You didn’t know how the two of you had gone from arguing in the car, to arguing while walking up the steps to your place, to suddenly being tangled up and pinned against the closed door of your apartment. The entire drive back to your place, Steve hadn’t had a single good thing to say to you. And you were pissed off enough to reciprocate his energy. The two of you were physically and mentally beat up after how the day had gone, but you weren’t too tired to refrain from picking a fight. It was a real choice, after all, for him to be giving you so much shit about making rash decisions when he’d made quite the habit of waving his gun around in spaces that he shouldn’t.

But now all the snide remarks were being muted as his lips moved against yours, teeth pulling at yours just slightly. His hands were wrapped around your wrists, keeping your arms pinned above your head while he used his torso to keep you pressed tight between him and the door. One of his legs was wedged between yours, and you hated the way that your body automatically responded by grinding against him.

He finally pulled his lips off of yours, dragging your bottom lip just enough to make it sting as he did. You were fighting to catch your breath, your mind in complete disarray from everything, from the day, from the fact that you could feel the warmth of Steve’s breath against your face as he stayed so close to you.

“And I’m the reckless one,” you snapped with a roll of your eyes. Your sarcasm would’ve hit a little harder if you didn’t sound so breathless.

His grip on your wrists tightened. He leaned in, closing what little shred of distance he’d put between you, his nose brushing against yours. “You fuckin’ are.”

You shook your head at him, giving him a little resistance, trying to fight back against his hold on you just enough. It got you nowhere, of course. If anything, it just had him pinning you harder, his hips pressed against yours.

“This is you using good judgment, then?” you asked, knowing that he could hear the smugness in your tone even though his face was too close to yours for him to see it in your expression.

He let go of your wrists, hands dropping so that they were balled into the collar of your shirt instead. Somehow you almost felt more trapped that way even though you had back the use of your hands.

“Do you know what could’ve happened out there? What shit you could’ve fuckin’ landed yourself in? Landed all of us in?”

You leaned back, letting the back of your head tap against the door behind you. “Why don’t you fucking enlighten me, Agent Murphy?”

“Do you think that you weren’t wrong?”

You scoffed, trying to remain as collected as you could given the circumstances. “You’ve made it pretty goddamn clear that I was wrong, Steve.” You paused. “Got a weird way of showing it, but—”

The tic in his jaw was impossible to miss. You could only imagine what he was thinking, the remarks in his head that he wanted to say. You were waiting for it, for the next verbal blow. How he hadn’t exhausted himself between base and your apartment was beyond you.

Instead of coming back with another comment, he pinned you with another bruising kiss. You knew it was coming this time, and while the logical part of your brain was telling you that you should try to quit while you were still half a stride ahead of whatever mess this was about to turn into, another part of you was saying that the way was already an absolute shitshow, so what was one more thing? Steve was already pissed at you about literally everything else, so why not just throw this on the pile? At least this would be something the two of you could be mad about tomorrow, when you were done being mad about everything that had happened today.

One of his hands moved from your collar up to the side of your neck. His thumb pressed just beneath your chin, keeping your head tilted at just the right angle to keep your lips on his. You busied yourself with undoing the buckle of his belt. The slight hitch in his breathing when you started on the button and zipper of his pants wasn’t lost on you.

Bringing your hands up to his chest, you rested your palms flat against him before pushing him back. It wasn’t out of resistance this time, not trying to push him away from you. Both of you were fully resigned to whatever mistake this ended up being now. Your push this time was a direction. Rough guidance, the only kind either of you really knew how to give. And he followed the cue, allowing you to get him back to the couch in the center of your living room.

When Steve felt the backs of his legs press against the sofa, he made a point to stop, to not let you keep pushing. His hands gripped onto your hips, pivoting the two of you so that you now had your back to the couch. He pushed you back just enough for you to fall back onto the cushions and he was on you in an instant.

Before you could take too much time to think about it, your shoes and jeans were on the floor and Steve was hovering over you. It was close, almost cramped quarters on the couch for the two of you, but it’d work. It was fitting. Maybe if he was in the mood to clean up the mess of the day rather than make it worse you would’ve let him fuck you on your bed.

You were pushing his jeans down off his waist just as he was curling his fingers into the waistband of your underwear. He pulled them down your legs at the same time he pulled himself away from you. He only put enough distance between you so that he could take off and cast aside his own clothes. Then he was right back on you, pulling up the bottom hem of your shirt to peel it off over your head. You’d started off undoing the buttons on his shirt, but you only made it about three-fourths of the way before every single type of frustration coursing through you got the better of you and you ripped the remaining few, hearing a couple of them clatter on the floor.

Steve mumbled something against your lips, a sentence you couldn’t quite make out but you knew that he wasn’t thanking you for what you’d just done. Whatever rebuttal you would’ve come up with was lost the second you felt his hand running up the inside of your thigh. The string of curses that you let out under your breath when his fingers slipped between your legs was something he would’ve taken more pride in on a different day under different circumstances.

Your legs were just beginning to tremble when he pulled his hand away. Your head dropped back against the cushion as you muttered an exasperated, “Fuck me.”

Steve let your annoyed statement act as an instruction as he gripped onto your hips and pushed into you. Your legs immediately hooked around his waist, locking him to you. His hips snapped against yours in a way that had you clawing at his back, asking for more with everything but your words. His lips slid down the column of your neck, teeth grazing against the sensitive skin there until they sunk in right where your neck met your shoulder. You arched into him at the contact, nails setting in a little deeper.

You knew from the second he pulled his mouth off of you that there would be a mark left behind when this was all over. Just another piece of the mess. What was one more bruise?

He put enough distance between the two of you so that he could look down at you and really see you. Despite the motions that you were going through, the peculiar intimacy of it all, you could still see and feel the tension between you. Even knowing it wasn’t going to fix the issue, you still didn’t want to stop. A thought crossed your mind in scattered fragments that you would rather take all of Steve’s anger like this, let it be a problem between the two of you that you tried to work out this way, instead of him constantly making his anger everyone else’s problem that he came across. This had to be better than that, right? It certainly felt better for the moment.

His hand slid up your stomach and over your chest, creeping higher until his hand was resting around your throat. He didn’t say anything for a moment, and neither did you. The look on his face asked the question for him, because he was an asshole, sure, and he had been beyond pissed off with you all day, but still. He still hesitated with the silent question.

You were pissed off too. With him and just about everything else. But right now it was just you and him. And as much as you wanted to make things more difficult just for the sake of doing so, you found yourself nodding instead, curiosity beyond piqued at the way things were unfolding.

His hand tightened and your eyes instantly fluttered shut, body arching into him before you even knew what you were doing. Your eyes were closed and you couldn’t see him, but you heard the breathy, “Fuck,” he let out at the sight of you like that. For a brief moment he almost forgot the hell you’d put him through.

