cw: 1600s au, dark!ghost, reader described as curvier/plus-sized, graphic depictions of war + violence + murder, possessive!ghost, war-criminal!ghost, inaccurate historical settings probably, unprotected piv, cumplay, breeding kink, size kink, simon "my wife can do no wrong" riley, pregnancy, references to childbirth (18+)

There is a beast that sleeps at the foot of your bed. In the shape of a man, it is curled up there, calloused fingers wrapped around one soft ankle and split lips kissing the bone there gently. It purrs as it slumbers, paws that look like hands sliding up your bare legs until your knees fall open, and it can slither between the warmth of plushy thighs.

It eats as if it hasn’t had a proper meal in days—and perhaps it hasn’t. A curling tongue that prods between your sopping cunt, deft fingers thumbing back the hood of your clit so it can widen its jaw and suck the supple thing into its gaping, drooling mouth. When you whine, the beast laughs, and it sounds an awful lot like your husband.

It feels like him, too, when it slips inside. The thing is hot to the touch—when your hands slide around its shoulders and down its spine, you think you recognize the striations along its skin. Pulpy, protruding scars, puffs of torn-apart skin, firm, thick muscle and fat that barely gives when you press your fingers into it. When it kisses you, you keen, knees hiking up and back arching as you try to follow it with eager rolls of your hips. It’s so heavy, so warm, locking you in with big arms as it fucks you into the silk sheets of your bed. You pant into its mouth, feeling the growl deep within its chest, and you lean your head back and cry in hopes that it won’t stop feeding your greedy pussy with what it wants—something thick and wet and stuck inside of you.

“Simon—”

“‘ello, wife—” He pants, mouth curling into a sick smile. His teeth look sharper from this angle, and he puts a hand under your arse and tilts your hips so the tip of his cock curves right into your cervix. You cry, scratching down his back, and he nudges your chin up so he can kiss you again, tongue mingling with yours as you try your best to just take it, take it, take it—

“Insatiable beast,” you pant against his lips. He’s pressing his hips against yours, chest heaving as he tries to come down from a back-numbing kind of pleasure. He knows as soon as he pulls out, it’ll pool underneath you, globs of himself, of you, messy and nasty because that’s just how things are between you. You blink up at him after he lights the candelabra on your nightstand, and in the flickering of its low light, you see him well for the first night in months.

His hair is freshly cut. Blonde hair cut close to his head, how he prefers it, making it easy to focus on his dark eyes and blonde lashes. He has new wounds—his arm bleeds where a bandage has come loose, and you notice new notches and cuts starting to heal along his chest. His eyes sweep over your face before it follows the line of your jaw. You moan a little when his hands cup your breasts, thumbing over the tender skin there before they drop to your tummy. He sucks on his teeth, a big smile coming over his face, and his hands slide down to smooth over the skin there—round, smooth, waiting.

“‘n ‘ello to my boy,” Simon murmurs. “Missed me, did ya?”

“He must’ve,” you whisper, putting your hand over his on your stomach. “Makes me sick every morning…”

“Mmmm…” Simon tsks, shaking his head. “I’m here now, love. He won’t bother you any longer.”

“You’re so certain of that?”

“A boy needs his father. ‘n hurting his beautiful mum…” Simon picks you up from under your hips, manhandling you gently to get you onto your knees. “...I won’t allow tha’.” You giggle into your pillow, getting up onto your elbows. Simon puts his hands on either side of your thighs, parting them, and he groans as he watches a dribble of cum fall onto the bed underneath you. He leans forward, sliding his tongue along the seam of your cunt, and you push back against his face, whining.

“Simon—ohhh—”

“Taste so good,” Simon rasps, and you squeak when he smacks a hand across the soft skin of your arse. You mewl, wiggling your hips, and Simon laughs. “Gonna keep you like this. Olways. Fat…” Simon cups your belly, where his son rests comfortably underneath the skin. “...Beautiful…Warm…” He prods your folds with his tongue, kissing you there, sliding his tongue around, slurping when you drip a little too much and making a wet, smacking sound with his mouth. “‘s just like I told you, innit? Saw it…saw you…” He kisses beside your thighs, up the curve of your back. “Do you believe me now, dear wife? Tha’ wot I see is as true as you are?”

As the months pass, Simon has become more irrational. You know that part of it is your doing. When Simon is in your bed, with nothing but moonlight illuminating your faces, you whisper in his ear about the things that can come to be.

Simon does not always seem interested. He has never been someone that cared for wealth or land or title. Simon was born into the lowest class—a drunken father, a terrified mother, a brother who could not overcome the weight that was settled onto his shoulders before he was strong enough to carry it. Simon was alone since he was small, and he made his way into the king’s guard because there was nowhere else for him to go. Everything he has earned, he earned because he was simply too good at killing.

The only prize Simon has ever asked for is you.

So when you tell him about pretty jewels and grand estates and shiny gold, Simon barely blinks an eye. He pets your face and sweeps his eyes over you and waits until you stop talking so he can slip his tongue into your mouth and put you onto your knees. Simon gets so easily distracted by you—he can’t look at you for too long before he wants to get his hands on you. There is nothing better than the woman that sleeps in his bed. Your breasts, plushy thighs, warm middle, it’s everything Simon fights to come home to. Now more than ever—there’s half of him growing inside of you, and he practically drools as you roam the halls of your home.

You received a plentiful amount of gifts when you told Simon for the first time. You hadn’t bled in two months, and you were confident writing to him that you had good news. A few weeks later, there was a trunk full of goods waiting for you in the entrance hall. Dresses, silks, lace, jewels, gold. Expensive paints, interesting books, little trinkets from faraway places—and at the bottom of the trunk, a pair of little black boots and a letter penned by Simon.

To my dearest wife, Nothing lifts the spirits as much as hearing from you. I spend long days staring out at nothing but wasted land, and I find myself at times unable to find moments of reprieve. Your letter found me seemingly when I needed it most. This campaign won’t last much longer. Renewed vigor is in me now that you have told me of what waits for me. My beautiful wife, and my son. Simon

He has insisted since that first letter that your baby is a boy. You wondered early on if Simon would be one of those men that detested girls—that having one would spoil his bloodline or weaken his family line. Simon was insistent that was not the reason.

“My firstborn will be a boy. Tha’s oll I know, love.”

He says girls will follow. He’s seen them—with your hair and your nose, his eyes and his dry sense of humor. He told you that they will be beautiful, just like you are, and it is in these visions that you plant the seed of your want in him.

The fire is warm in the sitting room. It crackles, helping keep away the autumn air outside. You’re sitting in Simon’s lap, curled on top of his thigh as he catches up on some finished ledgers from the previous month he was away. There’s a blanket over you to keep your legs covered, but it’s just under your waist, letting your belly show under your dress. Simon has his free hand cupped under the curve, holding you there protectively. There’s an unfinished blanket in your hands that you are sewing, in a navy blue color with white accents.

“Do you think our baby will be big?” You ask softly, leaning back into Simon’s chest. He hums, his thumb rubbing over your belly, and he kisses your cheek gently.

“If he’s anythin’ like me, love…he certainly might be.”

“And what about our girls?” You smile, looking up at Simon from over your shoulder. He smiles back at you, scarred lips stretching.

“They’ll be perfect, just as you are,” Simon mutters, his eyes on your lips. “All elegant. Too intelligent for their own good. Strong. Stubborn…”

You giggle, fluttering your lashes at him, and Simon smooths his hand over your belly again, rubbing it gently. He fixates on it often, and you can do nothing but oblige him. He keeps you fed, warm, and off your feet, and ever since he came back home, he keeps his head between your thighs and mouth on your cunt. He says it’s good for the baby, to feel good, and you certainly won’t complain.

“They’ll be such daddy’s girls,” you whisper, touching his jaw. “Your little princesses.”

“Mmm…”

“In all but name, I suppose,” you add softly. An odd expressions flashes over Simon’s face. He frowns a little, meeting your eyes, and you shrug. “Just…you know. They won’t…actually be princesses.”

“No, I suppose they won’t be.”

“A shame,” you cup his jaw and give him a warm kiss. “You’d make such fine ones…Your Grace.”

It is easy to water the roots after that. Once they have a hold between his ribs, you feed it as much as you can. The children are the beginning—you call them his little prince, his princesses, you tell them they are worthy of so much more, that they deserve everything you could give them. Not even born yet, and you instill in him what it means to be their father.

That you must give them the best life possible. That you must do what is necessary so that they have whatever they want, whatever they need. That you must do better than those that came before you, because you both came from nothing, and you have earned this kind of life to live.

Because we bled and we cried. Because we were beaten and berated and ignored, so are we not owed some kind of reparations?

His men come after. Simon spends long campaigns in foreign lands at his king’s bidding. He spends that time with the king’s army, taking them across the water, across land, over mountains just to conquer the places that John Price deems should be his. They do this with aggression and precision, and they do it with Simon at their stead, and you know they are vital to getting what it is that you want.

A man can only influence those that will listen.

You invite them over with grand feasts. With not much to spend your newfound wealth on, you decide often to treat Simon’s men to many nights of good food, good wine, and good women. His men are pigs; they eat with open mouths and fuck with dirty bodies, but they are what protect John’s realm and follow his orders, so you appease them anyways. These are the same men that nearly tore your skirts to shreds just to have you once, and now they eat at your table.

When you look upon them, you never show your distaste. You simply fill their cups with more wine and ask if there is anything more they need from you.

Simon’s second-in-command is sweet on you. He’s got the loveliest blue eyes and a quirky accent, but the thing that makes him stand out the most is the soot he draws across his face and the shaved sides of his head that emphasize his dark curls. Simon tells you he is of the North—a place of great cliffs and cold waters and decadent history. He wears holly pinned to his armor as a homage to his homeland, and when you presented him a small coin purse made of plaid fabrics and asked the band to play him a special song, you had him.

He waits on you, hand and foot. When Simon is not around, you feel him in the background. When their men get too close, and Simon doesn't see, it's Johnny that puts a blade against their backs and tells them one more step will mean they lose their legs. Johnny may be from somewhere else, but he is made of the same things that Simon is made of—Johnny is a dog with no owner, and your fingers under his collar only make him salivate. He wants, just like anyone; always searching, never found.

Simon’s men loved their duchess—what would they not do for the woman that fed them, clothed them, attended to them? When you gave the gold that hung from your very ears to the soldier with a sick child to pay for treatments, how could they think any less of you?

You are the woman that married a man with many faces, all of them presumed ugly and detestable. They think you a saint for always putting Simon in a good mood, and for that alone, they’d kiss the cobblestone that you walked on. There is no wrong that you could ever do. You remember their names and their favorite meals and what songs to sing when they sit in your halls, and they recognize the callous you still have in your hands as a sign of the working past you still haven’t let go of. Humble beginnings. A sweet woman. If they knew you wished their death blowing out birthday candles, they’d never believe it. Not the duchess. Not Simon’s wife.

The lady is innocent.

“Johnny, wait!” You waddle outside just as Simon and his men are mounting their horses. You wave to your husband, who nods at you, and then you come up to Johnny’s horse with a small pack in your hands. “Here. One of my maids is…from the Isles. She packed you some things.”

“Fer me, Yer Grace?” Johnny laughs. His cheeks are rosy, and not just from the cold, and he side-eyes your husband nervously before deciding it would be rude to not take the bag from you. He stuffs it into a pack on his horse before giving you a short bow of his head, and you smile before resting your hand over your belly to kiss your husband goodbye. You stand on your toes and press your lips to his helmet. “Say thank ye to the duchess fer her kindness, lads.”

A round of thank yous follow Johnny’s command, and you pet Simon’s horse gently as he fixes his pack to the back, a bedroll and satchel of supplies you readied for him. His stallion is so great and large—onyx with dark eyes, so much taller than you that you are always craning your neck to stroke his nose. He has lovely dark hair, and his mane has been carefully brushed out overnight. You reach into your pocket for a piece of fruit for him, and you giggle when his horse nuzzles into your neck as you feed him his snack.

“You spoil ‘im, love,” Simon mutters, and you sigh, feeling him at your back as you give his horse another piece of fruit.

“He deserves it,” you say softly. “He brings you home to me.” You look up at him. “To us.”

“Tha’ he does.”

Simon is the final obstacle to conquer. Not to sweeten his mind to royal children or fatten up his men—no. You have to convince Simon that climbing this particular ladder is worth what comes after, because doing so will not go quietly. Simon does not do things or make decisions unless they are backed by tactical advantage. It is why he is still alive and why he always wins what he is after. There must be some strategic advantage, some gain, that will be good enough that it will be worth the blood he spills to reach the top.

Simon Riley is a descendant of vikings. His men whisper it amongst themselves often, and when you watch him sleep at night, it is not a difficult thing to believe. His sheer strength. His large stature. The darkness of his eyes, the width of his palms, the way that warfare and killing and conquering are so innate and instinctual that it must be woven into his very being, in his blood, in his bones, passed down from generations of warriors that he must have had as ancestors.

Simon was born for this. Simon was born for more. Simon was born to take and to take and to take—the same way he took you, the same way he simply saw what he wanted and made it his, this is his purpose.

Blood will spill. If not his own, then someone else’s—someone’s that will matter. There will be anger, and there will be dissonance, so it needs to be a decision made in good timing. Taking matters this way will lead to political strafes—it needs to be at a moment where Simon can easily sway them back to contentment. His men will be frightened—he must do this at a time where he has something to offer them in return. The balance must be kept, as all things in history are done. When someone takes too much, it is given back in some way. When someone is too generous, they are taken advantage of, betrayed or left behind. Chaos, anger, and pain—these are the things that will work in Simon’s favor.

He has already lost so much and built himself back up; but Simon’s cup is not yet full.

You do not see Simon again until the celebration of the queen’s birthday.

All noble people have been asked to come stay at the palace. You follow in your carriage behind a long line of other carriages up the grand path to the royal estate. When you peek your head out of the carriage window, you see Johnny trotting alongside, catching your eye and giving you a small nod before he picks up the pace a little. He’s been riding alongside you for the three-day trip to the palace—it would be quicker for Simon to meet you here, but he had planned for a small group of his men to accompany you on the journey.

You brighten as soon as you see him. Simon is there just beyond the gates, waiting on his horse as he watches the line of carriages come in. You suspect he must be surveilling them, watching for something awry. You wave when you catch his eye, and though he does not move from his post, you giggle when he winks at you as you pass.

There’s decorations everywhere. As soon as you walk into the entrance hall, you’re greeted by arches of red and white roses. There’s candles lit everywhere, greenery across all the walls. You clutch your fur coat to your chest as you look around in awe. It’s so grand and beautiful, and there’s red and gold banners flying across all the halls. The palace has been bathed in the celebration of your queen, extravagant and elegant, but you wonder briefly how much coin it took to make it so.

England's people starve; but there's somehow money for a grand party.

You tried to dress for the occasion. Your dressmakers sent you off with a trunk full of new gowns, and you wear one now. Puffy sleeves have been seen all throughout court, and you wear them now. Heavy navy blue velvet, with trims along the sleeves that reveal the silver under-fabric of your dress. Everything is held together with your skirts just pinned above your belly, with a silver chain belt high around your waist. Your skirt glitters with small, handsewn pearls and gems, and you wear a pin of Simon’s motif on your chest. The skull eyes are adorned with black diamonds, and you touch it absentmindedly for comfort.

“You came!”

There’s an excited squeal that sounds from down the hall. Guests are filing in, being escorted to their rooms, and you notice them all stopping to bow as bright, red fabric flies past them. All you see is a mess of bouncy, ginger curls as you’re engulfed in a big, warm hug. You stumble backwards a little, squeaking, but she keeps you steady as she pulls back to look at you.

“Your Majesty,” you breathe, and she cups your cheeks and shakes her head.

“It’s my birthday, and I command you not to call me that anymore, you must call me Victoria,” she laughs. She looks down as your chambermaid takes your coat, and she gasps when she sees the small bump poking out from under your skirt. “Oh, look at you! You look so beautiful. Can I feel?”

You smile shyly and nod, and she touches your belly with gentle hands. She sighs deeply, shaking her head, and she meets your eyes with a bigger smile than before. She is so genuine, it nearly makes you sick. For all the airheadedness you associated with her, she is kind. When you served her, she always made sure you slept in a warm bed and ate enough food and had enough funds to go to the markets with her. She may be rich and royal and impressionable, but there are glimpses of a soft heart; it's a shame she has no spine to let it show.

“I was hoping you’d come sooner, but…” She shakes her head again, “I’m sorry John keeps your husband away. I…I would try to speak to him, but I fear it won’t do you any good. He never listens to me.”

You resist the urge to roll your eyes. You will never understand her.

“I’ll ask Simon if we can stay a few more days,” you tell her. You don't tell her that you don't have to ask; you don't tell her that if you just asked him, he would make arrangements to make it happen. “After everyone’s gone. I miss the desserts from here. My cooks don’t make jam the way yours do, I miss the way Thomas does it.”

“Thomas?” Victoria looks confused.

“Your pastry cook,” you remind her. “His name is Thomas.”

Her royal blood shows. Her face contorts, as if learning the name of her cooks is something extremely irrelevant and unimportant. You're reminded of your differences.

“Right.” She takes your hand. “Come! I need you to help me pick accessories for tonight, and my ladies never do it right.”

Her birthday always calls for a grand celebration, but this one is packed full of festivities. This year, there is a week-long itinerary of events just in Victoria’s honor. Games, feasts, dances, so many parties. You don’t know why, not even the king celebrates his birthday this way, but you suspect John had done something, and now he is vying for her favor.

For Victoria, you suppose many parties and lots of diamonds will do it.

You help her dress, even though it’s improper for a lady of your station to do it. She tells you that as you stand behind her and delicately tie her corset, but you shake your head anyways, shooing the maids that surround you as you pull deftly and tie solid, perfect bows.

“It makes me feel useful,” you tell her softly, shrugging. “I am not allowed to do much of anything these days.”

“You’re growing a future duke, that’s more work than either of our husbands will do in their lifetime,” Victoria laughs, and you laugh with her. Her dress is utter magic. Intricately patterned red fabric layered over many skirts. Grand sleeves of gold and red, a train of a skirt that stretches far. The trim of her dress is lacy with gems, and you suspect all the pins and buttons and snaps of her dress are proper gold. You put a hand on your belly and step back as one of her maids fits her headpiece on, with a short trailing veil of red tulle. You smile at her. “Well, what do you think?”

“Beautiful as always,” you tell her, and you mean it. She takes a few moments to look at herself in the mirror before she dismisses her staff except for you. You swallow, finding a plush chair to sit in and taking a seat as she stands there, still looking at herself. “Is something the matter?”

Victoria smooths a hand down the front of her dress, shrugging. She stares longingly at her middle, cupping her hands in the way that you often do now. A phantom belly, one she aches for, but her hands fall flat against her dress, all give.

“Please don’t take this the wrong way, because I am very happy you’re here, but…” She sniffles a little. “I thought I’d have a babe by now, too. I am so happy you are, I am, I just…” She bites her lip. “Do you think something is wrong with me?”

“What?” You breathe. “No! Of course not!”

“Then why…” She blinks at you. “Why am I not with child, too?”

You stand up slowly, making your way over to her so you can take her hands in yours. You squeeze them gently, shaking your head. The doubt that plagues her mind had to have been planted their by a man. You can't imagine what her staff must say. What John's men must whisper. The blame will always be on the less-valued body, and next to John, Victoria's worth is simply replaceable. If she ever died, he would marry another.

“May I speak plainly?” You ask. She nods, looking down at her feet. “Well…hmm…perhaps when you lie with John, you could try…a different position. Or…” You face warms as you talk, but you just lower your voice. “Or keep your position for longer. Even after…” You laugh, trying not to be awkward, but the topic is not usually for conversation. You've only ever spoken of these things with Simon.

“After what?” Victoria asks. You blink up at her, confused.

“After he…” You bite your lip, “you know…finishes.”

“Oh,” Victoria laughs. “No, he always goes before that.”

“Oh, Victoria…” You breathe, squeezing her hands again. “Come sit.”

The party is lively when you make it to the grand hall. You’re in a new dress, a more embellished one, and your headpiece has a dark veil that covers your eyes, stopping just above your nose. You are seated just beside the queen, with her husband’s chair empty on her other side. She sits quietly, looking the picture of elegance, but every time you look at her, her face is sullen, and her smile never reaches her eyes.

The music is bright, and the food is lovely. There is a long table filled with fruits, desserts, and meats. Golden roast chicken, fire-roasted lamb and beef and pork, little cakes and tarts filled with jams.

You have no appetite until you see your husband.

He follows your king into the room, standing tall, thick, iron helmet over his head as he surveys the room. His sword drags heavy along the floor, making a scraping sound that rings even over the loud music playing. You don’t focus too much on the dark specks that shine over his armor or what they might be. Instead, all you see is big and terrible and horrifying, and you smile to yourself as you cup under your growing belly and admire him from afar. You are ashamed you were ever afraid of this man.

He’d kill anything to get to where you are now if he sensed some kind of danger. You do not think too long about the fact that it is John Price that stands between you now. He looks handsome; beard combed, trousers fastened, blouse casually unbuttoned. He is all man, John Price, but his presence and his attractiveness never made you look twice. You know of what lies beneath John Price—or rather, what doesn't. John Price is hollow inside. There is nothing there but façade.

Victoria helps you stand when you grab the table to greet the king. As John nears the table, he holds his hand out to you, gesturing you to sit again, and you do, leaning back against the chair as you breathe through a warm spike of back pain.

“Your Grace,” John greets you with a small smile. “You’re glowing.”

“Thank you, Your Majesty,” you say softly. “It’s nice to be back here.”

“We’re glad to have you, aren’t we, love?” He turns to his wife. She shifts in her chair, clenching her jaw. She finally looks at him, ire in those lovely green eyes.

“I wish she had never left,” Victoria says finally. “She’s always honest with me.”

A large shadow falls over the table. Your smile comes back, big and giggly, and Simon bows to your queen before turning to look at you. He moves to round the table, his gait heavy and sounding, and then you feel him at the back of your chair.

“Your face,” you hear him say. His voice is low, tone gravelly and laced with concerned. “Y’r in pain.”

“Just my back,” you say lowly, shaking your head. “It’s nothing.”

“He misses me.”

“I do, Simon,” you whisper, finally looking up and over your shoulder. His armor shifts as he bends his neck to look down at you better from under his helmet. “I miss you.”

His arm comes around and cups under your jaw. The metal of his armor freezes your skin, but you close your eyes anyway. It bites, this kind of touch, but you know this is love. The edge of his armor cuts, too, but it does not make you bleed. Simon couldn’t hurt you—even if he tried.

“We should get ya t’bed,” Simon mutters. “You’ve been on y’r feet too long.”

“No,” you shake your head. “Just a little longer. Please.”

“Not much,” Simon insists. “It’s been a long day f’r ya. Need to sleep.”

“It’s okay,” you tell him, taking his hand in yours. Your palm is engulfed by his, the armor making him seem twice as large. It’s warm now from your touch. “I’ll tell you when I’m ready. Will you sit with me? I haven’t seen you in so long. Please.”

He takes the seat from beside you and falls into it. It creaks under his weight, and you keep his hand in your lap. You smile when he fixes that deadly stare on you again, and you put both hands over his in your lap and keep him close.

“I read another book,” you tell him. “French military strategy. It was fascinating.”

“Was it?” Simon hums. “I didn’t know they had one in English.”

