run from the sunlight, dracula!

The sparkling blue of the sea is almost the same colour of Dick’s eyes as he peers at you over the brim of his sunglasses. He’s grinning, head cocked slightly to the side, mess of dark waves falling into his face. Sunlight falls over his skin, catching on his freshly applied sunscreen and shimmering.

“Come on, sweetheart.” He pleads, “just for five minutes.”

Your answer comes in the form of you kicking yourself further back on your chair and spreading the pages of your book further.

“I mean,” he crouches to sit in the sand next to you, “what’s the point of coming to the beach if you’re just gonna read?”

Dick Grayson, as per usual, is absolutely relentless. He leans closer to you, sun-warmed skin tan and warm against yours. He squints to make out the words on the page you’re currently reading, eyebrows raising.

“I’m relaxing,” you say simply.

“You’ve got to be dying of heat. Come on,” he reaches for your free hand, “just take a dip with me.”

You dogear the page and set your book between your legs. “I know you, Grayson. It’s never ‘just a dip’ with you.”

His smile only spreads, a knowing look on his face. “What’s so wrong with that?” And as if knowing you’re halfway to caving, he rises to his feet, making a big show to stretch his arms over his head. His biceps curl, muscles reflecting the golden sunlight. You can’t help but look, can’t help but trace your eyes up from the tanned muscle of his thigh, to the defined look of his abs, to the shiny white of his teeth.

You sigh. It’s the greatest curse, and blessing, that you happen to have the hottest boyfriend on the planet.

“Okay.” You officially concede, ditching your stuff on the chair and rising to your feet. “Five minutes.”

Dick’s quick to run up to you and wrap his arms around you, squeezing you tight against his muscled chest. “You’re the best.”

“You’re relentless.”

“You love it.”

And unfortunately for you, you really really do.

Dick laces his fingers through yours and tugs you after him, the two of you making your way through the hot sand to where the shore meets the water. Gentle waves lap at the wet sand, your toes sinking into the soft ground. 

Dick wastes no time in running ahead and executing a perfect dive into the water, his body arcing and making a big splash as he hits it. You, not nearly as showboaty as Dick Grayson, slowly wade your way into the water until it’s up to your chest.

Dick surfaces, shaking his wet hair out like a dog. “The water is amazing.”

He leans in so close you can see the water droplets running down his face and purses his lips, pressing them against yours. The cold water on his skin rubs against you and soothes the heat that’s soaked into you throughout the day.

“You’re getting me wet,” you cringe.

“It wouldn't be the first time, right?” You smack his bicep. “Shut up.”

10k event | dc masterlist | navigation

His face is a map of healed disasters—thin white lines cutting through his brows, the faint pucker near his jaw, the uneven texture along his cheekbone where skin never quite settled back into what it was meant to be. There was a time when even the thought of hair growing there felt impossible. He remembers the chemical sting, remembers laughter echoing too loud in a warehouse that smelled like rust and rot and something sweetly corrosive.

The Joker had called it “light acid.”

As if acid could ever be light.

As if anything about it had been.

After that, hair just… didn’t grow. Not where it should have. Not where other boys his age complained about patchy beards and uneven sideburns and the awkward in-between stage of becoming something older.

Jason never got that stage.

He went from boy to broken and skipped the mundane humiliations in between.

Until now.

At twenty-two, standing barefoot in front of the narrow bathroom mirror in his apartment in Gotham City, Jason Todd squints at his reflection and feels something dangerously close to disbelief.

There is hair there.

Not much. Not thick. But there. Real.

Dark stubble shadows his jaw, uneven and stubborn, catching the early gray light filtering in through the frosted window. He drags his thumb over it once, slow, like he expects it to come away empty.

It doesn’t.

The memory surfaces uninvited—your voice last night, half-breathless and laughing when you pulled him back just enough to complain that it was itchy, that it scratched when he was feasting on you like he hadn’t eaten in days. You’d swatted at his shoulder and told him to shave.

It hadn’t been an attempt to redirect your mouth onto him for once like he thought.

Not that time.

“Oh, god,” he mutters now, staring harder at the mirror.

He looks dreadful.

That’s the numb, dawning realization settling into him as he takes in the rest. The hollows beneath his eyes are darker than usual, bruised crescents that no amount of sleep seems to erase. His nose looks a little more crooked than he swears it did yesterday. His hair—thick, black, unruly—is sticking up at impossible angles like he lost a fight with his pillow and didn’t bother winning.

He leans closer.

At least his skin looks better.

That part softens something in him.

You had noticed it two nights ago when he complained, voice rough and embarrassed, about it feeling irritated again—too tight, too sensitive along the old scar tissue. You hadn’t teased him. You  just disappeared into the bathroom and came back with that stupidly expensive face cream you insist on buying, the one that smells faintly of lavender and something warm.

He grumbled the whole time.

You ignored him the whole time.

In the dark, your fingers had worked carefully over his face—gentle where the scars pull, slower along the places that still ache when the weather shifts. You’d murmured nonsense into the quiet, soft praise and softer affection, lips brushing his temple between instructions to stop fidgeting. He remembers the weight of you leaning over him, the warmth of your thighs against his hips, the way your thumbs smoothed over his brow like you were trying to iron out something deeper than irritated skin.

Jason had fallen asleep like that.

Just like that.

He doesn’t remember the moment it happened. Just remembers waking up tangled in you and the faint trace of lavender still clinging to him.

“I knew it was hair!”

Your voice slices cleanly through his thoughts.

He flinches slightly before catching himself, then groans under his breath as you pad into the bathroom behind him, bare feet silent against the hardwood.

You look like you crawled straight out of a dream.

