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The petitions had continued endlessly. Each one convinced their particular trouble outweighed the last. Ormund had sat through them all: a dispute over a millstream, a merchant guild demanding lower tariffs, a minor lordling whose son had impregnated a farmer's daughter and wanted the matter handled quietly. Governance. The word itself was leaden on his tongue.

He sank lower in the copper tub, letting the scalding water close over his chest, his shoulders, until it lapped at the hard line of his jaw. Steam curled from the surface in slow ribbons, fogging the stone walls, beading on the cool stones of the floor beyond the tub's rim. The heat found the knots between his shoulder blades and pressed into them, not quite enough, never quite enough. He let his head tip back against the rim and closed his eyes.

Behind the heavy linen curtain that divided the bathing space from the rest of the chamber, voices murmured. Yours, warm, threaded with amusement, and the lighter, quicker tones of two of your maids. A burst of laughter, hastily smothered. The rustle of fabric. More whispering. He caught the edge of a word that might have been shameless and another that sounded like he won't. He did not trouble himself with it. Whatever plot they hatched behind that curtain, it was not his concern. His concern, at this moment, was the slow unclenching of his jaw and the heat working through the ache in his back.

Then the chamber door clicked shut. The maids' footsteps retreated across the outer stone corridor, their giggling fading to nothing. Quiet settled over the room like a lid pressing down, save for the soft pad of your feet moving about, and the whisper of something being drawn from a hook.

"Come here," he called. His voice carried the rough, low grain of exhaustion. He shifted in the tub, water sloshing gently against the sides. "Let me gaze upon you before you sleep."

A pause. Then the curtain parted.

Ormund's mouth opened. No sound came.

You stood in the gap of parted linen, backlit by the candles on the far side of the room, and every detail of you hit him in sequence, each one landing harder than the last. The slip you wore, if it could be called that, was the scantest, most indecent scrap of silk he had ever laid eyes on. Sheer where it ought to have been solid, the fabric clung to your body like water, tracing the curve of your waist, the soft swell of your breasts, the small peaks of your nipples pressing against the gossamer as though the material simply was not there. It ended high on your thighs, high enough that the bare skin below the hem gleamed in the candlelight. Two threads of ribbon held the whole construction up over your shoulders, knotted at the front, thin as twine. A single breath would undo them. Your waist-length hair fell in heavy curls around your shoulders, and your eyes, warm, bright with mischief, held his.

He recovered enough to find his voice. "Come closer."

You crossed to him without hurry, settling on the edge of the tub, your hip pressing against the rim, and laid your hand against the side of his face. Your palm was warm and soft. He leaned into it. The stubble along his jaw rasped against your skin.

"I have missed you," he said.

You bent and kissed him, lingering there, your mouth moving against his with a gentleness that had no urgency in it.

"I have missed you more."

He reached out, his wet hand dripping, and caught the delicate hem of your slip between thumb and forefinger. He held it, examining it as though he did not understand what he was looking at. A smirk tugged at the corner of his mouth; the slow, crooked expression that surfaced only when something genuinely amused him.

"Why, I wonder, is your clothing budget so high, when it does not appear you wear any clothes?"

"Ormund." You rolled your eyes. "This is for you."

"Oh?"

"It's meant to excite a husband's loins." You said it plainly. "All the ladies have garments such as this."

He laughed. The sound came from somewhere deep in his chest, unused all day, and it loosened something in him. "When, precisely, did you acquire this?"

"Does it please you?"

He drew back to look at you again. The shift in angle let the candlelight catch the silk differently. The dip of your waist, the flare of your hips, the shadow between your thighs, all lay bare to him. His eyes moved over you slowly, cataloguing.

"You look as if you'd be at home at a pleasure house."

You gasped. Your hand snatched from his face, and you drew upright, mouth parting in affront.

He caught your hand before it could leave him entirely. His fingers closed around your wrist, firm, not rough, and he drew your knuckles to his mouth. His lips pressed against them, warm and damp from the bathwater, and he held them there a moment before speaking.

"I do not mean it unkindly," he said against your skin. "Only that you look as though you were made to confuse good men and lead them to ruin."

You held his gaze. The affront in your face cracked, crumbled, gave way to something else.

"Would you spend your coin on me?"

"I would give all the gold in my treasury," he said, his voice dropping, "for a night with you."

Something shifted in your smile. It turned sly, knowing, the warm playfulness draining from it only to be replaced by something more calculated. The two of you were no strangers to bedroom games, and though this had not initially been your intention, you saw no reason to change course.

You knelt beside the tub. The stone was cold against your bare knees, and the contrast with the heat rising from the water prickled along your skin. You folded your hands in your lap, straightened your back, and let your voice drop into something soft, submissive, and wicked.

"I have never seen you here before, my lord."

He caught on at once. The exhaustion in his face rearranged itself, and when he looked at you, the softness of a husband's gaze was gone, replaced by something cooler, more assessing; the gaze of a man who had paid for a service and intended to inspect the goods.

"You remember every man who passes through these doors?"

"No, but I would remember a man as handsome as you."

"I'm not here for flattery." He leaned back against the copper rim, and the water sluiced off his shoulders, running down the hard planes of his chest, catching the candlelight. He let you look. The muscles of his abdomen ridged beneath the water's surface, and the hair on his chest, darkened by the wet, lay flat against his skin. His arms rested along the edges of the tub.

"Why are you here, my lord?" You let your gaze trace the line of his arm where it rested on the tub's rim. "Does your wife not satisfy you as a husband deserves?"

His mouth curved. The stubble along his jaw caught the light. "My lady wife pleases me greatly."

"Then why," one finger extending to trace the thick vein that ran along his forearm, "would a contented man spend his coin on a woman such as me?"

Your fingertip moved slowly. The vein stood out against his skin and you followed it from the crease of his elbow to the ridge of bone at his wrist. His hand twitched. He did not pull away.

"Do you make your living sending men back to their wives?" he asked.

"I'm only curious, my lord." You could feel his pulse beating steady and strong beneath the thin skin.

He leaned toward you. The water shifted around him, lapping at the copper sides, the space between you closed until you could feel the heat coming off his skin, see the fine details of his face, the specks of pale green caught in the blue of his irises, visible only at this distance, like chips of sea-glass in deep water.

"Because my lady wife is a delicate creature. Gently born, gently bred." His eyes moved over you, taking in the way your kneeling position pressed your thighs together and made the hem ride up. "I would never do to her the things I'm going to do to you."

Something flickered across your face. Heat, delight, the sharp thrill of a challenge accepted. Your lips parted, your hand still resting on his wrist.

"Very well, my lord," Your voice was barely above a whisper, but it carried in the humid air, clear and steady. "Use me as you see fit."

Ormund gave you a crooked grin. The kind that crinkled the corner of one eye and bared the edge of his teeth. He planted one hand on the copper rim of the tub and carefully stood, water sluicing off him in sheets, running down the hard ridges of his stomach and the thick muscles of his thighs. His body was a map of old violence: a pale ridge across his ribs where a blade had caught him years ago, a raised mark along one shoulder, the silvery seam of an old stitch-job curling around his left forearm. Light brown hair dusted his chest, trailing down the center of his abdomen in a thin line that thickened below his navel. His cock hung heavy between his legs, already half-swollen, and as he stepped over the rim of the tub without reaching for a towel, water cascaded onto the stone floor in a wide splash that went utterly ignored.

He straightened to his full height and looked down at you, still dripping, still grinning. "Stop gaping and come here."

You took a step back. His grin widened.

"Don't be shy now," he purred, closing the distance. His hand closed around your wrist. Not rough, not gentle, just certain, and he drew you forward until your body met his. The wet heat of his skin soaked instantly through the sheer silk of your slip, plastering the fabric to your stomach, your breasts. "Touch me."

You raised your hands. Your fingers found the swell of his chest first, palms flat against the dense muscle as you trailed your hands down. You felt his abdomen tighten beneath your touch in a reflexive clench, tracing the ridges of his stomach, fingernails grazing through the trail of hair below his navel. One hand traced the hard cut of muscle at his hip, that sharp V-line that angled downward like an arrowhead pointing the way, and his cock twitched; thick and heavy and hard now, lifting away from his thigh. You looked up at him and found his gaze already on you. His eyes were dark, pupils blown so wide the blue had thinned to a narrow ring; the heat in them sent a warmth racing across your skin, prickling down your neck, between your breasts, pooling low in your belly. You looked back down.

He took your hand. Guided it. Wrapped your fingers around the shaft of him; hot, impossibly thick, the skin velvet-soft over iron hardness, and held you there. "There you go." He rolled his hips, a slow, controlled thrust into your grip, and the head of his cock pushed through the circle of your fist, slick with bathwater. You felt him pulse in your hand, a heartbeat made flesh.

"My lord, you cannot possibly mean to—"

Ormund's grin sharpened. A callback to your wedding night when you had teased him with that very phrase. "I assure you, I mean to give you all of it."

You stroked him again, slow, deliberate, your thumb dragging across the sensitive head. He hissed through his teeth, eyelids fluttering shut for one unguarded second. When his eyes opened again, the playfulness had burned away. What remained was something harder, hungrier, the look of a man done waiting.

"Get on the bed. Spread your legs."

You turned and walked. The stone floor was cold beneath your bare feet, water from his body marking a trail behind him as you crossed from the bathing area into the space where your bed stood. You could hear him behind you. Not rushing. He stalked after you the way a predator tracked something wounded, not running, because running implied the prey might escape, and you were going nowhere.

You reached the bed, grabbed the carved footboard, and scrambled up onto the mattress on your hands and knees, linens bunching under your knees. Then a large hand locked around your ankle. Iron grip. He yanked, and you slid backward across the sheets with a gasp, the silk of your slip riding up your thighs, your legs dangling off the edge of the bed. You rolled over. He stood between your knees, looking down at you.

"Take that off. I want to see what I'm paying for."

Your fingers trembled. You reached up to the thin straps of the slip, hooked them with your index fingers, and slid them down your shoulders. The fabric peeled away from your skin with the dampness of his bathwater still clinging to it, and the material pooled at your waist, baring your breasts to the cool air. Your nipples tightened instantly; partly the chill, mostly him. You shifted your hips, lifting yourself, and pulled the garment down your legs, past your knees, off entirely, letting it drop to the floor in a wet heap of silk. You lay back against the linens, hair fanning out around you in a wild dark halo, and looked up at him through the candlelit haze.

"Am I to your liking, my lord?"

"Yes," he said. "Very much."

He climbed onto the bed and moved over you, not straddling yet, just close enough that you could feel the heat radiating off his still-damp skin, close enough that the head of his cock brushed your thigh and left a wet smear. He braced himself on one arm above you and looked down, the corner of his mouth curled up.

"Do you touch yourself?"

The question hit you like a slap. Heat flooded your face, your neck, your chest, blooming down to your sternum. "I beg your pardon?!"

He chuckled. Low, dark, the sound rolling from deep in his chest. "Do not take that tone with me; you are not my wife."His voice dropped a register, quiet and hard, the voice he used when issuing commands. "Answer the question."

You swallowed. "Y-yes, my lord."

He raised an eyebrow. The interest in his eyes sharpened to a point, the blue nearly swallowed by black. "Show me."

You lay back against the linens. Your legs fell open slowly, first one knee tilting, then the other, your thighs parting in increments, your breath coming shallow and uneven. You had never done this before him. Your hands moved down your body, fingertips tracing the plane of your stomach, the curve of your hip, dipping lower. You found your core with two fingers and ran them down the length of your slit, feeling the shape of yourself, the softness of the outer folds and the slick heat between them. You drew your fingers back upward, circling your clit with the pad of your middle finger, and a breath escaped you at the contact, your stomach tensing.

You brought your fingers back down. Found your entrance. Found yourself wet, dripping, honestly, the arousal thick and slippery on your fingers. You pushed one finger inside, and a moan spilled out, soft and unguarded, as you began to move it slowly in and out, feeling the walls clench around the intrusion. You looked up.

Ormund was flushed; his hand was wrapped around his cock, stroking himself in long, slow pulls, his eyes locked on what you were doing between your legs. His head was flushed, dark, weeping a steady thread of clear fluid that his thumb smeared across the crown with each pass. His jaw was clenched so tight the muscle in his cheek jumped.

"That's it," he said. His voice was shaky. Cracked at the edges. "Add another."

You obeyed. Pushed a second finger in alongside the first, and the stretch made you gasp, your head tipping back against the linens. You picked up speed. Your fingers curled inside yourself, stroking the spongy front wall of your cunt, and the sounds you were making- soft, hitching moans, breathless little gasps- filled the chamber, mixing with the wet noise of your fingers working in and out of you. Your hips rolled against your own hand.

Ormund's breathing was ragged. "It's not enough, is it."

You shook your head. It wasn't. Your fingers were slim and delicate and could not reach the places inside you that ached to be filled. Could not stretch you the way you needed, could not pound into you with the weight and force that turned your bones to water. You needed his thick fingers, his thick cock, the mass of him bearing down on you to truly stretch you the way you liked.

"Use your words."

"No, my lord, I—" You pulled your fingers free, slick and glistening, and before you could say another word, he caught your wrist. Lifted your hand. Brought it to his face, inhaling deeply, his nose nearly touching your wet fingers. The sound he made was animal, a low groan in his chest. Then he took your fingers into his mouth. His tongue swept between them, lapping at the taste of you, curling around each digit, sucking the slick from your skin with a wet, obscene sound that made your thighs clench together. You gasped. Your free hand gripped the sheets.

He released your fingers with a slick pop and crawled over you. His large body caged you in. Arms on either side of your head, knees spreading your thighs wider, his cock hanging heavy and hot between you, the shaft dragging across your stomach as he settled his weight above you. The sheer size of him blotted out the candlelight. His shadow swallowed you.

He leaned down, his mouth beside your ear, his breath hot and damp against your temple. "I hope you are prepared, because I will not be gentle with you."

A jolt of electricity ran through you, starting at the base of your skull and crackling down your spine, through your belly, straight to your cunt. Wetness pooled between your legs, a fresh surge of slick that you felt drip onto the sheets. The thought of him using your body, taking what he wanted, made your thighs tremble. Your breath came in short, shallow pants.

"My body is yours, my lord."

He braced himself on one hand, and with the other he reached between you. You felt his fingers wrap around the shaft of his cock, felt the broad head of him drag through your silky folds, through the wetness, the heat, and the friction of it; even that light contact made your hips buck. You placed one hand on his shoulder, gripping the hard cap of muscle, and the other on his bicep, feeling the cords of muscle flex beneath your palm.

He pushed into you. The full length of him drove into you in a single, brutal thrust, and you cried out, a raw, ragged sound torn from somewhere deep in your chest. You had not prepared enough, your fingers too slender, too few, for the girth of him forcing you open around his cock. You felt every inch. The sting was sharp and bright, and you loved it; loved the ache of it.

He pressed his weight onto you. His strong arms gripped you tight, pulling you against him as he sank even deeper, and you clawed at his back, fingernails raking down the sweat-damp skin, leaving red lines across his shoulder blades. He held himself there, buried to the hilt, and you felt him throbbing. A pulse that matched the hammering of your own heart. His jaw was clenched, his breath coming in short, harsh bursts through his nose. He was adjusting to the feel of you.

"You're so tight for a whore," he said through gritted teeth, and the words vibrated against your throat.

You managed to find your voice. It came out breathless. "My mistress reserves me for only the most special clients."

He leaned back onto his knees, his cock still buried inside you to the root. The new angle shifted him against your front wall, and you bit your lip. "Is that so?" he asked, one eyebrow arched.

You rolled your hips. The friction dragged a sound from both of you simultaneously. "Yes," your voice had gone half-wrecked already, trembling at the edges. "Rich men usually have small cocks."

He tilted his head. His eyes narrowed. The blue had vanished entirely; only black remained, bottomless and bright with something dangerous. Then, slowly, a grin spread across his face, the kind that preceded ruin.

"I am going to enjoy this very much."

He pulled out. The drag of him was slow; you felt every ridge, every vein of his cock as it withdrew. The suction of your cunt gripping him, trying to hold him in, until only the head remained inside, the thick crown stretching your entrance. Then he slammed back in. One brutal, full-length thrust that drove the air from your lungs and punched a cry out of your throat that echoed off the stone walls.

He did it again. Pulled out to the tip. Drove back in. You felt him carving his way into you, reshaping you around him, the drag of every vein against your swollen walls as he withdrew only to plunge back in, each thrust so deep it felt as though he were reaching your throat. The wet, obscene sound of skin meeting skin filled the chamber; squelch, slap, squelch, the bed frame groaning beneath you, linens bunching and twisting under your back.

You bit your lip. Pressed your mouth shut, trying to muffle the sounds climbing out of your throat. He noticed.

"No. I pay for those sounds." His voice was rough. "Let me hear them."

He delivered another harsh thrust; deeper, harder, his hips cracking against yours, and the moan that ripped out of you was loud, uncontrolled, bouncing off the walls. Your back arched off the bed.

He picked up his pace. Thrust after thrust of him using your body for his pleasure, his hips driving forward in a relentless, battering rhythm that shoved you up the bed until your headboard rattled with each impact. You could hear yourself; wet, desperate, the sounds you were making beyond your control, moans and gasps and broken syllables that might have been his name.

"Harder," you begged, the word coming out a sob of want.

His hand found your throat. His fingers wrapped around the front of your neck; not squeezing the airway, but pressing, claiming. The weight of his palm against your pulse. Both your hands flew to his wrist, wrapping around the bone, just holding on. He slammed into you harder. Each thrust driving the breath from you, the sound from you, the thoughts from you.

He had never handled you like this. Never spoken to you this way. Each filthy word that dropped from his mouth, each degradation, each dark praise, traveled straight to your cunt like a physical touch, making you clench and drip around him.

"You dirty whore," he growled, his thumb pressed against the side of your neck, feeling your pulse hammer. "Getting off like this. Wanting to be fucked like this."

You could only moan. Heat overwhelmed heat. Your skin was burning where his body met yours. The coil of pleasure wound tight in your belly, a spring being compressed to its limit. You felt the hair at the base of his cock grinding against your clit with every thrust, the friction sending sparks up your spine, and it was so much, too much, the sensation layering and building until you could barely breathe—

Your orgasm hit you. Hard. Your whole body seized, clenching in violent, rhythmic spasms around his cock, your back arching off the bed, your nails digging into the thick muscle of his back hard enough to leave crescents. You came with a sound that was half-scream, half-sob, your thighs clamping around his hips, body shaking. He groaned above you, a deep, guttural sound, and you felt his rhythm falter for one stroke as your spasming cunt milked him.

He continued fucking into you through your orgasm. Each thrust prolonged the waves crashing through you, drawing them out, stretching the pleasure into something almost unbearable. You whimpered, oversensitive, your hands falling away from his back to grip the sheets, twisting the linen in fists. He rode you through the aftershocks, his pace still brutal, still relentless, until the pleasure edged toward pain.

