#13atoms

Even after months and months, that feeling hadn’t settled or gone away. It had become comfortable for you, though. To be completely intoxicated, and obsessed with her. It seemed obvious, after just six months, that the only possible option for you was to live your whole life around Lois. To know you’d factor her into every choice you ever made, and follow her wherever she went. Everything felt so easy, so obvious. She would cut through your problems and worries with a word, and set your mind at peace with a roll of her head against your shoulder when she got sleepy on long plane rides. After six months she’d put the keys to her apartment on your keychain, and nicked your spare set once for logistical reasons, never bothering to return them. After a year, of course, you hadn’t needed two sets of keys anymore.

Two years after those drinks, you felt settle. The Planet wasn’t new anymore. You were getting headlines, and spending every summer followed by interns, like little ducklings wandering around in your wake. You’d sometimes pretend to have meetings at lunchtime, to get away from them and laugh with Lois on the rooftop.

A relationship with Lois had been so effortless. So easy. You calmed her and she energised you.

“You’re too good to be true,” she murmur to you, sated and sweaty in bed, and you’d laugh.

“I always think that about you.”

Of course, it had been too good to be true. Because then there was Clark Kent. Bumbling into both of your lives. You had interviewed him for his job as a Daily Planet reporter, actually. Lois had been busy that day, and the whole panel had been charmed by his daft sincerity and his country boy wholesomeness – helped by a big fancy graduate degree. Three weeks later, he’d been assigned a desk and introduced at the team meeting.

You hadn’t realised the problem yet, of course. Stupid, in hindsight, but Clark had seemed harmless. He had just been new, and big, and bumbling. And in those rare moments he believed in himself and his abilities, distinctly brilliant.

Then you saw how Lois watched him. Clark and his wide set shoulders as he opened meeting room doors and pressed himself out of the way to let others go first. Clark and those big hands, which engulfed his whole keyboard, tendons flexing as he typed away furiously. When he needed help with formatting, Lois would take the mouse from his hand, her hair falling has a curtain between your watchful gaze and their faces, laughter echoing high and low throughout the bullpen.

You’d had some inkling that there was something you didn’t like about Clark, but you thought it would pass. There were plenty of colleagues you didn’t like. And Lois was so above him, above everyone. Even Clark knew – stammering out his apologies every time he interrupted her with a question, giving up his place at press junkets if she asked. It had all been safe, and you knew you’d spend the evening tangled up with her, even if new Marlon Brando took a sheepish shine to your girlfriend.

Then he started those damn Superman interviews, which made Perry run extra prints of the paper and emptied newsagents across Metropolis. The website needed a new server provider, something which could be more dynamic, for when Clark’s stories broke. He had teeth, too, you’d begrudgingly admit. Clark would follow leads for Lois on corruption, city politics, Lexcorp scandals – one morning, they’d stood shoulder to shoulder, explaining the cloud of evidence they were trying to cut a line through for a story, and your stomach had dropped as you realised what a perfect match they made.

There they were, beautiful and clever and electric as they clashed and sparked against each other in front of an entranced room. They matched, in dark features and perfectly-imperfect hair and the way their bodies could hardly contain their energy, bouncing on their toes and interrupting each other in a scramble of brilliance.

For the first time in your whole relationship, you wondered if Lois remembered you existed.

Never in your life before had there been so much to lose. Those sleepy mornings in bed, Lois waking you up with soft lips on the tender skin of your neck. Those afternoons she would insist you both ditch the office early and take her car, and drive and drive until you couldn’t see another person and start some mountain hike recklessly late. You needed her at those fancy parties, needed the draw of her across any ballroom, the promise in her smirk as she worked a lead she had sworn to leave alone.

You had just moved in with her. You were writing the best you ever had, with her hand in your creative process, swapping pages as you proofread for each other on the couch. You needed Lois, and watching her with Clark was the first time you had ever considered you might not have her.

There were new joiners to the Daily Planet all the time. Plenty had come after you. But she’d never followed any of them around the office with her eyes like she did with Clark. Never invited them to your shared apartment to work late when the janitors kicked them out. You’d thought you were the only one, the only person she’d risk her reputation at work for. Now, he was there, leaning down to read her screen more often than not.

They looked so damn good together. It was sickening. You could see it now. The matching rings he’d pick, Clark on your side of the bed, and marking Lois’ articles in the purple pen you’d left on the coffee table. He fit her perfectly, strong and imposing, where she was lithe and intimidating. You knew which piece didn’t fit.

You knew you’d been off with Lois when you took the subway home with her that evening, her little finger hooked around yours on the walk. You hadn’t spoken enough. You hadn’t followed her conversation, or laughed in the right places. It was childish, and you knew she’d loathe the idea you were too insecure or weak to just tell her you were upset. Lois wasn’t like that. She was strong. She was certain, and invincible.

“You’re quiet,” she told you, once the door of the apartment was bolted against the outside world, “what’s up?”

You sighed, and rolled the tension from your neck, eyes closed to prevent the inevitable for as long as it took for Lois to fasten her fingers around your face and press her nose to yours.

“You’re in a mood. And I have a hunch it’s with me.”

“Lois…”

She pulled away, and started to unpack her tote bag, laptop on the table.

“Tell me!” she called, and you crossed to stand behind the couch, playing with the seam of a cushion.

“It’s not your fault...” you told her.

“Try me anyway.”

You whined, and she walked to you again, gently encircling your wrists in her fingers and pulling your torso against hers.

“Clark.”

“What about Clark?”

“I just… when I see you together I feel like… like there’s something between you. And it’s like when I was new, and you’re doing the same thing.”

“The same thing?”

“Being nice to him. Working with him. I’m worried he’ll think you’re flirting with him.”

Lois had such an intense stare, when she was engaged in something, refusing to let you turn away from her, holding your wrists and giving you her full attention.

“Do you think I’m flirting with him?” She asked, head tilted, tone unaccusing.

“No! No. Are you?”

“He’s good looking, sure. But no, I’m not.”

She shrugged, and let go of your hands, swinging her arms at her side.

“You think he’s attractive?” you asked.

“In another life, I could see it.”

Why on earth were you surprised? Pragmatic, practical, painfully honest, Lois. There she was, all flat tone and shrugs.

“It doesn’t feel great in this life,” you managed to get out, and she frowned, lips pursed.

“There’s nothing there. He’s good looking, and nice, sure, but you’re my girlfriend. I know we’re not traditional, but this relationship is closed, and I love you.”

You thought for a while, looking away from Lois because her eyes would melt any anger left in your chest.

“But you think he’s attractive? In another life?”

“Sure. But not in this one.”

She said your name, softly, and you knew she wasn’t trying to make you feel bad – but you felt ridiculous. Petty. Like you were asking for something unrealistic. Of course, she was allowed to think an attractive man was attractive, but this was your colleague and he was so different and –

“If I wanted to be with Clark…” she trailed off, and looked at you with a raised eyebrow.

“You’d be with Clark,” you finished, and she sandwiched your face in her hands, so she could kiss you firmly.

There was so much more you wanted to say, but you had no idea what it was. Lois was like that. She flattened disasters into short conversations before they even happened.

“I’ll stop inviting him over. Sorry, I know I never properly asked you.”

“No,” you told her, “no. I’m being silly. Thank you for… for explaining. I knew you weren’t flirting, I just… I was worried he’d get the wrong idea.”

“I’ll stop inviting him over. I’ve been meaning to talk to Perry about keeping the office open later, anyway.”

There, you were back. Calm. Wondering what to have for dinner, and worrying that Lois worked too hard.

“What you need to talk to Perry about is coming home on time, you’re going to exhaust yourself!”

“I can go forever. You don’t want me having more energy,” she had you by the hand again, pulling you around, down onto the couch so she could trap you, phone in her other hand, “what a nightmare. I’d be bouncing off the walls.”

“Hm, disaster,” you conceded, smiling into her sleeve.

“You couldn’t handle me if I wasn’t shattered all the time.”

“So could.”

She laughed, arms wrapped around you, as you both watched her tap out an email to a source.

Later, in bed, she sighed and turned over to watch you through the darkness, hair falling over her pillow. You were both meant to be going to bed early, but you never managed it, talking late into the night.

“Are you still upset about earlier? About Clark?”

“No. No, sorry I brought it up. I appreciate you explaining.”

Lois settled onto her back, staring up at the ceiling. There was a glow in the dark star there, one you’d found lying around the office after a party and brought home. Lois complained about it sometimes, but she’d always stopped you from taking it down.

“I think there are a lot of versions of ourselves we can be. Different loves, different lives. It’s what we choose that counts.”

You hummed an agreement, and tried to sleep.

“Love you,” she murmured, before curling into you, immediately falling asleep.

*

You never quite put away the idea there was something between Lois and Clark. She’d been respectful, and better at telling you where she was, but ultimately you reminded her you didn’t mind her relationship with Clark. A friendship, electric and brilliant thought it was. It was only to be expected, between two people like them. Highly emotionally intelligent, articulate, kind, of course they were fast friends.

In the quiet evenings you spent without Lois, while she worked herself to the bone and you tried to gain some work/life balance, you had come to accept the role Clark played in her life.

It didn’t mean you had to like him though. Weeks passed of their intense dynamic, of shared authorships and investigations so risky Lois tried not to tell you about them until afterwards. They were brilliant. Lois, though, was even moreso, checking in and being so conscious, you didn’t have the faintest suspicion of anything untoward.

In another life, they might have been something. In this life, you were happy for Lois’ new friendship, and the glint in her eye as you passed newsagents every morning and took photos of her name in print.

Annually, the Daily Planet hosted a dinner for sponsors. A huge amount of money was set aside for the event, and it was always in a museum or art gallery or other culturally important space to lend a bit of class to the whole occasion. Far from the broken office coffee machine, you’d dine on three courses of fine dining and sip at champagne. To everyone’s displeasure, all the journalists were given the morning off to scrub up, and wheeled out for entertainment.

The seats were assigned, and as you and Lois arrived you realised you’d been dispersed among the rich and powerful who sponsored and distributed the paper. Not a surprise, of course, but you’d recently had a couple of pleasant water cooler chats with Perry, and hoped he might have had mercy on you and let you sit with Lois.

It was fine, though. You were opposite some people from the printers, and sandwiched between the wife of a newagents chain and Superman’s best friend.

You realised, then, that you’d never really spoken to Clark Kent. Not on purpose. You’d emailed him about things, and checked if he had information to help with leads, and proofed his articles when Lois asked you to or the scheduled demanded it. He was pleasant in passing, when you interacted because of Lois, but you’d never gone out of your way to speak to Clark.

The thought occurred to you as he sheepishly took his assigned seat, grimacing at you like he was apologising. Lois was far down the table, and she gave you a sarcastic little wave when you looked for her, already hemmed in on all sides by old men with article ideas they wanted to give her.

“Sorry, you’re stuck with me,” Clark caught your attention, worry carrying on the baritone of his voice.

He was squeezing himself into the seat, shoulders hunched to avoid touching you. Gazing up at the exposed beams crossing the art gallery ceiling, blatant appreciation on his face for something as simple as a company dinner.

“That’s okay. There’s a very long list of people here who I be far more upset to be sat with.”

He smiled, eyes now trained on the table. Guilt bit into you, its jaws locking around your flesh, and shaking. Lois was still watching, glancing sideways as she listened to the head of some tech company about his views on print media. On your left was a conversation about golf. On your right, a reporter you probably owed an apology.

“I really liked your article on the free school meals trial in Midvale,” you told him, finally setting aside your resentment. “I’ve always wanted to do something about framing welfare as investment rather than charity, but I never found the right story. It was a brilliant call for a paradigm shift, I hate the way the governor talks about that kind of stuff.”

You’d been so annoyed, when you’d read the article in bed one morning, waiting for Lois to finish in the bathroom. It had been brilliant.

“Thank you. It was nice to write something that isn’t Superman,” he admitted.

You rolled your eyes. You hadn’t exactly been quiet about Clark’s limited range, in private company.

“It really was very good. I was thinking about it for ages, poor Lois didn’t hear the end of it.”

“I appreciate it. Thank you.”

He thought for a moment, clumsily toying with the edge of his fabric napkin. He didn’t seem sure what to do with it, and his lips were pressed together in thought.

“How long have you two been together? If you don’t mind me asking?”

“A little over two years,” you tried to keep the pride off your tongue, but it was difficult.

There was a back off in your tone, and you hoped Clark hadn’t caught it.

“You’re very lucky. Both of you. She’s amazing – and she thinks the world of you. If you don’t mind me saying.”

You didn’t want to say thank you, or suggest any surprise. For Clark to see you and Lois as anything but one inseparable entity was inviting trouble.

“You were a great hire. We’re glad to have you.”

He smiled tightly, dimples popping in his cheeks. Those big fingers were fidgeting, running along the prongs of his silver fork.  

In another life, Lois had said. His glasses were slightly askew, and you found yourself longing to fix them, to soothe the red line forming where the arms didn’t fit quite right.  

“I must admit, I’m jealous. You both seem like such a great fit. Not many people ever meet their soulmates.”

You swallowed, and chanced a look at Lois, her hands flying in mid-conversation.

“I’m not sure I’m as much of a romantic as all that. But yeah, she’s great.”

“That’s a rare thing. People… I love people. But not all of them are like you two.”

The food was coming out. You distracted yourself by watching the waiters. There was something raw, sincere, in Clarks’ stare. You couldn’t stand it.

“Yeah I uh, don’t like many of them. Lois is something else.”

“I’m so grateful she helps me. I hope I don’t bug her too much.”

“You don’t – you’re pretty impressive yourself. It’s good for her to have someone to keep up with her.”

“That makes two of us,” he smiled sweetly, bumping your shoulder with his.

For a split second, you couldn’t help it. Smiling up at him, impossibly sweet and kind. You didn’t want to feel that awkward grin of his in your chest. Didn’t want to the warmth that spread over your cheeks.

Nonetheless, it was there, growing with each glass of prosecco, and each sweet anecdote Clark told you about home.

When the meal was done and the room was being cleared, you hadn’t spoken a word to Perry’s guests, and Lois joined you with a polite interruption – immediately falling into the retelling of some anecdote about your last adventure into the National Park just north of Metropolis.

Soon, it was later than you’d anticipated, and all of you were a little worse for wear – though Clark never seemed to become anything but flushed and giddy, while you and Lois stumbled over stairs and spilled drinks – and he offered to walk you both home.

Suddenly, clarity. Lois was teasing him for being an old gentleman before you’d even started to say decline, but the illusion was gone. And as much as you’d enjoyed his company, it was time to get Lois away from him.

The taxi was quiet, and you only spent ten minutes in the late evening traffic before being dropped off outside the apartment and filing upstairs after Lois.

She didn’t say much as she unlocked the door and both of you wandered into the bedroom, sleepy and sobering up. Lois was content, but your mind was racing.

“You guys got on, then? I was a bit worried.”

“Yeah, uh, fine. You know me. I’ll make the best of anything.”

She was starting to undress, sliding off her necklace and her blazer, combing out her hair and tying it back. You found the strap of your shoes, and almost fell trying to undo it.

“That’s not true. I didn’t see you talk to Aaron Jackson’s wife once. I forget her name.”

“I didn’t have much to say about golf.”

“What were you talking about with Clark?”

“Just… work stuff, mainly. He told me a bit about his childhood.”

“Oh?”

“It was really sweet, actually. You know he still says ma and pa? Definitely a mommy’s boy.”

She hummed, and wandered into the bathroom for eye makeup remover, calling back:

“He calls them almost every day. It’s sure something.”

“I think it’s cute. He seemed to worry about them. They’ve still got a farm, apparently.”

“He sure told you a lot. He’s been pretty cagey with details.”

You shrugged, sitting on the bed, paused while Lois moved back into the bedroom, packing away the mess you’d both made getting ready.

“I think he wanted me to like him. He was singing your praises.”

“He’s always asking about you, I think he was probably just excited you’d finally give him the time of day.”

You laughed, and Lois gave you an eye roll, unzipping her boots.

“If I had any sense, I’d be more worried about the way he looks at you. Like a little puppy you’ve locked outside.”

While you scoffed, started on undoing her top button, and you learnt back on the bed to watch her.

“I don’t get why he doesn’t get on the apps, he’s a good-looking guy,” she murmured.

The ceiling was still spinning, the smallest, tiniest, bit. You hadn’t noticed until you lay down.

“He’s gorgeous.”

She turned to you in surprise, mouth open, shirt halfway undone.

“Gorgeous?”

“You said it first!”

“I don’t think I’d have said that. He’s attractive, sure,” she paused, playing the way her open shirt sat across her bra, “Do I need to be worried?”

“Lois Lane, are you jealous?”

Lois surged forwards, all energy and sinew, the very picture of mock outrage as she clambered over you on all fours.

“Of course not. Never. You don’t even like hunks. Did you say the Hemsworths’ wives probably can’t even find them, because live in one of those halls of mirrors?”

“Hm. And Twitter didn’t like that very much.”

“You’ve done more insightful work. Stupid Perry.”

“I don’t think Clark’s like that. I’m not even sure he knows he’s a hunk.”

“The nerd cancels it out, I think,” Lois mused, wriggling around to get to the clasp of her bra, “Have you ever noticed the way he watches us?”

You froze.

“Like, in a pervy way?”

“No. That’s not Clark. Like, a longing. How I stared at you until I plucked up the courage to ask you for a drink,” she forced her hands into yours, and clasped your fingers together.

She used your conjoined hands to push you down into the mattress, and you collapsed with a grunt, Lois following.

“I’m not sure his ma ever even gave him the birds and the bees talk,” you teased, and Lois rolled her eyes.

“He had a girlfriend. Back in college, I think it was.”

Suddenly, everything was a bit serious. Lois’ tone. The intensity she was watching you with. The tightness in your stomach at the thought of Clark, fumbling around with his first girlfriend.

“Oh,” was all you could manage.

“Do you think he imagines us?” Lois’ voice had dropped, lips pressed to your jaw.

“He was asking me, earlier, about our relationship,” you murmured, and let your fingers find her scalp through silky black hair.

“Oh yeah?”

“Just normal stuff. But… he said he was jealous.”

“Of me?”

“Of both of us, I think. I’m not sure.”

“I’d be jealous of me,” she groaned, fingers finding the waistband of your underwear.

“As you should be.”

The conversation dissolved, into lazy, tipsy intimacy, but it ebbed and flowed through your mind for the rest of the night. And then the following day.

Gorgeous.

In the office the next morning, he had been gorgeous, curls and glasses all askew in the early morning sun. He’d given you a cheery greeting, and you smiled back tightly, resisting the urge to walk over to his desk.

Lois had been watching you all morning, too, eyes flitting to you and then to Clark whenever she moved to the printer, the meeting room. Of course, the day was busy. Perry had the same number of pages to fill as usual, and you’d all lost a day to schmooze with sponsors. You hardly noticed as the sun set and the office lights grew brighter and harsher, until sure enough, your looked up from your screen to see that only the three of you were left in the whole bullpen.

You caught Lois’ eye, as she stared blindly out the window, tapping her pen to her lips as she thought. She raised an eyebrow, but made no suggestion of stopping. You carried on, typing away at those sentences which wouldn’t come as readily the next morning, until your attention drifted to Clark, blazer thrown across the back of his chair. He was stumbling to his feet, and spared you a gentle smile as he wandered away from his desk, water bottle in hand.

You watched him leave, admiring the excellent tailoring of his shirt and trousers. Maybe custom? No where stocked clothes for men built like Clark. So intently, in fact, that by the time you blinked at the open doorway, Lois was leaning against your desk with mischief on her lips.

“Staring?” she whispered.

“Lois!” you gasped.

Before you could defend yourself, she was pushing you back into your office chair, the back sinking under her force, lips squashed to yours even as you tried to speak.

“You’re in a mood this evening.”

“Uh huh,” she laughed against your lips, and you gasped at the feeling of her hands all over you, one on your jaw, the other slipping between your jacket and shirt, her hair all over your face.

“Christ, Lo,” you gasped, realising too late that as you broke for air, she was undoing the clasp of your bra, “Lois!”

The release on your ribs was bliss, and exposing, the cups gaping away from your chest beneath your shirt. Lois  was rubbing at the indented skin on your back, as she often did, this time blinded by the full outfit you still wore.

“What the fuck,” you complained, “I’ve got to walk home.”

You were about to ask her why she was doing this, now, under the fluorescent lights of the office, but she was already forcing her tongue against your lips, making out with a desperation you’d never felt from her before. Lois was the wildest you’d ever seen her, and it was only when she finally leant back from you that you realised why.

Clark, bless him. Sweet, rural, lovely Clark. Stood in the doorway with water from the tap splashed on his shirt and trousers, frozen in shock at the scene in front of him.

“Oh!” you managed.

You were halfway through pushing Lois off you – she was reluctant to move – aware that you were a complete mess, when Clark bolted for the door. Blazer left behind, computer unlocked. Guilt stung in you, those wide, blue eyes imprinted on your memory.

“Clark!” You called, but he was long gone.

Lois was packing up her bag, slinging a tote over her shoulder and wiping at her lips.

“We should head out too, actually,” she told you, coming up behind you to snake her hands under your shirt and refasten your bra.

You batted her away, still breathless, the shock leaving your brain addled.

“Why did you do that? Oh my god, Lois!”

“My gorgeous girlfriend, working hard, and I can’t even kiss her?”

“No! To poor Clark! Yesterday, we were talking about how he said he feels lonely. Or jealous, or whatever!”

She shrugged, grabbing her coat and yours, and saving the document on your laptop before she closed it.

“Lois!”

“Sorry! Thought it might do him some good, to see you’re taken.”

“Do you know how bad I felt, about being jealous you were spending so much time with him? And now you’re doing this?”

This time, Lois succeeded in getting her hands under your shirt, deftly refastening your bra and smoothing it out.

“He probably liked it.”

You groaned, swatting at her as she handed you your things.

“I’ve never seen anyone move that fast, poor guy.”

“Whatever,” she rolled her eyes, the spat forgotten by the time the subway doors closed.

*

Lois had forgotten the whole incident by the next morning, at least you assumed  so, but the moment you saw Clark picking at a breakfast sandwich in the kitchenette, the shame came rushing back to you. You’d been thinking about this moment all night, but the speech you’d over rehearsed wouldn’t come.  

“Clark! Um, I just wanted to say… last night… Lois was – well… Sorry.”

It was so lame, you couldn’t even look him in the eyes, playing with one of the cheap satsumas Perry bought for the team.

“No, I’m sorry I interrupted. Please, don’t mention it.”

You couldn’t muster a smile, try as you might. Clark’s palm found your elbow, and the gesture startled you so much you looked up, and saw nothing but sincerity behind the reflections of his glasses.

“Pretend it didn’t happen.”

With that, he was miming zipping his lips shut, swiping his coffee from the machine, spinning on his heels to get back to his desk. Everything was absolutely terrible, of course. The shame, the workplace embarrassment, the slight morosity in Clark’s tight-lipped smile. But the worst part of all of it? How weirdly attractive Clark had looked while he forgave you.

*

There was more of it, of course. Of Lois intertwining your fingers in the lift so Clark could see. Pressing your legs together when the three of you shared a taxi. Flirting loudly at your desk. You should have been giddy, and delighted in how blatant she was being. A few months ago, devastated at their closeness, you would’ve given anything for the way Lois was rubbing your relationship in Clark’s face.

Now, though, it just made you upset. Such a kind, sweet, intelligent man – and he was hurting himself watching you and Lois, yearning for something he seemed not to have by blind luck. If he’d joined first, if he’d skipped his postgrad, you could’ve been sat on the opposite side of the booth every time the three of you ducked out for lunch.