“They don’t,” you tell him. “Had to brush up on my French, but it was worth it. Oh, can I tell you about it, Simon?”

“Let me ‘ear it, sweet’eart,” Simon murmurs. “‘m listenin’.”

After a few minutes, you’ve moved from your chair to his lap. You’re still talking animatedly, using your hands, and Simon’s helmet is tilted at an angle so he can listen and speak to you better. One big hand is where it should be—cupping your swollen belly and securing you from behind. Victoria watches, nearly shaking in her seat. Simon’s entire face is covered, and yet, she already knows her own husband has never looked at her that way. He doesn’t crane his neck to listen to her talk. He doesn’t hold her close that way, not even in private, and he’s never made her feel like the only woman in his whole world.

Their union was political and beneficiary, as most marriages are. Her father, a lord with much land in foreign places—her dowry included a large gold reserve that still keeps their pockets heavy to this day. John needed money to recuperate after his father’s death. For Victoria, John Price was a king—his name meant reputation, royalty, recognition, and no family of fortune would pass that up, even when their country was beginning to be bled dry of its resources. A king is a king, royal blood is royal blood. They did not marry because they would love each other, they were married for fame and fortune.

Victoria might be innocent and naïve, but she is not stupid. Victoria is a romantic. Simon bled for you. Simon won for you. Simon fought to have your hand; he has always wanted you, and now he has you, and he still works to keep you. As John takes his seat beside her, she feels tears at the back of her eyes. She will never live the life she envisioned for herself as a girl. She will never have a story like the ones she used to read about in books or hear from her maid at bedtime. She will never be able to look at her husband without some form of doubt.

John won’t even give her a baby to keep her company. She felt so lucky to marry him—handsome, gallant, endearing. Now, all she sees is half of a man. The crown he wears must bear heavy, because his shoulders are slumped, and he looks sad. She does not know what the fuck he has to be sad about. Money, land, titles, authority, is it never enough for men like this?

She looks over to where you and Simon sit. Your forehead pressed to the side of his helmet. His arm curled around you protectively. The music hurts her ears. The food tastes bland. She wishes it was not her birthday.

“I wonder what it’s like to be loved that way,” Victoria says, absentmindedly. John follows her gaze to where Simon is helping you back to your feet. He sniffs, running a hand over his beard.

“Something you’d like to say to me, dear?” He asks her lowly.

“Fuck off,” she whispers, standing and tossing her napkin aside. “I’m retiring to bed.”

John doesn’t follow her. She knew he wouldn’t, but she cries in her chambers about it anyways.

A house built on precarious foundations is not one that is built to withstand. You think of this as you walk the halls in the morning, Simon’s hand in yours as you breathe in the cold air. Winter is fast approaching, and you see a bit of snowfall that likely won’t stick already clouding the outside world. You slow your pace as you approach the south-facing walls, the farthest away from the guest quarters, when you know you are alone, just with Simon.

“I have a confession to make, Simon,” you tell him. You put your hands on the edge of the balcony you look out of, sighing as you stare out at the dying orchards outside. It makes the roses all over the palace seem all the more magnificent. Inaccessible.

“Not a priest,” Simon grunts, shaking his head. “Y’r my wife. Y’can tell me anythin’.”

“Without repercussion?” You laugh, but it is without humor. There is nothing funny about what you have been doing behind his back, without his knowledge, without his guidance, without his advice. You are Simon’s confidant, but he is not yours, and you wonder how upset he will be once he knows the secret you have been keeping from him under the guise of security—and power.

“Woteva mess y’ve made, I’ll clean it up,” Simon kisses his teeth. “Tell me wot y’ve done.”

You turn to look at him from over your shoulder. He stands at attention, arms at his back, and you fold your gloved hands in front of you, over your belly. There is no need to protect yourself from him—it is true that no matter what you’ve done, he will not hate you. A morbid thought you suddenly have, but there could be a trunk full of dead children in your closet, and he will create some horridly wonderful excuse to explain your misfortune.

“A terrible thing, Simon,” you whisper. Your eyes water a little. “And I don’t know…” You bite your lip. “It’s a terrible thing, and I don’t feel bad about doing it, and I can’t bring myself to feel bad. It’s a selfish thing. I’m selfish.”

“Tell me now wot y’ve done,” Simon repeats. “Won’t be upset. Just tell me. I’ll fix it.”

You don’t know how to explain what it is you’ve done. You haven’t really done anything yet, but there are people you have whispered to for far too long, and now they cannot possibly ignore you any longer. Anger, frustration, jealousy, real ire—when placed in vulnerable hands during times of great peril, you can wind up a mechanism that will spiral out of control.

That is your moment. That is your window of opportunity. That is the plane between what exists now and what you really want, and you will need to angle Simon’s head in just a way so that he sees exactly what you see. Bend him to your height. Force him to a knee. Pull back the skin he thinks he wears to show him what he really is inside—royal and deserving and full of red blood. Everyone bleeds the same color, no matter their status or class or what they carry in their coin purse. Simon has never been one for politics or grandeur; you will make him one. You will make it matter because it is you that says it.

“I’ve set something in motion,” you say. “I can’t stop it now. I…I’ve been doing it behind your back, Simon, a-and I’m sorry—” Your lip wobbles. “You will hate me.”

“Are ya speakin’ of the throne that’s right down the hall tha’s mine f’r the takin’, love?”

Your breath catches. Your heart falls straight into the acid bath of your stomach. You pull your coat around your shoulders a little tighter, shaking your head. He narrows his eyes at you under his helmet, and a few tears slip and roll down your cheeks. Under his scrutiny, you feel smaller.

“Y-You’ve known?” You whisper. “A-All this time?”

“Y’think I wouldn’t spot a coup in the makin’ from this close?” Simon chuckles. “Got half a mind to be offended, my dear wife. Hmm…” He walks towards you, his hands coming up, and you flutter your lashes up at him as he cups your jaw in two big hands. The sour in your stomach settles. Your insides calm. Your lips part, and you stare up at a beast that will tuck you away in their den later. “Y’were indeed made t’be mine. You are…” He hums, a deep growl that rattles your insides. “...bloody evil.”

Johnny’s gifts. Your children’s praises.

“S-Simon—”

The French military strategies you so adore—

“‘s my blood inside of you—” Simon whispers. “My son, he makes you hungry, as I knew he would, but this is…” He cups the back of your head and presses the front of his helmet to your face, so firmly, you feel it imprinting on your skin. “...you are mine. In ways even I could not have predicted.”

You blink up at him, wet eyes shining like stars. You put your shaking hands on either side of his helmet, and with his dark eyes on yours, you feel stripped bare and so naked. He sees you in ways no one else ever has. He knows you in ways even you do not know. You are so in tune, in a manner that terrifies you and comforts you all the same. There are things at play now that will change the courses of history, but with Simon at your back, you are so far from afraid. There is nothing in this entire world that could hurt you, not with him so close, so fucking close.

You are unbound. Simon pries the manacles off of you with nothing but brute strength. His trust washes over you, absolving you of every secret that you thought you were keeping from him that felt like marital sin. Simon knew—has known, knows. He let you keep this from him, this quiet lie, this diabolical plan, because only someone like him could ever think to do something so heinous. There are many thrones up for grabs and many places he could have called himself king, but you chose the very land he was born on. The dirt that’s always been under his feet. The walls he built with his very hands. The food he eats that he has watched grow right outside of his window—you chose the very place that owes him the most for the sweat, the blood, the skin he has marred and dug out just to keep from succumbing to someone else.

Simon built this place. Simon put it back together after it had fallen apart, scattered across realms that never thought someone like Ghost would return for it. John wanted to pay for it on Simon’s back; but crowns come at great cost, and John is in debt.

You have swayed his army. You have pulled the veil down that he kept over his wife. You have stolen things from him that will be impossible to get back, and as you watch the red and gold banners flap in the winter air, you wonder how much better these walls would look if they were your navy blue. There is a red that may still color the stone, but you’re afraid it will be much less wanted there.

Tonight, it is a private celebration for the queen. Only the most noble of invitees, and although you normally might not be included on this particular list, Victoria asked for you, and John allowed Simon to be a guest, not guard. You are dressed for the occasion—a large dress, a multiple of layered skirts. The collar of your dress is lined with delicate white fox fur, and there are no pearls in your dress this time. Only diamonds, black and peppered, and your headpiece covers your eyes again, leaving only your mouth uncovered. The fabric of your headpiece cascades down your back, covering your hair, and Simon smooths his gloved finger over your exposed bottom lip as he straightens out the veil.

“You get more beautiful everyday,” Simon mutters as you pick up one of his heavy pauldrons. You smile as you fasten his armor, He’s so handsome, and you love putting the bulk back on him. He carries it so easily—several stones worth of iron and chainmail that never weighs him down. He moves so swiftly, so deadly. There are rags in the washing room at this moment with some unfortunate’s blood on them, rags you dirtied just a few nights ago when you cleaned him off before bed. As you put it back on him, you feel like you’re putting back on his true self. “Like a flower.”

“Come off it,” you giggle, draping his cloak around his shoulders to fit into their place. It hangs across his back, and you straighten it out until the skull insignia is visible. Then, you take the grand blue sash that is laid across the bed and fit it across his chest. You pin it in place and fix the pins and medals there. “Look at you. So official.”

“It’s decoration,” Simon grumbles, rolling out his shoulders. “Like I’m some sort of bloody present. Ridiculous.”

“I agree,” you coo, putting your palms against his chest. “I prefer you dirtied from the mud outside, like the dog you are.”

“Careful, love. I’ll bite.”

“Won’t you, Simon?” You whisper, touching your nose to his. “Bite me?”

The kiss you share is wet and languid. Your tongue slides over his, and when he cups the back of your neck, you lower your hands to cup where he’s hard and wanting. Throbbing even.

“It’s been too long, Your Grace,” you whisper between kisses. “Please…”

“Bloody hell.”

You squeak with delight when he picks you up from under your thighs. You laugh as he sits you on the nearest surface, a side table full of trinkets and books and knickknacks that Simon tosses onto the floor. You drop a hand to gather up your skirts, and you moan softly when Simon’s big hands smooth up your thighs and spread them apart for him.

He always hurts to take at first. No matter how much prep, no matter how many orgasms, no matter how long Simon has spent with his mouth fixed to your cunt, you always feel like you’re taking him for the very first time. You lick into his mouth when he slides in, already wet and leaking, and you break your kiss to groan when you feel him snug inside of you.

“Good for the baby,” Simon whispers against your lips, and you lift your knees to take him deeper.

“You’re good for the baby,” you gasp, your head falling back as Simon drags his hips in a slow grind. Your cunt squeezes him in, velvet and warm and dribbling around his cock as it suckles on what it was starved of for too long. Flowering, blossoming, opening up even though it’s already full of him and given him what he wants. Simon thinks the sex only gets better—you are wetter, tighter, softer than ever before, and as your belly grows, so does his hunger, and yours with it.

He is a greedy monster. Bloodthirsty, harrowing. Simon must have been dropped on his head as a babe to have a mind so terrible, but then again, what is your excuse? For being horrible? Terrible? A reaper in training with soft skin, why is it that you have fallen angel syndrome when you’ve never touched anything so black in your life?

Simon is the dark. Simon is what soots the fingers and wets the blade. Simon is what carves into stone and erodes great canyons and splinters the wood, bit by bit. His shoulders are not just for showing great strength—he creates the path he needs to follow, whether or not it yet exists in front of him. Your word is truth, and Simon makes it real, and you never should have doubted the thing that’s been most honest since the day you married.

Love. Raw and unfiltered between you, a waterfall that cannot be broken, not by stone nor dam nor whatever is rigid enough to try. This love is not careful. It is not sweet. It is not romantic. It is everything that his men are afraid of, and everything that his king will learn is a reckoning years in the making.

When you were just girls, your queen loved to hear the story of the Old Sultan. A dog, without teeth and mar, who overheard he would be expended just the next day despite his years of servitude because he was no longer able to do as he once did in his youth. Without teeth, he had no bite, and without bite, he served no more purpose. He was a burden—a burden that required soft food and a warm place to sleep, but he could not pay for it any longer.

So, the dog struck up a ruse. To steal his master’s babe, to watch a befriended wolf take it away, and to show he was still useful by bringing the babe back; and even when the wolf called in his favor, the Old Sultan refused to betray his master. It is a tale of sheer and true loyalty. You always hated the dog for needing to prove himself over and over again. Victoria always loved the dog because everything he did, he did because he loved so much.

Would she compare your Simon to this dog? Big and terrible and too heavy for his own good—not useful anymore, not enough? Even if she did, she might think Simon loyal enough to not betray his king. The ultimate betrayal, the most awful truth, surely, the king’s right hand would never dare to do such a thing.

When Simon comes inside of you, you are reminded that Simon is not old, nor is he past his prime. Simon has only just begun his reign.

It will be glorious.

Victoria is always the picture of elegance, but she looks much more like a queen now that she despises her husband. Her head is held so high. Her shoulders are square and back. Her eyes are dull and wanting, and when she smiles, it is only to save face, and not because she means it. Her dress is structured silk, that is pleated over her corset, and she looks magnificent and ethereal. Her veil is longer than her skirt train, and she is dripping in golden jewelry.

John drinks and barely speaks. Simon sits at his side, a similar golden cup in his hand, and he drinks and makes conversation lowly with his king. Your queen is receiving gifts, seated as guests come, bow, and present her with little trinkets and wonderful jewels and titles of wonderful plots of land. She coos and gasps at everything presented to her, and she even tries to show John some of her gifts, but he just smiles absentmindedly and waves his hand.

When the meal is over, guests shuffle back to their rooms. There is a full day tomorrow, an entire winter festival planned where there will be games, food, prizes, and more celebrating. When the candles are burning down to the last fo their wax, it is just you and Simon, your queen and your king, and a few lingering guards. The music has quieted, but a lone few musicians still play light music.

“What a marvelous amount of gifts, Your Majesty,” you say softly. You put your hands over your belly, smiling at her, and she cranes her neck to look at you before looking back at the gifts on the table.

“Yes,” Victoria agrees. “Beautiful. Aren’t they, John?”

“Quite beautiful, my love,” John nods. “We’ll need to find a place for everything, won’t we?”

“You know an awful lot about where things must go, John, don’t you?”

Your eyes flicker to Simon. He meets your eyes, and he gives you just the slightest shake of his head. You spread your hands across your belly protectively, shifting in your seat. Opportunity presents itself in the most mysterious of ways. The air tastes good. There is something in it.

John takes a deep breath, turning to look at Simon for just a moment before settling his eyes on his wife. He folds his hands together and leans against the table, clicking his tongue.

“You’re always in a sour mood when our duchess comes to visit, y’know tha’, love?”

You turn your head enough for John to be in your line of sight. You suck in a soft breath, but the air is stale and ugly. Victoria grabs her wine glass and pushes it over, letting the red liquid spill over her presents as she grunts angrily at her husband.

“You hate all of my friends!” She whines. “Do you know how…h-how alienating it is to be your queen? No one wants to tell me the truth, t-they just…spoon feed me compliments that taste like lies. How could you be so cruel, John?”

“Cruel?” John laughs. “I gave them their titles, I don’t need to be anything other than what I am, and that is a king. I don’t hate the duchess—”

“You’re a terrible liar, Your Majesty,” you say softly. Simon tights one hand into a fists, looking up towards the ceiling for a moment. He hears it in your voice, what you don't say out loud. “It was difficult to hear it before, but I hear it now. Very clearly.”

“You need to learn your place, Your Grace,” John murmurs. “Or have you forgotten where that is?”

“Careful, my king,” you warn him. “Sounds…an awful lot like a threat.”

“Can we just be civil?” Victoria sniffles, wiping at her face. She pouts, shaking her head. “I don’t want any fighting on my birthday.”

“We do not fight with anyone, I am king, and you are queen, and our subjects do as we say,” John reminds her. “That is all. The day you forget that—”

“John, just stop it!” Victoria snaps. She slams her hands on the table in front of her, making the dishes rattle, and you stiffen at the way her entire face twists with anger.

“What is it about her that makes you so fucking irate?!” John spits back, standing. His chair clatters as it falls behind him, and Victoria winces. You don’t flinch, and neither does Simon. Simon swirls the wine around in his cup, kissing his teeth behind him as he watches carefully. John is walking a fine line, and Simon will allow it, just until he crosses over it. “What is it that she says to you that makes you so fucking difficult?!”

“The truth,” you answer for her. “I tell her the truth, and it bothers you so to say it to her, and I can’t imagine why.” John’s eyes are no longer blue—so dark, they are to scare you, but there is nothing to be afraid of. “Who is it that you visit when you are not with her, Your Majesty? What bastard children do you hide?”

The sound of a blade unsheathing is all too familiar for you. You barely blink when you feel the sharp tip of it against your jaw. You knew you would strike something deep within him, but you are in fact surprised at his reaction. You didn't expect something so reckless.

Something so utterly stupid.

“No! J-John, what are you doing?! Get a-away from her! Oh, please—!”

Simon is still seated. He leans back, relaxed, hands splayed wide across his thighs as his king holds a blade against his wife’s throat. You purse your lips, shaking your head as much as you can.

“It’s alright, Your Majesty, he won’t do anything,” you tell Victoria. She has tears coming down her face, and her hands are shaking as she watches in horror. “If I die, he goes with me. That I’m sure of.”

“I am your king,” John mutters. “You have committed treason. You have betrayed your king and your queen, of the highest offense, and I condemn you, do you know what tha’ fucking means?”

“John, p-please!” Victoria cries. “Please, please—I’m sorry—just let her go! Please, don’t do this—she’s with child, for God’s sake!”

“All the more reason she should’ve been more careful opening her mouth.”

The music has stopped. The room is so cold and so silent, but you keep yourself from shivering. You steel your hands, and with Simon’s eyes on you, you know not to move.

“Y’ve had y’r fun, You Majesty,” Simon speaks up finally. “Lower tha’. It’s been a long time since you’ve seen blood, my king, and if the first bit of it you see is my wife’s, I’ll cut off the hand tha’ does it.”

“Threatening your king, now?”

“I’ll do a lot worse if ya don’t do as I tell ya.”

Victoria meets your eyes. She’s a wreck—shaking, shivering, sputtering tears as she reaches out for you. You hold her gaze, shaking your head, and she stands on wobbly legs as she moves back until Simon is in front of her. She hides behind his chair, in shambles, and she whimpers when the hall doors bang open and a regiment of soldiers come inside.

Johnny is there, leading them. He looks so bewildered. Like a knife has cut through his gut, his eyes shine with wetness. Before him stands the moment of truth—does he keep the oath he swore his life upon, or does he honor the dirt he bled on with his men?

Simon makes the decision for him. He stands, hands at his sides, and Johnny takes one last look at you before he decides. His sweet duchess—perfect princess. Humble. Kind. You always remind him of home. You touch him, and you see him, and you remember his name.

“Put down the knife.” Johnny’s voice finds itself. It shakes, just enough, and his king looks horrified.

“What’s the meaning of this?” John breathes. “What the fuck are you lot looking at? Seize them!”

“Put it down, Yer Majesty,” Johnny mutters. “We won’t ask again.”

You blink up when you feel the knife leave your throat. It nicks the skin anyway, and you feel a slow drop of blood trace the line of your throat and settle down the neckline of your dress. You watch as John tosses the knife onto the table, slumping into his chair. Simon takes slow, deliberate steps towards you, and you finally breathe out the breath you’ve been holding when you feel his hand on the back of your head.

“Johnny.” Simon’s voice is low and commanding. “Take my wife back to her room. Gather her things. She’s leaving.”

“Simon—”

He shakes his head, and you quiet. He helps you stand, supporting your back, and when you round the table, Johnny takes your hand to help you down a few steps.

“What’s happening?” Victoria whines. She’s sitting on the floor now, hugging the wall, and she shakes as the guards come close to her. You know that fear. You remember it.

“Don’t touch her,” you tell them, stopping in your tracks. She may be rich and spoiled and dumb at times, but she protected you when she didn’t have to. You could at least preserve her dignity, for whatever it is worth. “Take her back to her chambers, and leave her be.”

“Do as she says,” Simon snaps, and the guards start moving again. “Don’t make her repeat herself, bloody fuckin’ hell.”

Victoria is inconsolable. Screaming, crying, kicking, sputtering John’s name, who doesn’t so much as look at her. When her crown falls off of her head and clatters to the floor, no one picks it up for her. They drag her out, despite her protests, and she takes the noise with her. You share one last look with Simon before Johnny guides the doors shut, and all he does is nod your way before the lock sounds.

The air only thickens when they are alone. Hot, like iron, rusting like it, too. It burns to breathe it in, and John doesn't know where he is. He doesn't recognize this place.

“There is a horizon that men do not see,” Simon murmurs. “I don’t know why we cannot, but tha’ doesn’t matter.” He spins the dagger between his fingers, the pointed tip piercing the tip of his index finger enough to draw blood, even under his glove. “She sees it; and who am I to refuse what she’s promised me, John?”

There is no convincing Simon. Even if John doesn’t believe himself, even if you are lying, there is no convincing a man who has put his faith in the hands of a woman like you—you can tell him the grass is purple, and he will not step outside to confirm. You can tell him the sun has never been orange, and his memories will shift and skew until yes, dear wife, you’re right—it has always been black, hasn’t it? There is no fighting Simon on the matters of his wife; you carry his son inside of you. John thinks, disappointingly, that even if you were not pregnant, Simon would still not deny you this request. Your word is gospel. Your want is Creed. Your need is salvation. Your joy is redemption.

“You cannot be serious, Simon,” John tries. “Listen to yourself! When have we ever listened to anyone but each other?”

“Perhaps if you paid any attention to the wife you’ve forgotten, you would have seen this coming,” Simon tells him. “If she was anything but a warm vessel for a child you won’t give her, she might have been able to tell you about somethin’ you were blind to. Y’r ignorance has killed you, John. Y’r neglect is the knife in y’r back.”

Your mistake was giving me what I wanted. I asked for her—you gave her to me.

“Simon, do not do this.”

“Don’t beg, John,” Simon kisses his teeth, shaking his head. He twirls the dagger between his fingers, and it glistens as it spins until the handle is in his palm. “It’s beneath you.”

“You are beneath me!” John slams his fist against the table. His voice shakes; Simon has never heard John so afraid. Even the men who have died beside him in battle don't sound this afraid, even when their insides are spilling out of their chainmail. John doesn't know what it is to be afraid. Everything he has ever fought for has never been earned. “You answer to me! I am your king! You’ve forgotten yourself, Simon, but don’t forget where you fuckin’ came from. You were nothing when I found you, and despite everything I have given you, you are still the dog that you always have been. I’ve let you do as you please for far too long, but now you need to stand down and be a fuckin’ good one!”

John knows he’s made a mistake as soon as it slips out. Simon is a dog—one that he’s neglected, because that is what kings do. They have subjects, subordinates, and not friends. They have allies and advisors, not confidants, not family. John has put distance between everyone. Not just his men, but his wife, too, and Simon understands that this means he must die for it. John does not command his men—Simon does. John does not appreciate his wife—she stands alone. John does not incite loyalty—he has ostracized himself, the son of a usurper, the king that took good people for granted, the king that wanted land and money to make up for everything his father had pissed away. He climbed the ladder alone, and he will die on it alone. There will be no one to catch him, even if they are there to watch it. They will watch him fall and gladly bury him.

He is not your dog anymore—he’s mine.

That is what you said, isn’t it? Blasphemy—that is why John must die.