Then he released your throat and stilled his hips. You blinked up at him, dazed, as he pulled out of you. The sudden emptiness was shocking. You were gaped open, fucked loose and swollen, slick with your own arousal, clenching around nothing. You opened your mouth to speak. He flipped you over. One hand on your hip, rolling you bodily across the rumpled sheets, and you found yourself on weak hands and weaker knees. Ormund's hands gripped your hips. The broad head of his cock pressed against your entrance, still slick with your orgasm, and you felt him lean over you, his chest against your back, his mouth near your ear.

"My turn," he said.

He pushed in, slower than before but still splitting you open, filling you so completely that there was no room for anything else. No air, no thought, just the overwhelming reality of being fucked.

He began to pound into you like an animal, snapping his hips forward with enough force to rock the heavy bed frame against the stone wall.

"Take it," he snarled, his voice unrecognizable.

He released one side only to snatch both of your wrists, yanking them behind your back, pinning them there, using the leverage to force your upper body down into the mattress. Your face was pressed against the linens, your breath coming in short, desperate gasps. The bed creaked and groaned under the assault, the wooden frame sounding as if it might splinter at any moment.

Your arms were useless, trapped in his grip, legs trembling violently, your muscles burning from the strain of maintaining the position on your hands and knees. Slowly, your knees gave out. Ormund let your wrists go as you collapsed, allowing you to fall flat against the mattress. He followed you down, covering your body with his while he continued to thrust into your prone form.

The angle change hit you deeper, rubbing against spots inside you that made your vision white out. He slowed his pace just fractionally, grinding into you instead of thrusting, torturing you with the depth.

"Are you going to peak again?" he rasped against your ear, his breath hot and ragged.

You let out a groan and nodded your face against the sheets. "Already?" he mocked, his voice dripping with dark amusement. "What kind of greedy whore finds her pleasure twice before a customer achieves his once?"

You could only babble, incoherent pleas falling from your lips, your mind shattered by the relentless stimulation. "Please... Ormund... I can't..."

He reached around your hip, his fingers finding your swollen, sensitive clit. He rubbed it roughly, in tight, fast circles, matching the tempo of his hips. You screamed his name as the second orgasm tore through you.

"Fuck!" Ormund roared.

He slammed into you one final time, burying himself to the hilt, and held himself there as his body seized, spilling inside you, his cock pulsing as he filled you with his seed. He groaned low in his throat, his eyes squeezed shut, every muscle in his body locked in a rictus of pleasure.

Then he pulled out slowly. The movement dragged a whimper from your lips. He shifted back, kneeling between your legs, and watched with fascination as his cum began to leak out of you. It was a thick, white trickle, running slowly down your thighs, mingling with the slick evidence of your own arousal. You looked thoroughly fucked, used, ruined in the best possible way.

Ormund threw his head back, his skin glistening with sweat in the dim light. "Fuck," he breathed, the word a prayer.

The energy in the room began to settle, giving way to a heavy, sated exhaustion. He collapsed onto the bed beside you, lying on his back and staring up at the ceiling as his heart rate slowly returned to normal.

After a moment, he turned onto his side. He reached out with a gentle hand, wiping the sweat-soaked baby hairs from your forehead and brow. His touch was tender now, a stark contrast to the moments before. You opened your eyes to look at him. They were glassy, unfocused, but filled with a deep, lingering warmth.

"Are you alright?" he asked. The game was over. The role shed, leaving only your doting husband.

You nodded, unable to find your voice just yet.

"I have never..." He started, then stopped, shaking his head as if unable to articulate the magnitude of what had just passed between you. He groaned as he sat up, swinging his legs over the side of the bed. His body ached in the most satisfying way.

You continued to just lay there on your stomach, thinking of what had passed. Your mind was a haze of pleasure, the boundaries between the fantasy and reality blurring.

Ormund stood and walked across the room, his movements slow and heavy. He returned a moment later with a warm, damp cloth. The first touch of it between your legs made you gasp. You were sensitive, swollen from the rough handling, and even the gentle pressure was intense.

"I'm sorry," he murmured. "Relax."

He wiped you so gently, cleaning away the mess of your coupling with a care that belied his earlier ferocity, taking his time, ensuring he was thorough. When he was done, he discarded the cloth onto the floor and pulled back the heavy duvet, gathering you into his arms as if you weighed nothing. You curled into his chest, burying your face in his neck.

"You were so perfect," he whispered into your hair, pressing a kiss to your temple.

You shifted, propping yourself up slightly on his chest to look at him. A shadow of doubt crossed your features, a vulnerability that hadn't been there during the game.

"Is that what you need to be happy?" you asked softly. "Have you been unsatisfied before in our marriage bed?"

Ormund looked at you, blue eyes serious. He reached up to stroke your cheek, his thumb brushing over your soft skin.

"I am very happy. More than I deserve."

He leaned in to kiss you, a slow, deep kiss that tasted of salt and lingering desire. He pulled back just enough to rest his forehead against yours.

"If I made you feel as though— I am sorry."

You kissed him again, laying your head back on his chest, listening to the steady thrum of his heartbeat. The fear dissolved, replaced by a warm glow of security. You traced idle patterns on his chest, your mind drifting back to the thrill of the act.

"Next time," you murmured sleepily. "I am in control."

Ormund ran his hand down your back, soothing you. "Oh, really?" You could hear the smile in his voice. "What would you like to try?"

You smiled against his skin, a mischievous glint returning to your eyes. "Perhaps I can be a princess, and you can be a dark knight holding me for ransom."

Ormund laughed out loud, a deep sound that startled the quiet room. "You're going to fuck your way to freedom?" You smacked his chest, feigning outrage. "I will not tell you my desires if you are going to laugh!"

He caught your hand, interlacing your fingers, rolling you both over, shifting his weight so he was looking down at you. The playfulness in his expression softened into something warmer and infinitely devoted.

He loved your uncle and treated Daeron as if he were born of his own blood. But though you were often found in the same trouble, Ormund's display of discipline was always a bit different when directed at you.

Not only a raised voice but a physical punishment, too.

A rough hand on the back of your neck. A lashing across your knuckles. Fingers curled tight around your jaw.

You'd let yourself believe that things would change when you became a woman grown. It is one thing to discipline a girl with the intent of guidance, but it is another thing to strike a lady.

The solution was to discipline in private.

Once, you'd gotten caught stealing wine from the kitchens in the dead of night. And when Ormund had been told of your transgression, he'd come to your bedchamber alone. Sat on the side of your mattress, fingers gentle as they stroked your cheek.

He shook you awake, and pretended at patience while you rubbed away the drunken stupor from your eyes.

And then he'd explain, "I am hard on you because I care. Because I see the potential beneath all your corruption. I understand it is not your fault you have such atrocity in your blood. I am only teaching you to overcome it. And you have much yet to learn, sweetling."

This is the first time Ormund takes you over his knee.

His palm lands sharp and hard across your bottom, five good times for each and every cup you'd stolen. He makes you count, and does not comment on the tears as they brim at the corners of your eyes.

The first time is the worst, because you hadn't expect it.

But by the tenth time it stops being a surprise and starts to become an expectation.

The routine is always the same. The sun will set, and he will slink into your chambers. Sometimes he doesn't even speak. He will simply stare down at you where you lay, head tilted, eyes dark, and you'll whisper apologies in the flickering candlelight.

He is meaner, you come to notice, when he is encumbered by duty. His strikes are harder and there are more of them. Sometimes he will spend hours in a day listening to petitions or dispersing soldiers or politicking with lords who come to him with future propositions.

On these nights, Ormund will groan low in his throat when you twist in his grasp, your legs flailing as you run from the impact of his tingling palm. But he will always wait for you to compose yourself, and then he'll lift his own leg over yours to bracket you in place, all before striking you again.

It is only after several months of this routine of discipline that you begin to wonder if it is less for your sake and more for his.

On one particular night, you're on strike eight out of ten, the number gritted through your teeth as you speak it aloud. Your breath comes fast and labored in your chest, lungs burning as you greedily drink up oxygen. Your muscles tire of pulling tight in anticipation only to melt in relief as the pain disperses across your skin.

It is later than usual, and you'd spent the day on horseback, and you're so exhausted that you fold your hands over one another and lay your head atop them. Face turned, you steal a glance up at Ormund to find his lips parted and his shoulders relaxed.

Posture far different than it had been when he'd closed your chamber door behind him.

You force your eyes to stay open as he hits you again, observing the look on his face.

Troublesome and argumentative woman you are, you're smart enough to recognize solace when you see it.

"Nine," you say, though it is more of a whisper than a fully spoken word.

Ormund notices.

His eyes find yours, gaze heavy and intense, as if he were seeing something inside of you that he could not put a name to if he tried.

This time, when his palm comes down against your cheek, it is hard enough that the sound echoes against the stone walls.

Your eyes squeeze shut and your ears ring and you can hear and feel and sense nothing but the heat of him beneath you and the pain he elicits. Breathing does not come easily. Each inhale is short and labored and choking.

"Count," Ormund says, the word low and demanding, the way he so often is.

You cannot catch your breath.

"Count, girl," he repeats. "Or we will begin again."

A spark of fear ignites in your chest, because you could not endure another ten lashes. Not like this, not knowing this is not even about the cruel words you'd spoken to your septa but rather for his own selfish respite.

"Ten!" The word is rushed. "Ten, ten, ten—!"

His hand smooths over your spine, as if to heal the ache he himself inflicted. "Very good," he whispers, shushing your cries. "You did so well."

The following morning, your flesh stings and bruises have already begun to form, but all you can think of is the way his praise had made your heart sing inside the cage of your ribs. The words echo in your mind, a mantra, a song, a poem.

The feeling is only because it is so rare to hear such things from his mouth, you tell yourself. It is not for desire. You could not desire a man like Ormund, could you? Who'd shaped you into the woman you are. Who saw such corruption in you and had spent the better half of your life trying to root it out.

But no matter how hard you try, you cannot shake the look you'd seen on his face. Like he'd enjoyed it.

And because you are stubborn and far too curious, you conduct an experiment to disprove your theory.

For weeks, you try very hard to be good. You go to your lessons without complaint, you listen to your septas, you pray to the seven and deny yourself excess in all forms.

You speak kindly. You cling tight to poise. You cast your eyes away when a man speaks to you and bow graciously instead of arguing or challenging a direction, no matter how stupid it may be.

You are perfect.

It is the longest you have gone without punishment in all your life.

But the stretch of time only lasts so long. And you wake late one night to find Ormund standing at your bedside, hovering.

Staring, with that same look he's leveled at you for years—not disgust, but something more complex. Something hotter. Searing.

You lift yourself up on an elbow and ask timidly, "Did I do something wrong?"

His jaw feathers as he clenches his teeth. "No."

Somehow, his answer is worse than if he had found a reason to punish you. Because this meant you were right, that his discipline was not only for you. It meant there was something else beneath it all.

It meant that this perverse craving in your chest that you have tried to fight off was not only yours. It was shared.

"If I've not done anything wrong, then what are you—?"

"Get up." He lifts his hand, motioning for you to remove yourself from the comfort of you linens, finally breaking the intensity of his stare.

And because you have been trained to heed his every beck and call, you do exactly as he says.

He sits at the edge of your bed, the way he always does. And you stand in front of him awaiting instruction, the way you always do.

Your heart feels suddenly too large, pushing against your bones.

He is supposed to say, kneel. He is supposed to say, over my knee. He is supposed to say, do you know what you've done?

Ormund does not.

Instead, he says, "Take off your gown."

You blink in surprise, unsure if perhaps this is a test. Maybe he's temping you, goading for a reason. Trying to get you to reveal yourself, to sacrifice your modesty so that he might prove you are just as wicked as he believes you to be.

"What?"

"Your gown," he says again, voice firmer now. "Take it off. Do not make me repeat myself."

You can hear the blood rushing in your ears and feel suddenly frozen. Afraid to move, afraid to say one thing when he truly means for you to do another, and—

Ormund stands suddenly and his hands are on you. Big and rough and mean, tearing the lace fabric over your chest so hard it leaves indents against your shoulder blades. Your nightclothes are thin and give so easily beneath his violence.

You do not stop him. You don't even try.

You don't want to.

Before you can fully process what's happening, you're standing completely bare before him, white fabric pooled at your feet. Your nipples harden beneath the night's cool air and your heart hammers in your ribcage.

He is not shameful in his assessment of you. His eyes are greedy and roaming, leaving no part of you untouched, starting at the curve of your throat and the the swell of your breasts, and eventually lower down to your navel and the space between your legs.

Ormund stares, and his lips part on a hollow sigh. His hand comes up to cup his jaw, squeezing hard, trying to rub the tension away.

You want so badly to hear the thoughts in his mind but know better than to ask.

Does he think you're beautiful? Does he like the shape of your body? Does he enjoy the softness of your skin, or the scent of honeysuckle oils at your pulse point? Are you womanly enough for him?

Does he want you? Does he think of you, the way you have him? Do you appear in his dreams, too?

He clears his throat, the sound masculine and powerful, startling you out of your reverie. And then he sits back down on the edge of your bed and says, "Kneel."

You do.

"Over my knee."

This instruction, too, you follow.

Warmth blooms low in your belly at the texture of his leather breeches against the top of your bare thighs.

He doesn't ask if you're aware of your transgressions, because there are none.

Ormund sets one hand on the small of your back, and the other comes to rest against the globe of your arse. His hands are calloused. Rough. Hardened from the weight of a sword.

And above all, they are…delightful. Delicious. "How—" you swallow thickly. "How many?"

His hands are gentle as they stroke your skin. Feather light and mistakenly devoted. Ormund leans forward, lips a breadth away from your ear as he answers, "As many as I'd like."

And then his hand comes down sharply, the sound of skin against skin a piercing echo.

A whine leaves you, and it takes a moment to gather yourself enough to choke out, "One."

He hits you again, and again, and again—and each time those delicate touches in between last just a bit longer. As if he is able to find peace in your punishment, granting him the gift of softness.

Everything feels hot. Your skin, your hands, the place between your legs. It throbs and aches and grows stickier by the minute.

You think he must see it. He must. Each strike has your spine arching, exposing you even more, the number more of a moan on your lips than a cry.

It is around number six that you begin to feel him harden beneath you.

The swell of his cock presses against your belly, right beside your navel. Growing larger with each loud echo.

He does not mention it, and neither do you. But your head feels fuzzy with the truth of it.

Ormund settles around strike fifteen. You are certain it will be painful to sit tomorrow, but you can't find yourself in it to care when he traces delicate patterns over your warmed flesh with the tips of his cool fingers.

The praise comes after some time, when your muscles relax in his hold, when you stop expecting one more strike to befall you.

"You always look so beautiful in the aftermath," he mutters. and you feel yourself smiling, despite your better impulses. "Pretty, obedient little girl."

His hands knead at your sore skin, squeezing the pillowy flesh and spreading you open. You look up to see him staring at your most intimate place, likely seeing the wetness that's gathered.

He then does one more thing you don't expect.

With only the pad of his thumb, Ormund slides his finger through your slit.

The touch is firm and so unforeseen that it sends a jolt straight to your heart. You let out a true cry this time, but not of pain.

Of pleasure.

You're so sensitive that your muscles clench at the contact, so lost in the feeling that you hardly hear the low groan that rumbles through his chest.

And then he's pushing you off of his lap onto your bed, and standing to his feet. He does not even spare you a parting glance over his shoulder as he says, "Enough for today."

You do not see him again for some time.

In fact, Ormund leaves Oldtown entirely the next morning and he takes Daeron with him. It is only from your septa's that you learn they've set on a quest to deliver goods to the Citadel.

Usually Ormund will mention as much to you over supper with your uncle, and you cannot help thinking the reason for his sudden and unannounced absence is due to what transpired between you the night before.

And to yourself only, you admit his absence has made you yearn for him.

You cannot quiet the thoughts in your mind each night, the longing for him, the hope that he will simply appear at your bedside with a heavy hand and that familiar stare.

But he never does, and left to your own devices with thoughts of his touch invading your every thought, it is not long before you try desperately to abate the need yourself.

In fact, you form a new routine of your own.

It starts as desperate rocking against nothing, but you learn rather quickly just how much better it feels with your linens wedged tight between your legs as you do.

The bulk of the fabric presses deliciously against your center, and each roll of your hips has your vision turning black around the edges. You can think only of Ormund—your mentor, your disciplinarian, the hand that shaped you.

You think of the force behind his strikes and of his low groans and of his sweet, sweet praise. You think of the darkness in his eyes and of his strong jaw and the way the muscles in his shoulders flex when he moves.

Even his gait makes your belly squeeze tight in desire—the surety in his steps, his confident posture and the way he towers over you. Always so big and hulking and intimidating.

Sleep only comes to you each night after you reach the peak of bliss. After a fog clouds your mind and your vision goes all starry.

You think if Ormund were to see the things you'd been up to in his absence, you don't believe fifteen strikes would be nearly enough.

He would tell you it is a sin to indulge lustful fantasies in this way. That your pleasure is reserved for your husband, meant to be given at his discretion.

But you've never been a perfect listener nor a rule follower. If there is anything in your life you are certain of, it is that.

You allow yourself to freely walk about the tower in his absence, too. The rookery and the kitchens, plucking fruit or cheese from nearby trays and sending ravens to your aunt Helaena in the Red Keep.

You visit the stables to pet the horses and even make friends with a bastard boy who'd recently come to Oldtown from Casterly Rock.

When Ormund does finally return, you're there to greet him in the great hall with a flicker of delight in your chest.

He looks the same as when he'd left. Strong, masculine, confident. His skin is maybe a bit more sun-kissed than before, and his normally polished leather boots are caked in mud.

Yet still, you cannot help but smile when you see him. You'd worn your most beautiful dress, a gown of emerald velvet and white lace, low cut with a jeweled bodice. He'd complimented you on it once, several moons ago, and it has been your favorite ever since.

When he comes to stand in front of you in greeting, you bow low. "My lord," you say. "I am grateful for your return."

His eyes stay glued to yours when you rise, his pert mouth turned up at the corners. "I am grateful to be back," he says, taking your hand in his and bringing your knuckles to his lips.

Ormund's kiss is chaste, but it feels anything but. The simple touch of his hand has your belly flipping and your face heating.

He does not linger long, though you wish he would. But there is much to tend to in the keep, things that have simply been awaiting his return.

The cooks prepare a feast that night. A massive spread for both Ormund and the knights that traveled with him.

Ormund sits at the head of the table and Daeron sits to his right. You are placed on the other side of your uncle, who spends most of the night recounting tales of the Citadel to you. Of the towering stacks of books and the tomes bigger than his head.

He tells you in a whispered tone just how old the Grand Maester truly looks. "Ancient," he explains. "With tufts of graying hair and eyes that no longer see."

You laugh and giggle together about it, indulging your childish whims that always manifest whenever you are near him.

Daeron tells you, too, about the ambush they'd suffered from raiders who's been lying in wait off the King's Road.

"Uncle Ormund nearly died from a stab wound," he whispers, and it makes your heart give a sudden lurch. "He fought bravely. Slashed the raider clean in two, if you'd believe it."

This makes you mirth fall. You have never considered his loss before this moment. Ormund has always been there, a steady presence in your life.

Just the thought of it—of losing him, it does not sit well in your gut. Though hated by him as you are, you could not imagine...you could not imagine.

