#adow fic

“I ran into some old friends while in Lyon.” 

Matthew didn’t even bother to knock as he entered his brother's office. Baldwin held up his hand, phone pressed to his ear. 

“Don’t think that I won’t let this go. You have until Friday to fix this.” 

He hung up before the blabbering idiot on the other side could form a coherent reply, turning his attention back to Matthew. “We have quite a few of those, brother. You might want to be more specific.” 

Matthew dropped into the chair opposite Baldwin, without the grace of a millennia old vampire. “The Castellanos.” 

“All of them?” Baldwin inquired, leaning back into his chair. 

Matthew shook his head. “Only Alessandro and Elena but apparently they’re all going to be here at some point this month. We should pay them a visit. Or invite them here. It’s been quite some time since last.”

Some time was an understatement. The Castellanos had paid their respects after the loss of Philippe, an appreciated gesture of course, but it had been over 70 years since he had met any of them. 

They had been valuable allies and losing the ties between their families had been a mistake but after his father’s death, Baldwin had enough on his plate. On the other hand, 70 years in a vampire’s life wasn’t that long. Getting back in touch wouldn’t be such a bad thing. And he had been slacking recently with family business, too busy with work. 

“Are they residing in Lyon, or just visiting?” Baldwin inquired.

Matthew smiled. “According to Alessandro they relocated here when their youngest got accepted for university. They wanted to stay close. Not sure if all of them actually live there though.”

Baldwin raised an eyebrow. “Giovanni is studying again? If I remember correctly, he’s already acquired a few degrees in the last few decades.”

“Ah, here’s where it gets interesting. Their youngest is a newer addition. She wasn’t around last time we saw them.” His brother had a mischievous look on his face, something that rarely bode well for Baldwin. What could possibly be the reason for his brother’s excitement?

“A new vampire among humans? I’m surprised they’re willing to risk it by letting her attend university.” Baldwin commented, leaning forward and locking his hands together underneath his chin, his light brown eyes locking onto Matthew. 

His brother mimicked his position. “It’s not a new vampire. She’s human.”

That caught Baldwin off guard. While the recent years had made him somewhat more emphatic towards other creatures, warmbloods among them, he wouldn’t say that he understood why some thought humans fascinating. 

“A warmblood? Are you sure?” He questioned, wondering if Matthew was playing some kind of joke on him, simply to see how he would react.  It wouldn’t be the first time.

Matthew nodded. “Yes. She seemed nice. She’s attending ENS de Lyon, which is impressive. I didn’t have the time to chat more, which is why I think a visit or invitation would be nice. Catch up about the last 70 years.” 

Baldwin had four situations related to work that required his attention, Diana was on his case for something about the Congregation and he needed to deal with the latest issue concerning one of his sister’s children. 

Ideally, he wouldn’t have time for this, even if reconnecting with Alessandro and his family could prove useful. But the intrigue of a human family member in a vampire clan was tempting to explore. 

“Get in touch with Alessandro. See what fits them best.” Baldwin ordered, not caring that Matthew technically didn’t have to follow his orders. But their relationship had improved in the years that had followed his brother's mating and the birth of his children, so he didn’t think it was an unreasonable request. 

Matthew rose from his seat, phone in hand. “I’ll keep you posted. Oh, I promised Becca you would stop by later, just so you know.” 

Never the one to refuse his niece anything, something Baldwin would never admit to doing openly anyway, he simply nodded his agreement. “I’ll stop by after I deal with the idiots trying to ruin my company.”

He watched as Matthew left the office, phone already pressed to his ear. He couldn’t exactly say why but he felt a little off about potentially seeing their old friends again. 

Baldwin wrote it off as stress combined with the fact that it had been a while since he fed. Looking out at the darkening sky, he thought he might as well take advantage of the twilight. It would help get him mind off work and the other issues that were currently on his plate. 

He would need to return to Sept-Tours soon, but it could wait. For now, he needed to clear his head. And a hunt might be exactly what he needed.

Allowing a couple of daemons with no sense of restraint or discretion to open a nightclub in one of the largest, most audacious cities in the world was definitely up there on the list of bad ideas involving creatures.

As the Congregation member with the most connections in New York City, it fell to Baldwin to investigate and evaluate the risks. The witches refused to go anywhere near the place and Gerbert d’Aurillac was certainly not going to be able to blend in with the likes of Cher, Elton John, and Liza Minnelli.

