying to stretch himself as you stared, and tried to keep yourself composed. It had been a childhood infatuation, catching up with his races, celebrating his wins in dressing rooms alone. You were trying to not make a fool of yourself, but it was hard when you had so much history and yet so little spoken between the two of you. "The lady said you just finished an international tour." Max tries to make conversation, leaning to touch his toes. 

"I was Aurora, in Sleeping Beauty." It was an honour. There was so much to say about the experience, so many people, so many memories. All the children in the audience, watching in awe. That had been you, once, and you had finally made it to where you had wanted to be. You would never, ever voice it aloud, but it somehow hadn't satisfied the pit in your stomach. You had done enough, surely, so why didn't it feel like it? 

"A princess!" Max says, head snapping up to look at you as you try to hide how much it makes you smile. He always said you looked like a princess in all your costumes, and you still think his look like grown-up onesies. "I called that." 

"For those wondering," You say up to the camera, "Max used to say all of my costumes were princesses. He didn't understand the difference between them." 

You had grown used to that, too. The camera presence, the collaborations, the sponsorships. You were stuck between putting on a good show for Formula 1, and for the school, and getting to know Max again. It was a hard thing to balance when all you wanted to do was join him on the floor and talk about all the things you never got to. "Well, they all look like princesses, even the swans." 

"You remember that?" Max's eyes don't quite meet yours as he moves to stretch out the other leg. 

"Of course I do." 

-

It was the very first snowfall of winter. It was light, not yet able to cover the ground, but it was still frigid, and the perfect opportunity for photos, your mother had insisted. You were in Swan Lake, after all, so getting some nice photos of you in actual snow would be good for some portfolio or another. It was your dream role, you think, to be the actual White Swan, to play Odette. It had gone to someone else, much to your mother's annoyance. 

She had used this photoshoot as a way to cheer you up, she'd said. Didn't make it any less cold, any less miserable. You strike another pose, pushing up onto your pointe shoes, hands resting perfectly above you. "Hands." Your mother reminds you, and you stare up at them as if they hold the answer to their own misdoing. You shift your fingers and hope it's right. "I told you not to overdo it on the blush." 

"Blush?" Your hands find your cheeks, feet resting back on the hard pavement of the parking lot. You hadn't applied much blush at all - perhaps it was the cold. "I'm just cold." 

"Don't complain!" A car pulls up, and your mother glowers at its headlights ruining the photos. To your delight, Max gets out of the car, though it does nothing to help your apparently overblushed cheeks. It was always nice, to see him in passing. The other girls liked to watch the karters, sometimes, point out the ones they thought were cute from the windows of the studio. Max had always been your favourite, because he thought you were a princess. 

"What are you doing?" His father says to your mother, making the both of you freeze. "You're taking up the race track's parking spots!" 

Your mother had dragged out one of the moveable backdrops, a deep blue one that let the snow show up, and set it up in the empty lot. She plants a hand on her hip, camera waving wildly in the other as she responds. "This lot is available to both the studio and the track! I am perfectly within my right to be here." 

"Another princess?" Max offers quietly as he approaches, fingers idly drumming against his helmet. 

"Swan, actually." You correct him, fluffing out your feathers. 

"A swan princess?" He just had to rub it in, didn't he? You scowl, and Max quickly apologizes. "Sorry, I didn't know." 

"I didn't get cast as the White Swan." You complain, rubbing your arms to keep yourself warm. "I'm just a background swan." 

"This half of the lot is for the track, that half is for your little dancers. You need to take this all down." For no other reason than to show off, you bounce back up onto one foot, now taller than Max. He smiles up at you, going up on his own tiptoes to try and match your height. 

"You look more like a fluffy angel than a swan." He jokes, and he was right, considering the wings were made from an angel costume tucked away in one of the studio's costume closets. "Who would want to be a duck anyway?" 

Your mother says a word you don't understand, and Max's eyebrows raise in shock. "What does that mean?" 

"Oh," Max breathes out, quickly shaking his head. "Nothing. Just don't repeat it." 

"Come on, I'm old enough, you can tell me." You didn't actually know how old Max was, and considering the look he's giving you, he doesn't know how old you are. "I'm eleven." 

"I'm also eleven." Max answers, finally resting back on his feet. "But princesses shouldn't know bad words." 

"I thought I was a fluffy angel." Finally, it seems your parents have realized you're talking, and Max's dad snaps his fingers at the boy and points to the track. 

"Distracted by the pretty ballerina, are we? Get going!" Max offers a small wave which you return as your mother grabs your wrist and hauls you toward the studio.

-

"So, a waltz is what we call a box step, because you're moving around in a square." You hold out your hands to Max, and he slips them into yours, and he hopes they feel as nice in yours as yours feel in his. You're directing him into different steps, one forward, to the side, then his feet slide together as yours do the same, and for a moment, he thinks he has it until he spares a glance up and finds you staring at him, a softness to your expression that he hasn't been awarded in a while. "You're alright," You soothe, "Just fall back into the box step. Forward," 

"To the side," Max continues, "Then together." 

"You're a quick learner." You say as you stop, letting his hands fall from your grip. "No wonder you're world champion." 

World champion. It was a title he was given often, but it seemed strange coming from you. "You followed my races?" 

"You're a very important man here in the Netherlands." You say, moving over to grab your phone. You spare a glance at the film crew, showing them your Spotify page. "I'm going to play copyrighted music, is that an issue?" 

"We just won't record audio for this portion, then." The boom operator says, setting down the mic. "We can fill in music over it." 

You put on something soft and slow, and you return to him, and this time, you gently place a hand on his shoulder and extend the other, and Max's hand finds your waist, careful in his hold on you. His other hand slots into yours, and this close, he wonders if you can feel how fast his heart is pounding. It's ridiculous, he can hear his father say in the back of his mind, to be this worked up over some ballerina, someone he hasn't seen in so long, but a young version of him is still tucked away somewhere in his chest, and has come to life at seeing you again. "Now, I want you to do the box step without looking at your feet. Just look at me, and try to get it. It's alright if you stumble or step on my feet, it is your first day." 

"Did you ever watch my races?" Max asks, somewhat selfishly, now that the microphones are off. It's just you and him, and he can ask whatever he likes and no one else will be able to hear over the music. He begins the box step, awkwardly hitting your feet as he goes, but his eyes don't break from yours. 

"When I could. I was in Vienna, when you got your first world champion win." You answer, moving as if this melodic sway is simply second nature. He's not sure how to take the admission, that you could remember exactly where you were when he first won. "I know it's silly, since we were children, but I was so proud to have known you. I liked to check in, just to see how you're doing." 

"I hope you'll forgive me for not doing the same." Proud. The word pierces something in Max's heart, and his eyes drift from yours to over your shoulder, gaze falling on the wall of mirrors behind you to ignore the guilt. You had seen him become what he'd always talked about, and he'd not thought once to google your name and see if you did. 

Your foot nudges his, somewhat purposefully, and Max looks back to you to find you staring at him intently. "You don't need to be forgiven. You are a very busy man, Max Verstappen. I don't blame you. We weren't...we weren't exactly best friends, either." 

"I think under different circumstances, we could have been." Max finds himself saying, betraying the emotion behind the distance between you. In another life, Max would have loved to come to your birthday party, and he would've loved for you to attend one of his races. But you had been children, with very big things ahead of you, and no way to combine being young and being famous together. "I'm not sure your mum ever would have allowed me to come for a playdate." 

"I'm not sure your dad would have allowed the same." It's different, when it comes from someone else, someone less knowing. When people read or see his family life and offer comments, concerns, Max wants to think they come from the right place, but that's not what he's been through. You knew, however. You could tease him because you had been through the same dynamic, though in some ways, fared better or worse. You had been so similar as children, which is probably why you never were more than strangers in the night.

The song ends and you step away, clapping your hands together once. "Well, I think you've nailed the box step. Want to try turning?" 

"Turning?" He watches as you set up the next song, something slightly faster, and tries to find a balance between providing entertainment for the cameras, actually learning to waltz, and keeping his childhood at bay. "You're going to have to go slow with me." 

The grin you offer him is real, and you slot right back into his arms like you were meant to be there. "I'm sure you haven't said that often." 

"I can take things slow." Max retorts lowly, and he pretends the pink on your cheeks had always been there. After the box step, you move, turning the two of you to the side, and Max stumbles to realign himself. "You didn't have to agree to do this," Max says as he steps on your foot accidentally, quick to look down to try and right himself. "Just because it's me. I'm sure this is much below your level." 

"Keeps me humble, the charity cases." You joke softly, and Max spares a glance up to roll his eyes at you. "Besides, I'm not sure we'd get a reunion any other way. Not every day you can say you taught Max Verstappen to waltz." This, Max would argue, isn't waltzing, more like blindly stumbling in a square, but you have a point. There aren't many options for the two of you, between the world of racing and the world of dancing, to just have an afternoon together. "How does it feel? Being Max Verstappen, World Champion?" 

"Not much different than the Max Verstappen who kept you company in parking lots." If his younger self could see him, he'd be proud, though confused at many things. Currently, he'd probably be losing his mind about you teaching him to dance, and the fact that you're holding hands again. Maybe, his younger self prods at him, he could make up for lost time. "How does it feel? Being a world famous dancer?" 

"Not much different than the princess you used to make fun of." That peaceful, almost sad look return to you, and you shrug one shoulder as you lead him into another turn. "It's not as glamorous as we dreamed, I'm afraid. Haven't touched any of the bucket list we made up as kids." 

It was some random weeknight, late enough that you probably both should have been in bed, Max waiting for his father to finish talking with another family, you waiting for your mom to return from somewhere. You had sat on the steps to the karting track together, listing off all the things you'd do once you were rich and famous. "Ah, so no army of cats and dogs yet?" 

"Unfortunately, no. I also don't have my own fashion line, or a sandwich named after me. Yet." Funnily enough, Max did have his own fashion line technically, and somewhere, he thinks, there must be a Verstappen sandwich, but he keeps both of those thoughts to himself.

"I don't have my own personal race track either, but I do have you beat in one aspect." You turn again, and Max actually does it, falling right back into step, and he grins like an idiot. "I've got three cats."

Your smile matches his, but strangely, he doesn't think it's from the dancing. "Really?" 

"Jimmy, Sassy, and Donatello." This time, you falter, foot hitting his before quickly righting itself, and he'd forgotten the depths from which he'd pulled the name.

"What?" It was another late night, when you were both older, and kittens had been found abandoned in the parking lot. You named them all after historic figures, and Max had mocked you for it. Who'd name a cat Donatello?

"After two, I couldn't come up with a name." Him, apparently. "You should come see them sometime, in Monaco." 

"Monaco!" Your face lights up in disbelief, and this song ends much quicker than the other. "You really did make it, huh?" You don't move away from him yet, despite the silence rippling through the room now. 

The last thing he wants in this world is to let go of you, but there are cameras, and commitments, and Max can't ignore either. Slowly, he steps back and bows, trying to play it off, and you feign a courtesy with a small smile. "We made it." He says as he rises, and something glints in your eyes. Then, before he can convince himself out of it, he asks, "If you don't mind, could I have your number? I'd like to reconnect, outside of all this. After rehearsal, if you want." 

Just friends, he'd say if anyone, or you, questioned him about it. Just to catch up for old times' sake. And, if you kept looking at him like that, and you felt the way he did, then it was a date some twenty-odd years in the making. "Of course," You answer, like it's the most obvious thing in the world. Someone gets his attention to do some little side interview, and you watch him go with a smile. "Good job, Max." 

He's going to die in this dance studio. 

-

Max 🏎

I've got a strange question 

Do you remember the summer, before I left? 