Ormund does not speak to you, but you can feel his stare. Heavy and warm on the side of your face. You wonder silently if he'd missed you as you have him.

Had he been thinking of that night, too? Of how it had felt to be bared before him? Of the heat you saw in his gaze?

Had he thought of you with a blade pressed to his belly? Had it truly gotten that close?

Ormund makes a toast to his men near the end of supper. To their valiant efforts that contributed greatly to the trade and to their protection.

Your maidens ready you for bed that night and spend a little longer scrubbing you clean at your request. They dress you in white silk and by the time they leave, the fire in the hearth has dwindled to cinders. The excitement in your chest is a roaring flame, however.

But, Ormund does not come to you.

You toss and turn restlessly, hoping to hear the creak of your chamber door or footsteps on the stone just outside.

Yet, there is nothing. The night is still, as it has been for the last several weeks.

You lie there with a longing in your chest, an ache between your legs, and your head filled with a thousand questions.

The setting sun has long since given way to the moon by the time you leave your bed.

Ormund's chambers are on the other side of the Hightower, but you are more and more certain with every step you take.

Ser Roy of Oldtown stands guard outside his door, the way he does most nights. He bows low when he sees you, eyes cast away from the too thin fabric of your gown. "My lady."

"I wish to speak to him," you say, trying to muster the strength to keep your voice from wavering.

"He did request not to be disturbed lest there was an emergency," the knight tells you.

"I don't care," is your simple response, because it is true. "Please, ser, step aside so that I might—"

Ormund's door opens, the heavy weight of it daunting.

He looks at you and stares. Hard and knowing.

Your breath gives way at the precision attention, all the jumbled thoughts in your mind untangling like a pulled thread before promptly vanishing. There is…something new behind his ire for you. Something you might call intrigue, if you didn't know any better.

Ormund does not take his eyes off of you as he speaks. "Find something to busy yourself, Ser Roy," he says, eyes searching your face now, flickering from your nose to your cheeks and then to your mouth. "And do not come back," he adds to the knight.

Roy nods stiffly and doesn't argue. He, too, knows better.

The clang of his armor disappears down the corridor, and before long it is just you and the man who haunts your insides. Heart and head alike.

He smiles down at you. A true smile. Small, but real, and it weathers your resolve in an instant. Because it's a kindness he does not give freely or often, but he is here now, giving it to you—who you'd thought he'd hated.

But this doesn't feel like hatred to you in the slightest.

It's heavier. Sharper. Sweeter.

In the end, it is you who breaks the spell, pushing past him and into his chambers. You recall all your uncle had said about the journey to the Citadel. How blades had been drawn and blood had been spilled and the thought of it makes your eyes sting.

Ormund closes the chamber door behind you, but you face away from him. Staring into the crackling flames in the hearth, trying and failing to fight the tears that brim in your eyes. "Daeron told me there was an…altercation on the King's Road," you say. "He speaks tales of blood and death. Is this true?"

His heavy footfalls sound in your ears. Ormund nears you, yet you still do not turn to look at him. "It is," he answers simply. "These are dark times, as you well know. Darker yet to come."

The idea of it—of war, of famine, of the rot and loss that he speaks of, it makes you terrified. You've seen men die before, in jousts or tourneys, even on the way here to Oldtown. But thinking of Ormund in the middle of it all?

Finally, you turn to face him. He is closer than you'd expected. Only a single step away, focus narrowing as he sees the tears in your eyes. "You could have died."

"But I did not." His head tilts curiously. "Where do you place your ire?"

"In you!" You should not yell. You know this, and yet the venom in your mouth refuses to be washed out. "It is from someone else that I'd had to learn you'd been attacked on the way to the Citadel. From another I'd learned you'd taken a wound that very nearly could have put you in the grave. And even those details I'd had to overhear from one of your men when it should have come from you!"

He watches it unfold; your rage surfacing, all masks of poise absent. He does not stop you or speak a warning into existence, he only watches with curiosity on his face and something far more intense alongside it.

"I have longed for your return for weeks! You leave without a word and take my uncle with you, leaving me to sit all alone and wonder if perhaps I'd done something wrong or worse—disappointed you!" Your tears fall freely down your cheeks now, but you are far past the point of sparing yourself any embarrassment.

Ormund raises his hand to your face, cradling your head in his palm. His thumb strokes gently across your cheek, swiping your tears away. "Is it for me that you weep, sweetling?"

Yes, you want to say. Yes, of course it is. He is everything to you and has always been. "Do you have any idea how I would have mourned you?"

His eyes soften, and it soothes something inside of you to see it. Ormund leans forward slowly, carefully so as not to frighten you.

And you stand there, frozen in the gentle hold of his hands, as he licks the tears from your cheeks. His tongue is warm and soothing against your ruddy skin, and it feel so intimate that it makes you shiver.

He then kisses your eyelids. The left first, followed by the right. "I cannot promise to tell you of each of my wounds," he says, voice softer than it's ever been before. "But I can promise to warn you before I leave the tower again. I thought you'd be glad to be rid of me after all I've done, in truth."

"Glad?" The thought does not register in your mind. "I could never be glad of your absence. I confess, I…I hate it."

"Is that right?" Ormund takes a step back, and you see him inhale a shaking breath as he does. "More than you hate me?"

You wish you could deny the words, but you cannot. You've hated him all your life—the man who'd always looked at you as if your very blood was wrong, who'd never hesitated to raise a hand to you, who'd been cruel and rigid. The man who denied you the softness you've always craved unless you'd earned it.

You do hate him.

But yes, you hate his absence more.

"There is another matter," he says, not giving you time to answer his question.

Perhaps because he did not care to hear the answer, or perhaps because he could not bear it.

"I am told you'd been quite disruptive while I was away," Ormund says. "That you'd stolen and spoken with a sharp tongue. All things I could forgive, considering the worst of your misdeeds."

Your brows furrow. "And what was the worst?"

"I have told you a hundred times to stay away from the stables," he explains. "So, imagine how unexpected it was to hear that you'd been spending far too much time with a boy who works in the very same stables I've warned you against."

Your stomach twists at the sharp tone of his voice. A stark contrast to the way he'd spoken to you only moments ago. "He does magic tricks," you say. "We were not being inappropriate."

"Magic," he spits. "Is that what you'd sell your virtue for? Your maidenhood? Worth nothing but a few tricks?"

"What? No! I—!"

"It does not matter if you truly did it," Ormund interrupts. "All that matters is the way it might seem to the passing eye. A whisper in one ear turns to truth in the mouth of another."

"But I didn't do anything! There was another, in the stables," you argue. "An old woman mucking out the stalls. Ask her, she can attest we were simply brushing the mares and—!"

"He did not touch you?"

"No, my lord. On the seven above, I swear it."

You see something rigid relax in him as you say the words aloud. His posture softens, his hands unfurl. Ormund wets his lips and says, "There is still the matter of precedent. I told you not to do something, and you went ahead and did it anyway. On this much we can agree, yes?"

"Yes," you echo.

He nods thoughtfully, steps closer to his four poster bed, and says, "Come."

You do not know quite why, exactly, you feel your heart slow as he says it. The word is rehearsed and familiar and puts you at ease in all the places you've felt wound tight for weeks now. You stand in front of him and await further instruction, and Ormund does not hesitate to give it.

"Remove your dress."

That spark of excitement returns. You obey wordlessly, unlacing the fabric just enough to pull the silk over your shoulders. It falls down your body like water and pools at your feet.

And then, finally, he says, "Kneel."

You do.

Ormund does not sit on the edge of his bed for several moments. He simply exists in the space you've created, drinking up the power he holds over you. He's still fully clothed, wearing a black tunic and leather breaches, towering over your naked body that awaits his instruction.

When he does finally sit, he speaks a word you have not practiced before but it invokes something primal in you all the same.

"Crawl."

You do.

Ormund's chest heaves as you keep your eyes firmly on his, closing the space on all fours. And when you're close enough that you're right between his spread knees, you lay your cheek against the inside of his thigh.

He squeezes his eyes closed, whispering under his breath, so quiet you'd have missed the curse on the tip of his tongue had you not been paying attention.

His throat bobs as he swallows and exhales slowly. When his eyes find you again, there is something akin to wonder in them. "Over my knee."

You assume the practiced position and find yourself slick between your legs before he's even touched you. But you know he sees it, too, when he squeezes your flesh and spreads you open wide enough to feel to cool air touch your cunt.

"Ten," he says lowly. "Because I can see now that you were only acting out in response to my lack of thought for your isolation."

Ormund does not give a warning. He never does. He simply raises his hand and brings it down sharply against the swell of your cheek. The impact is painful and soothing all at the same time, and though your breathing stutters you feel your chest loosening.

You count each and every one in perfect succession, skin growing raised and warm to the touch. You cannot be sure if his hand comes down harder each time or if perhaps you've just grown more and more sensitive.

By the sixth strike, you're throbbing. Your hips move of their own accord, desperate for something to be wedged between them. Your toes curl and your feet cross at the ankles, thighs squeezed together as you try to abate the need.

By the eighth strike, you can feel Ormund's cock pressing against your belly, hard as stone. You cannot bear to look at him, not like this. Because you think you might lose all sense of self if you do, might kneel and beg for him to touch you. To violate you.

"Nine," you hiss, fingers curling in his sheets. You can feel everything, everywhere, all at once. Not just his hand and the way he hits you but his other, pressed firmly to the small of your back to keep you in place. You can feel the leather beneath you and his breath as it fans across your spine. You can feel the cool air that drifts in through the open window pane and the warm lick of the fire across the room.

You can feel your blood in your veins, the air in your lungs, the holiness in your body.

"One more," Ormund says. "Breathe, girl."

You obey, sucking in a slow breath of air and letting it fill your belly.

He strikes you on the exhale, and this time his hand stays against your tingling skin.

"Ten," you whimper. It feels as though your bones melt in his hold. The tension in your muscles dissipates, fading to nothing.

Just one touch would be enough. The pressure has become a mountain inside of you and it's on the verge of collapse.

"Are you…enjoying this?"

You cannot lie. Not to him. "Yes," you answer breathlessly.

He hums, a sound at the back of his throat that you're not sure is because he's pleased with you or because he's appalled. You half expect him to strike your backside again.

He does not.

Instead, his hands drift slowly down the back of your thighs. And as his thumbs move, they slide through your slick and your spine arches back of its own volition.

"Oh—" You grit your teeth, trying to hold back the moan that threatens. But it feels so good, better than anything else.

He lifts one hand, and you expect it to hurt when he touches you again. Ormund instead curls his fingers inwards, spreads your knees, and strokes his knuckles through your syrupy folds.

This time there is no chance at holding back your sound of pleasure. It rips through you, deep and heady, goosebumps spreading across your skin.

"So sensitive," he muses, more to himself than words spoken to you. "You've always been such a sensitive girl."

You press yourself backwards, chasing the sensation of his hand. He gently strokes you again, soft enough you'd convince yourself it's a touch of love if you believed he were capable of such a thing.

His knuckles graze over your clit and what was once warmth in your belly now spreads like wildfire beneath your skin.

"Please," you whimper. "More, please. I'll be good, I'll be—I'll be so good, I promise."

"Of course you will be," he says. "You're my perfect girl."

The word clangs around in your emptied mind. Perfect.

Perfect, perfect, perfect—

Ormund smooths his hand over your cunt, the pressure and roughness of his touch dizzying. He then presses his thumb directly to your clit and you feel all the blood in your body rush to your center. "Do you know what you're asking of me?"

"Yes," you answer truthfully. "I want it to be you. I need it to be. No one else…" You swallow.

"Speak, sweetling," he encourages.

"No one else makes me feel like this," you admit, turning your head to look up at him.

And what you see is catastrophic to your aching heart. Because you've known Ormund all your life, but you've never seen him look like that.

Despaired, hopeless, a slave to the thoughts that plague him. There is such longing in his eyes that it makes your stomach flip. But beneath it all there is understanding—like he relates far too well to your words to ever deny them.

"I could ask for your hand," he mutters. "Though your mother will likely deny me for my allegiance to my cousin and my house."

"So take me." The words come unbidden, a treason in their own right. "Steal me away. Hold me captive, a prisoner of a war not yet waged."

Something dark and searing flares behind his eyes when you speak.

"I am yours," you admit, and you think it may just be the truest thing you have ever said. "The way I have always been."

Ormund growls low, a frustrated sound at the bottom of his chest. He leans forward and presses his forehead to the space between your shoulder blades. "You are, aren't you."

Not a question.

He sighs, breathing in the scent of your skin deep into his lungs to soothe himself.

You are unsure of what comes next, once the truth of your feelings for him has been laid out in the open.

It feels raw. Like your chest has been cut and your ribcage cracked so he might see your very insides.

What happens next is a kiss upon your shoulder.

Gentle. Devoted. Faithful.

There is a deep crease between his brows, and you can feel evidence of hesitation in his hands.

"You are troubled," you observe aloud. "Is it because of me?"

He winces as if you'd struck him. As if the words were far more painful than anything he's ever done to you. Ormund's jaw feathers, and he breathes in deeply before saying, "Of course not. You have never…"

He shakes his head, swallows, and tries again.

"Understand this; my feelings for you do not come from a righteous place. I should feed you, guide you, protect you, and do nothing else. You should not be here now. I should not want this. Or—or you."

"But you…do?" It sounds mousy as you ask it, said with an unsure tongue.

"I do," he admits in a hoarse whisper.

There is pain in his eyes as he says it. As if this feeling has been sitting in the depths of him for some time, and only now does he allow himself to succumb to it.

You move. You are uncertain and cautious as you do, but you will strength into your limbs anyway. Climbing into his lap, straddling his hips, winding your hands around his shoulders and tugging gently at the hair at his nape. "You don't have to take," you say, so close now you're breathing in his air. "Not if I give."

His stare is heavy and dark. Full of more longing and lust than you have ever seen exist in a man before.

You close the distance. Ormund freezes, unmoving as you press your lips to his experimentally. He tastes of smoke and cedar, of steel and blood, of safety and familiarity.

He tastes of home.

When you pull back, his chest heaves and his hands curl into the sheets. The thought crosses your mind that he is angry with you—furious, even.

But Ormund does not shout or raise a hand to strike you.

He grabs you by the back of the neck and crushes his mouth to yours. Less experimental and less nervous than you were.

Ormund kisses you like he's starving.

His lips move against yours, soft and wanting. And when his tongue slips between them, he moans into your mouth as he tastes the inside of it.

It is a battle of a different kind. He bites and sucks and licks, and you try to meet his fervor. You are just as desperate, but Ormund is untamed. A feral dog let off its leash.

Your center throbs and you whimper, rolling your hips on top of him to abate the feeling. He is still fully dressed while you sit naked in his bruising grip, and you suddenly want nothing more than to feel his bare skin beneath your fingertips.

When you tug at the buttons of his tunic, Ormund's hands find yours to assist your clumsy movements. He is much faster than you are, and tugs the garment over his head the moment he is able.

There, along the left side of his abdomen, is a jagged wound.

You pause to press your fingers tenderly to the angry, red skin. His muscles are strong and hard beneath your touch. Though the stitches are removed now and the wound is mostly healed, he still winces at the pressure of your fingertips.

Without thinking, you lean forward and press a soft kiss to the scarred skin.

Ormund melts beneath your affection. And then he brackets his arms around your waist and turns you both, laying you flat against the mattress. He kneels between your legs, seeming so large and intimidating from the new angle.

His hands find your face, feeling your skin. They move slowly over your bones, down your neck, over the swell of your breasts, your navel, your hips. As if he were trying to memorize this particular moment by sight and touch alone.

"I have thought of this more times than I could ever say," Ormund tells you. He settles low, hovering over your body, pressing his mouth to the hollow of your throat.

His lips follows the same path as his hands, peppering wet kisses over your skin and leaving goosebumps in his wake.

"Your taste, you scent, your sweetness—I have dreamt of it," he continues. His tongue circles your navel once before moving further down. And when he kisses your pubic bone, Ormund pauses. Looks up at you through dark lashes, his stare soft but still no less intense. "Is this where you ache, sweetling?"

The words feel filthy and depraved and so delicious that you whine. "Yes," you tell him, squirming. "Will you kiss me there?"

A malevolent smirk forms on his pretty mouth. "More," he answers.

And with no warning at all, Ormund licks a stripe through your heat, tongue flat and soft and so very wet.

It sends you reeling. The sensation, the sensitivity—him. "Oh, gods, I—"

He does it again, this time licking back down as well. Ormund moans low and the vibration of the sound spreads through you mercilessly. Again, and again, and again, his tongue laves through your apex. You feel yourself clench, muscles pulled taut.

Your spine bends off the mattress and your hands come to his head, fingers twisting in his soft curls, pulling his mouth impossibly closer.

When he takes your clit between his lips and sucks gently, your vision blurs. Everything else in the world fades to nothing, every sensation muted apart from the pleasure his warm mouth brings.

Ormund is relentless. He doesn't stop, even when you're writhing and gasping for air. His face flushes and you can feel his stare on you even when you can no longer keep your eyes open.

It's far better than linens between your legs, far more intense. It doesn't take long before you become a trembling mess, legs shaking around his head, heels digging into his spine as you scramble to find some sort of purchase.

And then it happens—a searing pleasure, ripping through you mercilessly. Light flashes behind your eyes and your spine arches and your fingers tighten in his hair.

He licks and sucks you through it, making those sweet, rumbling groans all the while, as if this is more for his pleasure than yours.

The bliss is blinding and fizzles out slowly, leaving remnants of euphoria behind. Only then does he settle, tongue slowing as it slides through your wet heat with less pressure now.

When he finally pulls his mouth away, his cheeks are flushed and his lips are glossy with your arousal. "Better," Ormund whispers. "Far better than I ever could have dreamed."

You can hardly react to his praise, too lost in the feeling he'd given you. "I did not know it could be like that," you admit, breathless. "That it could be so…"

"Perfect," he finishes for you. And you think, yes. He is perfect.

Maybe not in everything, but for you.

Ormund crawls over you until you are face to face once more. He is heavy on top of you, muscles thick and smothering in the best way. His length presses against your hip, so hard now you can feel the pulse of it.

He kisses your mouth but this time it's slower. Softer. The taste of you lingers on his tongue, sweet and intoxicating.

His hands cradle your face far gentler than another ever has. It is dizzying, the way he can bring such pain and still grant such ease.

You wriggle your arm beneath his abdomen, reaching for the metal of his belt buckle.

Ormund groans, but you feel the way his lips turn up just slightly against yours. "Greedy girl," he says, pulling away to nuzzle your cheek with the tip of his nose. "I have warned you against overindulgence endlessly."

He speaks true, but you have never listened to his warnings. Have always bent the rules until they break, have retained a sharp tongue and a love for all that might destroy you.

Including him, you suppose.

"Will you deny me, then?"

"No." Ormund shakes his head. "Never in all my life."

It eases something in you to hear the response. To know this is a sin you share, a mirrored reflection of one another.