Your hair is down and messy, falling around your shoulders in soft disarray, catching the light in uneven strands. You’re wearing one of his old shirts—swallowed by it—and a pair of his pajama pants that you bought him, the drawstring pulled tight and the hems cuffed four times so they don’t drag. The fabric hangs off you like you belong in it.

Like you belong here.

You slide your arms around his waist from behind without hesitation, pressing your front to his back, warmth seeping into him instantly. You get on your tip toes as your chin settles on his shoulder, cheek brushing the rough edge of his newly grown stubble as you peer at his reflection with open curiosity.

“Jason, baby…” you murmur, studying him in the mirror like he’s something precious and slightly ridiculous.

He snorts softly, but his hands come up automatically to rest over yours where they’re clasped against his stomach. His thumbs trace absent circles over your knuckles.

“You loooove it,” he says, stretching the word with heavy sarcasm, though there’s something almost hopeful beneath it.

You hum, pretending to consider it.

One of your hands slips free and moves up to his face, fingers squishing his cheek gently, testing the scratch of the stubble. Your nose wrinkles.

“Hmm,” you decide, lips twitching. “It's itchy. And the last thing I need is irritation down there.”

Jason exhales through his nose, long and slow, the sound vibrating faintly in his chest before it escapes him.

Mock-offended. Almost dignified about it.

“I don’t have a razor,” he says after another indulgent second of you squishing his cheeks like he’s something soft and manageable instead of what he usually is. His words come out slightly warped beneath your fingers. “And it’s a holiday… stores won’t be open.”

The apartment is quiet in that sacred, late-morning way—sunlight slipping through the blinds in thin golden blades that cut across tile and skin alike, dust motes suspended lazily in their glow as if even they have decided to rest. 

Somewhere outside, a car door slams. Distant chatter echoes up from the street. Gotham City hums in the background like a beast half-asleep, never fully docile, but quieter than usual.

“I use a men’s razor,” you mumble thoughtfully, as if you’re offering him a piece of gum instead of a shared blade. “Wanna use that? I can disinfect it.”

He stills.

It’s subtle—the way his shoulders lift and hold, the way his fingers pause against your wrist—but you feel it. You always feel it. There are certain silences in him that aren’t empty; they’re crowded. This is one of them.

“I…” he starts, and the word drags.

Jason Todd does not drag words. He fires them. He sharpens them. He uses them like tools or weapons, depending on the need. But now it comes out slower, almost shy, like something young and unsure has briefly surfaced beneath the hardened edges.

“I don’t know how to shave,” he admits finally, gaze dropping to the sink like it’s suddenly fascinating. “Even… before… uh. It didn’t really grow.”

He doesn’t elaborate.

He doesn’t have to.

The space after before is heavy, but you don’t reach for it. You don’t pry it open with sympathy or soften it with apology. You simply hum, soft and thoughtful, and unwind your arms from around him to open the mirror cabinet above the sink.

“Why now?” you murmur, mostly to yourself.

The hinge creaks faintly as it swings open, bottles clinking together like small glass wind chimes. You reach for the razor with easy certainty, as if you’ve already decided the answer to that question doesn’t matter nearly as much as what you’re going to do next.

Jason watches you through the mirror.

Why now?

It’s the same reason he’s gained weight—real weight, not the kind born of muscle and vigilance, but something warmer, something earned in kitchens and late-night takeout and meals he didn’t force himself to finish out of obligation. There’s a softness now at his lower belly, subtle but undeniable, a gentle curve where there used to be only rigid lines and constant tension. His shoulders still carry power, his arms still know violence, but his body no longer looks like it’s bracing for impact every second.

He thinks his body is learning how to be happy again.

Like an animal stepping cautiously out of a trap long after the jaws have opened.

Like soil finally allowed to grow something instead of just endure.

He doesn’t say that.

“Maybe it’s because you’re always slathering me in your fancy stuff,” he deflects instead, a quiet chuckle warming the edges of his voice as he flicks the toilet seat closed with his foot and lowers himself onto it. “It probably shocked my face back to life.”

You glance at him over your shoulder, amused, sunlight catching in the loose fall of your hair.

Jason sits there completely naked, utterly unguarded in a way that still feels new enough to be fragile.

The light doesn’t hide anything. It travels openly across him—over the scars that ladder his torso, the uneven patches of skin that never healed quite right, the pale lines and darker ones, the geography of damage that used to make him want to flinch away from mirrors entirely. There was a time he would have layered himself in clothing even alone, as if fabric could soften history.

But you didn’t run.

The first time you saw him like this, you hadn’t looked horrified or pitying. You’d looked curious. Careful. Your fingers had traced each scar like you were reading braille, mapping him not as something broken, but as something survived. You kissed him afterward the same way you always did—no hesitation, no recalibration.

If you didn’t run from that, he doubts you’ll run from stubble.

You step back toward him now, razor in hand, a small towel draped over your arm like you’re about to perform something sacred and slightly ridiculous. The scent of your soap lingers faintly, mixed with steam from the sink you’ve just run warm water into.

“C’mere,” you murmur. 

You nudge his knees apart gently and step between them, the casual intimacy of it making something low in his stomach tighten. Your warmth bleeds into him. He instinctively rests his hands at your hips, thumbs pressing lightly into the soft fabric pooled there.

“This feels like a trap,” Jason mutters, but his voice lacks conviction.

You smile down at him—slow, fond, almost reverent—and press your thumb to his jaw, tilting his face slightly so the light catches the uneven stubble.

“Relax,” you say softly. “I’ll take care of you.”

The words aren’t dramatic, and aren't grand. But they land in him like something holy.