Simon does not come home in a rush. You are sitting by the window in the drawing room, watching as his horse trots calmly up the road. He rides alone, black stallion huffing as it carries your beast of a husband towards the stables. You cannot see his face, but you can read his body language. Shoulders hunched, gloved hands curled into tight fists along the reigns. He is stiff and closed-off even from a distance, and like he knows you are watching, he tilts his head up, and your eyes meet.

Simon pulls on the reigns enough that his horse stops. The great tail flicks as it bends its head to chomp a little on a bale of hay on the side of the path, and Simon takes a few moments to look at you before he kicks his foot and his horse gets moving again.

You waddle downstairs to the stables to meet him. You have a thick shawl over your shoulders to keep you warm, and when you emerge in the doorway, Simon is just leaving his horse with the staff waiting for him there. Simon exchanges a few words with him before he turns to greet you.

“Too cold,” Simon says, nodding his head at you. “Inside.”

“Simon—”

“Inside.”

You wait in the kitchen. One of the maids is getting you a glass of warm milk when Simon comes in. His armor has been shed, and you feel sick when you see the front of his shirt speckled with red. When he nods at the maid, she leaves in a hurry after passing you the warm cup.

“What happened?”

You jump a little as he drops to his knees. He presses his face into your stomach, cheek resting over the small bump there. You widen your knees to hold him closer, cradling his head against you as you bend to rest your cheek against the top of his head.

“It’s okay, Simon,” you say softly. “Whatever happened…I forgive you. It’s going to be alright.”

I forgive you.

It is enough. Simon does not pray in chapels. Simon does not receive blessings from the church nor does he anoint himself with something as trivial as water. There is no power in some man’s hand hovering over some entity, but there is power in the papers that say you belong to him, in the wedding band you wear that symbolizes the boundless, endless sanctity of your marriage, there is power in the hands that you have smoothing over his head and absolving him of this sin. It is not a sin in Simon’s eyes—there is nothing immoral about doing what is best for his kin.

There is nothing immoral about loving your wife—even it if means doing what others could not. What others would not. The unthinkable. The unfathomable. The inevitable. He did what needed to be done, and you forgive him.

"You could have sent for me," you tell him. You've followed him into the bathing room, where there is a tub that Simon now sits in. The bath water is hot, and you thank the maid that finishes pouring the last bucket of water into it. When you are alone, Simon does not meet your eyes. You raise the sponge to his head, and he turns away from you. You lower your hand, pursing your lips. "You covered it in your rage. You did not want me to see it."

His eyes say it all, and you clench your jaw.

"You forget that I know you, Simon," you murmur. "You forget that I was once afraid of you because of the things that I know." You sit up and cup his cheeks, forcing him to look at you. "I have seen you carry decapitated heads on your back. I have stood in those very halls and watched you…watched you do the most awful things. There is nothing about you that would—"

"There is something you must learn about these things," Simon interrupts you gently. Your lip trembles, and the water sloshes as he takes your hands in his and squeezes them. "About men…and the things we do for wot we love." He shakes his head. "There is somethin' wretched in me, love. Something…no' right. It bleeds in me—" You close your eyes as his arm leaves the water, wetting your nightgown as he cups under your belly and feels where another heart beats. "—and now it bleeds in you. Forgive me for wanting to…keep you from it. Just this once."

"Simon…"

"I've always known it. Even when I knew tha' you were wot it was I was missing, I took you—don't you remember?" He asks you through his teeth. "I killed battalions ta prove my worth. So when I asked for your hand, there would be no uncertainty. I have…I have put head on spikes just to come home to you quicker. I have killed my own king to do your bidding, don't you know wot tha' means for me?" Simon tangles his fingers in your hair, and there are tears in your eyes. "My loyalty lies with no one. I have no friend nor foe. My heart lies in your hands—" He jostles you as he presses his forehead to yours. "—and if you crushed it, I would still be grateful tha' you had it at all."

His kiss is bruising. His teeth clack against your own, and you bite down on his lip, keeping him near. He growls at the feeling, mouth opening wide, and when your tongues meet, you climb into the bath to meet him closer.

Simon gains clarity—that's what his new title does to him. When they hand him a crown, Simon all but sneers at it—nearly spits on it until you whisper in your ear that such behavior is unbecoming of a monarch.

He refuses any kind of coronation. The only difference in the changing of hands is that the banners that hang are colored navy blue—the red flies no longer.

The estate looks abandoned. It's frozen in time, from weeks ago—there are still dead roses lining the walls, candles that have melted into their sconces. The banners that used to hang are crumpled on the floor, and when you pass the grand hall, you try not to stare too long at the staff throwing buckets of water onto the stone floor.

You try not to linger on the fact that the water runs pink.

Victoria is wearing black, as if there is something for her to mourn. She sits in the library, on the floor by the south-facing windows. It's snowing steadily now, sticking in powdery mounds, and when you see her face illuminated by the clouded sunlight, she looks pale and worn. There is no color in her face, and her eyes are dark, barely green. Her hair has barely been brushed, perhaps just a comb ran through it, and she is void of any jewelry. It's so odd to see her this way—so plain. Your belly is much bigger now, prominent under your dress, and you have to take a breath to sit. You knew Simon would make a big baby, but the weight you carry is starting to become increasingly more difficult to handle.

"They tell me you won't eat," you say softly, smoothing your hands down your stomach. Victoria doesn't move. Her head lays on her arms as she stares out at the snow, and you pity the tear that falls down her face. "You have to eat."

"In a matter of weeks, I've lost my husband, my title, and my friend. I don't have an appetite."

You were told she has been only quiet. In the weeks since her birthday, she stays in her room, and she does little else. You were surprised she wasn't angrier, more filled with rage, but she just seems disappointed. She might be sad that her husband is gone, but you think it's more of something else; the life she thought she always wanted died, too, and she doesn't see purpose anymore.

"It wasn't personal, Victoria. None of it was."

"Please don't lecture me. Please."

Her voice breaks, and you look down at where your belly pokes out under your skirt. Perhaps your first act as queen will be one of mercy.

Generosity.

"I came to see you because I…have a proposition for you," you explain gently. "If you'll listen to it."

She finally turns her head enough so she can look at you, and her lip trembles.

"Are you making me go?" She asks.

"No," you shake your head. "I need…someone that I can trust. And there's…" You swallow. "There's someone I need you to marry."

"Who would want me?" She whines. "There's nothing to want from me anymore. I'm not a queen, and I lied with another man. N-No one will want me."

You smile, gentle pity. "Trust me, Victoria. This one wants you," you laugh gently. You remember those blue eyes when you asked it of him. That smile. "I promise."

She moves her hands into her lap, and she slumps against the wall. You take a deep breath before joining her on the floor, and she takes your hands in hers to help you sit next to her. Victoria turns her head to look at you, and you look at her, and as she continues to cry, you reach up to wipe her face gently.

"Do you hate me?" She asks.

"No," you breathe. "Of course not. I never have." Your hands go back to your belly, and one of hers follows, and when her palm touches your skirt, your son kicks. Her eyes widen, and she lets out a laugh through her tears, putting both hands on you as she feels his feet. You make a face at the feeling, your insides feeling sore. "Do you hate me?"

Victoria shakes her head.

"No," she whispers. "I couldn't hate you for…what men do."

Would she hate you if she knew the actions of men were because of you? Would she hate you if she knew that yes—a man drew the sword—but it was me that gave the order?

Simon is not just your executioner; he's your shield. The world will give him the credit and the ire. No one will ever think to look at who stands beside him. You think Simon knows this. Your sins and your lies, they will never really be your own. They will always be his. He will take your wins, yes—but he will also take the blame. That's the way he would prefer it.

That's the way he will make it to be.

It is spring when your son is born. The snow is just starting to melt, just barely, when you hear him cry for the very first time. The ache you feel in your chest when he is in your arms is like nothing you have ever felt. You have sweat cascading down your back, along your forehead, and your midwife's hands are covered in a layer of blood and fluid; there by her side is your husband.

It isn't standard for men aside from physicians to be here, but you begged him to stay, and he came willingly. He was not afraid of any of it. Not the blood, not the screaming, not the panic. He thought, disturbingly, that it was not unlike a battlefield, and when you collapse against his chest holding his son, he thinks you must be the strongest person he knows. You endure such pain. You accept it willingly. Unlike men that wet themselves the moment a sword is in front of them, you face the discomfort and the ache head-on, and you do not turn away when it pushes back on you. He closes his eyes when he hears his son wail, and his lips find your forehead when he hears your own cries.

"Look wot you did," Simon whispers, holding you closer. "Look wot you made."

You are told that your baby is one of the largest the midwife has ever seen. You are sore for weeks, but there is so much joy, it's hard to think about it too hard. Your title and your wealth afford you nannies and night nurses and wet nurses, but you refuse them all—you can't fall asleep without being able to see your son's chest rising and falling, and the thought of someone else answering his cries for help is unbearable.

The sight you love the most now is of Simon holding him. The way he cradles your baby in one arm, the way your son is tucked into the space there and curls up, protected and safe, makes your entire body warm. There is nowhere better than the space between Simon's arms, and your son already knows that, and he is only weeks old. He has his father's eyes. His father's nose. All of his wisdom, you know it already, and all of his vigor and strength.

Simon tells you that he has your cunning. That it will make him a great king.

It is strange to think of yourself in your past life. The girl that used to hide. That did nothing but bow her head and ask how she could serve, serve better. You remember kneeling beside your queen, cowering behind her many skirts, watching as John's knight tossed bags leaking with old blood onto the stone floor and caused a roar of cheering and thrown mead. You think of yourself, barely peeking around her, making eye-contact with that beast from under his helmet. You knew he always watched you. You knew he noticed you. For all of your invisibility, Simon constantly made you feel as if he was putting you on a pedestal, and you hated it. You rejected it. You wanted the floor to open up and swallow you into it, and you wanted everything to be just a little quieter, a little darker.

You were blind. You were naïve. You saw the storm just ahead and not the beautiful horizon just behind it.

You are watching your son waddle around the library when Simon comes to find you. He has just begun to walk, and now he can't stand not being on his feet. He squeals and laughs when he sees his father come into the room, and you can't help the smile that blooms over your face. Your son adores his father. As Simon comes near, your son raises his arms, bouncing on his chubby little legs, whining until his father picks him up from under his arms and tosses him into the air to make him laugh.

"Taking a break from your difficult duties, my husband?" You ask. He hoists your son up on his hip, pulling something out of the bag at his side and presenting it to your baby. You roll your eyes with a laugh when you see what it is—an egg tart, one of your son's favorites, who reaches for it with his little hands to bring it to his mouth. Almost immediately, he's covered in pastry crumbs. "Simon, you spoil him."

"He's a growing boy. Needs his food."

"Uh huh. Don't you have meetings to be at?"

"'s olright. Johnny's there."

"I thought they were still honeymoon-ing."

Simon snorts, shaking his head, "they're back. Definitely…still honeymoon-ing. Bloody mutt can't keep still anymore."

You think of Victoria and her infectious smile. Her fluttering lashes the day after her wedding, and the flushed cheeks whenever she looked at Johnny. What a good distraction for her—morbidly, you think of how she can even say the same name when she lies with her new husband, if she so wanted to.

He sets your son down, who quickly waddles towards where his wooden toys sit on the carpet. Your eyes go lidded when you feel Simon come closer, his hand along the nape of your neck. He tilts your head up to look at him, and then he takes a knee so he can draw you closer. He lifts the front of his mask, and you whine when he kisses you softly.

"I can't keep still anymore, either."

"Simon…" You sigh, licking your lips. "Careful. There's a baby in here."

"Right," he smirks. "Think we can make another?"

Your face grows so hot. There's butterflies in your belly. You open your mouth, and he kisses you again. He tastes so good. He tastes warm. He tastes like victory. Everything you have ever really wanted is yours because you let a stray in and gave it a name.

Where are the places you might go? What are the crowns you might take? What waits for you across the ocean now that the storm has passed, and there is nothing but calm waters ahead?

John would liken Simon's leash to a noose, the one you hold, the one you have wrapped so tightly around your hand. It is your second skin.

cw: mature language and content, suggestive language and content, graphic depictions of violence, smut, unprotected piv, cumplay, oral, simon is not a good or nice person (except to reader), reader also maybe isn't a good person who knows, reader has hair long enough to hold, curvy/plus-sized!reader, size difference, size kink, military inaccuracies, 18+

There is a special place in hell for men like Michael.

You can see her through the window by the door. Her big eyes are looking at where you are, paws against the glass. Her mouth opens, and she scratches at the window, and your bottom lip trembles as you set your hand down where she touches.

You could care less about the things you left inside. Your clothes, your bags, your shoes, even your fucking computer can stay behind, but not her. Your tabby cat is inside, sitting by the window, and Michael changed the fucking locks.

You bang on the door for an hour. You leave, come back, keep banging, but no one ever answers. You've never felt this desperate or uneasy, but every time you come back and see her by the window, you nearly lose all of your composure. It isn't fair. She doesn't belong to him. He can take years from you, take your money, take your sanity, but he won't take her. You'll come back every single day. You'll become a nuisance. You'll never let him relax. Until he gives her back to you, he will never know peace.

A single day passes before you decide it's time to take drastic measures.

The nearest military base is situated a good distance away, but not so far that you won't drive to its neighboring city. There's a small main road with a few local shops, including a few restaurants, a bookstore, a coffee shop, and the crown jewel—a pub.

It's just after supper time when you ring the bell above the door walking inside. On a Friday evening, it's lively, packed close with warmth and tall pints and plastic baskets full of chips and greasy fingerfoods.

There's a lot of military around here. You can tell by their haircuts and the way they chug their glasses; but you aren't looking for baby-faced rookies with too much pent-up aggression. You're looking for the meanest guy in the room, and that means someone with scars and someone who goes cloudy behind the eyes when you ask him how he's gotten back from where he's been.

That man is sitting at the far booth with his back to the wall. A place where he can have an eye on the rest of the room at all times. Big, gloved hand wrapped around a sweating glass, gaze focused on the foam of his beer as he pretends to listen to whatever the red-cheeked man across from him is laughing about.

You ask the bartender what they're drinking and order another round, picking up each glass and making your way towards their table. You'd be nervous if you weren't so determined. You stand awkwardly beside the table before his friend notices you there.

"Tha' fer us, bonnie?"

He juts his chin out at the drinks you're holding, and you set them down with a nervous smile.

"Yeah," you look between them. You fixate on the big guy, who barely squints at you over his drink, and you bite your lip. "I was hoping you had room for one more."

His friend cackles, "aye. Always fer a pretty face."

"Cute," you swallow. "But…I wasn't really talking to you."

The bigger one sits up at that. He leans back in the booth, rolling out his shoulders, and you hop up onto the seat next to him. His friend seems to get the message, picking up his new drink and tipping it towards you before taking a long drink of it and going to find a warm spot at the bar.

"Lookin' for advice or a fuck?"

"Neither," you say softly. "You're big, yeah? Are people…generally afraid of you?"

He laughs, and when he wipes at his masked face, you see a glimpse of a tattoo sleeve that adorns his massive left arm.

"Suppose."

"Great. How much for you to be my bodyguard for a few hours?"

He kisses his teeth under the mask, and then he turns his head to look down at you. His eyes are half-lidded, the skin looking a little greasy under the eye-black smudged there, but he's so calm and collected and amused. You've amused him; you're entertaining him. It's the most interesting thing that's happened to him all week, and you hope you're keeping his attention.

"Wot's tha' include?"

"It's gonna be illegal," you mumble, biting your bottom lip. "Just a little bit."

"Tha's my specialty, love."

"Not murder," you clarify, and he just shrugs. "Just…a little breaking and entering. Maybe some intimidation."

"'s Friday night, swee'eart, at least offer me somethin' fun."

"This isn't funny," you suck in a shaky breath. "It's…" You look down at the sticky pub table, swallowing again. You dig your nails into your own legs to keep your composure. "I need to get something back. Something that belongs to me. So it's not really…it's not really stealing."

A pregnant silence falls between you. You fail to keep the tears at your lash line back, and you quickly use the back of your hand to wipe your face gently. You think about your cat scratching for you on the other side of the window. You think about her sweet face; you think about Michael forgetting to feed her in the mornings as he usually did, and how he never changed the water filter in time even when you asked him to.

"'m Simon."

The low timbered voice breaks you out of your inner spiral. You look up at him again, and when you meet his eyes, you're finally able to let out a breath of relief. You don't know why, but there's something extremely soothing about sitting next to him. About being in his vicinity. He's so large and takes up so much space, but it's warm there, and he's not as mean as his outer layer might suggest. He's calm, and the way he presents himself tells you that it is not by luck that he's still sitting beside you.

You tell him your name, and his gloved hand touches under your chin.

"Olright, love. Lead the way."

Every time you have ever come back to this apartment, you have met the closed door with dread. A little fear. You feel none of that; not with the apparition at your back. You knock on the window beside the door, and like always, she appears. She meows on the other side, her eyes wet as she scratches and sniffs. You look over your shoulder at Simon who tilts his head to the side.

"This wot he stole?"

You look back at her on the other side of the window, shrugging.

"No," you say softly. "But it's all that matters."

The jiggling of metal brings your attention back to him. Simon is at the door, a multi-tool in one hand, and he's focused intently on working the doorknob until you hear the sound of a lock turn and then the door opens. The chain on the door jangles just as Simon opens it slightly, and you watch with rapt attention as he sticks his arm inside for just a few seconds, and then he swings the door open wide.

You push past him, reaching for the cat. She meows loudly, coming right to you, and you coo as you bend and pick her up from the floor. Loud purrs and sweet chirps follow as you hug her to your chest. You pet her little head, turning towards the living room. You used to keep her carrier behind the couch, and you find it as you go searching for it, exactly where you left it. You slip her inside and zip it up.

"What the fuck is this?"

You freeze, standing up straight and turning. You're caught, definitely—you knew he must have been home by the fact that the chain was latched, but you tried the nice way. You weren't going to get your cat back by being patient, not anymore.

"I'm just getting her, I'll…I was just leaving."

"Fuck no, you broke into my flat."

"Our flat," you snap back, putting the straps of the carrier over your shoulder. "And I'm leaving."

Michael looks like he's going to take a step towards you, but then he notices the dark shape in the corner of the room. He frowns a little, squinting.

"Who the bloody hell is that?"

You turn just in time to see Simon take a small step forward. The sudden movement seems to terrify Michael; he scrambles backwards into the kitchen counter, making the plates behind him fall off the counter and shatter onto the ground. He nearly trips over himself trying to get distance, and Simon seems to think it's very funny. He laughs, chest heaving, and he looks down at you as he gets closer.

"Flopping like a fuckin' fish, he is, in'he?"

Michael looks around frantically before he finds a pair of prongs. His hand shakes as he holds the pointy end towards Simon, spitting at him.

"Get the fuck out of my flat! T-The both of you!"

Simon's reaction tells you that maybe he has a few wires crossed in his head. He steps forward instead of away, laughing still, and you watch warily as he tilts his head to the side and nods his head towards Michael.

"Go on, then, mate," Simon taunts. "Try it."

Like a fool, Michael obliges. You flinch when Michael swings, but Simon tilts his body at just the right moment to dodge. He smacks Michael's arm, but he tries again—and like playing footie with a child, the weapon is now in Simon's hand, and then oh—

Michael's screaming as it pierces through his open palm.

He bleeds a lot less than you thought he might. Sadly, also, his blood is as red as yours. You thought he might be a little less pathetic at a moment like this. It is a gift, however, to see him bursting into tears as Simon grips the collar of his shirt and leans over him.

"Lot like you like to take things that aren't yers, tha' right?" Simon spits. "Like to punish and intimidate and fuckin' take, even if ya aren't owed."

"Please—please just get out, take her, fuckin' please!"

"Oi, wot's all this?" Simon snorts. "Now yer pissin' where you stand cause it got too real, eh? Got wot was comin' ta you? Reckon it's not like you thought. Reckon you thought she'd come hat in hand, beggin' for wot she deserves, but you wouldn't know good cunt even if it sat on yer face, yeah?"

"Please…"

"Simon—" You try, but he tsks, shaking his head.

"Nah, love, he's gonna learn," Simon murmurs. "Have you learned?"

"Yes," Michael squeaks, and you're not longer staring at the blood dripping on the hardwood, you're oogling at the giant man standing in what once was your kitchen that's starting to look more delicious by the second.

"Good," Simon breathes. "I know where ya lay yer head, mate. Know where ta come back if things aren't quiet on her end. You'd do well to remember tha'."

He releases Michael with a shove; Michael sinks to the floor, hands trembling, and Simon makes his way towards you to put a hand to your back and turn you around towards the front door.

"Need anythin' else?" Simon asks. You're too speechless to say anything, so all you do is shake your head. You clutch the carrier closer; she meows from inside the bag, and Simon nods his head towards outside so that you start moving. The door shuts behind you both, and then you're being led to his truck, ushered into the passenger seat, precious cargo on your lap as you breathe a huge sigh of relief.

The drive is quiet, but a comfortable quiet. You don't realize until a few streets over that you're smiling; a big, sparkling grin that's taking over your face, and when Simon rolls his truck to a stop at a red light, you lean over the center console and give his masked cheek a big, wet kiss of gratitude.

"Got a death wish or somethin'?" Simon turns to look at you, glaring from under the mask. It's so hard to be scared of him. He just put the fear of God into your terrible ex-boyfriend so you could get your precious cat back; he scared him shitless—literally—and he did it looking this good.

"Is that what a kiss gets me?" You ask. You slide your hand down his bicep, swallowing the drool when you feel just how solid and beefy he is under that hoodie. He fills it out too well. He must be so fucking handsome under that mask; there's no way he wears it for anonymity, he must be so hot, he wears it so he doesn't have to swat away all the boys and girls when they usually buzz around him like moths to light—

Maybe death is really this sweet. This good. Your cat is snoozing, safe and sound, in your bedroom with a full belly. The lights are on low; soft orange glows from well-placed lamps, giving the entire living room a warm feeling. There's a man on your couch with his belt unbuckled, mask halfway up his face as he pants because his cock is in your mouth, and he tastes like sweet, sweet victory.

"Ahh—fuck."

You nuzzle your nose up the length. He's so hard; you don't think a man has ever been this hard for you. He's leaking so pretty, dribbles down the length that you catch with the tip of your tongue, forcing him to hiss and spit and bite his knuckles. He keeps his hips still, but his hand around your hip squeezes the flesh there nice and tight, borderline bruising when you suck his tip a little too softly. You lick a stripe around the head before leaning back up towards him, and his hand around your hip curls against the back of your neck as you share a messy, wet kiss.

You twist your wrist, pumping his cock with a gentle glide of your palm, and he grits his teeth between kisses, touching his forehead to yours.

"Oll tha' for a cat, yeah?"

It is true. You did do it for her. But you did it for you, too.

"Not just the cat," you whisper, smoothing your thumb along the tip. He kisses you again, slower this time, and you groan into his mouth as you squeeze your thighs together. "Look at you…"

"Fuck—" Simon grunts, and his other hand finds the base of his cock, squeezing hard, and you giggle as he scrunches his nose. "Don't say shit like tha'."

You can't with his mouth on your cunt. He's laying flat on his back on the couch, legs too long to fit. Boots against your blanket, you'll whine to him about it later, but now both thighs are on either side of his head, and he's slurping with a hot tongue. You cup both sides of his head, dragging your hips, and while normally you'd think twice about dropping your weight on someone like this, the ease at which he hoisted you up his chest tells you Simon's a big, big boy—and he can handle whatever you give him.