He leans backwards, just enough to unbuckle his breeches and remove them. His cock is larger than you'd anticipated. Thick and veiny and flushed at the tip, hanging heavy between his legs and decorated with a thatch of dark, coarse hair at the base.

Ormund kneels in front of you, staring hard, watching you take all of him in for the first time.

He's beautiful, you think. Strong and powerful and profound. Your mouth waters at the sight of him, your brain going fuzzy again, carnal impulses beginning to take hold.

"I can be gentle," he says. "If that is what you need."

But it's not gentle you want. You want him—with all his sharpness, with all his anger. The totality of it; his heart, his soul, his body. If it hurts, you think it is meant to. "What I need," you whisper, "is you."

He watches you for a moment, eyes searching your face, trying to find hesitance that doesn't exist. And then he nods, leans forward to kiss your temple, and says, "You will tell me if it becomes too much."

You swear to him that you will.

Ormund takes his cock in his hand and slides the head of it through your center, coating his length in your wetness. Each stroke of him over your clit has you sighing, hips canting towards the sensation.

He lines himself up at your entrance, and your attention is so focused on his movements between your legs that it startles you when he uses the other to grab your face.

Ormund's fingers curl tightly around your jaw, forcing your head back, forcing you to look at him. "Eyes here," he says, voice firm.

And then, gently, he begins to push in.

The stretch of him burns, but it is not terrible. It simply aches, and you whimper a distorted version of his name but he does not stop. He keeps going until he's fully seated inside of you, so deep you swear you can feel him in your belly.

All the while, he keeps his big hand around your jaw, squeezing so tightly it momentarily distracts from the throbbing of your cunt.

Ormund touches his forehead to yours, breathing in your air. He says, "You are so fucking perfect."

And it makes you moan.

He starts to move, slowly at first. Pulling out of you tenderly just to slide right back in. A few strokes, encouraging your endurance. Sweet and soft and loving.

"Feels so—so full," you say, whimpers falling from your lips.

Ormund pulls out again, nearly all the way this time. He still forces you to look at him, and you can see the desperation enter his eyes mere moments before he slams his cock in deep.

There is nothing soft about it. Nothing sweet.

Your vision goes blurry and the air vanishes from your lungs as if it'd never existed there in the first place. The force of it aches so deliciously you feel pressure begin to form behind your eyes. "Oh god—!"

He does it again, pulling out almost completely before slamming back into you. "My perfect girl," he mutters against your lips. "Does it hurt?"

"Yes." Your hands find his shoulders, fingernails digging into the thick muscle .

"Do you wish for me to stop?"

That familiar warmth spreads someplace deeper than before. Not just your belly but in your womb. "No, please don't—don't stop."

Ormund turns your head just enough to press his own against the side of your cheek. He inhales the scent of your skin and a low growl reverberates in his chest.

Finally, blessedly, he picks up the pace. Hips grinding hard against yours, finding a rhythm that feels somehow both satisfying and violent. He breathes shallowly against your cheek, pressing kisses to your jaw that feel so tender in comparison to the way he fucks you.

And when he reaches between your bodies with his free hand to find you clit, you think you might die. It's too much, too sensitive. Your toes curl and your spine arches, pressing your breasts against his chest. The only word you seem to have held onto in your bliss is, "Please. Please, please—oh god, please."

"You beg so prettily," he says. "Almost like you were made for it. Made to kneel before me. Made to be mine."

The possessiveness in his tone alone has you teetering on the precipice of release. You'd given yourself freely to him, willingly—but Ormund still manages to take. Your innocence, your purity, your heart.

You're falling. Bliss blinds you, thighs trembling, nerve endings coiled and white-hot. His name falls from your mouth and Ormund kisses you hard to swallow up the sound.

"Yeah," he murmurs. "There you go, sweetling. Give it to me. My perfect girl."

He doesn't stop, even when tremors rock through your body. He keeps fucking his cock into you without remorse, fingers moving over your clit in tight circles, ratcheting your pleasure higher and higher until you feel like you might burst with it.

The pace of his hips falters, and then he's groaning low against the curve of your neck and laying wet, open-mouthed kisses against your pulse. With his cock buried inside of you, he fills you with his release, painting your insides all sticky and white.

Ormund gives a couple of slow thrusts, chest heaving as he tries to catch his breath, before gently pulling out of you and rolling to his side.

It is not you who reaches for comfort first.

His arm wraps around your waist, hauling you across the mattress and into his warm embrace.

You nestle beneath his arm, head resting against his shoulder. He is so large and the heat of his skin is so comforting. Familiar in some ways, despite this being the first time you've ever been so close.

That same warmth that emanates from him seeps through your bones and touches your fast-beating heart. A delighted giggle escapes you, and you can feel Ormund's mouth turn up into a smile against your forehead.

He tilts your chin up so you're facing him. "What is it that you find so amusing?"

You shake your head. "Nothing, just...I am—I am happy."

His smile softens into something heavier, but no less pleased. You don't believe you've ever seen him look this way. So vulnerable. Benevolent, even.

Silence settles for some time. And you would be content to stay here, skin tingling in the aftermath of bliss, safe in his arms. But there is something weighing on him, and you can feel it in the stiffness of his hands that stroke gently over your hip.

When you can stand his distance no longer, you ask, "Is there something wrong?"

He doesn't answer right away, which frays the edges of your comfort. But then he says delicately, "I have something for you. A gift."

"A gift?" You prop yourself up on an elbow. "From the Citadel?"

"No," Ormund answers. "I'd had it made for you some time before my journey. But I—it is not a…kindness, exactly. More a token of my own grotesque worship of you."

Your brows furrow in confusion. "What is it?"

Ormund untangles himself from the sheets, unkempt and messy now below you. He crosses the chamber to his wardrobe and pulls open a drawer.

It is hard to see from so far away, but you watch as he takes something hesitantly in his hand before returning to the bedside.

"I…I sometimes believe that I have been shackled to you by the gods themselves," he begins. "Fated to bend my own morals in response to my longing for you. I am but a wolf coiled around a lamb and there will never be anything else, not for me."

You don't understand. It makes a million questions form in your mind, none easily answered.

Ormund swallows thickly. "I am a slave to your affection," he says. It makes your chest pull tight. "I do not deserve your softness but I will never turn it away so long as you continue to give it."

He extends his hand in front of you, opening his palm to display the prettiest necklace you've ever seen. Made of glittering emerald stones and a silken black ribbon.

You reach out to touch it on instinct, and Ormund lets you take it from him. But as you do, witnessing the lack of length, realization dawns on you. "This heralds a collar," you say.

Ormund nods slowly. "I only wished for you to be…possessed by me, the way I have been possessed by you."

A response does not come easily.

There is a part of you that knows this is not the way of things. A man should love his lady. Should be kind and respectful. He should certainly not place a collar around her neck as if she is owned property or a family pet.

But there is…something else, too. A part of you where desire sparks at the thought of being so wholly his, of surrendering to whatever fate may befall you so long as it is done by his own hand. There is peace in it. And certainty.

"I'd told myself to get rid of it a thousand times, but there has always been a hope within me that perhaps one day you might return my wretched affections," he says. "It is yours. But if you are to wear it, you must do so willingly."

The decision feels heavy. Weighted.

But you do not need long to decide.

You hand the necklace back to Ormund, who takes it hesitantly from your grasp.

And then you turn, facing away from him but looking over your shoulder to ask, "Will you tie it for me?"

He smiles, and there is something deeply fragile in it. Almost boyish, as if this is the first time in all his life he has ever felt truly loved by another.

Ormund kisses the back of your neck and sets the ribbon in place around your throat.

And when he ties it, he pulls the ribbon tight.

At least your superior had a soft spot for you. A new desk made from gorgeous stained mahogany sits before you, polished to almost a mirror-like shine. It feels sinful to rest your elbows upon it as you lean forward and prop your chin on your wrist.

Though, perhaps it’s not nearly so sinful as what happens beneath.

When the president had procured this desk for you, he ensured it was the best in all aspects. Naturally, this included a spacious, enclosed area for you to stretch your legs. The legroom truly was unparalleled and quite comfortable. If you wanted to, you could easily crouch down and fit underneath. After all, that’s exactly what Loki is doing right now.

While you explain for the billionth time today that the president is not available at present, gesturing to the clone that pantomimes reading documents the next room over, the real Loki kneels between your legs and bites softly at your inner thigh. His teeth drag bluntly over the sensitive skin before he sucks on it, marking you under the mini skirt he’s bunched up around your hips.

“He… he’s clearly quite busy--” You inhale sharply when his tongue laves over the dark bruises he’s created upon the canvas of your legs. The man standing in front of you eyes you curiously with an arched brow. Canines dig into your tongue to stifle the moan at the back of your throat. Loki’s breath is hot against your core through the fabric of your underwear. “--and I am not feeling terribly well. If you could just try again tomorrow--”

“I have been attempting to get a hold of him for three weeks now!” the man exclaims as his face grows red. “This policy needs his attention immediately!”

“Sir, if I might remind you, that is not how the American government works. You would be much better off addressing this with your representative in the House, and--ah-!”

With a hand over your mouth, you bite down on your index finger to muffle any further slip-ups. You can feel the smirk on Loki’s lips as they lead feather-light kisses closer and closer to your folds. Fingers curl into a white-knuckled fist as you grip the edge of your desk.

Thankfully, your current “client” is far too focused on his own agenda to pay attention to your strange behavior.

“That’s exactly why I’m here! I called and called, and I think they blocked my number--”

You barely hear what he’s saying even with his frantic gestures and waving his arms. The man is clearly quite animated about whatever it is he’s going on about. It’s hard to focus on that when your senses hone in on the dextrous fingers that hook in the waistband of your undergarments. It’s a bit difficult while you’re sitting down, but he manages to shimmy them down your hips without too much effort on your part.

Thankfully for you, this man seems more than content to ramble on about how important this proposal is and why it should be the first thing on the agenda. So much so that he begins pacing about the room as he talks.

And then Loki’s tongue flattens and paints a fat stripe through your folds. You’re so glad this guy is turned away from you when your eyes roll back and you clamp your hand over your mouth fully. That accursed, talented appendage zigzags and swirls, drawing patterns all along your slit but never quite high enough where you want it most. He drinks of your nectar, feasts on your essence. Your breath comes out in staggered gasps and your brows knit together.

“Are you even listening to me!?” the man practically shouts, startling you and pulling your attention away from the euphoria between your legs. “I swear, the government these days--!”

“Do you wish for me to deal with him, my dear?” you feel more than hear Loki’s words as he whispers them, his cheek pressed lazily against the plush of your thigh while his verdant green eyes gaze up at you. His lips glisten with your slick, and it makes your head spin with desire. It would be so tempting, so easy…

But you snap out of it and shake your head. No, you wish to do this yourself. It’s part of your job, after all, at least in a roundabout way. And if your intuition is correct, really all you’ll need to do is change your approach.

The real challenge is staying focused while Loki gets back to work lapping at your cunt.

“I understand your frustrations, sir,” you practically coo, removing your hand from your face and leaning forward. You bat your long, fake eyelashes up at him. His demeanor changes instantly and you see his shoulders relax. “I really am listening. You were just so passionate about it that I was taken aback.”

“You… yeah. You’re right. I’m sorry. It’s just such a serious matter, and no one is listening…” he bemoans.

“Such a mischievous little devil,” Loki purrs quietly. Your legs tremble on either side of his head with the effort it takes to keep yourself composed. “You’re playing this poor man like a fiddle, aren’t you? What a cruel mistress…”  The nearly inaudible chortle rumbles through his lips and onto your dripping core. It sends a shudder through your entire body and prickles your skin.

You make a show of licking your lips before pinching the bottom one between the tips of your canines. Loki is right--you have this man absolutely captivated.

“Here, sweetheart,” you begin, sliding a sticky note towards him. “I’m sorry there’s nothing more I can do today, but that’s my personal cell. Give me a call tomorrow and I’ll see what I can do for you, okay?” It’s almost sickening putting on a show like this, but it might as well be your calling with how easily he buys it. He’s cradling the piece of paper in his hands like it’s some sort of holy artifact as he thanks you profusely and finally makes his exit from your office.

As soon as the door closes behind him, in fact, you finally exhale the breath you were holding with an airy whimper.

“Mm,” Loki moans into your folds. He rewards you with a flick of his tongue at your clit that leaves you digging your nails into the wood. “What a perfect succubus you make. Tell me…” he begins, teasing a finger at your entrance. “Who did that number belong to? I know you wouldn’t dare give such a lowly creature your actual information.”

“It’s--” You keen and bite your lip when his long finger slowly curls into you. “It was your--fuck--” Loki smiles devilishly as your hips buck into his hand. “--your brother’s cell.” Your cheeks flush and you laugh breathlessly. “I imagine that will be quite… quite the conversation tomorrow…”

An almost evil laugh thrums in his chest. “Gods, but I do love that wonderfully deviant mind of yours,” he praises as he begins thrusting the digit in and out. Kitten licks flutter against your sensitive bud, and your toes curl in your heels.

“And I--” you huff, moving instead to grip the more comfortable arms of your office chair, “I need more of that deviant tongue of yours,” you joke breathily.

He slides a second finger into you and begins pressing against the soft, spongy spot, grinning wickedly when he feels your thighs tense around him. “Making demands of your president? How terribly daring of you.”

Words are beginning to fail you even before his lips encircle your clit. Your chest heaves as you whimper with every breath. He sucks on that pleasurable little bud, timing every curl of his fingers with a practiced swipe of his tongue. Ecstasy builds and bubbles in your core, and you try so desperately to contain the sounds that threaten to spill from your lips. Even if no one is here right now, someone could walk in at any moment. That thought shouldn’t thrill you nearly as much as it does, and you feel Loki chuckle as he suckles on your clit.

“It feels good, doesn’t it?” he purrs. “The thrill, the danger, chasing such forbidden pleasures…” A low whine sounds in your throat as he continues. “I wonder… what would you do if someone were to discover you like this, in the throes of pleasure?” He slows his fingers, instead thrusting with purpose as your walls quiver around them. “Would you stop me?” He knows your answer when you mewl and tighten around him, but he asks anyway. “Or would the desire only intensify as you ride my tongue and desperately chase your release?”

“Loki, fuck--!” You’re so close, so desperately close, hanging off of the precipice as the pleasure below waits to consume you.

But his fingers still inside you, and the flicks of his tongue that punctuated his words cease entirely. The edge was right there, but now you feel it slipping away from your grasp as a mournful wail rings from you.

“That is President Loki to you,” he corrects you before busying his mouth by biting and sucking at the skin of your thighs. “You will address me properly if you want to continue indulging in this… deviant tongue of mine.”

Your breathing is ragged. Your nails are threatening to rip off the padding of your armrests. “P… President…” Your eyes nearly roll back when his fingers drag slowly through your velvety walls. It’s more, but it’s not enough. Your body trembles. “President Loki, please.”

Immediately you feel his fingers thrusting vigorously in and out of your soaked core. Your moaning returns in full force, potential visitors be damned.

“That’s it. You sound so terribly pretty when you beg for me,” he praises. His tongue finds your clit and swirls feverishly about the bud, and you feel all of the pleasure that had begun to fade return tenfold as you grind shamelessly onto his face. It’s a fire roaring in your belly that licks its flames outwards to tingle at your fingers and toes. Loki moans his own appreciation as he slurps and swallows, smacking lewdly as he drinks up everything you give him. The vibrations push you over the edge as you let out a silent scream, mouth agape as your thighs clamp around his head and you buck wildly against his tongue.

Your body slumps in your chair as you stare, dazed, off at nothing in particular. Your chest heaves with the effort of catching your breath. The orchestrator of your undoing merely smirks, licking delicate stripes up your sensitive folds that make you twitch and whimper from the overstimulation.

“What a beautiful mess you make,” he regards you as his tongue collects your essence from his lips. Before you have the chance to reply, to right yourself, he snaps his fingers and vanishes from his place beneath you.

Well, he doesn’t vanish completely.

No, instead he takes the place of his clone, and when your bliss induced stupor finally allows you to glance over through the window into his office, you see him smiling wickedly and patting his face gingerly with a handkerchief. Perfectly composed, as if nothing out of the ordinary had occurred while you try desperately to recollect yourself from a mind shattering orgasm.

Lucifer help him, his jaw hangs open as a deep moan filters out into the silence of the chapel. It's late in the evening, a Thursday, and he'd taken over for Frater when a meeting ran over. Of course, the bastard wasn't the least bit thankful, but Perpetua cares a lot less about it now that he's got a pretty sister's mouth around his cock.

Really, it was pure coincidence.

You fully expected Frater, and were running late to confession when you passed him in the hallway. Confused, he informed you that his twin, Perpetua, was covering for him. He seemed loathe to admit it, and scurried off with an irritated huff. The newest Papa was an enigma still to the ministry, as recording, touring, and other duties kept him away for long period's of time. It's a rare treat for him to be undertaking confession's, and you aren't about to let the opportunity pass. It seems the rest of the world knows him better than any of the siblings within the ministry, and you're desperate to get to know him better.

The chapel was silent as you entered, with only one other person that exits from the confessional. Thursday's were always the slowest night for confession, with weekend plans and Black Mass to prepare for the following day. You half expected to see more of a crowd given that it's Perpetua, but you doubt word had managed to get out fully yet.

The rich smell of incense envelops you as you slide into the confessional. On the other side of the thin lattice wall, you see Perpetua sit up. Tonight, he wore his black cassock, but chose to forgo the accompanying biretta. It was refreshing to have someone new to speak with after so long, not that you disliked Frater by any means. But Perpetua was new, and each Papa chose to go about confession's differently. You already knew what Copia would tell you in response to your sin's, but V was a different story.

"Bless me, Papa, for I have sinned," You spoke.

"Go on, Sister," He encouraged, his voice light and welcoming.

It was deeper than his brother's, and without the same accent that you'd come to find endearing. Yet it's alluring and smooth, and you can't help but try and steal a better look at him through the small openings.

"Papa," You began, testing the waters slightly, "I've been so terrible this week. I overslept twice because I was too lazy to get up, Frater was irate."

It was best to start with something simple. Laziness - sloth - was a starting ground, a safe vantage point to overlook the situation from a comfortable distance. Perpetua hummed, nodding his head gently. After a moment, you continued.

"In my defense, I haven't been sleeping well."

"Why is that," He offered from the other side.

His voice was lined with curiosity, and from the tiny slats that separate the two of you, you caught a glimpse of that unmistakable white eye as it followed you with interest. It was almost strange to see him so still. He found his footing as Papa so quickly on stage, and was just as raunchy as his predecessor's, if not more. Rumors of him licking mummy bucks in exchange for lingerie spread like wildfire, and his almost bratty persona on tour had led you into believing he would be more animated.

"I have been having these... dreams."

The booth creaked on the other side of the wall as Perpetua sat up. This is the part he savors, the atmosphere growing thicker as tension began to take root in the air. It was on the tip of your tongue, the way your chest seemed to rise and fall a bit faster with each exhale and your cheeks bloomed a soft rosy color. Listening to the lustful confessions of his congregation became one of his favorite pastime's at the ministry, with some part of him living vicariously through them. He wasn't afforded much free time, and what little he does have was spent catching up on sleep and doing simply nothing, just to enjoy the slowness of the moment. His carnal desires have taken a backseat to everything else that demanded his attention.