He tilts his chin up, obedient in a way he never is with anyone else, trusting you with the vulnerable line of his throat. Your touch is deliberate but tender, as if you’re handling something both fragile and fierce.

You rinse the razor under warm water first, testing the temperature against your wrist the way you always do with anything that’s going to touch him. Steam curls faintly into the air, softening the sharp morning light and turning the bathroom into something gentler, almost hazy. When you open the shaving cream, the scent—clean, subtle, faintly medicinal—mixes with the lavender still clinging to his skin from the night before and fills his senses.

Jason smells like you. He thinks numbly.

“Hold still,” you murmur.

He huffs softly. “I am holding still.”

“You’re flexing.”

“I am not—”

“You are,” you insist, smiling a little as your fingers press into his jaw, encouraging him to unclench.

He forces his shoulders to drop.

Jason isn’t used to being handled like this. In training, contact is correction—forceful, precise, meant to overpower. In fights, it’s impact—bruising, brutal, survival measured in split seconds. Even affection, in most corners of his life, is clapped onto backs or ruffled through hair, rough-edged and fleeting.

But this?

This is his hot girlfriend taking care of him. 

You spread the shaving cream slowly, fingertips gliding over his jaw, working it into the uneven terrain of scar tissue and smoother skin alike. You’re meticulous about it, smoothing the foam into the curve beneath his cheekbone, along the sharp line of his jaw, over the stubborn patch just beneath his lower lip.

Your touch changes when you reach the scars.

Not hesitant. Not afraid.

Just attentive.

You adjust the pressure instinctively, tracing the raised line near his chin with your thumb before coating it gently. Jason watches your face instead of the mirror now. The focus there. The way your brows knit in concentration. The small crease that forms between them when you’re trying to get something exactly right.

“You don’t have to look at me like I’m hurt and you need to patch me up,” he mutters.

You glance up at him through your lashes. "I'm not. I'd prefer that right now. At least you sit still when I patch you up.”

He snorts quietly despite himself.

The razor touches his skin for the first time.

It’s a soft, almost inaudible scrape. A delicate drag that removes the shadow in a clean stripe, revealing pale skin beneath. You move slowly, rinsing the blade after each careful stroke, watching for any sign of discomfort.

Jason feels it more than he expected to.

Not pain—just awareness. The sensation of something being removed. Of change happening in real time. 

That sounds dramatic. He scolds himself in his own head. It's just hair. Hair he would have died to grow when he was seven and desperate to be tall enough to steal from the top shelf.

The warm water trickles down his neck in thin lines when you wipe away excess foam, your fingers following to catch it before it drips too far.

He swallows once when you tilt his head slightly to the side, exposing more of his throat.

“You trust me?” you ask lightly, but there’s something real beneath it.

He doesn’t hesitate this time.

“Yeah.”

The answer is simple. Immediate.

Your thumb rests just below his ear as you guide the razor along the sensitive stretch of skin near his jawline. The intimacy of it hums between you, quiet but undeniable. He can feel your breath ghosting across his cheek. 

His hands, which had been resting loosely at your waist, slide upward without thinking. One settles at your lower back, palm spreading there. The other drifts higher, fingers grazing the fabric at your ribs, tracing the outline of you through cotton.

You pause when you reach the faintly discolored patch near the corner of his jaw—the place where the skin never quite grew back the same.

“Does this one still feel tight?” you ask softly.

“Sometimes,” he admits.

You don’t comment on it. You just adjust the angle of the razor and move even slower, barely any pressure at all, your other hand steadying his face with gentle firmness.

Jason’s eyes close for a second.

He lets them.

There’s something almost reverent about the way you do this. Like you’re not just shaving him, but tending to him. Like this small, ordinary act is a way of saying: I see all of it. I’m not afraid of any of it.

When you finally finish one side, you lean back slightly to inspect your work, head tilting.

“Look at that,” you murmur. “Sexy jawline coming back.”

“Never left,” Jason says automatically with a shit eating grin.

You grin. “Sure, baby.”

You rinse the razor again, then shift to the other side, fingers brushing through the faint shadow still there. The bathroom is quiet except for the sound of running water and the soft rhythm of your breathing mingling with his.

He watches you again.

The way your hair falls forward over your shoulder and nearly brushes his chest before you tuck it back absentmindedly. The way you don’t seem to notice how intimate this is—how your hands cradle his face like something precious.

When you’re done, you wipe the last traces of foam away with the warm towel, pressing it gently along his jaw, then down his throat.

“There,” you whisper.

You smooth your palm over his cheek, testing it. Your thumb lingers at the corner of his mouth.

“Much better.”

Jason turns his face slightly into your hand.

The movement is instinctive. Almost feline.

He looks at himself in the mirror again.

The stubble is gone. The scars remain. The crooked nose. The tired eyes.

But there’s something different in the way he’s sitting. Less guarded. Less braced. Like he isn’t waiting for the mirror to betray him.

He slides both arms fully around your waist now and pulls you closer until your hips press flush against his chest. He rests his forehead against your sternum, exhaling slowly, breathing you in.

“You’re gonna make me soft,” he mutters against your skin.

Your fingers comb gently through his messy hair, nails scratching lightly at his scalp.

“Thats the goal,” you say.