Two weeks after Clark’s dorky forgiveness in the kitchenette, the three of you were last in the office, again. This time, because you had some fancy dinner organised with a wealthy source. You’d brought a dress in your tote back, and it was slightly wrinkled as you changed in the office bathroom.

You’d noticed Clark at your back as you did your makeup at your desk, sneaking glances in the mirror, keyboard framed by his pinkies as he touched the keys but didn’t type, waiting for inspiration to strike.

Lois, of course, held no punches when it came to flirting with you in front of Clark. She demanded a kiss before your lip gloss went on. She messed with your hair. And when you walked out of the office bathroom, fussing with your neckline, she groaned so obscenely you swore the temperature in the room increased from the heat of Clark’s blush.

“Are you sure we can’t just go out instead?” she whined, spinning you around with two hands on your torso.

“This is important, Lois! Shit, I need spare batteries for my tape recorder…”

“You need to cancel on this guy so I can take you out!”

Behind her Clark rummaged in his desk, and didn’t make a sound as he placed two packaged AAs gently by your bag.

“You’re the one who talked me into this bullshit. You’ll be glad I went when we’ve actually got a source for that stupid modern art money laundering piece.”

While she was distracted, you caught Clark’s eye, and mouthed a thanks. He gave a thumbs up, already swinging back in his desk chair, pretending to be engrossed in his blank work processor.

“Do I looked okay, do you think? I’ve got no idea where this place he’s invited me is. Their Instagram looked fancy though –”

“I’m not kidding, I think you should pull a sickie…”

Lois had finished fussing with your hair, and she was moving on to the bodice of the dress, straightening seams. Suddenly she plunged a hand into the neckline, and pulled your breasts up, settling them higher in the dress.  

“Doesn’t she look great, Clark?” she was saying, and poor Clark’s blush returned, eyes roving in panic.

When he didn’t reply, Lois turned to him, and pulled you in front of her with both hands on your shoulders.

“Clark?”

“Hm?”

“Doesn’t she look great for the interview?”

He looked mortified. You tried to mouth ‘sorry’, but you were sure he hadn’t seen.

“Yeah! Sorry. Great. Go get ‘em, tiger.”

Lois gave an awkward little laugh, and finally let you leave, rushing through the evening commuters to get to the restaurant. The interview had gone well. Better than expected, actually, considering how much of your brain was twelve blocks away, trapped in an awkward newsroom bullpen.

When you left, giddy on the high of a good scoop and two glasses of wine, you text Lois that you were heading back. Beside her in your notifications, you saw an unusual name.

> Clark Kent (Work): Sorry for not answering earlier. You looked beautiful. Good luck with the interview!  

You tapped out a quick thanks, frowning at your phone all the while.  Your interviewee waved from his taxi window as he passed, and you smiled sincerely as you waved back. What a strange life. The evening was mild, and pretty, and you walked to try and stay in the fresh air a little longer. Clark didn’t leave your mind

And, it was funny, but after years living in Metropolis, the walk home was the first time you’d ever seen Superman patrolling the streets, swooping overhead in and out of the skyscrapers.

You’d shown Lois the texts of course, almost as soon as you got home. It was the right thing to do. And when she took your phone, she went completely still, holding the tiny glowing screen above her face in bed and then, while you held your breath, smirking.

“Told you,” was all she said, as she handed your phone back.

“It’s so awkward Lois!”

“I can’t believe you don’t see it!”

You sighed, and threw yourself onto the bed, over the covers in your clothes while she lay naked underneath.

“What do you get out of this?” you whined, “Lo, this is mean. Or, I don’t know, rude. Poor guy, if he does have a crush on one of us. Either way, this is so messed up.”

“What’s wrong with giving the guy a little something to look forward to in the office?”

You rolled over, fully aware you were squashing your girlfriend. Lois groaned. The pleasantness of the night, the Metropolis hazy evening, the Superman sighting, it was all fading away as Lois brought your mood crashing back to earth.

“Do you want him to find us attractive? What is this?” you asked,

“I think we should invite him out for drinks.”

Then, everything was quiet. You showered, wordlessly, and Lois was asleep by the time you crawled into bed. You watched her, the serenity of her bare face, and wondered what on earth she meant.

If she meant it.

If that was what you wanted.

*

It all remained the same, the cadence of your life. Despite the turmoil in your head, despite the tension in your relationship with Lois, despite the way Clark looked at you.

Subway, office, interview writeups and morning meetings, everything stayed the same.

Those tiny changes, however, were amplified. Those little things above the noise floor. Clark telling you he’d watered your desk plant. Clark proofing your articles when you sent them to the editor pool. Clark, getting up and going to the kitchenette when you did, and lurking by the counter while you filled your water bottle, bouncing on his feet.

Sometimes, Fridays were for work drinks. By the time a week had passed since your interview, and it was just the three of you in the office again, you’d made up your mind.

A final few deep breaths, to chase away the doubt, before you text Lois.

> We should invite him out for drinks.

And instantly, it was marked as Read at 5:45pm.

Movement, of course, began with Lois. Her coat over her arm, her laptop sliding into a tote bag and the thump of her shoes against the suspended office floor tiles.

“Fancy heading out?” she said to you, ignoring your frown.

“Sure.”

Clark’s head had popped up from hunch over his keyboard, but so far, he remained with his cheek resting on his hand, pretending not to be listening. Of course, the instant Lois turned her attention to him, he was staring up at her. Eyes wide, innocent, like a puppy.

“You guys heading out?” he asked, and for a moment you thought the timidity had left his voice, replaced by something full, All-American GI Joe. By the time he spoke again, the normal Clark was back, playing with the wire of his keyboard between his hands.

“Yeah, reckon we’ll get an early night, love?”

You shrugged, starting to pack you bag.

‘Up to you, Lo. I could go for a cocktail, if you fancy it?”

“Hm, I think I could tolerate that.”

She was playing. Showing off for Clark, again, slim fingers playing with the strap of her tote bag, flitting to shift your hair from your face..

“Maybe a beer.”

She let the words hang in the air, for far too long, and you could see Clark trying to decide whether he should pretend to be disinterested in the conversation, or politely pay attention.

“Want to come for a drink?” she asked him, finally.

Clark slipped, fingers fumbling against his keyboard, glasses falling askew on his face.

“Me?”

Lois laughed. You could feel the heat rising in your face – the second hand embarrassment was unbearable as Clark rushed to turn off his computer.

“Yes, you!” She was teasing, “C’mon. It’ll be fun.”

“Yeah! Yes, of course. Um, where are we going?”

Like you, he was following Lois’ lead, coat in hand. You trailed behind her to the elevator, and he trailed behind you. She was already  in the car, holding the doors, when Clark darted inside.

“I know a place,” was the only answer she gave, leading you both out into the mild evening air.

She hooked her little finger around yours, pulling you to her side as she walked, leaving Clark to negotiate the obstacles on the sidewalk to keep up with the conversation, both of you orbiting around her as she set the path and you dodge pedestrians and scaffolding.

“Do you guys do this often, then? Drinks after work?”

Lois hummed, giving your hand a double squeeze, which could have meant a million things – but in this moment evidently only meant one.

“It’s how we met, actually. I finally plucked up the courage to ask her out for a drink. Took me long enough.”

You laughed, and let Lois guide you inattentively over a crosswalk. She’d look out for you.

“Two weeks?”

“That’s not like me,” she quipped, “I knew in two hours. That I wanted to ask you out.”

You got the impression Clark was holding back an aw; the noise he made came out somewhere near it. It was a sweet story, especially from someone as tough and pragmatic as Lois. She had soft spots, but they were well guarded. You were the exception.

“We actually went to a place right by the office, Eclipse Room. We’ve been there for work dos, sometimes.”

“Fancy,” Clark commented.

He’d fallen behind, helping a lady with a pushchair up a curb with a cavernous storm drain beneath it. In a few long strides, he was back behind the pair of you. You kept looking back, trying to make sure he was included, as Lois dragged you onwards.

“Yeah. It was nice,” you admitted, “I couldn’t believe Lois just kept buying rounds. My cocktails were like, three time the price of her beers. But when I tried to order an IPA, she just came back with the Long Island I really wanted.”

“That’s so… kinda sweet, actually. Didn’t know you had it in ya, Lois.”

“Fuck off, Kent.”

Lois was laughing, bright and climbing up an arpeggio, as free as those sweaty moments in the afterglow, when you said something just to hear her giggle. For a moment, that panic returned, that Lois and Clark were close and in sync and you were completely ignorant to that current between them. But then the moment was over, and Lois was pulling you closer to her and squeezing your hand twice, and meeting your eyes with a question.

You nodded, bottom lip caught between your teeth, and she sent you the kind of wink she’d used liberally in those early days of your relationship – so smooth, so cheeky that it made your knees weak.

“Shit!” she exclaimed suddenly, letting your hand slip from hers and turning to Clark, the three of you forming a triangle of tote bags and totes and inky fingers on the sidewalk.

The bar was looking worse for wear – the 72 Speakeasy had lost half it’s lettering, the front windows smashed in, the distinct shape of an impact visible in the brickwork façade.

“What the hell. Closed due to damage from recent battle.”

There it was, a handwritten sign taped to the inside of the remaining glass panel – the other side of the door was covered in plywood, bent nails fastening it in place.

“God, that’s so sad!” you were saying, as Clark patrolled the front of the building, inspecting the damage.

“Shoot, I wish you’d said this is where we were going. Superman mentioned he’d accidentally gone into it yesterday, thrown around in a fight. He’s super sorry, though.”

You both looked at him for a moment, as Clark toyed with the nails protruding from the boarded up windows. They must have been cheap metal, he was slightly bending them in with his fingers, stopping them from snagging passersby.

“That’s the impression I got, anyway. I had no idea it was somewhere you guys liked.”

Lois sighed, and pulled you into a half-hug.

“Sorry, honey. I wouldn’t have dragged us all the way out here if I’d known.”

“That’s okay, I like the walk. Besides, there’s loads of other places. There’s Joe’s around the corner…”

“But they don’t do that nice rum cocktail you like,” she was quick to interrupt you, eyebrows reaching for her hairline.

“That’s okay…”

“What do you think, Clark?” she was asking, calling over your shoulder, “I was thinking we might just had back to ours. I’ll make you a drink there, hm sweetheart?”

When you spun Lois so that you could see Clark, the dejection on his face nearly broke your heart.

“Oh, okay. Yeah. That’s sensible. Are you guys gonna be okay getting back?”

“You’re going?” you asked him, aware how much less sure your voice sounded than Lois’.

“Oh… Oh! I assumed…”

“You’re very welcome,” you were saying, “if you want to come, that is. You don’t have to. But if you’re still up for a drink…”

There he was, back. Smiling, daft Clark Kent, dimples deepening with his smile and ready to lead the way to your apartment.

“If you’re sure that’s okay!”

“Of course it is!” you said, just as Lois nodded.

“Then let’s rock and roll!” he beamed, “I’m parched.”

*

72 Speakeasy was, of course, the closest bar to your apartment. It was barely a two minute walk before you were unlocking the front door, quickly tidying up while Lois sauntered to the kitchen and began dishing out drinks.

She never made you that nice cocktail, but a glass of cold rosé was pressed into your hand, the bottle set on the living room table, sweating and ready to be split three ways.

Lois settled you onto a couch, and Clark into the matching armchair at the foot of it. She fussed for a moment, setting up nibbles in a very un-Lois-like manner, before clambering onto the couch beside you. You were so close, you were practically tangled with her – and it didn’t escape your notice that Clark was watching intently as she negotiated your arms around her to take a sip of her wine.

“At least this is quieter,” you said, to no one in particular.

One wall of the apartment was stacked floor to ceiling with books, mementoes of stories. Opposite, windows which offered a panoramic view of the city. In the middle of the room, however, there was only the three of you, warm bodies on you and Lois’ fancy new sofas, around the dark wood coffee table which you both swore you’d stop leaving clutter on.

You and Lois ate there, often, sat on the floor with the couch at your backs. Clark, too, had used the table before, for those late night writing sessions which had first tinged your world Kryptonite green.

You’d bruised your shin on it, countless times. Including when you’d first broken in this sofa. You’d insisted Lois find a blanket to put under your naked bodies, and she’d whined that you were ruining the mood, before acquiescing.

As your mind wandered, you found yourself glad Clark was sat on the armchair. Not just sitting, fully occupying, long thighs extending beyond the chair and his feet haphazard where they fell on the floor, like he was too big for your furniture. The stem of his wine glass was woven through his fingers, and when he touched it to his lips, you couldn’t help reflecting on the fact you’d shared that wine glass too. And Lois. It had been through the dishwasher, of course. The thought was purely sentimental. And yet, something caught in your chest as he hummed in thought, the pout of his bottom lip pressed against the glass.

He was talking to Lois, voices low, and you found yourself excused from conversation for a moment. Instead, you let your mind wander. To the fact he’d shucked his jacket at some point in the chaos of the three of you spilling into the apartment. You noticed that Lois was pulled her foot onto the sofa, so it was pressed to your thigh. That Clark was taking breaks from his conversation to train his eyes on you, and you smiled back as you caught him.

On an empty stomach, the first glass of wine burned, and you thought if you stood up you’d probably already feel the slight headrush that rosé always brings. You could feel it warming your face, making Lois’ body hotter against yours.

“You still with us, honey?”

Lois only caught your attention as she stroked your hair from your forehead, and shifted on the sofa to refill your wine glasses. The last of the bottle went to Clark, and she extended fully to fill his glass, laughing at the balancing act of it, even as you caught the quick glance he took down her shirt.

He had pink cheeks. It could’ve been the wine, but Clark had never struck you as a lightweight.

“Sorry,” you murmured finally, and both Clark and Lois turned towards you to pay close attention, “I was miles away. What were we talking about?”

Clark laughed, not unkindly, a quiet chuckle deep in his chest. Lois cooed, and rubbed at the back of your neck.

“That’s okay. It’s been a long day, you must be exhausted.”

“Long week,” Clark agreed, “I keep thinking, sooner or later, we’re due for a relaxing time.”

“You signed that away with your last promotion, I think Clark. Welcome to senior – you’ll never have a moment’s peace again.”

That caught your attention.

“You got promoted.”

He brought one finger to his lips, making a clumsy shh sound, more playful than you’d never seen him before.

“I’m not really telling people. I don’t mind you knowing, though. I guess Perry will announce it eventually.”

“Clark! That’s amazing! Congratulations.”

Already, he was waving you away, modest to a fault. You could see the pride in him though, burning so vivid and hot that it was almost bursting out of his tight smile.

“Eeh, it’s the Superman stuff. Nepotism, basically.”

“I don’t think our readers mind that, it’s the writing that’s brilliant,” you told him kindly, raising your glass, “we should be toasting. Congratulations, Clark Kent, senior reporter!”

“And new owner of the metahumans desk,” Lois added, resting her head against yours.

Clark raised his glass, matching you, but there was a weariness to it. He didn’t seem as happy as you’d imagined serious, career-driven Clark Kent would be at such a big milestone.

“I know you’ve been there longer…” he was saying, but you waved him away.

“Oh, I don’t care. You deserve it. The last thing I want is more responsibility. Besides, the money doesn’t seem worth it. I hardly pay for anything anyway,” you grinned and Lois, and she rolled her eyes in return, nothing but fondness in her expression.

“She’s demanding,” she shrugged, sharing a joke with Clark which he didn’t want to be part of, “absolute nightmare. You’d hardly know it, she seems so sweet at work.”

He looked at you, eyes flitting, and softening at your shrug. There was that expression again. Somewhere between longing and gentle acceptance. You hated it.

“Demanding? I can’t believe that,” he said softly, and you smiled softly.

“She’s a liar. I’m an angel. Besides, this apartment would be a bombsite without me.”

“This is a sugarmommy situation, I see how it is,” Lois was teasing, “older woman, bigger salary…”

“You hardly make more than me. I actually think you’re underpaid. If I was after the cash, I’d make you move to the Gazette–”

Abruptly, you felt you were seeing yourself from the outside. From Clark’s perspective, on his lonely, undersized armchair. It was cruel. And as much as Lois denied it, if just the smallest things were different, it would be you on the outside, watching them cuddle up together. The thought made you feel nauseous, if you let yourself focus on it.

“Mind if I use your restroom?” Clark asked abruptly, hauling himself from the chair and putting his empty wine glass on the table.

“Of course,” Lois answered.

He knew where it was, of course, after those evenings spent here with Lois. You wondered if they’d shared a sofa, or if he’d been designated that armchair, and you were the last to know it was his.

He was difficult to be angry at, though. Clark took the time to get a coaster out and put it under his glass before he vanished down the corridor towards the bathroom. Sweet boy.

Both of you were silent for a while, sipping at your wine until you were sure Clark was out of earshot. Then Lois brought her lips to yours, and kissed you solidly, straightforwardly, lips parted and with the seriousness that she was sealing some deal you were unaware you’d made.

You started to push away from her, create a little bit of space, but Lois wouldn’t allow it. She took your arms and removed them from the cavity between you, letting her press her body to yours.

“You’re both so sweet. Cheers-ing his promotion like that. It’s obvious he’s not happy, though. Why do you think that is?”

“I don’t know.”

“I think you do, sat there watching him. It’s obvious, how much you laugh at his jokes. Smile at him.”

“Lo, I cant tell if you’re upset, or seriously suggesting – ”

She was being too loud. He’d be able to hear. He was coming back any minute, and the sounds Lois was drawing from you were obscene, and –

“Tell me you want to fuck him.”

“Lois!”

“Yes or no.”

“God! Um, yeah. Yes.”

“Yes?”

“Yes. Definitely yes, but –”

Then Clark was back, making himself heard, thumping his socked feet against the hardwood floor. Your breath caught in your throat. He’d heard some of that. Probably most of it, you presumed. He definitely heard when Lois took one last kiss from you, groaning against your open mouth, the heat in your face was becoming unbearable.

“Big, isn’t he?” she whispered, as Clark moved back to his seat, her lips tight to your ear and her face hidden in a curtain of hair.

“So sweet, too. He’d look after you.”

Clark was watching curiously, excluded from the conversation. You shivered, suddenly very aware of how warm you felt. How wet. That rush of blood downwards, making your clit ache. Was Lois really serious? Was she fine with this?

You watched Clark Kent, reporter and country bumpkin, and wondered how on earth he’d found himself in Lois’ dragnet.

Then again, you’d wondered the same about yourself, once upon a time.

“Are you doing anything to celebrate your promotion?” Lois asked, so loudly it made you jump, accustomed to her low whispers against the shell of your ear.

“I, um, haven’t really told anyone yet. Lois, uh, only knows because she was a reference for me. It was really nice, actually. What you wrote.”

“All true,” she shrugged, “every word of it.”

You hummed approvingly. And felt yourself clenching around nothing. Clark’s jaw ticked, and you wondered how good he was at eating out. He seemed like the type: giving. Generous. Unselfish. Eyes so wide and sincere, they were made for looking up from between your thighs.

Even more than before he was sprawled out in his armchair, elbows hanging off the side, knees wide and feet crossed at the ankles beneath him. His head was hanging to the side a little, flustered under Lois’ dismissive praise, eyes flitting between you and your girlfriend.

“I really think you should do something special. God knows, promotions don’t happen often around the Planet. Not if Perry can help it.”

A chuckle, a blush. The press of his cheek against the meat of his palm. Clark was so predictable, it made your chest clench.

“Does anyone want more wine?”

Three empty glasses and an empty bottle were littered across hands and the table. You moved to stand, but Lois hooked you, a leg around your thighs and an arm around your waist.

“You’ve had enough, I think.”

“We can’t invite Clark here for a drink then open one bottle,” you teased.

When you glanced up at him, Clark was smiling into this hand, eyes fixed on the pair of you.

“Clark?”

“I can grab it, if you’re trapped?”

You beamed at him, and he rose effortlessly to his feet, padding into your kitchen and opening the fridge like he lived here.

“Same again?” he called to you.

“Please.”

“I’m being plotted against, in my own home,” Lois grumbled to herself, and Clark came back, eyes sparkling behind his glasses as he poured you a new glass, leaning over you so that he could fill Lois’ empty glass, and taking it from her hand to give to you.

“Lo?” you murmured, and she shook her head.

“I’m fine.”

It was a crying shame, you thought, that the armchair was so damn far away.

“See, Lo. If you really loved me, you’d get me wine.”

“Har, har.”

You were adrift, in a funny gap in conversation. Lois had wanted this, right? You and Clark? This strange electricity between you? His fingers had brushed yours when he handed you the wine glass, and you couldn’t stop rubbing your fingers against the spot where he’d touched your skin.

Even if all three of you wanted this, you had no idea how to get there. Lois was being frustratingly quiet.

Interviews were in her blood. In yours. In Clark’s. Getting what you wanted with wit and careful planning. So why couldn’t you do it?

The silence was getting too long. You and Clark were sipping your wine, small, frequent drinks because you weren’t sure what else to do. The city outside was dark shapes and bright lights, manipulated by the storm which had started outside, flickering in the rain and shifting in the wind. The windows were too thick to hear the wind, the rain, the thunder, but you could tell it was there. It was in the beads of rain on the windows, in the tense, humid air of the apartment. When you looked away from the window, you caught Clark’s eye, and he smiled shyly, ducking his head at being noticed.

“Tell me about Superman.”

“Lois,” you groaned, “that must be all her ever hears!”

You were laughing, trying to diffuse the tension, as Clark shifted uncomfortably in his seat. Lois, though, ignored you – piercing stare on Clark, all the way over in his armchair. There was something there, in the way his posture changed. His wine disregarded, miles away in one long arm, the other rubbing at his bottom lip, shoulders squared to the cushion.

“What do you want to know?”

It was there again, that flicker of a deeper voice, a more confident man beneath Clark’s self-effacing. Gone again, of course, as Clark smiled tightly, and tilted his head in a stretch.

“Hm,” Lois was playing again, pretending this conversation was impromptu, when you all knew she did nothing casually.

She adjusted you, gradually so your wine wouldn’t spill, until she was sat fully on the couch and you were halfway between her lap and the cushions.

“Powers, then. We know he can fly. Eye lasers. Super strength. Super speed.”

“Surviving being thrown around like a ragdoll,” you added, because you felt like a ragdoll yourself in that moment.

Clark waited a moment too long before he spoke.

“He’s very careful about what he shares with the public,” he said, wine glass swirling around at his side.

“He never seems very careful what he shares with you,” Lois pointed out.

“Because he trusts me.”

“Right,” Lois’ fingers were at your right trapezoid, hidden from Clark, massaging out the stress, “powers, then?”

You remained perfectly still in her lap, enjoying the sensation, but knowing how close the relief was to pain. Lois was careful, but she was also on the hunt, chasing Clark down with a precision equal parts scary and breathtaking.

“You’ve got most of them. Cold breath, too. Like he did on that creature, last week. X-Ray vision. We see him do that, when he’s evaluating a scene.”

“Just vision?”

Lois’ fingers went still, and you rolled your head into her hand a little. Clark was completely distracted by the motion, following it as closely as you were. Her hand slipped down, outside your arm, inside your elbow, sliding across your waist to sit low on your stomach. You couldn’t keep your eyes open. Couldn’t blink. It had been so long, since that whisper in your ear. Since your first saw Clark sitting on your furniture, drinking from your glasses, all muscle and longing, wide eyes.

“Just vision, Clark?”