He heard the shaky gasp of a breath that you pulled in despite his grip. He could feel the way your body began to tremble the closer you got to release. Your nails bit into his arm, his shoulder, but you weren’t fighting against him. You were just out of ways to pull him closer so you had to settle for that.

Something about the sight of you like that, coming undone beneath him, looking so blissed out despite having no right after all the hell you’d caused, sent him over the edge right after you. His hand slipped away from your throat as he collapsed against you, his face buried in the crook of your neck for a moment as he felt the thudding of your heart, listened to the sound of you sucking in a full breath. Your hands rested on his back, flat, gentle compared to the way you’d been raking your nails against him before.

Once the two of you had started to catch your breath, you let your hands drift so that they were resting against his sides. “Steve?” you said, voice still a bit raspy.

He pulled back, looking down at you with an expression you couldn’t quite piece apart. “Yea?”

“Get the fuck off me.” You started to push him away from you, not roughly, but you needed the breathing space. “Please,” you added on, the ultimate afterthought.

He scoffed and shook his head, but he did what you said. You were pretty sure it was the first time you’d ever seen Steve without something to say. You propped yourself up on your elbows, watching him as he gathered his clothes off the floor. He tossed you yours as he came across them, and you shimmied into them the best you could from your current position on the couch.

Once he was dressed, his shirt open at the bottom because of the missing buttons, Steve ran his hands back through his hair. His face was flushed, tinged pink in a way that you might’ve found endearing if you weren’t so annoyed still.

He let out a deep sigh before looking over at you. “So…”

You sat up, swinging your legs off the couch so you were sitting on it properly. Bracing your arms against your thighs, you repeated the word back to him. “So?”

“What,” he gestured vaguely in the air, “the fuck now?”

You shrugged, running your hands down your face. “You can stay and we can keep arguing, or you can leave and we can argue again tomorrow.”

His brows knit. “You don’t think we should talk about—”

“Is it gonna change anything?” you asked, cutting him off. “I mean, really. Is anything actually different now?”

“I mean, yea, I was just fuckin’—” he stopped himself short this time, shaking his head. “You know what? You’re right.” He threw his hands up in defeat.

You let out a sarcastic laugh. “Wow. First time I’ve heard you say that all day.”

“It’s the first time you haven’t been wrong all day,” he rebutted.

You rolled your eyes. “Thanks for making sure I got home safe, Agent Murphy. Now get the fuck out of my apartment.”

You weren’t yelling, but the look on Steve’s face had you thinking that he almost wished that you were. At least then he’d have a reason to respond in kind. Instead, he shook his head as he made his way to the door. He muttered under his breath, “Fuckin’ unbelievable.”

July 2 — B — blood, bound & begging

Final Warning by @purplesong1028 — Amado x Pacho, bound & begging, 490

Please (with your finger) by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, bound & begging, 1.2k

blood on vacation by @ashlingnarcos — David Barrón x f!Reader, blood, 1.8k

July 3 — C — cuffs, choking

If I go too far by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, choking, 737

mentirosos by @narcolini — Kitty Paez x gn!Reader, cuffs, 1.1k

July 4 — D — domesticity, “don’t make a sound or they’ll hear us.”

Taking Care by drabbles-mc — Diego Ramirez (Narcos OC) x F!Reader, domesticity, 2.1k

Lipstick's smudged by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, domesticity and “don’t make a sound or they’ll hear us", 447

A Few Moments by @purplesong1028 — Miguel Félix/Pacho Herrera, “don’t make a sound or they’ll hear us", 482

July 5 — E — edging, eldritch

The first time I felt a ghost by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, eldritch, 716

July 6 — F — fight or fuck?, friends with benefits

No relationship talk by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, friends with benefits, 422

Unbroken Rules by drabbles-mc — Horacio Carrillo x f!Reader, friends with benefits, 2.9k

July 7 — G — gag/gagging, gun play

Paper-thin walls by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x f!Reader, gag/gagging, 361

Whatever He Wants by purplesong1028 — Amado Carrillo Fuentes x Miguel Félix, gun play, 416

July 8 — H — honor bondage, hatesex

Dress blues by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x f!Reader x Gurney Halleck, honor bondage, 1.8k

THE DISTANCE BETWEEN US by hausofmamadas — Enedina Arellano x David Barrón, honor bondage, 2k

July 9 — I — infidelity, in public

Never meet your heroes by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, in public, 955

Don't Mention It by drabbles-mc — Javier Peña x f!Reader, infidelity and in public, 2.7k

No Strong Suit by purplesong1028 — Miguel Félix x Pacho Herrera, infidelity, 439

July 10 — J — jealousy, "just shut up already"

Unprofessional by drabbles-mc — Walt Breslin x f!Reader, jealousy, 4.3k

A bad idea by @artemiseamoon — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, jealousy, 2.3k

The ring by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, jealousy, 1.1k

July 11 — K — knotting, knocked up

Which time? by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, knocked up, 418

Secrets in the night by artemiseamoon — Horacio Carrillo x Original Female Character, knocked up, 3.5k

Someday When It's Over by drabbles-mc — Horacio Carrillo x Original Female Character, knocked up, 2.8k

July 12 — L — luxury, lingerie

Eres guapa by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, lingerie, 544

Desire by artemiseamoon — Enedina Arellano x Original Female Character, lingerie and luxury, 3.9k

Round-trip Ticket by drabbles-mc — Steve Murphy x Original Female Character, lingerie, 7.7k

July 13 — M — mirrors, "make me forget (all about him/her/it/them)"

Another brick in the wall by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, make me forget, 812

Favors Owed by drabbles-mc — Maria Elvira x gn!Reader, make me forget, 2.7k

Like Old Times by artemiseamoon — Judy Moncada x Original Female Character, mirrors, 1.4k

July 14 — N — nipple play, "no one does it like you"

No One Like You by drabbles-mc — Javier Peña x f!Reader, no one does it like you, 2k

Sore by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, nipple play, 580

July 15 — O — on all fours, one night stand

Cascade by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x f!Reader, one night stand, 580

July 16 — P — praise kink, pulling hair

Dress blues, pt 2 by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x f!Reader x Gurney Halleck, praise kink, 404

July 17 — Q — quiet (or trying to be), quickie

Sweet, sharp, addictive by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, quiet (or trying to be) and quickie, 464

July 18 — R — role reversal, ruined

Bad Guy Treatment by drabbles-mc — Steve Murphy x f!Reader, role reversal, 3.8k

What is she to him by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, ruined, 444

July 19 — S — submit, "say my name"

Stoke the flames by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x f!Reader, submit, 387

July 20 — T — trapped together, tied up

On company time by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x f!Reader, trapped together, 574

July 21 — U — upper hand, underwater

The Weight of It All by drabbles-mc — Walt Breslin x Sal Orozco, underwater, 2k

he keeps his rules. you keep him. by ashlingnarcos — Horacio Carrillo x gn!Reader, upper hand, 1.1k