And for once, the idea doesn’t sound like a threat.

jason peter todd tag-list : @justamarsbar, @peridotnature854, @nayy-a, @that-willowtree, @kekeanna266, @i-gotta-go-so-much-bigger, @theonlysakura, @givemefinganame, @theonlyshowgirl, @melllzz, @strawbrysapphic, @nightlights-and-twiklingstars, @tasia13, @foivetimesacharm, @noble-17, @celestialend,@superuddertrash-blog, @revesephemeres, @redhooduwu, @themessedupsonata

Im gonna be honest I had a shit day and this felt like the only was I could talk to someone lmao don't got any other method, don't take this as me coming back frfr cus people are mean here too

(｡ᵕ ◞ _◟)

You stood behind Dick’s chair with one hand resting near the pommel of your sword, your armor polished, your expression composed, and your attention divided between the men arguing around the table and the prince whose shoulders had begun to slump beneath the weight of fiscal policy.

Lord Halyard had been speaking for nearly eleven minutes.

Dick leaned back just far enough that the carved wood pressed against the front of your breastplate. He did not turn his head.

“If I throw myself from the western tower,” he whispered, “would you be obligated to catch me?”

“Yes, Your Highness.”

“Even if I specifically asked you not to?”

“Yes.”

“What if I made it an official command?”

“I would disregard it.”

A pause followed.

“Disobedience,” Dick murmured. “How exciting.”

You kept your attention on Lord Halyard, whose description of the southern wheat stores had somehow become more detailed.

Dick’s hand slipped beneath the table. A moment later, a folded piece of parchment appeared beside his elbow.

You stared at it.

He pushed it toward the edge of the table with one finger.

There were twelve councilors present, as well as King Bruce at the head of the table, the royal secretary, two scribes, four guards at the doors, and you. None of them appeared to notice that the heir to the throne was attempting to pass secret correspondence to his personal knight.

That only meant they had all learned not to acknowledge it.

You took the note.

Dick sat straighter as you unfolded it.

Lord Halyard’s mustache resembles an exhausted squirrel.

You folded the parchment again and placed it beside his hand.

Dick glanced back at you expectantly.

Your face remained still.

His expression fell with such theatrical disappointment that the royal secretary paused in her writing to hide a smile.

“You know,” Dick whispered, “most people would consider that funny.”

“Most people are not responsible for keeping you alive, Your Highness.”

“I fail to see how those matters are connected.”

“Your survival requires my concentration.”

“Surely you can concentrate while appreciating my wit.”

“I have never been presented with the opportunity.”

His eyes widened.

The secretary’s pen scratched sharply across the parchment. Across the table, Lord Foxworth coughed into his fist.

Dick turned fully in his chair, council meeting forgotten. His blue eyes were bright with triumph.

“That was a joke.”

“It was an observation.”

“You insulted me.”

“Your Highness, I would never.”

“You did. I heard you.”

King Bruce lifted his gaze from the report before him.

“Richard.”

Dick faced the table again. “Yes, Father.”

“If your knight has finally threatened you, I suggest you deserve it.”

A few of the councilors smiled. Dick looked wounded by the betrayal.

You remained motionless behind him, although satisfaction warmed beneath your breastplate.

Lord Halyard resumed his report. Dick lasted almost three minutes before passing you another note.

This one bore a poorly drawn squirrel with an enormous mustache.

You did not laugh.

You did keep the parchment.

Dick never noticed you slide it beneath the edge of your vambrace.

The truth was that you laughed often.

You laughed with the women who worked in the kitchens when they smuggled you honey cakes before dawn patrol. You laughed with the squires when one of them stumbled into the wash trough after claiming he could defeat you blindfolded. You laughed when the stable master complained that the palace’s most expensive warhorse had developed a personal grudge against decorative ribbons, and when the laundress’s youngest daughter followed you around the courtyard with a wooden spoon tucked into her belt as a sword.

You laughed loudly enough that Captain Gordon had once crossed the entire training yard to ask whether someone had been injured.

It was only around Dick that you seemed to lose the ability.

The problem was not that he failed to amuse you. The problem was that he succeeded far too easily.

Dick Grayson had been charming people since he was old enough to understand the effect of his own smile. Courtiers adored him. Soldiers would follow him into impossible battles. Visiting royals forgave him for ignoring protocol because he could make an insult sound affectionate and a diplomatic concession feel like a shared secret.

You had watched him dance with princesses, flirt with ambassadors, and kiss the hands of noblewomen whose fathers possessed useful armies. He offered warmth as naturally as breathing, and most people mistook it for intimacy.

You knew better.

Or you had tried to.

You had been appointed to his personal guard six years earlier, after distinguishing yourself during an attack on the northern road. Dick had been twenty, newly returned from his first military campaign and furious that his father intended to assign someone to follow him everywhere.

He had disliked the restriction.

He had liked you almost immediately.

By the end of your first week, he had learned your patrol schedule, your preferred sword, and exactly how close he could stand before you became visibly annoyed. By the end of the first month, he had begun leaving pastries beside your gauntlets before morning training. Within a year, he had confided in you about everything from the burden of the crown to the fact that he hated the ceremonial shoes required for state occasions.

You knew the names of the servants who had raised him. You knew which scars ached before rain and that he slept poorly after battles even when he claimed otherwise. You knew he checked every room for its exits without thinking and softened his voice around frightened children.

You also knew the precise shape of his mouth when he was attempting not to smile.

So you kept your own mouth firmly under control.

Affection encouraged carelessness. Desire encouraged worse. You had sworn to place Dick’s life before your own, and you could not afford to forget what he was simply because he insisted on making himself impossible not to love.

Your restraint had worked admirably.

Until the night he found you in the stables wearing an old linen shirt, feeding stolen apples to a foal while explaining to a barn cat why Lord Halyard’s mustache had become a matter of national concern.

“His Highness drew it himself,” you told the cat, who sat on an overturned bucket with a blue ribbon tied loosely around his neck. “The likeness was poor, but the spirit was accurate.”

The cat blinked.

“You are right. I should not encourage him.”

The foal nosed impatiently at your shoulder.