Baldwin knew hedonism well enough. He was a Roman and had witnessed the excesses of that empire after all.

But there was hedonism, and then there was Studio 54.

The bad ideas flourished in every cocaine dusted corner of the building, from the dirty cubicles in the basement to the infamous rubber room upstairs. And like any hotbed for vice, the energy-seeking daemons and hungry vampires of the city were drawn in like moths to a flame.

Half the stories circulating failed to fully capture what really went on behind the velvet ropes and ruthlessly guarded doors - and those were only the stories shared by the clueless humans. Those were the modern myths in the making that gave the club its star-powered notoriety.

The salacious things Baldwin helped cover up - like how that dead body really got into the air shaft - were secrets as closely guarded as the vetting at the door. The key to keeping those stories tightly under wraps were straightforward threats of how easy it was to arrange ‘accidental’ overdoses.

Between the intoxicated humans, chaos-prone daemons, and vampires in search of easy prey, it was a creature PR disaster waiting to happen. 

Yet Baldwin could not bring himself to shut it down immediately.

By his reckoning, the club’s downfall was inevitable, regardless of if he was involved or not. If it wasn’t because of the illicit drugs, it would definitely be the tax evasion. Drug addicted daemons made horrible accountants. That fact was never more obvious than when he learned about the garbage bags of cash stuffed into the ceiling panels of the managerial offices and smuggled out each morning.

In truth, despite its outrageousness, Baldwin had a soft spot for Studio 54.

Maybe because dead bodies and overdoses were easier to deal with than the cutthroat world of creatures politics. 

Maybe because he did not find the out-of-control, over-the-top debauchery as distasteful as he pretended at Congregation meetings.

Maybe because he rather liked doing lines off Jerry Hall’s chest, even if the drugs had no effect on a vampire. At least until her married boyfriend Mick Jagger foolishly tried to get handsy after a couple Quaaludes.

Maybe it was all those things, and more. 

It had been a tough few decades since the world wars reshaped the world. In some strange way, Studio 54 reminded him of a time when he had far fewer responsibilities. 

Regardless, Baldwin was never one to overthink the reasons behind his actions. He just kept going night after night under the pretense of keeping a close eye on the situation.

As a rule, he did not often partake in the more scandalous revelries. In fact, most nights he simply did the rounds to gather incriminating intel, avoided Andy Warhol (the most tedious, pretentious daemon he’d ever met), and allowed some hot young starlet or singer to coax him onto the dance floor.

But no creature, human or otherwise, was completely immune to the electric, intoxicating atmosphere. Not even Baldwin de Clermont.

This particular Saturday night, Baldwin was in a dangerous sort of mood. The New York economic situation was in complete shambles, Matthew had somehow accidentally blown up his state-of-the-art million dollar lab in Oxford (he was blaming Marcus, of course), and the new witch representative on the Congregation, a demanding, ambitious little fuck named Peter Knox, was doing his head in.

Aloof observation was not going to cut it this evening. He needed to fuck or fight to blow off some steam, and he’d gone too long without the satisfaction of either.

Emerging from a dark corner of the VIP section, Baldwin wiped the corners of his mouth with a silk handkerchief, pocketing it before smoothing the wide lapels of his rust brown suit. The two accommodating young ladies he left behind had been more than eager to expose their necks. Sadly, they were more interested in each other than him, meaning he was still on the prowl.

The heavily laced blood began to hit as he sauntered over to peer down from the balcony at the packed dance floor below. Gods only knew what was pumping through the veins of the club’s elite clientele - coke and Quaaludes for sure, but there was a variety of other potent drug cocktails on offer in the restrooms.

Whatever it was heightened his own desires considerably, and he swore he could feel Donna Summer’s soulful voice reverberating through his very veins. 

Tapping his foot and swaying to the grooving beats, Baldwin scrutinized the writhing sea of bodies below in search of someone worth seducing. The air was thick with smoke and the musk of sweat and sex, but his keen nose picked out something he never expected to find there.

Something familiar. 

Something that hit him square in his inebriated chest with a pang of longing.

Frankincense and orange blossom.

Copper head swiveling, Baldwin spotted her standing on the other side of the dance floor, casually leaning against a pillar with another vampire whispering in her ear. She was decked out in a shimmering black and gold halter dress that sparkled when it caught the flashing lights and perfectly showed off her flawless pale skin and lithe limbs.