Polkadots by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, underwater, 359

July 22 — V — virginity (loss or roleplay), video

Off the Backburner by drabbles-mc — Steve Murphy x f!Reader, virginity, 4.1k

In this moment of pretend by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, virginity roleplay, 435

July 23 — W — "we probably shouldn't do this", worship

Stay A Little Longer by drabbles-mc — Horacio Carrillo x f!Reader, "we probably shouldn't do this", 1.5k

Lunch break daydream by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x f!Reader, "we probably shouldn't do this", 497

July 24 — X — exhibitionism, exes having sex

It's complicated by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Helena, exes having sex, 971

Not Yours Anymore by drabbles-mc — Steve Murphy x Original Female Character, exes having sex, 3.2k

no witness by ashlingnarcos — Walt Breslin x f!Reader, exes having sex, 2.4k

July 25 — Y — yearning, "you look good like this"

Superman (4) by @garbinge — Javier Peña x f!Reader, "you look good like this", 5k

Lost Time by drabbles-mc — Horacio Carrillo x f!Reader, yearning, 2.9k

If he closes his eyes by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x Original Female Character, yearning, 442

July 26 — Z — zipper, zeal

Things Like That by drabbles-mc — Danilo Garza x f!Reader, zipper, 2k

Zealot by salt-is-a-terrible-currency — Javier Peña x f!Reader and Nathan "Cable" Summers from Deadpool x f!Reader, zeal, 4k

Not being much of a talker, nor willing to make him an offer that’d be too painfully refused, you give yourself a bit of cover and the upper hand. You approach him when almost the entire office is long gone home.

It’s a sea of darkness illuminated by the occasional little island of lamplight coming from a desk: Urrutia, just leaving; Peña, leaning back in his chair; Carrillo, framed by the window to his office. 

You knock gently before you let yourself in and lock the door after you. You make eye contact with Peña through the open blinds, then close them. Carrillo is looking up at you from the desk, pen still in hand, keeping his questions to himself with rare patience. 

You need a haircut and a shave, you don’t say. The two of you talk of nothing but work here, and he never touches you, and that is the way of it. That’s his rules. That can continue. 

As you walk towards him, he stands up. Not wary, but collected, ready for anything. His lips part like he’s got something to say, and you can’t have that. Whatever it is, you don’t think you want to hear it. He’s before you now, and in the split second before the first syllable can slide out of his mouth, you slip your hand between his shirt and his trousers, grip the canvas hard, and tug towards you a little. 

The trick is not to try and read his eyes. They’re near black and bottomless. Then there’s the rest of his face, stubble, scattering of scabs at his temple, shadows that cling to his jaw like they love him: just let the raw beauty cut into you, just stand there and take it as the warmth of him bleeds through his shirt and into your knuckles. Hold that gaze. 

“I always obey orders,” you say. The door might be locked, but he’s got a way out. All it’d take is a word.

“I wouldn’t let you in here if you didn’t,” he says. 

He’s letting you. It sends an warm rush of relief through you, viscerally good and viscerally alarming at once; you’d given yourself the excuse of being at work to cover for him if he turned you away, and yet it turns out that excuse was too flimsy. If he’d said no, it would have mattered a great deal.

But he didn’t say no, so you press your other hand flat against his stomach and feel the slight tensing and then relaxing under your fingers as reward. You smile a little at that, and he doesn’t smile, but his face gentles, looking at you. The warmth of your palm a promise. I’ll take care of you. 

You look down and unbutton his trousers, reach inside his briefs, and kneel. 

The floor is hard and cold against your knees, he’s soft and salt in your mouth, and then there it is—the slight shake in his long slow exhale. You grip his thigh through the canvas, fingertips digging in a little, and take your time with your work. 

You’ve never talked about it, but you know you’re the only one who gets to do this, and that’s the pull of it. That, and the power, the way his breathing goes heavier. Lungs don’t lie. When you look up, it’s hard to tell in this light, but you could swear his eyes are closed. You take him down as deep as you can, welcome the burn in your throat. You’ll choke if it means you can make him stutter. Fair trade.

When he comes, he has to put one hand on his desk to steady himself. He’s breathing like he’s run a race, still trying to stay quiet even though he can’t. With no towel to hand and an endless will to watch him shiver, you lick him clean. His hand on his desk is a fist, and you can see the tendons tensed in his inner wrist too.

Once he’s clean, you sit back on your heels and wait for him to open his eyes. He does so slowly, looks down at you through a haze, heavy-lidded and as full of intent as though he hasn’t already come. You wipe your mouth with the back of your hand. 

When you stand, you stand close enough to feel his body heat, invading his personal space. He’s no longer panting, but he’s still breathing a little faster than usual. You tuck him back in, zip and button up his pants, and stay where you are. If you won’t touch him, he still won’t touch you; it’s delicious and excruciating at once. He smells like sweat and cigarettes, fucking rank. You eye the hollow of his throat just above the neckline of his shirt, golden like all of him is golden in this light. You consider just begging.  

After a second, he takes his hand off his desk. 

You lean in. there’s a spot just behind the corner of his jaw, and you press a lingering kiss there, deliberately; it’s the only place you’re touching him, until it isn’t. He turns his head towards you, and then you’re cheek to cheek, his stubble scraping your skin. You’ve had his cock in your mouth, and yet it’s that that makes you blush, somehow. When you pull back, you’re not sure if you want him to see it. 

You walk away. Your own footsteps seem unnaturally loud. As you unlock the door, you say, “Come see me when it’s over.”

“As you command,” he says, and that makes you smile a crooked little smile, despite it all: that’s your line. 

Even now when she looks like she might murder him, it’s a struggle to keep his mind from wandering into thoughts on the quickest way to undress her. Aurora straightens herself, spins on her heel to glare daggers at him.

“I’m what, Javi?” she snaps. “Infirm, feeble? Incapable of protecting myself? If you’re so goddamn scared that I’ll do something stupid, why did you decide to have a kid with me?” He puts a hand on his hip, raises the other in a ‘hold your horses’ gesture.

“First of all I’m not worried. Second of all, you’ve not been either of those things a day in your life.” That’s not true. He knows it even before he says it, that there was a long time in her childhood were she wasn’t able to protect herself. And he most definitely is worried about the two of them: his wife and the little girl that he’s seen in his dreams. Aurora’s face falls for a second. He almost goes to apologize for having, indirectly, brought up the past but stops himself as he knows she’ll only be more upset by it. It’s a mistake Javier has made before. Aurora picks herself back up, her brow returning to its pinched state and she huffs at him.

“I’m fine, baby’s fine, and oh,” she snarks, “the 12-year old that was about to get robbed by some asshole is also fine, thank you for asking.” Javier pauses.

“He was only 12?” He knew there’d been a kid peddling drugs involved but assumed it was one of the high schoolers. In his mind, he sees the boy that pointed a gun at him when he cornered one of Escobar’s men. Aurora huffs even louder.