“You have already had three pieces.”

She nudged you again.

“You are becoming entitled.”

Her ears flicked forward.

“That was not praise.”

You surrendered another slice of apple.

The foal took it delicately from your palm, then sneezed so forcefully that warm breath and flecks of fruit struck your face.

You stared at her.

She stared back.

A laugh escaped you before you could stop it. It grew when the cat, apparently offended on your behalf, leaped down from the bucket and swatted at the foal’s front leg. The foal jumped sideways. The cat fled beneath a wooden bench, blue ribbon trailing like the pennant of a retreating army.

“You are both ridiculous,” you said, still laughing as you wiped your cheek with your sleeve.

“I have spent six years trying to make that sound.”

Every trace of amusement vanished.

Dick stood at the stable entrance.

He was dressed in dark trousers, soft boots, and a loose white shirt open at the throat. His hair was disordered in a way that suggested he had been running his hands through it, and the candle he held painted gold along the edge of his face.

You rose too quickly.

The basket tipped beside your knee, sending apples rolling through the hay.

“Your Highness.”

Dick looked behind you, then beneath the nearby stall divider.

“Where did she go?”

Your heart was still beating too quickly from surprise. “Who?”

“The woman who was here a moment ago.” He stepped into the stable. “She looked exactly like you, but she smiled.”

“I do smile.”

“Not at me.”

“That is not true.”

He stopped beside an apple and nudged it with the toe of his boot. “Name one occasion.”

You searched your memory.

Dick watched you struggle.

“Precisely,” he said.

The barn cat emerged from beneath the bench. Dick looked down as the animal wound around his ankle, the blue ribbon still tied around his neck.

“What happened to him?”

“Nothing.”

“He has a ribbon.”

“It is decorative.”

“Does he often decorate himself?”

You folded your arms.

Dick crouched, offering the cat his hand. The animal sniffed his fingers, then permitted Dick to scratch beneath his chin.

“What is his name?”

“He does not have one.”

Dick glanced at you.

The cat purred.

You looked away. “Sir Whiskers.”

Dick’s hand stopped.

“He was named by one of the kitchen children.”

“Of course.”

“I did not choose it.”

“Then why is he wearing your ribbon?”

You looked at the cat. The cat regarded you without loyalty or shame.

“He has sensitive ears,” you said. “He requires ornamentation.”

Dick laughed.

The sound filled the quiet stable, warm and startled and far too pleased. He rose, still grinning at you.

“You have been hiding an entire person from me.”

“I have done nothing of the kind.”

“You sneak into the stables after midnight, tell scandalous stories to animals, and knight cats.”

“I did not knight him.”

“He has a title.”

“It is part of his name.”

Dick stepped over the scattered apples. “Do the horses have names too?”

“Their names are written above the stalls.”

“I mean other names.”

You said nothing.

His grin widened. “They do.”

“Go back to bed, Your Highness.”

“I will not.”

“You have a diplomatic breakfast at sunrise.”

“I’m aware.”

“You require sleep.”

“What I require is an explanation.”

You bent to collect the apples. Dick knelt before you could stop him and reached for one at the same time you did. His fingers brushed yours.

You withdrew your hand.

The movement was small, but he noticed.

Dick’s expression changed.

The amusement remained, though it softened at the edges. He picked up the apple and placed it in the basket.

“Do you dislike me?”

The question was so unexpected that you stared at him.

He collected another piece of fruit, his gaze lowered. “You laugh with everyone else.”

“Your Highness—”

“I have heard you in the training yard. I didn’t realize it was you until now, but I remember the sound.” He placed another apple in the basket. “You speak freely with the squires. The kitchen staff know more about your life than I do, and I spend nearly every day with you.”

“You are my prince.”

“That does not answer the question.”

“It answers all of it.”

Dick rose. You did the same, holding the basket between you like a shield.

He studied your face with an intensity you usually saw reserved for battle maps and political negotiations.

“Have I ever made you believe you cannot speak freely around me?”

“No.”

“Has anyone in my household treated you poorly for your position?”

“Never.”

“Then is it the title?”

You tightened your grip on the basket. “The title is not something that can be separated from you merely because you dislike its inconvenience.”

“I don’t want it separated from me. I want you to look at me and see something other than a responsibility.”

“That is precisely what I cannot afford to do.”

Dick went quiet.

Beyond the stable walls, the castle grounds were still. Rain had begun sometime after midnight, whispering against the roof and gathering in the gutters. The horses shifted in their stalls, accustomed to your presence and unconcerned by the prince who had entered their sanctuary.

Dick took the basket from your hands.

You let him, mainly because resisting would have required touching him again.

He set it on the bench.

“You think caring about me would make you worse at your duty.”

You stared at the hay near his boots.

“I already care about you,” you said. “That is part of the duty.”

“That isn’t what you meant.”

“You should return to your chambers.”

“You have faced armed men without retreating.”

“Armed men are generally less persistent.”

“You say the sweetest things.”

Despite yourself, you almost smiled.

Dick saw it.

He stepped closer.

The movement placed him within reach, close enough that you could smell rain on his shirt and the faint cedar oil used in his rooms. Your training measured the distance automatically. A half step to intercept an attack. One movement to draw your sword. Less than a second to put yourself between him and danger.

There was no danger here except the one you had carried quietly for years.

Dick lifted his hand.

He paused before touching you.

When you did not move away, he plucked a piece of hay from your hair.

“You are allowed to be a person in my presence,” he said.

“Being a person is the problem.”

His fingers remained near your temple.

You could see the moment understanding began to form. Dick was clever enough that it did not take long, although disbelief arrived before certainty.