Lois’ fingers were pressing in, just a little, to the soft of your stomach, her pinkie dipping below the line of your hipbones. She was so close. When you looked up at Clark, eyelids drooped, his mouth was slightly open, eyes fixed on the place where Lois’ fingers dug into your shirt.

“Um. Uh, I think so.”

“Hearing, surely. I’ve heard he hears danger, across the city.”

“Oh. Yeah. I guess so.”

You had no idea what any of this had to do with anything. Shielded by the fold of your thigh, Lois’ fingers were working below your shirt. Not where you wanted them, though. You felt your face heating up as Clark watched. She settled for passing over the skin of your torso, a lump moving beneath your shirt as she let her fingernails graze you. He was staring intently, although your thigh blocked the movement, you supposed it was obvious Lois was doing something.

“I bet he heard me earlier. What I said to you, huh, honey?”

“What?”

“When Clark was in the bathroom. I asked you a question. Do you remember what I asked?”

“Oh! Uh,” instinctually, you clamped your free hand down on Lois’, stopping her movements as you desperately searched her face.

She was frustratingly cool, on the outside. Giving away nothing.

“I don’t remember,” she looked up, and Clark blinked back.

That defensiveness had melted away, and he was slumped again, his whole nervous system focused on watching the pair of you on the couch.

“Clark, did you hear? What I asked her?”

He swallowed, and looked away, out at the skyline.

“I’ll take that as a yes. What did I ask her?”

You couldn’t see Lois, but you could tell she was smiling, wide, sharklike. She’d won her hunt. Clark wasn’t answering, and in the haziness of your own mind, you were still putting together the silent conversation they were having.

The hand on your ribs tightened under your palm. Lois leant down, her eyes focused on Clark as she whispered in your ear.

“He’s Superman.”

“What?”

You’d turned, open mouthed, to stare at her. Clark had gone beet red, spluttering and failing to find a single word.

“It’s obvious,” she was ploughing on, teasing him, craving the writhe in those taught muscle as he squirmed, “the disappearing. The physique, his concentration. Clark always hears things he shouldn’t. And his Superman interviews… even Cronkite couldn’t have gotten such perfect packages from those.”

“You didn’t tell me?”

Her fingers found your collar, slipping under to rub at your collarbone, humming sympathy.

“I wanted to see if you’d work it out on your own. I thought you were pretty close,” there was a glint of mischief in her eyes, that echo of a mentor relationship which made your stomach clench, and you groaned as you surged forwards to kiss the smirk off her lips.

Out of the corner of your eye, you could see Clark. He was an absolute state, a whine caught in his throat and red printed prettily across his cheeks, an arm lying not-so-casually over his crotch.

“Okay over there, Superman?” Lois called.

“Are you actually Superman?”

From your place in Lois’ lap you turned to him, wrecked and hazy from the wine and the conversation and Lois. He took a deep, shuddering breath as he tried to meet your eye.

“Yeah,” Clark exhaled, and you could hardly process it.

He pulled his glasses from his face, and set them carefully on the coffee table, moving oddly cautiously for the man of steel.

There he was. Otherworldly, and handsome, and Clark’s eyes were even more desperate without the glass hiding them from you. He was waiting for something. Some reaction. Approval, disgust, surprise.

Lois rubbed at the skin over your ribs, encouraging you.

“Christ, you could’ve mentioned how attractive he was in your articles,” you complained, and Lois rubbed both hands up your torso as he laughed.

“Never one to blow his own trumpet, our Clark,” she teased, voice low and fond.

It was too much to bear.

“You must be able to hear it too, then. How desperate she is. That heartrate.”

Clark said nothing. He was still cautious, as he watched Lois pull your torso flush to her, and arm over your hipbones like a seatbelt.

“Can your hear it?” she asked, sending your pulse rushing as she fidgeted beneath you, pulling your torsos closer together with one hand over your chest. “Sorry, Clark. She’s… can’t leave my girl hanging.”

“By all means,” he ground out, voice gravel, and you couldn’t bear it.

Lois’ was talking past you to Clark, her hands hovering above the band of your trousers, over the fabric of your bra. When you forced your eyes open, you could see Clark was fully hard, slacks stretched painfully across his lap.

“She was so jealous, when I spoke about you,” she was palming at the bottom of your breast, through your bra, but it wasn’t enough, “when we were writing together. She said some really nasty things, actually.”

Mortification was rushing through you, hot in your veins and in the clench of your pelvic floor and the rise and fall of your chest. You couldn’t look at Clark. Fully clothed, you felt completely exposed between them, those two powerhouses. When you dared to glance at Clark’s face, you saw brazen, bare interest, the way he was leaning forwards on one elbow, observing like he was about to write an article.

“Lo…” you whined.

“Shhh, sweetheart. I’m talking to Clark. She came home all jealous, talking about how good looking we were together. Isn’t that funny?”

You were clenching on nothing, hand clasped over Lois to try and move that incessant palming of your breast, trying to force her towards somewhere more useful.

“Clark?”

“You’re beautiful,” he managed, “both of you.”

“Isn’t it funny, though? All upset, because of it. When I’m completely obsessed with her?”

Somewhere, below the heat and the blind lust, Lois’ words were soothing. Clark was, of course, the outsider. The intruder, the guest.

“God, stop…” she was playfighting you, resisting your hands, as you tried to do anything for some relief.

“Clark, can you help me?”

“Hm?”

He hadn’t moved, but he was ready to. Every muscle tense, coiled, about to spring forwards.

“She’s moving, even though I know what she needs. Can you get that wine glass off her? Hold her down.”

Beside you in a second, Clark was unclenching your fingers from your glass, or maybe it was Superman, saying, “here, sweetheart,” as he shifted everything to the far side of the coffee table, eyes never leaving your trapped body.

“I know you need it, baby,” Lois cooed, “Clark said he wanted to help you.”

Mouth open, Clark struggled to defend himself, and your head spun. What had she said to him?

“C’mon. I’ll hold her here, stop her from fidgeting,” she was talking past you again, as Clark rounded the couch to stand at the end of it, staring down at the pair of you, “you can do the hard work.”

You weren’t fighting, you were stupefied, when Lois hooked your ankle to shove one of your feet off the couch, pulling the other leg in parallel with her own, up against the back of the sofa. You were open to him, beneath your clothes, and the shift of angle made you desperate with need. In pulses, your clit was overriding the rest of your nervous system with reminders of how desperate you were. Had been. Wetness and heat which had been unsatiated for so long it was aching.

“I didn’t fuck her this morning,” Lois was telling Clark, “or last night. I wanted her to be so desperate, completely ready.”

Clark’s hand found your ankle, pulling it closer to him to take the strain out of your hip, and effortlessly pulled your lower body downwards so you were only half on Lois, the other half completely on the sofa.

“I’ve always wanted to see you fucked by someone with a cock. You know that?”

“Hm?”

“Clark’s huge. Look at him. Clark…”

She grabbed his hand, placed it against yours, so you could see how enormous he was. He was so warm, preternaturally so, skin rougher than Lois’, thick fingers eclipsing yours.

“God, imagine those fingers…”

Again, Lois’ hand, pulling Clark’s hand from yours and startling both of you, until Clark’s skin was reunited with yours. This time the soft skin of your lower tummy, Lois’ deft fingers pulling your clothes out of the way until his wrist was nestled on your pubic mound, fingers spreading and reaching, up, up, impossibly far.

“Look,” Lois whispered for both of you, “look at that. How big he is, honey.”

You were looking. It was all you could do. Clark, too, looking at the image of his own neatly manicured nails over your plush skin, fingers stretching most of the way up to your ribs. It wasn’t lost on you, what Clark was doing, when he pulled his palm back towards himself, over your misplaced trouser waistband, until he was lining up his knuckles with where your entrance would be.

“Do you want that, honey? You don’t have to. It’s only an idea,” Lois murmured, and you saw Clark’s brow furrow, “maybe it’s a bad idea. I know you’re delicate – ”

“No! I do. Clark, I…”

You didn’t know how to ask for it. Lois would have made you, wrung those mortifying words from your lips, but Clark just smiled gently.

“Can we get some of these clothes out the way?”

“Please,” you breathed.

Lois was there, pressed to your back, and Clark quickly undressed you. Lois’ arms were wrapped around you, but she didn’t comment, undoing your shirt but leaving your bra in place, and Clark effortlessly removed everything on your lower half. Unable to bear it, you pressed your head against Lois’ torso, twisting sideways to hide in her arm, but she gently coaxed you back out.

“Isn’t Clark nice, helping you out like this, honey? When

“Can I touch you?”

“Please,” you breathed.

You were so wet, liquid, that the first gentle stroke of Clark’s fingertip between your lips was hardly there. Then another, exploring, his breath accompanying the slithering of his fingertips across your pussy, defenceless and forced open by the sprawl of your legs across the couch.

“Pretty,” he murmured, face to close to you, each breath was torture.

He experimented for a second, playing, until finally he glanced up at you, and slid a finger upwards to the hood of your clit. That first touch was ecstasy, the tip of his thick middle finger finding its place on your clit and circling for a few seconds, your whole body reduced to the near-frictionless roll of his rough fingertip against the most sensitive part of you.

Then, he was gone, and you didn’t have the vocabulary to beg him to continue. Lois did, though. Her arm snaked around you, fingers finding their way between your legs, and you opened your heavy eyelids to see Clark’s face nearby, watching breathlessly.

“God,” she exhaled, finger dipping into your entrance, “you’re soaked, baby. I’m sorry, we made you wait so long. You must have really been suffering.”

You hummed, more overcome with frustration than anything else. Lois brought her fingers to your clit, letting them slip either side of it a few times, before stilling.

“Know what you’re doing, Kent?”

To your absolute elation, Clark rolled his eyes. Lois’ trite fine, was muffled as she brought her fingers to her mouth.

There was no doubt in your mind that Clark Kent knew exactly what he was doing. With the briefest rub of introduction to your pussy lips, Clark Kent had his index finger inside you, hunting for an angle and pattern until he was devastating you with every movement. Then, a second finger, slowing his pattern for just a few seconds to let you stretch around him until he brought you back to making desperate gasps against Lois.

Lois was getting impatient on your behalf, slipping her hand back to your clit, but she only made a few of those familiar quick, tight circles before Clark was shoving her away, back hunched over you as his tongue found its mark.

“That’s a much better idea,” she murmured.

Hands were everywhere. Big fingers inside you, now resting, filling you as Clark’s tongue worked. Lois’ fingers on your breasts, pinching at your nipples, coaxing them to a swollen-red stiffness and aching enough to keep Clark’s attentions from becoming too much. Lois’ mouth was on your neck, as she watched Clark’s curls brush against your stomach. Clark’s mouth – fuck – Clark’s mouth was suctioned to your clit, the rough texture of his tongue fighting the soothing pressure of his lips, bathing your most sensitive spot in spit and affection.

Don’t stop, you wanted to say, don’t change a thing.

Words died in your mouth, desperate and unspoken. It was all much, the desperate lathe of his tongue, Lois’ murmured encouragement, the sheer strength of those two fingers gently pumping inside you – you didn’t realise you were cumming until your breath stopped, and your muscles clenched without your consent.

Clark didn’t stop. He alternated between pressure and kitten licks until you laughed, desperately shoving him away, and he remained in place, on his knees at the end of the couch, damp fingers hovering above the fabric.

“Good girl,” Lois was murmuring, hands stroking your skin under your open shirt.

You could hardly hear her, blood pounding in your ears. Your eyes were focused on Clark, on the way he was stretching out his fingers, watching the slight gape of your pussy, glistening between your legs.

He raised his fingers to his mouth, suddenly uncertain.

“Can I..?”

Breathless, you nodded, and watched as he sucked and licked his fingers clean with such fervour it made you clench in remembrance.

“It’s not fair,” Lois whispered in your ear, “that he doesn’t even need to breathe.”

God bless Lois Lane. You laughed, and so did Clark, and suddenly he was clambering up your body and fitting his wide hips between yours, kissing you with the taste of you on his lips.

“Is that okay? The kissing?” he asked, and you realised he wasn’t asking you.

You looked between them – up, since Lois had you slouched against her – and blurted the words out as soon as the realisation hit you.

“Did you… did you plan this?”

“No! No, um… well….” Clark spoke first, and you could see the laughter at the corners of Lois’ lips, “she asked me…”

“I asked him if he’d want to fuck you. His reaction was very much the same as yours.”

“You knew?” you frowned at him.

He’d seemed so unsure, earlier.

“I didn’t… I didn’t know this would happen. Or now. I just… you’re so pretty.”

“Really?”

“Of course. Imagine… imagine meeting these two amazing women… and thinking you’ve got… something. Chemistry, maybe. And realising they’re already in this amazing relationship with each other. I’m so happy for you, I just… want that.”

Lois was watching him, predator and prey, but Clark’s gaze was fixed on you. Her lips brushed your ear.

“I thought maybe Lois was teasing me,” he finally admitted.

You felt any hostility melt away, reaching for his hand, and watching as he fought back the wide grin which desperately wanted to make an appearance.

“Do you think we could work something out?” Lois whispered, “Only, I said he could fuck you.”

You were bare, pulsing, nerves aching for the warmth of Clark’s tongue against you again. You missed him already. Clark’s hand found yours, and you closed your fingers around his palm, interleaved like you did with Lois. His fingers were wet, from where he’d licked them clean.

“You’re Superman.”

His eyes were shining with something, staring down at you with giddiness and desperation and such humanity, the Superman thing wasn’t sending you into a tailspin panic.

“It’s a nightmare for journalistic integrity,” he told you gently.

You choked out a laugh like it was a sob, and he beamed, bright and brilliant.

“God. What the fuck,” you laughed.

“Superman,” Lois was addressing him in her reporter voice, elocution perfect for the imaginary tape recorder, “any sign you’ll be called away this evening?”

“Well, Miss Lane,” he began.

Christ, he was Superman, you could feel the heat returning, surging through you, as his eyes bored into Lois’ and that voice, silken and from another era, boomed into the room.

“It’s all clear out in Metropolis this evening. I believe I’ve got far more important things to tend to right here.”

Lois, of course, had been able to read you since the day you met.

“I never knew you found Superman attractive,” she teased.

You were squirming, your body tortured by so long spent soaking and tense and untouched.

“I… bit of a goody two shoes for me,” you managed, barely able to string a sentence together.

Clark’s intense stare turned slowly to you, dishevelled and braced by the two most powerful people you’d ever met.

“I’ll pass the message on. Though I’m not sure it’s true. I’m sure you could drive him to do absolutely anything.”

“You’ve been so patient, Clark,” Lois interrupted, “c’mon, tell me what you want.”

He couldn’t say anything, mouth opening then closing again, as he looked between you and Lois, her head above yours as she held you in her arms.

“Please?”

“Should we go to the bedroom?” you suggested.

You were feeling quiet, but you didn’t like seeing Clark looking lost. There was still some wetness around his lips, and you could see him pulling his bottom lip into his mouth, trying to lick it clean.

“Good idea,” Lois shifted beneath you, then chuckled, “you going to move, or…?”

“I want to,” you rolled your head, I just…”

You hadn’t finished speaking before the warmth of Lois was lost to you, and replaced by two strong hands around your back and thighs, and the high, clear tune of Lois’ laugh as you were whisked into the air with a shriek.

When the shock had worn off, Lois scurrying behind you, you pulled your face from Clark’s chest.

“This isn’t very sexy,” you told him.

“I wouldn’t disagree more.”

He set you down gently on top of the sheets you and Lois had left crumpled that morning, and immediately felt her sink onto the mattress beside you, Clark on the other side.

“Shall we ditch the clothes, Superman?”

It was hilariously fast, how quickly Clark shucked his work clothes, standing in his boxers as Lois huffed, unbuttoning her shirt, sparing a second to unclasp your bra before her own.

The bedside light was on, and everything was softer than in the lounge. More intimate, as you finally saw the sheer size of Clark, his biceps as big as your head, and the huge band of smooth muscle across his stomach. You were used to Lois, of course, equally gorgeous, and it was strange to have to split your attention between the two of them.

“I think you’ll have to ditch those too, Superman,” Lois teased, and even in the low light you could see the slight tense of his upper body.

You rose to your knees to peel down the waistband of Clark’s boxers, sparing him the pressure of your palm over the fabric, hoping to ease his brief uncertainty.

“Okay?” you asked.

“More than okay.”

Once you’d eased the waistband down his thighs, Clark made quick work of kicking off his underwear, standing on his knees beside you on the mattress. Big had been an understatement, and you could see just how desperate he was in the redness of his erection. It almost looked painful, as you glanced your hand once, twice along his length.

Lois had a hand on his shoulder, pulling him to lie down. You could see the slight seriousness in her one, a sudden switch, as she was upright on her knees and glaring down at Clark, gaze flitting over his bare skin.

“Just… let her get on top first. Be gentle, okay?”

“Of course,” he was so sincere, eyes wide as he stared up at her, you could’ve cried.

Instead you accepted Lois’ hand, using her to balance as you straddled Clark’s thighs, and worked your way up his body. As soon as you were close enough, his hands found your hips, thumbs rushing over your hipbones like a worry stone.

You leant down to press a kiss to his jawbone.

“It’s so funny seeing you without your glasses,” you told him, sparing a glance to Lois as she ran her free hand over your back.

“Miss them?” he teased.

For a man so desperately hard, so close to the edge, he was still taking the time to let you tease him, lazy smile on his lips. Just enjoying the moment.

“No. I just… I keep forgetting you’re Clark.”

“I don’t look that different,” his confidence faltered, his hands stilled on your hips, and you frowned down at him.

“No, it’s not that. You just… you’re more confident, I think. You even sound different. I like hearing you confident. Pretty boy.”

He rolled his hips under you, so strong you bucked, and it made you laugh.

“Easy, tiger.”

Lois’ hand squeezed yours, and you could see her starting to grow frustrated, her hand had left your back and disappeared to knead at the flesh of her own breast. You reached for Clark’s hand, too, holding his thick fingers in one and Lois’ in the other.

“Let her get on top, Clark,” she instructed,  “just at first.”

When you turned to watch her, she kissed you firmly on the lips, leaving her hand framing your ear.

“Just so you can go at your own pace, to start. I don’t want you getting hurt.”

Clark was a little left out, lying on his back, and you could tell from the uncertain way he looked between you.

“I knew you were a big guy, Clark, but this is ridiculous,” Lois teased, trailing quick fingers across the v of muscle between his groin and the muscle of his thigh.

Clark shuddered, and you soothed him with a gentle rub of your thumb across his abs.

“Sure?” you asked him, running your thumb across his knuckles in your hand.

“Never been more sure of anything, sweetheart.”

You thought maybe he tried to wink back at you, but his head thumped back against the bedsheets so quickly that it was hard to tell. There was some fumbling, releasing of hands, but when you sank down onto Clark, you were so soaked that there was no opportunity for friction – only the slight burn of your muscles stretching, giving way, for you to seat him deep inside you.

“Fuck,” you breathed, clenching involuntarily.

You waited for your body to relax, before you even dared to lean forwards and move your hips, playing with the last inch of his wide cock inside you.

He was so big, you were to overstimulated, that you didn’t last long. You could tell Clark was getting frustrated, made of energy and muscle, while you tempered your pace on top of him. He was so big, your thighs forced so wide around him, that it was difficult to get any kind of easy rhythm.

When you glanced down at him, squeezing his fingers and involuntarily clenching around his shaft, his eyes were squeezed closed in desperation.

“Clark,” you gasped, “want to take over?”

You didn’t think it was intentional, how he thrust up into you, relief overtaking his control. His eyes flew open as you gasped, and tried to pull one of the hands you were holding down to your clit.

“I’m gonna flip us over, okay sweetheart?”

You nodded furiously, ready to keep him seated inside you as he moved, when suddenly you stopped him.

“Wait!”

Clark froze under you with a groan, and you kept rolling your hips, just enough to keep yourself sane as your called for Lois, twisting your upper body to kiss her, sweaty and desperate. Distantly, Clark’s whine reached your ears.

“Feel good, honey?” Lois asked.

Her fingers were desperately rubbing herself, and you reached down to play in the wetness which had formed between her thighs, smearing across her clit and making her laugh desperately up at you, desperately trying to ride Clark.

“I’m no good at being on top,” you admitted.

She giggled, and let go of you, and suddenly you were being turned, and then on your back, blood rushing to your head and Clark was holding his bodyweight off you on the two huge biceps which now framed your head.

“Vibrator’s in the drawer,” you managed, and Clark glanced down at you in confusion as Lois gasped, and rushed to the bedside table.

“Good idea,” she managed, groaning as the whisper-quiet buzz of the toy started.

Lois had reclined into the pillows beside your head, and you could hardly follow Clark’s eyeline to watch her, too busy trying to get used to the steady, deep thrust of his hips against yours. He was the deepest you could remember anyone ever being, bigger than any toy you’d used with Lois, and occasionally he’d readjust to fix the pinch of his head pounding into the sensitive ring of your cervix.

He was superhuman. Stamina itself, and yet even Clark didn’t remember to slip his fingers between your bodies and work your clit until you did, feeling the thud of his mons pubis against your fingers as you strummed at your clit. Then –

“Oh my god, Lois.”

Distracted, of course, Lois’ eyes were glazed over, mouth open. Nonetheless, you dragged her free hand over to your stomach.

“Feel that.”

“Holy shit.”

You could feel him, bulging against your stomach, and when Lois pressed down to feel the movement better, your vision turned to darkness for a split second.

“Can I please…” Clark was begging, groans over your head, hips beginning to snap more aggressively into the plushness of your cunt as he grew more desperate.

“Hm?”

Your fingers were back to sliding over your clit, Lois’ hand putting pressure over your womb. You knew it was making Clark desperately close, you could feel the tensing of his stomach against the back of your hand.

“Do I have to pull out?”

“No!” you gapsed. “No, please don’t – ”

“Are you close?” he was begging, and you groaned, “say you’re close, please, I can’t…”

“C’mon, Clark. Cum,” you were goading, fingers so slippery you were struggling to find friction against your clit.

Time blurred, and the whole world was reduced to the contractions of muscles, sinew, pleasure, the way Clark groaned and pleaded in your ear until he finally came inside you, for so long you thought he might never stop. Lois’ hand found its way between you, vibrator wet with her arousal, and as Clark’s rhythm faltered and his knees trapped your legs open, you felt the touch of silicone against your exposed, swollen clit.

When you returned to the room, to the bedside light and the world beyond the skin touching yours, Clark was still inside you, and your whole body felt raw and sweaty, your fingers numb and pruned. Lois was stroking your hair, and Clark… you weren’t sure you’d ever seen him so still. He was sated, heavy on top of you, a lazy smile on his face as his half-closed eyes met yours.

“Feel good?” he asked you, and you couldn’t help laughing.

“Thanks for doing the hard work.”

“I know it’s a lot. That was… amazing. Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me,” you smiled fondly. There was a stray curl on his forehead which refused to move from his face, no matter how many times you tried to return it to its compatriots.

“Feeling good?” he repeated, and you nodded.

“Amazing, Exhausted, but good.”

He smiled so sweetly, it made your heart ache, and your pussy clench weakly around him. He did it again, just to try out the feeling, and groaned.

“Shall we clean you up?” he asked, long arm reaching blindly off the bed to find his discarded undershirt.

When he pulled out, gently cleaning you up as his semen leaked from you, you could hardly believe he’d been inside you. Even soft, he was a monster.

“I don’t know if it’s ever felt that good,” he murmured, and you couldn’t help agreeing.