Princess 🩰

When you spilt ice cream all over yourself?

Max 🏎

On the ground, actually

Princess 🩰

But yes, I remember that summer

Why? 

Max 🏎

There's an ice cream van, in the park by my airbnb 

Make up for lost time?

Princess 🩰

I'm sure we both have diets were not supposed to ruin 

Max 🏎

I'm paying 

Princess 🩰

Deal 

-

There were many things you were not allowed as a child. You did no other extracurriculars, you could not dye your hair, you could not go out without your mother's supervision, could not do anything extreme, lest you hurt yourself and your dancing career. You were not allowed ice cream, either, or many sweets, to keep you in shape. 

Having grown, you know it wasn't healthy to avoid the same things, but you had yet to grow a sweet tooth, or have the desire to do anything spontaneous, anything rebellious. Max, you think, had fairly similar experiences. You knew he liked football, though he wasn't allowed to play often. Racing probably had its own dietary needs, and despite the fact he was already involved in one high speed sport, he probably wasn't allowed to put himself at risk, either. 

So standing here, together, with the sun setting in some little park waiting in line for ice cream, you had felt more out of place than you had in a long, long time. 

You felt happy. "I never realized they had so many options," You whisper to Max, eyes glued to the menu. "I thought it was like, just vanilla, or just chocolate." 

"What are you thinking of getting?" He asks, and you glance over at him, rather lost. It's odd to think you're both so grown, fallen back into the same patterns after so long away. It should be awkward, strange, anything, but it just sort of feels normal. Like you were always made for late nights in random parking lots, though the ice cream is a nice exception. "Do you want to both get something and split them? So we can try different things?" 

"One normal, one crazy." You answer resolutely, and then Max goes about ordering, and gets some chocolate thing, an expected choice from him, and some brightly coloured swirled one in a waffle cone, which he extends to you. You hadn't really meant to make him pay for both, but he seemed far too happy with himself to say anything about it now. 

"Mum," A child harshly whispers nearby, though he's not too quiet about it, "Max Verstappen!" 

The woman turns to look at Max, who offers a little wave, and that's all the boy needs before he rushes to Max, a thousand questions spat rapid fire at him, and you take the ice cream cone from him so he can squat to the child's level. "Don't eat that," He says up to you jokingly, and the child stares up at you in wonder. "She's going to steal my chocolate, isn't she?" 

"I wouldn't do that to World Champion Max Verstappen." You tease, and the boy launches back into his questions, but Max doesn't look away from you, and you can't stop staring at him, because it sort of hits you all at once that this is real. 

You aren't children sitting on cold pavement talking about futures you didn't really understand yet. You aren't making up titles because you didn't know if you'd ever get one. You aren't friends, barely know each other, but you know each other so deeply because you had been forged in the same kind of fires. The child keeps asking questions and Max finally looks away to answer him, and you remember it all so well. Of being that young and excited about the world, dreaming of going big places and meeting your biggest heroes. 

But you were here, now. The childhood wonder had long faded, the years caught up to you, and now it was Max posing for a photo with a fan, not the other way around, that same cheesy grin as he's always had, and it almost hurts. That everything you went through, all the struggles and the triumphs and the pains and the endless nights had happened, and they led you here, and it wasn't what you dreamed of. 

You're sure for Max it had to be. It had to be all worth it, to be him, to be this known and loved and a four-time world champion, but it was different when all that work paid off and you were on stage and thrown roses and brand deals and it never felt like it was worth it. All the sores from your dance shoes, all the bruises, all that pain of childhood that had meant so much, and still did, but was tarnished in comparison to everyone else. 

You hadn't let yourself think of it, really, of that unfulfilment waiting in the back of your mind, that you staved off with promises of more shows and more work, but it returned with a vengeance when Max rises, waving goodbye to the boy as his mother has to drag him off, and you handed him back his ice cream.

You never got to have ice cream as a kid. 

So what could it be like to enjoy it now? "We should go somewhere more secluded, maybe." Max says, unaware of the battle he'd returned you to. "Before your fans start flooding us, too." 

"That was really sweet." Is all you can bring yourself to say, letting Max guide you through the park as the sun dips below the trees, the sky a deepened purple as he finds some random bench nestled between the trees and settles there. You fold yourself up on the hard wooden planks, turning to face him as your back presses against the bench's arm rail. He plucks the chocolate piece off the top of his ice cream and extends it to you, and your heart sinks just a little bit further into your chest. "That's your favourite, Max. You can have it." 

"You never told me your favourite chocolate." He bites half, and you shrug, looking past him and down the path. 

"Never was allowed to have enough to have favourites." You offer quietly, and Max moves his head to force himself into your line of sight, and he has a look on his face you've never seen before. "I've got a very strict diet, Max, I always have." 

"But everyone has a favourite chocolate." He holds out the half-bitten chocolate, and you slowly pick it up staring at the little brown piece in hand. 

You could've tried more, now that you're grown. You could've snuck more behind your mom's back, could've done a lot of things, but you'd never thought to.

It had just always been that way. "You always were a princess, weren't you?" Max says softly, though not as an insult. "You never thought to be a rebel." 

"You're one to talk." You say lowly, afraid to voice it more than a whisper. 

"I used to think we were so similar. You were the only person who really understood the kind of pressure I was under." Max tilts his head back to look at the fading sunset, and your eyes don't follow. "But it was different, wasn't it?" 

"I was allowed to do more things." You begin, still staring at the chocolate.

"But you were micro-managed, more. I could eat chocolates. I remember that one time you ruined your hair by talking to me in the rain. I don't think my dad ever cared about my hair." His eyes finally return to you, gently nudging your hand with his. "Your secret is safe with me, you know. It's okay to rebel, princess." Then, when you don't move, he reaches over to gently move some hair away from your face, finally bringing your eyes to him. "I promise." 

You pop the chocolate into your mouth before you can overthink it, letting it just sit on your tongue, and you can't help the smile that grows on your face from the flavour of it. 

"You're not going to eat it?" Max asks, incredulous, and you shake your head.

"M' savouring it." You say around the chocolate and he beams at that, shaking his head as he takes the coloured ice cream from your hand and presses the chocolate cone into yours, and he tentatively licks it, pulling a strange face at whatever flavour he picked. "What is it?" 

"I don't know. Sugary?" You lean over to try it, chocolate finally having dissolved on your tongue, and he's not wrong. It's some bright, tangy thing, maybe citrus, maybe just sugar, something to give even a child a headache. "I don't, uh," Max clears his throat as you pull away, "I don't think I can finish it." 

"Want to just split chocolate?" It was a waste, but Max doesn't seem to care, dropping the cone into the wastebin beside him. Then, without a word, you extend the cone to him, and you take turns eating it, living in a moment that neither of you really knows how to navigate, though it seems Max is doing it better. 

It's okay to rebel, princess.

I promise. 

"You know, I always wanted this." Max says, taking the words out of your mouth. "When they'd come out to the racing track on our big race days, and I never got it." 

"Same here." Max eats over the same space you did, and you wonder if you should be less comfortable with each other, having just rekindled after years of not seeing each other. But it was right, you think, for you to be sitting idly together and sharing a moment you never got to have before. Tonight, you could let some barriers fall just for him. "I always wanted to try something like karting," You admit, and Max's eyebrows pinch together. "Not for the actual racing, but just for something dangerous, a change of pace." 

"I always wanted to take a trip for a reason other than racing. I got to see so many countries, but I only got to see their racing tracks. I've changed that, now." You let Max finish the rest of the cone as night falls. The first stars will show up soon, and you tilt your head back to try and see if you can map them out. 

You did that so often. You used to feel so special, compared to some of the children at your school, that you got to stay up late on school nights for dance, that you could point out constellations and show off your dancing skills at talent shows. You hadn't fully realized what you were missing back then. "I always wanted a sleepover." You say to the sky, though you never had any friends to sleep over with, anyway. "I always saw slumber parties in movies and thought they'd be so fun. I never got a single one." 

You shift to swing your legs over to sit on the bench properly, and your hand lands on Max's, taking you back to that chainlink fence. You always thought he meant to do it on purpose, just to make yourself feel better. You don't immediately move your hand, and Max doesn't move his, and you just stare at each other for what feels like the hundredth time tonight. 

"I lied, I think." Max says suddenly, "I did get that ice cream once." 

"No," You answer for him, "You spilled it everywhere." 

He offers you one, long stare, before looking up at the sky. "I still tried." 

-

The last time you saw Max, before he went off to pursue racing, before you went off to a proper dance school, you had been back on that grassy patch by the fence, hiding away from your mom, from the heat of the dance studio, from the other dancers. You got special treatment, they'd said. You didn't deserve it. 

Your mother said it was jealousy, the other dance teachers saying you were just kids, but you had heard enough words, felt enough cold stares, eaten at break alone enough to know that while you might be a good dancer, you weren't a good kid. Good kids had friends, had other hobbies, had something going for them. 

You were determined to be the next big ballerina or ballroom dancer, and to do that, you had to give up being good. 

Didn't mean it hurt any less. There was a rough slam, and you expected your mother to be behind whatever door was being blown up, a flurry of unkind words to get you back into the studio and dancing again, but her voice never came. Instead, Max, in full racing gear, powered his way over to you, helmet not removed. You hadn't seen him in full get-up this close, your reflection staring back at you through his visor. 

Without a word, he sat down on the grass beside you, folded his knees to his chest, and shoved his helmet against them. You had never seen Max angry before, or maybe upset, and it suspended your own tears long enough to investigate. You gently placed a hand on his back, ignoring the sweat, and began to move it soothingly, like how you'd imagine someone would do if they were comforting another person. "Go away, princess. This is my grass." Max's voice is muffled, and you scowl at him, though he can't see.

"Your grass is on the other side of the fence. You go away." You didn't want him to. You were just angry, and he was angry, so it felt right to say. Really, you wanted him to comfort you, not the other way around, but it was Max, and you'd never seen him like this, so you were kind of at a loss. 

"It's all my fault." Max's voice is quiet, raising his head to shake it. "I fucked up the kart." 

"Max!" You gasp, and he rips off his helmet to reveal a little sleeve thing under it, which he also pulls off. His hair sticks up every which way, rather spiky with sweat, and you take the time to wipe your wet hand on your leggings. The tear tracks staining down his face probably match yours.

"It's true. I fuc-I messed up. And I dropped my ice cream." Max corrects himself this time, pointing down to the stain on his stomach. You'd wanted to go get something from the truck that had come for the race, but you hadn't been allowed. "The one time I could, and I dropped it! At least I ate the cone." It was another one of the little unfair things in life that Max shared with you. Staring at him now, you're pretty sure he'd grown over the summer, a bit taller, a bit thinner. He was still kind of handsome, if you could call him that. "Oh." He breathes out softly, finally looking at you properly. "I'm sorry." 

You shake your head this time, wiping your nose on your arm. You're sure it's not the most ladylike thing to do, but you don't really care, and you're sure Max doesn't either. "I'm not crying because of you." 

"What happened?" He asks and you shrug, words lost for a moment. Max extends his hand this time, gently rubbing the back of your shoulder, and it's the sort of thing you thought would bring more comfort than it did.

"The girls were mean." You played with the grass, plucking some up to drop it on his lap. "They don't want to dance with me anymore, and...and they said I wasn't pretty enough to be a ballerina." 

"You're pretty." Max answers instantly, and you shove him. "I'm serious. You...you look nice, like a...like a bird." 

You sniff softly, staring at him as he tries to come up with a compliment. You think you might like anything he calls you, really. "A bird?" 