"At first, I could ignore it But then, I started having them every night," You're unintentionally leaned forward, the smell of Perpetua's cologne and natural scent pleasant in the air as you inhale softly.

"What do you dream of," Came his response.

"It start's the same every time," You began, "it's late, and I'm finishing up for the evening in Frater's office when you come in. I think you're looking for him, but he's never there."

Of course not, Perpetua huffed. Even in your dreams, you've captured his brother's absence strikingly. He put it aside for now, regaining his composure when you continue.

"You offered to walk me back to my room since it was so late, and I don't think much about it. On the way, I always ask you how you like being Papa and you say it's rewarding, but it keeps you busy..."

Perpetua leaned closer to the wall, forcing himself to deep breath in to steel his trembling voice as the anticipation seeps in.

"It does," He laughed, "stunning observation, Sister."

You let yourself laugh with him, and for a moment, you're tempted to drop your silly little test. You almost feel guilty, bothering him while he's meant to be working. But then, he spoke again through the wall, and the interest in his voice was unmistakable.

"Keep going."

It sends shock waves through your body, your thighs pressing together seeking some sort of relief from the heat that surges between them. The movement isn't lost on him, and it takes every ounce of control he has not to groan at the effect he has on you.

"And I selfishly ask you to come inside."

"Greedy woman," He hissed out, "that's good. To share it with your Papa is better."

Your Papa. Your core clenches around nothing, panties growing slick as you allow yourself to indulge in the memory.

"And then you come inside. At first, I try and play coy... You slip your jacket off, it's the black leather jacket, from stage?"

He nodded silently, his fingers reaching down to curl around the edge of the bench.

"You aren't buying it. You stretch out onto the couch and pat your thigh... It's exciting, to be alone in this position with the new Papa. When I hesitate, you're telling me..."

You hesitated in the booth. It's one thing to tease Papa about lustful dreams, it's another thing to actually confess in graphic detail the litany of things he does to you in your sleep. You aren't even really sure when it started, whether it was seeing him on stage or enjoying the mystery of his character, all you knew was that the dreams refuse to leave you and if you don't do something about this heat you'll surely go mad.

"Sister," Perpetua urged, "we celebrate sins, of all magnitude. Do not run from it, embrace it."

He was coaxing you, his honeyed voice like music to your ears as he adjusts in his pants.

"And you tell me to be a good girl and come sit for my tired Papa. Instead of sitting in your lap… I crawl to you and sit between your open legs. My head is on your thigh and I just can't help myself, my hand slithers into your pants."

The confession sucked the air from his lungs. It wasn't the first time a sibling confessed to dreaming about him, but there was something different about it because it was you, and he knows you. He can put a face to your voice and suddenly everything felt much more personal. He can picture you now, standing in one of the standard ministry issued sibling rooms in a habit that's salaciously short, the pressure of your head against his thigh as your soft hands come to undo the buttons of his pants.

He can't help but let a small groan spill from his open lips. You make it worse, because of course you do, and have the audacity to giggle at his desperation. His eyes widened, and he watches as you stiffen on the other side of the booth, laughter dying on your lips as you feel his gaze.

"Ah, you enjoy a little tease, huh?" He challenged, his tone humorous but the invite is there.

It's there and it has your heart racing within the confines of your habit.

"Papa," You hummed, "I'm just trying to be a good Sister here and confess."

"Then by all means proceed," Perpetua purred, "Confess to your Papa, yeah?" "I could confess," You said quietly, "Or I could show you."

This is the part where he flounders. The moment he was actually propositioned, Perpetua always managed to shut down any tension by chickening out. It wasn't that he was afraid of sex, quite the opposite. But he's gone so long without it that he's afraid. He couldn't even remember the last time he brought a sister to bed with him, which feels illegal given his position as Papa.

"W-what?"

He cringed inwardly, clenching his eyes shut as he stuttered. He's Papa, for fuck's sake. He wasn't supposed to stutter when a sibling makes an advance towards him. He's supposed to be cool and suave and sensual but the reality of the situation short circuited his brain. When he hears you shuffle in the booth next to him, the door creaking open, he deflated slightly. He let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding, leaning back against the booth.

Though he craves connection so deeply, sometimes it's easier to send siblings away than deal with the expectation's that come from building such connection's. He has so much to do as Papa, and while a certain amount of lazing about was expected, there was only so much time to spare for such activities. It wasn't enough to dedicate towards anything meaningful, but tonight the temptation stuns him and leaves him defeated.

The door of his side swung open, and his eyes snapped open in surprise. He opened his mouth to say something, but you beat him to it.

"I can leave, if you want me to," You offered, "or I can stay…" "Get in here and shut the door," He ordered.

He tried to regain some sort of composure, but his nerves are shot from being able to see you without the lattice blocking his view. You look much different away from your desk, and to his delight, your habit was indeed short and grazing your mid thigh as you shut the door behind you. Your veil had shifted backwards, strands of hair escaping from the sides in a way that feels almost too intentional to be truly messy.

Satan is on your side, you chuckle to yourself.

You don't wait for his invitation. He stared up at you with glassy eyes as you moved slowly over to him, standing between his open legs. Perpetua's hands remain clenching the bench by your knees. You can feel the warmth that radiates off of them, and when your arms finally ghost over his shoulders he releases the bench and lets his gloved fingertips graze the soft skin of your outer thigh.

His eyes darken, and something in him awakens from a deep slumber. It's been so long since he'd given into desire, and the scent of your perfume and pleading look in your eye have him trembling from anticipation.

"You're so wound up, Papa," You said quietly, "allow me to relieve you."

You shuffle down onto the cool wood floor. Before you, Perpetua was leaned back, his chest rising and falling rapidly as he watched you from above. His mouth tipped open, his soft pant audible in the silence as you let your hands finally wander his covered leg. Beneath his black cassock, he wore plain jeans with the same obnoxiously large belt buckle from his stage fit's. It's almost funny, imagining it beneath his clergy attire. But you aren't focused on it, your entire body reacting on it's own accord as you press your front against his leg, your hands skimming the front of his buckle where his pant's bulge out. They're so tight you can see the clear outline of his entire cock, fully hard and throbbing against the denim.

His hips pushed into your awaiting palm, the feel of it beneath your palm warm as he lets out a barely audible moan, sending another gush of slick down your legs. With trembling fingers, you unbutton his belt and push it open just enough to pop the button of his pants open and tug the zipper down. There was little left to the imagination as he was bare beneath his jeans. Above you, Perpetua let out a breath of relief, scooting further down the bench as he shoved one hand into his pants to fish out his cock.

He was tired of pretending he didn't want it anymore, and with you presenting yourself as some offering from the Olde One himself, how could he not give in to the temptation?

He was an average length but the base was wide with several prominent vein's pulsing as it twitched in his grasp. The tip of it was flushed red and already glistening with droplets of pre-cum to lubricate it. He was holding himself back though, his thumb just barely grazing the edge of it as his entire body arched itself towards you. It takes a surprising amount of control for him to come back to himself, squeezing at the base just to feel something while you stare, doe-eyed at him.

"Relieve me then," He grunted, "and stop teasing your Papa."

You grasped the shaft in your hand as Perpetua lets out a soft moan that's nearly lost in the shuffle. He's so much hotter in your hand, fully erect and positively aching as you let your tongue dart out to wet your lips. He was asking you nicely, but part of you enjoys having some power over him now. It's short lived though, as his hand plucked the loose veil from your head.

Your hair was already ruffled and messy from being beneath a veil all day, and Perpetua doesn't hesitate to wrap his hand around a chunk of it to guide you further down. You take him in your lips then, the scent of his soap and taste of his skin invading your senses as his length fills your mouth. It was impossible not to release a slight whimper, tightening your hold on the base as he let's out a deep groan, his head falling against the back of the booth.

You sucked your lips over your teeth, taking him deep as your tongue slid over his head, his hips jerking in response to force more of him down your throat. You pull back until only his tip remains. His free hand came to press against his mouth, his leather glove smearing his paints provocatively as his brow's knit together. You make deliberate eye contact with him as your lips envelope him, your tongue coasting over the ridges as he shivered, his mouth dropping open.

"S-Sister," Perpetua whimpered.

Any sense of control has left him, and he was content just to let you do whatever you pleased at this point. His brain was nearly mush at that point, watching your lips stretch obscenely around the width of him. He's about ninety percent sure his soul leaves his body when you take him deeper, increasing the suction in a way that has his thighs tightening around your shoulder's.

Of all the men you've ever been with, Perpetua was the most reactive, his grip on your hair loosening as you moved freely down his shaft. He watched you with heavy eyes, his mouth parted as soft pants fell each time you pulled back enough to leave just the head before diving back down. Spit dribbled from the corners of your lips, dripping down onto his balls as you take him all the way down.

The moan he lets out is filthy, straight from his chest and deep as his thighs shake violently. You keep him there for a moment, lathering your tongue along the ridges and veins as his breathing starts to increase. Perpetua's hand tightened around your hair again, pulling it and you backwards off his cock as you pant, taking in gulps of air.

Your jaw was tender and you could feel the sticky coating of spit covering your entire chin, but you can't find it in you to feel self-conscious when he's looking at you the way he is now. His eyes are gazing at you so adoringly as he grips himself, his cock glistening as globs of spit trail down the base and onto his hand, his mouth parted as he nods once to you, the question obvious.

You rose from aching knees to return to his lap, nestling your weight into the warmth of his thighs. He releases himself, shaking hands coming to pull the button's of his cassock apart to free himself from the restrictive robe. You help him, pushing the heavy garment off his shoulder's. He let's it pool around him as you make quick work of his satin under shirt, cursing as the buttons slip from your damp fingers.

Perpetua makes no move to help you, surging forward to press a damp kiss to the column of your throat. He doesn't hide his want, his tongue sliding out from his parted lips to taste your sweaty skin. It's all too easy to get lost in it, your fingers slowing as his teeth graze you ever so gently before he presses his lips firmly in the indents. You feel the soft vibration of his groan against you when you finally free him from his clothing. His chest was pale, bare aside from the thin covering of dark brown chest hair and a tattoo you only barely manage to glimpse before he's tugging at the end of your habit.

"Off," He demands softly.

It's hardly assertive, but you're way beyond wanting to continue your little game when your panties slide against your desperate core with each tiny movement. His fingers find the zipper, pulling it down as he lets you out of his grasp just long enough to discard it entirely. You weren't prepared to ride Papa in the confessional, obviously, wearing a basic black bra that offers nothing beyond basic support, and a thin bikini that isn't prudish, but it's far from sexy. If he cares or even notices, Perpetua shows no obvious indication of displeasure.

He presses open mouthed kisses down your exposed chest, leaving a trail of lip shaped smears of black paint behind him as you feel him shuffle beneath you. You hadn't realized he removed his gloves until you feel his bare, sweaty palm glide up your exposed skin. Goosebumps rise in the ghost of his touch as he tugs the cup of your bra down, slotting his hips between yours with a groan as his hardened cock glides against your damp underwear.

The feel of him pressed against your pulsing clit is almost too much, your hips moving slowly over him as his lips wrap around your nipple. His mouth was all to warm, his tongue teasing but so delicious when he sucks it gently. There's little to no resistance in your unhurried grind, the only layer separating you from him now being your underwear that offer little to the imagination. You reach behind you to unclasp your bra, elbows knocking against the sides of the booth as he pulls it down your arms, his mouth leaving yours only temporarily before diving back into the other nipple.

One hand encourages your slow grind against him, pressing his leaking cock against your underwear and moaning each time it catches the edge of the fabric. He wants nothing more than to push it aside, the flimsy scrape doing little to hide your want from him as the outline of your clit grows more prominent. He doesn't want to rush, however, content to suck on your nipple as your fingers run through his hair.

But it's not enough for you, and you aren't risking someone walking in just so you can dry hump the cause of all your recent wet dreams.

"Perpetua," Your needy voice is raw with want, dreary eyes slipping closed as he hums against your chest, half-listening, "touch me."

Perpetua was never a particularly aggressive man - but something overcomes him at baring witness to your desperation, all flushed cheeks and spit-soaked lips as you move your hips over him. You're so wet you've soaked through the fabric, the slick of it almost painful against his over sensitive cock. He's quickly approached his limits, gripping both sides of your panties and giving one firm tug to split the seams.

He wrenches the fabric from under you, tossing it into the corner of the booth as he pulls you over him. Whatever you felt while rubbing against him in your underwear was nothing compared to the feel of him bare against you, your slick wetting the length of him as he moaned freely, tightening his grip on your hips. The ridges catch against your clit, body twitching as you finally grasp the pleasure that has been sitting at the tip of your tongue for what feels like ages.

Whatever reservations you have about riding him in the chapel are gone each time his tip slides past your awaiting hole. You clench around nothing, and Perpetua is practically drooling against your breast when he dares to lift your hips just enough to let the first inch slip past. Instantly, the pleasure of it hits him like a truck, his thighs shaking against the booth as you slowly slide down on him.

It's a tight fit, your walls gripping him so intensely it's almost painful, but you're so wet it begins to form a damp patch on his pants below his balls. Seated at his base, Perpetua offers you the softest grind, his green eye focusing in on you as you lean in, pressing your lips against his. It struck you that it's the first time you're actually kissing him, and can't help but question if you haven't jumped ahead a couple steps. It matters little to you, though, when he's groaning and slipping his tongue into your mouth with expert precision.

The sound of it stirs something primal in your gut, moving purely on instinct as you raise yourself up on shaking knees before slowing moving your hips back down. Your chest presses to his for some sort of leverage, and thankfully he takes pity on you as his own desire wins out, stilling your movements before pushing in deep and giving a light circle of his hips, his abdomen grazing your clit just enough to make you whimper in his ear.

"Let me ask you something , Sister," He purred.

Perpetua speeds up gradually, the sound of his thrusts audible as the shuffling of clothing and wet smacking filled the quiet booth. It doesn't take him long to find your spot, the tip of him knocking into it with such precision it knocks all the air from your lungs. All you can do is hold onto him as he lifts your hips to meet his thrusts, leaning back against the booth to gain leverage.

"Did you come here tonight for absolution? Or so you could sit on my cock?"

Your mouth falls open in a sharp gasp as he punctuates his words with a particularly deep thrust. You hadn't imagined Perpetua to be such a dirty talker, but the revelation catches you off guard in the best way as you wet him further, trying to find his lips in the haze of pleasure. You need something to ground you back to reality, each calculated thrust straight to your g-spot sending you further and further into some trance where all that matters is him. You're losing the fight fast though, whining deeply as his fingers find your clit, rubbing soft circles over it that has you leaning forward towards him.

"Pretty baby," He moans, laughing lightly as you knock your forehead against his, breathing into his mouth, "it's okay. A Papa serves his congregation as much as the congregation serves him."

His lips find yours quickly, too quickly and you follow him, pathetically chasing the string of spit that keeps you connected. It's desperate, and every nerve in your body feels like it's on fire when he pushes back in and speeds up his fingers. They catch perfectly, deliciously slick against your heated skin as you make some effort to meet his thrust's half way.

"Serving your Papa so well," Perpetua murmured, and something like reverence flashes in his eyes.

He was losing himself in his cockiness, his face twisting as beads of sweat gather at the edges of his mask. As much as he wants to prolong your encounter, months without have left him without his usual stamina and the familiar clench of his abdomen signals an earlier end that sends shivers down his spine, unable to control the grunts that come from his throat with each push down.

"P-Papa," Your whiny voice calls out to him like a siren, and he's gasping, sucking bruises on your chest as he tries unfocused to find your nipples.

"I know," He hushed, "you feel it, yeah?"

All you can do is nod, staring at him dumbly as his cock continues pummeling into you. He starts to lose his tempo but never misses his mark, collecting slick that has dropped to his stomach to smear against your clit as he makes quick circles against it. Now that he's found his confidence, all you can do is hold on as he mashes his lips against yours as a deep moan echoes out from his chest.

By now his pants are soaked and the booth smells so heavily of sex, anyone who walks in will surely have no trouble deciphering what is happening. But the thrill of being caught with him, to take what so many siblings wanted, was positively addicting as you fall off the edge.

Your ears ring as you do, waves of pleasure so intense it has your vision going blurry and every nerve ending vibrating as you clench around his cock. Slick gushes from where the two of you are connected, each thrust pushing more out to coat the booth where he sits. You fall limp against him, writhing as his hands grasp your ass, now fully chasing his own pleasure as he drives you up and down against him furiously, kissing you with a messy tongue that moves lazily against yours.

His hips stutter after a moment, and Perpetua's lips part to let out the most erotic, drawn out moan that you could ever imagine. When he cums, his entire body tenses and for a moment it looks like he's in pain before he's letting out breathless bits of laughter as he stares at the mess in his lap. He grinds against you for a moment like that, riding out his orgasm as he stares transfixed at the creamy ring that coats the base of his cock.

It's been too long, and if he was a younger man he would have gladly kept going but overstimulation forces him to stop. His hands card through your hair as you look up at him through sleepy eyes, pressing your lips against his lazily and uncoordinated. He reciprocates none the less, taking the moment to savor your taste as he slips his softening cock from inside you.

The only sound comes from your labored breathing, steadily slowly as you regain consciousness and pull back to look at him.

"Thank you for blessing me, Papa."

Perpetua grins, huffing out a bit of laughter.

"You will always have your Papa's blessing, whenever you should want it…"

You reluctantly slide from his lap and tug your habit back on. Your underwear is ruined, sitting in a damp pile in the corner so it's no use trying to save them. The feel of him threatening to drip down your legs has you pressing them together, the action not missed upon Perpetua who grins, tucking himself away in his pants. You don't try to fix your veil either, holding it crumbled up in your hand as you run the other through your hair in attempt to smooth it out in some way.

It's not that you're ashamed - quite the opposite actually, but you want to bask in the afterglow without someone else prying for every dirty detail.

"Remind me to thank Frater," Perpetua laughs, readjusting his cassock as he checks his watch before standing to his feet, "although, I think he might actually try and kill me if he finds out I fucked his pretty little assistant while covering for him."

The next morning, Frater is already ranting on the phone to someone when you get into the office. Your hips ache and your knees are bruised beneath your habit, but you slept better than you have in months and had even come in feeling optimistic about the day.

"Ah! Sister," Frater greets, sending you a wave as he presses a button on his landline, muting himself as he continues, "That-that fucking V. I ask him to cover for me when a meeting with the tax consultant goes late and what does he do? Defiles the confessional! It's going to add an entire hour onto the housekeeper's route today!"

“Tell me, ghzala… have you had enough?”

You pant, both palms splayed on the tile wall of the showerhouse. Your back is arched to near-discomfort, your hips gripped by gloved hands as Cypher fucks you roughly.

Except it’s not your Cypher. It’s the other one. The wrong one.

But here and now, it almost feels right.

Almost.

You’re too fucked-out to answer him, something he notices in an instant. He chuckles, and a shiver runs up your spine. “Poor thing… have I fucked all that attitude out of you?”