“All this time,” he said slowly, “I thought I was failing to charm you.”

You wished for an enemy to emerge from the rafters. You would have accepted an assassin, a fire, or the sudden collapse of the eastern wall.

Instead, you had Dick looking at you as though the entire night had rearranged itself.

“You succeeded years ago,” you admitted.

His lips parted.

Once the words existed, you could not force them back behind your teeth. Your composure, so carefully maintained for so long, seemed suddenly as fragile as a cracked shield.

“I took an oath to protect you,” you continued. “I stand outside your chambers. I accompany you to war. I watch you dance with women who may one day become your wife, and I remain close enough to hear every charming thing you say to them.”

“I don’t say the same things to them.”

“You told Princess Koriand’r that the stars had envied her entrance.”

“She had arrived during a meteor shower. It was contextually appropriate.”

“You compared Lady Helena’s eyes to moonlight.”

“She had a knife beneath her skirt. I was distracting her while you moved closer.”

“You sent flowers to Ambassador Bea.”

“Her nation controls the eastern shipping route.”

You stared at him.

Dick frowned. “Those examples are less compelling than I expected.”

A laugh threatened at the back of your throat. You swallowed it.

His eyes narrowed.

“Do not.”

“Do not what?”

“Laugh now.”

“That seems contrary to everything you have ever wanted.”

“You are confessing your love for me while presenting evidence that I am an indiscriminate flirt. I am trying to defend my honor.”

“I did not confess love.”

“You said I charmed you years ago.”

“That could mean anything.”

“Could it?”

He moved closer until only inches separated you. The softness in his face did not diminish the satisfaction in his eyes.

You had watched Dick negotiate with warlords. He was relentless once he discovered an advantage.

“Perhaps I find you mildly pleasant,” you said.

“Mildly.”

“When you are quiet.”

“You love me.”

“You are remarkably confident for a man who spent six years losing an argument with my face.”

His smile became brilliant.

There it was again, the expression that had won over kingdoms and soothed frightened soldiers. You had always resisted it in public. Here, with hay beneath your boots and Sir Whiskers cleaning one paw nearby, resistance felt less like discipline and more like cowardice.

Dick’s hand came to your waist.

He gave you time to stop him.

“Does your oath forbid you from kissing the prince?” he asked.

“It does not specifically address the matter.”

“An oversight.”

“A catastrophic one, apparently.”

His thumb pressed lightly into your side. “You could tell me to leave.”

“You would not listen.”

“I would if you meant it.”

The answer stripped the game from the moment.

Dick could be reckless, demanding, and infuriatingly amused by rules designed to protect him from himself, but he had never made light of your boundaries. Even now, when he had finally uncovered the affection you had concealed from him, his grip remained gentle.

You set your hand against his chest.

His heart beat hard beneath your palm.

Dick looked down at it, then back at you.

“I do not want you to leave,” you said.

He kissed you.

For all his confidence, the first touch of his mouth was careful. His lips brushed yours softly, testing whether you might change your mind. You had imagined kissing him often enough that the reality should not have surprised you, but imagination had never included the warmth of his hand at your waist or the quiet sound he made when you leaned closer.

You kissed him again before he could pull away.

Dick’s restraint broke.

He caught your face between his hands and kissed you with years of unanswered flirtation behind it. You gripped the front of his shirt, dragging him nearer, and his back struck the wooden divider beside the nearest stall.

One of the horses snorted.

Dick smiled against your mouth. “Scandalized.”

“Quiet.”

“You are kissing me in front of the royal cavalry.”

“You kissed me.”

“You kissed back.”

You pressed your mouth to his again to stop him speaking.

His hands slid from your face to your waist, then around your back. There was strength beneath the elegance the court expected from him, built through years of swordsmanship, climbing, riding, and the acrobatic training he still practiced whenever the master-at-arms was not watching.

He turned you smoothly, guiding you backward until your thighs met the edge of a heavy tack trunk.

You sat.

Dick stepped between your knees.

Without your armor, there was little separating you from him. Your linen shirt had been borrowed years ago from the knights’ laundry and worn soft through use. His hands settled on your thighs above your pants, warm and broad, while he kissed the corner of your mouth and then your jaw.

“You are very different off duty,” he murmured.

“I am never off duty.”

“You are feeding apples to a horse in the middle of the night.”

“I remain capable of drawing my sword.”

“Is that a threat?”

“It may become one.”

His lips moved beneath your ear. “That sounds familiar.”

You shivered.

Dick felt it. His mouth curved against your skin, but when he kissed your throat, the teasing gentled into something slower. He seemed determined to learn every reaction you had denied him, and you had spent too long hiding to know how to survive the attention.

Your fingers slid into his hair.

He exhaled against your neck.

“That,” he said, “was worth six years.”

“You have had women touch your hair before.”

“I have never wanted them to be you.”

The simplicity of it hurt more than any practiced declaration could have.

You tightened your grip and drew his mouth back to yours.

Dick kissed you until breathing became difficult. His tongue swept across your lower lip, and you opened beneath him, tasting the faint sweetness of the wine he must have drunk at dinner. His hands moved higher along your thighs, thumbs brushing the crease where your legs met your hips.

Heat gathered between them.

You became aware of every place your bodies touched. The press of him against your knee. The lean strength of his waist beneath your hands. The growing hardness beneath his trousers when you pulled him closer.

Dick broke the kiss with a ragged breath.

“Tell me to stop if this is too much.”

“You are still speaking.”

“I need you to understand.”

“I understand.”

His gaze searched yours. “Say it.”

The prince could command armies, but this was not an order. You heard the vulnerability beneath it, the need to know that the woman who guarded him was choosing this without duty, rank, or years of loyalty clouding the answer.