Blindly, as Clark gently cleaned you –  leaving you with far more dignity than should be possible – you reached for Lois.

“Thank you,” you murmured, pulling her down for a kiss as you flopped in the centre of the bed, “for scheming. You’re an evil genius.”

She only laughed, and let you lick at her wet fingers.

“Did you finish?” you murmured, and she smiled, reaching for the vibrator which had been tossed aside as you became so sensitive the vibrations grew to torture.

“That thing is great.”

Lazily, she let you explore her familiar skin, and slip between her legs to hook two fingers inside her. When you pumped them, curled against the texture of her g-spot, she curled forwards with a groan.

“Are you sure you finished?” you asked her, and Lois rolled her eyes.

“I think the moment’s passed,” she told you, with a quick kiss, and you let your fingers slip out of her.

Clark. Where was Clark? Watching. Folding the towel carefully, so the mess was on the inside. Placing it aside, watching the bounce of Lois’ breasts as she curled down to kiss your head, sweaty but – you suspected – not fully satisfied. Despite the slowness of your limbs, the exhaustion you felt, you reached a hand out for Clark, and he let himself be pulled forwards, over your body and into the fray.

“Could you eat Lois out?” you murmured, fingers running across his abs, “Please? I want her to feel like this.”

You knew she’d never ask. Too good, too giving. And you were selfish enough to want to see Clark do it.

“Of course, I’d love to,” he murmured, “you gonna stay there?”

You nodded. Right there. Supine on your back beside them, overworked flesh exposed to the cool aircon, feeling Clark’s cum deep inside you.

“Superman,” she greeted him, as he crawled across the bed to her.

“Miss Lane.”

With quick manhandling, she was slumped back against the pillows, hips a few inches off the bed with Clark’s easy strength. You made yourself useful, an arm thrown around Lois, lips lazily marking up the tender skin of her breasts.

“Gonna show me that super-stamina, big guy?” she teased, “I know of a forum who would be very interested in hearing about this.”

She was clearly still elated with herself for figuring out the Superman stuff. Proving her own brilliance was foreplay enough for Lois – not that she’d had any shortage of that.

When Clark groaned at her teasing, loud and dramatic, he made sure to do it as he ran two strong thumbs along the sensitive outside of Lois’ vulva, delighting in how she jumped.

“So,” he put on a voice somewhere between Superman and a doctor, and you coudlnt stand it, “I’ve heard from a concerned citizen that you’re in need of some assistance.”

You smiled languidly from the other side of the bed, exhausted and so covered in arousal and cum. You’d given up on saving the sheets. You didn’t even bother to move your own limbs when they got in Clark’s way, he did it for you.

“My girlfriend, I believe.”

“Oh, what a kind young woman she must be.”

Clark was speaking with his mouth full, and you knew how it felt, that blissful frustration of his mouth moving from where it was suctioned onto skin. Lois kicked at his back impatiently.

“Respectfully, ma’am, I’m going to need you to hold still. it’s not everyday you find yourself with a superhero at your service.”

Lois could be tricky, a control freak, and you weren’t prepared for how she melted under Clark. They were still arguing, of course, that was some part of this, but she yielded completely, hand in Clark’s hair and one leg hooked into the corded muscles of his back.

She gasped as he slid a long finger into her, swearing under her breath. You moved to massage her calf, knowing she was prone to giving herself cramp.

“C’mon, gorgeous,” Clark murmured under his breath, “you must be desperate. All that time, watching us. Me and your girlfriend. Tricking us both into this.”

At Clark’s gentle suggestion – a tap to your foot – you shifted up alongside Lois, cradling her head, kissing along her neck and collarbones, leaving her mouth free to gasp and swear. You played with her nipples, and poured every ounce of thankfulness you could manage into using your mouth for form red marks against her fair skin.

You’d never seen her so flushed as when Clark made her cum on his tongue, and refused to unlatch until she screamed.

*

Clark had declined your offer to help when you realised he’d gotten hard a second time, instead getting himself off with your hands against his chest, your tongue in his mouth and Lois lay exhausted between you.

Sated and sleepy, Lois had insisted you could all shower in the morning, and the sheets could wait. Clark sternly sent you to the bathroom to pee, backed up by Lois, but shortly after the three of you were collapsed together again. You’d learned you had a real love for Clark’s stomach, feeling the muscles tense and spasm under your fingers as you rest your head on his ribs, and danced your fingers across his skin.

“It could be every day,” Lois murmured when he’d finished, using the corner of the sheet to clean himself up.

You broke your stare from him, still fascinated that he’d ever fit inside you, that those powerful muscles had hammered into you. Lois looked sheepish. You weren’t used to it, from her.

“That there’s a superhot here. In our bed. If… if you wanted, I mean,” it wasn’t like Lois to be unsure, and you frowned at her. “You said it’s not everyday… you get a superhero.”

Clark looked to you for your reaction, and you ran your hand from his thigh to his stomach, ghosting his soft cock, but still making him jolt.

“I… um,” he began, but Lois had already turned off the bedside lamp.

Clark’s hand reached out in the dark, and settled over your heart, resting his wrist in the valley between yoru breasts.

“Let’s talk in the morning,” you suggested.

You could hardly keep your eyes open. In the morning would come the aches, and the partially clothed conversations in your kitchen, and that inevitable whispered conversation with Lois where you asked each other the grown up questions. For tonight, though, you could sleep, each of you touching both of the others, and barely covered by the sheets.

“You’re both too good to be true,” Clark admitted the dark room.

It made Lois laugh, not unkindly, but with a writhe of her body which came from overtiredness. Clark felt the brief, teasing contact of a lock of her hair brushing against his face.

“I’m serious.”

It was a world away from Quantico: sun-bleached, dense, full of plastic and palms instead of concrete and maples. Nonetheless, the principles remained the same no matter where you were. Take everything in, speak to everyone, suspect everyone. Stepping in and out of trailers gave you very little relief from the heat, although respite from the sun pounding down on you was a welcome break.

Dr Spencer Reid stood a short distance away, shielding his eyes with his hand as he contemplated the sea of trailers around him. He’d stared around as you drove into the park, something faraway in his eyes as he memorised every detail from the safety of the SUV.

Now he stood close to you, heads inches apart as he whispered so that only you could hear. He faced one way, you the other, and you could focus on his words knowing that Spencer was watching your back.

“These things all come equipped with the same locks, at least each model does. If you recognise the trailer home, you know how to pick it. It’s fairly trivial, for someone with some basic industry knowledge.”

You hummed through pursed lips, surveying the small crowd who had gathered to gawk at a pair of FBI officers on their turf.

“And that would be true of all of the trailer parks… we know he’s got a common MO.”

“Exactly.”

“You reckon someone in the industry, then? A salesman? Maintenance guy?”

Spencer rolled his neck, stared up at the sky for a moment. His curls were long at the moment, damp at the name of his neck, a little frizzy in the humidity.

“Not necessarily.”

“It’s quite specific,” you agreed, “anyone operating as a common thief around here would have the knowledge too. We could be talking about a classic escalation – burglar to home invader to murderer?”

His eyes snapped from you to his phone.

“I’ve asked Garcia to check out any patterns in robberies, home invasions… the locks are hardly scratched. We know he wears gloves, cleans his tools. This guy knows what he’s doing.”

You nodded, surveying the street again. The sun was glinting off of white plastic, making you squint. You worried for Spencer, the heat and the light wouldn’t be doing his headaches any good.

“You want me to take that?” Spencer was saying, and you snapped your attention in the direction he was gestured.

There was middle-aged man a little way forward of the crowd, shoulders hunched, hands entwined. Nervous. He had the tan of someone who lived here year-round, not a big believer in suncream, with tanlines when he removed his hat and glasses to speak to you.

“I’ve got it,” you murmured, and Spencer nodded.

It was an unspoken part of your partnership, that Spencer liked when you started conversations with witnesses. You liked that he trusted you, trusted your skills, never questioned whether you’d done the right thing when you spoke to people.

Instead he remained a short distance away, climbing up the front steps of someone’s home for a higher vantage point to survey the place.

“Hello, sir. Can I help you?”

“Yes, ma’am. Thank you. You said you’re with the FBI?”

The man had a tip, and it was an interesting one. A rumour spread throughout the HOA about someone trying the locks at night, the sound of metal against the doorways, silhouettes against frosted glass. A few people even had security camera footage, though nothing identifiable. It was great. You gave him your card, told him to get the footage to you asap.

It must be terrifying, you realised, to hear that kind of noise in the night. To be so close to danger, after a neighbour had been killed. The local sheriff’s department seemed frustrated by the interest the case was garnering – frankly you were amazed the story wasn’t bigger. There was no small amount of comforting involved in the conversation you had with the witness, and soon enough a few more people stepped forwards from the crowd. All seemed middle-aged, likely transplants to the sunshine state, and equally shaken.

When everyone’s stories had finished, they stood in silence for a moment. You frowned, noticing their gazes slightly misaligned.

Spencer.

He was stood at your shoulder, sharp gaze flickering across each face of the gathered residents.

“This is my colleague, Dr Reid. A few of you have already met, I believe.”

“You know,” he began, “the socio-economic factors influencing the way we think about crime in mobile home communities are fascinating. Often trailer parks are stereotyped negatively in the media, and because they are generally cheaper to live in than traditional housing estates, and that can foster a sense of shame or isolation for residents. Transient populations can also make community policing and security difficult, and anomalies in the patterns of everyday life become more difficult for people to subconsciously spot.”

You held your breath, and tried not to look worried at the reaction of the small crowd. Instead, you focused on Spencer. He was speaking with his hands a lot today.

“But I think the assumptions we tend to make about trailer parks completely overlook the very nature of living so close to your neighbours. There is a sense of community in living so closely, as evidenced by the conversations we’ve been having today. I’m not sure whether the killer understands that, or is exploiting the former theory that places like this allow for more deviations from the way we implement traditional security in communities. An unsub might hold some sort of resentment towards trailer parks, or some specific resident in his past, or perhaps he’s simply exploiting how incredibly easy it is to simply walk up to a mobile home and slip the lock open with a humble mass-produced lock pick.”

He was greeted with a sea of blank faces, littered with the occasional frown. Finally he looked to you. You caught the furrow of his brow, the way his shoulders hunched into himself, the clutching of his elbows to his body.

Oh, Spencer.

“That’s really interesting!” you tried to say, but Spencer was already backing away.

“Anyway, I’ll, um, leave you to it.”

“Thank you, Dr Reid,” you called after him, as he fled, disappearing into the shade of a nearby trailer.

 Your heart ached for him a bit, but you pushed that aside. Instead, you had a sea of potentially offended retirees to keep on side.

“God, what I’d give for a brain like that,” your witness laughed, his linen shirt straining under the movement.

You couldn’t help smiling, a little relieved the tension had broken.

“It’s not often someone has a face like that and a good head on their shoulders,” one of the older ladies piped up.

You found yourself looking over your shoulder at Spencer, his profile sharp as he looked down the road, deep in thought.

“He’s certainly a rare breed,” you agreed fondly.

A number of the crowd were following your gaze, and someone in you wanted to snap them out of it. Stop them from staring.

“He actually has an eidetic memory. Once he’s seen or heard something, he remembers it perfectly, forever. It’s incredible.”

“Oh, my goodness! I can hardly remember my own email password!”

“I wouldn’t mind if he hung around me and talked like that all day, even if I didn’t understand a word of it. Though perhaps he could use a haircut…”

There was a chorus of agreement and various coo-ing which seemed to occupy the entire scale from grandmotherly to entirely inappropriate. You couldn’t help staring at Spencer a moment longer, wondering if he was truly oblivious, or simply pretending to be.

A rare breed.

You were certain you’d never met anyone else like him. Certain you felt like a better version of yourself in his company. That you’d trust him with your life, that you searched every room you entered until you saw him. Watched the elevator doors each time they opened, all morning, until Spencer walked in.

You were certain you’d felt giddy the first time Spencer insisted the two of you would work together, alone.

 “Imagine knowing that he’d remember everything, forever…” one of the women was saying, her eyebrows raised in a way you didn’t particularly enjoy.

You cleared your throat, and hooked one hand over the badge at your waist.

“Unless anyone has any further leads, we’d better be on our way…”

The group silenced, and watched you dutifully. You passed out a few more cards, reiterated how dedicated the team was to stopping this killer, and gave out a few promises that there would be a police presence after dark throughout the trailer park.

When the request for any further questions was met with more glances towards Spencer, you thanked your witness, and made a beeline for the car. After only a few seconds Spencer was beside you, jogging to catch up.

“All done?” he asked, and you smiled at the question.

“I think so.”

You started the engine and both waited with the doors open for the car to cool down. The department’s penchant for black SUVs was not helpful when the sun was so vicious. Feeling the heat themselves, the group of residents had dispersed into a few groups, wandering into one another’s homes to continue gossiping.

“God, I’m disgusting,” you lamented, “sorry for the sweat-smell. I might actually take a cold shower when we get to the hotel.”

Spencer was already waving you off, leaning into the car to mess with the AC. Through the open door you saw him groan at the heat, swiping a curl from his face.

“I’m afraid to raise my arms. It’s so humid, I’m not sure why anyone would retire here. High humidity aggravates a number of chronic conditions, especially respiratory ones, which are common in older people. Not to mention the skin cancer…”

“And it ruins your hair,” you teased.

Spencer faked a gasp, and reached for a damp, limp section of his hair.

“I mean, look at it!”

You laughed, and rolled your eyes at him, nothing but fondness settling warm and tight in your chest.

Surveying the road in front of you for one final time you saw a few curtain-twitchers, but no new faces. You climbed into the car, wincing at the heat. The seatbelt buckle was burning hot, and you swore as it burned your fingers.

“I always forget about that,” you grumbled, slamming the car door closed.

“You know, if you fasten your seatbelt after you get out, it stops the metal getting hot and burning you,” Reid offered, and you rolled your eyes at him again.

“Gosh, doesn’t it get exhausting being right about everything?”

Spencer went quiet, and all you heard was the click of his own belt. After a few moments the car was cool and bearable, and your lungs felt like they could finally move again. The sat-nav happily talked away, and you started stealing worried looks at your partner once you’d returned to properly-maintained roads.

“What you said out there was really good, do you mind if we go over it again once we get to the station? I think it’s worth exploring.”

“I shouldn’t have said it in front of them.”

He was right, but you didn’t have to heart to say anything. That was the thing which made your heart twinge about Spencer – he was so insecure, and yet so self-aware, it was the worst of both worlds. Being an expert in body language was a double-edged sword.

“I don’t think they minded. Did you hear those old ladies talking about your big brain?”

Spencer didn’t laugh. He turned himself towards the window, curled up with his hand beneath his jaw.

“They were very impressed. So was I, for what it’s worth. I think we’ll make some really good progress on this profile tonight.”

He hummed agreement. Watched a vista of blurred blue and green and white going past the window. The radio was turned down to a low hum, you could hardly hear it. Silence pierced its way through and sound of mumbled songs and road noise.

“Are you okay?” you asked finally.

“I’m okay.”

You sighed. Tapped the steering wheel. Sped a little to get through an intersection on amber.

 “Spencer…”

“I’m sorry. I really didn’t mean to ruin that for you I just… sometimes I think of things and it’s like I have to tell you.

“Spencer I’m not mad at you! Not at all! I think we’re both just tired, and too warm…”

He didn’t say anything.

“Honestly, I was worried you’d heard what those ladies were saying about you and gotten upset. It was inappropriate of them…”

“I didn’t hear anything. What did they say?”

Your gaze was focused on the road, but you met Spencer’s eye in the rear-view mirror as he watched your face.

“Just that you were a handsome young man. And that they wanted you to get a haircut, which I firmly disagree with…” you teased.

Spencer touched his hair self-consciously. He was still quite curled up, leaning away from you despite his interest in the conversation.

“That’s nice of them, I suppose.”

“‘Nice’ is an interesting way of putting it, but I’m glad you’re not upset about it.”

“When I was a kid, I read a book at the library about how to tell if you’re attractive. It was for women, all about makeup and stuff, but there was a section about what made guys hot. I could never figure it out, I just always thought I looked like an alien.”

The sudden change made you sit up straight, heart in your mouth as you rolled to a stop behind a queue of traffic.

“I think everyone feels like that sometimes. Being a teenager is really hard.”

 “I… yeah. I suppose so.”

“I always felt so jealous of the people who walked around looking perfect every day, confident that they were not. It just never came naturally to me.”

“Really? I assumed you were one of those girls in school who I’d be too afraid to talk to.”

You scoffed, and for a moment were struck by how little you really knew about one another. The way Spencer looked at you, looked it everyone, it felt as though he had an x-ray into every tiny detail of your life. How could he know, though?

“Of course not,” you laughed nervously.

You weren’t sure if you’d prefer Spencer knew the truth, or kept believing whatever he’d made up ini his head. You weren’t sure what any of this conversation meant. Traffic was moving. The precinct was two turns away.

“I’m not sure I believe you.”

He was teasing you. Finally he leant back in his seat, shoulders square to it, legs stretched out in the passenger footwell.

“Either way, I’m glad you can talk to me now. I’d miss it if you didn’t.”

“You might be the only person on this planet with that opinion.”

You took a moment to glance across the car at him, and caught a flash of a smile. He was joking. You released tension from your shoulders you hadn’t realised you were holding.

“I’m sure that’s not true. You’re a handsome genius, just like Barbara said.”

“Her name was Barbara?” Reid laughed.

You shrugged, and took the final turn into the precinct parking lot.

“I’ve got no idea.”

Even with the SUV in park, the aircon no longer blasting away, neither of you moved. Not for a moment, at least. A moment of peace before the chaos all began again. Just the two of you. Wherever you were, with Spencer was your favourite place to be.

“You’re the same, you know. A genius. And handsome…”

You frowned.

“Pretty! Beautiful. You know what I mean.”

“Handsome?”

In truth, you didn’t care about the words. Not at all. Not when your heart was pounding at the realisation Spencer had his gaze fixed on your lips, his eyes soft and pupils blown wide.

“Beautiful,” Spencer repeated, “You know, in a lot of languages, handsome can be translated for men and women. The word itself doesn’t have a gender. Guapa, for example, in Spanish…”

You let him talk, on and on. You decided you wouldn’t kiss him yet, while your hair was matted in sweat and Spencer’s face was brushed with sunburn and embarrassment.

“Bella is more popular in South America, though, or bonita. My favourite is Japanese, though. Kirei. To be beautiful both inside and out…”

I’ll work late tonight, catch up on everything, then crash for the whole weekend, you’d promised Garcia at lunch. In one breath, she’d claimed that was impressive, that everyone would love you forever for getting it done, and warned you to take care of yourself.

Sometimes it was hard to know how to. You felt dreadful being here, you'd feel worse if you went home, thinking about the work hanging over you. For a moment you lay with your head on your forearm, idly massaging out the headache that had started to form.

Dinner, you realised. You hadn’t eaten dinner. Maybe that was why you felt dreadful.

The temptation to just go home would be too strong if you went out to get it, so you headed for the drawer in the kitchen full of takeout menus.

While you were flicking through the pile for the least sticky menus, the elevator doors opened.

It was almost certainly security checking to see who was still up here, or a cleaner making their rounds. Nonetheless, with half the building dark, it was hard not to suddenly be on high alert. In socked feet, you tiptoed back along the corridor until you could see the doors, already sliding closed with the carriage empty.

You crept further forward, until you could see a man, hair slightly damp around his face and a satchel looped over his body. Reid. He was stood behind your desk, peering at the computer you had left on, as though he was confused.

“Evening,” you offered, pushing against the warm fondness you felt as he jolted away from your chair in surprise.

“The computer screens turn themselves off after five minutes of inactivity, and you never leave yours unlocked. I figured something must have happened.”

He was silent for a moment, his gaze drifting to your socked feet, then back to your face.

“Evening.”

“I just went to get menus,” you held them up limply, and Reid smiled.

“Have you not been home yet?”

“No, I can’t believe you’ve been home!”

“I actually went home early,” he admitted the fact as though he was embarrassed. You were fairly sure Hotch had shoved him out of the elevator doors.

“You’ve snuck back in, them?”

Finally you crossed the bullpen, sinking back into your office chair. Reid perched on the next desk over.

“Couldn’t settle – I figured I could get through everything quickly, save everyone the job…”

“Especially after we’re inevitably called in over the weekend, and all these cases feel like a lifetime ago.”

He smiled grimly.

“Exactly.”

For a moment it was silent, and you felt a little caught at Reid finding you in the office alone like this. Your headphones lay out on the desk, music blaring tinnily from them, and you felt your face grow warm as you reached across to turn the music off.

“So you’re getting food?” he hadn’t moved, gesturing at the menus.

“Yeah. Have you had dinner?”

“Not really. If you don’t mind me joining you…”

“Not at all,” you insisted, “please.”

He glanced over the options you’d laid out, over the three piles on your desk. You wondered how long ago he’d showered, his hair was straighter than usual with the weight of being damp. He was wearing one of his usual jumpers, but he must have put a t-shirt on underneath it. There was something odd about seeing him without a shirt collar. Some insight into what Spencer wore when he wanted to be comfortable, when he thought he wouldn’t be seen.

“I– Thank you. I don’t mind going out to get it?”

“I usually just order it in, and then get security call me down and accept it.”

Reid frowned, no doubt prepared to reel off dozens of stats about security risks.

“Is that allowed?”

“No one’s ever stopped me,” you shrugged, only to delight in Reid’s wide, nervous smile.

 He’d never had the chance to be a naughty schoolboy, you’d often reflected, it was why he often seemed to look like he was being called into the principal’s office.

“So long as you make the call…”

“Don’t want to get in trouble?” you teased, and Spencer laughed.

“Absolutely not! That’s the last thing I need.”

“Well then, in that case I’m choosing Chinese. Pick something.”

You tossed him a menu, and he glanced it over before looking up to think. You’d never quite get over the way his mind worked.

Once the order was placed and Spencer had laughed over your stomach grumbling, reality sunk back in. Sat at your desk, on a Friday night, under fluorescent lights.

“Isn’t it funny to have your dream job, and it’s still so boring most of the time,” you mused, and Spencer just chuckled.

He still hadn’t moved to start his work.

“I know what you mean.”

He paused for a moment.

“Was this your dream job?”

Oh, no.

“Is that lame? I assumed this was everyone here’s dream job,” you admitted.

Spencer shrugged, and you found yourself watching him desperately for any kind of redemption from the ache of embarrassment you were feeling in your chest. It shouldn’t matter, whether Spencer thought you were lame. Somehow, it seemed like the only thing that did matter.

“I suppose I never knew where I’d end up, but I’m glad it was here.”

You nodded, waiting for him to speak more. Spencer spoke a lot, defended himself with constant talking. It was something different, rare, when he was talking about his own past.

“What am I talking about? Yeah,” he was smiling, and that meant you were smiling right back at him, all toothy and lame, “this is my dream job.”

“If it was really a dream job, they’d pay for our dinners,” you teased, and Spencer laughed.

“That’s true enough. Oh!”

He rifled through his wallet, pulling out a twenty and hunting for more.

“My half,” he offered, “thank you for letting me crash your dinner.”

“Not at all, it’s nice the you’re here! And I wasn’t angling for you to pay me back, Spencer. Don’t be daft.”

“No, you just reminded me, is all.”

He put the cash down beside your hand with an eyebrow raise, and you laughed.

“Thank you.”

You wondered how someone sourced bills so clean, it wasn’t as ratty as the cash you grabbed from your wallet.

“I’ll take it as danger money, in case security squeal on us for ordering takeout.”