You tighten hard, responding only with a low moan. It feels good—shamefully good. You shut your eyes, trying to focus on the sensation alone. Bent over like this, with his hands on you, you can almost pretend it’s the Cypher you know. The Cypher you want.

The Cypher you’re in love with.

“What a pretty whore you make,” he purrs, grip tightening ever so slightly. “So desperate, debasing yourself just for a taste of me. Of him.”

Your stomach turns at his mocking tone, the illusion in your mind quickly fading away. Your Cypher would never talk to you like this. He would be gentle with you. Kind.

Wouldn’t he?

You growl. “You—talk too much.”

“Ah, but that’s what you like about him, don’t you?” he coos, leaning in closer. “That smart mouth, that sultry voice…” He pushes you forward just then, pressing you harder into the wall. “Talking in your ear. Isn’t that right?”

You gasp, half your face crushed against the wall as he pounds into you. When he speaks again, it’s right in your ear, and it makes you shudder.

“A shame your Cypher doesn’t love you,” he taunts. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t have to seek me out.”

You make a frustrated sound. “Stop it.”

“Still holding onto Nora,” he continues, almost bitterly. “And his precious little daughter. There’s no room in his heart for you, is there?”

“Shut up,” you grit out.

“Poor girl,” he croons, his mask brushing your ear. His voice is soft, but there’s venom in his words. “You poured out your heart to him, and he rejected you. He left you broken—and led you straight to me.”

“Shut up!” you snarl, hitting the wall with your fist. Your heart twists at the painful reminder, shame swelling inside you. You don’t want to think about that. Anything but that.

Stop talking. Stop talking. Stop talking.

“Tell me to stop, zwina,” he rasps. “Tell me to stop, and I’ll leave you here, empty and pitiful. You’ll be alone again—just like you always will be.”

The moan that leaves you is more of pain than pleasure—emotional torment, born of guilt and heartache. You hate him. You hate yourself for giving in to him, for betraying the Protocol to satisfy your desperate heart. You’re depraved. You’re selfish. You’re despicable.

You wish you didn’t need him like this. But you do.

You close your eyes and surrender. “Just shut up and fuck me.”

Cypher laughs—a cruel sound that echoes throughout the showerhouse.

The others were occupied—Watson was naturally with Mary and Lestrade while he spent a few hours in the celebration, also, naturally left home to his wife. It sounds lonely, but isn’t, really. Not when his grey eyes, smoldering and sharp, were shooting across tables and more, simply for the soundbite he’s been hearing all night—enticed him, to be frank—a pleased feminine little giggle that were several booths down.

There, chatter uproared of mostly young women—constable women. Junior class, it seemed. Clocked out early for a celebration. You were the center of the crowd. An imaginary spotlight shone on your person as you stood in the middle seat, slightly tipsy, he observed, fueled by sherry sluggishly gesturing and yammering away with a half filled cup.

It wasn’t entirely one-sided.

You had noticed his gaze several times, meeting his eyes over their heads. The first time you bit your lip when he crossed his legs. The second time you stuck your tongue when he didn’t respond. And the third time, perhaps you were even more inebriated than usual fueling unusual boldness, that you winked, mouthing incoherent words he knew were not appropriate for a constable to allude to.

At some point, you held up a fist, brought it up to your mouth, and swiped it back and forth, puffing one side of your cheek several times—a crude indication of your want, or perhaps, jest. When your deliberate provocation did just that, drawing a smile out of his lips, you became flustered and ducked your head.

It was you, he remembered, the junior constable. Newly promoted to fieldwork. It was only now that he was able to perceive you more evidently. At the yard, you were barely noticeable, always tripping over your boots, and in most cases, always clutching bundles and stacks of paper in your arms that would eventually trip you three steps down the stairs.

He wondered if you recognized him. He was sure not as much given how you barely recognized Detective Inspector Lestrade when he strode by. You yelled to everyone to open the door for the DI, since his, to quote, ‘old knees might not hold him up to it’.

You were never without a superior chewing your head off for simple faults such as keying in suspect’s name incorrectly. For all his precise routine-lined modus operandi, and in effect would be displeased by such bungling behavior, you were strangely endearing, clumsy in a way that he found skittish creatures to be.

And perhaps, he was also strange himself, even a slight bit tipsy, that he made his way over with a bottle of water. By then, the crowd had dispersed, off to the bar for more drinks, the toilet to retch, or outside where they continued their festivity with a smoke.

You were alone in the booth. Absolutely out of it, cheek smushed against your forearm on the table. Your head lolled here and there, as you grinned at nothing in particular, muttering under your breath. His stride hastened when a man, clearly not constable and friend, approached the table with a dubious smile.

“She has company, I’m afraid,” Holmes emerged, towering behind him.

“Yeah? Says who?” He whirled around, puffing his muscular chest.

His pride faltered visibly when it dawned upon the man that he was, in fact, eye-to-eye with another man’s waist coat. Had to tipped his head back enough to fully regard Sherlock’s eyes

“Sherlock Holmes,” Holmes simply smiled, “you needn’t worry about her being alone. Her company is spoken for.”

“Holmes, as in that funny bloke on twitter?”

“An associate of Scotland Yard, to be exact.”

“And what’s that gonna do?” He barked a laugh, “Wet my knickers?”

“No,” He said cordially, “but it’ll find you a bed in an agreeable cell if you keep that act along. So run along, now. Unless, you have decided for a ‘funny’ little deduction, instead.”

“Keep up the clown play, mate. No way you’re bringing up that card trying to hook up with a pretty face. Doesn’t work on me, and probably doesn’t work on her,” He tried to shoulder past but Holmes grabbed his arm.

“Do not be so hasty, my dear man,” He said cordially, “It’s free consultation for the likes of you.”

“Like I said—” He tried twisting away from Holmes’ vice grip, “—I ain’t interested.”

“Oh, you don’t have to be even I can bring forth several deductions aplenty already.”

The man grew impatient, face turning a flush of red, “Mate, look—”

“Starting with the tanned band on your right finger, for one,” Sherlock went on, “But a ring is missing, suggesting a wife, perhaps divorced?”

The man jerked away in surprise, and spat out, “What are you a bloody PI? Wife hired ya?”

“Yes to the first,” Holmes said smoothly, “No the other two.”

“How else would you know!—”

“I do,” He went on calmly, “unfortunately know too much about people. Plenty. It’s my trade to do so. Such as the knowledge that you are currently on, what was that, hold for a restraining order?”

That did it.

The man turned florid, sputtering with anger and, then—“Oh, piss off you fugwat!” With that he stomped away, drawing curious looks from nearby tables, cursing under his breath.

Hellions. Holmes thought, dryly. Absolute hellions. He returned his gaze to table where you perked up at the commotion, head tilted, like a confused, startled rabbit. And, adorably so. With how he emerged, looming in his black coat and fedora, you must’ve assumed—with three cups of sherry induced reasoning—he was some deity ready to take your soul to the grave.

That wasn’t the case, apparently. He was a little surprised when he noticed your eyes scanned him from the top and bottom, pupils dilated, your pretty lips parted slightly. It was clear by your expression what you were thinking. Who is this strange, strange man at your doorstep and why is he so handsome?

Heat coiled low in his belly. Loins, if you looked close enough. It shouldn’t have—you were his junior constable after all, it’s not proper. Unfortunately for him, improper things sought him out most days.

“Woah—hellouhh,” You say coherently, in an attempt to be seductive, probably to emphasize your cleavage by leaning forward, chin your hands, arms pushing against you breasts—

But all that did was skid you forward, elbow sliding across the incredibly smooth table. He caught both your arms in time that pretty face wud land smack on the table top.

“Quite.” He said, gently pushing you back to sit upright.

“Thanks.” You blinked slowly, “Wanted to do something—don’t remember what.”

“I’m sure you’ll remember it in time.”

“Who’s that man?” A wobbly finger pointed somewhere over his head, “He’s loud and mean. Not you though. Not you. You—you’re not loud or mean. You’re quiet and… handso—handy, I mean handy, when people are mean.”

“He is someone currently of no consequence,” He replied, sliding into the seat beside you, “A hellion. A nuisance to society. It is better we ignore them.”

You didn’t move away. He’s pressed against you, shoulder to shoulder. Noses inches away from one another. He raised his eyebrows, looked at you from your nose to your hands clasped on your lap—to perhaps bring the sitting arrangement to the fore. You followed his eyes, Still, you didn’t make a move. Bemused, neither did he and regarded you as you regarded him.

“But he’s mean.” Your brows were furrowed like you’re thinking real hard, and in that moment again, he wondered if you recognized his face.

“He is.” He said quietly.

“But you said to ignore him.”

“I did.”

“Why?”

“He’s a nuisance.”

“But…” To your tipsy reasoning, it didn’t make plenty sense, “…he’s mean.”

Junior constable of Scotland Yard, apparently.

“Precisely why, my dear girl.” He mused.

“How strange…” You sighed, an endearingly whole lot of breaths for someone so cheerful moments ago and laid your cheek on his shoulder, “mean….” Your cheek was warm, soft against the rough wool of his coat.

“Here,” He had forgotten about the water bottle he brought and patted around for it in his coat pocket. He felt the familiar bulge of the bottle, and pulled it out, “have some water. Your throat is sore.”

You blinked owlish and slow, then your eyes flickered up without moving your head, “How’d you know, mister?”

“About?” He twisted the cap with a crunch and handed it over.

Your eyes did a sweep, indirectly appraising, down from his arms to his hands. Your eyes particularly remained a second too long on his fingers.You licked your lips, they were already crusting and painful, and took the bottle, “My sore throat.”

“You have been swallowing more than normal, have you not?”

“…I think so.”

“Well, there you go,” He gestured.“That is the answer.”

“And you can guess that just from swallowing?”

He tilted his head, smiling, “I can guess a number of things from simply sitting.”

A pregnant pause. You looked at him, “Can you guess something right now?”

“What would you like me to guess?”

“How much fingers I’m holding up.”

“You aren’t raising any.” He looked down to your hands, which were holding the bottle earnestly.

“Mentally, I am.” You said.

“Alright,” He conceded, arranging the tails of his coat around him more neatly. He usually doesn’t humor anyone regarding his abilities, thought they wasted his time.

“If you insist,” He said, “Keep that number in your head. Don’t let it go. Not even a slip.”

Your brows turned down, and you nodded determinedly, gripping the bottle like it was a precious clam.

“if I have to guess,” He thought for a moment or two, his eyes searching your face, then he smiled—the sort that says he’s landed on the tarmac with a perfectly done twist.

“Five,” He said.

Your eyes widened, those soft lips he’d been staring at all night parted wider—enough he caught a glimpse of the tip of your tongue, “You’re a wizard.” You breathed, in awe.

“Please,” He laughed, waving you away with a hand “ it is all theatrics. I only assume the best.”

“It’shnot.” You frowned, “It’s…like magic.”

“Why don’t you see it this way?” He leaned against the seat and brought you along with him with a soft ‘oof’. He laid a hand on your head. Your hair was soft under his fingers. Very soft.

“When I explain the mechanics of how I reached my judgment,” He continued, a finger twirling your hair, “the admiration will falter, i assure you. It is after all very simple. So simple that if anyone in this world used enough common sense—they’ll be on the same level as me. Unfortunately for many, humans are so very easy to distract.”

“No, no, no” You sluggishly turn to him fully, as if your head was bigger than your body, the water sloshed over the rim, “That’s good enough, you know. People in this world—they don’t think enough. They don’t see what they don’t wanna see.”

“And do you see what you want to see,” He mused, his hand found your face and he squeezed the soft, round swell of your cheek, “or is it the fact otherwise?”

“I dunno,” You shrugged, the effort of it made your entire body wobble, “maybe I do maybe I don’t,” You took a sip of the bottle, a playful smile stretching wide on your lips, “all I know is that a handsome man several booths over had been making eyes at me since he came in.”

“You’ve been counting.” He said, his callouseds hands, warm and large, drifting down your neck. Trailing goosebumps in its wake. They were warm. Large. Large enough to span over your throat.

You poked his chest, “But you don’t deny it.”

“Of course I can’t. Not when i have already been observing things that are of my interest.” His larger fingers slid through your own, clasping his palm against yours, “But I’m curious. And, I hope you won’t mind me asking—which did you mean by that little gesture?”

You cocked your head, “Which one?”

“Your hand on your mouth and it goes back and forth—”

Your eyes brightened and you repeated the gesture, fist to your cheek, back and forth, “Oh, this one?”

“Yes,” His cheeks flushed, he wasn’t sure why, but the gesture alone somewhat lewd, “that.”

“Blow job.” You said conversationally.

He shouldn’t be surprised. His brows jumped for a moment and he cleared his throat, composing himself, “I see.”

“It means I want to suck you off.” You went on, “It means I want to—”

He held up a hand. “I perfectly get your meaning.”

You weren’t deterred.

“ I’ve observed something myself, as well.” You said, “That you’re a detective.”You thought hard for a moment, “It would be a shame if you aren’t ‘cause we really need handsome detective these days.”

He broke into a laugh, a warm rumbling sound that shook his shoulders from the top-down, “I see.” He said again because he had nothing else.

“So, am I right ‘tective handso?”You leaned in with a conspiratorial whisper, though your whisper was about three booths heard.

“While I can’t confirm or deny, I am curious how you made that connection.”

Your soft, warm cheek bumped his own, closer until your lips were against his ear. You then said, lowly, your sherry breath stirring heat low in his abdomen, “Because, If I was a client, then I’d only want someone this handsome to solve my case.”

“That’s terrible business,” He nudged his nose against yours.

“But efficient.”

“It would be so if you are able to handle it.”

“I can,” You pulled back, your eyes bright, “I can handle anything. Even if my….souvenirs are a little,” You looked him up and down, “say, vintage.”

Holmes smiled.

.

AS A CABBIE West Burnon had seen enough of society to know two things: one, don’t be bloody nosy; two, you’ll be bloody nosy yourself if you’re nosy. So, when the two folks hauled into his cab, gave him an address, and started slobbering their tongues all over each other, he immediately found the new headphones his daughter bought him interesting.

“Tech junkies…” He muttered, and used it—what choice did he have?

In the back, you were a warm weight on his lap, thighs bracketing his hips, “You don’t seem very drunk.” You said against his lips. He could taste your breath—sweet sherry, a hint of chocolate and the salty taste of a person’s mouth who spoke too much.

He couldn’t respond because you were leaning in again, kissing him, plunging your tongue deep into his throat. He could only hum in his chest, his hands feeling up your spine through your clothes, taking a breath as he pulled away.

“Then,” He panted, pressing his nose against your throat, “you’re not very good at reading people.”

“I am, actually.” You giggled, the sound vibrating against his nose.

“Enlighten me,” He pressed a kiss against your soft throat, and another against the underside of your jaw where you whined at the contact.

You narrowed your eyes, thinking, so very hardly. “I can read that you’re very much rock-hard, right now.”

He was, achingly so. It didn’t help you were ensconced snugly on it, your plush pelvis rubbing against his erection.

“Anything,” He breathed, “perhaps, less crude?”

You grinned, gave his boner one more rub, “Horny?”

Perhaps he shouldn’t bother trying.

.

HE PRESSED you against the wall just as he led you into the flat. The living room was dark, illuminated by the moonlight through the parting curtains.

So engrossed with the soft taste of your mouth, he shut the door with the heel of his oxfords. The lock turned with a click and you both stumbled backwards into whatever room was nearest. The living room, where the armchairs were, where his clients would intrude and present their quandaries.

His tongue plunged inside your mouth. You moaned softly as it slid against yours, taste buds grainy and so slick laving your teeth. He tasted like salt burn whiskey and cigarettes. It mingled with your sherry breath; you tasted sweeter..

For an old fellow, who struck you as a man of genteel essence, you’re surprised he’s quite adroit with the use of his tongue. He devoured you, swallowing every whimper you made, breaths against breaths, teeth against flesh. And his hands, too—those large, veiny hands with clear visible knuckles, wrapped around one swell of your ass. He squeezed.

“Oh!” You broke away for a breath and he dove in, lips latching onto your neck, not quite pleased by the lack of touch. His body thrummed with heat, with the need of staying close, even if clothes were a barrier.

“Is that a good sort of ‘oh’ or should I be concerned?” He said against your throat, peppering kisses that sent tingles of electricity to your toes.

“Don’t know,” You slurred, fisting the back of his coat, relishing in the visual of tearing it off his shoulders, “you tell me.”

“Can’t you deduce it for yourself?” He smiled, his other hand cupping your jaw and tipping your head back.”

“Can’t think right now when all I want is your cock in my ass.”

He raised his eyebrow, “Quite a dramatic proposal, don’t you think.”

“Cock in my ass, and then we go on for five hours. Is that dramatic yet?”

He rubbed your cheek with his thumb, “Too little to be considered so,” He bent down and captured your lips, “Make it all night, darling,” He groaned when your palms felt up his thighs to squeeze his erection, “I’ll keep you up—all night.”

“I’m an insomniac, anyways.”

“Good.”

He backed you up to the couch, stumbling along the way. He was sure he knocked some books over, but he’s in too over his head to care about mere organization. That’ll be trouble for another day.

The back of your thighs hit the cushion. His lips were still on yours as he shrugged off his coat and kicked off his oxfords. He wanted to curl inside your throat and live in your body like a mole on grass plains. When he was already in his dresshirt, you felt up his biceps and chest, squeezing the muscles, anything just for the touch of his body. He was warm, so snugly so, and you could imagine the days forward when it wasn’t just sex but comfort—on the bed, and cradled in his arms with his chin in the crown of your head as he spoke to you. Those gentle grey eyes crinkling as he smiled.

The visual quickly disappeared when you felt his clothed erection, so formed under the fabric of his trousers, rub against your pelvis. It nestled perfectly between your thighs, hotdog on two slices of bread. You moaned, fisting the shirt just above his hip and pulled him down. The sugar can wait. Right now, you need something a little more raw than bamboo in your throat. Holmes humped against you for a moment, rocking his hips back and forth, each thrust sending waves of pleasure throughout your body. He groaned and panted, murmuring sweet nothings in your ear until you slowly spread your thighs wider to accommodate him.

And in the middle of unbuttoning his vest with one hand you struggled with the zipper on your trousers with the other. You whined in his mouth when it wouldn’t go down, stuck midway.

“Impatient girl,” He mused against your mouth.

He gently pushed away your hands and pinched the tab himself, slowly tugging it down. Cracks of your panties were seen with each descend and he felt his loins burned at the simple sight of your belly.

“Fuck me through my panties,” You said desperately, hips humping upwards, but he held you down with his hands on your waists, “Can’t take it anymore.” You whined, thighs trembling from the sheer want of being stuffed full.

He could tell. There was a damp spot blooming across your panties, dark and so slick from arousal. Oh, god. His cock stirred underneath his boxers at the sight. If he were to to have this view everyday—every night, every morning, every time he came home to work—then god bless his soul he’d do anything, perhaps even give up the seven percent cocaine shots for the warmth of your walls.

Alas, he is a gentleman, and those men are gentle.

