#chrismae

They need her. She is the key. But they're so afraid.

Apart from him.

She has no idea who he is. Some cowboy who ended up in space apparently. But he touches her skin, a small brush inside of her wrist. It's like waking up. For a moment they pool into each other. Minds opening. A dark expanse between them but they see each other. The lights they keep hidden in the depths of themselves.

--

It's a few weeks before she sees him again. Expecting to see fear in his eyes but instead their is simply uncertainty.

"You came back," she murmured. Slow. Her tongue is heavy, the seditives still heavy inside of her. The mask muffling her voice. "You saw too much."

There is a moment of silence. Maeve wondering if he was going to instantly walk away. But then his lips quirk into a smile. Something warming his features. He is beautiful. This solider. This keeper of hers.

"We are going to raise this little ons strong," Lex whispered to her. "Unlike your other mongrels. They will be put down."

As a boy, he hadn't been all that aggressive which made him a failure in his father's eyes. Too gentle which the older man had striven to beat out of him over the years. Turn him into a man. What he'd done was turn him into a man who didn't let anyone see who he was. He let no one under his skin. Aloof and fuck you. Except for a few who saw what was beneath. Under all that was a kid still feeling like a failure for never living up to expectations that were never actually explained to him. Somehow he was just supposed to intuitively know. That he didn't made him a bigger disappointment. He'd been called stupid his whole life by more than just his father and figured so many people couldn't be wrong.

It was why he felt he didn't deserve Maeve. If they were both soaked in vicious sins, then that was one thing. Something they shared. But she was so bright and imaginative and creative. And he wasn't. When she talked about the science of her work, she always taught him something he had never known. Sometimes he pretended to know, would nod in agreement, just so she would not have to dumb herself down further. He was in awe of her.

There was no point in him learning. He wasn't a witch. Even if he could understand, and he didn't know for sure that he could, he wouldn't be able to use that knowledge. But he wanted to understand. Lucas could learn, so could he. So one morning while she was in the shower, he stole one of her books and took it with him out to work. The book was kept hidden in his saddlebag for several days. Obviously he didn't have hours on end to sit and read something. He took it chunks at a time, reading over breaks.

He got about three-quarters of the way through when she noticed it was missing. Fuck. He had hoped to finish and put it back before she noticed. But on the off chance he had seen it, she asked. Maybe in her trance she had mislaid it.

"It's got a blue cover," she told him, hoping that might help.

He gave her a guilty look. "Yeah, hang on. I know where it's at," he told her, rising from his spot to go fetch the book.

She watched him go outside with a confused frown. There was no way she had taken it out there. Her confusion prompted her to follow him onto the porch, watching him go all the way to the barn then come back--the book in his hands. He held it out to her once he reached the porch.

"Sorry. Didn' think ya'd miss it. You don' get into that one too much," he explained with a guilty smile.

"Why did you take it out there?" She asked, still not having quite caught on. He never cared about her witchy stuff so she was thinking it was a prank. Like haha, how long does it take the absent-minded witch to notice he's moved something?

A myriad of excuses ran through his mind to avoid admitting he was trying to understand her and what she did better. He even considered telling her it was a prank. But he didn't have it in him to lie to her. "I was readin' through it. Tryin' t'understand what you do better. That's all. I'm sorry," he explained feeling a swell of awkward shame and he moved around her to go inside.

She didn’t expect someone to grab her arm, spin her around. Certainly not for some stranger to be there. The sight of him made her wolf light in her eyes. Surging forward despite the binding she wore. A moment of sharp awareness of him. 

“We need t’go, Mae.” 

Mae? No one called her that. She had no idea who this man -- wolf if his eyes were anything to go by was.

“Get your hands off me, wolf,” she hissed, a low growl on her lips. Jerking her arm away. Or attempting to. His hold simply tightening, starting to haul her off. 

“Woman, don’ make me haul you over my shoulder.” 

“They’ll come for me. They will kill you.” 

It stopped half way to his mouth as her mind curled around him. Fierce, sharp. Claiming. He was hers. She’d already warned Reagan what she was going to try so there was no alarm from the Alpha as Maeve effectively demanded the control of her Mate. The world shifting as a sudden Pack bond snapped into place. The gold that had been her eyes shifted to brilliant, shimmering blue. Alpha blue.

Back through the gateway. Back to him.

To her daughter who moved to cling to her now as she died. To the stunned visage of her self.

And Chris.

It's why Christian tipping it down the drain takes her completely by surprise. Eyebrows rising in question.

"No more of that."

It was simply said but enough. No birth control. Him putting his foot down. And she could argue. Could ignore him. Her man of the house. Her Wolf.

It lights a fire in her and she's pressing into him quick and eager.