Eva Jaeger.

There were very few women he considered to be his great loves, but Eva was definitely one of them. He’d been quite smitten with her, once upon a time. Their relationship had spanned roughly half a century, though it was off and on towards then end. More off than on, really.

Her classically beautiful face had already tilted in his direction, searching. Through the din and cloud of hazy smoke, their eyes met. Next moment, Baldwin found himself swerving through the VIP crowd and down the stairs with little regard for anyone else. 

It had been thirty-odd years since he last saw her.

It was that night he’d sought her out in Germany right after the Second World War. Not long after Philippe died.

He’d been drunk. 

Drunk former soldiers were not hard to find in Germany in those days, most unable to cope with the collective traumas of the war and its aftermath. Ysabeau wasn’t the only de Clermont who went hunting post-war; it was darkly satisfying to drink Nazis dry and call it revenge. Not that it ever filled the void left by his father’s death.

Given she left him for the final time more than a decade earlier, Eva had every right to turn him away when he tracked her down in 1945.

But Baldwin had never groveled like he did that night.

He’d been desperate for relief. Anything to help him stop thinking about Philippe’s horrific end and seeing the greatest vampire to have ever lived reduced to a broken shell of a man. 

For reasons unknown, Eva had taken pity on him. Offered him untainted blood and the best red wine she could scrounge up and listened while he ranted about everything, but especially about Matthew. How he’d done what should have been Baldwin’s duty in helping their father die, then having the audacity to claim it was Philippe’s dying wish Matthew assume control of the Knights of Lazarus.

Somehow they ended up in bed.

She kicked him out in the morning and told him that was the last time. He knew she was serious by the Luger pistol she calmly aimed at his head while she did it.

Baldwin avoided Germany for two decades after that, until Verin and Ernst got married. He gave Eva the courtesy of letters and telegrams informing her of his family’s movements in Germany (East and West) and his business dealings in Berlin (on both sides of the Wall), but she never replied. 

This wasn’t Germany though - this was Studio 54. New York City was relatively neutral territory, despite Baldwin’s substantial investments in the city, the stock market, and the ruling vampire family.

Undeniably under the influence, he was loose on his feet when he swaggered up to Eva. She merely arched a delicate eyebrow at him as she took a drag from her slim cigarette. Her vampire companion was off speaking to one of the shirtless bartenders at the bar.

“Hello, Eva,” he greeted, considering if she would allow him to swoop in for a kiss on the cheek.

“Baldwin,” she replied in such an icy tone that he decided against the hello kiss. “I didn’t know this was your scene.”

“I spend a fair bit of time in New York these days. It’s everybody who’s anybody’s scene.”

He gave her an appreciative slow sweep of his eyes, particularly liking how her dress’s low V neckline showed off a tantalizing glimpse of cleavage. His lungs hauled in a deep inhale of her familiar scent now that he was within arm’s reach.

“You’re looking well,” he purred, a bit too fascinated with the way the changing lights played on the metallic sheen of her dress.

“You look…” Her pale aquamarine eyes narrowed speculatively, taking in his too large pupils and uncharacteristically ruffled hair. She pursed her lips primly before concluding, “You look like you’re enjoying yourself.”

Baldwin smirked conspiratorially. “I am. There’s a lot to enjoy here.” He angled his head as close as he dared, mindful of the burning cigarette in her hand. “Perhaps we could find something for us both to enjoy, Liebling?”

Eva stepped away, pointedly clearing her throat and casting him a withering warning glare. “You presume too much, Baldwin. I am here with Reinhardt.”

“I suppose he could join,” Baldwin shrugged cavalierly.

Eva rolled her eyes with a rather unladylike snort, flicking the ash from her cigarette on his toes. “Don’t try your luck.”

“You may change your tune after you’ve sampled some of the crowd,” he said, casually kicking the ash off his shoe. “I have a penthouse nearby we could take a few back for a private party. Reinhardt can tag along.”

“Nein, danke,” Eva snapped with a soft hiss. The German always slipped in when she was angry. “We had our goodbye fuck, Baldwin. That’s not a mistake I care to repeat.”

Baldwin flinched noticeably.

Even in his addled state, he grasped the futility in continuing this pursuit.Time apart had not done him any favors - it appeared that bridge was well and truly burned.