"I don't know. Elegant. They're just being mean." Max's name is bellowed from the karting track, and Max sniffs, pulling back on the strange sock thing. Before he can pull on his helmet, you stop him, and you hug him for the first time. 

You, to this day, don't know why you did it. It had just seemed like what you both needed at the time, maybe, maybe some part of you knew you wouldn't meet again, and Max hadn't hugged you back, just stared at you, half hidden by his mask thing. Max's name is shouted, again, and Max rises to his feet.

"I'm sorry you dropped your ice cream," You say, trying not to be embarrassed about the hug. "And fucked up your kart." 

"Hey!" Max gasps and you laugh, wiping your nose again. It felt good to say something like that. "You can't say that. You're a princess, remember?" 

"Well, this princess can. Don't tell my mom." Max smiles at you, and his dad bellows again, and you know what it means when you get yelled at like that. Something bad's going to happen, but Max doesn't seem all that bothered. "Your dad's going to get mad at you." 

"He's always mad. Doesn't matter if I did good or not." He tugs on his helmet, finally, and your reflection blinks back at you. You look rather sad, sat here alone. "Don't tell him I cried." 

"I won't." You say, extending a pinky, and Max interlocks his with yours. "I promise." 

-

Max was trying, desperately, not to think of the dress you were wearing, a navy blue flowy thing, or the fact that it had an open back, his hand pressed gently to your bare skin, or that you had spent yesterday tucked against each other, learning more dance moves in a blur that Max can't really remember. 

Or that you had shared ice cream, that you didn't really have chocolate enough to have a favourite flavour, or that you had held hands, again, by accident. 

There was a lot going on in his mind that wasn't dance moves, and he needed to clear his head if he was to actually do this final performance properly. He was even wearing a suit, to make it seem more formal, and your hand slipped from his to adjust his bowtie as someone set up the music over the speaker. "You're nervous." You say quietly, so the team doesn't hear, as your hand smooths down his lapel. It rests over his pounding heart, and he doesn't know how to tell you it's not really the dance portion, and more so that his childhood crush has returned full force, and he's not sure what to do about it. "Just one dance, then this is all over." 

"I know." One dance. That's all it is, but it doesn't feel like that as the music starts up, and your hand returns to his, and he carefully begins plotting out the steps you'd taught him so patiently. He wasn't really a patient man, though he tried to be. Being raised to be fast, to win, patience wasn't exactly a virtue, but somehow you were. 

He turns the box step, like you taught him, and you offer a proud little smile that he doesn't mess up. There's something different to it, however, the same as when that fan had come up to talk to him. You had stared at him like he was the only man in the universe, like he was something strange to be studied, and you were doing it again. "Can we talk, or will that distract you?" 

"I don't know," He answers truthfully. Your voice had distracted him before, both in ways that let him dance freely and that had him stumbling. "What do you want to say?" 

"We made it." You whisper softly. "It just keeps hitting me, seeing you again, that we've done what we said we wanted to do." 

"I'll need to see you perform sometime." Max extends his arm as you move out, so he can spin you around. Your dress perfectly swirls around you, and with every turn that Max gets a glimpse of your face, he finds that you're not quite happy. 

He's not sure what he's said wrong. "I'm not sure if I'll perform for a while, so I'm not sure if you ever will." 

"What? Why?" He questions as you return to your previous position, falling back into the dance step. You weren't the kind of people raised to take breaks, so Max's mind immediately moves to ideas of struggling artists and a world of dance that was just as hard to get into as F1. "You toured internationally. Surely there are more roles for you." 

"It's not about if there are roles, it's about if I want to take them." You look back up at him, a sorrow to you that Max hadn't realized was always there. It was that sadness, etched from childhood, that had taken Max some time to shake off. "Do you ever...doubt it? The success?" 

"I don't know what you mean." 

"It's all I've ever wanted, to perform in front of crowds like that, and it was incredible, but it didn't satisfy me like I thought it would." It was all we were raised for, he's sure you'd add, but instead, you let your eyes drop, looking away from him. "It sounds selfish, doesn't it?" 

"We're too used to fighting." The words come out before Max realizes he's saying them, head dipping slightly to speak into your ear, words he'd rather not have others overhear. "We've had to fight to get places, fight to prove ourselves, especially to...to those who matter to us. Once you make it big, it's hard not to feel like you have to keep fighting, but you get there, eventually." 

This close, Max can feel you shiver when his breath hits your neck, and he pulls away before he oversteps any further. He knew what it was like to be on the podium, to be the best, and to feel like it never mattered at all. There were people who made it to the same place as him who didn't have to fight half as hard. There were days when he failed, where it all felt like a waste. Nothing could satisfy the craving for power, except to replace it with something else, something neither you nor Max were taught to enjoy: contentment.

When you won, or you kept winning, and the world kept turning, and it wasn't the prize you wanted or gave you the same joy, you just had to live with being happy. With being where you were, with coming this far, with being still. To stop fighting and not feel like you're giving up or giving in. "We're allowed to just be. We don't have to fight for that anymore. No one's going to come yell at us for sitting in the grass anymore." 

"I didn't know you were a poet, too." You say softly, eyes returning to his, and Max has never been so overwhelmed with the need to kiss someone before. To hold you, hand splayed against your back, and be with you. You're looking at him in a way that sort of defies everything he just said, because it feels like he's winning, all over again. 

The music swells, and before Max can really think what he's doing, he dips you, low and fast. You let out a shocked breath, arms gracefully wrapping around his neck before you break out into a smile, and he grins right back. He knows he is going to get so many comments about this video, about this whole stupid thing, but when he gets to hold you like this, he's not sure if it's going to really matter in the end. 

He pulls you back up to spin you again, and this time, every time you turn, he catches you staring right back at him, and when you fall back into the box step, your cheeks are flushed, and he finds his own words coming back to haunt him. He doesn't have to keep fighting anymore. He doesn't have to skirt around corners or hide in back alleys to be with you, doesn't need to feel like he's doing something wrong when he tries to hold your hand. 

He can be content with you, and no one can really say anything about it. Maybe he is a poet, or some motivational speaker, when he's not really thinking of what he's saying. "You are something else, Max." You whisper up to him, "Where did all that come from?" 

"We don't have to keep fighting anymore." Max repeats, somewhat shyly. "So I'm allowed to dip you if I want, just as you are allowed to do anything you want, princess. Do you want to keep dancing?" 

"With you? Happily," You tease, though it does something strange to Max's heart that he's never felt before. "On stage? I'm still not sure. It's my...well, it's my dream." 

"Then take a break, travel, maybe see some car races. I hear Monaco is great this time of year." You roll your eyes as Max grins, the music finally slowing, and you step apart so that Max can bow, and you can curtsy, but the distance suddenly feels so far, no longer having you in his grip. 

Without much thought, as soon as the film crew starts to applaud, Max wraps his arm around your shoulders to pull you into his side. It's where you should always be, nestled against him, and when you rest your head back on his shoulder, Max doesn't really care that there's a film crew, or that they're asking him questions. 

You're looking at him like he'd always wanted you to, and he can't doo anything but stare into your eyes. 

-

Max 🏎

I've got a surprise for you 

A thank you for putting up with my dancing this week 

Princess 🩰

Is it a race car?

Max 🏎

Something better

Come over? 

Princess 🩰

Isn't it late?

Max 🏎

You can bring pyjamas?

NOT in a suggestive way!

Just...bring pyjamas

-

You're not sure what to expect when you get a text from Max Verstappen in the middle of the night, telling you to come see him and bring pyjamas, but you definitely weren't expecting this. 

He opens the door to his Airbnb to reveal a large living room, set up in what you can only describe as a slumber party. There are blankets and pillows piled around, snacks laid out, some movie already loaded on the screen, lights dimmed, and candles lit. You sort of malfunction at the door, gym bag sliding off your shoulder and hitting the ground with a soft thud as you try to understand it. 

I always wanted a sleep over, you told him. 

Max awkwardly stands by the door, and you can't do much more than blink at him as he offers a sheepish smile, gesturing to the whole set up. "Your reward," He says softly. "I thought we could make up for lost time." 

"Max, I..." It had been too much, you think. Teaching him to dance, getting ice cream, actually dancing with him. He had dipped you, and in that instant, you knew that whatever stupid crush you had a kid had returned full force, and standing in front of him now, you didn't know whether or not to cry or kiss him. 

He'd set up a slumber party for you to make up for lost time. What you never got to do as kids. "If you don't like it, I-" 

You cut Max off as you throw yourself at him, and he catches you easily, spinning you around with the force of it. You know it's too much, to be holding him like this, arms wrapped tight around his shoulders and face pressed into his neck, but you had been close all week. You suppose one more night wouldn't hurt. 

"I take it that you like it." Max whispers into the top of your head as he gently puts you back down on the ground, and you stay in his arms as you stare up at him.

"Max, this is too much." Max's arms remain around your waist and yours around his neck as you take in all the things he got, a true array of sweet and savoury snacks, like he couldn't figure out what you might like. It was the sort of thoughtfulness you wouldn't expect, let alone from Max after just three days. 

It was the sort of grand gesture that happened in movies, not in real life. It was the sort of thing that made you realize you had fallen entirely for him, though you wouldn't say that aloud until you figured all this out. You look back up to Max, and realize the position you're left in, so close that you could bounce up on the tips of your toes and kiss him. Max stares down at you intently, and you forget about the boy he used to be for a moment to think of the man he is now. 

That he had every chance to forget you, to not care, to keep going, but he chose to do this for you. He let you teach him to dance, took you out, like it was a normal thing to do. Then again, nothing about you and Max was normal. From childhood, you have been raised to win, to be the best, every move monitored. Success in adulthood was just as wonderful as you wanted it to be, but this freedom, being here in his arms, this was what made the other things, the winnings, the shows, the races, all worth it. 

It was having someone to understand them, to be there, even if it was in childhood. You suppose now is as good a time as ever to stop thinking of that, of childhood boundaries, of old crushes, of what your past did to draw the two of you together. You were here, now, and it was time to focus on the future. 

Without much ceremony, you rise up and kiss him, and you feel Max's muscles all draw tight before relaxing in a second, practically melting into your touch as he kisses you back eagerly. It's a soft, longing thing, with no rush or no heat behind it. It's the sort of kiss you wouldn't expect to be your first, but rather your hundredth with someone - so sure in that it was right to do. 

Max's hands flex on your waist as your hands slide up into his hair, playing with the growing out edges as you pull back. "Thank you." You say as earnestly as you can, and Max just sort of blinks at you. 

"May I kiss you?" He asks softly, one arm letting go of your waist to shut the door behind you. "Again?" 

"You don't have to-" Max's mouth is on yours before you can finish, back pressed to the door as he hovers over you, still just as sweet as the first time you kiss him. It feels that much more real, pressed between him and the door, that you're here and kissing him, something you'd fantasized about for as long as you've known him. 

Max pulls away for air, your own chest heaving with the intensity of it. His pupils are dilated so wide you can barely make out the soft, stormy blue of his irises. "You can...you can strike that off the bucket list." 

"What?" 

"You said you wanted to have a real kiss, not a stage kiss, with someone who asked." He recalls, a heavy blush painting his cheeks as he speaks, the colour spreading down his neck. "I always wanted to, but wasn't allowed." 

"Then you can strike that off the bucket list, too." Max leads you to the couch, where he unceremoniously falls onto it, still trying to catch his breath as he stares at you. For a professional driver, you'd think he'd have better lung capacity, but something tells you it's not just the kiss that has him breathing so heavily. 

You curl up beside him, and you stare at each other for a long while as you realize that you just kissed. Your heart couldn't quite figure out its pace, picking up as you took in how dishevelled he looked, slowing back down with the calming effect of having him nearby. It could all not work out, your brain tries to supply. You were a dancer who toured, he was a driver who did the same, and whatever this was might not work. 