“Yes, Javier. He was a little boy.” Shit. Javier rubs his eyes. They just keep getting younger and younger. First it was pregnant women swallowing balloons and now this. When he looks up at Aurora she’s got her jaw set in stone, arms crossed over her chest so tightly he’s tempted to say she’s hurting herself.

“You did good,” he admits, begrudgingly so, “but I’m still angry with you.” Her face contorts.

“Well, I’m fucking pissed at you!” She spreads her arms out wide, gesturing to the empty air as she closes the distance between them. “Where do you get off thinking you can scold me like I’m a toddler stealing cookies?” The anger, temporarily dampened by the realization that there’s a 12 year old moving drugs in Laredo, returns full force to Javier.

“You’re my wife, that’s our baby, I’ve seen enough people die to last me a hundred lifetimes,” Javier lists the reasons, ticking them off one finger at a time. “A little bit of concern about your well-being is kind of part of the deal.” Aurora steps forward. She’s so close he can see the gold in her eyes. How long has it been since they had a moment to themselves? The ranch has been overrun by out-of -town family for the better part of a week, and before that Aurora suffered brutal morning sickness. He wraps his fingers around her scarred left arm, even more tanned and warm from a long day in the sun, tugging her closer.

“Funny, seeing as I’m not allowed to be concerned about my husband when he’s snooping around town, asking about those deliveries coming in on the water.” Even as she makes the snippy comment, she steps into his arms though her eyes are hard as they meet his gaze.

“That happened once,” he dismisses.

“Twice,” she counters, “that I know of. Don’t you fucking lie to my face, Peña.” He knows he’s in trouble when she uses his last name. Back when they were with the DEA they always used each other’s last names, it was just how things worked. That shifted dramatically once she moved to the ranch.

“Don’t you fucking get in the middle of ongoing robberies,” he retorts. Her braid has started to come undone, dark curls falling around her ears and framing the sharp cheekbones. She pouts, saying nothing. The sight of her full lips pushed forward drains what little self-control Javier had left. One hand still around her arm, he brings the other up to cup the back of her head and presses his lips to hers in a harsh kiss. There’s no moment of hesitation, no pause where he thinks she might reject him and walk off in a huff. Aurora wrings her arm free from his grip and wraps them around him. He doesn’t even realize she’s pulled him along until there’s the low thud of her back hitting the counter, a grunt escaping in a pause between kisses. Javier pats the counter.

“Get up there,” he gruffs. She hoists herself onto it, his hand at the small of her back keeping her from knocking over the salt and pepper shakers. Thank God she wore a dress today. She’s still settling in when his hands begin to wander up under the skirt.

“You’re infuriating, querida,” he grumbles as he finds her heated core, covered by damp cotton. 

“Shut up.” She punctuates it with a bite at his neck. He cups her sex, feels blood rush to his crotch. He braces himself against the counter with one hand, the other at her hip. It’s a struggle getting her panties out of the way, with her shifting this way and that to tug them down and him so desperate to touch her that he can’t keep his hands to himself. She takes care of his clothes too, unzipping the jeans and shoving them down to his knees. She pauses to squeeze his bulge - big golden brown eyes staring at him. She’s still mad at him, though there’s love there too. Absolutely infuriating. His boxers join the jeans, erection curving up towards his stomach. Aurora takes him in hand and he groans from deep within his chest. Her legs hook around his waist, keeping him close, but even if he could pull back he wouldn’t want to. In fact, he wants more. Javier grabs at the shoulder strap of her dress, snagging the bra strap underneath it as well.

“Off,” he orders. He’s already been reduced to one-word utterances but when his love, his wife, pulls her top down and somehow manages to unclasp then throw aside her bra he forgets both the English and Spanish languages in their entirety. With her guiding him, Javier pushes into her in one swift motion. It’s sloppy, rushed, tinted with anger, desperation and the awareness that Chucho won’t be gone forever. Javier loves it all the same. Is grateful for her very existence as well as for how she clutches him in her cunt. She leaves wet kisses along his neck and at the hollow of his throat, leaving sparks in the wake of her lips. A familiar heavy feeling begins to build in his crotch and he’s not sure if he’ll be able to hold it at bay for long. Throwing aside the skirt that’s draped itself over her thighs, Javier reaches between them and grinds the heel of his palm against her clit. Aurora jumps.

“Shit,” she curses but he knows it’s a curse uttered in appreciation. His hand there is the extra pressure she needs and soon she’s shaking beneath him, building to her peak, and when she comes she flutters around him as her teeth sink into his shoulder. Another two stumbling thrusts and he follows with a growl and eyes squeezed tight as if his life depends on it. They stay there, wrapped around each other, as if they have all the time in the world.

“I still can’t believe you scolded me in front of the cops,” she mutters, face buried against his chest.

In those hours, they found peace; peace in the ecstasy of carnal pleasure, peace in the way their bodies worked in sync. Those moments of heightened breathes, soft moans, and the sweet music they made as they pushed each other over the edge time and time again. Those moments became something deeply special and meaningful to the both of them, though neither would voice such a truth aloud.

It wasn’t rare to dissolve into bliss the night before then face each other at a morning meeting. Gianna always wondered what Carrillo was thinking in those moments. She wondered what he thought as he laid down plans for her, Steve, and Javier when just hours earlier she was able to drive him to great highs of pleasure and watch him melt in her arms during the comedown.

Gianna got to see him in a light no one else could. She got to see him fall into a restful sleep, lighter than she's ever seen him before; every muscle in his body relaxed as he lay beside her. Gianna saw little bits of his softness on those nights. And sometimes he’d kiss her shoulder before going back to sleep.

Read on a03

“Oh, come on,” you goaded as you knelt on the foot of the bed, hands rested in your lap as the mattress cushioned your knees, “it’ll be fun!”

Steve shook his head as he stood in front of you, looking down at you. “I doubt that.”

“Please?” you laid it on thick, the tone you only ever used with him when you were really trying to get something from him. You didn’t have to use it often.

“No,” he said as he shook his head. “No fuckin’ way.” He looked at you, the way you were batting your eyelashes at him. He could feel the waver in his resolve, but he knew that if he buckled on this he would absolutely never hear the end of it from you.

Reaching out, you pulled him closer to you by the beltloops of his jeans. His legs pressed against the edge of the mattress as you asked, “You’re telling me that you’ve never even thought about it?”

He gently cupped your chin, tilting it so that you were looking up at him. He brushed the pad of his thumb along your bottom lip, eyes dragging slowly over every feature of your face. You felt a tingle of hopefulness before he leaned down and pressed a kiss to the dead center of your forehead and said, “Not even once.”

You huffed, rolling your eyes at him. You lifted your chin so that it was no longer being cupped by his hand. “I doubt it.”