"Gonna let me handle things from now on," Simon murmurs. He kisses the inside of your thigh, and you yelp when he smacks one side of your ass. He's waiting for an answer, and you took too long to give one.

"Y-Yeah," you breathe, leaning your head back. You feel yourself dripping between the legs, flooding his mouth, but he curls his tongue all the same. Uses two thumbs now as he hooks his arms around your thighs to pull the wet, sensitive skin back so he can drink what he's owed. He said he takes payment like this, getting his fill; he says he's never really satisfied until there's cum in his mouth and some in your cunt, and he's not gonna leave your flat before becoming familiar with those two, mutually non-exclusive events.

"Yeah, y'r pretty, olright," Simon laughs, but there's no more humor when he bounces you on his cock. Oh, he hurts a little. He told you he might, but then you're really there, knees on either side of him as you clutch onto the meat of his shoulders and hope to God he doesn't let you go. "Told you tha' you'd feel it, didn't I?"

"Yeah," you whisper, cupping that face of his, half-revealed to you, and you rub your thumbs down his scarred cheeks. Gorgeous, even with eyes that dead inside. "'s big."

"Don't—" He snarls, holding down your hips, shaking his head. "Wot did I say about sayin' shit like tha', eh?"

Life has spoiled you. Life is too good. Life is your pet curled up between your pillows and warm beneath the blankets, and life is fucking the sanity out of big, pudgy military men with blood under their fingernails and their breath stuck in their throat. You've rendered Simon to nothing but grunts and sputters. He's focused on keep the rhythm, arms clasped around your middle as he fucks up into you and pants into your neck. You reach for the back of the couch, digging your nails in, and all you can do is cry and take it as he keeps bringing you back down again and again and again.

The kiss you share is starved. You're so hungry, your hand slipping under the mask to cup the back of his head, and he draws your hips down and holds you there as he licks into your mouth and relishes in the pulsing of your cunt. This is what he fights for, maybe.

Not the glory. Not for the good of others. Not for Price and his self-guided moral compass, not for Laswell and her targets, not for revenge, not for blood, not to save the world. It's so he can come back here onto home soil and fuck a gorgeous girl without ever being interrupted by the sound of anything but her.

Her. You. Whatever she is, what you are, what you will eventually be—it manifests itself in the very room he's in, and he's got it between his teeth, and he won't be letting go for anything.

Nothing at all.

He's smoking a cigarette by the open window as she makes tea. He smiles, just barely, with teeth a little yellow when he sees you burn your hand a little as you pour the water into a misshapen mug.

"Olright?" He asks. The mugs shake a little as you bring them back into the room, precarious as you overfilled the mugs. He takes one from you and takes a long sip, flicking the cigarette out as he watches you get settled. You set your mug down on the coffee table, leaning forward to give him that same sweet, wet kiss on his cheek.

"Never better."

Belly full. Eyes bright. You are nothing like the woman that propositioned him just a few hours ago. A monotone, piss-drink evening, and then a scared, desperate girl asking him if he was willing to do something a little off the books.

Fucking finally. The world was just starting to get a little too dull.

It's the middle of the night when he hears the creak of a door. The sound of a little bell. You're laid out on your side, having just fallen asleep. The movie on the telly still plays, but Simon has turned the volume down. The light flickering from the screen is enough that he sees the cat trot into the room, eyes searching for you and seeing the two of you settled there.

She comes over slowly, sniffing the toes of Simon's boots, and then she closes her eyes as she rubs her face against his leg. Low purring, headbutts, and then she's putting a paw to his boot and looking up at him with the same big, wet eyes her mother has. Simon reaches down, scratching under her chin, and then she's curling up on his lap, little head next to yours as he leans back and takes it in. The sight for sore eyes. The thing that makes his medals and his stripes and all the money in the world look worthless—cheap.

The big ones, the important ones, sure. He remembered them all too well, even through the haze of pain and fatigue that often hung thickly around their reception. 

But there were too many to account for. To remember the particulars of each slash and burn and gunshot wound was a losing battle. He’d long since given up on keeping track of them. Little lines on the sides of his fingers, stretchmarks on the backs of his biceps, winged fans of a burn on the side of his thigh, a pale line along the point of his elbow that he might as well have been born with.

There were ones from further back, too. Scars that time and pain had eroded the precision of the memory, but not the feeling. Cigarette burns on his forearms, a necklace of animal teeth on his side, a craggy line across his hip, accompanied by the shadowy memory of hand reaching for him, and not being quick enough to duck out of the way. 

They all meshed together into the hard patchwork of scar and muscle his body had wrought itself into.

Almost none of them could be helped, out of his control, out of his hands.

They were a catalogue of his life, a story traced on his skin.

Stamped, more like. Branded. 

Survived. 

And soulmates shared scars. 

Their hurt was his; his hurt was theirs. Literally or metaphorically, he wasn’t quite sure. Simon had so many, spent so much time in pain, it was impossible to know if any of them didn’t belong to him originally.  

He didn’t like the thought of someone sharing his scars, having felt what he did. Possessive of them and the pain in a strange way. 

It’s ironic, then, that he should be able to find his soulmate more easily than the average unmarred person, and wanted to do nothing of the sort. Simon dismissed the whole thing as drivel a long time ago, anyway. If they did exist, if they weren’t just incredibly rare instances of luck, Simon was sure that he hadn’t been afforded one. 

There was guilt, too, settled somewhere deep inside him, that someone had to endure it alongside him. It was easier to believe he’d been left out of the whole thing. 

Better he was alone. 

The likelihood of finding that person was slim. It almost never happened. Eight or so billion people swanning around the planet would do that. A one in eight billion chance. 

A grand, cosmic joke. The unfairness of it drove some people crazy, drove them to do insane things to increase a probability that couldn’t be altered—to know that person probably existed somewhere and yet know that they would probably never run across them.

A trend of self harm cropped up online every few years, healed over self inflected wounds posted in forums of people seeking their other, fated, half. The presumption being that they were being desperately searched for in turn.  

Idiotic. Determined. Fallibly human.

And taboo. Most saw it as circumventing fate. 

Violently frantic for the thing Ghost had been unwillingly given. A way to find them, or, at least, easily identify them. And he never would. 

But, sometimes, he wondered. 

He tried to picture the imprint of a person somewhere out in the world wearing his wounds, suffering his losses. The thought would circle his brainstem in an unrelenting loop, a bright fish whispering around the perimeter of its bowl before it dissipated in lieu of something more pressing. 

It was always there, though, waiting to be grappled with again. 

He always came up blank. Nothing but a shadow in his mind where a person should be. Fitting, typical.  

It was a cruelty he couldn’t imagine, somehow. Someone being fatefully, inescapably afflicted with him. 

Simon didn’t want a soulmate anyway, and he was sure, if they existed, that they didn’t want him either. 

If there was someone out there, someone wandering around with his scars on their skin, he was certain they hated him already. 

He didn’t particularly believe in fate; life had taught him not to. He believed in himself, his capabilities, planning and contingencies. And Simon didn’t relish the thought of something he couldn’t control, someone holding the other end of his corded, deformed soul, like a leash they could tighten and use to yank him to his knees. Compromised, vulnerable. 

It wouldn’t happen; the margin for discovery was so small it was practically nonexistent. 

He blamed Soap, then, for tempting fate.

Ghost listened to Johnny yammer on, the sound of his voice louder than usual in the rattling dark belly of the transport plane home. The glow of green light, the roar of engines, the jangle of gear. 

It was an irritating, and sometimes endearing, quirk of Johnny’s that he couldn’t stop talking in the post-op cortisol and adrenaline drop, his words a smeared haze of jumbled thoughts spoken aloud for hours afterward.

The notion of a soulmate was at the front of Soap’s mind, not for the first time. He’d always seemed to enjoy the idea of it, and find some comfort in it, particularly after a close call. There was someone waiting for him, somewhere, after all, it couldn’t all come to nothing yet.   

Simon glanced out the window, watched the sea below morph into land. 

A yellow network of light winked below, a sea of reverse stars swimming in the black.

“Lucky that way, Lt,” Johnny declared with finality, finally winding down, sounding exhausted. “Findin’ ‘em will be easier.” 

Ghost glanced over, the first time in nearly an hour that he’d acknowledged the conversation beyond a hum and a nod. “What do you mean?” 

Soap gestured to his scarred chin, then his temple. “Know ‘em straight away, wouldn’t I?”  

Simon’s own thoughts spoken out loud; his hopes to never see his own scars reflected back at him turned on its head. 

Johnny made it sound like a good thing, instead of the nightmare it was. 

No, he thought for the nth time in his life, not that, not for him. 

But he’d always had an extraordinary knack for beating the odds. 

.

.

.

The base was a constant flurry of activity, a relentlessly buzzing hive of people. There were very few places that skirted away from the general chaos of life on a military base, but Simon had catalogued them all—the field behind the barracks when drills were not being run, the concrete service walkways beneath the base, crowded with spiderwebs and dust, the cool, sterile medical wing, and, the orderly administration offices. 

Each place had caveats. 

The service walkways were the most reliably quiet, but Simon hated being underground, hated the claustrophobia of it, like some part of him would always be clawing at black earth, and so usually avoided it. 

Soap had found him smoking behind the barracks once and now regularly joined Simon there. 

The medical wing could be crowded and frenzied, depending on the day. 

The administration offices were practically serene in comparison. Neat file folders, tidy desks, windows that let in the watery, gray English sun. Square offices with their doors propped open, conference rooms bathed in the light of glowing intel reports, data convergences, and map overlays, uniform gray walls and floors. 

The admin wing only occasionally spasmed into restless activity if an emergency op was underway or about to be, and if that happened, Ghost was usually already swept up in it himself, probably already long gone. 

A spare office stuffed away at the end of the hall with the name plate removed technically belonged to him. A mostly unused space he sometimes finished reports in but, more often than not, sat empty. 

He preferred to haunt the corridors, observe the more peaceful, inner workings of the military, breathing in the quiet air for five minutes at a time. It gave his perpetually over taxed nervous system, his forever-in-fight-or-flight-mode body, to relax, if even it was only an increment or two. The lightning was softer, the constant bark of orders and drills, the snap of gunfire, the general loudness of the rest of the place, was muted and far away.

Simon knew of all of the staff and their precuilarities—names, ages, birthdates, minor feuds among each other, immediate family members, previous posts, favorite foods, habits, complaints about the building’s irregular temperatures and the pervasive scent of diesel. It wasn’t information he necessarily collected on purpose. Gleaned over years of half heard conversations, glimpses of photos on desks. They, like the medical staff, didn’t often change, not like the revolving door of soldiers and operators. 

It was a regular, routine, quiet place. 

So it would be difficult for even the most oblivious person not to notice when the familiar order of the place was interrupted. 

Soft, dandelion light flooded the hall from a doorway that had always before been shut tight.

The scent of an unfamiliar perfume lingered in the hall in a feathery streak, oakmoss and lavender. It settled hard in his lungs, made his footsteps slow slightly, caution prickling at the back of his neck. 

The click of ceramic being sat on wood, the soft shuffle of files, tapping of computer keys emanated from within the now open office. The faintest notes of bubblegum pop floated by, at odds with the chill, still air. 

Inside, you were hidden behind two massive computer monitors, the very top of a pair of lilac headphones just visible over the rim. Plants in colorful painted terracotta pots lined the window to your left absorbing what they could of pale winter light, a thick blanket was thrown over the back of a chair in the corner, a jumble of bright, hand crocheted squares. A brass floor lamp with a circular shade sat behind your desk and drooped forward like the antenna of a giant radio, or a bug, casting a delicate halo of light around you like a protective ward. 

There was something. . .lambent that emanated around the room, that had nothing to do with the ridiculous lamp. 

Simon hovered in the doorway, in the shadow of the dim hall, just to get a glimpse of your face. Start a mental file on you, begin his careful catalog. Something to match the color and light to. 

It was a surprise to you both, then, when you glanced up and caught him at it. 

You stood hastily, headphones sliding down your neck when the cord jerked taut, the tinny sound of pop echoing loudly from them until you slammed your fingers down onto the keyboard and silence descended abruptly. “Sorry, sir. I didn’t see you there. Can I help you with something?” 

Simon could only stare at you, a curl of dread snaking its way between his ribs. 

Johnny was right, then, he would know his own scars anywhere. 

He would know his own face anywhere. 

He would, apparently, know you anywhere. 

Your face was a faded mapping of his own, the same scarring traced with a lighter hand. The same crack over your lips, a line drawn across your cheek, a faded check through your brow, the bridge of your nose bisected, the outline of webbed burn scars crosshatched at the edge of your jaw and shoulder. A jagged, thick line crossed your throat. 

Despite his legacy marring your face, you were pretty. Beautiful, even, with curious, cautious eyes, one side of your mouth pulled up into a half grin that tugged at the line across your cheek and somehow didn’t ruin the brightness of it. 

You were watching him watch you with a tentative gaze, brows drawing slowly together the longer he stood there staring at you, breathing around the newly minted cavern under his lungs. 

His eyes met yours again, and as soon as the realization settled in, something clicked violently into place inside his chest, like a missing rib bone had suddenly slotted into the cage around his heart. 

Pain bloomed hot and tight across his chest, so acute he covered his side, expecting to find a knife inexplicably lodged there. He grunted mutely. The discomfort receded as quickly as it had come, leaving behind a vast hollow just beneath his breast bone. Cavernous, lurching, undone. 

The hollow hardened into a solid brick of pain. 

Nausea swept into the back of his throat. 

“Are you okay?” 

He was frozen in the direct line of fire. Your eyes swept over him, fingers curling around a folder on the edge of your desk which you thumbed nervously. You began to lift your other hand, an aborted half movement toward your face that you dropped at the last second. But you didn’t avert your gaze. You looked past the mask, past him, and into his eyes. 

You saw him. 

Simon was not to be seen.

Ghost didn’t get caught, didn’t freeze. 

Didn’t feel like an animal trapped in a cage, pinned and weak and panicked. 

Not anymore. 

He was a ghost, a shadow, a silent—

The silence unspooled, thin and fragile as unraveling lace. 

Your smile widened, a slow, confident thing that stretched across your face crookedly, pulled at your scarred skin as you tilted your head. It was, maybe, the most beautiful thing he’d ever seen. 

“Sir?”

Amusement threaded your voice; a laugh curled like a sleeping animal in your throat. 

Instead of answering, he faded back into the hall.

As he retreated an uncertain realization prodded at the back of his mind. One wonderful contingency. 

You had not felt the shift, the world turning horribly on its axis, the pain that radiated hot as a wildfire. 

You hadn’t recognized what he was. 

And he was going to keep it that way. 

.

.

.

It felt like there was a hook in his chest, slipped right between his ribs, a constant painful tearing that landed him again and again outside your office door. Like he was a fish on a line, and you held the reel in your fist, totally oblivious to it. 

He didn’t love you, that’s not how the soulmate bond worked. You were tied together, for some reason, though that reason remained to be seen. Resentment was all he felt, a burning desire to chew his leg out of this trap, to grip the line that bound you and run a knife through it. 

Better yet, through you. 

Sever the tie as cleanly as a blade through an artery. 

One sure way to free himself was your death. 

It was unusual, but it happened—headlines of a soulmate killing their pair because they couldn’t tolerate the connection. It was taboo, considering how rare the bond was. The link suffocated them, instead of comforting them. 

Simon understood the urge.

He thought of your office, the way your back was angled half toward the door, how easily he could slip in and slice your throat open. He had seen and done worse, but the thought of you lying in a pool of blood, let alone at his hands, was so abhorrent and wrong that he doubled over as an acute, sharp pain pinched between his ribs, like someone wriggling their fingers between the bars to claw at his insides. 

Which irritated him. Things like that didn’t bother him, not anymore. At the very least, he was better at handling discomfort than this. 

It did start him thinking about someone else doing it, though. Slipping quietly into your office and nudging a knife between your ribs, pressing a silenced pistol against your temple, Ghost left to find your cold corpse. 

It was wrong. 

He could feel your life wrapped around his fingers, tangled in little ribbons around his wrists. A pulsing, glowing, bright thing.  

The resentment doubled because he should not care. He didn’t know you, trust you; your death should mean nothing. You should mean nothing.  

Still, he found himself walking the administration wing again the following day, even though the sun was out and it’d be nice to sit behind the barracks and smoke and listen to Johnny rattle on about something or the other when he inevitably showed up. 

Your door was open again, gold light spilling into the corridor, the low flutter of too loud music in your headphones accompanying it. 

Simon would never admit it to himself, but he also needed to know that he could remain hidden from you. The shock of your eyes finding his still hadn’t left him. It had never happened before—not on an op, not about the base, not out among civilians. He blended in, he remained invisible, but you saw him, sensed him, and he needed to know if that was something he had to adjust to. Planning was survival, and you were an unknown factor he needed a method for handling.  

Simon stepped close to your door, out of the beam of light. 

Your office was bathed in soft, cream light but not from your antenna bug lamp. 

Your back was fully turned toward the door, face tilted into the scarce winter sun streaming in the window as you leaned back in your chair. Your eyes were closed, headphones over your ears as he suspected they were. 

Fuuucking hell. 

Couldn’t see, couldn’t hear, back toward the entry point of the room. 

Your life hung there, trusting, fragile as spun crystal. 

He waited, but you didn’t turn, didn’t seem to know he was there. Something in his shoulders uncoiled, tension slowly replaced with an odd sense of calm. The pain in his chest eased for the first time in twenty-four hours, fading to a tender ache. 

Your lunch, half eaten, laid abandoned on your desk. The blanket that had been on the chair in the corner was swaddled around your shoulders. 

You yawned, eyes still closed. 

He waited for you to sense him, glance up, but you seemed unaware of him. He wouldn’t admit it then, but he half hoped you would. 

Ghost backed away, left you to your peace. 

The weight in his chest intensified again.

He hated you for it. 

He went back the next day. 

And the day after that.

.

.

.

Anchor might be a better descriptor. 

Hook was too violent.

Simon knew what it felt like to have a hook between his ribs, and this feeling was not that. 

He was satisfied, after weeks of observation as late winter turned to a wet spring, that you did not have a preternatural sense of his presence. In the process, he learned other things. 

You hated the cold, and your office always seemed to be chillier than you would prefer, blanket perpetually tucked around your shoulders. He watched you fiddle with the radiator one morning, bottom lip caught between your teeth, sigh, and resign yourself to it. He waited for you to complain to your coworkers like everyone else did, to call maintenance to fix it, but you didn’t. 

You liked to sit in the sun, however you could, squinting against the glare of it against your computer screens just to have it on your skin. 

You hunched over your desk, and clearly had pain in your neck and back because of it. 

You often stayed later on base than many of the staff and walked out of the building alone late at night. 

You didn’t drink tea, but politely accepted the tea several different coworkers made for you with the very good intention of showing you a proper cup. You drank every drop as you chatted with them, even though you clearly detested it. It didn’t show, but Simon could tell. He didn’t like that he could, that it was instinctual and nothing else. 

They were also plying you with shit tea, of course you weren’t going to like it. He watched as one bloke let it steep for a full fifteen minutes and then presented you with what must have been the bitterest lukewarm tea to ever pass through the base. An older secretary took the opposite approach and handed you a cup of barely brewed tea with approximately four tablespoons of sugar in. 

Absolutely bloody foul. 

Horrific crimes committed in your name, and you swallowed them with a smile. 

And you smiled a lot. From the tiniest twitch of your lips when you were alone, to a grin so big he could see all your teeth, that your eyes squinched closed. 

You nearly always had headphones on—wired earbuds dangling from the collar of your shirt as you walked down the hall, or over ear headphones looped around your neck at your desk, usually pop, occasionally 70s rock or alternative spitting from the speakers. 

You talked a lot, and your voice carried. One of those truisms about Americans, you could be heard long before you were seen even if you weren’t being particularly loud. He didn’t need to be close to hear you, and he found himself thinking one afternoon good. It would be easier to keep track of you. 

He liked your voice, anyway, liked your laugh, liked to hear you say English phrases in that accent of yours that made them sound ridiculous. 

You could likely give Soap a run for a world record of useless chatter. Anyone who walked into your office was subject to your stream of consciousness if they lingered long enough. 

Lonely, he might have called it. But you were new, to the base, and to the country. Your only connections were those you were attempting to craft with stuffy intelligence officers who sometimes seemed to regard you as below them. 

He found his thoughts drifting to the sound of your voice once he’d left you for the day, replaying things he’d heard you say in the period of observation he allowed himself, like the tune of a lullaby. It calmed him. 

The resentment in his chest festered like a badly healed wound. You were nothing but a distraction, a thorn stabbed into his side, stealing his focus from nearly everything that was more important. 

That used to be more important. 

Now his every thought was asterisked by you. 

Distracted. 

He didn’t do well with it. 

He didn’t like that he could feel the newly rended hole in his chest corroding and throbbing when he wasn’t near you, suffocating him. He’d felt worse in his life, so he could mostly ignore it. 

Simon decided that the nature of the bond was at least neutral. You were not a threat.  

He was tired, anyway, of constantly thinking about your back to the door, your headphones playing too loudly. 

After you left one evening in mid spring, he moved your desk. 

Simon sat in your dark office for longer than he should have, letting the pain ease out of his chest. 

It was enough to be where you had once been. 

That was as close as he cared to be. 

He fixed the radiator before he closed the door again. 

.

.

. 

He went by Ghost, you learned eventually. 

His was a redacted, blacked out name in the files on your computer, so Ghost seemed less a name than a description. You briefly scanned the ops he had been on. It was a horrifyingly long list, most of them totally classified or excised beyond comprehensibility. And those were only the missions you could see, likely his involvement in many ops had been scrubbed entirely. 

It was clear that he was good at his job, though it left you to wonder what he had been doing in the administration wing of the base, let alone peering into your office like a silent wraith. 

It should have been terrifying to find him looming in your doorway. His massive frame had blotted out the corridor behind him. Mostly in black, a skull mask covering his face. You hadn’t been able to see his eyes in the low lighting. But you had only felt curiosity, apprehension, a delicate wrenching in your gut. 

Something that a different person might liken to butterflies. Absolutely absurd, but nonetheless true. 

Fear, afterward, of course, that you’d missed some kind of order or request. 

It had also been a while since someone stared so openly at you, since you’d felt the urge to duck your head, obscure the scars littered across your skin. You never had before, and you wouldn’t have started then. You wore them proudly. Most bore their soulmate’s scars better than their own, and you were no exception. 

It had become a rarity, really, in recent years that anyone spared you more than a glance. Being surrounded by military personnel who had seen worse, might have had worse on their own skin, meant you didn’t stand out.

When you mentioned the incident to Laswell, worried that some kind of disciplinary report, during your first month at this post no less, was headed your way, she had only shook her head. “That’s just Ghost. He probably didn’t say anything. You get used to it.” 

The base, especially among the operators, was filled with odd personalities with even odder quirks, so you decided not to question it. You had only nodded, and said, “Okay.” 

Laswell had smiled. “You’ll do well here.” 

You suspected you were being watched in the weeks following the incident, though you couldn’t say why at first. The suspicion was confirmed when you arrived one blissfully sunny spring morning to find your office warm and your desk moved. Your other furniture was rearranged neatly around it. You rounded it, dropping your bag as you went, half expecting to find a note. 

There was nothing, and you started to rotate it back, a bit irritated, when you paused and sat. The new angle gave you a clear view of the door and window. The sun hit your face without causing a glare on your screens. The monitors had been lowered ever so slightly so you could easily see over them.