But you couldn't stop staring at him, realizing that maybe, just maybe, it could. "Did you, uh, want to get changed?" 

"Oh, right." Pyjamas. Your cheeks warm at the thought of having a proper sleepover with him, the kind that your younger self wasn't fantasizing about yet, and he's quick to cut through your thoughts, redder than you've ever seen him.

"You don't have to, or stay the night, I-"

"I'm surprised you're not wearing yours." You say, trying to stop the words tumbling from his mouth, and Max glances down at himself, obviously in sleep pants and a t-shirt, before up to you. "Where's the adult onesie?" 

"For the love of-" You don't get to hear the end of Max's complaining as you laugh, and Max wraps his arms around you and pulls you into his lap as he scowls. "It is called fireproofs! You're never going to let that go, are you?" 

"You still call me princess," You retort, happily curling up against his chest, and resting your head on his shoulder. "So it's only fair." 

Max's fingers drift up your arm, tracing a shape that you think is awfully close to a race track, and he shakes his head. "You don't like it?" 

"Never said that," You whisper softly. "Just saying that some things stick." 

"Go get changed," He says, leaning forward to press a quick kiss to the side of your forehead, smiling to himself at the action. "And it better not be a onesie, or movie night's cancelled." 

-

Max had changed the way he was sitting on the couch seven times in the time it took for you to get changed. 

So, needless to say, he was screwed. You had kissed him! He hadn't meant for it to go this way, but he was most certainly not complaining. He just wanted to do a nice gesture for you, after everything, and you had kissed him for it, and he had made up some lie about kissing you again to get it off your bucket list. 

In reality, he had done it to make sure that you had actually meant it when you kissed him, and it wasn't just some fluke, thank-you kiss. 

You liked him, and he liked you, as much as it was obvious, and he was absolutely screwed. He'd forgotten how to sit, how to breathe, how to do anything really, and when you step out of his bedroom, he's pretty sure he's forgotten how to keep his heart beating, because you're beautiful. 

You always were beautiful, didn't matter what form, but you were in an oversized t-shirt that made you look like innocent incarnate, and then his eyes land on the design, and he's staring at his helmet, and him with a trophy over his head, and the words "2021 World Champion" underneath. 

And his heart stopped beating, because that wasn't his shirt. You had to have bought that, when he won his first world champion title, and it was worn enough to show that you likely slept in it often. 

If Max was screwed before, he's fucked now. "What movie did you pick?" 

"Uh-" He has to clear his throat, sitting up and focusing his eyes on the tv screen, and not you as you approach. Movie, he thinks. Pick a movie. "We could do Cars?" 

"I should've guessed." You place a hand on his shoulder gently as you sit at his side, and Max spares a glance towards you and it takes a considerable amount of strength not to just kiss you senseless. You probably wouldn't mind, but tonight was supposed to be innocent. Movies, snacks, maybe falling asleep in your arms. 

He wanted all the softness he dreamt up as a kid; nothing more, nothing less. "You're making me look bad," He mutters softly, eyes dragging down to your shirt. "Celebrating me like that." 

"It was for your first big win. Least I could do." Max barely manages to look back at the TV before his resolve breaks, dropping the remote to plant his hands on either side of your face, and kissing you once more. 

It's hotter, heavier this time, the way your hands splay against his chest, the way he can't think of anything else besides you in his merch, representing his number, his first win. He didn't expect himself to be a territorial man, but he was now thinking of all the Red Bull merch he could shower you in before it became obscene. "I'd sleep in a shirt with your face on it, too, if I had one." He says and you laugh, a bright thing that seems to surprise you as you slap a hand over your mouth. 

"You would not! I don't even think they make those." Without missing a beat, Max wraps an arm around your shoulders and drags you into his side. 

"Well I'll make one, then." 

You say nothing as you lean into him, watching him flip between racing movies, and very gently, you trace patterns over his bare arm, and Max would get the touches tattooed there if he could. "If you want," You begin quietly, "I have a video of me performing? To finally see me dance." 

"You do?" He had thought videotaping those things was illegal, but the moment you offer it, there's no other movie Max could ever want to watch. He spares a glance down at you, and you're lost in thought, and Max places his hand over yours. "We don't have to if you don't want. If it's...too much." 

You said you didn't want to dance again, and Max somewhat understood that feeling. He'd never gotten this close to quitting, but he had days where it didn't feel like it was worth it, and he can imagine from your point of view, it must be that much worse.

You shake your head, and shift back against the arm of the couch as you open your arms. Max doesn't have to think twice before laying down between them, passing the remote off to you, and you go about pulling up an almost 3-hour-long video on YouTube, to his surprise. 

He'd thought ballets were short things. 3 hours seems...extreme, but for you, he'd happily watch every second. He's careful in the placement of his head on your chest, arms wrapping around you as you set the remote aside, and your hands find his hair, gently petting through it, and Max is so content he might start purring. No wonder the cats like this - it feels heavenly. "I want you to see," You whisper down to him, pressing a kiss to the top of his head. "It's just not going to be the same thing as it being live. It's more magical that way." 

"You're always magical," Max says as the curtains part and the ballet begins. "But I guess I'll have to wait to compare it to the real thing sometime." 

"I wonder if Monaco has any ballet companies." The words become ice in Max's veins for all the right reasons. "I hear it's nice this time of year. I could do a little vacation." 

Max, however, stops paying attention to your conversation once you're on screen. While slightly grainy, you're dressed like a princess, tutu and tiara and all, and you move so fluidly across the stage that Max is captivated. He's unsure how long he lies there, unresponsive as you gently card your hands through his hair, watching you become Aurora before his eyes. 

Finally, when there's a break from your dancing, he pushes himself up onto his hands to stare down at you. "I've been missing that? This whole time?" 

"Max, that was-" He's not sure what you're going to say, but it doesn't matter, because he's kissing you as passionately as he can. It was one thing, to know as a kid that you were a dancer. It was another for you to teach him to dance. 

But to watch you dance? Like you belonged on the stage forever, like you were in your element, a perfect princess that made fun of his fireproofs. You gasp into his mouth and Max slows his movements, torn between needing you and needing to be with you, lying here, watching you dance. "If you ever choose to dance again," Max says softly against your lips, "Know that I will be at every show." 

"And if I don't?" He lies back down on your chest, turning to watch you spin on screen. 

"Then I'm buying you tutus to perform with the cats." You laugh, the sound reverberating through your chest as your hands return to his hair. 

"I'll get you in one, too." And Max, despite it all, doesn't argue against it. 

-

-

-

Max was good at being quick. He would argue it's his job, but he's also say he's fast in real life, juggling all the shoots, the dinner, his family and friends, practicing, and you. 

Tonight, however, might be the quickest turn around he's ever had. He'd won the Monaco Grand Prix, stood on that podium with his trophy above his head, but he couldn't care to look at it, or the crowd, but rather tried to find you, nestled among the rest of his crew. It had been months since your dance lesson, since that video had come out and everyone, including those on the grid, lost their mind about him dancing like that. 

They lost their minds, too, when Max had introduced you to this world for the first time, too. It had blown up in a way Max had never expected, of childhood sweethearts reunited, but the biggest shock of all was how good you were with it. With fitting into his world, into Monaco, like you'd always been there, slotting into the other side of his bed like something he didn't know he'd been missing. 

And now, he was slotting into your life, rushing home while you rushed to the city centre, the morning that started all this looping in his mind.

"What's this?" It was a rather official-looking envelope that showed up at Max's door, and he was used to them, save for the fact that this one had your name on it. You had snatched it out of his hand that morning, scandalized, and you hugged it tight to your chest. It was odd, after all, for you to get mail, considering you'd only been living with him for a week at that point. "Liefje?" 

"You can't open it." You'd said, before promptly shoving the envelope back into his hands. "I can't open it! You do it." 

"What is it?" And there, scrawled in the return address, 

Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo. 

He had never asked. You had entered his life and left dance out of it, and Max didn't pressure you. It was your dream, your life, your choice. He had been serious about ordering tutus for the cats, but this envelope seems to erase those ideas for the time being.

You had sought out a ballet company in Monaco. "It's not...I don't know." Your hands twisted together, stuck watching the envelope like it held all the universe's secrets. "It's not a big company, or anything prestigious, but it's for me."

"For you?"

"I don't want to fight anymore. I don't want to give up on my dream because I overworked myself for it." It was the sort of thing Max did with the Nurburgring. He didn't want to hate racing because of all the little things that wore him down, so he tried something new, something similar, to let himself enjoy the speed and what got him started here in the first place. "It's Swan Lake, and I told myself if I get cast as the White Swan, I'll give myself another chance at something bigger someday."

Was it healthy, to pin your future as a dancer on one role? No, but Max understood it so well, of wishing on stars and praying to gods and pinning hope on random raindrops, that maybe if they fell in the right order, Max might get ahead.

Max ripped open the top of the envelope, not wasting any time and pulled out what appeared to be a contract. You're quick to cover your face with your hands, and Max is taken back to that last day as kids, of seeing you cry, of having you hug him, and he decides to make things right for his past self and he sets the paper aside to pull you into his arms.

"Being a swan means this much to you?" He whispers into the top of your head, and you nod against his chest.

"Swan princess, actually." You corrected, and Max couldn't help but laugh. 

"Of course you're a princess." You pulled back, gesturing to the paper, tired of his antics, and Max picked it up. "We would like to offer you the role of Odette." Odette. Probably still a good role, but not what you wanted. "Oh, love, I'm s-" 

The scream you let out was the closest thing Max could compare to bloodcurdling. He knew you'd be disappointed, but this? Rather than burst into tears, however, you ripped the paper from his hands, and turned as white as it was. Max carefully pulled you into his arms, knowing the heartbreak this must be, but there, pressed against his chest, you began to giggle.

"Listen, schatje, there will be other roles-" You pulled back, a growing grin on your face as you shoved the paper into his. 

"Max, Odette is the Swan Princess." A pit drops into Max's stomach. 

"What?" He stared down at the paper, the last shot you had given yourself. 

You were the Swan Princess. "I'm going to be sick, I think." 

"No, we are going to celebrate!" Max picked you up, hoisting you onto his shoulder like how the mechanics do with him after he wins. You had laughed down at him, and Max spun you around the living room. "You are going to do so well, schatje. I can't wait." 

And now, after all that waiting, Max was frantically changing into his best suit to get ready to see you perform. You had gotten special permission, to miss your rehearsal this afternoon to see him race, and like hell was Max going to be late in return. He doesn't say a word to any of the attendants or ushers who try to help him, but rather takes the stairs two at a time to get up to a special viewing box you'd reserved for him. 

-

You had never been this nervous for a performance before. Perhaps it was because it was Swan Lake, perhaps it was because it was Monaco, or perhaps it was because you had poured so much hard work into this, you weren't sure if you would be able to come back from this if it failed, if it didn't feel right.

It also didn't help that Max was in the audience. Well, it did, after everything you'd gone through together, but it was his first time seeing you perform live. 

It was strange, that so much time had passed since lying with him, on that couch, watching you dance in Sleeping Beauty. It had been his reaction that had convinced you to apply to Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo. It had been his encouragement that powered you through, and his win this morning made tonight all the more important. 

You're broken from your daydream of Max at the balcony seat as one of the other dancers reaches over to squeeze your hand. Perhaps you looked as afraid as you felt, but in a few seconds, you couldn't show any of that. 