He chuckled, shaking his head at you. “Whatever you say.”

You stayed put at the end of the bed. It’d been long enough now that you felt like you knew Steve pretty well. The two of you had always been able to get a good read on each other even when you’d first gotten together, and since then you’d only honed the skill. He could try to lie about his curiosity, but you could still see it in his eyes anyway.

He started undoing the buttons on his shirt, eyes fixed on his own hands now instead of on you. Leaning, you placed one palm to the mattress, leveraging yourself so that you could get your legs out from underneath you. Within a few moments, you were sitting, legs hanging off the edge of the bed. You had one on either side of Steve, who had noticed the way you were resituating yourself but didn’t say anything about it one way or another.

Peeling his shirt off, he tossed it into the hamper. He was about to start undoing the buckle of his belt when he felt your heels press against the backs of his legs. He let out a quiet laugh, looking at you and the amused smirk on your face. Leaning in, he kissed you on the lips. He went to pull away but you followed, not letting him get enough distance. He caught the hint enough, bringing his hands to either side of your face as he kissed you with a little more heat behind the action. You put your hands on his hips, fingers crawling their way along his belt. They grazed over where his badge rested on one side, empty holster for his gun on the other. The feeling of your lips against his had him blind to everything else, including the way you deftly lifted the handcuffs from the back pocket of his jeans without him noticing.

What you’d done didn’t register with him until he heard the clinking of metal as you brought the cuffs back to you. Once he recognized the sound, his eyes instantly popped open and he pulled out of the kiss. Instantly, he was grabbing for them, not nearly as amused by your pickpocketing skills as you were as you scrambled back farther on the bed, doing whatever you could to stay out of his reach. You were laughing as you tried to move quick enough for him to not be able to snatch them back out of your hand.

“Give those back,” he told you as he crawled up the bed to you.

Still laughing as you got your back pinned flat against the headboard, you shook your head. “No can do.”

“I’m serious.”

You rolled your eyes, knowing by the look in his eyes that he really wasn’t that serious. He was more annoyed that you were able to pull one over on him than the actual situation itself. “Come on, Agent Murphy,” there was just enough sarcasm layered on the way you addressed him to get him riled up more. “You can’t possibly tell me that you’ve never wanted to know—”

Your sentence got cut short as Steve placed one hand on each of your thighs, pulling you down so that you were flat on your back on the mattress, your legs still on either side of him. He had one hand planted next to the side of your head, keeping him propped so that he could look down at you, his other hand gripping lightly onto your hip.

“I’ve worked real hard to make sure I never end up on the other end of those cuffs.” His thumb traced back and forth against your hip as he said it, applying just enough pressure to wake up every nerve ending in your body.

The hand with the cuffs was tucked safely behind your back, like you were a few teenagers bickering on the schoolyard and you were holding his lunch money just out of reach. Using your other hand, you dragged your fingertips down his chest. Your nails didn’t dig enough to leave a mark, but you still felt the way his heart sped up in his chest at the contact.

“It’s just me,” you said as innocently as you could manage. “You trust me, right?”

He laughed, shaking his head. “Not with those.”

“Why not?”

The nearly-genuine surprise in your voice had Steve fighting the urge to roll his eyes. “You know why.”

Your mouth formed into a knowing smirk as you finally gave in with a shrug. “I guess.”

“So?” He leaned in, lips close enough to yours that they brushed as he spoke. “Can I have ‘em back?”

Despite the excitement that was coursing through you with him so close, you weren’t so distracted that you didn’t notice the feeling of his hand slipping behind your back. He’d have to work harder to get you off-kilter enough for that—you weren’t quite as easy as him.

You brushed your nose against his, slowly pulling your hand out of the reach of his. “No.”

You heard the way he mumbled your name under his breath, along with a couple curses as he tried to use his long reach to take the cuffs back from you. The fact that you were so incessantly amused by it all only made it more frustrating for him. It became much more about the principle of you giving him a hard time rather than whether or not he wanted anything to do with being handcuffed to the headboard.

He grabbed for them once more. “Will you just—”

He heard it before he felt it. The unmissable clicking sound cuffs made when they were being tightened around someone’s wrist. His eyes drifted up to see where you’d clamped it around his wrist. It wasn’t uncomfortably tight, but the fact that it was latched around him at all was his issue.

“Are you kidding me?” he asked, the tiniest bit of amusement in his voice underneath his frustration.

You smiled. “See? Not so bad, right?”

He shook his head, putting himself in a kneeling position so that he could reach into his other back pocket. “Hate to break it to you, baby, but—” He stopped short, patting all the pockets of his jeans before looking back at you again, disbelief on his face. “Did you…?”

You burst out laughing as you held the key to the handcuffs up, a triumphant smile on your face. “You should keep better track of your things, Agent Murphy.”

His head dropped, chin tucking in towards his chest. “Guess I thought I’d be safe with my girlfriend but I guess not.”

You laughed, shaking your head. “Should’ve known better.”

There was a pause as the two of you looked at each other. Steve was shaking his head at you but he was still smiling. He couldn’t believe how proud of yourself you looked for the shenanigans you were performing. Gun to his head, he’d have to admit that he was a little impressed too.

“You’re not gonna give that key back to me, are you?”

“I might…”

He chuckled. “You’re somethin’ else.”

“C’mon,” you hooked your legs around him and pulled him back to you, “be the bad guy for once. And I’ll, you know,” you twirled the key between your fingers, “I’ll bring you in for questioning.”

He laughed at that, shaking his head but not fighting to pull away from you. “’Cause you know what that’s all about?”

“Give me your other wrist and you’ll find out,” you replied, not missing a beat.

His eyebrows shot up at that. The look in your eyes as you toyed with the key in your hand had him giving into you, his curiosity taking precedent over everything else. He took a deep breath, giving a small shake of his head as he sat back and looked at you.

“Alright.”

Your entire face lit up. “Yea?”

He chuckled at your excitement. “Yea.

Wasting no time, you moved so that Steve could lay down where you’d just been. Once his back hit the mattress, you quickly threw one leg over him so that you were straddling him. You felt him laughing beneath you before you heard it. Glancing down, you saw the way he was looking at you and you couldn’t help but to smile.

“Can I have your other hand?” you asked, one eyebrow raised.

He took a deep breath, but nodded as he stretched both arms above his head, wrists close enough so that you could loop the short chain over the bar of the headboard and clamp the second cuff around his other wrist. You carefully tightened each of them, running your fingertips along the insides of his wrists before looking back down at him again.

“You good?”

He nodded, his breathing, the look in his eyes, already shifting. “I’m good.”

You set the handcuff key off to the side where you could both see it. “I know I like giving you a hard time,” leaning down, you cupped the side of his face with your hand and traced your thumb along his cheekbone, “but if at any point you don’t wanna do this, just tell me, okay?”

Steve nodded, squirming beneath you with anticipation. “Okay.”