“I’m not sure the late night paperwork should the riskiest part of the job.”

He laughed, and finally made a move to stand up. Suddenly you were overcome by the need to stop him from going anywhere.

“What have you got left to do?” you asked.

“Case reports, a few bits of random paperwork, I think there’s a security review and some statements to type up…”

As you talked over the workload, you realised you’d done some of the work Spencer had intended to. He offered to take over on some things, and you knew he’d complete the work perfectly, until finally the workload split between the two of you felt manageable. He pulled a chair over to share your desk, and by the time the food had arrived, you felt far better about your odds of getting home before midnight.

“Do you want to try some of this?” you offered Spencer, catching him watching you.

“Oh, um, yeah actually.”

You hadn’t really meant it. Spencer didn’t share, you’d already double-dipped and your chopsticks had been in your mouth and…

“Do you want a spring roll? These are amazing.”

You let him use his chopsticks to drop a spring roll into your container, and you smiled your thanks as he did. His face was suddenly far closer to you than you’d realised, knees inches apart as  you struggled to share one desk.

“Hm,” you mumbled, “that is good!”

“Right!”

For a while you ate in silence, and if you forgot about the fluorescent lights and stale scent of office, it was like you were sharing dinner together by choice. Spencer in his casuals, you still shoe-less, perched casually on your chair, it was nice.

“So, do you have weekend plans?”

He’d be silent for so long, you hardly heard him.

“Hm?”

“Weekend plans,” his voice dropped quieter, less stable. “What are you up to?”

Spencer was asking what your weekend plans were. Spencer.

“I just thought… asking about… asking about your weekend shows that I care for your wellbeing and builds social rapport between colleagues, or… I mean, I think we’re friends at this point? Too? So I just wanted to know what your weekend plans were.”

He was bright red and staring down at his noodles, you could see the rise and fall of his chest, the panic growing in him.

“No, Spencer, I appreciate you asking. I’m, uh, just planning on crashing to be honest. I have to clean my apartment, do all my laundry. Nothing too exciting. And my building’s laundry room is flooded – again – so I guess it’s a long wait at the laundromat.”

Desperate to say anything, to make Spencer feel better – and make sure he didn’t regret talking to you – you found yourself rambling on and on, until he was smiling nervously. Still avoiding your eye, he interrupted you gently.

“Public laundromats have all kinds of risks. My biggest concern is always bed bugs – even commercial machines in laundromats often can’t kill bed bug eggs, leading them to be transferred between customers…”

“Oh, god Spencer, that’s really not making me feel better!”

“No! I just mean… I have in-unit, for that reason. Disinfected regularly.”

You looked at him, bemused, the warm food in your lap forgotten. He paused, and met your eyes, a lock of hair falling over his face. He brushed it back.

“Oh! I meant, I wasn’t bragging about my washer being clean. Uh, you’re welcome to use mine, if you’d rather.”

It was the strangest thing that had ever made your heart clench with fondness. He was still blushing, clearly afraid he’d said the wrong thing, done something weird again. It was your first instinct not to bother him, but at the innocent look in his wide, brown eyes, you found yourself accepting.

“That would be amazing, if you wouldn’t mind, Spencer. Be warned, I’ve got a lot of laundry to do, you can kick me out anytime you get sick of me,” you teased.

“I know, from all the travelling. You’re wearing clothes you never normally wear, presumably because all your favourites need washing.”

You stared at him, processing for a moment. You could see his finger tapping against the side of his thigh, the smile he was trying to hide.

“You can stay as long as you like,” he clarified.

“Maybe we can watch a boxset or something, if you like?”

The raise of his eyebrows was enough to make you laugh, and he quickly looked away, taking another mouthful of rice.

“Doctor Who?”

There was nothing you wouldn’t have watched with Spencer, as you woke up the next morning blessedly free of work calls and lazily made your way to his apartment with two suitcases full of washing and a huge bags of Skittles for Reid. He’d surprised you with a made lunch, and with a freshly cleaned washer and dryer. Despite the way he made himself scarce when you pulled out underwear and bundled it into his washing machine, two hours later, he was brave enough to sneak an arm around your shoulder.

The strength of it made her falter a bit. It was easy to forget Rupert was an athlete, in those moments where she forgot about the naked tennis, and she wiped her hands on her jeans, staring at the floor, while her senses returned.

Rupert was just standing there, watching her, eyes soft, his mouth somewhere between gawking and a smile.

“Right! Um, the menu!”

She’d brought a notebook and pen, and she pulled them from her bag, following Rupert to the kitchen.

“I’ll get some tea on?” she offered, and gave Rupert no time to say no. It took her a few attempts to get the right cupboards for everything, but soon the kettle was on, and she was on tiptoes rummaging for tea, giving Rupert the best view Penscombe Court had to offer.

“I should’ve brought Gertrude,” she was saying, almost to herself, “I always worry she gets lonely. But she’s more of a people-dog, than a dog-dog, I think.”

Rupert waited until she turned around, until her wide-eyed stare caught on his face.

“She’s always welcome here. As are you.”

He stepped forwards, crowding her, and Taggie held her breath as she found herself dangerously close to the soft skin of his neck, the freshly-shaved plane of his jaw. All too soon it was over, and she realised Rupert had only gotten close to her to open a cupboard and retrieve a biscuit tin.

“Sorry, love,” he was saying, tossing the biscuits onto the counter with a frustrating air of indifference, “you were saying? About the menu?”

Taggie hummed, turning around to fuss with the tea bags in their cups. She furiously avoided looking at Rupert, or letting the blush on her cheeks show. He wanted her. She knew he did. And all that unworthiness stuff was behind him, now. Or at least, it was being transformed into a desperation to be good enough for her, to prove himself, that she found jaw-droppingly attractive.

“I mean, it’s your menu,” she murmured, “people normally just tell me what to cook. Or tell me who they want to impress, and I give them some options.”

“I don’t really care at all. What’s easiest for you?” Rupert asked, and finally the kettle finished boiling.

She shrugged.

“Doesn’t really matter. I don’t mind doing anything. I don’t exactly want to get a reputation for cheese on toast and spaghetti, anyway.”

Taggie made the tea as they spoke, taking the endless opportunities not to watch Rupert. He procured a teaspoon, grabbed the milk for her, opened the bin for the teabags, all while Taggie managed to avoid looking at him.

“So, we’re at a stalemate. Because I don’t care what we eat so long as you cook it, and you’re unwilling to give me a hint as to what you think I should ask for.”

He sensed a miscalculation, somewhere here. Taggie was so skittish around him. More skittish than she’d been in months, and in some way, he’s just made it worse. He carries the cups of tea to the lounge, leaving the biscuits to Taggie, and sits on the sofa opposite the fire, so she has no other seating choice than to join him in sinking down into the plush Louis XV.

He’d had it reupholstered recently, and he goes to make a comment on it, but Taggie’s staring into the unlit fire. The notebook is under her arm, unopened.

“Sorry, darling. I, uh, I just mean, I want you to pick for me.”

“I really thought you cared about food. You’re always giving bloody notes to Bas.”

“I do, I just trust your taste. You’ll have some fancy French thing up your sleeve, you always do.”

Taggie frowned. She wasn’t a formally educated chef. She could make all those things because she was a quick learner, and had a great intuition. Who did Rupert think she was?

“I’m not sure this is going to work, Rupert.”

She wanted to leave. It was all over her body language. Her glancing around, the tense of those thighs under her jeans, the way she was refusing to pick up her tea. Rupert felt something sickeningly close to panic rising up in his throat.

“Let’s go through this, then. It’s a dinner party, obviously. Next Thursday. A bunch of people from Venturer, some politician types, and a few well-timed comments from me about how well a more diversified BBC budget portfolio would suit small, independent companies like ourselves.”

Taggie relaxed, hands moving to grasp her knee. She frowned at the floor.

“So, that’s what, ten? Twelve?”

“Nine. Plus enough for your dinner, so ten.”

She ignored that comment, and instead opened her notebook, turning until she found a fresh page. It was tilted away from Rupert at such an extreme angle that he wondered if she had a bloody diary in there. Hopefully there was some absolute filth in it.

Taggie wrote slowly, and he watched curiously. Their tea was still steaming on the coffee table.

“And how many courses?” she asked, not looking up.

“I suppose three is traditional, and I’m sure I can’t be bothered to sit through any more than that. I’ve got a red wine I want to serve, to butter up the Minister for Culture, his wife’s family owns the vineyard, and only the red is remotely palatable.”

Taggie stumbled a little over the word, before she asked:

“Hor d’oeuvres?”

“Oh, god, yes. I suppose so. Half of them are coming from London, and the Venturer lot are all chronically late. Better have something to keep the rabble at bay.”

He’d never really considered the complexity of what Taggie did. Did he want hot or cold hor d'oeuvres? It mattered because they’d have to be served in batches if they were hot, and the smell would be more noticeable. How many types? What would be in season? Was anyone allergic to shellfish? He was exhausted just thinking about it. She’d be a damn good mistress of a big country estate. Rupert found his heart quickening at the thought, whether in shock or something else, he wasn’t sure.

“If we’re doing a starter, we’ll assume everyone’s sitting down for dinner, rather than a buffet?” she asked, and Rupert waved a hand dismissively, before catching himself and leaning forwards, paying attention.

“Yes. Sit down. I was thinking Foie gras?”

He sensed an immediate error by the wrinkle of Taggie’s nose, and way she looked away from him, across the room to those imposing oil paintings which hadn’t changed since his childhood.

“Ah,” he rambled on, “the bleeding-heart-O’Hara’s are coming, so maybe no animal cruelty.”

In an act of charity, Taggie offered him an alternative.

“How about melba toast, pate, a summer salad?” she suggested.

“Perfect! In fact, that sounds delightful. I’ve never even liked foie gras. Makes me feel sick, just seeing it,” she knew he was lying, and he was delighted to see her laugh.

Taggie kept pausing, frowning as she wrote, and Rupert could tell the toll it was taking on her. Every time she got excited, had some brilliant idea, it would be undercut by the long moments spent writing it down.

“Right. Give that here. You be brilliant, I’ll keep the notes!”

Rupert swiped the notebook from her, despite her protest, and made a show of flipping to a new page, angling the notebook so she could see, as he wrote down all the details so far. He used his absolute neatest handwriting, and suddenly felt like a schoolboy, as he crossed out and went slowly, eyebrows furrowed in concentration. He had a flash of embarrassment as he caught Taggie watching him, and quickly school his face. Bas had told him not to frown. Made him look old.

“Right! What’s next. We’ve done hor d'oeuvres, a starter, though now I think about it, we’ll need some veggie starter for that weirdo from Stroud…”

He wrote down ‘WEIRD VEG STARTER x1’ in the hopes it might make Taggie laugh at a later date. For now, she was lost in thought.

“Is the vegetarian important?” she asked.

“Hm?”

He had been busy drawing a broccoli in her notebook. It wasn’t going particularly well.

“Should we do the whole meal vegetarian?” Taggie asked.

Rupert looked up, eyes wide.

“Oh! Oh, god no. It would be catastrophic not to serve Markie something red and bloody. I’d never hear the end of it.”

“Right. Beef wellington then, and we’ll do a mushroom pie for the vegetarian. Sort of the same meal, so thoughtful, but Markie still gets his beef.”

“Brilliant idea!” he pointed the pen at her, then leant in so that she could see him writing, “points to Agatha O’Hara.”

Taggie watched the steadiness of his hands as they engulfed the pen, the elegant way his handwriting swirled. She’d noticed that Rupert was smaller here, in his own house. In The Priory he was everywhere, stooped in the kitchen, blocking her walk to the fridge, invading Taggie’s space and making her breath hitch as he sat in her father’s chair at the kitchen table. He always reaching the top shelf, always sprawling across armchairs, ducking to get through the front door. At Penscombe Court, with its high ceilings, its rococo and dozens of sofas and endless grounds, Rupert was returned to just being a man. Very tall and handsome, though he was.

“Seems like it does matter, then,” Taggie found herself muttering.

“What, love?”

“The menu. I thought you ‘didn’t give a shit’.”

He quite liked her impression of his posh drawl, and Rupert felt his face cracking, even as he sensed he was being caught out.

“Well. Yes, quite, I suppose. That’s why I wanted you. You know things like this.”

A beat passed, and he could sense Taggie deciding whether to engage with him. Whether to tolerate the distraction.

“You’d put Lady Monica Baddingham to shame.”

God, didn’t that sound good in the baritone of his voice. Taggie flushed, and brushed the stray hair out of her face, the only break from his eye contact.

“She hires me too, you know. Quite a lot. I actually think she’s very nice, despite her absolute prick of a husband.”

It was sometimes easy to forget she was Declan’s daughter, until she called Tony a prick. He swore there was even a trace of the accent, in the melody of the word prick.

“Hm. She knows you were born to be the lady of some grand old house.”

She blinked at him for a long moment, before ducking her head down. Fuck. He’d lost her.

“Dessert, then,” she insisted, pointedly ignoring the ache in her chest, the way he was blatantly staring at her. “Something chocolatey, if we’re doing red wine and beef, or we could break up the richness.”

 “I’m always in favour of decadence.”

“So, dark chocolate parfait? And I’ll make a coulis, raspberry or – ”

“Don’t get all professional on me now, Agatha,” he interrupted her.

“Do you want me to cook a dinner for you or not?”

They were both shocked by how sharp her words came across, but Taggie bit her lip, resisting the urge to apologise. How could he? This was her passion, her livelihood, and it felt like he’d invited her over here just to tease her.

“Yes. Sorry. I was just…”

“You were just what?”

Rupert couldn’t answer. Just flirting. Just trying to stop picturing her making tea for them every morning, while he boxed her in against the cabinets? Just trying to convince her to marry him and wear one of the family diamonds, and have conversations like this every day? A lifetime of rambling to the cameras and flirting with every journalist in sight, of controlling the house from the backbench, and he couldn’t find a single answer for Taggie.

“You’re my client,” he told him, but this time it lacked conviction.

Rupert laughed, full-throated, and Taggie felt it in her chest.

“Am I now? God, and here I thought we were getting somewhere.”

Fuck. There were tears in her eyes. This was a mistake the whole thing was. The little mini parked so far to the edge of his drive it was like she was trying to hide it. His handwriting in her notebook. The stupid thing he did with the box of biscuits. Taggie was trying to cry, and it was breaking his heart.

“So what, you hired me to make me tea and flirt at me?”

“You made the tea,” he tried, but she frowned.

Right. Not helpful, Rupert. Do better.

“I’m sorry, okay. I thought you were having fun and you’re not…”

Taggie blinked, clearly desperate not to let him see her upset, but her eyes had already gone red, bloodshot, and he was panicking. Badger came to investigate, and he desperately resisted the urge to pull the lab into his lab and hug him for comfort.

“I should go –”

Rupert so desperately didn’t want that to happen, that he reached for Taggie’s wrist, almost grasped it before he pulled his hand back, dug his fingers into his thigh.

“God, why am I so useless when it comes to things that actually matter?” Rupert felt more anger in his chest than he had intended.

That irritation that came from a missed jump, a lame horse, a botched campaign speech, the fine line between self-improvement and self-destruction. She was blinking at him, eyebrows furrowed and eyes wide, and Rupert felt a surge of adrenaline plummet through his veins. A stumble on a difficult jump, and the ugly head of ingrained knowledge it had become so much more important to do well for the rest of the course. She was staring at him, but she wasn’t leaving. This could be won.

“Taggie,” he reached for her hands, and she didn’t relax, but she let him hold her loosely closed fists in his palms, “I’m doing an absolutely appalling job at this.”

In her mercy, Taggie only raised her eyebrows. He could tell she was still on the verge of tears, but the immediate threat seemed to be over. The bigger threat, in fact, was the solid mass settling at the back of Rupert’s throat, the watering of his own eyes. He coughed, tried to blink it away. Between them, the notebook fell to the floor. Badger jammed his chin into Rupert’s thigh, and he ignored the dog.

“I don’t know how to make it clear to you that I think you’re absolutely astonishingly good at your job, and that I also hired you, as a happy coincidence, so I could see you alone again. And, admittedly, flirt with you.”

Taggie was looking at him with reproach, but she leant down slowly to pick up the notebook and pen, leaving one hand in his. He pulled her knuckle to his lips, held it there as he spoke, and he refused to crumble, to look away from her.

“I want dark chocolate parfait. Or mousse, if that’s easier. With the raspberry coulis, or that passionfruit one you made at Mousey’s Christmas party. It sounds divine, angel. Please, I’d love that. Maybe some white chocolate with it. I’ll pay you a thousand pounds a course, and I’ll get Mr Bodkin to drop you home at the end of it.”

“Rupert, my dad is literally coming to the party,” Taggie was monotone, less excited than he’d imagined at being offered six months’ wages for one party. Maybe they all paid that much, she was damn good.

“You know what he’s like. You’re probably best not to get in that car, actually. I insist you go with Mr Bodkin.”

“I’ll just drive him home.”

“You will not.”

She watched him for a moment, and then handed him the notebook, the pen. With it in his lap he was hunched over, and she waited while he found the right page again, dutifully not reading anything else in there.

“It might be hard to find passionfruit, sometimes Waitrose has it, but the market tends not to stock anything that exotic. I’ll try passionfruit, and make raspberry if that fails.”

“I can send Mrs Bodkin out, or Gerald – ”

Rupert shut up the moment that her glower told him that was the wrong thing to say. He murmured a sorry, and wrote everything down.

“How in god’s name do you spell coulis?” he murmured.

Taggie laughed, almost watery, and Rupert could’ve collapsed in relief as he joined in.

“Why on earth would you ask me that?”

“I don’t know! They’re your notes, how would you spell it?”

It absolutely floods Rupert’s heart that she doesn’t shrink away from him as they play out the game of trying to spell the stupid word. He realises halfway through he probably should’ve said sauce, but they’re having too much fun by then.

“Starts with a ‘c’,” Taggie says, making the sound of the letter rather than saying the name. Rupert takes the cue.

“u?”

He turns the page so they’re both looking the ‘cu’ he’s written the right way up.

“That doesn’t seem right,” she frowns, and Rupert agrees, but doesn’t really offer any helpful suggestion.

“I’d maybe put an ‘o’ in, but you’re the one who has to read this. Let’s just go phonetically.”

They end up choosing an ‘l’, an ‘a’, and a ‘y’, and the more Rupert thinks about it, the more he can’t see any way it isn’t spelled like that.

“Reckon that’s right?” Taggie’s pulling at her bottom lip, and it’s so endearing Rupert takes a moment to watch her before he answers.

“I’m honestly not sure a single letter of that is right,” he laughs, “stupid word anyway. Who invited the French?”

“Reckon it’s French?” Taggie frowned, her eyes were drifting over the rest of the page, and Rupert had no interest in ruining the mood. He snapped the notebook shut, and put it beside their tea.

“Sounds it,” he shrugged, “and it has a stupid spelling, so it must be.”

With that, it’s done. The recipe, the party. They talk over some details, Rupert reveals the doors are basically always unlocked and she can just walk in whenever she wants on the day of the party, and they finally sip at their tea. Rupert opens the biscuits, because he can tell Taggie wants one, and surprises himself by eating an extraordinary amount of shortbread and getting crumbs on his trousers and newly upholstered Louis XV.

“You’re way overpaying me, by the way,” she mentions, through a mouthful of biscuit, “but I sort of suspect it will make absolutely no difference to you.”

“None at all,” he says cheerily, and Taggie grins.

“Well then, thank you for paying Caitlin’s school fees.”

She makes as if to cheers him with her teacup, and Rupert only meets her half-heartedly, ghosting the cups against each other. Taggie’s got too much sense to actually let the bone china touch, but Rupert wouldn’t have cared. He sprawls back, one arm flung along the back of the sofa.

“I’d rather you spent it on a new car, I do worry about you, in that Mini.”

“I’ll keep borrowing dad’s car as long as I can get away with it,” she admits, “I wouldn’t know the first thing about servicing it.”

“No one knows anything about cars, Tag. You just pay someone to do it.”

She laughed. She’d seen him messing around in the engine bay of a tractor before, but Rupert seems serious.

“I’m not sure that’s true, unless you’re rich,” she glances sidelong at him, checking he’s not offended, “and I’m not smart enough–”

“Hardly anyone’s smart, darling. Look at the person who invented the spelling of coulis, or parfait, for that matter. It’s clearly completely incorrect.”

She doesn’t laugh like he’d hoped, but hums, and lets herself lie back against the sofa. His arm isn’t quite touching her, but it’s a close thing.

“I wish you wouldn’t worry about smart quite so much. Besides the fact you are, absolutely, incredibly clever, it hardly matters. Look at me.”

Taggie stares at him, deer in headlights.

“They sent me to Harrow. Best boarding school in the country, and an absolute waste. I can’t even order dinner without getting it wrong,” he’d gotten quiet, closer, and Taggie found herself leaning in closer.

“I thought Eton was the best boarding school in the country?”

Rupert gasped, and threw himself back as though wounded, peeking through the hands he’d plastered to his face as she laughed.

“God, Taggie, you do know how to tear a man down!”

“Isn’t it?” she asked quietly, a nervous smile fixed on her face.

She was worried about getting it wrong. They really had to break that habit.

“I suppose, if you only care about academics.”

“It’s a school,” she began, but Rupert interrupted, groaning.

“It’s these bloody socialist Irish parents of yours! Eton is more academic, but Harrow…” he paused for effect, leaning in as if to whisper, “is posher.”

“Oh my god,” she laughed, “you’re insane. All of you people are insane.”

He shrugged, showed the palms of his hands, and made the colossal effort not to mention his Olympic medal.

“I just saw you eat a biscuit like an absolute animal. I’d say it was money wasted.”

“Couldn’t agree more, love. But y’know, there’s no other way to get into politics.”

“That’s disgraceful,” she was saying, but it was without bite.

Their tea was empty, the notebook was closed. Rupert was just trying to figure out some other ploy to get Taggie to stay regarding interior decorating or table design, then she did the hard work for him.

“So, you invited me over here to do… what?”

He blinked, his mind going blank, as Taggie fixed that blood stare on his face.

“To hire me for your dinner party,” she prompted, “and…”

Flirt. Oh, God. He’d told her that. Rupert replaced his arm on the back of the sofa, and fixed her with the kind of stare he’d normally reserve for a particularly egregious round of ‘trying-to-charm-a-magazine-interviewer-into-a-quickie. Best not to think of that now. Regardless, it wasn’t working. He was struggling with smoulder, and landing on pleading.

“Well now I’m worried you’re only interested because of my Harrow education,” he attempted, pretended to sound wounded, and Taggie rolled her eyes.

“One thing about posh people, is that they never shut up about it. I’m not sure anyone could’ve missed that.”

“Have I mentioned my showjumping medals?” he tried, and Taggie rolled her eyes again.

She was doing something curious with her hands, settling them in her lap, like she wasn’t sure what to do with them.

“Next you’ll be telling me you’re Minister for Sport,” she teased, and he pretended to wince.

“Not anymore, I’m afraid. Not even an MP. You’ll rather have to go after Gerald, and I’m afraid I’ve always had my doubts…”

“You brought me here to talk about the menu, and to…”

“Flirt,” he finished slowly, and God, the way Taggie was looking at him was absolute sin.

“I rather think you’re underdelivering, Mr Campbell-Black.”

“Well, I’m rarely accused of that.”

He pulled her forwards, until they were chest to chest, one hand firmly on the splay of her shoulder blades. He could feel the structure of her bra beneath her jumper, the press of her against him.