Instead, you had to be the White Swan, the role that had plagued your mind for years, only this time, your prince wasn't just one stage, but out there in the audience too. The curtains pull, the lights dim, and you move across the stage like you'd practiced your entire life, from your bedroom to the studio to parking lots late at night, and you dare one, single glance up to the seat you'd booked for Max, and he's leaned on the railing, eyes glued to you, and for a moment, you lock eyes. He makes no gesture, and you don't either, having to go about the rest of your dance moves, but it was a spark you hadn't felt in a long, long time. 

The next eyes you land on are a young girl's, sitting in the second row, perched up on her seat to properly see you, and a single tear slips from the corner of your eye from the soft knowing that you made it. The music swells, the prince approaches, and for a blissful moment, you're not on stage or staring at the audience, but in your childhood bedroom, practicing these steps and watching in the mirror, looping the soundtrack you'd gotten for your birthday

And that little girl knew every move. You know every move. 

When you glide, it's with purpose. When you spin, it's with grace.

When you fall back in love with ballet, it's with Max in the audience, who falls in love with watching you dance like you were always meant to. 

You push off the counter of the small coffee bar, coming to take the hat from his head, and rake your hand through his hair instead. 

He smiles slightly at the action, letting his attention break to look up at you. "Do you think they miss their mums?" You ask, eyes finding the broadcast. Max would've been about their age when he started, so young, so full of dreams. You weren't that much older than them really, but it was still enough to be daunting. 

Being 18, like Kimi, was the time of little independent steps, going away to university, starting something new. Becoming a world-famous F1 driver when you're not even old enough to drink in some countries had to be quite the trip. "What?" Max responds, now turning to give the TV his full attention. "The rookies?" 

"They just look so young." Doing all this, on their own. They might have teams and managers and fellow drivers, but it had to be terrifying. "It's got to be hard, away from family like that. And on Father's Day, too." 

"I didn't miss my parents," Max says, returning to the notes in his lap as he lies. He can never look at you when he does. You never pressed about his childhood, though all you can imagine is that poor boy, charting across Europe alone to do all of these races, with all the stress. It can't be good for children, even if they are racing prodigies. "I turned out fine." 

There's a beat of silence where you don't answer, and he lets out a soft breath. 

"Fine, relatively speaking." He corrects. "Besides, with all the karting and F2 or F3, they're used to travel." 

"Even when they're still in school, poor things." Max glances back at the TV as the clip of Isack hugging Lewis's dad plays, and your heart dislodges in your chest. That's a lot of pressure, something that never goes away with F1, or at least you've never seen it leave Max. He was becoming a beacon for the rookies, maybe because of it. He probably knew better than anyone how to handle that sort of pressure, the lifestyle change. 

Someone walks by, cutting through the moment, and you and Max just look at each other as you wait for them to leave. There was so much more to be said on this kind of topic, specifically behind closed doors, but there was more than just Max being a good mentor that played into it. Finally, the person leaves, and Max returns to his notes. "If you're worried about their education, you could help them with their homework." 

"Maybe I can cook them a nice meal. You can have them over." Max laughs, then, getting up from his chair to wrap his arms around your waist and pull you close to him. The move startles you, so quick and so in public, but you lived for these stolen moments. Max was always like this when he knew no one could see. Little bursts of energy, the hidden romance that was best protected when others weren't around. You didn't mind by now, really. You'd rather your kisses be private than spread across Instagram. "What?" 

"You are something else," He says, pressing a kiss to your forehead. "Worry about me for a change, hm? Where's my home cooked meals?" 

"They're a treat for when you win," You say as you press a quick kiss to his lips before finally pushing away. The last thing you needed was some photographer walking in on you two. "So go lose, yeah? Saves me from having to do the dishes." 

With a dramatic roll of his eyes, he prepares to go, and you're struck by a feeling you can't quite describe. It's a strange sort of love that twists in your gut, almost complete but not quite. Loving Max was always just a full-bodied feeling, that some small part of it missing was obvious. It wasn't nerves, though the butterflies still came out as he raced, as he battled for second place. 

It wasn't anger, or concern, or sadness, no strange emotion you couldn't place. Instead, it just felt like you were waiting for the last piece to click into place, even if you didn't realize what it was. Max gets second, and the win doesn't really fix it either, though you're happy he placed well. He probably wasn't the most enthused at George's first, but then, as the racers settle, you realize who came in third: 

Kimi. 

Little Kimi, with his homework and the pressure and now, you realize as you watch the nearby Mercedes garage, without his parents. 

That must be awful, you find yourself thinking as your heart sinks further into your stomach. What a race to miss, to have no one there to celebrate. The big screens catch your eye as you see Max approach Kimi, and for a moment, the world pauses as Max pulls him into a quick hug that feels like it might last forever. 

That's the missing piece, you think. 

Max had always been so good with kids. Whether his little nieces or nephews, or teenagers like Kimi, he had a way with them. He was patient, and funny, and kind, and welcoming. He was saying something to Kimi as your visions swims before you, a mix of emotions that truly catch you by surprise. 

It's pride, and heartbreak, and knowing. 

That could be your son someday. Maybe he had just done well on a test, or won a competition, you didn't care, and Max was hugging him like a father would. You turn back toward the Red Bull garage's bathroom, quick to try to calm yourself, but it's no use. 

Max would make a fantastic father one day, and for the very first time, you realize that's something you can pursue. 

-

There was something going on with you lately. Max hadn't really had too much time to notice it, with the triple headers and your work schedule, but you were just...softer. Not in a bad way, and not in a way he'd ever vocalize, but you were just so utterly irresistible and sweet. He didn't want to get out of bed, didn't want to leave your side, didn't even mind hearing you talk about ridiculous things like rookies being lonely and the best parks near his apartment. 

But there was something brewing under the surface, and he didn't really know what. 

Then again, he also just got 2nd place, and you're not at the barrier to greet him, so he doesn't really have time to focus on that either. He chalks it up to the crowds crushing in to get to George and Kimi, both for George's first win of the season and Kimi's first podium, both of whom refuse to stop smiling, especially once they get to the podium platform. Even from up above, however, Max can't seem to spot you. He can always find you in a crowd, a skill he prides himself on. 

You were wearing one of his hats, and a cute little white dress, so it should be easy, but you're not with his team, not with the crowd. 

Nowhere. 

Finally, when he gets back to his driver's room, and it's empty, does he start to worry. "Have you seen-" He barely gets the word out before one of his attendants is gesturing towards the restroom with a strange expression, and Max panics at the thought of you being sick, of something being wrong, and he quickly knocks on the door. "Love? You okay?" 

"Shit, Max-" Your voice sounds hoarse and Max's heart breaks at the thought of you being sick while he was out celebrating, but when you open the door just a crack, he realizes it's something else entirely. "Sorry, sorry, I'm a mess." 

You let him into the restroom, a small space considering it's just a little side room, but that sort of invasion of each other's space had never bothered either of you. What does bother him is the tear-tracks on your cheeks, the way you laugh sadly as you try to wipe away the evidence. "What's wrong?" 

You crying is not the most uncommon sight in the world, but the last time you cried at one of his races was because he won his fourth championship title. Maybe you were crying over how poorly he was doing? Maybe something terrible happened? "The video-" 

"What video?" Max rushes out, coming to cup your face in his hands. "I swear, if anyone said anything-" 

"You hugged," You say with another soft laugh, now truly confusing him. Max tries to wrack his brain for the last time he hugged a woman that might be taken as him cheating, and then what it might take for you to have a mental break. "And his dad wasn't there." 

"What?" Then, the pieces click into place. "Kimi?" You nod, sniffing softly as you wipe at your nose with a tissue. "You're crying...because I hugged Kimi?" 

"Our little baby got his first podium." 

Our. 

Little. 

Baby. 

Oh shit. "Are you pregnant?" 

"What?" That seems to snap you from your tears, looking up at him before reaching out to smack his arm. "No! I can be emotional without being hormonal!" 

"I wasn't saying that," He soothes, though he finds himself somewhat saddened by the answer in a way he never thought he would be. "You just called him our baby." 

"He's your baby," You joke, covering your face with your hands. "He won and you hugged him, and his parents are here, and he's probably so happy I just...I can't. How could you not cry? He worked so hard!" 

Max slowly wraps his arms around you and gently rocks you, unable to stop the growing smile on his face. Only you could get emotional about another man getting on the podium. You'd probably be like this for all the rookies, he thinks. He'll need to start packing more tissues. "But you didn't come to watch." I missed you, he wants to say, but right now is not about him. 

"I didn't want anyone to see me like this and take it wrong." You say, muffled by his shoulder. "If I saw him in person I'd probably start bawling." 

"Well, you should go congratulate him if it moved you to tears." He says, somewhat teasing, somewhat not. It was a very big thing for Kimi to finally get on the podium, and you were right. He worked hard to get here, taking third place in a way many other drivers couldn't currently. 

Maybe crying over it was a bit much, but being proud? That was understandable. "Give me your sunglasses." 

"Anything for you," He says, reluctantly pulling the sunglasses he'd hung on his shirt collar and handing them out to you. You walk, then, hand in hand through the garages before reaching Mercedes, which Max realizes is somewhat enemy territory, but for you, he doesn't mind. Kimi is off to the side to take pictures with some of the mechanics, all beaming ear to ear, and he hears you sniff beside him. "Hey, Kimi." 

Kimi looks up with a grin, and you offer a small wave. "I just wanted to come congratulate you," You say, and Kimi immediately goes in for a hug, which somehow makes Max more emotional as he watches it. 

That's the missing piece, he thinks, what he wasn't getting about the tears.

You were always so good with kids. Whether Max's own nieces or nephews, or teenagers like Kimi, you were always so good with them. Even now, Kimi sinks into your arms like you're his mother, like it was the kind of hug he needed. You already were so patient with Max, you had to be with children, so warm and honest and welcoming. Kimi could be your kid someday, maybe after having a hard day, or maybe after a good one, just needing comfort. 

You would be an incredible mom someday, and as Max had said earlier, he'd do anything for you. A little baby, clad in Red Bull gear, with his hair colour and your eyes, it would be perfect. 

Anything you make would be perfect. "I'm so proud." You say as you pull back. "Your parents must be so proud! Third! You're first podium!" 

"You're going to make me cry," Kimi sniffs, and Max watches your bottom lip tremble. "No, no, don't cry too!" 

"Alright, alright." Max wraps his arm around you, pulling you into his side. "Both of you." 

"Emotions are meant to be felt!" You say stubbornly, a reminder Max has had to hear plenty of times. You had never made him feel guilty when he got angry, never made him feel like he couldn't be sad. It was the sort of thing a parent should have said to him as a kid, the sort of thing that would make you a fantastic parent now. 

"You know what they call you?" Kimi says, more to Max than you. "Mother Hen. Now you are Mother and Father Hen." 

You tense in Max's arm, and he softly laughs. "We're adopting him." You state bluntly, looking up to Max. "Can we adopt all of them?" 

"Bit late to adopt, I think." He says, leaning down to press a kiss to your temple. "We'll just have to make our own." 

"Hey!" Kimi says, hands flying to his ears like an actual kid as he laughs.

"You can be our babysitter," Max continues, reaching out to shake hands with the boy, who happily shakes it back. You, on the other hand, are shooting Max a rather strange look. "What? It'll be good for him to have a normal job for once." 

"We can all take turns," Kimi agrees eagerly. "Ollie and I-" 

You finally laugh, shaking your head as you take a step back, and Max doesn't blame you. Those boys probably got into more strange situations than Max did at that age, which is saying something. "There is no way both you and Ollie are looking after them. That is a recipe for disaster waiting to happen." 

"What's a disaster waiting to happen?" George asks, and now it's Max's turn to tense. He was very good at being civil, good at hiding it too, but that didn't cut the tension in the air.