The longing in his chest turned into a dull ache made all the more painful by the drugs and alcohol in his system.

Shifting so he was standing alongside Eva, he attempted civil conversation for the sake of appearances. “What brings you to New York? This isn’t your sort of scene either.”

He wasn’t sure she would answer, but she did not move away again as she took a thoughtful drag of her cigarette. 

“I’m studying in Boston,” Eva replied. She did not bother to blow the smoke away from him. “We came down for the weekend to see what the fuss is."

“Studying?” Baldwin echoed incredulously. She was not academically inclined when they were together. “What on earth are you studying in Boston?”

“Economics,” Eva replied, flicking ash in his direction again and flashing a devious grin that showed off her perfect white teeth. Teeth he knew could cut deep when they wanted. “At Harvard Business School.”

Harvard…someone else had mentioned Harvard University recently…

It took him a few moments to remember. That pest Peter Knox had been stuck on something to do with Harvard - some witch who worked there. It was purely a witch matter though - nothing related to vampires.

“You wished to go to university for that?” Baldwin asked, coming back to the present and still thoroughly confused. Eva had never shown much interest in his financial dealings when they were together. She listened, of course, but seemed content to leave him to it.

“I already earned a degree at Mannheim. I am studying other perspectives now. It is all because of you, of course.” Baldwin shifted uncomfortably as one of the light towers nearby flashed red like a giant warning beacon. “You inspired me to study the subject more thoroughly.”

That dull ache in his chest felt more like a sharply twisting knife that even the drugs couldn’t dampen. 

There was only one reason he could have inspired her to study economics. Engineering Germany’s stock market crash in 1911 was something he came to regret. Not only was it the reason Eva left him when she eventually learned of his involvement, but it also deepened the divisions in Europe which eventually led to the First World War. 

“Eva—I—”

Reinhardt chose that exact moment to join them, passing a glass of wine to Eva and eyeing Baldwin suspiciously.

“So this is the notorious Baldwin de Clermont?” Reinhardt drawled in heavily accented English over Eva’s shoulder. Somehow he managed to look down his nose despite Baldwin being half a head taller.

Baldwin drew to his full height and squared off with a stiff nod, not offering to shake the other vampire’s hand.

“And you must be Reinhardt. Eva and I were just catching up.”

“And I’d say we are finished now,” Eva said with cool finality. “Enjoy the rest of your…carousing, Baldwin.” She arched that damn judgmental eyebrow at him again before turning a soft, adoring smile toward Reinhardt.

Unbidden, Baldwin remembered when she used to smile at him that way.

“Auf Wiedersehen, Eva,” he growled curtly. He did not bother acknowledging Reinhardt again.

As he stalked off in the opposite direction, he overheard Eva ask her new partner to dance. It sparked a flash of memory when they went out to the clubs and cabarets in the ‘20s, of Eva coyly fluttering her lashes and pulling him out of his seat for a dance. 

Baldwin’s precarious mood from earlier resurfaced, exacerbated by rejection and bitter remorse. He wondered how far he’d have to push Reinhardt to spur him into a fight. Although a vampire fight was sure to draw notice even in Studio 54.

Of all the disco clubs in all the cities in all the world, why did she have to walk into this one?

His refuge from responsibility lost its luster with the abrupt force and ferocity of a flash flood. In the span of a vampire’s heartbeat, the Bee Gees blaring through the speakers began to hurt his ears and the chaotic lighting irritated him further.

In a black haze made worse by the drugs, Baldwin had a strange sense of alienation despite being completely surrounded by people. 

Despite the upbeat funky music, the dancers were no longer attractive; nor were the glamorous VIPs in the balcony above. Drinking from anyone else under the influence was definitely a bad idea, because it would only pull him down further and likely make him aggressive.

Finding his way home to the solitude of his mansion on Fifth Avenue was more appealing than continuing with his earlier enterprises. He had no doubt he could find someone else willing in the crowd, but anonymous sex was not going to cure what ailed him.

*** The anonymous tip sent to the IRS on Monday morning was not going to cure him either, but it would hasten Studio 54’s demise. 

It was purely a matter of business, Baldwin told himself from the comfort of his corner office overlooking Wall Street. He was simply doing his duty and what he should have done from the beginning.