You left your desk in its new position. It was better that way. 

Ghost appeared in your office that afternoon as suddenly as he had left it. 

You sensed that he’d been there for a long time when you finally noticed him in the doorway, that you were only seeing him because he wanted you to.

You smiled and turned away from a report. A welcome reprieve for your strained eyes and hunched back. 

“Hi. Something I can help you with, Lieutenant?” 

This time, he stepped into your office, grasped your offer with both hands. 

The room seemed to shrink and adjust to his size. He was more massive than you remembered, in height and breadth. His eyes didn’t leave yours, a deep blackened honey brown half hidden by skull. Neither of you looked away.

“Have I passed?” 

His head tilted ever so slightly. When he spoke his voice was like an iron rod shoved down your spine. Deep and jagged and rough, it settled between your ribs, in the pit of your stomach. “Passed?” 

“Your test?” 

“Think I’m testin’ you?” 

“You moved my desk.” 

He didn’t answer for a long moment, still not dropping your gaze. The silence lasted so long you began to think he wouldn’t answer at all. “Practically had your back to the door,” he said eventually, as though that explained it. 

It conjured the image of Ghost creeping around the base in the dead of night to adjust offices into more tactical configurations and you had to bite the inside of your cheek to keep the giggle in your throat from bubbling out.   

You nodded and then shrugged instead. “I guess I don’t think about things like that.” 

“Should.”

“Maybe.” 

“Especially in the field.” 

“I don’t do field work.” 

He nodded slowly and finally took his eyes off yours, glancing around the room again. When his lashes caught the light, you saw that they were a light blond. 

“Welcome to sit,” you offered, taking up a pen and a pad of yellow paper. “Ghost.”  

He didn’t sit, but he didn't leave either. When he remained mute and motionless, you looked back at your report and continued working, resigned to the new addition to your office. 

Minutes passed in silence, with only the scratch of your pencil over paper, the tapping of computer keys, for company. 

All at once, the room sighed, and when you looked up, he was gone. 

Ghost was strange, slightly off putting. 

You liked him.

Maybe, you thought, he’d come back. 

.

.

.

Ghost visited regularly after that. 

Sometimes he simply stood at the door and watched you work. 

His boots were so silent that you often didn’t know he was there until he was leaving again. It felt as though he often melted into nothing but shadow, but it wasn’t an uncomfortable feeling. 

You didn’t feel watched, so much as observed, minded.

But the lengthy silences began to wear thin, so you started talking to him.  

Talked at him, more like, about anything that came to mind. 

The shit weather and how cold you always were. Recounted phone calls with your sister and noted things you’d seen on your commute. You told him of your slightly creepy neighbor who would follow you occasionally down high street when you did your weekly shopping trip, but that was probably harmless.

You were sure he wasn’t actually listening, his eyes focused somewhere in the middle distance as he stood statuesque in the middle of your office.  

The visits were occasionally broken up by operations that could last days or weeks, once up to a month. Time passed either way, but you found it passed more easily when you could reliably count on a visit from Ghost. Hearing his voice in staticky communications wasn’t the same. A blinking green dot on a map that you tracked just a little more closely than the others. 

Ghost sat down for the first time toward the middle of a particularly miserable and cold spring afternoon. He sighed as he did, the only sign of any feeling. Almost a resignation in the soft cut of it. 

You didn’t comment on it, just chatted as you usually did, buoyed in a way that you could not explain. 

He started to bring you coffee, done up to your preference, always when you were hitting the midday lag. 

In exchange, you left offerings at the edge of your desk. Baked goods, protein bars, chips, sweets— which disappeared when you looked away from him. You noted what went first so you could invest in it. Chocolate went more frequently. 

But Ghost, whether he was listening or not, made you feel less alone. The ache of loneliness in your heart eased, and maybe that said more about you than him. 

If he was around, he usually slipped in while you ate lunch. He didn’t eat with you, the mask never moved, but you began cooking extra in the evenings, leaving tupperware containers at the edge of your desk in addition to brownies wrapped in waxpaper, chocolate chip cookies sprinkled with sea salt. “Don’t have to,” he always said. 

“Want to,” you answered, and then received the empty, clean container from the day before as though it were an offering.

Your office always smelled like tobacco and tea for hours after he left, a comforting combination that you began to wish you could bottle. 

He didn’t appear one day at his usual allotted, precise time. You figured something came up or he finally got tired of you, but he turned up instead late in the afternoon.  

“Sorry,” he said as he sat, without explanation, a paper cup of coffee steaming at the edge of your desk like it appeared there by his will alone.  

“Oh,” you answered. “You didn’t have to—“

“Did,” he said simply. “‘ave you eaten?”

“Yep. Got something for you, too.” 

He settled back. “Neighbor still botherin’ you?” 

You blinked in surprise, the slightly creepy neighbor had not spoken to you in a few days. “Oh. . .I—You were listening.”

He tilted his head. “‘Course I was, bird.” He leveled you with a look. “So?”

“Not recently. Not in a couple days.”

“Good. Let us know if he does, yeah?”

Then he sat back and waited, shoulders relaxed as though attending a sermon, but content with silence anyway. 

When you glanced up from a report a while later, for clarification on a mission detail that he happened to be on, his eyes were closed. 

It felt akin to having a wolf willingly curl up in your lap, blood wet maw dripping peacefully onto the floor.

.

.

.

When you turned from watering your plants one innocuous spring day, you found Ghost entering your office with a different mask on. A soft black balaclava. You could see his eyes and brows, the bridge of his nose and the thin, bruised skin beneath his eyes.

You froze and then smiled at him, tried hard not to stare. His eyes were always pretty but now you felt you could actually see him. Blond brows and lashes, his irises were lighter, amber honey in the yellow light of your bug lamp, as Ghost had called it one afternoon without a shred of humor. 

It was raining, and the dim light made the small space cozier than usual. The patchwork blanket was around your shoulders, a ward against the chill bleeding beneath the window. 

In his usual chair, you’d laid a gift. 

He pointed to the blanket you had carefully folded there earlier. 

“It’s for you. I knitted it.” 

He froze, hand half extended toward it. You swept past him around your desk again, inundated with the scent of black tea and cigarettes as you went. His was alternating black and dark blue squares to your brightly colored purple and teal. “Just in case you were cold. You’re always so buttoned up after all,” you joked. “And you fixed my radiator this winter. So it’s a thank you, too.”

Ghost only moved it to the back of the chair. You hadn’t expected him to take it, really, but his gloved fingers lingered on it for a moment, rubbing the fabric gently. “How d’you know it was me that fixed it?” 

“Who else would have?” 

He grunted. “You knit?” 

“When I can’t sleep,” you answered. “Keeps my hands and brain busy.”

His brows furrowed, and seeing even that small movement felt like seeing him naked, like seeing something he didn’t want you to. You averted your eyes, heat crawling up your neck. 

“Can’t sleep?” His fingers slid off the blanket and he sat.

You shrugged. “Must seem silly to you. You see it with your own eyes. But some of the reports. . . stick with me.” 

Ghost considered this for a long moment. “It’s not.” 

“What?” 

“Silly.” 

The way he grunted the word made you laugh. 

“Could I ask you something, Ghost?”

“Reckon you just did.” 

You rolled your eyes. “Am I allotted only one question?” 

“Just two.” 

It was. . . funny. You giggled and shrugged. “Guess I’m shit out of luck.” 

“And out of questions.”

You laughed again. 

He surprised you by laughing too. If a low, graveled grunt counted as a laugh. You certainly counted it, a cache of swollen pride bubbling in your stomach. “Go on, then.” 

“Where are you from?” 

The levity vanished. His brows lowered. “Why?” 

You shrugged. “Just curious. I’m not good with all the accents yet. Just can’t place you.” 

He relaxed back into the chair again, but didn't answer. 

The pinch of his brows, the tense line of his jaw, remained, his expression considering as he tilted his head back. 

“Why do you come here?” You asked instead. 

This question he answered readily. “It’s quiet.” 

“That’s one way to tell me to shut up.” 

He blinked and lowered his chin to meet your eyes. “Not the kind of noise I mean.” 

You decided not to take offense at being called noise. 

You snorted and reached beneath your desk, taking some pride in the fact that Ghost did not tense anymore than usual when you did, withdrawing your lunch. 

“Hungry?” You asked.  

“Tryin’ to see my face?” 

You smiled. “Never,” you answered, “Not sure I want to see what you’re hiding under there.” 

The rain tapped against the window as you popped the thermal lid off.  

“Why are you here?” He asked as you folded your legs beneath you on the chair and tucked the blanket around them. Ghost rose without asking and twisted the knob of the radiator beneath the window a bit higher.

You waved your fork, indicating the office. “Fairly positive I work here. But perhaps base security is more lax than I thought.” 

He sighed, a long suffering sound. “England, smartarse.” 

You smile and dig your fork into last night’s spaghetti bolognese. The steam caressed your face in a warm puff as you lifted a bite. “I’m on loan to Laswell.” 

“On loan?” He asked as he settled back into the chair, broad shoulders pressed to the wall behind him, against the blanket. It slid over his elbow a little, curled over his forearm. He didn’t move it. 

When you lifted your gaze to his, his stare was piercing, brows lowered, furrowed. You imagined he must be frowning.  

“Temporary replacement for whoever used to be in this office,” you explained. “She needed someone quickly, who she could trust.” 

Ghost folded his arms across his chest, something more tense than usual in the movement. “How long are you on loan for, then?” 

You shrugged, twisted your fork into the noodles. “It’s unclear. So, for now, indefinitely.” You smiled, “Hopefully not through another winter, though, I don’t think I’m cut out for the rain and cold.”

His shoulders eased, but only marginally. If it weren’t for all the hours he’d passed in your office, you weren’t sure you would have caught it at all. 

“From somewhere warm?”

“Warmer than here. Especially in the winter.” 

“Must be nice, that.” 

“Has its perks. But the summer is its own kind of hell.” 

“One you enjoy.” 

“But of course. I like feeling like I’m baking alive.” 

He snorted again.

You ate in silence for a bit. The quiet had become comfortable between you somewhere along the way, silken and gentle. 

When you were scraping the last bit of sauce from the bottom of the container, Ghost said, “Manchester.” 

“Hm?”

“Where I’m from.”

His voice was low; he wasn’t looking at you, eyes trained on the door instead. 

“Manchester,” you repeated, trying to place it on the map of the UK in your mind. “And do you all sound sort of like—“

You were about to say like you have gravel in your mouth but he makes an affected noise, that stiff grunt again. “Are you laughing at me?”

“It’s your fucking accent.”

“My accent?” You asked incredulously. “Have you heard yourself?” 

“Got a thick one, bird.” He imitated your voice. “Manchester.” The sharp rhotic r sound was like a gunshot in his mouth, each letter enunciated to the point of being butchered. 

You scoffed, not bothering to fight your smile. “Takes one to know one, I guess.” 

“Suppose it does.” 

“Fucking Brits,” you said, without any venom. “I can’t do anything right according to you all.” 

He tilted his head, something predatory in it. It made your heart flutter a little. “Who’s tellin’ you you can’t do something?” 

You sighed, long suffering. “My coworkers. Can’t make tea, apparently. I don’t care for it and everyone keeps insisting I just make it wrong.”

“They make it wrong too.” 

You groaned. “Not you too.” 

Ghost rose to take his leave as you snapped the lid back onto the now empty container. 

“I’ll show you how to make a proper cup sometime.” 

You paused, a warm surprise sweeping into your chest, and decided not to linger on this solitary acknowledgement that Ghost would return to your office. “Big fan?” 

“I love tea.” 

It made you laugh. “Of course, English afterall.” 

He nodded, just once, and started toward the door. “Ghost?” You called. 

Ghost turned and you slid another tupperware container across your desk. “For you.” 

He stared at it, for a moment too long, as he always did, like he was telling himself to leave it. “Didn’t have to.” 

“I know.” You nodded at it again and then then ducked behind your computer screens. “I always want to.” 

Ghost moved so silently that you didn’t hear or see him take it, but when you looked up again he and the container at the edge of your desk were gone. 

.

.

.

It should be a good thing. 

You would be gone soon enough, none the wiser of who Ghost was. Of what you were to each other. 

But it didn’t sit well. It was a new thing to nag at the back of his mind, finding your office empty, you becoming a ghost in your own right. He hated the ache in his chest, the thought of you so far away. He could only assume you’d be stationed back in the US.

The thought festered, burrowed. 

“Laswell.”

She jumped, hand going beneath her desk before she spotted Ghost in the corner of  her office. She sighed and closed her eyes, fingertips rubbing her eyes instead. 

“Ghost,” she sighed, “Don’t do that.” 

Simon said your name, and Laswell lowered her hands to look at him. “How long has she got?” 

“What do you mean?”

“Said she’s on loan. I want to know how long.”

Laswell considered him; Ghost waited. He wouldn’t explain himself, and Laswell knew that. 

“Maybe as long as a year.” She tilted back in her chair and asked anyway. “Why?” 

Ghost didn’t answer, slipping back out of her office and down the hall. 

You were still in your office, hunched over the desk, lavender headphones pulled down around your neck. He watched you for a long moment, eyes tracing over scars that belonged to him. It was jarring each time to see pain he experienced threaded over your skin. It made him feel exposed by proxy.

As he watched, you lifted a hand and rubbed your neck with a wince, fingers lingering on the long scar slashed at the base of your throat. The grimace faded from your face and your expression receded into the impassive, blank, focused slate it always settled into as you continued working. 

When he sat down in your office, you just shot him a tired smile and continued working. 

He walked you to your car around midnight. 

“Tell us if you’re here this late again,” he said, not looking at you. 

“Ghost,” you said. “It’s almost enough to make me think you like me.” 

“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” he answered. 

You just laughed. 

.

.

.

“Tea?” 

You jumped, just as Laswell had, only your hand didn’t go beneath the desk. Nothing there to reach for, he knew, your vulnerability like a beacon, or a stain. 

It would need remedied. 

But first, this. 

It was the sixth time in two weeks that you were at your desk well past when everyone else had gone home.  

“Jesus Christ.” 

“Unfortunately not.” 

You laughed; his shoulders eased. “Ghost,” you said. “To what do I owe the pleasure?” You tilted your head. “I’m starting to think you’re spying on me.” 

“What’re you still doing ‘ere?” 

“What are you doing wandering around our wing after hours?” 

Not a line of questioning he was keen on following. That just being near a place you had been earlier in the day was enough to loosen that fucking tether in his chest. That he was worried incessantly about you being alone at night.

“Offerin’ to make you a tea,” he answered. “Obviously.”  

“Obviously,” you echoed. “Of course.” 

“You’re supposed to tell me when you’re stayin’ late.” 

“Ghost,” you said seriously, lifting your brows, “I’m here late again today.” 

“Hilarious, you are.” 

You giggled again. “Are you really offering to make me tea?” 

He nodded. “C’mon then.”

You smiled and shrugged the blanket off your shoulders. He waited while you locked your computer and stood.

Simon allowed you to lead toward the breakroom where he’d observed the many cups of tea you’d politely swallowed from well meaning coworkers, who left it to steep for too long or too short, added too much sugar and milk, or left it totally plain. 

The overhead lights were too bright, a blue-white glare that made you frown and squint. Your nose scrunched up in distaste. There were circles beneath your eyes, exhausted loops that matched his own.  

“So,” you prompted, leaning against the counter, “How does one make a proper cuppa?”

“Not bad,” he said of your accent, lifting the electric kettle from the hook to fill with water. “Little posh.” 

“I’ve been practicing.”

He grunted, and put the kettle on, before rooting through the cabinet above the sink for tea bags. A grim selection awaited him, but he’d make due with what was available.

“Ah, so you boil the water. I was under the impression you could just stick it all in the microwave.” 

He involuntarily made a pained sound. “Fucking hell,” he muttered, “That your usual method?” 

You bit the inside of your cheek, poorly concealing a laugh. “I scandalized a data analyst with that joke.” You cup your chin in your hand, peer up at him from beneath a thick fringe of lashes. “I do know how to boil water, I’ll have you know.”

“Got a head start then.” 

You laughed again, shoulders shaking. Simon watched the corner of your mouth curl, and it eased something in his chest. You were painfully close, the woodsy, floral scent of your perfume curled in the air. Your elbow brushed his. He didn’t know how you could be unaware of the bond at that moment, when being that close to you felt like being lit on fire. He wanted to reach for you so badly that he had to clench his fist closed to avoid it. 

If someone were to ask him to move away from you right then, it would end badly. Bloody. 

The thin, needle sharp connection ached, begged. 

Simon ignored it.  

When you glanced up, he looked away. He could feel your eyes on his face, and didn’t mind the scrutiny in it. He didn’t mind you watching him, and wondered what you saw. 

“I like being able to see your eyes,” you said, just as the kettle clicked off. 

He met your gaze, disarmed by the declaration. Your features had softened, melted into a dangerous fondness. “Why?” 

“You have pretty eyes,” you shrugged. “And it’s hard to see you with the other mask.” You shifted, watching him lift the kettle, pour the hot water into a mug and over the teabag he’d dropped into it. 

“You can tell me to fuck off, if you want,” you began carefully, fingertips drumming nervously against the counter. “Why do you wear it?” 

Simon watched the teabag bob on the surface of the water, thin amber trails unfurling, coloring the water slowly brown. “Five minutes,” he nodded at the tea. “Don’t touch it. None of that dunking shite.” 

“Yes, sir,” you agreed. “Five minutes, no touching.” 

He huffed, and your smile widened. You bumped your shoulder against his. The contact only lasted a second or two, but the relief it provided was so intense that he nearly choked on it. 

The pain, softened by your proximity, returned immediately, crept down into the soft ligaments between his bones. He felt the loss in the roots of his teeth, the middle of his chest; it was like losing his breath in a different way, being suckerpunched in the solar plexus, knocked on his ass.

“To hide my face.” 

“Your identity, you mean.” 

“My identity,” he agreed.

“Why?” 

He released a long, slow breath, and thought about telling you to piss off, maybe even just to see how you’d take it. Were you as good as your word? Would you let the subject drop? 

Instead, he said, “There are a lot of bad people in the world, bird.” 

You pursed your lips, fingers toying with the teabag string, flicking the tab at the end with your nail. There was another question swimming in your eyes, but you let it go unasked, dropping your eyes from his instead. 

“You’ve seen more of them than most,” you said. “I would guess.” 

“Part of the job.” 

Your mouth curled a little, lashes fluttering against your cheek. “Hm. But y’know something? I think I’d know you anywhere,” you said, without a hint of shame or irony. “It’s all in your eyes.” 

Before Simon could respond, you hid a yawn in your sleeve and rubbed your hand over your face, exhaustion layered in thick rings beneath your eyes. “Even if this is gross,” you indicate the tea, “At least it will keep me awake.” 

“I take offense to that.” 

You laughed again. “Hm. Sorry, Lieutenant.” You leaned in, “It smells so nice, so why does it taste like shit?” 

He rolled his eyes. “I’ll make you a coffee if it’s shit.” 

“You’re kind.” This time when you leaned your shoulder against his, you left it there. The empty soreness like a bruise inside his ribs loosened again. For the first time in a while, he was left with the absence of pain.  

When the tea was done steeping, he did yours with a bit of honey. There was no way you’d take it plain and like it, but he drew the line at milk. Especially the blasphemy that was the military issued powdered milk in a canister that sat on the counter. Abso-fucking-lutely not. 

“There you are,” he said, “Cup of tea.” 

“A proper cuppa,” you tried again. It was a little less posh this time. 

He huffed. “Better all the time.” 

“And I have you to thank.” 

Your face creased as you took the cup between your palms, an unreadable expression flitting across your features. Then your mouth twisted to the side, a sure sign you were attempting to keep some emotion or thought in check. 

Your shoulder was still pressed heavily against his. 

“Thanks, Ghost.” 

“”S just tea.” 

You shook your head and lifted the cup, blowing gently on the surface before you took a tiny sip. He watched your face, watched your throat move as you swallowed, the flickering web of your lashes. A step up, at least, from all the shit tea from your coworkers that make your brows tense in an effort to conceal a grimace. “One good thing has come of this,” you said after a moment of contemplation. 

“What’s tha’?” 

“I know how to make tea for you now.” 

“Like it?” 

“I love it.” 

You briefly tilted your head onto his shoulder, then pulled away entirely. The flood of discomfort was worse than before. His muscles spasmed around it in a violent convulsion. “I mean that really.” 

He breathed out, through it. “I don’t take honey.” 

You studied the contents of the cup, tilting it one way and then the other, like something important laid at the bottom of the porcelain well. 

“Noted.” 

Sure enough, the next day, a hot cup was waiting for him, which he drank as you chatted from behind your computer, decidedly, pointedly, giving him the privacy to do so. 

.

.

.

Things settled into a pleasant rhythm. 

A regimented, regular existence that you had long ago learned to embrace. The base became home more than the tiny apartment you rented and spent only enough time to sleep, bathe, and cook in. 

You timed your days to the ebb and flow of the base, to visits to your office, debriefings and conference rooms, the restless energy of so many people in one place moving. You breathed around absences, the pockets of emptiness that sometimes cropped up. The loneliness that felt like an unfillable pit in your stomach. 

People often saw your scars and thought not to bother. Why would fate have marked you so heavily if you weren’t meant to find your pair? The scars meant nothing, really. They were no more significant than anyone else’s. Your chances of running into your soulmate was no higher than someone who had accrued no scars from their bond. 

You were a stopping off point, a bit of fun, but not someone to invest time and effort into, not when the reminder that someone else might come along and render it all moot was so visible, so literally in their face. To look at you was to be reminded of that bond waiting in the wings, for them and for you, and that you could only ever be temporary. 

It made friendships hard too. Some were jealous, others thought there couldn’t be room for anyone else in your life. You were important to no one.

It had been proven to you time and again, and you weren’t sure what kept you hopeful that someone would one day see past it. So when Sergeant Davies stuck his head in your office one Friday afternoon long after Ghost had departed your office for the day, and asked you out, you found yourself saying yes. 

“Would you like to go out sometime?” He asked, hand rubbing the back of his neck. “Just round the pub for drinks?” 

“Oh,” you said. “I—” 

It had been a long time since anyone took interest in you. You’d only talked to him a few times before, but Davies was handsome in a boyish way and sweet and you liked him well enough, you found yourself hesitating for half a second. To your horror, your mind flashed to Ghost, stomach lurching painfully, a knot of tension fisting itself in your chest. 

You looked at his usual chair, empty now, seeing his large frame sprawled there anyway, thighs spread wide, arms crossed over his chest, eyes steady and focused, locked onto you with an intensity and constancy you still weren’t used to.

Heat bloomed in your lungs, crept up your neck. You glanced away, back at Davies waiting at the door. 

“Yeah,” you answered firmly. “Sure.” 

“Brilliant,” he grinned. “How about tonight?” 

Your belly gave another sour squirm that you ignored; it had just been a long time, that was all. “I’m free.” 

“Brilliant,” he said again. “I’ll text you.” 

“Okay.” 

His grin was crooked and self satisfied as he exited your office. 

So you found yourself walking off the base with Davies later that evening. You found yourself laughing and hopeful in a local pub that you hadn’t gotten the chance to explore yet, busy as you were, the base a tide that tugged you back again and again. Like a magnet, you wanted to be there. 