"Ollie and Kimi babysitting for us." You answer for him, head coming to lean back against Max's shoulder in an attempt to soothe him. It's the sort of admissions that would make headlines if it got out, but considering what Max was planning on tonight?

Probably wasn't too early to announce the baby.

"Babysitting?" George echoes, shocked. "Are you expecting?" 

"Not currently," Max says before he can help it. "Give it about nine months." 

"Max!" Your face flushes red, smacking at his arm, and he takes it as his cue to leave. "You are unbelievable!" 

"Congratulations, Kimi." Max says as he leads you away, trying hard not to laugh as both Kimi and George exchange looks. "George." 

You wave goodbye, turning around to look at them, and Max keeps his arm around your waist to drag you backwards. "You both did so well! You better celebrate tonight."

"I think you are celebrating enough for the both of us." Kimi answers, and George turns on him like a scandalized mother.

You laugh as you turn back around, and Max finds that he missed the sound. You crying was easily one of the things he hated most in this world, meaning your laugh is one of the things he loved the most.

Your hand slips into his, offering a squeeze. Only when you're finally out of earshot, the rest of the crews and the microphones and the eavesdroppers hidden away, do you tug harder on Max's hand, drawing his attention. "Do you mean that? About starting a family?" 

"Like I said, anything for you." Then, after a beat, "We're not naming our kid Kimi." 

"I know," You answer, leaning up on your toes to press a kiss to his cheek. "I was thinking George." 

Soulmates were just another distraction in a world full of them. To pursue your dreams, to want something bigger, you couldn't believe in fairytales fed to you by the delusional. It didn't stop Max's 18th birthday from rolling around anyway, waiting with baited breath for some sign, some magic name on the inside of his wrist, anything. It took a few days for his soul mark to be spotted on the back of his right shoulder, over his shoulder blade. It took a few days after that for Jos to notice and to continue his rants on the distractions of love in the path of greatness. 

After that, after everything his father put him through, everything Max did to earn his love, he stopped caring about soulmates. He'd meet the love of his life someday, surely, even with his soul mark bandaged, hidden from flashing cameras. It was through his fame Max realized how right his father was, of those attempting anything to copy his soulmate to pretend to be his love, a warning straight out of whatever textbook his father used to learn how to raise his children. If it was still in publication, Max was pretty sure he'd pay good money to have every copy burned. Soulmates, magical connections, they were just another distraction. He didn't want someone loving him because of a mark, because of how fast he went around a track and how much money he made, he wanted something real. Someone to look at him and think that he was meant to be theirs for no other reason than Max himself. 

It didn't stop the whole thing from getting to Max every so often, when someone close to him found their supposed one true love, when it made the headlines. Tonight, it was some bartender seeing colour for the first time, their soulmate a patron. The whole bar exploded with drunken excitement for them, forcing Max out into the night air because there were some things even a man as strong as him couldn't stand. 

"-and don't fucking follow me!" A man calls, slamming the door to a cab as it rips off into the hot Monaco night, and Max finds that the words are not directed at him, but rather you, sitting on the curb, looking entirely unenthused. 

Without thinking much of it, Max finds his place beside you. "Trouble in paradise?" He finds himself saying, scrubbing his hands over his face. Just because people were soulmates didn't mean it mattered, didn't mean it would last, didn't make both parties nice. 

"I wish," You breath out softly, "They're not my soulmate. Just a date." 

"A date?" Max echoes, sparing a glance your way. In the mixture of moonlight and streetlights, there's a sort of warmth from you that has Max wonder why you'd go on a date with someone who isn't your soulmate, even if he understands it perfectly well. 

"Surprising, isn't it?" You muse, sparing a glance up at the night sky. "Dating someone who isn't your soulmate, how terrible." 

"No, no." Max is quick to correct. "I understand." 

And then, in the middle of the heated Monaco night, you lock eyes with him for the first time, and if it were meant to be something, Max would feel something. Instead, he takes in someone pretty, warm from the night, flushed softly, probably from the drinks at the bar. He takes in someone who went on a date without their soulmate, and he feels a little bit less alone in this strange, awful world. Your eyes are slow to part from his, only breaking his stare when a car drives by too fast. "My soulmate passed away, I think." You admit quietly, almost hidden under the dragging noise of the car as it passes. "It's not worth being alone the rest of your life because you missed out on the perfect match. I'll settle for second best." Then, with a soft laugh, "Third, even." 

"I have a soulmate." Max says, and you turn to look at him again, that softness slowly slipping away. "And I don't want them. Don't know who they are." 

"So you're leaving some poor soul all alone for nothing?" Max shakes his head, trying not to think of whatever 'poor soul' matches with him. It was always a selfish thing to try and explain, but that was how Max was raised to think, and some habits die hard. 

"I want someone to want me for me." He says then, the words so often unspoken. He'd rarely talked about this to any of his teammates, and to admit it to a stranger somehow felt better. Your soulmate had passed; there was no threat of a matching symbol. You would just understand what it was like to be alone, to be othered and date anyway. "Not because I'm supposed to be a soulmate, or for some random choice that we don't even understand. For no real reason." 

You don't answer immediately, just staring at him intently, before you nod slowly. "You want someone to fall in love with you for the sake of loving you." 

"I don't want to hurt my 'soulmate' in the process," He says with air quotes, "But them loving me for a mark is just not what I want, in the end." He doesn't tell you about how he also doesn't want someone to fall in love with him for the fame, and he realizes only in this moment, it's because you could fall in love with him. 

For him. 

Your soulmate had passed, you were already going on dates. You could get to know him for no other reason than to know him, and he could make it work. The warmth he gets when he looks at you isn't magical: it's something realistic. "And how has that gone so far?" 

"Haven't got a single date." Max jokes, but it's the truth. No one wants to date a random stranger when their soulmate might be out there. "For obvious reasons. And you?" 

"They don't last." You say quietly, "Like I'm a stepping stone before they find who they want." Then, because that's not the kind of thing to admit to a stranger, you duck your head with a soft blush, and Max scoots closer, leaning to nudge his shoulder with yours. 

"You're the finish line for someone out there." He says, an unfortunate race reference he doesn't think about until later. 

"Thought you didn't believe in soulmates," You answer back softly, rocking your shoulder into his, and Max finds himself grinning down at you. 

He didn't believe in soulmates, he believed in this. Real connection, with real people, no magical, mystical interference necessary. "Didn't say that person had to be your soulmate. Could be anyone." His eyes flicker down your dress, stuck on the open back of it, the perfect curve of your spine, and he has to take a slow breath. "Some stranger on the street." 

You turn to look at Max with something so close to hope that he can't think too much about it, or he'll start to fall sooner than he can prepare for the landing. He just wants proof that he can love, and be loved, without needing a soulmate or matching mark. He doesn't need you to be the answer to all of his problems; he just wants a chance. "You're really sweet." You say, that look of hope flickering, "But I'm only here a week." 

"And?" He rises off the curb and extends a hand to help you up. "Doesn't mean we can't enjoy ourselves while you're here." 

"You're not a tourist?" Your hand slips into his, and if you were his soulmate, if they were real, it would be something magical. Every story has the first touch being something so important, the final connection of a soul bond, but when your soft skin glides against his, nothing remotely fantastical happens, and Max loves it all the more for it. 

"I'm a veterinarian here," He answers, the first fake profession he could think of as he helps you up. Might make the fact that he owns three cats more normal. He lets your hand drop, a terrible thing, and he gestures for you to follow him on the sidewalk. "I can take you for a midnight tour of Monaco if you like?" 

"You know, this is typically how people end up kidnapped or dead, or something." Without much thinking, Max pulls his wallet from his pocket and hands it to you, and you blink up at him. "What?" 

"If I was going to do something to you, why would I give you my wallet? It's got all my identification in there." You open the wallet, staring down at his driver's licence and flipping through the few cards he keeps in there, more out of curiosity, he thinks, than scrutiny. 

You spare a glance up at him, folding the wallet up and tucking it into your purse. "Now it feels like I'm robbing you, Max." 

"Well, I'd rather you take advantage of me than the other way around." You saying his name trips him up in a way he didn't expect, sounding so nice in your voice. It's just Max, he knows, but still. 

It does something to his heart that he didn't realize it could do. "You're one of the strangest people I've ever met." 

"Welcome to Monaco?" You laugh, another beautiful sound that has Max realizing he's more screwed than humanly possible. A week, he tries to remind himself, but with you by his side in that dress, it's hard to think of anything but the present. 

-

You're not sure how you end up on the beach with Max, heels in hand, but it's a pleasant change of pace. If it hadn't already screwed you over, you'd say it's fate, to be here with him, but that wasn't possible. Not when whoever bore your matching soul mark had faded out, or at least the soulmark had, splotchy and scratched out in a way you could only imagine meant death. 

It had happened so young, too, that it had never felt like you were able to pursue love or a soulmate seriously. Sure, there were online groups for widows, though you didn't consider yourself really a widow at this age. So, instead, you focused on all the other great things in your life, hoping for that miracle to come someday, and currently, it was in the form of a Dutch veterinarian in Monaco. 

Not how you expected your night to go. "They're named after clubs?" 

"Jimmy and Sassy are, but Donatello is not." Max answers very seriously, sparing a small grin your way, and you try to think what kind of experience he must have gone through to not want his soulmate, to want love from anyone, just for being him. You understand the thought of not wanting someone to just automatically stick with you for the sake of being a soulmate, but Max had so much to offer. You kept trying to find faults, but all you found were cats and a sweet tooth. "What would you have named them?" 

"Three cats? You should give them all names with the same first letter, like Jessica, James, and John." A laugh bubbles out of Max at the suggestion, a bright thing that has you blushing, luckily hidden in the dim light of Monaco's nights. 

"I am not naming a cat Jessica. Or James." 

"But John works?" You tease, stopping to stare up at a crystal clear night that, even with the light pollution, reveals a sky littered with stars. Max comes to stop at your side, saying nothing for a moment as the two of you just stare out into the night, and your hand brushes his. 

It shouldn't be this electrifying. Shouldn't be something so intense from a stranger, some truly random man you met in the night, but it was the sort of adventure you wouldn't mind pursuing. You only had a week here, but maybe you wouldn't mind spending that week with Max. "For the right cat," Max finally continues, still happily enthralled with the cat conversation, "John would work." 

"Do you think the water would be nice?" You ask, stepping closer to the shore. The water barely reaches your toes, and without much consideration for his pants, Max pulls his shoes and socks off, and wades in shin-deep. You laugh, watching him practically stomp around, and there's an evil glint in his eye that has him charging at you. You don't even try to run, letting him grab you by the waist and haul you into the water, spinning you around and sending water flying around with it. Your hands brace against his shoulders, and for working with so many different animals, he'd have to be strong for that, surely. 

Or maybe he just likes to work out in his free time, your hands smoothing against his biceps as he sets you down into the water, a pleasant thought you tuck away for later. "Does that answer your question?" 

"You are ridiculous." Then, you realize Max hadn't let go of your waist, and you hadn't let go of his arms, wrapped up together and standing in the water like it was normal. 

Because it could be. 

This could be your future, if you really think of it. Love was something worth pursuing, even if it wasn't the perfect match set out for you from the universe. You had spent so long mourning your soulmate you hadn't stopped to realize that maybe, just maybe, there were other people out there for you. 

That there could be a Max, after it all. And you could kiss him, if you wanted, looking up at him in the moonlit night, on a random beach, but fear stirs in your stomach too quickly to let you. There was little evidence this could ever be more than a pleasant night, that it would last, and Max notices your hesitation, very gently letting your waist go. "We, uh, don't have towels." You say, trying to direct the conversation away from your spiralling thoughts. "We're going to have wet feet." 