Only You Always by @xokissyourdarlings

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body talks by @ofhouseadama

The Pitt; Mohabbot; intimacy and romance - WIP

The Kindest Cruelty by aliasramsay

Bridgerton; Kate & Edwina; angst and sisterhood - complete

Surrender by @kindlyones

All Souls Series; Baldwin Montclair x OC; angst, fluff, magic - WIP

the light, the dark, the truth, and my real name by @aepiphany

The Pitt; Robby x Collins; second chance romance, angst and more - complete

and flowers, stronger than cement by @tellingoldstories

The Pitt; Mohabbot; strangers to lovers to hi, we have a kid; fluff - complete

Kiss It Better by @princessphilly

The Pitt: Robby x Collins; time jump, angst and fluff - WIP

Hobby Girl by @forasecondtherewedwon

The Pitt; Mohabbot; 5+1, fluff - complete

all the bright places by @phantomphaeton

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Ouroboros by FormerlyIR

You were surprised Pierre had even agreed to go. He was usually so busy with helping Matthew and Diana.

But they had practically pushed him to the door when you had asked if he would liked to join. 

«I’m sorry if I took you away from your work, Pierre—I just didn’t want to go alone, and no one else seemed to want to», you told him, looking up at him.

«It’s no problem y/l/n—»

«Please call me y/n. You make me sound like my parents when you use my last name.»

He smiled and nodded, «Very well, y/n. I don’t mind going to the market with you. The villagers always make the best Christmas markets.»

It was true. The Village surrounding Sept Tours had an amazing Christmas market.

You’d both been walking around for an hour, looking at all the different stalls.

«We should stop so you can get a bite to eat», Pierre suggested.

Your stomach decided now would be the perfect time to growl, and you giggled softly, «How’d you know?»

«Oh, I have my ways», he said with a chuckle on his lips, tapping your nose.

Making your way to one of the food stalls, Pierre let you order, a bite to eat and a mulled wine for you, then ordered his own mulled wine, which you would later find out was spiked with blood, and paid the bill.

«Thank you, Pierre.» He gave you a soft smile, leading you to a place to sit.

After eating, you got up, grabbing your cup, «I want to go another round, before we head back to the chateau.»

«As you wish.»

A broad smile erupted on your face and you quickly grabbed his hand, pulling him with you for some more exploring.