You kissed him lightly on the lips. “I love you.”

He relaxed a little more at that, nodding as he said, “I love you too.”

You brought your lips back to his, kissing him as you raked your hands back through his hair. You heard the moan that built in the base of his throat, soon followed by the clinking of the handcuffs being pulled on against the headboard. You laughed as you kissed him, the kiss only breaking when Steve dropped his head back to the pillow with an exasperated laugh.

“I already don’t like this,” he said with a chuckle.

You laughed, pressing a kiss to his jaw. “Looks like I don’t even have to give you the bad guy treatment.”

He lifted his head so he could get a better look at you. “Not being able to touch you is the bad guy treatment.”

You rolled your eyes but you couldn’t fight the smile on your face. “You’re ridiculous.”

“Yea,” he tugged against the restraints, “I see that now.”

Still smiling, you pressed your lips to his in another kiss, one that he didn’t break quite so quickly. You had one hand on his chest, the other cupping his face and keeping him close. You could feel the shift in the muscles in his chest and shoulders as he went to move his arms, like he’d already forgotten what had happened only a few moments before.

Your tongue slid to meet his and you felt the way his muscles eased, his body becoming pliant beneath yours as he reveled in the taste of you. It wasn’t until you started to grind your hips against his that you heard the clanging of metal on metal. Even through your shorts and his jeans, you could feel him getting harder. He tugged against the cuffs once, twice more before resigning himself to them again. You had the feeling it was going to be an ongoing fight, and it was one that you were looking forward to.

Pulling your lips off of his, you left a trail of kisses along his jaw, down the column of his neck, trailed across his chest. You heard the sound of his head against the pillow, the way he dropped it in resignation as he breathed out a quiet, “Fuck.”

Your lips curled into a smile against his skin as you continued to move your hips. You felt the way that he tried to get enough leverage, be able to move himself against you, but you had the upper hand here in every possible way. Separating your hips from his, you heard the short huff of frustration he let out.

It was impossible not to let your hands roam. All the real estate in the world and no one to stop you from exploring every inch of it. You could feel Steve’s eyes on you as you drank him in. The rise and fall of his chest as he breathed was hypnotic, your teeth dragging along your bottom lip at the sight of him now when you’d barely gotten started. You could only imagine how he was going to look when you were done with him.

Locking your eyes onto his, you dragged your hand over the bulge of his jeans, fingers running along his length even through the denim. He took a slow, calculated breath in, hands steadily pulling against the cuffs.

“Something you want?” you asked, feigned innocence in your tone.

He laughed. He was shaking his head at you until your face was suddenly directly over his again. You cupped his face by the chin the way he’d done to you so many times in the past. Being on the other end of it, along with the slick grin on your face, sent a jolt down his spine, any smug remarks he’d been thinking of making stuck in the back of his throat.

Finally, he got himself together enough to say, “You’re killin’ me.”

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Help me out,” he said, pulling against the cuffs for a moment like it might be the time they magically came undone.

“You know how this works,” you said as you sat back, hips moving just slightly against his as your hands rested against his stomach. “You want me to do something for you? You gotta do something for me.”

Steve chuckled, shaking his head. Fuckin’ bad guy treatment. “Like what?”

Your fingers began to toy with his belt, almost going through the motions of undoing it and then you stopped. “Tell me exactly what you want.”

For a moment the thought crossed his mind that he never should’ve given you so much power. But then he felt you move just slightly against him, saw the hungry look in your eyes, and suddenly all he could think about was making you look at him that way forever.

“I wanna be inside you,” he said, quieter and more breathless than he intended.

A smile curled the ends of your lips as you finally undid the buckle of his belt. “That’s a start.” Your fingers landed on the button of his jeans, eyes traveling back up to his as you paused. “Would it kill you to say please, though?”

He huffed out what he could manage of a laugh. Shaking his head, all he could think about for a moment was how differently this would all be playing out if he just had the use of his fucking hands.

He was snapped out of his obstinate thoughts by the feeling of you cupping his face again, forcing him to look at you. “Hey,” you leaned in, lips nearly touching his as you spoke, “you wanna know what you have to do for me so I’ll do something for you?” Your nails bit into his skin just slightly. “You gotta beg a little, baby.” You brushed your lips against his, hardly enough to constitute a kiss, but more than enough to leave him wanting more. “That’s what you can do for me.”

For a brief moment, he thought that he was going to melt right into the mattress. All he could feel was you—your hand on his face, your breath on his skin, the warmth radiating off your body seeping into his. He was about to disappear into it all, and willingly at that.

“Please,” the word came out in the closest thing to a whine you’d ever gotten out of him, “please fuck me.” He turned, pressing a kiss to the inside of your palm. “I wanna be inside you so bad.”

His words went straight to your core. Pressing a quick, hard kiss to his lips you pulled away so that you could finish what you’d started, undoing the button and zipper of his jeans. He lifted his hips off the bed just enough for you to be able to pull his jeans and boxers off all in one swoop before tossing them onto the floor beside your bed.

Steve was vaguely aware of how exposed he was in that moment, how vulnerable. He expected to find himself second-guessing it all, shying away from it. But all he could focus on, all he could think about, was the way that you were looking at him. You were kneeling between his legs, eyes roaming over him like you were about to dive in and devour him whole. He would’ve let you.

He sucked in a sharp breath when he felt your hand wrap around him, not caring about the noise that came from him fighting against the cuffs around his wrists. Each stroke of your hand had him pulling against the restraints, and you were loving it.

Resituating yourself just slightly, you leaned down, wrapping your lips around the head of his cock. His head dropped back, and you heard him muttering out, “Fuck,” and a string of other curses as you started to move, tongue running up and down his length as you did. Using your hand and mouth in tandem, it wasn’t long before you had Steve repeating nothing but your name and the word please over and over again.

When you pulled your mouth off him, you could feel the way his breath caught in his throat. Lifting his head, he looked down at you, almost like he was worried that you’d changed your mind. You smiled, tongue darting out along your bottom lip as you quickly slipped your shorts off. The groan that Steve let out when he realized that you hadn’t been wearing underwear the entire time was sinful, and it brought a smile to your face.

You straddled him once more, so close that Steve was pulling hard enough against the cuffs that for a moment you thought they might actually snap. “Still want me to fuck you?” you asked, like the answer wasn’t glaringly obvious.

You were rewarded with the clanging of metal on metal, followed by Steve’s breathless, “Please, baby.”

Giving right in was just as much for your own benefit as it was for Steve’s. You both moaned as he slid into you. Leaning in, you slowly started moving your hips as you kissed Steve on the lips. He kissed you back fiercely, hungry for whatever you would give him.

“You feel so good,” he murmured against your lips between kisses. “All that for me?”

You smiled into your kiss for a moment before pulling away. Reaching up, your fingers danced along his hands and wrists. “Guess I kinda like you like this.”