And all of it came to nothing, the moment Davies saw the extent of the scarring when you took him home. It wasn’t just your face, it was your hands and arms and chest and belly. Your whole body was marked, dogeared for someone else. He looked down at you in your bed, his head framed by your ceiling fan and you saw the moment it clicked. The moment it wouldn’t work. 

“Someone out there is really looking for you,” he said. “You’re lucky.” 

“No more than anyone else,” you countered. “You know that’s not how it works.” 

“I know,” he said, pulling on his shirt. “I’m sorry.” 

“It’s okay,” you said before he kissed your cheek and retreated. 

Still, you didn’t sleep, just laid on your side, half undressed, staring out at a sky that slowly lightened, stars fading, wondering if perhaps your truest fate was to be lonely for your whole life. 

You didn’t hate your scars, or your soulmate. But sometimes you thought it would be easier if you didn’t have one at all. 

.

.

.

Monday. 

There was a knife in Simon’s pocket. 

Not unusual in and of itself, he carried several at all times, slipped into his sleeves and belt and boot. 

The one in his pocket, though, was for you.

A gift, a contingency, and an offer all wrapped in one. 

The knowledge that it was yours was an uncomfortable weight in his chest. It meant admitting he cared enough to procure it, test it, hand it over. 

It wasn’t quite your typical lunch hour, but Ghost was headed to your office anyway. It was sunny, for once, and he expected to find you taking an early break anyway, leaning back in your chair with your headphones on, absorbing the rare rays. 

And, he wanted to be done with it, to stop tapping his pocket repeatedly, checking the blade was still there, like it might have run away. 

Soap had noticed his fidgeting as they all sat through a briefing on intelligence reports with Laswell that morning. Ghost had forced his hand still, exuded a forced calm, but Johnny’s eyes hadn’t turned away. 

When he arrived at your office, deliberately rustling against the doorjamb so as not to startle you, you glanced up and smiled tightly and his plan vanished. 

Something was wrong. The blinds were closed, your office an unusual sea of gray air. Your shoulders were caved inward protectively, your expression wan and closed. Your smile didn’t reach your eyes, your voice was rough when you said, “Hey, Ghost.”  

Simon took his usual seat, watching you type something, decidedly not looking at him. He watched you, the set of your mouth and eyes. He waited for your chatter to begin but it didn't. 

“All right?” 

“Hm?”

“You’re quiet.” 

“Oh, only one of us is allowed to be quiet?” You joked, but it came out a bit brittle, and worn.

There were, he noticed as he looked at you, circles beneath your eyes. “What ‘appened?” 

You looked up again, and shook your head. “I’m just tired.” 

“Try again.” 

Frustration crept into your features. “Who said I want to tell you?” With that, you ducked behind your monitors.

Simon waited, but you did not reemerge. 

He stood, and rounded your desk. You glanced up then, leaning back when you found him so close. “Jesus, Ghost—” 

“Nice weather.” 

“I can see that.” 

“And you aren’t out there sunnin’ yourself? Something horrible must have happened.” 

Your mouth twisted to the side and you glanced away. “I. . .I’m just being dramatic.”

“C’mon, then.” 

You blinked up at him. “Where are we going?” 

He didn’t answer, but you rose anyway when he tilted his head toward the door. Simon snagged the blanket you’d knitted for him months ago from its place along the back of his chair, finally with a proper purpose, and carried it over his arm. 

“Lunch.” 

You grabbed it and followed him down the hall. Simon shouldered open an external door and held it open for you, the scent of your skin, the warm brush of your body so close to his as you ducked under his arm like a beacon, a light he wanted to follow. 

Carefully, you nudged your shoulder against his as you walked. The familiar sharp, sweet pang whenever you brushed too close together settled in his chest. He wondered if you felt it too, if you felt that sickly flutter in your chest, or if his suspicion that he was holding one end of an untethered bond in his hand was right. 

Just his luck. 

Didn’t matter though. 

He ticked his elbow out a little, and after a moment, you pushed your hand against the inside of his arm. His shoulders loosened; his jaw unclenched. The pain in his chest settled. 

The absence of the ache was intense; he was so used to being in near constant pain. 

“So, what are we doing?” 

“Walking.” 

“I can see that.” 

“Why’re you askin’, then, bird?” 

You huffed but didn’t ask anymore questions as he led you down one concrete pathway. 

The sky was a flawless robin’s egg blue, only a wispy, thin line of cloud on the very distant horizon. The distant shouts of drill instructors snapped in the warm summer air. Your shoulders drooped as you walked, eyes fluttering closed for a few seconds at a time as you tilted your face to the sun, inhaling deeply. 

He led you around the last building in a long line of barracks and brought you to a halt. The only thing beyond was a chainlink fence that marked the edge of the base. A faint breeze coated him in the smell of your skin, settled deep in the well of his lungs. He took a breath, watched your lashes flutter. 

Your thumb stroked a pattern against the inside of his arm, lazy and slow. “You’ve got a soft spot for me, Ghost.” 

He didn’t deny it. 

“What are we doing back here?” 

Ghost pulled away from you with some effort and spread the blanket over the grass. He sat on the concrete steps that led to the back door of the unused barracks.

You sat on the blanket, started to open your lunch and then flopped back in the sun instead. “A usual haunt?” 

“Sometimes.” 

“Secret’s safe with me.” 

“Mind if I smoke?” 

“No.” Then, “I won’t look.”  

He grunted in acknowledgement, rolled the bottom of his mask up, carton of cigarettes and lighter pulled from the depths of a trouser pocket. Simon watched the rise and fall of your chest, tracing the latticework of scars over your face. They looked better on you, he decided. Not as noticeable as his own, faded and light, pencil through wax paper instead of the thick groves of his own. 

They glinted a little in the sun, like the scales of an iridescent fish. 

Your eyes remained peacefully closed, soaking up the sun like a long deprived plant. Sweat beaded along your forehead, and when you pushed up your sleeves, Ghost was reminded that all of you matched all of him.

He recognized a burn mark on your forearm that belonged to him, a cut that wrapped halfway around your wrist. He was pretty sure the burn mark was from a mishandled flare, the wrist scar from a rope that had gotten tangled and burned him. 

Simon wanted to reach down and cup the side of your throat, feel the soft, sun warmed skin beneath his fingers. He wondered if your scars felt the same as his own, rough and grooved. 

Probably not, they were imitations, ungenerous sketchings of his own. 

He’d like to map them all against his own, find out if he bore any of yours. He wouldn’t have noticed something small that you might have collected yourself. A childhood fall, a careless burn while cooking. 

He watched the delicate flex of muscle in your forearms. Your shirt was a little askew, more faded marks left like a tracery of veins on your chest and collarbone and shoulder. It was fucking awful, a wrenching feeling in his chest, to know all that had been inflicted on him, had fallen on you too. 

He wondered about the pain again, imagined you writhing with terror and agony and confusion, every gunshot wound and burn and slash he received an echo inside you. Cigarette burns dotting your arms and wrists when you were just a child, months of pain without end when he was captured and tortured and his life was irrevocably changed. 

Simon wanted to ask, needed to know just how much damage he’d inflicted. But the words stuck in his throat. A fear of knowing, if he asked about the pain, maybe he’d hear other things too, how much you must hate him and didn’t know it was the man in front of you your hate should be directed at.

When he stubbed out his cigarette on the heel of his boot and rolled his mask back down, you blinked into the sun and exhaled, long and slow, and then sat up, leaning back on your palms. 

“What ‘appened?” He asked.

Your mouth twitched into your usual, if a bit more sheepish, smile. “You’re like a dog with a bone, you know that?” 

“Affirmative,” he said. 

You rolled your eyes and set up straight, brushing your palms together before reaching for your lunch. “I brought something for you.” 

“Stalling.” 

“Pushy,” you countered, giggling, rummaging around in your bag. Your smile faded as you pulled free one of the usual containers, what looked like lasagne within. He watched the edge of your mouth curl, the scar slitted along one side pulling at your expression. “I went on a date this weekend.” 

Ice slid down his spine, curled in a viscous circle in his gut. “Bad date?” 

“No,” you said, shaking your head adamantly, staring down at the container in your lap. “No, it went really well.” You glanced up at him and then dug in your bag again, passing another one to him along with a fork. “Until he saw my—” You fidgeted with your sleeve and then yanked it down. The other followed suit. “My marks. My scars.” 

“He’s a prick.” 

“No, he wasn’t,” you shook your head. “It’s happened before. They see the extent of it, and it’s like something biological clicks. I’m off limits.” You sat your food to the side and wrapped your arms around your knees. “Even though I’m no more likely to find mine than anyone else.” 

You looked very small, and alone at that moment. 

“I know it’s not my soulmate’s fault,” you said quietly. “I know that. I know that. And I don’t blame them for it. But sometimes I get so lonely I just—I wish—I wish I didn’t have one. Sometimes I wish I could hate them.”

The chill spreads outward.  

It was confirmation enough. If you knew, you would hate him. All that repressed, sentimentalized resentment would come bubbling up the moment you were actually faced with the person who so fundamentally changed the course of your life. 

He looked at his scars winking in the sun on your skin and felt a self hatred so intense it nearly made him flinch. He wished he could crawl out of that grave and kill them all over again, slower, just for this. 

You glanced up and smiled tightly. “But I’m a hopeless romantic, and dramatic. It was just disappointing. I always have hope someone will see past it.” You ran your hand over the blanket and unfolded yourself to finally begin eating. “This helped, though,” you said. “Thank you, Ghost.” You nodded at the food in his hands, averted your gaze again. 

And even though you could easily glance at him, Simon pushed up his mask and popped open the lid of the lasagne still warm between his hands. 

You ate together for the first time, in silence in the sun. You closed your eyes, kept your face pointed up and away, a cool breeze ruffling your shirt sleeves. 

“Have you found yours?” 

Simon looked at you, the edge of your jaw, the soft shadows your lashes cast over your ruined cheek. “Don’t think someone like me is meant for one.” 

You nodded. “Me either.”

.

.

.

He walked you back to your office. 

You felt better, settled, but he sort of just had that affect on you, you were coming to find. 

Ghost smelled like sun and freshly mowed grass and cigarette smoke. His shoulder kept touching yours, something in your chest lurching each time, like a rib bone had come loose and was knocking against your heart and lungs. 

Ghost carried the blanket back, folded it and set it carefully along the back of what had become his chair. 

You sat and turned, expecting to find him already silently gone as was his way. 

Instead, he was very close and depositing something on your desk. 

Matte black, compact, deadly, cold to the touch. 

A folded pocket knife sat at the edge of your desk. Ghost loomed over you, his shadow curling around your edges. 

He slid it toward you, watched you fold your fingers around it. For a long moment, each of you was holding it. “What’s this?” You asked when he released it, gloved fingers sliding across your desk, back to his side.  

“A knife.” 

“Oh, really? I've never seen one before.” 

He rolled his eyes. “It’s for you. I’ll teach you how to use it.” 

“Why?” 

“In case you need to.”

“Is this about me staying late?” 

“No.” He did not elaborate. 

“You know I received firearm training. I can shoot a gun. Isn’t a knife a little—” 

“But you don’t carry a gun.” 

“No,” you agreed. “I don’t.”  

He nodded as though that explained it. “Right.” 

You considered it, flipped it open. Deadly, shiny blade newly sharpened and oiled and well cared for. It was odd to be given a weapon, and yet unsurprising where Ghost was concerned. You glanced up, watched his dark, intense eyes flick over your face. You weren’t sure what he was looking for, but his brows knitted the longer you stared at each other. Concern, weariness.

“Okay.”

His shoulders loosened. “Tomorrow.” 

“Tomorrow,” you agreed. 

.

.

.

If you thought you would receive one lesson in knifework and be done with it, you didn’t know Ghost very well. 

You only ran drills first, as though Ghost were making sure the physical fitness exam you had to pass once a year was up to scratch. You proved again and again that you could run without getting too winded, disassemble, load, and fire a service weapon. When he was satisfied with that, the real training began. 

You practiced with a rubber blade that bruised when stuck into your ribs. He did not go easy on you. You left the gym battered and bruised, sweaty and just a little bit resentful. But you could break a wrist lock hold, grapple and use your body and size to your advantage. The goal he repeatedly told you, was not to turn you into a fighter or a soldier, but give you an opportunity to get away, to run away.  

What kind of danger he imagined you getting into between the base and your apartment you couldn’t begin to imagine. But you enjoyed spending time with him, enjoyed being in the gym. You found yourself laughing when you were repeatedly slammed into the mat, knife wrested from your fingers. It was fun. And, it was good for you, you decided, even if you thought his intense insistence was a tad dramatic. 

Ghost was a bit dramatic about certain things, you were coming to learn.

This was one of them. You were, you thought with warmth, one of the things he was a bit dramatic about. For whatever reason, you’ve been tucked under his wing, into his shadow. 

On the third week of relentlessly brutal training, you arrived at the base gym, empty as it always was, to find him holding a length of rope. 

You eyed it warily and shifted from foot to foot, amused despite the discomfort. “What do you imagine is going to happen to me?” 

Ghost didn’t answer as you set your bag down and pulled off your sweatshirt. The room was warm, close and humid, the scent of left over dregs of soldiers clogging the room for most of the day. The scent of plastic, lemon disinfectant, and sweat is thick on the air, but when you stepped toward Ghost, his familiar comforting smell of tea and cigarettes washed over you in a vacuous, orbital cloud. 

You looked up just as his eyes slid away from you, blond lashes catching the light, skin pink around his eyes. You’d swear it was a blush if you didn’t know better. “Ghost?” 

“Better to be prepared, yeah?” 

“For what?” All the same, you turned with a sigh. 

After a painfully long moment he stepped close and pressed the dark material around your wrists. His body was warm behind yours for that brief moment even without touching you, like the glow of a heat lamp that made the rest of the room feel cold by comparison. 

His gloved fingers were carefully delicate against your skin. It sent sparks skittering up your arms. What would his bare skin feel like against yours? 

Rough, warm. Safe.  

It’s a thought that had curled its roots into your mind the first time you fell to the mat together and you felt his weight against yours, brief and heavy, but comforting somehow. It wasn’t supposed to be, he was playing predator, it should have been panic inducing. 

Stupid, silly. 

If your most recently failed date had shown you anything, it was that feeling anything for anyone that had seen your scars was a failing venture. And Ghost had seen more of them now, than most. Maybe you should start wearing a mask. 

“What’s the goal today?” You asked, feeling a little like you couldn’t breathe. His warmth and scent and the weight of his presence was overwhelming in a way that made you want to curl into him, gladly suffocate. 

“Same as always,” he answered drolly. “To get away.”

“Hm. I keep thinking you’ll challenge me,” you teased.  

“Not a game, bird.” 

“But what am I meant to do? I can’t fight.” 

“Get out of the bindings. Get to the door.” 

“Is that it?” 

You would swear he’s smirking. “Simple enough, aye.” 

It wasn’t easy. 

For the third time in a row, you landed hard on your back. 

Ghost’s weight was heavy against you, before it lifted away. Your sweaty skin stuck to his hoodie.

Your breath comes in hard, deep pants. Your wrists ached and panic had begun to set in. 

“On your feet.” 

Clumsy as a newborn deer, you stumble to your feet. You had to be faster than him, incapacitate him. “You won’t be getting away from me,” he’d said once, “so you’d have a chance.” It was a compliment; one that said you were doing good. 

It didn’t feel like you were doing good now. 

By the sixth time, you felt raw and helpless, wrists caught at an odd angle beneath you. It wasn’t fun; it wasn’t sparring. You couldn’t manage to wriggle out of the bindings and you were useless at anything he’d taught you without your hands. 

“You’re hurting me,” you gasped. 

He released you immediately and the pressure in your wrists eased. It hadn’t been pain, not really, just panic, just exhaustion. 

But you knew instantly that you’d made a mistake, that he would not take it that way. 

“Shit.” 

.

.

.

The window was open and you were not in your office. 

Simon paused in the doorway, noted your bag on the chair in the corner, the patchwork quilt trailing over the arm of your desk chair and spilling onto the floor. His was gone from the chair. You’d been wandering off without him recently. 

He turned and marched back down the hall. An administrative assistant pointed toward the external door. “Getting sun, she said,” he said. “Sir.” 

Ghost nodded and shouldered the door open. He found you behind the barracks, lying on his blanket, staring up at a patchy sky, slices of blue peaking from between low hanging gray clouds. 

When his shadow fell over you, you opened your eyes and squinted up at him. “Ghost, you’re blocking my sun.” 

“Not much sun to speak of.” You grimace and frown at the sky. “You weren’t in your office.” 

“Sorry, should have left a note.” You patted the blanket next to you. “Sit.” 

Simon sat on the concrete steps. “Where’s your lunch?”

“Forgot it.” 

Worry sprouted, blossomed along his veins, ubiquitous as the pain that accompanies it. 

“Canteen,” he said. “Let’s go.” 

“It’s okay—“

“Wasn’t a suggestion.” 

“You’re bossy,” you said but didn’t move, chin tilted up, eyes flitting shut again. “I’ll have a big dinner.” 

He sighed and pulled a pack of cigarettes from his pocket, content enough to wait you out and smoke. The clouds continued to gather, putting your beloved sun to rest for the moment. The air grew steadily thicker with humidity. 

“Gonna rain,” he commented. 

You ignored him, eyes squinching closed harder, like you could will the sun to return. He watched you, made himself look at the bruises on your wrists and forearms, he knew there were matching ones on your ribs. They were harmless, just the usual consequence of sparring, but the ones around your wrists—that’s a mistake he won’t soon forget. 

When a fat raindrop landed on your arm, you sat up with a grumble. “Ready now?” He asked, pulling down his mask again. 

“I can see you won’t leave it alone.” 

“Affirmative,” he said. 

You rolled your eyes and started to get to your feet, pausing when he held out a hand to you. You stared for a beat too long before gripping his hand in yours. 

Even through his gloves, it was like being electrocuted. 

You released his hand as soon as you could, eyes skirting his. “Your lead,” you said. “I haven’t had the privilege.” 

He grunted, followed you closely back inside. 

As Simon’s misfortune would have it, Johnny was still in the canteen. 

He lasered in on the pair of you immediately, a grin growing across his face as he approached. “Ach so this is where you’ve been off to LT.”

Ghost herded you into line, a raucous group of new recruits halting their conversation to ogle you before their eyes flicked to his and away, conversation continued at a more subdued level. He shifted closer, between you and them, though you didn’t seem to notice.

“Haven’t been off anywhere,” he grumbled. 

“Who’s this then?” 

You smiled and offered your hand and name. “It’s nice to see that Ghost has bad manners with everyone.” 

“John MacTavish,” Soap said, all charm as he practically bowed. “Call me Soap.”

“Soap,” you giggled. “I’ve seen you in my reports.” 

Soap’s gaze flicked over your face, sharp eyes making the quick calculations that had made Simon hope he wouldn’t be in the canteen. “Are they yours?” 

“Sergeant—,” Ghost said sharply, a warning in his voice. 

But you only laughed and touched your cheek with obvious pride as the line moved up. “No. None of them belong to me. They’re nice though, right?” 

Simon went very still, swore his heart rate slowed. You held out your arm, showed off a sliver flash.

“Very becoming, lass.” 

You smiled again and gestured to your own chin, the side of your head. “Yours?” 

“Aye, all mine.”

“Ah, luck.” 

“Lucky indeed.”

Johnny’s eyes shifted to Simon’s, brows raised, with a look that said he knew. Simon glanced away, gritting his jaw so hard it ached.

 “Am I going to get food poisoning from this?” You asked as a tray was handed over, eying warily what was ostensibly mash, peas and carrots, mystery meat. 

“Probably not,” Johnny answered cheerfully. “Been mostly fine.” 

“Yes, but I think you military people might have tolerance to low levels of poison.” 

“That’s for sure, bonnie.” 

“Bonnie,” you said, giggling. “Are you calling me pretty?” 

Soap covered his heart, balancing his tray with one hand. “You wound me. Simon only keeps us good looking bastards around.”

“Simon,” you said softly, glancing up at him. “I didn’t think anyone knew your name.” 

Ghost didn’t answer for a moment, glaring daggers into the side of Johnny’s head, ignoring the way his heart was clenched so tight it felt like it was in a vise. Simon, his name on your tongue—  

“It’s need to know,” he snapped. 

Your expression folded and you glanced away. “Right, of course. Sorry.”

Simon clenched his jaw so hard it clicked as Johnny shot him a look. “This way, lass,” he said, leading you toward a spot in the corner of the mess. 

“Oh,” you said weakly, “That’s all right. You don’t have to—”

Ghost couldn’t help but notice the anxious look you threw him, the thin line your voice had transformed into. 

Soap wasn’t listening, already talking your ear off, pulling out a chair for you. You smiled and sat and Simon was left to silently watch it unfold. 

.

.

.

“Fuckin’ hell,” Soap muttered when they’d safely returned you to your office where a contingent of lesser analysts awaited you. The corridor leading away from the now closed door seemed impossibly long. “D’ya know how many people would kill to meet their soulmate? You’ve got yours right under your fuckin’ nose and haven’t even told her yer name!” 

“She doesn’t need to know.” 

“Yer name?” 

Ghost leveled Soap with a stare. 

Soap gaped at him. “Steamin’ Jesus. You aren’t plannin’ to tell the lass at all?” 

“Stay out of it, MacTavish.” 

Johnny followed him down the hall, outside into a bleak, gray drizzle. “You know it can kill you?” Simon kept walking. “Simon.” 

He stopped, glanced at Soap with a warning in his eyes. “Do ya?”

“It won’t.”

Johnny continues anyway, urgently. “There’s a pain, they say, under the ribs when—“

“Stay out of it, Sergeant,” Ghost growled, that very pain growing as it always did as he moved further and further away from you. “It’s nothing.” 

“It‘ll corrode,” Johnny said to his retreating back. “She’ll feel it eventually.”

Simon ignored him. 

But he wondered as he walked away, if he died, if you’d feel the corded snap of his life floating away from yours.  

Somehow, being that sort of ghost, didn’t sit well with him. 

.

.

.

Johnny, predictably, did not stay out of it. 

He regularly and reliably began to show up in your office. More than once, he looped Garrick into accompanying him. Ghost had watched as the same realization Soap had snapped into place on Gaz’s face, and knew it was only a matter of time before Price knew too. 

Luckily, they were the only three on the entire base that could make the connection, that had seen his face, so at least it was done with. None of them said anything to him about it, but there were a lot of worried glances being exchanged. 

Ghost felt the edge of his sanity begin to wear thin the longer it went on, not that there was much left of it in the first place.

The disruption, the infiltration, the distraction grated until his insides felt raw with irritation. He hadn’t wanted anyone else to know, not because he was ashamed, but because you were his, and you didn’t deserve to be burdened by that. He would shoulder that horrible belonging for both of you. 

But the way you’d tenderly touched your cheek remains burned into his memory. The soft look in your eye. The gentle way you and Soap always spoke of soulmates whenever they came up, reverent and tender. 

You enjoyed their company, Johnny and Kyle, and seemed all the better for it. It was clear immediately how much you liked both of them. How much you desperately needed friends. 

Ghost was loath to admit there was a seed of jealousy wriggling in his belly. The easy way you got on with them proof enough that a wire had gotten crossed somewhere, that you were more cursed by him than anchored by.

Then, the gifts left at the edge of your desk began to extend to the lads and not just himself, and it felt vaguely as though he were losing a vital piece of himself to it. 

Then, you stopped coming to the gym. You were gone, office dark, before he could walk you to your car. You went on another date. 