At the end of the trip, you came back to the chateau with a little gift for everyone in the family and everyone working there.

~~~

Tagging:

It makes Phoebe laugh now, a snuffle against his throat when she presses her face to his neck. He’s holding her to him and he sways her in his arms, shoulders rocking against the wall.

“I didn’t believe you,” she says, lifting her head. When their eyes meet, her expression grows shy and flustered, the way it has since they met at the auction house and he first looked at her like this—a mixture of acknowledging her intellect and wanting to take off her clothes. Marcus doesn’t say anything and Phoebe finishes, “But I see it now.”

He smiles, brushing the back of his fingers across her cheek.

“What do you see?”

Her eyes dance with his, hopeful yet trying to assess whether or not he’s teasing. But he’s speaking in earnest, like she is; not everyone needs to scowl when they’re being serious (Matthew). He watches her expression relax as she reads him like one of the pages she’s been poring over for weeks in his absence.

“I see…” Phoebe begins, palms warming his chest through his black t-shirt as they rest over his heart, “…someone capable of facilitating alliances. Someone whose painful past doesn’t stop him from looking ahead to a kinder future. I see a leader—”

At this, Marcus shakes his head, breaking eye contact. He can feel the snide smile on his face.

“It’s not me who’s the leader. Matthew—”

“Would not have succeeded without you,” Phoebe quietly insists. Marcus sighs and glances at her face. It’s all the time she needs to smile at him, encouraging the upward tug of the corners of his own mouth.

“Well, that’s true,” he allows in an amused tone, though he’s not fully joking.

“And none of that’s the main thing.”

“What’s the main thing?”

“Life, Marcus. Perhaps your greatest rebellion was coming back here and helping to bring those babies into the world.”

He rolls his eyes, feeling the compliment is overblown.

“They hardly needed my help. Sarah had the situation in hand.”

“But you did come,” Phoebe presses. “And you did help.”

“How long do we need to pretend it was the twins I wanted to hurry back for?”

Her lips part to answer, but he’s already ducking his head, nose skimming her throat before he kisses her skin—flushed from their reunion and two glasses of champagne. His mouth is slow and her heartbeat is fast. Her fingers tighten on his chest, slightly bunching his shirt, and he cradles her lower back.

“Don’t let Matthew hear you say that,” she jokes, but it’s breathy, questioning. Do you really mean it? Phoebe asks with her body leaning into his, with her hand on the t-shirt he’s been wearing since the delivery, since the car, since the plane from Louisiana.

His answer to the question she doesn’t ask in words is the slide of his hands down over the curve of her ass and the climbing path of his lips. Her breath hitches exquisitely just before he roughs her mouth up with his, kissing her with the craving he’s archived every day they’ve been apart. Of course it was her he was itching to fly back to. He’s never before spent time in New Orleans and felt so much of his heart pulling him away from the family he sired, telling him home is now elsewhere. It’s where Phoebe is. She makes him feel confusingly, blessedly young. Her mouth tastes like the sweet, expensive champagne Miriam poured generously into flutes and he has to dig his fingers in to stop them from shaking.

“I love you,” he pants. He’s said it before. “We could go back to yours, what do you think?”

She’s nodding, her forehead grazing his, before she stops herself and frowns, pulling back.

“What if they need you?”

“I’ll keep my phone on.”

“Is it wise to go though? I thought we were doing the safety in numbers thing for now?” Her pragmatic eyes search his.

“I’ll watch your back,” Marcus says, smirking as his hand creeps up her spine beneath her blouse. Phoebe shivers in spite of herself. “Anyway, Diana would tear any uninvited guest limb from limb. They don’t need us tonight. But I need you.” His hand flexes on her backside and he tilts his face in to kiss lightly across her cheek, right up to the edge of her mouth. He touches the corner with the tip of his tongue.

“I suppose if we stayed the sound of crying infants would only keep us awake,” Phoebe says thoughtfully.

“I’d prefer not to have sex with you in a house where Matthew is listening for every little sound.” He smiles. “But I will if I have to. Your call.”

She pushes back from his chest, smiling coyly. Her hands glide down to his hips and hook into his belt through his untucked shirt. The pressure is negligible, but it still feels like she’s pinning him to the wall. Marcus’s gaze crawls over her, hiding none of his lust as he feels her studying his face.

“Let me get my things,” Phoebe says, “and we’ll go home.”

Too late, he thinks. I’m there.

—

He thought Gallowglass had practically become the doorman around here, but with the man and his motorcycle departed, Marcus flags his own taxi.

He and Phoebe have walked a few blocks from Fernando’s and it’s felt unbelievably freeing. Maybe it’s just the transatlantic flight that’s made him glad of fresh air, or maybe it’s that they’ve hardly had a chance to do something so normal, so purely for their own enjoyment, since their first date. He holds the door for her as she slips into the back of the taxi and gives the driver her address. He looks in at her, down at her, and when she turns her head to see what’s keeping him, everything in him twists and scatters. It feels as though she’s watching the beautiful pieces of him catch the light, flecks of glitter in a snow globe. He climbs in next to her and shuts the door securely.