He chuckled, letting out a breathless, “Fuck me,” at the realization that he’d been right all along—you weren’t ever going to let this go.

He didn’t have too much time to think on it as you began to move your hips quicker, falling into a rhythm that was going to send you both over the edge soon. Steve’s eyes were glued to you as he watched you slide your hand down your body until your fingers reached the small bundle of nerves at your core. The moan you let out as your fingers teased, the way your walls clenched around him while you did, had him doing whatever he could to buck up into you, chasing his high the way you were chasing yours.

You braced one hand against his chest, hips stuttering in their rhythm as you came. The only sound in the room for a moment was the sound of you repeating Steve’s name over and over again. The sight of you like that sending him over the edge right with you, the clinking of the cuffs against the headboard reminding you that all he wanted in that moment was to touch you, pull you as close as he could.

You melted against him, sinking down so that you were resting your forehead against his, hands on either side of you doing what they could to keep you just the slightest bit upright. You were both fighting to catch your breath, still stealing kisses from each other despite that as you kept him inside you..

“You okay?” you asked, still breathless.

He let out a small chuckle as he nodded. “I’m good.” He kissed you. “You good?”

You laughed. “Yea, I’m, I’m good. Here,” you leaned over and grabbed the key from the nightstand, carefully undoing his cuffs before tossing it all safely off to the side. You gently ran your hands over his wrists, pressing kisses along the insides of them where they’d taken the brunt of his pulling. “You sure you’re okay?”

He nodded, wrapping his arms around you, pulling you tight to him because he finally could. “I’m good.” He kissed the edge of your forehead. “Next time, though?”

You tilted your head up so you could look at him. “Next time?”

You’d lost track of the last time the two of you had spoken. The last phone call between you felt like it had happened lifetimes ago. The last face-to-face conversation? Even longer than that. You both had the feeling that it was coming. Inevitable was too strong of a word, but it was much more than probable.

It would only be so long before he really started holding it against you. You knew that was coming, too. No one got to leave him and let it be a clean break. There always had to be a little bit of a mess. He was practically hardwired for it.

Which was why you didn’t know how shocked you really were when you walked through the airport and saw him standing there waiting for you.

“Horacio?” you said, adjusting the bag on your shoulder.

“I heard you were coming home,” he said, his tone painfully neutral. “I wanted to see it for myself.”

His tone was controlled but you could see it in his eyes that there was more he wanted to say. There was more that he wanted to get into. He wouldn’t do that here, though, not in front of so many people. The look in his eyes almost made you want to remind him that Colombia might’ve been home for him, but it wasn’t home for you. Especially not once he stopped calling.

“Well,” you shrugged, “here I am.”

Your assumption was that the person getting you from the airport was going to be Steve or Javi. Someone from your team. Someone that you figured might still actually want to see you. It crossed your mind that maybe Carrillo had missed you more than his lack of letters and phone calls led you to believe. That, or he just wanted to give you a bit of a hard time and a cold shoulder about the whole ordeal. One of those felt a little more likely than the other.

He at least helped you with your bags. You had the backpack on your shoulders, pulling one rolling suitcase with you while he had the other. It was amazing to you that you’d learned to parse your life down to three bags. If someone had told you five years ago that you’d be able to do that, and that you wouldn’t feel like you were missing parts of yourself in doing so, you would’ve told them that they were insane.

He loaded everything into the back of the CNP vehicle. You made your way to the passenger seat. Just as you were going to buckle yourself in, Carrillo pulled the driver’s door open. And, just for a moment, it felt like you’d never left. There was that strange air of routine to it all. The problem was that everything else about the two of you felt different, strained in a way it never used to be.

“I was just going to head home,” you said as he put the key in the ignition, “unless they really need me there today.”

He gave a slight shake of his head. “Tomorrow is fine.”

“Alright.”

“Same building, right?”

You nodded, watching as his hand maneuvered the gear-shift and put the car in drive. “Yea. Same building. Couple floors up from where I was before.” You paused, trying to cut through whatever weird lingering tension was still in the air between you. “Peña and Murphy will have to put in a little work now if they wanna come up and see me.”

You were ready for him to make a comment about that. Some remark about how you’d still have your same place, the little shoebox of an apartment that had a balcony with a view that made up for all the rest of it, if you just hadn’t up and left. You could see the comments practically dancing on the tip of his tongue. There was a slight shift in his jaw as he bit them back, and you almost wished that he’d let them fly. Him being angry with you would make the previous weeks and weeks of silence a little more understandable. Maybe even palatable.

Whatever snide remarks he’d come up with, he stored away for another time. Anger that he would take out on someone else at a later date, you were sure. His grip on the steering wheel tightened as he forced out a simple, “Okay.”

When he pulled into the parking lot of your apartment building, you were ready for him to help you get your bags out, and then just leave the rest of it to you. It wasn’t as though you expected him to come up and help you unpack. Part of you was still surprised that he’d been the one to come and get you. You couldn’t tell what his angle was. You’d seen enough of his anger to know what that was like, and this wasn’t it. But it didn’t feel the same way that it used to between you either.

“I can get it from here,” you told him when he set your bags on the ground.

He shook his head. “I’ll help.”

“Horacio—”

“It’s fine.”

Of all the arguments that the two of you were practically destined to get into in the coming weeks, you weren’t going to let this be one of them. Grabbing one suitcase, you left the other for him. “Thank you.”

Slipping the key into the lock on the door, you let yourself in. You walked in first, Carrillo following close behind. You looked around the apartment as you stepped into it. It was nice enough, the way that most of the housing agents were put up in tended to be. It wasn’t luxury, but it was comfortable. That was really all you needed. You’d only be there to sleep anyway, and it wasn’t as though any of you did enough of that.

“I’d offer you a drink or something,” you told him, chuckling quietly as you dropped your backpack to the floor, “but I’m pretty sure I’ve got nothing to offer.”

“It’s alright.”

The two of you stood there in the space between your new living room and kitchen, the one patch of apartment that had nothing furnishing it. You waited for him to leave, or say something. It still felt like you were waiting for the other shoe to drop. You watched him as he looked around, like your government-furnished apartment was suddenly the most interesting thing he’d ever seen before.

“I didn’t think that you’d be the one to come get me,” you told him honestly, cutting through the silence since he clearly had no intention to.

“Why not?”

You laughed, more out of shock than amusement. Carrillo was many things, but he wasn’t stupid. Stubborn, yes, but not stupid. There was no way that he didn’t understand what you meant, why you said it. “You didn’t even want to make a phone call, Horacio.” You shook your head. “Going out of your way to play chauffer didn’t seem like it was going to be in the cards.”

“It’s not that I didn’t want to.” His response was quick, his words quiet. You were expecting an edge to his voice but found none.

“No?” you asked, still not believing him.

“I didn’t think that you were ever coming back. So,” he looked down at the floor, shaking his head, “what was the point?”