“It is not jagged enough to do that.” He said conversationally, palming your folds through the fabric and your head threw back at the sensation of slick cotton against your clit. You’re trembling from the heat, sweating, skin burning from the amount of energy balled up in your veins. You need release. You need a chute to spool every bit of arousal out.

“I need you to fuck me,” You cried out, “and then fuck again me, and when you’r done—fuck me again until I’m stupid.”

Every bit of your words spurred his cock on. He was sure there’s a patch in his boxers the size of England. And with every slide of his head against the fabric, he trembled from the sensitivity. He restrained himself from humping his boxers like a dog. Then again, he should’ve restrained himself from the get go. You were his subordinate, his junior, the clumsy fool who trips over boots and mistyped generic names.

“Turn over.” He strained.

And you did, rolling into your stomach, your rump held high in offering.

“Where, you say?” He laid one palm on your buttocks, squeezing it.

“Ass.” You wiggled those hips.

“Granted,” He gave it a little pat.

He shucked your trousers just enough over your ass, baring your panty-curved rump, the hemline digging into your cheeks. There was a damp spot where your folds lay and the musky scent of your arousal made him lick his lips. He wanted to bury his face in that, inhale you, and never leave. A gun would have to be held point to get him off.

“But not ass in a way, you know,” You rambled on as he hooked a finger over the waist band, “if ass, it’s too long. You gotta use lube and I don’t have time, it’s stupid. Saliva sucks because it stinks—and it’s also unsanitary—”

“I see,” He murmured when the underwater bunched below the curve of your buttocks, your bare cheeks on display, the hidden spoils behind those mounds.

“Doggy, doggy style,” You went on, “me riding you from below—”

“Just that?” He fumbled with his belt, struggling to peel it off—but he was a man of action, not the armchair thinker, and swiftly it pooled on the rug.

“That and only that,” You babbled, “raw, super raw and—”

With both hands, he hiked your hips up until you were flushed against his crotch. Felt the wet head of his cock prodding the cleft of your cheeks.

“Also,” His voice was low against your ear, “granted.”

And then he stretched you open, sliding through your folds slick wet and swollen with arousal.

“Oh, god,” You moaned, “Yes, fuck. Keep going.”

“I wasn’t going to stop, my dear girl.” He groaned, and once he was hilted, fully inside, he started fucking you into the cushions.

His hips bounced off your buttocks with every thrust, rippling the flesh and he relished in the sight of it yielding underneath his body. He punched every moan out of those pretty lips, made sure all there was to your babbles were his name wrenched out.

“Doing so well,” He groaned as the head of his cock nudged against the corners of your walls, “You’re doing so well for me.”

“Always,” You panted, “Just give me more and I’ll always be good.”

“So obedient aren’t you, my constable?” His hand snaked up from your hip to your throat , tilting you cheek just so he could kiss the underside of your jaw.

“Anything,” You whined.

He suckled the skin as he rocked against your ass, feeling the vibration of your babbles against his lips. You smelled lovely. Like cakes and cream. Like sweat on a summer morning. He held you down with one hand on your lower back, driving in ruthlessly from behind.

The slap of his skin against yours, the wet squelches of his cock buried in your ass, echoed off the ceilings. If he were the neighbors below, it wouldn’t be difficult to guess what one’s colleagues were doing with how the head of the sofa tapped against the wall. He shifted the angle to the side and you trembled, crying out as he rubbed that sensitive notch so ruthlessly.

“That’s it, that’s it…oh,” He groaned, pressed his nose into your hair, pushing you up the sofa with his thrusts, “Oh, god that’s lovely. So…lovely.”

You could feel it in your toes. The orgasm building up so high in your belly, a furled ball of spring ready to burst. And he was almost there as well. His hands shook where it braced against the cushions, his murmurings became babbles, uttering about this nonense and that.

“Fuck me again when you come,” You were at the peak of it, almost tipping over.

“Darling,” He chuckled, though he trembled slightly when you clenched down, “With my age I am not quite sure if i can withstand another round.”

“Then I’ll suck you off,” You slammed your ass back into his cock, “Nice and simple. I’ll play with your balls, suck on those too, and I’ll fuck myself on you and suck on your nose.”

That made him groan even louder. He was so close that, he felt, if he came he was sure his testicles would implode and he’d have to explain to Watson why he’s maimed precisely there.

“You,” He panted, his brows furrowed as he felt the wave coming—his thrusts were now erratic, and he was just an old man fucking for release, “You’re one adamant young lady.”

“I know what I want.” You looked over your shoulder, “And I want you to come inside me.”

And then it all came down. You cried out as your orgasm gripped your uterus like a fist, sending you into fits of trembles, eyes rolling back into your skull. He came a while after, spilling his come into your womb in pathetic little squire. Your shakes were still vigorous, thighs spasming. When it was all over, when you tagged against the cushioned, vaguely aware of him catching his breath behind you, you said, “Again.”

And he laughed.

.

YOU WERE late to the office. Oh, god. Perfect for a first impression to the DI of all liaison. After the little fuck-fest you were having at some old man’s flat, you slipped away from his bed. That guy—what was his name? You couldn’t remember. He was still unconscious under the covers. You toed in your flats, shrugged on your clothes with desperate hops, and quickly scribbled in your number on a piece of paper. You pinned it on the table with his fedora on top and quickly made your way down.

There was no time to head back to your flat so you head to the shower room at Scotland Yard, using the spare uniform you kept in your locker—supposedly only for emergencies, and perhaps this counts as too. When you were done, prim and proper in your uniform, your cap tucked low on your head, you marched to Lestrade’s office.

He was leaning against his desk. Behind were the glass windows, blinds pulled low, with sunlight creeping in. He was in the middle of a conversation with another man. Low tones, amused, a voice that was strangely familiar.

“…Why her specifically…” He exasperated, “she’s clumsy, Holmes…can’t imagine you’d—”

“I have my reasons, Lestrade.”

“You always do and they end up on the bloody news.”

The corners of his eyes crinkled when it lifted to regard you.

And there, as you stepped through the doorway you caught sight of the man. Your gut dropped to the floor. You’d be rolling around, tangled with your intestines if you weren’t so steady.

He lounged in the sofa, legs crossed, arms thrown over the headrest. A pipe was clenched in his mouth, drooping languidly on the corner. Smoke curled from the end, wafting around the room in a thin sheen of mist. He had his fedora slanted to one side, covering his other eye. And the one that was seen. That grey one gleamed under the light, amused, twinkling within the manner of a Cheshire Cat.

You didn’t fuck just any old man. You fucked your boss. The consulting detective—your superior at Scotland Yard. And gathering from his expression, you knew it wasn’t just a one night thing he was planning on.

You stood there, agape.

Whitaker's hand hesitated in the air like they were in class. “Well I think by casual she means-”

“I know what casual means, Fuckle-berry,” said Santos quickly. “But it was casual now it's just weird.”

You nodded along, humming.

She groaned, hands running through her hair in frustration. “I don't get it!”

You took a long gulp of your wine.

“How do you handle it?” Trinity asked, arms wide in question at you.

“Me?”

“Yeah, how do you and Robby do casual?”

“Oh- we... it's- um-” you stumbled over your words, hoping that if you let it up long enough she'd take it back and start on her problems again. She didn't and she stood in front of you and Whitaker, waiting for an explanation.

The whole thing between you and Robby had started about the same time Santos and Garcia started. In an awkward confrontation that was you and Trinity bumping into each other in your shared bathroom, both your hairs messed up and both supporting bruises suspiciously in the shape of lips on your necks.

When you returned to your room you and Robby waited eagerly to see who would flee Santos's room. Neither too shocked to find Garcia.

“It's um?” Trinity asked.

“It's going,” you said into your wine glass, finishing it and pouring in more. The truth was for a while things had been odd, on your end more so.

Casual was a label you thought you could do, that when Robby said to you a week after sleeping together, his sheets over the both of your bodies that he liked keeping it simple. Sex. Release. You thought you could do it.

Almost three months since then and you were regretting it because every time you saw doctors eyes lingering over Robby, every time you heard his 'seven-week rule' and every time you saw happy couples fawning over each other in the ED your stomach twisted.

You didn't realise you wanted that until it was dangled in front of you and snatched away all in the same minute.

Trinity's brows rose. “Oh?”

You looked to where Whitaker was next to you, hoping for sympathy. You only found curious eyes. “It's just different than before.”

“Different how?” asked Dennis.

“Is it still casual?”

You scoffed, mumbling under your breath. “Yeah to him.”

“You want to be more?”

You didn't know if she was accusing but your room-mates expecting eyes on you heated your body in shame and embarrassment. “And you don't with Garcia?"

“Ok, enough!” suddenly Whitaker stood up. “The two of you, we need to sort this out.”

With a vacant seat next to you Trinity plopped herself down and you gave her your wine. You just decided to take the bottle.

“I cannot stand it anymore, okay! The two of you, we're gonna change this,” he said. “Trin- no more pining and waiting for Garcia to call at like one am.”

She was wanting to retort but only folded her arms over her chest as he carried on.

“And you-” he focused on you. “Need to stop crying over Robby. You guys can do better.”

“Yeah in a world where we're not working twelve hour shifts five days a week,” you said. The idea of casual hook ups wasn't anything new to the ED, not even the hospital. It was easy way of escape without the pressure of dating when all their time was spent saving lives or charting about saving lives or studying how to save lives.

On the coffee table in front of you Trinity's phone pinged and she reached for it like it was seconds away from self-destructing.

She tucked her phone into her chest to read the text before slamming it back down.

You caught a glance at the words and the contact. Can't make it tonight, I'll hit you up tomorrow- G

“You're gonna leave them,” he said.

You and Trinity sat up. “What?”

“No!”

There was a flicker of fear in his eyes.

“Okay- I take it back,” he said, surrendering. “Then how about give them a taste of their own medicine.”

“Their medicine?” you asked.

Whitaker gently nudged the empty glasses and cans of beer aside, perching on the edge of the coffee table, appealing to the two of you. “How many times have they cancelled plans, or said you couldn't come over to ask you to come over two hours later?”

You hadn't realised how perceptive he was.

“Now, make it so you guys call the shots. They want to come round, you say no.”

The idea was new to you. You'd always wanted Robby. You spent half your spare time wanting him and the other half having sex with him. You'd never even wanted to say no.

“So then we what, don't have sex?” asked Santos.

“You will,” he said. “You create distance, get them wanting and crying or what-whatever and then they'll realise they've messed up.”

You thought we was giving them too much credit.

Santos chuckled. “Huckleberry, are you telling us to play hard to get?”

He thought about it, eyes moving as if he was calculating it. “Yes!”

That's how plan 'hard to get' started. It was agreed you and Santos, the next time Garcia and Robby asked you to come over you'd say no.

Easier in practise when you work with them.

The next day was a slower day, un-usual in that sense. It meant everyone had more time to linger around each other.

“And so I said to him- officer-” said Myrna, lying on the bed between you and Robby. She'd seizure, hurt her leg and needed it disinfected and cleaned- not for the first time in her life. There was a mix of glass and gravel that needed plucking out and apparently the attending of the ED had nothing better to do that join you in the task. “What would you have done if you caught your third husband eating out another woman?”

“And did he say shoot him?” asked Robby. He was bent over the same leg as you, your heads so close you were either gonna head butt or kiss. Not likely over the state of her leg.

“No, he didn't say anything, he just arrested me!”

Robby hummed, his glasses sliding down the bridge of his nose. “Imagine that.”

“You know Myrna sometimes I can't tell if all these stories are true,” you said, taking a small bit of glass and adding it to the pile you'd already created.

“Oh they're all true, honey, I never lie. Unlike Mark that two faced bastard.”

“Which one was Mark?” you asked.

“The fourth husband. Good body and shit everything else!” she said with a wheeze. Abruptly she grabbed your hand. “Are you single?”

Robby glanced up at you, creases of amusement at the corner of his eyes.

You looked away first. “Why, you asking me out?”

“If you're single, stay single!” she said. “Men, all they are are liars! Lying bastards! And babies! I hardly even shot the guy!”

“Am I so bad, Doctor?” asked Robby looking over the frames of his glasses at you.

Was he so bad? No. He was short-tempered sometimes, moody, didn't accept help from anyone. But you knew he could be gentle, you knew his true belly laugh and the smile he gave at mornings when you were still in bed. You just wish you knew if he ever saw himself staying in that bed a little longer, if he ever wanted to make breakfast and take the day together, stealing moments throughout.

“No,” you said, looking back down to her leg that was almost clean. “You're not.”

Myrna was oddly silent but you could see her head moving between the two of you. “Don't go there sweetheart,” she said, a word of warning. “This one might look fun but he's all danger and heartbreak.”

“Me? No,” said Robby with an air of un-care. “I'm a teddy bear.”

Five minutes later you and Robby were instructing Perlah wrapping her leg before throwing off your gloves and leaving her to it.

“How many husbands you think Myrna had?” he asked.

“Oh there's no telling,” you replied, fetching her chart to finish off the notes. At some point someone had put a star next to her name, as if she was VIP.

Robby leant next to you, scanning around the ED. “Any plans tonight?”

“On a Wednesday? Nop.”

“Wanna come over?”

There was an abrupt and loud clear of a throat.

You hadn't realised Whitaker was there but he was watching the two of you, closely. When you met his eyes he gave a small subtle shake of his head.

Robby looked. “You got a cough, Whitaker?”

He cleared his throat, sliding down in his chair. “No.”

The agreement. It was all fine in practise but how were you supposed to say no when you just said you had no plans and you really wanted to have sex with him! It was the glasses, you were sure that was what did it. The way he pulled them on and pulled them off, the focus it gave him and the way they slipped down his nose.

“So, tonight?” he asked again, voice low.

Only a few people knew, like your room-mates and you were sure others had guessed. Robby wanted to keep it private. Or a secret, you'd never asked for clarification.

You caught Whitakers gaze on yours, watchful. He didn't say anything but you wondered if he'd be disappointed. Would you even be disappointed in yourself? “I can't tonight.”

“Oh,” he said, nodding. “Okay.”

He didn't sound annoyed. He didn't sound anything. It was impossible to tell.

“Yeah, we just- there's this thing-”

“Thought you had no plans?” he asked, an almost amused rise in his brows.

Ah. “It's like- not a plan- just a- a room mate thing. You know?”

Robby looked to Whitaker as if to confirm.

He nodded. “Yeah! Every Wednesday. We watch films.”

“Films,” you confirm.

“And talk.”

“We talk.”

Robby nodded. “Sounds thrilling.”

“Robby!” Dana called. “Got a trauma, woman in her thirties. Five minutes.”

“Got it," he said but he was still slumping over the counter. He took his time moving, stretching up till his shirt rode up enough to expose that slither of skin that held so many promises. “Some other time then.” His hand ghosted the small of your back before he disappeared.

You watched him go, realising you wouldn't spend the night buried in his bored but sleepless and restless.

Whitaker replaced Robby at your side. “See? Doesn't that feel good?”

You answered truthfully. “No.”

That night you, Santos and Whitaker sulked on the sofa, face masks over your faces with a bowl of popcorn left on the table and a shitty movie filling the silence.

Your phone lay face up with nothing from Robby and from Trinity's expression you figured she'd had nothing either.

You'd been to the bathroom once, took your phone with you and debated texting him but you never got that far. You only flicked through texts, casual one's at first. Small 'Are you coming over?' or 'You left your shirt at mine.' There were some dotted from him, on times you were both too busy to meet where things got more... riskier. His texts started simple but you could always catch on to his wants, leading his want.

Things like 'Thought about you today,' or 'you looked good today,' but he never just complimented you for the sake of it.

The texts didn't help so you turned your phone off and re-joined the two all the while your head and heart were in bed with Robby.

The next day passed like another dry spell.

It was busy- too make up for the quiet day beforehand. You didn't have time to greet Robby before being thrown into the chaos from a pile up on the highway. All day your bodies shuffled past each other, his hands lingering on your arms when he passed or always standing next to you in trauma.

It felt something like punishment.

Or a test.

By Friday you were crawling out of your skin, still dealing with the ramifications of the last two days. You hadn't even seen that Robby had text you the night before, so exhausted from work you crashed only spotting his name on your phone the morning you woke from the blare of your alarm.

“You're avoiding me,” he said, kneeling at the computer you typed furiously at to get your charting down. It was a casual move he used, usually un-tying and re-tying his shoes. This time, he simply knelt, seemingly done with pretence.

“What? No.”

“I've barely seen you the last few days," he said, wetting his lips. “Is there something wrong?”

“No, no, I've just been super busy,” you said, tapping on the computer.

Robby shuffled next to you. His hand laid next to yours. He didn't take your hand or stop you but his fingers fidgeted like he didn't know what else to do with himself. “Did I do something?”

You looked down at him, spotting the crease between his brows. “No.”

It was the closest you'd got to seeing him vulnerable.

“So tonight?” he asked. “Feel like I'm losing my damn mind.” His finger was light as it traced your hand, slowly drawing circles.

Tasting Robby was like the first sip of alcohol. It always left you wanting me. Sweet. Bitter. Whatever. You were just left wanting and nothing else, which was why you went crawling back every time. Why saying no had never crosse your mind before. Why the smallest touch from his hand was leaving you in shivers.

You squeezed your eyes shut. “I can't tonight-”

Robby smirked, breathing out a puff of air.

“I would,” you said quickly, turning in your chair to face him. “Believe me, I would, it's just... Trinity is going through some stuff and I just- I don't want to leave her alone, you know.”

It was the truth. Trinity was taking Garcia's silence worse than you or Dennis had anticipated. You knew there was more going on, you only wanted to be there to help her.

Robby perked. “You need me to speak to her?”

“No, no, it's just stuff. She'll be okay I just, want to be safe.”

He nodded but his finger fell from your hand. “Okay.”

“Doctor Robinavitch!” his name was called by the familiar dread of Gloria.

He sighed under his breath as he pushed himself up. “Oh so help me, God.”

By Saturday you were sure Robby thought you were lying and sort out to punish you. He was practically glued at your side all day long. He didn't ask to see you, didn't put his lips near you. But he lingered.

“Okay we don't have a lot of time, there's a lot of bleeding,” said Robby in the face of a trauma, looming over you. “We'll do a Hilar flip.”

“A Hilar flip, are you serious?” said Trinity.

“No other choice.”

You gulped, staring down at the bleeding and misplaced lung. “I've never done one of them before.”

“I'll talk you through it, we'll go easy,” he said, coming at your side. “You're gonna rotate the lung one-eighty, very slow. Very gentle.”

Perhaps it shouldn't have been as erotic as it was. The way his chest heaved against your back, his arm stretching along yours to hold your hand and guide it through the blood to his lung. His face was concentrated next to yours but his breath was hot on your cheek and breathless.

“Go slow.... go slow. Easy.... gentle.... just like that, there we go,” he uttered against your ear.

“Blood loss is slowing down.”

“There we go, you got it,” he mumbled as you slotted it back into its place. “Okay-” Robby moved on like your whole body wasn't trembling. You had to carry on trying to save the guys life after it, like you weren't picturing his entire body draped over yours, whispering filthy things in your ears.

“Thought I was watching a porno there,” said Santos as you all fled the room when the guy was stable.