Not five minutes into the ride, Marcus’s arm around her shoulders (he’s a perennial ignorer of taxi seatbelts), Phoebe pulls her phone from her bag and focuses on the screen. He remains relaxed—if there’s an urgent message, she’ll tell him—and turns to watch the streets pass beyond his window. Shut shops, houses with lights aglow behind the curtains. He should feel guilty about his sense of contentment when there’s so much uncertainty ahead. He should.

All he lets himself feel is the buzz of his phone in his front pocket. Marcus extracts it and releases a huffed laugh to see he’s received a text from Phoebe. He looks at her, grinning, but her eyes are firmly forward. The upward tic at the corner of her lips has him curious.

I’ve never done this before, she’s sent him.

Brows drawing together in perplexity, he again looks from the screen to her face.

“Wha—”

Her hand lands on his thigh.

He already has them spread, stretching his legs, and he feels spine-tinglingly vulnerable as Phoebe’s hand moves higher in the space he’s accidentally provided for her. Her abrupt halt just shy of his groin gives Marcus a chance to snatch an unsteady breath, but her fingers knead his thigh through his jeans and he knows the mercy is short. Her posture under his draped arm is rigid. She won’t look over. He considers it supremely entertaining—her effort to appear entirely appropriate for their driver. He thinks he’ll enjoy forcing her hand. Literally.

Marcus plucks her wrist to lift her hand and reposition it on his crotch. Twitching from the moment she initiated this, he’s now hardening nicely. His smile, as he watches Phoebe struggle for composure, is triumphant. Admittedly, he’s less smug when she unzips him with fair subtlety and reaches into his jeans to stroke him through his boxers. The self-satisfied smile belongs to his girlfriend now. He’s slightly awed, slumping in his seat with his eyelids fluttering towards closure as she works his shaft.

“Just up here,” she directs the driver, cutting through his haze.

Phoebe grabs her bag while Marcus hastily rezips his jeans. She beats him to the fare and then he’s offering her his hand, drawing her out into the cold night, and the taxi is pulling away from the curb.

“I missed you,” she says. Keeping his hand, she leads him towards the building that houses her second-storey flat.

“Is that all the explanation I’m gonna get for why I’m hard as a rock right now?”

Phoebe smirks as she gets out her key.

“You missed me too?” she offers.

“You’re right about that,” Marcus says on an exhale, taking her face between his hands and kissing her greedily, pressing her back into the doorway. He feels her hands steal between them to clutch the front of his coat in both fists. He loves it when she does that.

“I thought you might be tired,” she gasps, “from your trip.”

She so often wears skirts, which he finds endlessly arousing, but with Phoebe in jeans, he can bend his knee and nudge his thigh between hers.

“The adrenaline of the delivery,” he explains. “I’m…” He smirks. “…reinvigorated.”

“I think we’d better go inside.”

He backs off enough to allow her to unlock the door but remains at her back, finding her hip through the heavy fabric of her coat.

“Wouldn’t want to give anyone who’s not a taxi driver the opportunity to gawk,” he quips.

“Shut up,” she admonishes, embarrassed.

Marcus leans in and runs his mouth up the side of her neck, letting his teeth scrape her skin without breaking it, listening to her heart react.

“It was hot,” he murmurs to her. “I love it when you miss me.”

Phoebe gets them through the door and they pound up the stairs hand in hand.

Inside her flat, she adorably offers him wine—red, his favourite to drink with her for the bloody shine it lends her lips—but he’s already feeling a little bit drunk without it. His hands are on her as she hangs their coats. She neatened her appearance before they said goodnight to Miriam, Sarah, and Fernando, and Marcus takes satisfaction in rumpling her, freeing the tail of her blouse from her jeans. When Phoebe places her hand on his cheek, he turns his mouth to her palm, kissing her, and then taking her hand in his to kiss her knuckles. His eyes locked hotly on hers, he traces his tongue between her fingers, tasting the warm metal of the thin gold ring she wears on her index finger. She grips him through his jeans.

Discarding their clothes along the way, they make for Phoebe’s bedroom. Her abode may not beg the explanation of “family money” that his does, but it’s so her, and she has no roommates; when he strips her bra off with eager hands and launches it, they can laugh to see it land on the kitchen counter without having to retrieve it for the sake of decorum. The t-shirt he sheds and flicks away like a matador’s cape will bother no one. He hops out of his jeans in the hall.

Phoebe switches on a lamp and he observes that the whirlwind he’s made of her life lately is barely reflected in her tidy room—decamping to Sept-Tours and returning only to bounce between her place and Fernando’s and he can’t see much amiss besides a couple of open drawers in her dresser. When he’s been here before, she’s prepared the bedding with fresh sheets, but he likes that he can inhale the scent of her sleeping body when he throws himself back onto the duvet. Rising up on his elbows, he admires Phoebe as she stands at the foot of the bed and peels her underwear down. Centuries he’s lived, and it’s been too long.