"Well, I might have wet feet." Max makes his way back to his shoes, using his socks to wipe off his feet before putting his sneakers on, and then he finds you at the edge of the shore, and holds out his arms. "But I could carry you?" 

"Carry me?" You echo, blush rising to your cheeks, and you realize Max is waiting for permission. "I mean, I might be heavy, I-" 

"Oh, heavy!" Max then proceeds to scoop you up, bridal style, like it's nothing. He marches up to where the beach meets a cobblestone road, and gently sets you on the low stone fence seperating the two. 

And then, like it's normal, like it's something people do, he squats down without a word and helps put your heels on, a Cinderella moment that has you considering if maybe he really was your long-lost soulmate. 

You'd never asked what his trait was, never got to see what it could be. Maybe you had matching, scratched-out marks. Maybe he got into an accident that damaged it. Maybe, by the way he's looking up at you, it didn't matter. "What brings you to Monaco?"  Max continues, as if he didn't just do the sweetest thing anyone has for you in a long, long time. 

"A break from it all." Max leads you down the street toward your hotel, and you don't want the night to end, both for your enjoyment, and the concern that it all might be over tomorrow.

Max doesn't realize you'd stopped infront of your hotel, sparing a glance to your side and then doing a small spin to face you again, lopsided smile revealed in the streetlight above him. "You should come back," He says, coming to lean on the wall of the hotel beside you. "I'm not sure I can show you all you need to see in just a week." 

"I might need more convincing than that." You joke, and Max smiles down at you, a sight that has your stomach flipping, and this time, before you let your emotions truly get in the way, you lean up on the tips of your toes and press a quick, chaste kiss to his cheek. "Thank you for all this, Max. It really means a lot." 

Max's hand hovers over his cheek, shock plain on his face from the kiss, and you're worried you've overstepped before he's blushing deeply, a perfect pink colour picked up in the lights of the hotel. It's a view you could get used to. "Oh," He breathes out softly, a small, giddy smile breaking out across his face. "You're most certainly welcome."

You take a step up the hotel stairs and Max calls after you, making you pause above him, and he stuffs his hands in his pockets, as if some kind of non-chalant defense for whatever he's about to say next.

"Think I could convince you to give me your number?" You half-heartedly roll your eyes, coming back down the stairs to put your number in his phone. You send off a test text, and you hope it's enough to make him want you tomorrow, because the more time you spend with him, the more you try not to get your hopes up. 

He's not your soulmate, and this isn't fate, but god, do you want it to be. 

You move back up the stairs and step into the hotel, leaving the door open to look back at Max, and you know you can't invite him up, can't jump through that many stages yet, and Max respectfully waits on the sidewalk, that stupid smile still on his face. "Goodnight, Max." 

"Goodnight," He says, along with some word in what you assume to be Dutch. You try to figure out what he possibly could have said when Max waves a hand, ushering you toward the elevator. "Forget it, it's Dutch. Go get some sleep." 

It's only when you get to your room do you realize you still have his wallet.

-

Max awakes to the sound of his phone buzzing. Glancing at the screen, since he came home and crashed, he's missed a handful of texts.

unknown 

hey! i still have your wallet

Then, about half an hour later, 

unknown

I really needed that tonight, thank you 

Maybe you can give me a tour sometime?

Then, this morning, 

unknown

me again, if this is the wrong number, can you let me know?

Glancing at the time, Max realizes he's slept in until noon. With a curse, he drags himself out of bed and quickly tries to type out a response that doesn't make him seem like a degenerate. 

max 

sorry, I passed out after I got home 

not used to staying out that late 

i could give you that tour in return for the wallet today? 

Your answer is almost instantaneous. 

unknown

that sounds wonderful 

sorry for keeping you up late

max

it was worth it

unknown 

I'm on a run currently, do you want me to pick you up some breakfast to start our tour?

max

you are perfect

and waffles?

And it was the start of something perfect. 

Without really putting too much thought into it, partially because it's early, partially because if he does, he'll start to crack into a million little pieces, he sends his address, and spends the next twenty minutes furiously cleaning everything he can. It's only once there's a knock on his door and he answers that he realizes he hasn't changed out of his pyjamas, left standing before you in an oversized t-shirt and boxers.

Somehow, though, it's not quite embarrassing. You just smile up at him, shaking your head with your arms full of take out boxes, his wallet balanced on top. "Give me a minute, and I'll get changed." He says, taking the boxes from you and setting them down on the counter, and you take in his space, almost presentable now with his frantic tidying. 

He disappears into his bedroom, trying not to think too hard about whatever outfit he throws together, something nice and casual, nothing to get him noticed in the streets. Considering you had his wallet, and knew his name, there's a chance you might have searched him, which ruins the whole fame aspect of this, but for some reason, he has faith. 

He steps back out to the kitchen to find you sitting on the ground, Donatello in your lap, and Max has to pause to take in the moment. It's so deeply domestic, of you curled up with his cats, boxes of waffles left open on the counter above you. He couldn't remember the last time he shared breakfast with someone outside of work, let someone into his space, like it was normal.

If he had his phone on him, he'd take a photo to remember the moment, but then you're looking up at him and smiling, and the memory will be better than any photo could be. "Who's this one?" 

"Donatello, or Donut." Max moves to the counter and gathers up the boxes of waffles and watches you struggle to pick Donatello up to join him, but the cat just lets you awkwardly cradle it like a baby. "He likes you," Max admits as he falls onto his couch and promptly tears into one of the boxes of chocolate waffles. "He doesn't let me hold him like that." 

"You're a vet!" You exclaim, coming to sit beside him, like this was normal, like you had always shared mornings, like it was meant to be, even if it never was. "Shouldn't you be an expert at this stuff?" 

"It's not about me, it's about the animal." He extends his arms to try and take Donatello, who leaps off his lap and disappears somewhere into the house. "See?" 

"Maybe that's what you get for naming him Donatello." You take one of the boxes, cutting up some crepe thing with a plastic knife and fork as Max takes his first bites of food. "Are you a car guy?" 

Max's heart stutters in his chest before you gesture to his shelf, where some replica cars and car books stand out, glaringly obvious. "Oh, yeah. My dad's a big racing fan. Do you know anything about cars?" 

"Not really, no." You answer truthfully, taking a bite. He waits for you to finish eating to continue asking questions, but then you're gesturing to his waffles. "Are they any good?" 

"Want a piece?" Without another word, you cut some crepe and give it to him as he offers up a piece of the waffle, trading like it's nothing, and Max finds that he doesn't really care if you figure out who he is, because so far, you've treated him perfectly normal. You're curled up on the couch, by his side, trading pieces of fruit and breakfast, an unspoken thing that you do the entire morning. 

When he slowly extends an arm over the back of the couch, letting you lean into him, you do, and you talk about the night before like it's nothing. 

Because it was nothing. It wasn't some big, meaningful thing, some soulmate bond, it was just you and him. You don't ask to see his soul mark, and he doesn't ask to see yours. You just sit in each other's company, laughing over the cats being idiots, and Max unfortunately realizes that he could really, really get used to this. 

A week wouldn't be long enough, so mentally, he decides to pull out every stop. Yachts, restaurants, hikes, anything that might convince you to stay, or at least stay with him. 

Anything to convince Max that something like this could last, and that it could be love. 

-

"What's your favourite colour?" You ask Max, taking your time as you wander through the Japanese-style garden he'd brought you to. For a veterinarian, he somehow had access to some of the best places in Monaco, apparently due to all the wealthy people whose pets are his patients. 

"Blue, I think." Max answers absent-mindedly, stopping to study a bush of flowers intently. "Here, come look." 

"What did you say in Dutch, the other day? Sounded like cat something." You join Max's side to see a butterfly perfectly perched on a flower, and distracted, you don't see how red Max gets at your question. 

"Nothing," He repeats softly, his hand gently brushing against yours. Without much thought, you link your fingers together, and walk the rest of the garden like that. "Just means good night." 

-

You are currently lounging on Max's yacht in a blue one-piece bathing suit, and Max has never struggled to look at a person more. It's sort of the opposite, really, that he wants to stare at you, to keep looking at the way your curves lay out perfectly on the blanket he provided, that you might have bought that suit for him, because it's his favourite colour. 

"You know," Max says before he can stop himself, "Wearing a blue bathing suit can be dangerous. You might not be spotted in the water." 

"What?" You say, rolling over to look at him, and Max has to stare intently down at the book he's trying to read to not look in your direction. "But I've worn this for years, no one ever said anything." 

I've worn this for years. 

His shade of blue, like it was meant to be, but it wasn't, because this was just something real, something two people could share without anything else influencing it. "I can take you shopping for something brighter? Just in case." 

"You just want to see me try on bathing suits, that's what this is." You tease, and Max flushes red. Then, to his surprise, you rise, coming to sit on the end of his lounger in the shade, and he ever so carefully looks up, so that he only looks at your face. "Do you need any sunscreen? You're getting pretty red." 

"It's not the sun." Max blurts, before quickly trying to return to his book. Then, your hand comes to pull the book down from his face, and the joy in your expression is something evil. 

"You really do like blue, hm?" Max tosses his book to the side, uncaring where it lands before he's picking you up. "Wait, Max, Max! Not the water, not the water!" 

"Perfect day for a swim, no?" He teases, and you smack his chest. 

"I thought you said people couldn't see me if I was in blue." You do have a point there. Without letting you go, Max settles back into his lounger, you in his lap, and without needing any instructions, you happily bury your face into the crook of his neck, letting Max hold you there. 

At some point, your breathing evens out, and in the only chance Max has, he gently presses a kiss to your forehead and lets himself fall asleep too. 

-

The last day doesn't quite feel real. Max had gotten you dinner reservations at a Michelin star restaurant, and you had tried to teach him yoga in the morning, and somewhere in between, you'd gone for a hike and gotten gelato, and Max had fallen into what he realized now might be love. 

"You know," He finds himself saying, watching as you curl up in his side, Donatello in your lap and his suit jacket around your shoulders, "I think Donut might miss you more than me." 

It was a perfect mirror to your first morning here. You had come back from dinner, not even thinking about returning to Max's apartment instead of your hotel. At this point, he should've told you to bring your suitcase, to spend the week here, but there were some boundaries you had yet to cross. "I can't say the same for Jimmy or Sassy," You say up to him, both cats nowhere to be found. They'd always been more territorial over Max anyway. You shift further into his side on the couch, hand reaching up to adjust his jacket before remembering that you had to give it back, and before remembering that you had to go. 

Max watches both thoughts occur to you in real time, the smile slowly fading from your features. "I suppose this is it." He says softly above you. Neither of you had talked about what this was, what it meant, and frankly, Max was terrified to bring it up on his own. 

He loved you. It was a strange conclusion to come to in only a week, but you were living, breathing proof that someone could care for him without a mark, without the fame, his identity perfectly tucked away the whole time. You could've searched him up, could've done a lot of things, but he's not sure you ever did. 

"Can I ask a question?" Max asks, hand coming up to gently brush some loose hair away from your face, a domestic moment that might haunt him forever. "Did you ever search me? My name, in the wallet?" 

"What, Max Verstappen?" His full name haunts him, waiting for the other shoe to drop, but it doesn't seem to come. "No, I didn't. Should I have?" 

"I'm not a veterinarian." He answers softly, and the confusion on your face morphs into something closer to fear, and very gently, Max finally admits what he's been keeping from you. "Another reason I don't want to pursue a soulmate is because I am a Formula One driver, and enough people have pretended to love me for that. That's why there's so much car stuff." 