Taggie gasped as he pulled her forwards. She could feel him shift, the tense of his muscles chest, the five points of his hand in her back. His breath was hot on her face as he spoke.

“I want to know if you, Taggie O’Hara, are biting off more than you can chew.”

“Probably,” she whispered before she closed the gap between them, surging forward to kiss him with too much enthusiasm, so he let out a shocked exhale the moment their lips met.

She would never have believed anyone who said Rupert Campbell-Black tasted like anything as comforting as tea and biscuits, or that he shifted her in his lap so that she wasn’t twisted. Or that he broke from kissing her, dejected, because Badger was licking her ankle and she couldn’t stop giggling.

“Get out of it!” he grumbled, shoving at the solid bulk of the lab, prolonging the whole event to hear Taggie’s breathless laughter.

“Like father like son,” she murmured, and Rupert groaned, covering his face.

“I’m sorry,” he said, knowing she didn’t mind.

“That’s okay,” her hands found his face, and he let her pull him around, until she was in his lap again she could peck him.

Rupert groaned, reaching to hold her still, but she kept speaking.

“Still the second best kiss of my life.”

“Second best?” he complained, and then he remembered New Year’s, and kitchens and blue dresses and the way his whole world had come crashing down afterwards.

“Oh.”

“That’ll always be the best,” Taggie admitted softly, and he could’ve melted at the vulnerability of it, the way she bit her lip and let her eyes dart across his face like she’d said something wrong instead of something so sickeningly romantic he would be thinking about it at every inopportune moment for the rest of his life.

Rupert couldn’t think of anything to say. He wanted to kiss her again. It was the only thought in his head. Taggie ruined him, all that wit and charm and silvertongue, gone. Yet again, she saved him.

“Are the dogs allowed upstairs?” she asked, and he almost said yes, dumb as Seb, that ridiculous teenager who’d tried it on with her.

“Do you think we should get away from them?” he asked darkly, and Taggie squirmed.

“I mean, only if you want to, they’re – ”

Fuck, it had been a long time since he’d picked a woman up, but the squeal Taggie let out was more than worth it, and she hammered at his back as he pulled her into a bridal carry and made it up the stairs, admittedly bounding a bit less than he used to. When the shock of being carried had worn off, Taggie redirected her attention to his shirt buttons, and to peeling away the collar from his neck and mouthing at whatever skin she could get to.

“You’re making it a little difficult to walk, my darling,” he confessed, reaching the top of the stairs, and Taggie giggled.

Rupert deposited her on his bed, already feeling as though he was in a dream state. Giving a speech he had practiced a thousand times, riding his familiar warmup routine in front of a huge crowd. He knew sex. He knew Taggie. But he’d dreamed of this so many times, he was fighting to keep his concentration.

“Not bad,” Taggie panted, flushed at the exhilaration of it, as he pounced onto the mattress after her.

Already she was trying not to sprawl, to sit up, regain control, and he absolutely wasn’t standing for it. With two hands he held her ankles apart, knees splayed, and she whined in protest as he crawled over her, using his hips to keep her legs apart, one thigh sprawled out against hers, his forearms holding his weight off her chest.

Boxed in, staring up him with those big eyes, Rupert worried she was panicking. He wanted to be the only thing she could see, feel, hear. He pressed his lips to hers, and she responded with a moan that made Rupert achingly aware of his own body, of the erection he was crushing against the rapid rise and fall of Taggie’s stomach.

Perverse as it was, Rupert was proud of himself for how long he kissed her. Hands above her shoulders, hips barely moving, letting Taggie get what she needed until she was the one grinding up against him, reaching down, desperate to undo his slacks.

Rupert panted as she broke away, exchanging breath. Her lips were reddened, pupils wide. He stroked at her hair, obsessed with seeing it fanned out against his white sheets. He surged towards her again, and Taggie gave him a few more seconds, tongue fighting into her mouth, before she pulled away again.

“More, angel?” he asked.

She nodded mutely, and he chuckled darkly.

“I might need you to keep that clever mouth of yours going, give me more than a nod.”

He moved on, kissed along her neck, but Taggie had gone quiet. He readjusted his hips a little, pressed himself up on his forearms to look at her again.

“You’re thinking about something,” he told her.

Taggie couldn’t meet his eye, she was looking at the swirl of the coving, the plaster ceiling above him. He knew Tag, and she certainly wasn’t the type to lie back and think of England.

“Tell me,” he asked.

Everything was quiet now. Still. Energy discharged, it was just them. Fully clothed, above the covers.

“I don’t want to ruin this…”

“What, Angel?” he whispered.

“I feel like I should tell you. I find it, uh, really hard. To orgasm, I mean. It takes ages and I don’t want you to think you’re not doing it right… or if that’s not fun for you…”

She wouldn’t look at him, embarrassment choking her throat, and it was breaking his heart. Rupert deflated above her, all the stress leaving his body, and he tried to suppress a laugh from his relief.

“Oh, darling. I was so worried it was, I don’t know, literally anything else,” he told her, “can you look at me?”

He wasn’t happy about it, but Taggie managed to look at him, her cheeks burning red.

“You say you find it difficult, does that mean you have come before?”

She nodded, bit her lip. Made him want to cry. She was making Rupert feel ancient, and protective, and his thighs were cramping to keep from pressing his erection too hard into her lower stomach.

“Did Seb make you come?” he murmured it against her jaw, trying to bring back that white hot arousal he knew was just beneath the surface. Beneath her fear.

“He didn’t try,” she said, and as Rupert tensed, she rushed to correct herself, “as in, we never did anything. We kissed, um, but that was really it. He offered to finger me up I didn’t really fancy it, at the time.”

Rupert couldn’t help snorting, and Taggie laughed too, muted as it was.

“But you have–”

“Yes! Yeah, once. Wait, how do you know?”

Whether it was Caitlin or Lizzie or Maud she had to kill, she’d do it later. Now, Taggie was focussed back on him, on the vast blackness of his pupils, dilated in the gauzy daylight of the bedroom.

“Did he make you come, angel?”

She squirmed, Rupert could feel it with his whole body. He knew the answer, she could tell.

“No.”

“Did he eat you out?”

She was red, squirming, and Rupert would bet Penscombe Court that if he reached down to check she was absolutely liquid.

 “Tag?” he asked, delighting in her deep, desperate breath, the rise of her chest under him.

“No,” she admitted, and Rupert grit his teeth to avoid moaning.

“So you did it yourself?”

“I think so,” she told him, face burning, but she was watching him.

“You think so,” he drawled, and he looked away.

He kissed her, quick, affirming, and when he pulled away she stared up at him.

“Tell me what you did,” Rupert knew he was begging, but he didn’t care. His muscles were shaking, and it was the only thing keeping him grounded.

“I, um, touched myself, I think that’s when – ”

“Where do you touch yourself?” Rupert interrupted, and Taggie blinked, mouth slightly open.

“In the shower, sometimes, or the bath. Normally at night, when everyone’s out, or asleep.”

“Where do you touch yourself?” Rupert tried to be kind, not to laugh, but when Taggie snorted he realised he’d been had.

“For god’s sake!” he groaned, and she freed a hand to stroke his hair, caressed a cheekbone with her thumb.

“I mostly rub my clit, and sometimes I fuck myself with the handle of my hairbrush.”

Rupert was going to die. He’d been warned by his doctor over and over again about the drugs and the alcohol and the strenuous exercise and now he was going to die. He groaned, buried his face in Taggie’s neck, and desperately hoped she wasn’t rolling her hips into him on purpose.

“And where the fuck, angel, did you learn the word clit.”

“Mum’s filthy books, mostly, like Lizzie’s –”

He almost roared, pulled both hands to cup her ribs and shoved his face against her chest and cleavage. Taggie felt it in her lungs when he spoke.

“I love her to death but I am begging you not to say Lizzie’s name during foreplay,” Rupert ground out

“Is this foreplay?”

“Yes. Now please tell me how you touch yourself, if you’d be so kind,” Rupert couldn’t believe how patient Taggie was. How turned on he was. It was the longest he’d ever been rock hard without doing something about it.

“That’s it, really. On my back, sometimes standing in the shower, I tried the water jet once because Caitlin said it was in Cosmo, but it was too painful – ”

“You’re killing me, Tag.”

“Sorry,” she said it so sincerely Rupert was worried, but when he looked up her eyes were thick with lust, carefree laughter caught in her jaw.

When was the last time he’d laughed this much during sex?

“No one ever gives you any time to your fucking self, I’d be amazed if you can relax at all,” he murmured against her sternum, and she hummed.

Rupert meant it so much, so sincerely, that it was torture to keep the venom from his voice.

“Yeah, well, whenever I want to fuck myself, I end up with a house full of Venturer people, discussing your misdeeds.”

Rupert was in an exquisite kind of agony. One flick of her hand, a few thrusts against her soft stomach, and he could’ve finished right there. But this wasn’t the time to be selfish. Christ, if Taggie spent another moment convinced she was bad at orgasms he’d be beside himself. This was pivotal.

“So back to our thesis, you’re worried about… finding it difficult to orgasm?”

She hummed, and Rupert felt embarrassingly close to his own climax, to the point the whole thing bordered on obscenely unfair. With all the strength he possessed he pulled himself up, looked down at her. She seemed so much more confident, so much more in control, that Rupert could look her in the eye without her flinching away or blushing.

“I just don’t want you to… worry. If it takes too long.”

She was teasing him now. The whole thing had shifted. Tag had seen right through him, and she was using it for her own benefit. It was working, Rupert was in pieces.

“Fuck, Agatha,” he breathed, “who do you think I am?”

It was vain, and ridiculous, but he reached for her hand and pulled it between their bodies, until it was firmly across the plane of his abs. Admittedly, there had been points in his life where they’d been more pronounced, but Rupert’s naked body was yet to disappoint anyone yet.

“Do I feel like a man with stamina problems to you?”

She murmured into his neck, and he pulled away from her, until she had to look at him. Her face was so flushed, he might have mistaken for someone who’d already had a very nice time in his bed.

“What was that, angel?”

“No.”

“I should bloody well hope so. Apart from those biscuits we ate – but I’ve never minded much when you fatten me up.”

She laughed, and so did he.

“It’s not funny. You’ll ruin me. I used to be a sex symbol, you know. All thrown away, because I can’t stop eating your parfait with coulis.”

“Excuse me?” Taggie teased, and Rupert’s jaw dropped.

When was the last time he’d blushed?

It was probably around Taggie, he realised.

“God, how have we still got our clothes on,” she laughed, reaching for her own jumper, and Rupert stopped her, forehead to her chest once again.

He was about to say some bullshit about patience, but Taggie pulled his head up – gently – but the curls of his fringe.

“Aren’t you meant to be good at sex?”

“Fucking hell – ”

Taggie had to have been sent to him as some kind of cosmic intervention. Punishment, surely, for the way she was laughing at him as he slid his hands under her jumper and t-shirt, and made an absolute hash of pulling them over her head. It was hardly seductive, as she laughed, and threw her own bra on the floor, and sat up to work on his shirt without a shred of concern for the fact she was now topless in his bed and Rupert was still reeling.

They were down to jeans and slacks, and Taggie made quick work of both, until it was Rupert’s rather unfortunate underwear situation, and a pair of lacy red bikini-cut panties which did not suggest Taggie had come here today and been seduced. Quite the other way around.

“Wear these everyday, do you?”

Taggie shrugged, and lay back on her elbows, surprised that Rupert wasn’t taking them off.

“Never know when a client might take my fancy.”

Rupert panted, a huge shuddering breath, and failed to laugh.

“What was it you wanted me to eat?” he asked instead.

She groaned, leant her head back, and Rupert was terribly disappointed in himself that he hadn’t explored her breasts yet. Christ, he was already planning it. He could palm at them as he kissed her, use to pinching fingers to make her nipples rise, thumb at the marks her bra had left on the swell of them, knead and grab until her hands covered his, begging them to move down.  He’d come back to it, during a refractory period, perhaps.

“Don’t make me say it,” Taggie  was murmuring, “besides, that was your turn of phrase–”

Rupert was on poor form. He had to regain some control of the situation. Taggie yelped as he let himself fall backwards off the bed, catching himself on his hands so that his knees touched the floor and he could pull her closer by the thighs, attaching his mouth to her soaked underwear mid-squeak.

To his relief, she said nothing, arching back into the mattress and letting out little whimpers with every laboured exhale.

“Is this what you had in mind, love?” Rupert’s words were so muffled, as he refused to stop working his jaw against her.

She started to reply, just as he scraped his teeth across her underwear, and Taggie gave a sob.

“Sorry, I’ll ask again,” he murmured, and repeated his trick just as soon as she began to speak, soothing the shock by suctioning onto the area around her clit.

“You bastard,” Taggie panted.

When Rupert detached she whimpered, tried to pull her legs closed around him, but Rupert wouldn’t allow it. He returned, suckled for a few more moments, and relished in the taste of her, adding the point of his tongue, and when she was about to give a full throated moan, he pulled back to speak, feeling the tense of her thighs around his shoulders.

“Feels good, though?” he asked.

“Take them off,” she begged, “and never do that biting thing again.”

“You like the biting thing,” Rupert pointed out, but he was already hooking two fingers into each side of her underwear, tugging them down her legs and throwing them so they’d land ever-so-perfectly on his headboard. His side of the bed, naturally.

“Do you want me to eat you, angel?”

“Yes, god. Please.”

There was no restraint left as Taggie squirmed, now fully naked on his expensive cotton sheets. Rupert discretely palmed himself over his boxers, out of her view, and tried not to hiss at how badly he needed relief.

One look from Taggie, peering down her body at him curiously, was enough to change his mind. He wrapped both hands into the sensitive join between her thighs and pelvis, both thumbs pressing either side of her pubic bone. Rupert circled for just a moment, distracting her, before he finally tasted her from the source. He’d known she was sodden. He could smell it, feel it on her underwear, but the first lap he took from her slit was like nectar, like honey, smeared across his face and he found himself desperately lapping for more. He had to close his eyes, had to steel himself, before he remembered how to properly pleasure a woman.

“Fucking hell,” she was saying above him, panting, really.

“Okay, angel?”

“Mhm,” she replied affirmative, “fuck.”

She was pulsing. She must have felt so empty, Rupert didn’t think before he slid his middle finger inside her, thick and at the last minute he twisted it, so that he could croon towards himself, feel the bumps and luscious softness inside her, until she shuddered out a moan and he found exactly what he needed.

“Ready, gorgeous?” he murmured, bracing himself as much as Tag.

“Ready?” she asked, but he was already slipping his tongue up, through her folds, until he found her clit.

It was hard, and eager for him, and Rupert laved it with his tongue in gentle sweeps until he felt her buck and throw one hand up to cover her eyes. He grinned against her, and heard her sob out a laugh. He slipped his ring finger inside of her, and felt her gasp more than he heard it, looking up to see Taggie reaching for his pillow, holding it over her face with desperate hands.

He worked harder, kitten licked, until she moaned through gritted teeth and arced until his fingers in her and on her had to keep her in place, and each pump of his fingers was greeted by her feet shifting on the bed around him.

Finally, he slurped at her clit, the start of intermittent pressure, and Taggie let out a sob.

Each time Rupert took a panting breath, she mewled her disappointment until he was breathing through his nose and only breaking away to speak. He laved her with his tongue, and she groaned sliding one hand down her body with a pinch at her nipple, before she pushed hard into her own stomach, then slid her fingers into his hair.

“Such a good girl,” he praised, and she clenched around him.

Even Taggie seemed surprised, as her cunt grasped his fingers and Rupert powered through, curling his middle and ring fingers, fighting against the urge to explore this newfound gift, desperate to give her all he could, suckling on her clit. She pulled his hair too hard, and he detached from her with a groan, and blew cool breath on her clit as a warning, and before she could even complain Rupert returned to his work. The sound of Rupert’s bedroom was outrageous, he was moaning against each breath he took, desperate to return to his task, and Tag’s slick pussy made each desperate pull of his fingers echo slickly wetly around the high ceilings, off the sash windows.

“You’re fucking ruining me Tag,” he whined, coming up for air, and then, “I’m so proud of you. Fuck – good girl.”

Rupert kept desperately mouthing at her clit, pumping his fingers, and he felt Taggie contract around him, but then she was grabbing him, by the hair, by the shoulders, until the weight of his torso was on top of her as she writhed and sobbed, pushing at the pillow until Rupert shoved it away for her.

“Good girl,” he couldn’t say it enough, whispered right into her ear, just for her, “oh I know. I know gorgeous. You’re doing so well. Good girl–”

He’d kept one hand inside her, something for her to clamp down on, and as her breathing returned to normal he gave a couple of gentle pumps of his fingers. She moaned when he slipped out, wiping his fingers with wide, light swirls against her pussy lips, until he got too close to her swollen clit and she whimpered and pulled him away.

Even the air was sensitive against her clit, and Rupert shifted to let her close her legs, to curl up on her side. He pulled her closer, wrapping himself around her, letting them both ignore the hardness against her back. He forced his chin into the gap between her head and shoulder, and she pulled him in, panting.

“Hi, gorgeous. Welcome back.”

Taggie didn’t really speak, and he wasn’t sure what to do about it.

“You should’ve let me keep going, could’ve tried for another one,” he teased.

Taggie’s eyes were wet, her face blotchy, like she’d been out in the arctic winter, pink and gorgeous and slick with sweat. She wouldn’t look at him, pulled her arms into herself. Rupert realised with distant horror that she was embarrassed, and he wouldn’t tolerate that for a moment.

“All that worry, and you did so well.”

“Hm?”

“Mhm,” he hummed against her.

The housekeeper always tucked the covers in too tightly, he’d complained before, and then felt like he was five years old. He reached over Taggie to tug the duvet free, and pulled it back across their bodies, letting her fidget until she was comfortable.

“Holy shit,” she murmured, and Rupert said nothing.

He lay there for a moment, waiting for her to come back, reflecting on the fact this might be the most difficult thing he’d ever done sexually. And Rupert had done some impressive things. Not because of her claims she found it hard to come, or because of any physicality, but just because he was so damn scared. Scared she’d hate him. Scared she’d regret it. Scared he’d let her down.

He took a deep breath. Taggie was fine again now, if embarrassed, and Rupert couldn’t help the shark-like grin he wore. This was the greatest thing that had ever happened to him.

“Sorry, I’m not sure what happened,” she began, but Rupert shushed her as kindly as he could manage.

“I knew you wouldn’t have a problem,” he told her gently, not wanting to make fun of her, “just a question of the right… partner. Someone taking the time you deserve. I hope one day you do too.”

“Thank you,” she said, and it was so sincere, that Rupert was lost for words, “I know you were… making me laugh, and stuff, so I’d be more relaxed. I appreciate it.”

“Hey, angel, none of that, it’s my genuine and utter pleasure. Besides, I think you mostly made yourself laugh.”

Taggie snorted, and detached from him, slipping onto her back and letting the duvet uncover her a little as she stretched out. Unselfconsciously, she slipped a hand between her legs, and felt how wet Rupert had left her. He watched as she spread herself with two fingers, touched her clit, slipped a finger inside herself to feel how he’d stretched her. It was, inexplicably, the most seductive thing Rupert had ever seen.

He couldn’t help it. He grabbed her wrist, pulled her fingers to his mouth, laved his tongue around them, desperate to taste her, to hear the groan she gave as he pulled his tongue up her entire palm, licking and sucking until she pulled away from him, pushing at his face like she was gently batting away a begging dog.

“Sorry, gorgeous, it’s just that everything you made it absolutely delicious.”

A bright pink flush rose up her face and chest, but nonetheless Taggie rolled her eyes, head flung back in an outrageously seductive tangle of reddish brown.

“You’re absolutely terrible,” she chided.

Rupert began to move, back down the bed so he was opposite her, and lying over her. He organised her hands so they were above her head, and gave her fingers just one more lick for good luck.

“Actually,” he said, and Taggie laughed as he ducked back down, to lick a slow, careful stripe up her opening, tongue plunging into her and the pressure lightening to the barest touch when he reached her clit.

“Sorry angel, I hope you don’t mind.”

“Not at all,” Taggie laughed, “god, sorry. I’m miles away. Like, hazy.”

“I trust that means I’ve done my job then,” Rupert was back to towering over her, kneeling, and he was palming at his boxers.

Taggie found her eyes caught on the wetness of them, grey darkening to black near the waistband, where the hard shape of his cock sat.

He set his knees inside hers, pulled one leg at the time up until her feet hooked around his back, and she had no choice but to curl up towards him.

“You’ve done an amazing job,” she told him, and twenty-four hours ago, Rupert wouldn’t have believed the pride which swelled in his chest as Taggie told him that.

For god’s sake. He truly couldn’t remember a single time before now when he’d been so desperate not to fuck up a sexual encounter.

“Angel, do you want to…” he trailed off. Like some teenager who couldn’t ask for what he wanted.

“Oh! Yes, please. Yes, Rupert – ”

“Lots of women don’t come during actual, y’know, this bit. We don’t have to, if you don’t want to.”

Taggie’s wide-eyed trust was too much. He was going to lose his mind. She didn’t seem to care in the least, reaching back for his discarded pillow, testing the feeling of it under her head.

“I want to feel you inside of me. It’s okay if I don’t… um, come.”

“Are you sure, angel? I won’t think any less of you, if we don’t do this today.”

“No, I do! I really want to. Besides, that looks, um, painful.”

She nodded down to his boxers, and sat up to start peeling them off him. Rupert let her, relishing in the feeling, hissing as her warm hand touched him, and then when it became too much he gently pushed her back down by the shoulders.

Rupert couldn’t believe the man he’d become. It was like an out of body experience as he crawled over her, and retrieved a condom.

He pulled her up by the hips, and Taggie leant back, watched him with curiosity.

“Are you okay like that?” she asked him, and Rupert could have cried.

“My back’s not quite gone yet.”

“Not what I meant,” she murmured, but Rupert was busying himself finding a way to get a hand free, and run it experimentally down her slit, then up to her clit. It was almost impossible to find friction, and her sensitivity against his slippery fingers made Taggie give a gorgeous spasm. She looked so beautiful, puffy, undone, that it was almost a shame to ruin it.

“Ready, darling?”

They’d lost momentum, in the time it had taken for him to put on the condom and to get Taggie ready, and he gave himself a few pumps under her curious watch. She blinked, and he repeated the question.

“Tag? Okay?”

“Yes,” she murmured, “please.”

Rupert hesitated as she spread her legs, lay back, didn’t seem quite sure what to do with her hands. Caitlin had said she’d had sex before, with some university kid who’d been at Patrick’s 21st, but he had a sudden flash of fear that it might not have been true.

But then Taggie was saying it again.

“Please, Rupert.”

“You’re sure?”

“Is something wrong?” she worried her lip, and he couldn’t stand it. He leant forwards, kissed her, and pressed his forehead to hers as he lined himself up with Taggie’s cunt.

“Let’s go together, yeah Angel? I’ll go slowly. I swear. The tip…”

He was speaking into her mouth, and he could feel her gasp as he broached her, and Rupert wanted so desperately to see her face as he stretched her, see how she looked as a strangled whine escaped her throat, but every muscle in his body was tensed and he couldn’t move for fear everything might be ruined.

Rupert was about to check on her, to kiss her again, when Taggie whined, and used what little leverage she had to force him deeper, so he pushed himself into her, guiding her head backwards onto the pillow with one hand on her forehead and the other on the inside of her thigh.

“Good girl,” he realised he was murmuring into her ear, “oh my god, good girl. Do you feel good?”

“Hm? Tell me?”