“Come to me,” he invites, reaching out a hand to her.

But Phoebe, with her smile of secret seductions, only puts her hands on his knees and kneels on the rug. Stark naked, Marcus shoots upright, the ruddy head of his cock tapping his abdomen. She squeezes his knees.

“Stay down,” she requests softly, and he groans, dropping onto his back.

He needs the patience of all his lifetimes to withstand this. She licks him until he has her duvet in a death grip, sucks him until his back’s bowing with the effort of not bucking across her tongue. Her hands pet his thighs, moving forward and back. Like he’s hurling himself to safety from a crumbling cliff face, he lets go of the duvet and finds a new hold for each of his hands: Phoebe’s caressing fingers and the crown of her head. He strokes her springy waves and unravels the place where she’s pulled them back, causing the length of her hair to spill across his thigh. Overwhelmed, Marcus’s eyelids flicker. Her fingers wind through his while her head bobs, indulgent and unhurried, and his eyes clamp shut as he comes.

Breathing shakily, he feels her pull off of him. She joins him on the bed, settling on her side and arranging his limp arm beneath her neck. Her knees draw up against his hip as she curls into him, kissing his shoulder. He’s come back to Phoebe. His world is perfect bliss.

“You’re trying to exhaust me,” Marcus sighs, eyes still closed. “But I refuse to be tired until you let me have you.”

Phoebe smiles.

“You have me,” she says.

He hums vaguely and wedges a hand between her thighs, grinning at her gasp when he quickly trails it higher to feel how wet she is, arousal slicking his fingertips. He massages her and, wordlessly, Phoebe shifts her thighs apart to negotiate for more.

Opening his eyes, he cocks his head at her and clarifies, “I want to have you properly.”

“If this is what ‘properly’ entails,” she says, loosely circling his wrist with her fingers as his gently manipulate her clitoris, “I’m liking it so far.”

“Good.”

He builds the pressure, varies the speed, and once Phoebe’s starting to sweat—he spies the glossiness of the skin between her breasts—she lets him tip her onto her back. Marcus hovers over her, taking her mouth tenderly until his fingers plunge inside her and she cries out. He’s hardening again. Kissing down her neck to her chest, he drives his fingers into her deftly, wringing more cries like a disjointed song, and her breast rises to meet his mouth as her back arches. He drags his teeth across her nipple, gratified when her hand flails up to grasp his hair.

“I have you. Missed you. Love you,” he swears, extracting his fingers and rubbing them, glazed in arousal, around and around her clit.

“M-Marcus,” Phoebe brokenly entreats.

“Phoebe, love.”

Her hips jump under his touch. She grips his wrist again to keep him in precisely the right spot. Blood pulses in his groin as she guides him. The light is on and he is grateful, watching them pleasure her together.

He buries his face between her breasts, clasped against her at the moment her orgasm hits. Marcus inhales the scent of her deeply—as though he’s the one who needs to catch his breath. Phoebe continues to writhe on his fingers, so he keeps them stiff for her, even as his waiting erection swells with envy. When her swaying slows and she sighs, exhalation ruffling his hair, he withdraws his hand and climbs up until their faces are level. Her appearance is always so neat; he aches with desire at the sight of her undone.

Delicately, she cups his face. Her thumb rubs his mouth and then her fingers whisper across his forehead, along the slant of his eyebrow. They outline his ear and earring and he smiles at her because it tickles.

“I love you too,” she says.

“Yes,” he acknowledges.

On either side of his hips, her thighs rise.

“Reinvigorated, hmm?” Phoebe wraps her hand around his cock. He thrusts a bit in her hold.

“Aren’t you tired?” Marcus checks.

“I refuse to be until I’ve had you properly.”

His grin snaps into place, but he takes his time removing her hand from him, dropping his hips to hers and grinding against her wetness. Phoebe moans, seizing his hip and the back of his neck. The rush of delivering the twins returns to him, the memory of bounding down the stairs on legs tense from crouching and clapping his eyes on Phoebe first as he came into the room. Her expression as she saw him for the first time in weeks, his success, surge upon surge of dopamine. Maybe he can’t wait after all.

She angles her hips encouragingly and Marcus aligns himself, easing inside with ragged breaths. He lowers onto his forearms to be close to her. They sink into each other like a single person falling through water to meet their reflection. There’s Phoebe, and there’s him, and mostly there’s the heat between them as they cling to each other, hips rocking fervidly. These sounds—from their mouths and below—are for them only. Though he can’t deny to himself that he would have strutted proudly down to breakfast tomorrow morning if they’d stayed at Fernando’s.

Marcus stuffs an arm under her back, clutching her waist as his hips shuttle faster. The birth compelled his instinctual recall of centuries of medical vernacular, but he praises Phoebe’s great beauty in simple words, panted into her ear.

He hopes the trip to New Orleans will be the only one he had to make without her. He’s missed her, missed her enormously. He promises her scrambled eggs in bed tomorrow if she will eat them naked.