“Jesus-” you caught your breath, throwing off the gloves and running your hands through your hair, trying to get some air to your neck that sweat.

Santos chuckled to herself. “So does Doctor Robby talk you through it?”

“Trin-” you snap.

“Does he praise you? Is that the kind of thing you're into.”

You didn't respond, hiding in the bathroom to throw cold water onto your face and calm the rush of blood but you could hear Santos outside the door. 'This is a teaching hospital!' she teased.

It became a thing you had to do, get away from him. You couldn't be distracted when dealing with patients. It was bad enough working with him when all you could think about was fucking him!

But Robby seemed to insist in helping you.

“Gaping wounds like this, under the skin we use sub-Q to bring it together,” he instructed as started the stitching for a mans wound on his leg. It was just like anything else, hardly a teaching wound when you knew how to do it. As it was under tissue and there was just no other nurse around Robby insisted.

“Five-O under skin, three-O after that,” he said.

“You think you could show me?”

You both knew you didn't need to be shown but Robby still gave you a small smile and sat on the stall, coming close to you till his meaty thigh was against your own. His hands- though gloved as yours were- still grazed yours as he took the instruments to do it.

“Guide it through... it's finer so you want to extra gentle... lotta care...”

You hummed but you couldn't say you were watching it with keen eyes. You weren't watching the way the stitches came together just the way his hands flexed, his fingers moved.

“Start deep... all the way in... bury the knot in... yeah, see how it comes together just like that?”

You nodded with an absent mind.

Robby held the equipment out to you. “Go ahead.”

You hesitated. Maybe you should have paid more attention.

He all but shoved them into your hand. “You're a big girl, you got it.”

Santos's voice played it your head. Were you into this?

With a breath you steadied yourself and went in. As he had before Robby leant over you, his body practically weighing you down.

You took the thread under the skin, pulling together just like he had.

“Bit deeper-” Robby's hands guided your arms. They were as light as a feather at your elbows before slowly sliding down your arms with a firmer hold, leading the threads.

You remembered his tight hold on you when he wanted you in place on the bed, when he was was dragging clothes off your body or wrapping a hand around your neck-

Robby called your name, watching you expectantly. His eyes were softened at the edges but they grew darker, the smallest bit of a smirk at the corner of his lips. Like he knew exactly what he was doing to you.

“Right... sorry-” you went as deep as he instructed, knowing his face was concentrated on you and your hands.

“Do you want me to leave?” asked the patient.

If he could leave his leg and leave it would've been great.

“We'll get you out of here in no time,” said Robby.

You'd thought that maybe the stitching at taken so long it was almost time to leave. Maybe you could talk to Whitaker and Santos about this hard to get thing. It was only eleven and you had more than six hours left with situations that constantly brought you and Robby together. Even when it didn't, there he was, whispering words of encouragement.

“You got this... nice and easy.... doing really good there...”

Or the simple phrase that had you hiding in the bathroom for five minutes.

“Good girl.”

When the end of the day came you ran out of there, gasping in air and rushing back back to your place.

“Hey,” you greeted walking through the door.

Trinity was already there, looking like she was ready to leave, jacket thrown over her scrubs she hadn't changed out of even though she finished an hour before you. “Hey.”

“Where's Huckleberry?”

“Oh he's at Amy's tonight.”

You scoffed. “Woah. What a speech about doing better and playing hard to get but as soon as the chance comes to play farm. So, movie tonight? I can order pizza?”

“Actually, I'm just on my way out too,” she said. “Garcia called.”

You slumped. Your entire body slumped. Your heart gave up. “What? I thought we all made a deal?”

“We did, I played hard to get now she wants to see me,” she said.

“I haven't seen Robby in three days!”

“So go to his, get dicked down, girl,” she said, moving past you with a breeze. “I'm sorry, we can talk about how much of a bitch I am when I'm back from having the best sex yet! Later!”

She was out the door before you could chastise her. You shut it after her, falling upon it.

You'd ran from the ED to stay strong, to avoid another interaction with Robby that would have you climbing his bones in an empty room. You'd happily have done it with the teasing he'd subjected you to all day. For your friends and the promise you'd made you remained strong.

You'd never do that again.

Saturday night after the longest shift of your life and you had the place to yourself. It was rare. Either Denis or Trinity were home or you were spending the night at Robby's.

Your phone was heavy in your pocket.

Call him.

But the problem still lied un-answered. You were still at Robby's beck and call, begging for his attention. Begging him to be hard thinking about you so he could fuck you into the mattress to be professional the net day and treat you like you were just another MR.

You didn't want special treatment so to say, didn't want him to give you the easy patients or get you into the traumas more. You just wanted a smile, or a glimpse of .... love.

Maybe your friends were okay with what they had. You weren't.

You turned your phone off for the night and stripped from your scrubs, changing into a large shirt and blasting music Trin hated and Denis claimed to hate (but you'd heard him playing your playlist in the shower). For a crazy night alone you caught up on washing several pairs of scrubs and anything else, cleaned out the freezer leaving you barren of anything to eat. Maybe you'd even iron some normal clothes-

That's at least what you were thinking when there was a knock at the door.

You'd hoped it was Denis or Trin coming back, tails between their legs, keys forgotten.

Robby stood on the other side of the door.

You stood, frozen, shocked to see him there. He was just as still, waiting with raised brows. “Doctor Robby. Is everything okay?”

His backpack was slung over his shoulder, his scrubs only slightly dirtied from the day. But his eyes were alive and his body didn't sag with exhaustion like usual. His eyes darted back behind you. “Can I come in?”

You held open the door, closing it slowly behind you.

Robby had only been to your place once before. He looked the open living space open with interest. Typically your meet ups were at his, on account he lived alone and his bed was much nicer to be down on than yours.

“Er- Whitaker and Santos aren't home, if- if this is a hospital thing.”

“It's not,” he said, lowering his bag at the sofa.

“Oh?”

He turned, leaning against the back of it. “It's a me and you thing.”

“Oh.”

His arms flexed as he folded them over his chest, the green of his top under his scrub bunched at the forearms. His head ducked, trying to get a read on you. “So?”

You rocked on your heels, realising the shortened of the shirt you wore. Not that it wasn't anything he had seen before. “So...”

“What's going on?” he asked. There was still nothing in his voice to give away his true thoughts, only a slight edge of urgency.

“What-what-what do you mean?”

Robby listed off what he saw was wrong like symptoms. “You've been avoiding me, you never answered my texts, you didn't want to see me the other night nor tonight though you have the place to yourself-”

“I didn't realise they were gone,” you said.

“Okay so every other time?” he asked. “If I did something you can tell me. I'm a big guy, I can take it.”

It was a chance to voice up every ill thought you'd had but all you could think about was how big he was. Standing there, jutted on the back of the couch with his scrubs around his arms and thighs.

“You didn't do anything,” you said, though you weren't looking at his eyes more his arms.

They flexed again like he knew what he was doing. His voice dropped, finally to something you could name. “So tell me. what's going on.”

If you threw yourself at him you knew the chances of him taking you to bed were high, but the chances of you regretting it in the morning when he had rolled out of bed, dressed and left you were higher.

“I just-” you blew out a breath, readying yourself for the dismiss. “I don't think I can do this anymore.”

Robby waited like he was listening to the words re-play. His head lowered as he nodded, taking it in. “May I ask why?”

“It's the casual thing,” you rushed out before you could take it back. “I don't think I can do casual. I thought I could, but I-I can't.”

He nodded, chin tucked into his chest and for a moment you thought you really had upset him. But then he straightened up, pushed himself from the sofa and shrugged. His boots thudded heavy as he stepped to you slow. “Okay then.”

Was this the moment when you got the door for him on the way out?

“Okay, so... um.... I guess I'll see you-”

Robby's hands grasped your cheeks and he kissed you quick, hard. His lips tasted as they always did with a hint of mint-freshness. They were rough as always as they worked against yours, opening you up to him as always-

You brushed away, shaking your head. “I um- Robby I can't-”

He took a deep, shuddering breath. He stepped closer to you, the heat of his body waving over you. “We don't have to be casual anymore, I don't want to be casual- not anymore.”

Everyone knew Robby only knew casual. Only selected few ever got past seven weeks. Heck you hadn't counted how long this had been going on for, maybe ten weeks but that could be nothing. You were good sex, that was all.

“Robby-”

“Listen, listen-” he said, arms waving around you before settling on your forearms. “You don't want casual, neither do I. You want me to ask? You want me to ask you to be my girlfriend, I'll ask.”

“Robby you don't date,” you tried to tell him.

He scoffed. “I date. But not anymore, not if I have you.”

Had word of the deal got out? Was Robby just tired after his shift? Delusional?

“Hey, hey-" his hands ran through your hair, cradling your cheeks. “I should've said it earlier, I know but I want this. I want serious.”

His eyes crinkled as he looked at you, the edges of his gaze soft. “You don't just have to say this. You can have anyone else-”

Robby's head ducked into the crook of your neck, brushing your hair back and pressing light kisses to the expanse of your neck. “I don't want anyone else, I want you.”

Your body awakened in shivers that he elicited.

His fingers wound to the front of your body, slowly peeling away the buttons of the shirt till it pooled at your ankles. He didn't move to ravage you, his lips remained light as they kissed down your neck, finding your collarbone and working a mark there.

Your hands wound up his arms, clutching at his shoulders. “Robby-”

“Not this time,” he uttered against your collarbone.

You knew what you called him when it was you and him. “Michael-”

“Good girl.”

You moaned out at the words, the moan you'd held all day revibrating around your flat.

He slowly kicked odd his boots and helped you throw off his scrub top before he kissed you again.

You only got a short glimpse at the body you craved before his tongue, hot and heavy, slid into you mouth, bathing in the warmth. His hands were rough as they studied every inch of your body, fingertips digging into skin.

“I want you, sweet girl,” he mumbled against your lips as you scaled your hands under his shirt and along his stomach till your fingers skimmed under his waistband.

His mouth opened against yours, groaning at this slightest touch. “Oh-”

His arms scooped you up, bringing your body up and flush against him as his arms were strong on your back, kissing you. It was all wet tongue and soft lips as he stumbled back on the edge of your couch.

“Santos will kill me if we have sex on our couch,” you gasped.

Robby rose a brow. “Oh, we're having sex?” he teased.

“I should hope so.”

You kissed you hard again, wetting the both of your mouths in delectable smacks of your lips. The two of you stumbled away to your room and his body caged you in as the two of you fell atop your sheets.

You crawled up the bed as Robby's face fell between your chest. His tongue made wet paths from each breast, taking a nipple in his mouth and his hand groping at the other one till you withered against his body.

“Michael-”

He moaned into your breast and shoved a meaty thigh between your legs. “Grind on me,” he demanded.

Your body did against him as if it only listened to his command.

He mouthed your other breast, groping where his tongue had pressed before. All the while you body moved against his thigh, dragging your pussy against him.

“Yeah.... jus' like that... god.... can feel you.... so good,” he uttered as he jutted his thigh against you.

Your hands went to his shoulders, messaging the skin there until he came back up your body and shoved his tongue down your throat again. Your arm wrapped around his neck, keeping him into you.

All the while you wet down his scrubs.

“You want serious?” he uttered against you, pulling back enough to see you.

You nodded, hair splayed over your pillow.

Robby nodded along, eyes hooded. His hand slid down between your bodies. “I can do serious.”

His finger slid into you, working in and out in slow thrusts. But even the meassured curl of his finger had you holding him, back arching from the bed.

“Mmph-”

“Don't be quiet,” he said, nuzzling his head in you neck, biting the skin there. “Don't do that.”

Another finger curled in and you moaned on. You weren't quiet usually, there was nothing more than Robby liked than being loud. Everything was measured in the ED, out of it, buried inside of you or hot mouths on each other had Robby groaning, moaning and wanting you to do the same.

His fingers thrusted knuckle deep in and out again, the soft moving of skin moving around the room as your breaths covered the sound.

His fingers moved quick as your breaths grew laboured. He sucked the skin of your neck, thrusting and curling as his hips sort some sort of friction.

You withered against him. “I'm gonna- Michael I'm gonna-”

He released your skin with a small bite and laid his mouth open on yours. “Cum,” he uttered.

“Michael-”

His voice turned harder, the hand that wasn't inside of you wrapping around your neck, pushing you into your bed. “Cum.”

With just the right curl Robby had your pussy in the palm of his hand, slick with your release as he worked you through it, rubbing his hand along your clit with jolts of your body.

“God so good,” he said, looking up at you as a thin sheen of sweat glistened on your bodies. “And all mine?”

You nodded, cheeks flushed. You could feel the heat of your body as strong as it was when he walked in.

“All mine, huh?”

“Yes,” you said, breathless.

Robby slowly took out his fingers from you, putting his fingers in his mouth and licking them clean like it was nothing. He fell back on his feet, fingers working on the ties of his scrubs. “That why you were avoiding me?”

“I wasn't-” your words died in your throat as he dropped his scrubs and boxers in one.

You'd seen his cock enough to know it by memory but the size and fullness of him always rendered you speechless.

Robby knew it to. He stood there with a smirk. “You weren't avoiding me?”

Slowly, he sank to his knees.

“No,” you said, mesmerised by the sight of him going down.

Robby's hands grabbed your thighs, spreading them. He tapped your ankles, getting them on the bed as he got closer to your heat, still leaking from the last orgasm. “Promise?”

The words had hardly left your lips before his tongue pressed into you.

Your entire body moved into his but his arms wrapped around your hips, keeping you pressed into the bed. He moved further up, burying himself in you.

“Aw- fuck-” your hands waved for purchase before curling into the sheets.

He licked a stripe up and down before nudging your lips open and finding himself in there. It wasn't the slow drag of fingers but the desperate kisses and licks of a man hungry. He pulled back, spitting against you. “You won't avoid me again, will you baby?”

You shook your head.

Robby's eyes remained on yours until he buried himself in your pussy. You watched his eyes roll into the back of his head as he moaned into you.

His hands kept you spread open every time they quivered but it didn't take long for his hand to wind down to his cock. You prepped yourself up onto your elbows to watch as he pumped his cock agonizingly slow.

“Want your cock, Robby-”

He halted his movements and you but down on your lip.

“What did you just call me?” he asked, slowly moving up your body.

You knew you were supposed to call him Michael but watching the full swing of his cock stand to attention as he made his way over you was far too distracting.

“Hey-v his hand cupped your chin, forcing you to look up. “Michael.”

You nodded. Your hands reached for his cock, straining to wrap around him.

The only notice of the effect you had was the clench of his jaw.

“Michael,” he repeated, voice almost a growl.

“Michael.”

He nodded.

“Condom?” he asked, jutting back on his heels.

Your hand slowly worked his cock, the pre-cum beading at the tip. You shook your head. You were both clean, you were on the pill but tonight you wanted to feel everything, wanted him to even fill you-

Robby bent his head, spitting down on his cock and your hand. For a moment that's all it was, you hand moving on his cock as your other circled your clit. “God... your hand.... missed you...”

When your strokes got heavier, faster Robby's head fell back and he groaned. His cock was pink, heavy in your hand-

Quickly he grabbed your wrist and threw it off before grabbing the hilt of his own cock and slowly pushing into you.

His throat strained as he groaned at the push in and your back arched into him. “Fuck!” he fell atop you, arms braced at either side. “Shit- ah-”

Your arm wrapped around his shoulders, keeping you in.

“God, you make me crazy,” he uttered, searching for your lips.

The two of you collided in a mess of salvia, tongue, lips as he pushed into you, catching your gasps.

Eventually the rock of his hips grew steady. The creak of your old bed echoed the moves of him against you.

“Shit- ah-” he groaned, shaking off the sweat and the tension.

“Michael,” you said, holding him in closer. “I want you to... go hard.”

Hard he could do. Soft he could do. He would do anything you asked.

His tongue darted out, swiping your lips. “You missed me?”

“So much, so much, so much,” you pulled him down till his weight tested yours, cock deep. “On me.”

“Okay, okay,” he mumbled to himself. He put all his weight down, crashing your body into his bed. He wasn't as young as he once was. By no means but if you wanted it, he'd give it.

Pressed into you his cock went far and deep and he couldn't fully withdraw so it was small, maddening movements.

“Oh god,” he uttered.

You moaned, loud, as he wanted and he was breathless, groaning.

The dull thump of your headboard banged on the wall and something on your bedside table fell off.

Robby's arm stretched out, grabbing your hand and stretching your arms to the headboard, trying to steady it. With the stretch of the bodies he reached that spot in you.

“Aw fuck!” You yelled out, louder than anticipated. “Michael I'm gonna- I'm gonna-”

“Fuck, fuck, fuck-” he grunted with you. His other hand threw to your hip, holding your pelvis flush into you. “Fuck!”

In seconds he let go inside of you and the gush of his cum and the sound of the wet bodies threw you over the edge. His clutch on your hand grew tighter as his body trembled with yours, the spurts of your releases cooling down.

If this was casual Robby wouldn't have lingered, he'd have pulled out, flashed you a smile before using the bathroom.

He moved slower, staying till the both of you were spent. He kissed you, soft and sweet, lips moving around to remember the taste. “I'll move out,” he whispered as he took out his cock.

You stole a glance of both of your release leaking from you and around him before Robby moved aside.

He didn't flee, he didn't go to the bathroom. He pulled the sheets from under your bodies and got the both of you into bed. He laid beside you.

Robby tucked you under his arm, sweat on both your bodies cooling as you laid together. “Feels better when we're serious.” His fingers moved slow on your shoulder, delicate touches like a feather.

If he woke with a new thought, woke with regret you'd deal with it. For the moment you allowed yourself to feel the thump of his heart as the two of you slowly lulled to sleep.

Your alarm was the first thing you picked up in the morning. It's beeping ringing in your ear as you moved to turn the thing off or throw it at the wall-

A weight over your stomach made the effort harder but you got it.

Last night came back to you in the spill of scrubs on the floor and the ache between your legs.

Robby stirred next to you. Last night.

He stayed.

“You on today?” he asked, morning voice rough. You got a look at him, it was a rare sight you got to see him in morning light. His eyes were still shut, his face without the stress the day job gave him. He asked so casual, as if this was a morning routine you'd slipped into years ago.

You hummed, nodding and readying to move-

His arm tightened, drawing you in. “Call in sick.”

You chuckled, but your eyes closed. You promised yourself five more minutes. “My attending might have something to say about that.”

Robby grumbled. “Have a word with him, I'm sure you can be very persuasive.”

Somewhere in you apartment you heard the front door open and close, voices moving around the place.

You hadn't closed the door.

“Hey! We brought coffee and bagels!” called Santos.

“We're sorry for leaving you- we- huh?” you heard Whitaker. “What the?”

The clothes on the floor. The scrub top that would have his doctors badge on it.

You groaned and suddenly Whitaker and Santos were passing the doorway, one smirking, the other shocked.

Robby beside you didn't even stir.

“Good morning, Doctor Robby!” called Santos.

He only lifted a hand in greeting before making sure the covers were over the two of you.

You reached for something heavy, landing on a cushion and aiming at the door. It closed in front of your laughing friends.