He didn’t know what to do with any of it.

One Tuesday at the end of July you were in your office, but Soap was there before him, tearing into a packet of crisps, lounging in Simon’s chair, patchwork quilt flattened beneath him in a heap. It was hot, and humid, a fan in the corner working overtime, window propped open.

You were happily listening to Johnny explain the ins and outs of football. A match was playing on your computer screen which you’d turned back so both of you could see. 

Your eyes found Simon’s when he paused in the doorway, and you waved him inside, an unsure smile twitching at the corners of your mouth. “Hi, Ghost. Do you keep up with soccer, too?” 

A groan from Soap. “Bloody Americans.” 

“Sorry, sorry. You keep up with footie too, mate?” 

“Horrendous,” Ghost said flatly.

Your smile faltered then brightened again. It didn’t quite reach your eyes. “You should hear my Scottish accent. Soap said I offended every one of his ancestors.” 

“Aye and you did lass,” he said solemnly. “Yeh—” 

“Sergeant,” Ghost interrupted loudly. “Aren’t you due for PT?”  

“Ach, right,” he muttered, getting to his feet, “Thanks for the reminder, LT.” 

“Oh, Soap,” you said, “Hold on.” You rummaged beneath your desk for a long moment, then passed him a brown paper bag full of cookies. “Your favorite, as requested.” 

“You sweet on me or something, bon?”

You rolled your eyes and said, “Out of my office.” 

“Yes, ma’am.” 

Ghost took Soap’s vacated seat, watched you avoid looking at him as you moved things needlessly around your desk, twisted your monitor back around and muted the match. 

The silence was suffocating. 

“All right?” 

You froze, then shuffled the papers together and slid them to a corner of your desk. “I wanted to apologize.” Your voice hitched a little. 

He blinked, taken aback. He didn’t like that you could surprise him. “For what?” 

You bit your lip, fidgeted again. “Your name, I guess. You didn’t want me to know.” Your mouth twisted to the side. “And your team bothering you here—” 

“You’re apologizing for Soap?” 

Your brow furrowed. “Well I encourage it—”

“No.” 

“No?” You shook your head, “and that day in the gym—” You opened and closed your hands anxiously. “I think I upset you.” 

He stared across the room, toward your big, sunny window, all those little potted plants that have flourished through the summer months. Your bug lamp seemed to droop in the heat, sad and watchful. He’d hurt you, and you’d taken the blame. Something horrible lurched in his belly, heavy and unforgiving. “Didn’t. I should have been more careful.” 

“Right,” you said carefully. “So if it’s not that, why are you—” 

He shrugged, watched one of the emerald leaves sway in the warm breeze. “I like you to myself,” he admitted. “Not the best at sharing.”  

“Oh,” you said, voice tender. “Oh.” 

“Mm.” 

“I’ll make space.” 

He didn’t quite understand what you meant by that, but he liked the way it sounded. Space for him. 

“You’ll come to the gym later, yeah?” 

“Yes.” 

“Good.” He stood, deposited your knife, which he’d snagged early in the morning to clean and sharpen, back onto your desk, along with the new box of tea because he noticed you were out the night before. “And don’t tell bloody Soap.” 

“Aye, LT.” 

He chuckled. “Take care of that.” 

“Teach me how?” 

He nodded. 

“Thanks for the tea. I used the last bag yesterday afternoon.” 

“I know.” 

Your smile was soft, your fingers touched his. He breathed a little easier. 

“‘Course you do.” 

.

.

.

Simon couldn’t stop thinking about pain. 

His body functioned at a constant low level of pain, had for years. Maybe it had his whole life, so he tended not to notice it. But the ache you caused had only seemed to grow over time, tendrils spreading to the furthest reaches of his body, the tips of his fingers, the backs of his knees, places he didn’t think could hold pain. 

The intensity increased too, until he could no longer ignore it. It was like a whine, like a child begging to be seen to. 

He kept thinking of your voice, too, dreaming of it. You’re hurting me. Panic ridden, laced with fear.

You said he didn’t, after,  but he didn’t relish the thought of the possibility. Accidentally hurting you, hurting you on purpose. He thought of his mother, doing her best with a brutal man. He was afraid of unknowingly stepping into a cycle, to find himself standing above you one day, drunk, mean, angry. 

You’re hurting me.  

It echoed like a heartbeat. Inevitable. 

You might collect his scars, but he would not add to them with his own hands. He’d rather die; he’d rather be burned alive; he’d rather crawl out of a grave a hundred times over. 

He was afraid of it. Afraid that every terrible aspect of this bond between you could only bring you pain. 

His father loomed in the recesses of his mind, all the violent men he’d ever known, every bloody fist. Simon’s scalp ached, the memories swam behind his eyes. Long nights, wild animals, dead girls. 

There was one person who had a preoccupation with soulmates who was likely to know, who badgered him regularly about eroding the bond, about bond tears and pain. Simon could know, once and for all, if he was the cause of the indirect pain, at least. His own imposed on you, pushed into your skin like a punishment. He could cross that off his long list of sins. 

Johnny, when Simon finally tracked him down, was sat in the armory cleaning a rifle. He watched over his Sergeant's shoulder for a long moment. The methodical movement soothed him, brought his heartrate down a little. 

“Johnny.” 

Soap jumped and glanced around. “Spooky fucker. Should put a bell on ye—” 

“Does she feel it?”

“What—”

He exhaled long and slow. “My pain. If I’m shot tomorrow, would she feel it?”

Soap glanced around, brows raised. “Ye don’t know?” 

“Say I don’t.” 

“No, the lass doesn’t feel it.” Soap turned his wrist, pointed to a scar that was lighter than some of the others, a pale tracery that slipped from the inside of his elbow to mid forearm. “Not mine. Watched it fade in one mornin’. Didn’t feel a thing.” 

Ghost looks at the scar, and Soap lets him. “Tha’ why you haven’t—”

“No.” 

“Why?” 

“Deserves better.” 

Johnny nodded, continued cleaning the rifle. “Thing is, LT. She doesn’t. That’s the point.” 

Well, at least he only had to worry about becoming his father. 

Fucking perfect. 

.

.

.

Two months deployment.  

The pain in Simon’s chest was agonizing, a constant fire. He couldn’t sleep, pain meds did nothing for it. 

He could only wait it out, wait until he was back on base and hope you were in your office, that the solace of your presence in that warm yellow light would be waiting for him. The pain would recede. He needed a plan, though. Clearly it wasn’t fucking viable to just let it go on. It was too distracting and only getting worse. It was no longer something he could ignore. 

Maybe, he didn’t really want to.

Maybe, Johnny was right. 

He half convinced himself that the lancing ache was so bad because you’d been posted somewhere else the last two months and you were further away than ever. Your office would be empty. This was just an agony he would have to learn to live with. 

Finally, though, they were going home. Intel secure. One last building to sweep. Empty. A loaded silence that made the back of his neck prickle. 

Not as empty as they thought. 

Soap steps quickly into the last room ahead of him, gaze sweeping from one side to another before he lowered his weapon and stepped forward. 

Ghost followed quickly, lowered his gun when he saw what Johnny had. Civilians. One curled around the other, sobbing so hard she made no noise. 

When she lifted her face, Simon sucked in a startled breath. She looked like you, only without his scars. There was a mark slowly bleeding into place on her temple, one that matched the gunshot wound of the woman beneath her. 

The wail that suddenly pierced the air was distraught, horrible, a lurch and a bang. 

Soap was there, kneeling, looking for wounds that Ghost knew didn’t exist. Horror froze him for the second time in his life, your face swimming behind his eyes. 

“I thought you said they couldn’t feel it,” he barked. 

“What?” 

“Soulmates.” 

Soap looked at the pair with fresh eyes. 

“They can’t, LT,” Soap said without glancing at him. “It’s no’ that. It’s just—” 

Grief. The unbearable snapping of a fated cord. The tether in his own chest pulsed, ached. He thought of it breaking cleanly in two, as though it never existed, your light snuffed out, leaving him in total darkness again. 

It wasn’t pain she was feeling, it was the absence. 

“Ghost,” Johnny said sharply and Simon finally snapped out of it, went to his side. 

It wasn't worth it, he thought. None of this could be fucking worth it. He was left with the sinking sense that all he could ever do was hurt you. 

All the same, he felt an urgency to go home. To return to your side. To feel your pulse under his fingers. 

Just to be sure. 

It took them a long time to get her to leave the body. 

.

.

.

Task Force 141 was deployed for nearly two months. 

September and October passed slowly, in starts and fits that seemed to drag. 

You developed a pain in your side, a stitch from taking it too hard in the gym you assumed. But nothing seemed to help it. The pang became a prick became a small misery that the base medical staff couldn’t pinpoint the origins of. 

You missed Ghost, and Kyle and Johnny, tolerated the terrible tea your coworkers made for you, went on another series of failed dates, and finally became friends with your cross-hall apartment neighbor. Months of baked goods and hellos finally coming to fruition. Pieces of a life were falling together. 

Finally, they were coming home. You left your offer that night with the assurance that they were uninjured, that Ghost, and likely Soap, would be in your office by noon the next day. 

But Simon still managed to reappear as he always did, silently and without warning. A shadow crossed your back as you were locking your office near midnight, a hand grazed your back. You followed the series of steps you’d been taught months ago. Foot back, elbow out, knife in hand, open, turn—

Your wrist was caught by the flat of his palm, fingers of the opposite hand yanking it from your grip.  

You blinked and breathed out heavily, relieved. The tight tenderness in your side leveled off for the first time in a month. “Ghost,” you murmured, lowering your now empty hand, “You aren’t supposed to be back until tomorrow morning.” 

“That disappointed to see me?” 

No. Never. But he was still in full tactical gear. The skin around his eyes was still layered with eyeblack, exhaustion and an acid tension rolling off him in a thick wave. His gaze was heavy, but steady, assessing you in turn. He smelled like diesel and cigarettes and gun powder. You lifted your chin. “Surprised to see you. Glad to see you.” 

He only flipped the knife around and held it out to you. “Nice work.” 

You smiled as you took the blade and stored it again. “You’re making me paranoid, I think.” 

“Good. Paranoid keeps you alive.” 

His eyes flicked over you, looking long and hard, though for what you couldn’t be sure. He stepped closer, until you were forced back against the door. He towered over you, corralled you back against the cool wood. Soft, dark eyes like wells of ink in the shadow of the hood pulled over his head, searched long enough that you began to worry something was wrong. 

You reached out and rested your hand on his forearm. His body was so taut you could feel the tremble of exhausted, overwrought muscle. “Ghost,” you said gently, carefully. “Are you okay?” 

He inhaled deeply, so hard and fast it sounded pained. 

He looked at you again, eyes sliding over you slowly, like he was orienting himself, finding steady ground on which to stand. 

“Why don’t you cover ‘em?”

Your belly clenched. “Cover what?” you queried, silently begging him not to ask that question. 

“Scars.” 

You went still, looking down at your skin. You had rolled up your sleeves earlier in the evening when furious typing had required it. They glinted silver in the low light of the hall. Pretty and delicate as dragon scales. 

It wasn’t anything he hadn’t seen before. 

Still, you fought the urge to cross your arms. You hated when he stared at them. 

“Why would I?” You rubbed your wrist. “I don’t want to. They belong to my soulmate.”

He glanced away from you, his jaw tight beneath the mask. “You actually believe in that shite?” His voice was harsh, aggressive in a way he had never spoken to you before. “It’s a bloody children’s tale.”  

You bristled, felt something hard and mean well behind your breastbone in a tight knot. The pain that had been kicking you in the ribs lately reared again, made you wince and cover your side. “Well,” you snapped, gesturing to yourself with your free hand, “these aren’t mine, so I guess I have to.”  

He scoffed and you felt your heart lurch, hurt settling in your gut, twisting an invisible knife that much deeper. You tried to side step him but he didn’t move, a terrible, solid wall of muscle and—anger? Irritation? You couldn’t tell. “What the fuck do you care? Maybe you’re ashamed of yours,” you said roughly, “But not all of us are.” 

His brows furrowed and he shook his head again. “Oh, come off it.” 

“What?” 

“You’re tellin’ me that if you came face to face with the bastard that did this to you, you wouldn’t hate him?” 

Indignation burned a righteous path up your throat. “You don’t get to do that,” you said lowly. 

“You didn’t deny it,” he said. “You would.” 

“No,” you interrupted vehemently, swallowing around the word like gravel in your throat. “No, of course I wouldn’t. It wasn’t done to me, it—” 

But Simon was determined, his mind set. 

“He hurt you, changed the course of your bloody life, whether you want to admit it or not. You’ll hate him for it, love.” 

“For something he went through?” You asked incredulously, defensively. “Do you know how scared I was?” 

Ghost’s eyes went blank, his stare suddenly flat and far away. His gaze drifted from yours, the weight of flinty amber lifted. “Of him,” he said viciously, like something terrible he’d always known had been confirmed. 

“No,” you snarled again, not sure why Ghost was fighting you, not sure why he cared about your scars suddenly. “You aren’t listening. For him.” Your ribs ached, your breath came in short bursts. He was too close, the clashing sensations of safety and agitation calcifying the tension between you into a solid, immutable wall. 

You inhaled shakily through the sudden distress. Your lungs hitched and spasmed before you could suck in a proper breath, feeling faint, glad for the wall behind you. 

He blinked, looked down at you again. “Hey—” 

“I was so scared I would lose him before I ever got to meet him. Ever since I was a kid I’ve had scars. Cigarette burns and scratches, bite marks. I used to hope he was older than me, so it wouldn’t have meant that he—so that he wouldn’t have been—” Agitation rises like a tide, all the nights you’d sat awake watching scars bleed into your skin. Your parents had been unable to look at you in the morning, wondering what the future held for you. What kind of person that child would grow up to be. 

The same fear Simon seemed to be holding onto so tightly. 

You stumbled over his concern, something prickling at the base of your neck. 

“Once,” you continued shakily, “they just kept showing up, day after day, for months. I didn’t know what was happening and there was nothing I could do. I thought he was going to die and I couldn’t help him. I was so worried and all I could do was watch.” 

You met his eyes, saw something so raw and wretched there that you flinched back, closed your eyes, breath caught. 

You aren’t sure when you transitioned to using he instead of they. 

It suddenly didn’t feel like you were talking about someone you hadn’t met yet. 

You thought of how strangely intense he was about you. How you had felt so strongly about him immediately. How the only bit of his skin you’ve ever seen has been around his eyes; the delicate veins at his wrists.

You thought of him making you tea and teaching you to defend yourself. You thought of him walking you to your car and pulling you into sunny days. You thought of all the cups of coffee and boxes of tea, the gentle way he handled the blanket you made him from cheap cotton like it was spun gold. 

You thought of Johnny asking after your scars the first time you met him. How not long after you’d been personally introduced to the rest of the 141 for no discernable reason. How they checked on you. How they were probably the only people that knew what Ghost’s face looked like. 

“No,” you whispered, pieces of a terrible puzzle sliding together in your mind. 

You opened your eyes.  

“Ghost?” you asked softly, tentatively lifting your hand. 

He jerked back. “Don’t do that,” he warned.  

You stepped closer, knowing you were playing with fire, that he might burn you, lash out like a dog with its leg in a trap. 

But if he was yours—

If he was yours, you would not be the one to inflict more hurt on him. 

He did not want this, he did not want you, that much was clear. 

You closed your hand and let it fall, pushed your fist against your heart instead. “I see you,” you said gently. “That’s all I’ve ever wanted.” 

“You don’t understand,” he rasped.  

“You survived.” You backed away. “That’s enough. To know you’re okay.” 

The empty spot in your chest ached, seemed to grow tendrils that wrapped around your heart. A bond so close and not latched. Because you haven’t seen him. He has to let you in.

“When you’re ready. If you’re ever ready. I'm here.”

He finally returned his gaze to yours. 

“Did it hurt?” 

“Did what hurt?” You tilted your head but he didn’t answer, just stared at you with big, moon dark eyes, brows pinched inward, eyeblack creating a tiny white line there. “Oh, you wouldn’t know, I guess.” You shook your head, “No I was just scared. Just worried. It didn’t hurt. You’ve never hurt me.” 

He moved so quickly and silently that you jumped when his hand curled around your wrist. Light enough that you could pull away if you wanted.  

“You don’t have to. You never have to. I don’t want to take anything else from you.” 

Ghost hesitated, his chest rising and falling quickly. “Do I have any of yours?” The question was quiet, almost reverent.  

You nodded, “‘Course you do. I fell out of a tree when I was a kid. Gave me a nasty scar on the back of my elbow. I landed on a rock.” 

His eyes flicked away, like he was trying to imagine it. You twisted your arm, showed him the thick line of scar there, totally different than the lighter version of his on your skin. “See? You’ll have that one in the same spot but lighter. Maybe not even visible, since you’re so pale.” 

Your breath caught when he stepped closer, the pain in your chest was so intense it made breathing difficult.

“It’s not fair to you.” 

“What isn’t?” 

“To bloody leave it. Hurts, yeah?” 

You didn’t admit to the spasming in your chest; it wouldn’t help anything. “When have you ever cared about fair?” 

He made a pained sound. “Don’t.” 

“I’m okay. I don’t need anything from you. I don’t want anything from you.”

“You’re supposed to need things from me.”  

He peeled his gloves off, tucked them into his back pocket. The hall was still and silent aside from your combined ragged breathing. It sounded like you’d been running a marathon. “Ghost—” 

“Simon,” he said. “Please, call me Simon.” 

You closed your eyes, felt his hands graze your collarbone, your throat, before anchoring on your jaw, tilting your face up. “Look at me, sweet’eart.” 

“I can’t.” Your voice trembled, tears clogging your throat. 

“Can.” 

Very gently, he leaned down and pushed his forehead against yours. 

You shuddered and swallowed and stepped closer. Simon curled his arms around you, pulled you into his chest. He was so broad and tall, you felt swaddled against him, warm and secure. His scent wrapped around you like ribbons holding you together. “No point dragging it on, yeah? No point you being in pain.” 

“How long?” 

“The whole time,” he admitted after a moment. His voice rumbled against your cheek. It felt like home. “First time I saw you.” 

“You have had this pain for almost a whole year—” 

“Not your fault,” he interrupted, one massive hand sliding down your spine. “Not your fault.” 

You huffed, hooked your fingers beneath his tac vest. “I’m sorry anyway.” You pulled back, felt his arms tighten around you for a moment. He didn’t want to let you go. “Is there anything you need to take care of? Reports or debriefing or something?” 

“No.” 

“Would. . . would you want to come to mine—” 

He reached under your arm and plucked your keys out of the lock before you could finish, guiding you down the hall, his hand never leaving your skin. 

You had never seen Simon outside the base, you realized suddenly, and everything felt vastly more fragile. It also felt as though that hollow pulse in your chest would tear if you were asked to walk away at that moment, something real and physical would tear and drop out of you, an irreparable part of your soul. 

You weren’t sure how you drove home, Ghost huge in your passenger seat, your hands shaking each time he shifted his grip on you. 

In your apartment, you hesitated, not sure where you belonged in your own space anymore. Simon looked strange in your tiny living room, among soft blankets and years of collected books and knicknacks. An all consuming shadow. You wondered if this would end like all those dates, just another failure, another loss. 

When you started to step toward the lamp, Simon’s fingers curled around your wrist to keep you by his side. “No.” 

“Just turning on the lamp.” 

He released you.

As you stepped away, a hollow pulse in your chest retched with pain that made you gasp and clutch the edge of the sofa. It felt real, like something was breaking, jagged edges clawing at the inside of your skin. You wondered what Ghost’s self imposed distance might have done to the bond. There were stories, albeit few, of corrosion. The bond literally rusting out, slowly poisoning the soulmate and their pair. 

“Come ‘ere,” he muttered. “Sit down.”

When his palm cupped your elbow, the world became softer. Like purr instead of a shriek. He guided you onto the sofa. 

Your hands shook when he released you, making quick work of the lamp. The room flooded with soft yellow light. He glanced around. Art on the walls, forest green rug over hardwood floor, molding you had painted a delicate gold. You felt embarrassed of it all suddenly. 

“God,” you muttered. He didn’t seem to feel the pain at all, which made your chest ache in a different way and guilt pool heavily between your bones for it. You didn’t want him to be in pain, but you felt as though you were breathing water, choking on your own lungs. “How have you dealt with this?” 

“Worse now,” he said, though you felt it was his version of a kind untruth. 

He sat next to you, reached for you, then faltered, unsure. You closed the space, folded your fingers between his. The scars made a fucked up little mirror when you looked down at your hands. They matched exactly. “I’m sorry.” 

Simon didn’t answer, but stayed close to you, letting you hold his hand. Even the smallest amount of space between you seemed to burn, a brazier that flared hot and demanded attention. But it was better; just having his bare hand in yours helped. 

“Nothin’ t’be sorry for.” He said after a few minutes of uneven breathing, eyes trained on your hands, thumb running over the back of your fingers. 

“You don’t want me.” 

It wasn’t a question. 

He glanced up, something razor sharp in his eyes. You flinched a little, but his hand tightened on yours. 

“You don’t have to—We don’t have to bond,” you tripped over the last word. “It’s okay.” 

“Obviously it’s not, bird.” 

Your heart sunk and you glanced away. A one in eight billion chance was sitting under your nose for months, and he wanted nothing to do with you. He was being forced into it.

“I’m sorry,” you murmured again. “Ghost, I’m—”

“Simon,” he corrected.  

“Simon,” you echoed. 

He curled his hands around your wrists, lifted your palms to the bottom of his mask. He let your hands settle at the base of his throat, eyes never leaving yours. “I didn’t want you,” he said plainly. “I never wanted you to know.” 

You swallowed and nodded. “I’m s—” 

“No.”

You closed your mouth with a click of your jaw. You don’t expect a speech and he doesn’t give you one. “You deserve better,” he said. “But I’m all you get.” 

His knee touched yours. Your faces were tilted together, so close that the only thing you could see were the soft depths of his eyes reflecting the gold light.

It didn’t feel close enough. 

You wished it were all different. 

That he didn’t feel forced, that you were what he wanted. 

“I deserve you. Isn’t that the point?” 

He watched you for a long moment, an unreadable expression on his face, then nodded. 

“Go on, then.” 

Your throat felt tight as you tugged the mask upwards, heart lurching when you recognized the same scar on your throat on his. You pushed the fabric over his chin and mouth, up until you could pull it over his head. 

You looked at him, the same scar over his mouth, along his cheek, the bridge of his nose was nicked, the outline of burn scarring crossed the edge of his jaw and neck. When you looked past that, you saw him. Crooked nose, thick, furrowed brows, dark eyes you’d loved for a long time cast darker by the black around them, light eyelashes and hair, longer on top and curling. 

Something seemed to. . .snap then. A warmth broke between you, filled that awful, dark, pained well in your chest. It hurt, but the pain was brief, like stitches done by a seasoned medic. 

Breathing was easier. You could feel the pulse of him without the threat of imminent pain. It was a warm, comforting, safe thing in your lungs. You inhaled, attempted to stand, to give him a bit of space. “Should be able to separate now. Shall we test it—” 

You didn’t get a chance to move away, tugged suddenly from your seat and into his lap. You fell heavily against his chest, wrapped tightly in his arms, foreheads slanted together. 

“No,” he said, sounding, for the first time since you’ve known him, breathless. “No.” 

“I don’t want to.” 

“Good.” 

“Can I touch you?” 

“Can do anything you like to me, bird.” 