“I want you,” you said.

Dick’s eyes darkened.

“Good.”

He kissed you once, hard enough to leave you breathless, then lowered himself to his knees.

Your thoughts scattered.

“Dick.”

His head lifted.

It was the first time you had spoken his name that night. Perhaps the first time you had ever said it without a title while looking directly at him.

The expression on his face nearly undid you.

“Again,” he said.

“You are kneeling in the stable.”

“I am aware.”

“You are the crown prince.”

“I’m also very comfortable down here.”

“Someone could come in.”

“That is unlikely.”

“You came in.”

“I was searching for you.”

“You were wandering after midnight.”

“Semantics.”

His hands found the fastening of your pants.

Your grip tightened on the edge of the trunk.

Dick paused. “May I?”

Every sensible thought you possessed urged you to stand, restore your clothing, and escort him back to the safety of the castle before either of you destroyed the careful order of your lives.

You lifted your hips.

Dick smiled as he opened the fastening.

“You look far too pleased.”

“I have been imagining what it would take to make you lose your composure.”

“You could have simply asked.”

“I did. Repeatedly.”

He tugged your pants down over your hips, taking your undergarments with them. The cool stable air met heated skin. You shifted instinctively, but Dick’s hands settled on your knees before you could close them.

His teasing faded.

For a moment, he only looked at you.

You had faced enemy forces with fewer nerves than you felt beneath his gaze.

“Say something,” you muttered.

“You are beautiful.”

“That was predictable.”

“I can be more specific.”

“You should not.”

His thumb moved along the inside of your knee. “You are already wet.”

“Dick.”

“There. That expression.” His smile returned, slow and wicked. “I have been trying to see it for years.”

“You have never been close enough to earn it.”

“I intend to earn several.”

He pushed your knees farther apart.

The position left you exposed to him, trousers gathered around one boot, shirt rumpled around your hips. Dick leaned forward and kissed the inside of your thigh.

Your breath caught.

He kissed you again, higher this time.

The rough grain of the trunk pressed through your shirt beneath you. Hay rustled under Dick’s knees. Somewhere beyond the stable walls, rain continued to fall, concealing the quiet sounds neither of you could entirely control.

Dick’s mouth brushed the crease of your thigh.

You pulled lightly at his hair. “Do you know what you are doing?”

He looked up.

The question had been intended as provocation. His expression suggested he understood that.

“Would you like a list of references?”

You tightened your grip.

He laughed softly. “Jealous.”

“I am reconsidering the wisdom of leaving you armed.”

“My sword is in my chambers.”

“That is not what I meant.”

His grin flashed before he lowered his mouth to you.

The first stroke of his tongue stole the rest of your threat.

Your thighs tensed around his shoulders. Dick held them open, firm enough to keep you where he wanted you without forcing the position. His tongue moved through your wetness, unhurried at first, learning the shape of you and the reactions you could not hide.

You pressed your lips together.

He looked up without lifting his mouth.

The challenge in his eyes was unmistakable.

You glared at him.

Dick licked slowly over your clit.

Your head tipped back.

A quiet sound escaped you, little more than a breath, but he heard it. His hands tightened on your thighs, and he repeated the motion with greater pressure.

Pleasure unfurled low in your stomach.

You had expected him to tease. Dick treated nearly everything as an invitation to play, and he had spent years provoking you simply to see whether you would respond. Between your thighs, however, his attention sharpened into something almost ruthless.

He watched you.

Every change in your breathing taught him something. When his tongue circled your clit and your hips lifted, he held you closer. When he drew back enough to press two fingers against your entrance, he waited until you looked down at him.

“Still want me?” he asked.

You could have struck him.

Instead, you said, “Yes.”

He slid one finger inside you.

The intrusion was easy, your body already slick from his mouth. Dick’s gaze remained on your face as he worked it deeper, curling experimentally until your grip in his hair became painful.

His eyes lit with discovery.

“You are unbearable,” you whispered.

“You like me.”

“Against my better judgment.”

He added a second finger.

Your legs opened wider.

Dick leaned in again, sealing his mouth over your clit while his fingers moved inside you. The combination tore through the last of your restraint. Your hips rocked toward him, seeking more, and he gave it willingly, following every movement with practiced precision.

You had been quiet in pain before. You had endured arrows pulled from flesh, bruised ribs beneath armor, and wounds stitched beside campfires without allowing Dick to hear more than a hiss between your teeth.

Pleasure proved harder to withstand.

A moan slipped into the stable.

Dick answered with a groan against you.

The vibration made you jerk. Your heel struck the side of the trunk, and one of the horses shifted uneasily in its stall.

“Quiet,” you gasped.

Dick lifted his head. His lips were wet, his hair disordered by your hands, and his eyes held enough satisfaction to be infuriating.

“You’re the one frightening the horses.”

“You are doing it deliberately.”

“Doing what?”

His fingers curled inside you.

Your answer dissolved into another broken sound.

Dick’s smile softened into something hungry.

“That.”

He returned his mouth to you.

You clapped one hand over your lips.

He objected immediately, catching your wrist and pulling it away. He laced his fingers through yours and pressed your joined hands against your thigh while his other hand continued to work between your legs.

“Dick,” you warned.

“I spent six years trying to hear you laugh.” His mouth brushed your inner thigh as he spoke. “I am not letting you hide every other sound from me.”

“We are in a stable.”

“Then you should be quiet.”

You stared at him.

He grinned.

Before you could answer, his tongue returned to your clit, and his fingers found the place inside you that sent heat blazing through your body.

Your hand crushed his.