Taggie couldn’t speak, she nodded fervently, and surged up to kiss Rupert. He laughed into her mouth.

She was pulsating around him, wet and soft and pliant and kind and he moved slowly to start with but after a second he began to plough into her, watching Tag take him with her head thrown back, occasionally grasping at her breast, or looking down to see him thrusting in and out of her, watching the slight movement of her stomach as he filled her.

Rupert tried to thumb at her clit but Tag brushed him away, replacing his hand with her own, making soft, delicate little circles until Rupert murmured that he was close, so close, and he’d almost pulled out before he had a muddled memory that a condom meant he didn’t have to, and thrust himself back inside as deep as poor little Taggie’s cervix before he clamped around her shoulders with both hands, and pressed his open mouth into her neck as he came, giving a few final, short humps before he stilled.

In the few short seconds it took Rupert to catch his breath, he felt Tag clenching around him, felt the rub of her hand against his inner thigh, her fingers working her clit in languid, gentle little circles and making her contract around him as he softened inside her.

“Tag?” he asked blearily, and she stopped her movements.

“Oh, sorry,” she murmured, but Rupert found her hand, made some half-hearted, exhausted attempt at mimicking what he’d been doing.

“Keep going, are you close?” he asked, and she picked back up, giving a hum.

“Just feels good.”

“Okay, angel,” he told her, and let himself drift, feeling the gentle rub of her fingers against him.

When Rupert woke up, Taggie was still there. He wasn’t inside her anymore, though he realised with a grimace the condom was still on him, wretched thing. She wasn’t playing with herself, she was just lying there, on her side, watching him.

He’d left toothmarks imprinted in her shoulder. She couldn’t have noticed yet, and he hoped they might fade before she caught sight of them. Or maybe he hoped they’d stay forever, for Seb and Bas and Declan to see so they could all fuck off and let him have her.

“Morning, gorgeous,” he tried, stretching his arms out above his head.

In truth, he was a little embarrassed. Falling asleep after sex was such an old thing to do.

“It’s only been about fifteen minutes,” she told him, and Rupert grimaced.

“No morning breath, then!”

He forced himself to roll over, walk into the en suite. Get that damn condom off. He wasn’t proud of the whore’s bath he took in his sink, but sometimes needs must.

He came back with a cloth and some lotion for Taggie. It wasn’t something he’d ever felt compelled to do before, but in a moment of madness, he saw the stuff and concluded that she would have sore muscles and he ought to rub them.

Taggie acquiesced, though had already cleaned herself up, and Rupert tried to be a gentleman as he worked over her shoulders, her lower back, her thighs and hips – it was the sort of thing they’d done at the stables a lot, before they all fucked each other.

When he ghosted his fingers over the toothmarks he felt a surge of pride, and felt Taggie laugh under him.

“You’re such an animal,” she teased, and Rupert chuckled to himself.

It occurred to him she wasn’t sure what happened now. Rupert had presumed they’d pretend to date for a few months, then she’d be Mrs Campbell-Black. Taggie was eyeing the floor, deciding whether to collect her clothes.

He wiped the lotion off his hands on his thighs, and clambered back onto the bed with her. It occurred to him she might be cold, but he was afraid to do anything to interrupt the moment.

“I do have a confession, Taggie,” he began, watching her tense, as he knew she would, “I have slightly put the horse before the cart here.”

“Oh?”

It broke his heart, a little, how she was determined to be relaxed, to keep her face open.

“Only, if I haven’t disappointed you – and I do believe sexual compatibility is incredibly important – it was far more my intention to take you on a date. Or two. Up to about a dozen, before I’ll propose. And you’ll have to move in, really as soon as possible but I understand if you want a tour of the grounds first, a few days to decide…”

“If this is some…” she began, before looking down at the floor, “are you making fun of me?”

He wanted to kiss her. Wanted to swaddle her in the duvet and never let her leave. He took one of her hands in his, and just held it.

“I have absolutely no idea what would possess you to think that, Angel.”

She blinked, and Rupert could see her thinking, about him, the house, the rumours, her bloody parents. He’d asked for too much. Rupert had always believed in bold gestures, but this was too far. He could tell, now. She looked at the hand he’d captured with his, and Rupert pulled her hand to his pounding chest, wondered if she could feel it through his skin.

Finally, she seemed to decide. Beamed up at him, hair a mess as it fell around her, her mascara pooling below her eyes.

“You’re not getting a discount on your catering,” she told him, and Rupert laughed, and laughed, and it wasn’t fully enough but he found himself wrapping Tag in his arms and pulling her into him and dragging them both under the covers.

She was laughing too, if a little more shocked, calling his name in shock when he pulled the duvet down around them even though it was only late afternoon and the sun was still high in the sky and they both had places to be.

“I’d have to hide the money in your coat for you to take it anyway,” he told her breathlessly, and Tag turned her head just enough that he could see her roll her eyes.

“Maybe I’ll accept payment in diamond form, from now on.”

Rupert didn’t even bother to laugh. He hooked a leg around her, pulled her as close as he could to him, wrapped a hand across her stomach, and put just that tiny bit of his bodyweight on her that he knew she liked.

Sometime in the early afternoon you had heard movement upstairs, and made yourself scarce, hiding in the lounge, tidying what you could and drifting along the spines of the novels which lined the O’Hara’s huge bookshelves. You’d picked up something that could’ve been Maud’s or Declan’s – you weren’t sure. It didn’t look well-worn. You’d been meaning to read The Shining for years, now seemed as good a time as any to sit at the end of the O’Hara’s sofa, and try not to think about what you had seen the night before.

“I didn’t realise you’d be staying.”

A hundred pages had passed before you heard that thick Irish lilt, rich with that kind of blunt hospitality which had to be imported from Dublin. You knew it sometimes rubbed people the wrong way, particularly in this passive-aggressive pocket of privately-educated England. You liked it.

He looked startling similar to the Declan O’Hara you were used to watching on TV. Not much like the Declan O’Hara who would pick Taggie up from club nights and sleepovers, waving with a sly, knowing smile from the car and asking if you’d be able to get home safely.

“Taggie invited me for the long weekend, but…”

You gestured around with the book at his empty living room. His empty house. There were streamers stuck in the rafters, too high up for you to grab and shove into a bin liner.

“Apologies for my daughter’s lack of hospitality,” he sighed, and sat down heavily in the armchair adjacent to your sofa, face in his hands for a moment.

He rubbed the skin of his forehead aggressively, and when he looked away his face was marked red, his hair thrown into chaos.

“That’s okay, I’m sure she’ll be back. The quiet is nice, after last night.”

Declan hummed, and spread his arms along the back of the chair, reclining. For once, spreading out didn’t make him look any bigger. He was wearing jeans and a smart white shirt, but it obviously hadn’t been ironed.

“You’re reading Stephen King?”

“Oh,” you closed the book around your fingers, showing him the cover, though he already knew, “yeah. A borrowed copy, I hope you don’t mind.”

“No, not at all! Please, borrow or eat or steal whatever takes your fancy. It’s the least I can do to make up for this shitshow. And my daughter’s forgetfulness…”

You chuckled, and looked anywhere but Declan. He had such an intense gaze, you wondered how anyone stood their own against him across an interview stage.

“It’s really fine. I’m glad she seems happy, or at least excited…”

Declan huffed, stared at the ceiling, and you couldn’t tell what it meant. His hands came together and met his lips like a prayer.

“Have you read The Shining?” You asked quickly.

He was a master of awkwardness, and of silence and question evasion, but you didn’t want to pressure Declan in his own home. If he were one of your friends, you’d already be crushing him in your arms, letting him break down against you in the fiercest hug you could imagine. Instead, he was Taggie’s dad, who you’d never been able to bear to look at too closely, and watched obsessively whenever he appeared on television. You’d even watched him judge a pagent, for God’s sake, crammed around a kitchen table with your housemates complaining and a VHS Taggie had sent whirring away in the player.

You felt a swoop of pride when he perked up at your question, a glint of white teeth visible as he leaned forwards to take the book from your hands, your page number lost. You’d find it again later, in exchange for that dry brush of his fingers against yours. Declan flicked through the pages, eyes moving quickly.

“I have. That’s my copy, in fact. I don’t think the girls ever ended up reading it.”

Something on the page caught his attention, and he hummed as he skimmed the prose.

“Oh, room 217, gives me the shivers even now,” he raised his eyebrows expectantly, and you frowned, tilting your head.

“I don’t think I’ve read that far…”

“Ah, shit. Pretend I didn’t say anything. He has a lovely time in room 217.”

He was joking, and you laughed to be polite. Declan looked drained. Exhausted, hungover, sad.

“Can’t wait,” you replied dryly, as Declan dropped the book onto the coffee table between you.

“I had to stop reading it in bed,” he admitted, glancing from side to side, as though his secrets might be revealed to some unwanted intruder, “I started waking Maud up, talking in my sleep about a ghost in the room.”

You laughed, again it was because Declan wanted you to – wanted to keep the mood light – but you never quite found the right pitch and volume. Maud. He seemed to remember then, talking about her, what had happened.

“I’m sorry you had to see that fiasco yesterday,” he had shifted his voice, and become formal again, like he was introducing his show.

You remembered his falling face, Maud telling him to beg, bag in hand. You remembered Taggie, putting on a mask after the tears had fallen, and the hollow way she imitated the cheeky eyebrow raise you’d exchange over schoolgirl crushes and flirting in clubs, before she sought out a man old enough to be her father. She’d been crushed.

“No, it’s… don’t apologise for that. I’m sorry.”

You didn’t need to say what for. He shrugged, and stared up at the ceiling. The house was so, so quiet. Declan’s breathing was quiet, but you could see how laboured it was in the rise and fall of his chest.

“Do you think she’ll come back, after rehearsals?” you dared to ask.

“I don’t think she’ll come back after the run’s done, to be honest.”

There wasn’t anything to say. You looked up at the fireplace, ancient and beautiful. In the long centuries the house had stood, you wondered if it had seen any sadder sight than this.

“She’s a fucking star!” he announced, voice too loud and his hands flying up, up, before crashing back to his thighs.

You froze, watching him cautiously. He cleared his throat, and made fleeting eye contact as he glanced at you, suddenly appearing sheepish.

“Sorry, that was… sorry. I didn’t mean to shout.”

You murmured that it was fine, but in truth you had no idea if you actually said anything. Declan was panting. Tears or rage seemed equally likely, and he looked at you beseechingly. You wished there was anything you could do to answer him. To help him. The silence went on for longer than you wanted, but there was nothing to say. What could you offer?

Not that ‘there would be others.’

Not that ‘she never deserved him’, handsome and sharp and so, so damn principled it made you ashamed.

He was clenching and unclenching his jaw. You could see it, the muscles flaring and thinning. Your heart pounded in sympathy, something hot and nauseating darting around your stomach, and when his eyes met your sympathetic gaze, you couldn’t bear it. You watched the floor by his feet.

“I knew she was cheating on me. This time, I mean.”

“I’m sorry. That’s not fair.”

Declan sighed, and rolled his head, stretching out his neck. You wondered if he’d been drinking, if he was still drunk. You could smell him, aftershave and sweat, but no whiskey. His eyes were clear and sharp, there was something so controlled about him. He was always in control of the frantic chaos around him. Action and madness had always circled around Declan.

“I’m just sorry for the girls. They deserve better than a father who can’t keep their mother. Or a job. Or a house,” he laughed hollowly, and fell back into his sofa again, watching you from the corner of his eye.

“Mr O’Hara…”

He smirked at you from where he was collapsed, a twitch of his upper lip hidden by his moustache. You could really see his amusement in his eyes, sparkling. You thought of evenings spent at their London house, Declan making the family roar with laughter over a takeaway while Maud was elsewhere. He was always doing something, when he was with his kids. Inventing clever games and telling stories and beating you all at cards. He was a man in control of every room he entered.

“Please don’t sound like you work for me.”

“Sorry,” you teased back, “but don’t half those people last night work for you now?”

He groaned, head in hands, but it was teasing this time. You knew he was joking. Declan kept his eyes uncovered, checking your reaction.

“Christ knows. I’ve no idea who does and doesn’t. Maybe I work for them? It’s all on my head if it goes tits up, though. That’s the main thing.”

“That doesn’t sound stressful at all,” you collapsed a bit in sympathy, pressing your face to your forearm, laying against the arm of the sofa.

“No,” he groaned, “selfish as it is to say, a runaway wife is the last thing I need right now.”

“At least she’ll be happy,” you ventured, and froze as his stare fixed on you, heart catching in your mouth.

“Sorry,” you rambled, “as in, she’s doing what she loves. Not… not that you made her…”

He stayed quiet, and watched you. It was a poor thing to say and a misstep and suddenly you froze. You’d overstepped, lying on his sofa and reading his books and joking with him like he wasn’t Taggie’s bad.

“I just meant, it might be easier, not worrying so much. That she’s making her own choices, and you’re not to blame for whether she’s happy.”

“Maybe I did make her unhappy.”

“Declan…”

He ignored your plea, his gaze fixed firmly on you, warm and intense and melted-chocolate brown. It was far too much, though you could tell his mind was elsewhere.

“I thought we were doing well. Not, well, per se, but well enough. Well enough that she wouldn’t leave me for London the first chance she got.”

You had no idea what to say. You let him speak.

“Everyone else in this fucking town seems to cheat at their heart’s content – God knows Corinium has herpes in the sofa cushions – and yet… I thought she wouldn’t. They all seem to pretend to be happily married, but my crime? Working too much? With the rate Maud burns through money, there’s no other choice. Venturer was all so I could finally stop being at someone else’s beck and call. She’d have supported that, back then. When we first met.”

When Declan stopped speaking, and let the room fall into uncomfortable silence, you realised you could hear your own heartbeat. It was pounding in your ears. Your pulse was thumping in your throat, and it hurt where your chin dug into your arm. The Priory was old and thick-walled and it absorbed all sound, so the quiet between you was absolute.

It wasn’t right, or any O’Hara home to be quiet. They were the loudest family you’d ever heard.

Finally, when it seemed like Declan was never going to speak again, you could bear to look at him again. He was still staring, but you weren’t sure he’d realised you were in the room. He looked so morose; you couldn’t bear it.

“I think Maud might never have been happy here. No matter what you did. If all she wanted was to be on-stage, what else can replace that?”

“She wants attention,” Declan sighed, “that’s what Maud’s always wanted. To be adored. Maybe she didn’t feel adored enough.”

“I think a lot of women would feel lucky, I mean, watching you with Maud… it was obvious how you felt for her.”

He raised an eyebrow as he looked at you, and rest his head against the arm of the oversized armchair, mirroring you.

“I’ve often wondered if she needs too much for any one man to give,” he speculated, the gentle rhythm of light-hearted teasing was back in his voice.

You were surprised to realise how much you’d missed it. Still, you weren’t sure what to say.

“She needs hundreds,” he continued, “fawning over her every night, cheering and throwing flowers. And maybe someone to watch her in the odd play as well.”

You laughed, sincerely this time, and it made Declan laugh too.

“God, that’s terrible,” you played at scolding, but had no heart for it.

Declan was smiling, indulgently, watching you sideways with half of his face pressed into his armrest and forearm. He was flexing his hand out absentmindedly.

“True, though,” he scoffed, “I always wondered what you must have thought, when you girls got all dressed up to go out and Maud showed up, all miniskirts and cleavage. You must’ve thought she was a nutter, trying to outdress her own daughters.”

“I actually asked her if she wanted to come out with us once,” you remembered fondly, “I was sure Taggie was about to murder me with a curling iron.”

Declan chuckled. Lethargic and curled up on an armchair, the fierceness of two decades in entertainment melted off him. You could see his frownlines when he raised his eyebrows to listen to you, but they soon smoothed again. Was this how he had looked when Maud first met him, gentle, relaxed?

“I was always glad she had you,” Declan admitted, “I was glad to see you, on the nights you’d all go out together. Knew that meant there’d be someone to look out for her.”

Something had changed, and he was talking to you as a peer. Dissecting a time when you’d been younger, known less. Maybe seeing his wife walk out on him qualified you to speak on equal terms.

“I think Taggie’s the most sensible person I know, I’m not sure she ever needed me.”

Declan sighed, and gestured into thin air, and you remembered how the two of you had ended up alone in the house. The hours of tears over Rupert Campbell Black, a small fortune in phone bills that Declan had paid silently, as penance for bringing his family to the Cotswolds.

“She’s got a good heart. Not sure I’d say sensible.”

You wanted to argue, but you knew Declan adored his kids above all else.

“With their genetics, I’m afraid all of them were going to end up brash. Emotional.”

“Clever, though. And kind. Isn’t that what matters?” you weren’t talking about Maud, and Declan knew it.

“They’re already better people than we ever were,” was all he offered.

You had been completely enraptured by their new house when you visited, and privately fascinated by the ‘countryside’ version of Declan. You had hoped he’d be less stressed, but from what you’d gleaned about his business ventures, nothing could be further from the truth. Nonetheless, there was something different about him.

About how he watched you.

Something self-assured, despite Maud and his kids abandoning the house. Perhaps it was your imagination, but it looked as though Declan was trying to work something out.

“What are you going to do now?” you asked.

“Hang out with you, I suppose. If you don’t mind.”

You remained silent. Declan read people for a living, and he knew that wasn’t what you’d meant.

“I suppose I’m meant to wait for her to come back,” he sighed, “and beg again, perhaps. Try not to catch crabs off whatever actor she’s under.”

You couldn’t help it – you winced.

“Sorry – I shouldn’t say shit like that. Tag would tell me off. I just… I’m not sure how many more times I can take it. It’s humiliating. Pathetic.”

“You’re taking the high road, I suppose…”

“Ah, fuck the high road!” he interrupted you, and threw his head back against the back of the sofa, “I’m tired of the sodding high road. There’s no one there, at the end of it, saying ‘congratulations on keeping your wedding vows while your wife fucked another man’. I know Maud. She’ll fuck around in London, and if it goes badly she’ll crawl back, and mope until she finds another ‘casting agent’ to fuck. If it goes well, I’ll never see her again, and if Venturer ever makes a profit she’ll divorce me to get it.”

You weren’t sure what to say, and when Declan’s brown eyes met yours past the forearm he’d thrown over his face, you realised his eyes were glassy.

“Sorry, you didn’t ask to hear all that. Christ.”

“No, I… I’m glad you’ve got someone to talk to. Declan… I can’t imagine.”

“Do you know what isn’t fair? What really isn’t fair? For all that talk about being abandoned and lonely and bored, I’d come back after work, or sneak back on my lunch break, and it was always ‘not now, Declan’. Every single time. ‘Neglected’ my arse.”

When you froze, it felt like a prey instinct. Declan was talking about his sex life. To you. His lack of a sex life. Christ. The way Taggie complained about her parents, you’d imagined something very different from Declan. You’d imagined Declan a lot, in fact.

“What a fucking hypocrite.”

You weren’t sure if it was your swearing, or your sentiment, but Declan’s face cracked into a grin.

“You’re telling me!”

“God, if I had a man in my gorgeous house, sneaking back on his lunch breaks…” you broke off with a laugh, and looked anywhere but Declan.

“You’d what?”

Was he closer? Declan’s voice was serious, and you had to glance towards him to realise he’d leant forwards, elbows on his knees.

“I’d take every chance I could get,” you finished quietly, and the words seemed to linger in the room forever.

“Atta girl,” Declan murmured.

Fuck. You could hear the shifting of his clothes as he fidgeted in his seat.

For a long time, you remained in silence, wondering if the heat you felt would suddenly dissipate. The air had become molasses thick, and you couldn’t look at Declan. He wasn’t far away, a few feet, when he leant forwards. Finally he slumped back into his armchair, legs spread obscenely far apart.

“Do you have a boyfriend, back home?”

You wanted to laugh. In disbelief. In embarrassment. Your clothes felt too tight against your heated skin. Instead, you murmured a no.

“Good. Not a damn man in London good enough for ya.”

The silence played out a little longer. You wondered whether Declan cared about fidelity at all. If he was going to move at all. For a while you just watched him. Forced yourself not to look down, top see if he was as turned on as you felt. It was obscene, how exhaustion and stress and misery still couldn’t hamper his good looks.

There was something more than look about Declan, though. Something in his mannerism. The intensity he watched you with. The way he catalogued every little time you’d interacted. The way he was letting his eyes sweep across you, his gaze hot and searching.

“I don’t want you to regret this, I’m not…” he began.

“I know what a rebound is.”

Your voice was so hollow, it turned bitter, and surprised you. His lust-drunk eyes widened suddenly, and the tension returned to his face. You could feel your own body respond, growing tenser, startled.

“I don’t know what you take me for, sweetheart, but I’m a damn sight older than the boys you’re used to. I wouldn’t know how to ‘play games’ if I tried. I swear. This is the first chance I’ve had to fuck you, and if you’ll let me take it, you’ll have a good time. I promise, the greatest thing about you is that you’re not my wife.”

He paused for breath, and seemed to struggle for a moment. You noticed his hand gripping his thigh, stopping it from shaking.

“You’re kind, and patient, and you listen to me, and you’ve read bloody Stephen King from my bookshelf without me begging you to care about what I care about.”

“Yeah?”

“You’re gorgeous. As soon as Taggie brought you here, I knew you’d ruin my fucking life. You used to ask me how every show went, do you remember? Back at the BBC? Not even my damn wife did that.”

He held a hand out for you, but you weren’t sure what to do with it once you took it. Fingers entwined, you climbed onto his armchair, straddling his lap. Declan groaned, and latched onto the exposed column of your neck, his free hand enormous as it found your waist.

“Oh, your ego likes me? Is that it?”

“Him too,” Declan murmured, and shifted, so that you suddenly realised you could feel him, hard against the crotch of your jeans.

“You’re too young for me,” he murmured against your skin.

“Who cares?”

He laughed, and you knew it was what he’d wanted to hear. Declan pulled more of your weight onto him until you were practically crushing him, thighs on thighs and chest to chest, and then he kept squeezing until his closeness began to hurt.

You rolled your hips and ground down against his lap, hoping to distract him, and Declan groaned, bassy and gorgeous.

“Tag can never know,” you breathed, and felt Declan’s hand move further up your torso in response, clutching the underside of your breast.

“Never,” he agreed, “never.”

When you wrapped both hands around his face and detached him from the underside of your jaw, Declan only released with a grotesque, went smack. You missed the feel of his tongue, skin chilled where his mouth had been, but it was far more important to pull him to your lips. He went willingly, head heavy in your control, looking up at you with glazed hazelnut eyes.

Declan groaned when he kissed you, matching his hands to your face as he took control.

“Do you know how fucking glad I was to see you yesterday?” he groaned against your lips, migrating across your face until he could return to the sensitive join of your jawline and neck, “and I couldn’t even admit to myself why. Isn’t that pathetic?”

“Honourable,” you mumbled, “I think it’s honourable.”

His hands were back on your body, groping until he could shove your bra up, pinching at your nipples through your clothes.

“You’re not gonna think I’m very honourable after tonight, sweetheart.”

“Yeah?”

You were grinding on Declan, desperate for the flashes of friction you could find against the seam of your jeans. He kept getting distracted, groaning when you found an angle he could feel.

“Think I might make you cry, I wanna see if I can make you tell me to stop. You ever been eaten out?”

When you didn’t respond, he squeezed your breast hard, making you yelp. You could feel the jolt from the pain between your legs. He cooed as he rubbed the pain away.

“Sorry baby, didn’t realise you were so sensitive,” he was mocking you, and it was making your entire body thrum.