"Max," You breath out softly, shifting up to look at him more directly, "I know why you didn't, but you could have told me." 

"You are proof enough that I was right, though." You were here, curled up in his home like it was yours, with no strings attached. He trusted you when you said you didn't know his identity, because he trusted you entirely. "I don't need a mark or money to make someone love me." Your eyes widen, and Max realizes rather quickly what he just said aloud, scrapping all the progress he made to drop that word on you after only a week. "I didn't mean, as in I thought, after the week, I-" 

"Wait, Max-" 

"I'm sorry, I didn't think of-" 

"Max." You sit up properly now, facing him, and if this were another fantasy, Max would drag you into his lap, hold you there for a while, but now, he lets his hands ball up into useless fists at his side, waiting for you to tear a strip off of him for saying that you loved him after a week. Instead of the coming anger he expects, however, there's a softness as you gently place a hand on his chest, smoothing down his tie. "I don't think either of us can call this love yet." You say, and Max tries to get something out before you can continue. "But you're right. You don't need a soulmark or money to make someone love you, because I have spent the most incredible week with you, and the only thing I've cared about is needing to get to know you more. Not more about your soulmark, or about your secret identity, I just wanted you." 

You just wanted him. 

God, this could be love. It's all Max can think as he leans in, kissing you before he can stop himself. It starts out as a soft, simple thing, but Max could never truly describe himself as soft, if not maybe only for you. His hands find your waist, pulling you into him, and you deepen the kiss as your arms wrap around his neck, slotting together like you were always meant to be here, even if you weren't. You pull apart for a breath, staring up at Max with so much knowing in your eyes that Max can't help but immediately loosen his tie, flinging it off to some far corner of his apartment before continuing. 

He doesn't want to rush you, doesn't need to rush this, but god, all he can think is that this could be love, and all the ways he might be able to make you stay, to make you his. He doesn't care how many jets he has to charter, how many rules he had to bend, because you cared for him, the closest thing he's ever known to love. 

Your hands begin to undo his dress shirt, beating him to his own game, and he practically rips it off himself to get to you, and your hand smooths over the bandage on his shoulder, and you still.

Desperately, Max wants to ignore it. He wants this moment to be his, he wants you to be his, and for this all to disappear. 

But that's not how life works, unfortunately. That's not what Jos allowed. Someday, he'll have to talk about it, and as you slowly pull away, Max swallows thickly, trying to think of how he could tell you all that he did, all that he's done, to get rid of this damned mark. To make his father proud. To be the driver he needed to be. 

"You don't have to show me," You say, somehow unexpected. Throughout this whole week, you had never rushed him, never tried to make him talk about soulmates again. Still, with this much tension between you, with that damned bandage under your hand, he didn't expect you to happily ignore it. "We don't have to talk about it." 

"It's ugly," Max says quietly, leaning back to press a hand to his eyes, the other still holding onto your waist, gentle but firm. "Shouldn't be seen anyway." 

"No soulmark is ugly," You answer, a knowing to your voice. "I would never judge you for it." 

"I scrubbed it off." The words hang in the air, a quiet admission that Max had never dared to tell another soul. 

That after the hundredth race belittled by his father, tormented by this stupid mark, by a love that served no one, Max had found some solvent invented to get rid of soulmarks, and to the best of his ability, he scrubbed it off. It hurt like hell, the scar worse than the soulmark was itself, but Max got rid of it. "What?" Your confusion answers everything Max needed to know, slowly leaning back to put distance between the two of you. 

"I was raised in a household where soulmarks didn't work. The universe didn't pick lovers, it just didn't...they didn't...work. And because I was determined to race, I was convinced love would get in the way. Didn't help that everyone kept throwing themselves at me, faking marks to try and convince me they were my partner. I scrubbed it off permanently, and I don't regret it." 

He does. 

It probably hurt his soulmate. It probably tortured him more than he needed at his age. You pull back even farther, a mix of emotions that Max can't read as you stare at him. Disgust, he's pretty sure. That he would do that to someone else. "That's why real partnerships matter to me. Not soulmarks that can be burned off." 

"God, I'm sorry Max." The apology comes easily, despite Max's experience that it should be difficult. No one ever apologized to him sincerely, but it came to you like breathing. "I'm so sorry anyone ever made you feel like you had to get rid of that to succeed. I'm so sorry they convinced you it wasn't worth it." 

"That doesn't matter now." 

"Doesn't matter now? Of course it does, Max." Your hand smooths over the bandage on his shoulder. "If I'm the proof you need that love doesn't need to be scrubbed away, then so be it. Soulmarks be damned, you are so worthy, Max. You never should have felt the need to do...to do all that." 

The tears come in waves that Max isn't used to, normally fighting them with all his might, but right now, he couldn't care as he lets them fall, your hands gently coming up to wipe them away. He was worthy. 

That was all he was ever waiting to hear, he thinks. "I'm sorry," He says as he presses his face into your neck, your hand gently sliding into his hair, soothingly parting his hair this way and that. "That you never got to meet your soulmate. They were one lucky, lucky person." 

"I got to meet you, didn't I?" You weren't his soulmate, he knows. But it was still a nice admission that has Max laughing sadly into your collarbone. "I never have to see your mark if you don't want, but never feel the need to hide it from me." 

Without much thought, Max leans back and awkwardly reaches over his shoulder, tearing off the bandage in one clean rip, but he doesn't let you see right away. Instead, he finds himself stuck, staring at you through slowing tears as you begin to pull your dress over your head, a shock that has Max's eyes squeezing shut tight. "Wait, wait, you don't have to-" 

"If you want to show me yours, I can show you mine." Max's eyes flutter open, and he never thought he'd be more distracted by a mark than by you, in your underwear, in his lap. 

But he is, because it's his. 

There, tucked on your ribs is his mark, the little lion-looking head, a symbol Max carried for years in homage to the one he scrubbed off. It's a matching scar, more faded now, but it's his, and instantly, his hand clamps over it to hide it from his sight. 

You're his soulmate. 

All that fighting, trying so hard to not need a soulmark to fall in love, and you were still his. "What, Max?" 

"Don't move." Max manages to say under his breath, the next round of tears coming. "Please, god-" 

Your hand smooths over his shoulder, fingers gently tracing over his scar, and once you make the full way around, you freeze, because of course you'd recognize a matching scar. All this time, you thought your soulmate had died because Max had scrubbed off his soulmark, making it look like he'd passed. "But I...I never felt the bond." 

"I told you," He answers through gritted teeth, "I scrubbed it off. It must have broke the bond." 

"Max." God, you should be so angry at him. He expects a tantrum, a fight, you storming out and ending this perfect week with all of Max's terribleness. 

Because if the universe was right, you were his soulmate, and he'd ruined it all for you. You and him had fit so perfectly, and he had just fucked everything up to a degree that even he didn't know how to fix. "Changes how you think of me, huh?" He jokes softly, unable to meet your eyes, and to his surprise, you gently take his head in your hands and press a kiss to his forehead. 

"Just confirms my suspicions, actually." You answer as Max's eyes flicker open, looking up to see you smiling at him. 

Smiling. "What?" 

"You might have destroyed our soul bond, but we still fell in love." You gently pat his chest as you lean back, taking a deep breath. "We were perfectly capable of falling in love with strangers, but something in me knew we were more than just...strangers." 

"You're not mad?" 

"This wasn't your fault." Oh. "You made some very, very poor decisions, but this...I couldn't blame you for this. I found my way back, didn't I?" 

Oh. 

Max pulls you into the tightest hug he can manage, holding you perfectly still as he finally comes to terms with the fact that once upon a time, you were his soulmate. He'd hurt you, scrubbed the mark and bond and made you believe he was dead, and you kept going. You kept trying to find love, and you found him, and maybe it all wasn't real. 

Maybe it wasn't the universe. Maybe it wasn't fate. Maybe it wasn't soulmates. The bond had broken, after all, and you had both proven you were able to love each other without needing an inch of proof of forever. You just needed him now, and Max has to fight the tears he'd had built up inside him since he was eighteen. 

He's not sure how long he holds you there, but it's long enough for him to be sure that you're going to miss your flight tomorrow, and long enough for him to be sure that no matter what this is, no matter what connects you, it's real. 

And that's all he ever needed it to be.

-

-

-

"So you're not soulmates?" One of Max's mechanics ask, stood beside you infront of the monitor. You almost don't hear them with your headphones on, but the words have been said enough times to get the essence of it. 

How could you possibly date someone who isn't supposed to be yours in the eyes of the universe? It was a hard thing to explain, that Max was your soulmate, but he had severed the bond, and you had repaired it anyway. You decided to keep all that from the world however, soulmarks tucked away to only be shared between the two of you. What the world didn't know wouldn't hurt them. "We don't have a soul bond, no." 

"But don't you think about your soulmates?" The final laps approach, Max having a fair advantage as you watch his car whip around the track. "Finding someone better?" 

"Better?" The best possible option was right here, shining in the night like he was meant to. You wouldn't lie and say that it didn't hurt, knowing that Max had purposefully tried to break the bond, but that didn't dampen your feelings for him. You were children back then, and he was hurting, and he thought this was the best way forward. 

Maybe, if he had kept the soulmark, you'd have found each other somehow, in some way, but that's not the love story you needed. Your love story started on the streets of Monaco in the middle of the night, falling for a man for no other reason than he was Max, and he was yours, and it was perfect. 

"Soulmates are not the be-all end-all. There is other love out there for us, and it's no better or worse." The only thing this could be was love, you think, soulmarks be damned. You believed, deep down, that something more than just coincidence connected you and Max, but what you had was built on a foundation of your own making, not the universe's. "Max is the best partner I could ask for, whether he was my soulmate or not."

The mechanic doesn't have time to question it further, because Max crosses the finish line, and your heart begins beating so fast that it has to be love. It was meant to be, even if at one point, it wasn't. You were meant to be here, and on that street with Max, and in his arms, and with his cats, and in each other's lives, and there was no explanation needed for why. 

It was love, when you rushed down toward the parc ferme, past all the garages and the flashing lights, that you were here for him. The headlines hadn't known what to do with you, and Max hadn't bothered to indulge their rumours. You were his, and he was yours, and nothing would come between that. 

Because you were soulmates. 

It wasn't a fact you let yourself indulge in too often, considering what you had wasn't built on the assumption of loving someone, but the growth of learning how to do it.

But, once upon a time, you were soulmates, destined to be here, and it felt like something finally clicked into place as Max meets you at the barrier, helmet and sleeve ripped off to kiss you senseless, because this is what you built, together. 

It was something real, no magical, mystical interference needed. 

You were healing each other in the ways only you could, and as you pull away, you find yourself picturing the young Max, who went through so much torment to be here, to be with you. To think this wasn't an option was impossible. "I'm so proud of you." You say, the few words that you knew Max needed to hear. 

That he was worth it, that he was loved, that there were other things in this world besides racing to devote yourself to. If you were somewhere more private, Max might let you know how he really feels about it, but instead, he gently cradles the back of your head as he presses a kiss to your forehead. "I told you," He says softly, "You'll be the finish line for someone." 

"Didn't realize you meant that literally." Sometime later, when the crowds disperse and the interviews stop and the night slows, you and Max drive away into the night for the hundredth time and end up back at the hotel, where a glimpse of his soulmark confirms your suspicions.

And, sometime later, after the room service gets delivered and the adrenaline of the day slows, you fall asleep on Max for the hundredth time, and as you shift in your sleep, he gets a glimpse of your soulmark as the shirt you'd stolen from him rides up on your chest.

Repaired, unscarred, and perfectly whole.

And, for the first time, in a long time,

Max starts to believe in soulmates again.