Dick did not slow. He drove his fingers into you with an increasing rhythm, each stroke drawing you tighter. His mouth alternated between slow, broad licks and concentrated pressure that made your vision blur at the edges.

You tried to keep your voice contained.

The effort lasted until he sucked gently.

Pleasure snapped through you.

Your thighs closed around his head as your body tightened, hips lifting from the trunk. Dick held you through it, fingers continuing their steady motion while your release broke over you in waves.

You said his name.

Louder this time.

He drew out every tremor until you pushed weakly at his shoulder. Only then did he slow, pressing one final kiss to the inside of your thigh before withdrawing his fingers.

Your breathing sounded impossibly loud.

Dick remained kneeling between your legs.

His cheek rested against your knee. The sight of him there—the future king, flushed and smiling, his lips shining with evidence of what he had done—sent a fresh pulse of heat through you.

He lifted your joined hands and kissed your knuckles.

“You are very expressive,” he said.

You covered his mouth with your free hand.

His laughter warmed your palm.

“I should throw you into the horse trough.”

Dick kissed the center of your hand.

“You would catch me before I hit the water.”

“I might reconsider my oath.”

“You love me too much.”

You lowered your hand.

His expression had become softer again, the teasing unable to hide what lay beneath it.

You touched his face.

Dick leaned into your palm.

“I do love you,” you said.

The admission felt different now. There was no armor between you, no council table or formal title behind which to retreat. You sat half undressed on a tack trunk while Dick knelt in the hay, and somehow the indignity made honesty easier.

His eyes closed for a moment.

When they opened, the prince had disappeared. There was only the man who had left pastries beside your gauntlets, trusted you with his nightmares, and spent six years trying to hear you laugh because he wanted some part of you that belonged to neither the crown nor your duty.

“I love you too,” he said.

You drew him up and kissed him.

The taste of yourself lingered on his mouth. Heat rushed through you at the realization, but the kiss remained tender, almost reverent. Dick settled between your knees again, one hand cupping the back of your neck.

His erection pressed against you through his trousers.

You reached for the fastening.

He caught your wrist.

“You don’t have to.”

“I am aware.”

His breath hitched when your palm moved over him.

“Someone may come in,” he reminded you.

“That did not concern you earlier.”

“I’m attempting to be responsible.”

“You are doing it poorly.”

“I’ve had little practice.”

You squeezed lightly.

Dick’s forehead dropped against yours.

“That,” he said hoarsely, “was unkind.”

“You like me.”

“Against my better judgment.”

You laughed.

It burst from you before you could stop it, bright and breathless and still tangled with the pleasure he had given you.

Dick went still.

He drew back just enough to look at you.

You became self-conscious beneath the wonder in his face. “What?”

“Nothing.”

“You are staring.”

“I know.”

“Stop.”

“I don’t think I can.”

You reached for your trousers.

Dick caught your hand again and kissed it.

“Do that again.”

“I cannot laugh on command.”

“I’m the prince.”

“That authority does not extend to laughter.”

“It should.”

“It does not.”

He kissed your palm. “I’ll petition the council.”

“You will do no such thing.”

“Lord Halyard will support me if I promise never to draw his mustache again.”

“You would break that promise before midday.”

“Probably.”

You smiled.

Dick looked as though you had handed him the crown willingly.

The affection in his face threatened to overwhelm you more thoroughly than his mouth had. You tugged your clothing back into place, and he helped without complaint, smoothing the linen of your shirt over your hips once you were covered.

When you stood, your legs felt less steady than you would have preferred.

Dick noticed.

He offered you his arm.

You stared at it.

“I can walk.”

“I have no doubt.”

“You are enjoying this.”

“Immensely.”

You took his arm anyway.

Sir Whiskers waited beside the stable entrance, ribbon crooked around his neck. Dick bent to scratch behind the cat’s ears.

“I expect discretion from an officer of the Crown.”

“He is not an officer.”

“He has a title.”

“That is not how military appointments work.”

“I’ll correct the oversight tomorrow.”

You guided Dick toward the castle before he could begin drafting official honors for the cat.

Rain had softened to a mist. The stone courtyard shone beneath the lanterns, and the windows of the palace were mostly dark. Dick remained close beside you, his hand covering yours where it rested on his arm.

At the entrance to the private wing, you stopped.

His chambers lay beyond the guarded corridor. Yours were in the opposite direction, near the barracks.

Dick looked toward the stairs, then back at you.

“You could come with me.”

The invitation warmed you, but the night had already changed enough.

“You have a diplomatic breakfast at sunrise.”

“I was hoping you had forgotten.”

“I never forget.”

“Tomorrow night?”

You studied him.

The hopeful uncertainty in his face was so unlike his usual confidence that you could not resist leaning closer.

“Perhaps,” you said.

Dick narrowed his eyes. “You are doing this intentionally.”

“Good night, Your Highness.”

You kissed his cheek and walked away.

His quiet laughter followed you down the corridor.

The following morning, Lord Halyard resumed his report on the southern wheat stores.

Dick sat at the council table dressed in royal blue, his posture attentive and his expression composed. Anyone who did not know him might have believed he was listening.

You stood behind his chair in full armor.

Your face revealed nothing.

Five minutes into the meeting, Dick slid a folded note toward the edge of the table.

You waited until King Bruce looked down at the agricultural records before taking it.

Sir Whiskers requests a formal audience regarding his appointment as Minister of Stable Affairs.

Beneath the words, Dick had drawn the cat wearing a tiny crown.

Your mouth twitched.

Dick turned his head.

“Face forward, Your Highness,” you whispered.

His smile was insufferably pleased.

He obeyed, though only after catching your smile, the one you could no longer quite hide from him.