A laugh shuddered from you, and Declan finally slid a huge, warm palm beneath your shirt and across your stomach.

“I’ll tell you what, why don’t you come upstairs, and we can get these clothes off, hm? Unless you want people to see.”

He slid a hand to the back of your neck, just firm enough to keep you facing down towards him. With his other hand, he began pulling your shirt up, until it was peaking above the mess he’d made of your bra, flesh spilling out obscenely.

“You’re right opposite the window, you know love, that big driveway. Anyone could be coming up to the house… and see you like this. All mine.”

Even lust-addled, you gasped, and tried to look up, but Declan’s grip on your neck stopped you, forcing you to stare down at him.

“You want me to make you cum here, right in from of anyone? In front of Tony? Or Rupert? The postman? My wife might walk back in right now…”

“No!” you gasped, trying to ignore the feeling of him kneading at your exposed breasts, your bra cutting a tight line across them, “please, Declan…”

“You’re sure? I don’t care,” he told you, glib, as he toyed with whether he could reach his mouth to your nipples, a wet tongue snaking across your skin.

“Declan!”

Finally, you wriggled away, and he gave up the moment you resisted him. You glanced up at the gravel driveway, exhaling shakily at finding it empty. Declan was chuckling to himself, pulling your torso closer again so he could mouth at your flesh.

“I did ask if you wanted to go upstairs, I think you were distracted.”

Finally, you could bring yourself to laugh breathily, pulling your shirt down despite Declan’s wandering hands fighting you.

“Upstairs!” you demanded, and pulled Declan to his feet.

He was walking differently, from how hard he was, and you palmed over his crotch, desperate to feel him. Declan groaned, and reluctantly tugged your hand away, adjusting himself.

“Before you get too mad at me,” he returned to your neck, and spun you in front of him, forearms bracing across your chest and stomach, forcing him against you.

You realised then he was framing you against a mirror, forcing you to look at how ravaged the pair of you looked. And the clear view Declan had of the driveway behind you.

“You’re a bastard, Mr O’Hara.”

Declan laughed, but you could see the colour rising in his cheeks, the gulp which moved his Adam’s apple.

“I told you you’d say that.”

“I’d assumed for better reasons than that,” you teased.

You wrapped your fingers around his belt, and began moving the leather to undo the buckle. Declan groaned and it caught in the back of his throat, rising to a whimper.

“C’mon, old man. You’ve made me some big promises.”

“I’m not sure I’ll be able to keep them,” he admitted, “if you keep touching me like that.”

“That’s okay,” you ran your hands along the inside of his waistband, feeling his stomach muscles twitch at the contact. “I know it’s been a while. How about you put that silver tongue to use first, yeah?”

“Christ,” Declan groaned, as you finally undid his fly. You stroked across the fabric of his underwear, and Declan threw his head back. His eyes were clenched shut, and his wandering hands had finally fallen to his sides.

“Do you think you’ll make it up the stairs?” you teased, “or should I just go up and finish this off on my own?”

Finally, he opened his eyes, and encircled your wrist with his fingers, pulling you away from him.

“Don’t say shit like that, love,” he went for your ear again, teeth grazing the skin and his lips salving where he’d been, “I’ve imagined that enough for a lifetime.”

“Oh yeah?”

You drifted your hand across his shaft one more time, and Declan let you, loosening his grip on your wrist.

“Come on then,” you teased, and took off.

He was slow, slower in his current state, but you let him chase you, up the stairs and across the landing, his breathless, deep laugh following you as he gave pursuit.

“I’m not that old,” he insisted, as he finally caught you on the upstairs landing, wrapping his arms around you from behind and briefly pulling you from the ground.

“Never said you were.”

“You’re really making me work for this,” Declan growled, sliding a hand down the front of your jeans. You laughed, safe in his grasp.

“I was just worried we’d never get up those fucking stairs.”

He chuckled, and pulled you against the bannisters, fighting with the button of your jeans. You laughed, and let him struggle, until the moment he succeeded, and his fingers met your clit, slippery and swollen.

“Please, just pick a room,” you begged.

“C’mon, love. Give me one here.”

You realised his gaze was out, across the fields, on the path where any one of the bastards in this village might see the pair of you. They wouldn’t, of course, but that was far from the point.

“Declan!”

“C’mon, just one.”

“Make it quick,” you conceded, and gasped as he let his finger slip fast over your clit. You could see the bliss on his face in the reflection of the window.

“That’s up to you, love. Think you can be good for me?”

“You’re the one,” you gasped, as he changed pressure again, experimenting, “you’re the one fingering me, Declan.”

He kissed you, suddenly, sweetly, on the cheek, fingers still working quickly over your clit. Despite the pressure building in between your hips, you laughed.

“What?” you asked him, catching him grinning to himself in the glass.

For a week, he had been buoyed. He had carried groceries for anyone who smiled at him, and lifted firefighters down from buildings to safety just to save them the effort after their own heroism. He had brought extra coffees to work and written up meeting notes he didn’t have to, and he’d put on the Superman costume just to makes kids smile. And every single time he’d gone out of his way, above and beyond, he’d glanced quickly around, scanning the crowd to see if you were there. He would do it all anyway. Of course he would.

But for some reason, Clark desperately wanted you to see him. For the man he was. The metahuman he was. He just wanted you to see him at all.

You had only met a handful of times, a consultant on some stories, so well-liked and knowledgeable that you’d be called back in every time your expertise was needed. Lois had found an excuse to bring you in to the ‘Planet just last week, and Clark had stumbled in, taking coffee and pastry orders.

“How’d you get that expensed?” Lois had asked afterwards, an eyebrow raised as they finished off the piled of pastries and cakes Clark had procured.

The table was messy with crumbs and paper bags – missing only the one you’d taken with you – not keen to eat until your work was done.

Lois already knew, of course, that Clark didn’t have a company card. That he’d swiped his own, hardly aware of the price because he was itching to run back, and watch the expression on your face as he handed you your drink, his fingers dancing away from yours in fear he’d overstep.

Lois knew because his face was tinged pink, and because Clark had asked half-a-dozen times when you were due to arrive, despite being nothing to do with the story.

“I just wanted to make sure we made a good impression.”

Snorting, the reporter packed up her things, recorder in hand and notes in a pile.

“You’re something else, Clark Kent.”

One part of his brain, of course, was processing the sound of you laughing politely with the doorman downstairs. The rest didn’t miss Lois’ eye roll, and his cue to turn even more red.

“I’ll clear up in here,” he interrupted her tidying, “you get going with the story. I know you wanted to get it in the Saturday edition.”

With a grateful smile, and one last glance over the table, Lois departed. He knew, knew, it was weird, but Clark let his hand rest on the arm of the chair you’d been sitting in.

*

Seeing you again had been dreadful. Perhaps the worst thing that had ever happened to Clark. Because the first few times he’d been overwhelmed, a little dazed, fumbling – just the way he liked Clark Kent, reporter, to be. The next times, though? He had to anticipate you arriving. Understand the way his heart was going to pound and his face was going to grow hot, and how he wouldn’t be able to say a word without watching your face to see how you reacted to him.

That last time, that interview with Lois, had been the final straw. She’d left an invoice from you out on her desk, and the address on it was the hardest Clark had ever tried to forget anything. You lived two blocks away from him. He’d accidentally flown past your building twice on every single patrol of the city since. He would wander home from work that way, on autopilot, and he couldn’t understand why every fifth person on the street suddenly looked like you did from behind.

Then, a fortnight later, he’d accidentally seen you. The real you. Not just someone your height or with your hair, or with a laugh that rang like yours did. It was you.

He had been Clark, fumbling with too much to carry, and feeling too big for the whole world as he tried to avoid barging into anyone on the sidewalk. You hadn’t seen him, until you were too close to each other, and walking too fast in opposite directions so you just beamed and nodded in recognition, and then you were gone and Clark was standing still on the sideway, blocking traffic and wandering what his face had done when you recognised him.

The final straw.

One day, he thought, you’d need saving, and Superman could carrying you away from danger. Or Clark would need you, for a story, and he searched every possible idea in his list for a way he might tangentially bring you in as an expert.

He liked a coffee shop between your building and his, or so he’d decided, and every time he walked up to the steamed-up windows he’d scan every single person inside just to see if you went there too. His heart would spike with it, the hope, and he tried not to hold it against you every time you weren’t there.

Clark had decided he was losing it.

This couldn’t go on. He couldn’t waste time scanning every crowd for you, calculating the velocity of every enemy in the packs which attached, always  to see if it any danger was heading towards you. Most of all, he couldn’t keep hoping. Ridiculous, pointless hope. That maybe you would need saving, or take issue with Lois’ article and storm into the Daily Planet offices, or worst of all – that you’d remember awkward, fumbling Clark Kent, and somehow come and find him.

Metropolis was a big city, and somehow every single part of it directed him back to you.

*

How ridiculous, then, that after three months of daily, obsessive, internal tug-of-war with himself over seeing you, that Clark almost missed Lois’ birthday party.

No part of him had considered that you might be there, in the private room of a basement bar near the Daily Planet offices. He hadn’t imagined that you might be buying Lois a drink and batting her credit card away with a laugh, that you might be dressed up and a little tipsy, and that your eyes might light up as Clark stumbled in a little late,  fluffing building dust out of his hair.

He smiled, raised a hand in a little half-wave, but you were already tapping Lois’ shoulder and pointing him out to her, and the reporter was waving him over to the bar, asking what he drank.

“I’ll get these,” you offered again, as the bartender pulled him a pint of something cold and golden.

There was something extra about Lois tonight, a challenge in her eyes, as she handed over a lite beer she knew was mainly for decoration. Still, even Superman needed to cool down sometimes. Clark’s whole body felt boiling hot – not just from the fight he’d won, the people he’d saved, but from the way he was fastidiously avoiding your eye contact.

“To Lois,” you were saying, raising your drink, and forcing the journalists to join, “my dear friend. Happy birthday. Thank you, for making me sound smart in the newspaper.”

Lois snorted into her cosmo.

“Like you need any help. I googled every other word you said.”

“I, uh, didn’t know you two knew each other,” Clark interrupted, too soon, too loudly, “I mean, obviously, you knew each other…”

You were looking concerned. So was Lois, eyebrows drawn together, though amusement danced at the corners of her lips.

“I just mean… socially,” he continued, “I didn’t know what you knew each other. Sources and journalists, y’know…”

“I’m a source?” you were asking, as Lois stood up a little straighter, head tilted in challenge.

Clark could hardly hear himself speak, it was like he was underwater, the words distant and foreign. He was making a fool of himself. Months, months, of planning how you’d meet again. How he’d charm you, and tell you how special he thought you were.

“Of course not! It’s just… you’re… not one of us, y’know?”

“Clark!” Lois finally interrupted, her good will for his bumbling had clearly run out already.

“We got on well. We go to the same gym, actually. And we both work with absolute morons, sometimes. So, we’re friends. Is that going to be a problem?”

“You’ve just never mentioned her…” he continued, lamely, beer slumping over the edge of its glass.

“Charming!”

You’re laughing, which Clark supposes is good, but he’s also not sure he’s ever been this socially inept in his entire life, which is quite bad.

“I’m going to take you over here now,” Lois is saying to you, and patting Clark on the shoulder for a reason he can’t really discern, “before Clark manages to put an end to our glorious friendship.”

You’re laughing again, and pulling at Lois’ arm, with a promise you’d never replace her because you need someone to force you to go to the gym. You’re also, he realises, watching him as you walk away. Slumping onto a bar stool, face in one of his hands, Clark realises he’s currently experiencing the new worst thing that has ever happened to him.

He wouldn’t usually finish a beer, except no one here knows he’s Superman except for Lois and Lois doesn’t care. It won’t affect him at all, even with the sun setting outside, and so he orders another one and pays for it himself (even though another colleague offers) because he wants to be left entirely alone.

With some good luck, you and Lois might forget he exists. It might be for the best.

Before, you had been a fantasy. A hope he clung to, alone on rooftops and curled up in bed. A pretty girl who would smile at him and let him carry her things, and be sweetly charmed when he told you how clever and pretty and capable he thought you were. Someone to fall in love with.

Now, he realised, he had measured himself up against the fantasy of dating you. For the first time in his life, he hadn’t made the bar. He was a thoughtful writer. A good man. A kind man. He strived to be all those things. Tonight, he’d been none. He was Lois’ rude, incompetent colleague.

She’d passed him once, on the way to the ladies room, and he’d tried to catch her attention on the way back. She had stopped only enough for another cosmo – and the bartender was strikingly efficient.

“Please,” he’d asked her, letting his card clatter down on the bar, plastic on metal, “I’m sorry for being a douchebag. I was just surprised, tell her I’m sorry. That I’m a normal guy.”

“What’s gotten into you?” she’d replied, fumbling with slightly-tipsy fingers to pick up his card and toss it back at him. “You are a nice, normal guy. You should apologise to her yourself. She thinks the world of, y’know, you.”

Her pointed look wasn’t helpful, and he said as much.

“I want her to think I’m normal.”

“I really don’t know how I can help you here, man.”

Drink in hand, Lois was in the process of sauntering away, friends turning to welcome her back to their little Clark-less huddle. You were there, he noticed, watching the whole scene with guarded interest.

“I didn’t mean to be rude,” he stumbled out, and when the words reached his ears, Clark thought he sounded like someone else.

Like a little boy, in a tiny school in Smallville, Kansas, who was too shy to make friends with the other kids.

Lois softened straight away, and despite the haze of the evening, he still saw that startling cleverness when he met her eyes, sharp and brown.

“After you first met, she asked me about you. In the elevator back downstairs. And at the gym, sometimes. She said she saw you on the street, and she talked about it for like, a day. And I can see this matters to you too. Talk to her, Kent. You’re better than this.”

“Really?”

Clark thought his voice still sounded small. His heart was pounding, twice the pace a normal man’s physiology could withstand. Yet he knew, inside, he was still that little boy, in that hulking shell, all the complexity of the life he’d made stripped away. It was childish, a feeling from two decades ago, of wanting to be liked and loved and not being sure how to show it.

“You’re so sweet,” Lois was smiling, quiet, to spare his dignity, “but yes. Really. You got this.”

It took whole minutes for Clark to centre himself. He listened to the sounds of the city, not sure if he wanted to hear the wrench of metal and screams, for an excuse to escape, or whether he wanted nothing more than to sit on this barstool fifteen feet from you.

Finally, he stood, took his useless beer and traipsed into the tiny, lantern-lit beer garden behind the pub. It was an alleyway, really, with grating overhead and composite furniture barely a shade different from the decking. Still, it gave the illusion of fresh air, and cooled the sweat which had decided to make a rare appearance on his face.

“Mind if I join you?”

You had peeled away from the group. They were still stood inside, in that big circle, laughing and celebrating Lois’ birthday. A cake had arrived at some point, and Clark felt a pang of guilt for not being inside, supporting his friend. He hadn’t answered, and so your steps out of the patio doors were cautious, until he turned and tried his best at a smile.

“Sorry, yes. Of course. I’m in my own world, tonight.”

“Too many of those?” you smiled, and he grimaced, putting down the sweating glass on the nearest table.

“I don’t think so.”

For a moment it was silent in the beer garden, and the space was filled by the rumble of traffic outside, the cheering and chatter of the party in the bar. He hadn’t realised that he’d tuned into your shallow breaths, but he was unconsciously matching each inhale.

“I’m sorry,” he blurted out, before he realised what he was doing, “for how I was earlier. I really didn’t mean to be rude, I’m glad you’re here.”

You regarded him for a long moment, playing with the stem of your glass. It was empty, and you were rolling it between your palms. Clark hadn’t realised he was holding his breath.

“This is so silly,” you confessed, gaze fixed a little past his shoulder, “but I was really hoping you’d be here tonight.”

“Why?”

Blunt. Rude. Again! What was wrong with him? You were looking at him with outright worry, and he hated to see the lines forming on your forehead, the visible faltering of your confident.

“I am so sorry! I swear, I am never normally like this. You… you do something to me. Make me act wrong.”

Again! Clark was sick of himself. He wanted Lois to save him. And excuse to throw a building, or wrench a window from a skyscraper. Anything, that would be easier than this. He took a deep breath. Tried not to notice the way you were shifting your weight back, away from him, towards the party.

“I really, really wanted to see you again,” he interrupted you, just as you were about to speak.

So, unconscionably rude. His Ma would clip him around the ear. Still, though, Clark couldn’t stop. He had to get the words out, before he never saw you again.

“So much. I went to the bakery near your place, and I thought about asking Lois for your number but I didn’t want to be a creep, you’re gorgeous and I –”

He’d admitted to knowing where you lived. To hanging around the area. He wanted to fly out over the ocean, and never come back.

“Lois said you were funny.”

“I’m… that’s the crazy thing, I’m not joking. I really, really liked you and I don’t know how not to screw this up.”

“Liked?”

“Like! I really, really like you. Sorry.”

Finally, you shift your weight forwards. You laugh. You don’t quite approach him, but you watch him.

“For what?” you’re asking sincerely. Not to tell him off, or because you want an apology.

“For being such an idiot about all this. I swear, I wanted to buy you flowers, and coffee – ”

“You did.”

“Well, yeah, but only because I wanted an excuse to see you, and Lois wouldn’t give up the interview –”

You were smiling. The weight in his chest subsided, and he just couldn’t, couldn’t stop talking.

“Would you let me? Take you on a date, and buy you flowers? I’m sorry this was such a weird start. I worry about you, all the time, and I swear I was just so shocked you were friends with Lois this whole time while I was worrying I’d never see you again –”

You interrupted him again. You had to, there was no other way to get a word in.

“I’d really like that.”

“What, when?”

“Well, it’s nice enough out here, and Lois seems to be managing without the both of us. My drink is empty…”

Clark moved past you so fast, it was almost unnatural. You blinked and he was at the bar and ordering another of ‘whatever she’s been drinking’ and a prepaying a cosmo for Lois. Then he was back outside, on the little patio, and pulling out a chair for you at one of the tables with a candle lit on it. Then back to the bar again, and then your drink in front of you. You exhaled with a laugh, in disbelief, as a smiling, exhilarated journalist threw himself onto the chair opposite you.

“That was fast!”

“I’ve been waiting for this for a long time.”

You beamed, and Clark felt something settling in his chest. A panicked, rushing thing which had been exhausting itself between his lungs for three months, finally at rest.

“I was so afraid I’d never get the chance to do this,” he confessed, only feeling the weight of the words once they’d formed in his throat and left his mouth.

“Do what?” you asked gently, hand resting on your jaw, trying to do anything but just stare at him.

He’s outrageously pretty, you’d complained to Lois once, wheezing out the words between sets, and she’d just laughed.

“Get to know you.”

You smiled tightly, and reached for his abandoned drink, sliding it in front of him.

“You might not like me, you know,” you teased, “what if I’ve got some big, scary secrets?”

He stopped, then, the jaw-aching grinning and the hunching forwards, trying to get closer to you. He searched your eyes, looking for the joke, looking for any chance you knew.

“I don’t think you have any,” he settled on, finally, and you raised your eyebrows.

“Really?”

“Yeah. And if you do, we’ll figure them out together.”

You held your drink up, and he was confused by what to do, until you tilted the rim a little, and wrapped his fingers around his beer.

“To figuring it out together.”

Clark couldn’t say anything. Over your shoulder, Lois was offering a thumbs up, beaming and generously keeping her iPhone camera firmly in her bag. He snapped back to you, the excitement on your face, the contours of your face illuminated only by candlelight and the distant, hipster bubs hanging over the bar. He raised his glass, and tapped it to yours as gently as he could, just to make you laugh.

Even in the airport, as Spencer passed through security with the lazy, efficient movements of a weary regular flier, you’d been waiting for his phone to ring. For it to all be over. You’d held his arm in the airport lounge, waiting for the gate announcement, not daring to speak a word in case the universe heard you and Spencer had to jump on a different plane before yours had even taken off. Then there would be the arguing with the airline. The money lost, the forms for it to be refunded by the FBI, your bags missing because they were already packed deep into the hold of the plane.

You had clutched your coffee cup, already feeling dread and exhaustion overtaking you.

Then the plane had taken off. You hadn’t quite believed it. Spencer put his phone on airplane mode, and showed it to you.

“We’ve made it,” he whispered, through a smile, “it would be in violation of the Federal Aviation Administration regulations to take a call from work now.”

You shoved your face into his neck, and let yourself begin to feel excited.

The resort was one recommended by a colleague of Spencer’s, boring and relaxing, adults’ only and pleasantly quiet. There was a time and a place for exploring and excitement, but truly the thought of Spencer spending a single week away from work felt like excitement enough.

In the taxi from the airport, when Spencer had turned his phone back on and not received summons from Gideon, you finally let yourself utter the words:

“I can’t believe we’re on holiday.”

“I know!”

Spencer was giddy, you could count on one hand the number of times you’d heard him giggle, and it was so wonderful you had to pull his hand into yours and squeeze it.

“I am so excited to do nothing,” he admitted, though you knew his e-reader contained a small library’s worth of books.

“I just want to eat good food, and spend time with you.”

“I think I’m going to turn my phone off,” he said abruptly, as though he’d only just had the thought he could.

“Yeah?”

“Yeah! Garcia knows where I am, if there’s a real emergency. That way I won’t feel like I have to check it all the time.”

“That sounds like a great idea.”

He smiled at you, and you watched as he shot off a quick text to Penelope, before completely turning his phone off. For a moment there was silence, and you both waited, listening to the sound of rubber on tarmac and feeling the heat of the sun outside. Nothing happened. Of course it didn’t. The realisation made you burst out laughing at the same time as Spencer, and you caught a flash of the driver’s backwards glance in the rear view mirror.

“You know what, mine too!”

You turned your phone off in solidarity, and stacked it beside his on the middle seat.

“Swap?” Spencer asked, offering you his phone, but you shook your head.

“Straight into the safe, when we get to the hotel. They can stay there.”

“That’s an even better idea.”

You knew, if it came down to it, if a life was at risk, he’d get the message from the hotel reception and go back to Quantico. That was okay. It was part of who he was, he needed the BAU, as much as they needed him.

There was a chain of people between that decision being made and Spencer finding out, including Gideon and Penelope, who would do everything in that power not to ask him. And that felt good.

For the first day, you let yourselves do only what you wanted to, to explore, to lie in bed, to read. Spencer needed the reminders not to watch every little thing that happened, not to examine poolsides and restaurants like they were crime scenes, but soon that went away and the frown in his brow was smoothed.

He wore swim trunks. He tried sips of your cocktail while floating in a pool. He laughed, and cried at one of the books he read, and ate properly, and let himself spend hours lying against your body in bed.

When you left the hotel, you both forgot your phones, and had to pay the taxi driver to turn around and get them.

“We should just leave them,” you’d joked breathlessly, as the receptionist concealed exasperation and politely led you to the room you’d just checked out of.

“That would be pointless, I’d just have to buy another one –” Spencer was distracted, following the receptionist, working out whether you’d miss the plane in the worst possible scenario.

You could see the stress in him, as the taxi driver waited outside with your bags, his meter running.

“Not if we stay here forever,” you teased, and finally saw the fall of his shoulders, the smile lines appearing on his face.

“You know, that’s not a bad idea.”

Spencer made it a whole 24 hours after landing without getting on another plane, and you considered it a small victory. When he called you on the jet you could almost see him, skin a little bit more tanned, his hair still a little curlier from the sun and the chlorine.

“You’d better bring a souvenir, jet setter,” you teased, and imagined Spencer wrinkling his nose before he replied.