You stroked the side of his throat, felt him shiver. “Well, I won’t. Not anything.” 

He made a content noise of agreement. 

You touched his jaw, his cheek, the tail of his brow, the faded check through it that you’d never noticed matched your own. His arms tightened around you in increments until the pressure forced you to take shallow breaths. “You’re beautiful.” 

“Lookin’ in a mirror, are you?” 

“Sort of,” you answered. “A little.” 

His hands shifted, anchored on your hips, and pushed you back a little. 

Disappointment that it was over so soon pinched at your throat but you backed off, attempting to slide from his lap. His hand caught at your hip. “Stop trying to bloody move.” 

“What—” 

He was only taking off the vest, which probably should have been left at the base. It dropped heavily to the floor as he pulled you against his chest. It was warmer, softer like that, thick muscle coiled beneath your cheek when you rested it against his shoulder, heartbeat hard against yours.  

“No more pain?” 

“None.” 

“Good.” 

You pushed your face against his throat, felt him tense and then uncoil. One large hand cupped the back of your neck, holding you there. You brushed your lips against his pulse point, felt a scarred flutter against your mouth, a muted grunt.

“You’re all I want,” you admitted quietly. “I think I knew. I think everyone knew. I’m sorry,” you finally said, “that I’m not who you need.”  

His hand squeezes your neck and then he’s pushing you down against the cushions, pressing one massive thigh between your legs, hauling you closer like it could never be close enough. The space between your bodies would always be too large, because you couldn’t climb into his chest, nest among his veins. 

It would have to do then, his hand tilting your jaw up, his eyes searching yours as you part your lips. 

“You are, sweet’eart,” he said simply, mouth brushing yours before he kissed you properly. 

He tasted of black tea; his eyeblack rubs off on your temples. 

Already, he was leaving pieces of himself behind with you to mark safe.

“Simon,” you murmured against his mouth. Just to say it, just to be rewarded with a shudder.

The kiss slipped into something more desperate, your hands felt the skin of his back, your own scar on his elbow, and you thought, maybe, you could become what he needed.  

You, who were used to discipline and seriousness, couldn't understand how someone like him could be part of such an important operation. He had literally been one of the people who had saved the world from being dominated by a bunch of alien bugs.

He, for his part, looked at you as if you were the most interesting thing he had ever seen in his life.

He smiled at you in that silly, genuine way that got on your nerves. He talked nonstop about things you didn't care about, his life as a vigilante, his intimate friendship with Peacemaker, his passion for birds.

“Did you know that owls can turn their heads all the way around?” he asked you one day while you were on patrol. “They can turn them like 270 degrees in a circle without moving their shoulders. Can you imagine if I could do that?”

You ignored him and kept looking through your binoculars. “I'm not in the mood to talk about birds, Adrian,” you said, your voice as cold as usual.

He didn't give up and tried to rotate his neck, very awkwardly due to his mask. “I could just rotate my neck like this and—”

“Adrian, please shut up,” you interrupted him, finally turning your head so you could look at him. “We have work to do. Stop being a fucking freak for a minute.”

He fell silent, and for a moment, you felt a little bad. But then you thought about all the times he had pissed you off, and you got over it. 

Still, it was strange. 

Despite your constant rejections, your constant unkind looks, he always came back. He always smiled at you. He always offered you one of his homemade cookies —which, much to your chagrin, were incredibly good.

He extended that extra special treatment to you and only you.

Adrian treated you as if you were the most important person in the world. And that, in a twisted way, made you feel like you were the freak in the situation. He adored you.

Although, deep down, you found him ridiculously cute. He was damn attractive when he shut his mouth and obeyed you in everything.

You would never accept it, of course.

Chris, on his part, tried way too hard to make you like him. Every time you guys hung out, he would mention how good of a friend Adrian was, how good he was at killing people, as if that would somehow impress you—which it did, of course—and how big his dick was.

He literally just mentioned it like that, without further explanation or any context, as if it were a piece of information you would be interested in knowing.

He took special care to pair you with Adrian for assignments, leave you alone together, send you to buy food for Eagly together. He was a kind of fucked-up Cupid.

“I don't need to know that,” you would say with disgust, trying very hard not to envision Adrian's dick.

And Chris would just nod his head, leaning in close to you as if he were revealing a top secret, “You need to know, dude. Honestly, I don't think Adrian likes sex that much. But his dick is big, I can assure you that.”

You didn't even want to know how he even knew that.

You didn't even like Adrian that way.

At least that's what you thought.

Until now.

You were on a regular night of surveillance; preventing a crime of some criminal gang that you had been tracking.

Everything was going well until the hallways filled with armed men, and a flurry of bullets struck near you. 

Before you could react, one of the masked men shot you in the shoulder.

You feel a sharp pain that shoots through your entire arm, and then blood began to flow.

“Shit!” you cry out, retreating.

Adrian, who had insisted —begged— to accompany you that night, turn around when he hears the scream. You can scarcely see how his eyes panic, desperately searching for you through all the chaos.

He moves faster than you had ever seen him move before.

Then, he throws himself on top of you, covering you with his body, and drags you to a safe corner behind a wall of boxes.

“You're bleeding!” he gasps, his voice tinged with panic.

The pain makes you grit your teeth and the way he looks at you knocks you off balance. “I'm fine, it's just a scratch.”

“It's not fucking a scratch!” he snaps, tearing off a piece of his suit to cover the wound. “You got fucking shot, Lynx!”

The use of your vigilante name makes you finally look at him, dragging your gaze away from your bleeding wound. You can see the concern in his eyes through his mask, and he doesn't have to take it off for you to know that his lips are pursed in a pout.

His touch is gentle and careful, which surprises you. The adrenaline prevents you from thinking clearly. You'd never imagine that Adrian would be so... gentle.

While he is bandaging your wound, another man peers down the hallway. Adrian pushes you further back. 

“Stay here!” he whispers, and without a second thought, he stands up to confront him.

The shooting intensifies and then you hear the sound of a chainsaw igniting, followed by a flood of screams of pain.

Just a couple of minutes later, Adrian appears in your field of vision, his suit covered in blood.

He looks so fucking hot that you couldn't even suppress the thought, in all the haze of hurt you are feeling.

“We have to get out of here,” Adrian claims, returning to your side. “you need a doctor.”

​You shook your head, the pain throbbing in your shoulder. “My car is a couple of blocks away. We can go there, but no doctors.”

He looks at you disapprovingly for a moment before sighing and help you up, supporting your weight against him. Together, you sneak out of the market, leaving the entire criminal gang slaughtered behind and the owner of the store with a horrified look on his face, calling the police.

When you reach your car, you struggle to open the door. Adrian gently pushes you aside and does it for you.

You sit in the passenger seat, feeling the sting in your shoulder with every movement.

“Where are we going?” Adrian asks, starting the engine right after you toss him the keys.

“My house,” you reply. It is the closest and safest option, although the idea of being alone with him makes you uneasy.

Adrian already knew your address, of course; he had been there several times, showing up with his homemade cookies, sometimes with new weapons to show you, and other times with clues about some criminal you were hunting.

The journey is silent, except for the sound of the engine, some Frank Sinatra album playing on the stereo and your ragged breathing. Adrian glances at you from time to time, his eyes displaying full concern once he takes off his mask and throws it on the back seat. You don't dare look at him directly, feeling a strange mixture of gratitude and confusion.

“Frank Sinatra?” he inquires a in a teasing, incredulous tone, without looking at you. This time, it is you the one staring at him, at his side profile, the line of his strong jaw, the curve of his nose, the way his eyelashes barely brush his cheekbones with each blink. Looking at the undercut of his hairstyle makes your stomach turn. He certainly is so cute. “The most ruthless assassin I know listens to Frank Sinatra?”

He looked odd without his glasses, maybe even more gorgeous, which was ridiculously beyond belief that it was possible for him to be.

“I'm not a ruthless assassin,” you mumble, looking away from him and feeling your cheeks flush, suddenly hot all over. You assume it is because your body is starting to healing itself. Or at least that's what you want to believe. “And Sinatra is a classic.”

“He is, I guess.” Adrian snorts softly, looking at you for a couple of seconds before shifting his gaze back to the road ahead. “For old people.”

“What?” you ask, looking at him again, your eyes trailing over the bend of his nose from his side profile, feeling a heat spread up from the lower part of your belly as you picture all the things you could do with that nose. You clear your throat, trying to snap out of your trance and snap back to reality. “I’m not old.”

A smile curls on his lips as he turns his head to look at you again, his eyes gleaming under the subdued lights inside the car. His gaze is soft, and caring, and warm.

But even so, Adrian seems a little flustered and nervous, overwhelmed by your presence right next to him, your scent, your breath, your voice. You.

When you arrive at your house, he helps you walk up the stairs at the entrance, holding you firmly. Once inside, he guides you to the sofa, always holding you close to him and handling you with care, touching only the necessary parts. He does not allow his hand to wander.

“I'll go get the first aid kit,” he says, already moving toward the bathroom.

You lie back on the sofa, feeling tired and in pain. He returns with the first aid kit and kneels down in front of you, carefully opening the supplies.

He removes the makeshift bandage from his suit, his gaze fixed on the wound.

“I'm sorry,” he utters softly, with evident guilt in his voice. “If only I had been quicker...”

“Don't be silly,” you interrupt him, trying to keep yout voice quiet. “It wasn't your fault. And in fact, you prevented any more bullets from hitting me. So...” your voice trails off and you blush lightly, “you saved my life, Adrian.”

He looks you in the eyes, and for the first time, there is not a trace of his usual antics. Only concern and a tenderness that makes you feel vulnerable.

And he doesn't encounter the usual coldness and detachment in your gaze; no, this time he finds softness and closeness.

“And it's already healing. So don't be dramatic,” you add, trying to brush off the real gravity of everything you just said to him.

“Sometimes I forget you have those creepy powers,” he says softly, looking up at you from his spot right in front of your knees. “It’s so fucking cool... and scary as shit. And hot.”

Still, Adrian disinfects the wound with steady but gentle hands, bandaging it again with clean gauze. Every touch is delicate, every movement calculated. His closeness, his scent, his gaze, the soft expression on his face... everything blurs your mind and leaves you dizzy.

You feel vulnerable, but strangely safe by his side.

When he finish, his hands go down to your knees and linger there. The sheer heaviness of his touch and the way he looks at you as he kneels in front of you makes you gulp.

At that moment, you just know that his feelings for you are real. He really likes you. And he had put himself in danger to protect you.

A cold fear ran through you as you thought about what could have happened.

Suddenly, you realize you don't want to live in a world where you couldn't hear his off-key singing or his comments about birds.

“There you go,” he finishes treating your wound with a smile, his fingers caressing your collarbone before he pulls away from you.

Driven by a feeling you've never experienced before and profiting from his closeness, you take his chin in one hand, look him straight in the eyes, and kiss him.

Surprised, he just stands very still for a moment, then closes his eyes and kisses you back with a passion that makes you feel like you had never kissed anyone in your life.

Adrian kisses you as if he had been waiting and dreaming for this moment his whole lifetime.

When you separate from each other, Adrian's breathing is heavy, and yours isn't much better.

His thumbs caress your cheeks and his eyes drifts down to your lips, then back up to your eyes, with a silent question. He don't need to say it out loud really.

Adrian leans up again, close to you, this time deliberately slowly, his lips brush yours, his nose affectionately caressing yours, before deepening the kiss.

His kiss is hungrier now, more desperate. His hands moves from your cheeks to your waist, barely lifting himself up a little so he could be closer to you.

Both of you know it.

It isn't just a kiss; it is a declaration, a release of all the tension that had built up between you through all this time.

“This is only because you saved my life,” you whisper in between kisses, attempting to convince yourself more than him.

Adrian is ecstatic, kissing you as if there were no tomorrow, hungry and desperate, like a lion that had just been released from a cage.

A smile curved his lips, reddened from so many kisses, murmuring against your mouth, “I'll save you every fucking day then, if this is how you'll repay me.”

You try to suppress a smirk, your arms around his neck pulling him up, closer to you. “Shut the fuck up.”

“Shut me up,” he challenges you.

And you shut him up with a kiss, letting yourself be carried away by the thrill of the moment and your instincts, your body acting on its own, controlled by a carnal desire that you had tried so hard to suppress.

Until now.

“Let's go to my room.”

Adrian obeys instantly, picking you up as he stands up and carrying you to your room, without even taking his mouth off yours. It is the perfect excuse to press you against him, his hands running over your thighs and backside, grinding against you with every step he takes.

“Can I touch you everywhere?” he asks, desperate and pleading, detaching himself from you for just a moment, his hands holding you under your thighs, pressing you against him and making you feel the prominent bulge in his crotch.

“I thought you already are,” you reply, panting for air, your hands around his neck, your fingers lacing through his hair.

His voice lowers sheepishly, very uncharacteristically in him, “I'm a gentleman. Consent is very important.”

You offer him a little sincere smile, kissing him again, “Yes, Adrian. You can touch me everywhere.”

He gently lays you down on the bed, positioning himself directly above you, his lips moving down your jawline, pressing a wet trail of kisses across your neck.

“Fuck yeah,” he hisses against your skin, right after placing a love bite near the junction of your neck and shoulder—the one uninjured. “You don’t know how much I’ve dreamed of having you just like this.”

His mouth suck, his teeth nibble, his lips press kisses, claiming your skin as his own.

“You feel much better than any dream.”

“Adrian,” you moan out his name, arching your back as you feel his mouth reach your collarbone.

He pauses for a moment, lifting his head to look at you, allowing you to see his fully dilated pupils. “Can I take this off?”

You nod instantly, biting your lower lip.

His hands settle on the fabric of your suit on your chest, frantically opening it and tearing it apart, always careful not to cause further damage to your wound.

That makes you gasp.

“Adrian!” you disapprovingly shout his name.

But he is mesmerized by your tits, which bounce free once he ripped your suit open, your nipples perking up at the feel of the cool air in the room.

“Motherfucker,” he curses, leaning down further to kiss one of your breasts, making you sigh. “You're not wearing a bra under this suit?”

“No panties either,” you confess with a hiss, closing your eyes when you feel his wet tongue leisurely flick one of your nipples.

“You're such a freak,” he whispers against your skin, mesmerized. “You act like a good girl, but you're so bad, hm? You do bad things like this and still act like little Miss Perfect.”

You bite down on your lower lip, holding back a moan as he sucks on the nipple, his fingers playing with the other, giving both of your tits his undivided attention.

“Adrian...”

“If you keep saying my fucking name like that, I'm gonna cum,” he rasps against the warm skin between your breasts, moistening it with his saliva. 

He begins to descend further through your body, kissing your stomach, marking your skin with kisses, bites, and hickies. He is opening your suit as he roams your body, igniting your skin and sending shivers throughout your spine.

Adrian pulls your ruined suit down over your legs so he could remove it completely, taking advantage of the opportunity to kiss your knees and ankles before moving back up.

“Did you know this would happen?” he asks against the skin of your inner thigh, forcing your legs apart when you try to close them, suddenly feeling embarrassed by the way he looks down at you, adoringly. “Or you'd go for someone else?”

You try to smile through all the desire, offering him a crooked, lazy smile, “Don't be jealous.”

He gaze at you with eyes hazy with desire as he pulls himself up and begins to take off his suit with trembling, clumsy fingers.

“I'm not fucking jealous,” he mumbles, watching the way your eyes drift down his body, passing over the width of his shoulders, his pecs, his abs. 

“You're staring,” then he remarks the obvious, trying to conceal the way he puff out his chest to look even bigger. With the movement, a silver chain hanging around his neck shimmered under the dim light of the room.

“So are you,” you snap back in a broken whisper, feeling your cheeks flush. 

And of course you are cheking him out.

He is fucking ripped. 

And so big that even his bulge under the fabric of his white briefs looked massive once he strips off the lower part of his suit.

He is so hard that it looks painful.

So what you had been hearing was real, so fucking real.

“Can I eat you out?” Still, he asks, eager to make you feel good, as he shook his head, causing a couple of curls to fall messily across his forehead. “You're so fucking beautiful, holy shit. I need to taste you or I'll actually have a stroke.”

Adrian return to his position between your legs, his hands delicately caressing your thighs as he waits patiently for your response, your consent.

You look down at him with half-closed eyes, your head clouded by the desire to reach any kind of pleasure.

He is carefully placing your legs on his shoulders, staring in awe at your pussy, dripping wet and so ready for him, when you click your tongue, “Can you stop talking and just get to it, Chase?” 

“So mean even when I got you fucking-- dripping for me,” he quietly says, looking up at you once more just before nestling between your legs and leaning close to your cunt, his warm breath and the raspy tone of his voice makes you clench around nothing. And he just gawked, smiling as joyfully as if he were standing at the gates of heaven, wide open for him, “Pussy is so pretty too, look at her— fuck, you're soaking wet for me, baby"

The pet name makes you swoon and fucking fold. 

“Adrian—” 

Your voice chokes off as you feel his tongue trace your slit, scooping up all the arousal that is leaking out of your hole and savoring it as if it were the most delicious meal he had ever tasted in his entire life.

The sounds of his mouth slurping and licking your pussy flood the room, so filthy and messy that it makes you feel a heat wave from head to toe.

You can't control the way your body yields to him, as if your whole life had been longing just for this moment, as if tailor-made for him.

A righteous and sloppy suck on your clit has you promptly reduced to a trembling, whimpering mess.

One of your hands lands on his head, fingers sinking into his curly locks and pulling them, drawing a hoarse groan from deep within his throat.

The vibration against your cunt has you rolling your eyes back.

“You smell so good,” he hums into your splashing pussy, which is throbbing harder and faster, your heartbeat pulsing right against his lips. He can feel it. “Cum on my tongue, baby. I want to drink everything this pretty pussy has to give me—”

But your hand on his head tugs him back, detaching him from your clenching hole.

He looks up from between your legs with squinted eyes, his lips, drenched with your own arousal, curl into a pout.

He looks so pussy drunk and pathetic for you that you could cum just by watching him looking like that.

“Oh, baby, don’t be mean now—”

You interrupt him, your thumb lazily stroking curls away from his forehead, “I want to cum around your dick, Adrian.”

Your words leave him dumbstruck for a few seconds. And the next second, he's peeling off his briefs as fast as a flash, and the next he's climbing on top of you, nice and slow.

He leans down to kiss you, preventing you from staring in awe at his dick, now held in his own hand, so hard and angry red that it has you drooling, “Holy motherfuck, that has to be the hottest shit I’ve ever heard in my entire fucking life.”

“Put it in, Adrian,” you whine, begging for him, squeezing your eyes closed and arching your back for him, looking for any kind of friction that helps you gett off, “Please, baby—”

The pet name rolls off your tongue so naturally, lace with so much pleasure and warmth that it had an immediate effect on Adrian, who fucking whimpers, kissing your lips sloppily.

Even so, he has the strength to stop and look you in the eyes, all flustered, “I didn't bring any condoms— fuck”

“No? Why?” you ask in a choked, whiny voice.

He looks at you with a face that conveys puzzlement and hopelessness, “Because I’m on patrol. I’m supposed to be fighting, not fucking—”

You interrupt him again, kissing him once more and staring straight into his eyes, “Fuck me raw, Adrian. I don't care. But fuck me now.”

And he can actually feel himself melting against your body, you can sense how he's trembling right under your fingertips, squeezing his shoulders as he presses his forehead against yours.

He closes his eyes, breathing in the scent of your skin, pumping himself as he lines up the plump tip of his cock at your entrance, teasing it along the wet folds.

“I'll be gentle,” he promises, breathing shakily, though his hips tremble as if he might lose control at any second.

“Don't be,” you correct him, your legs wrapping around his waist, pulling him closer. “Fuck me. Hard.”

The growl he lets out when he hears you has something animalistic, primitive about it. Adrian finally pushes himself inside you with a slow but powerful movement,deeply carving a way into you.

“God, you're so tight...” he cries out, his eyes tightly shut, as if the pleasure is too much to process. He's only halfway inside your squeezing pussy. “So fucking warm— I'm gonna cum, damn it—”

“Don't even think about it,” you cut him off, digging your nails into his shoulders to force him to open his eyes and look at you. “Hold it for me, yeah?”

Your words set him on fire. Adrian begins to move, erratically at first, then with more force, each thrust slamming you against the bed. You you scratch his back, pull his hair, grasping any part of him you can hold on to, as the wet sound and rhythmic thrusts fill the room.

“So pretty...” he hiss in a broken voice, choking on his own whimpers and kissing you between each word, his hungry mouth tracing your neck and jaw, drooling on your skin. “So pretty for me— fuck, sweetheart.”

He's so dizzy with you, overwhelmed that everything is you, everything around him. Adrian is in love, thrusting into you with a force that makes you gasp, moving with raw desperation, as if his whole world depended on making you feel good. Your moans mingle with his panting, with the dull thuds of his skin against yours, with the creaking of the poor bed shaking under you.

Your legs squeeze him closer to you, trapping him inside, and when your nails dig into his back, Adrian almost splits the air in two with his broken moans.

“Can I— Can I cum n-now?” he asks like the good boy he is.

“Do it,” you whisper, already losing yourself on the edge of climax. “Cum for me, baby”

“W-where?”

“Inside,” you whine, frantically gasping for breath, feeling like the world is shrinking and slipping away from you with every thrust Adrian pushes into you, the tip of his cock hitting that spongy spot over and over. “Mhm! --Fill me up”

The rhythm becomes wild and brutal until your orgasm overwhelms you, making you cry out his name against his mouth. Your walls squeeze him tightly and Adrian can't hold back any longer, spilling inside you with an agonizing moan, torn apart by pleasure.

The sounds of your two fluids mixing inside you are so obscene that they make you tremble.

Adrian stays right there, trembling, and still cumming inside you, twitching occasionally, his forehead pressed against yours, both of you breathing as if you had been running for your lives.

“Holy fuck, babe,” he groans, cracking his eyes open to look at you, a goofy, lazy smile curving his lips. “We made a fucking mess.”

Very carefully, he pulls out of you and your pussy squelches, gaping and oozing with your mixed cums.

“Look at that” he coos, lifting himself slightly off you so he can look down, gazing at your abused pussy in awe.

“Adrian—”

Too late, he already has one hand reaching down between your bodies, swiping his index finger through your folds, scooping up the fluids and plunging them back into your cunt, making you pant from the overstimulation.

When he makes sure that not a single drop of his cum is wasted outside of you, he brings his hand back up, holding it to his mouth to savor the remains left on his finger, making eye contact with you as he sucks his index finger.

“Delicious” he delights, leaning down to kiss you, making you savor the mixture of the two of you together through his lips.

“You're so weird,” you whisper against his mouth, kissing him again.

Adrian flops down next to you on the bed, letting out a sigh he had been holding in his lungs.

“And yet my cum is still inside you,” he replies, smiling contentedly. His smile suddenly fades, as if he's come back to reality. “Wait, can you get pregnant from this?”

You snort softly at his worried face, your hand gently brushing his still-flushed cheek.

“People usually get pregnant like this,” he nuzzles close to your caress, looking at you in awe as you talk. “That’s why you have to go to the pharmacy and buy me the Plan B pill.”

“Did you know that swans mate for life?” he asks afterwards, out of fucking nowhere, pressing a soft kiss on your fingers cradling his cheek as he snuggles closer to you. “And that they die of love if their partner dies?”

“What’s your point?” you inquire back, looking at him with curious, gentle eyes.

It's the first time you are showing genuine interest in his bird facts. And he is so happy he could burst with excitement.