“The point?” You stepped in closer to him. “I care about you. That was the point. I figured you cared about me too. Maybe that could’ve been the point.”

“Of course I cared.” He caught himself. “Care.”

You frowned. “Cutting me out without telling me why was a weird way to show that.”

“I couldn’t keep listening to you knowing that I wasn’t ever going to see you again. Talking to you, hearing about your day,” he shook his head, “when I wasn’t part—”

“You were part of it, though,” you countered, practically chest-to-chest with him now. “That’s why I spent so much time fucking calling you, writing you. That was you being part of my day. Me being part of yours.” Tears began to sting at the edges of your eyes, emotions you hadn’t had the time to feel in months bubbling back to the surface. “Then you gave it up.”

“You left first,” he argued, but his voice was still quiet.

“But you stopped trying first.”

He wanted to tell you the truth. He wanted to be able to say it all, but words had never been his strong suit. He wanted to tell you that every night he’d get off the phone and for as much as he loved hearing your voice on the other end of the line, it felt like someone dropped a weight on his chest each time he put the phone back down on the receiver. For as much as he loved reading every letter from you, studying all the intricacies of your handwriting, having to see a return address that was so far from where he was stung. He wasn’t enough to make you stay, and the ache of missing you was one type of pain he didn’t know how to stomach.

There was only a shred of distance left between the two of you, but you erased it anyway. Resting your hand on his shoulder, you squeezed lightly. “I missed you.”

His eyes went to your hand, traveling up your arm until they finally reached your face. “I missed you too.” He took a deep breath, forcing himself to relax slightly as he leaned in and let his forehead rest against yours. “It’s why I stopped picking up.”

Your eyes shut, and you could feel the tears that were clinging to your eyelashes. “You should’ve said that.”

He couldn’t go back and fix what had already happened, change the things that he did or didn’t say. But he could tell you now, at least. “I stopped because it hurt, because you weren’t coming back. It felt foolish, like I was holding out hope for something that wasn’t going to—”

“But it did,” you said, cutting him off. “And we could’ve had all that time.”

It was an argument that the two of you easily could’ve kept taking in circles. He could keep saying you kicked it all off by leaving, and you could keep saying that he put the final nail in the coffin because he stopped answering your calls. You were both right, and it wasn’t getting either of you anywhere.

“And now?” he asked.

You brought your hand from his shoulder to the side of his face, thumb grazing along his cheek. “I still miss you.”

He felt the way your thumb stopped moving, the way the tips of your fingers pressed into his skin just slightly. You were almost pulling him towards you, but you stopped yourself. Like you heard the words but were still deciding what they meant, how much weight was really behind them. So instead of saying anything more, Carrillo decided that he would just show you instead.

Lifting his chin, he moved just enough to bring his lips to yours. A gesture that was supposed to be soft, a gentle punctuation to prove that he meant what he’d said to you. But the moment that he felt the soft warmth of your lips against his, all of that went out the window. The second he could feel the quick breath that you sucked in when you realized what was happening, all he could do was desperately try to pour himself into you.

His arms snaked around you, pulling himself tight to you. His lips slotted against yours, desperate and bruising. Desperate to put all those nights filled with longing and missing you into something that would actually do one of you some sort of good. He didn’t know who was getting more out of it at that point. He didn’t really care.

He was everything you remembered, all hunger and need, traces of cigarette smoke still lingering on his tongue. A filthy habit you had been on him to quit but in that moment it tasted like coming home. Your fingers curled into the stiff material of his fatigues, needing to find purchase in something to make sure it was all real, that it wasn’t just part of a cruel trick he was playing.

He stopped kissing you for a moment, but his lips were still brushing against yours as he spoke. “I missed you,” he repeated.

In all the late night and early morning calls, the letters that went back and forth, he never really said it like that. Not so concisely, so directly. Like saying it as such would’ve given it too much power, made the distance between you and the yearning that filled it a little too real and too heavy. But now you were in front of him. You were here and he was kissing you, holding you. And he could say it. It was safe to say it now because he already had you back.

You were going to tell him the same, let him know that he wasn’t alone in all of this. He never had been. But he didn’t give you the chance. His lips crashed against yours once more, none of the calculated finesse that was such a staple with the Colonel in any other capacity. It nearly knocked the wind out of you, made your knees buckle, but it didn’t matter because he was holding you tightly enough to keep you from crumbling anyway.

Suddenly he had you falling back onto the sofa. He moved you through the apartment with the ease of someone who had been spending time there with you for weeks already. You didn’t fight him on it, letting your back hit the cushions, his body pinning to yours as he followed you down. You were pulling at his shirt, untucking it from the pants of his fatigues. His hands were already working at your button and zipper, each of you trying to peel the layers off each other as quickly and as clumsily as possible.

It'd gone differently in his head, all the nights when his mind wandered and conjured up what it would be like if he got to see you again, have you again like he used to. It was never quite like this when he pictured it. He’d given himself too much credit, thinking that he would be able to hold back at all, control himself. He couldn’t. From the second he felt the warmth of your skin against his, the tickle of your breath against his jaw, there was no moderation to be found.

Next time, he thought to himself as he yanked your jeans down your legs, next time he would drag it out. He’d take his time with you. But this had all been dragged out long enough. He wouldn’t have even taken the time to bother with his shirt if you hadn’t started with it first, but that was one thing he could easily do for you. He didn’t have it in him to take his time, but he could at least give you that. It hit the floor right before the rest of his clothes.

The groan that he let out as he pushed into you set every inch of you on fire. Your nails dug into his back, raking along skin that you hadn’t been able to touch in far too long. His lips moved away from yours, pressing a kiss to the side of your neck right before his teeth sank into it. Your body drew itself to his, wanting every bit of contact you could get.

He settled inside you for a moment, hips pressed tightly to yours. For a moment all of your thoughts about Colombia not being home couldn’t have felt further from the truth. You were fighting to catch your breath and the two of you had hardly gotten started. Your eyes fluttered shut, focused on how he felt against you, hips against yours, his face in the crook of your neck. You tried to pull him tighter to you, unsure if it was even possible to do so.

It was surprising to you in a way that maybe it shouldn’t have been that things with you and Carrillo were working as well as they had been. Out of all the men in Colombia you thought you would find yourself casually hooking up with, he certainly hadn’t been anywhere near the top of the list. He really hadn’t made your list at all.

You couldn’t even really remember how it all came up in the first place. A bunch of you had been out after a grueling week, drinking away the stress of it all. In between rounds everyone was catching up on gossip, all the little things that didn’t matter in the grand scheme of it all but were the perfect topics of conversation when the grand scheme had been so exhausting for you all. And there was no shortage of things to talk about. Messy breakups, dates gone wrong, new and not-so-secret relationships abound. Still waters run deep, after all.

At some point you’d all descended into talking about one of the officer’s friends with benefits relationship gone wrong. No one really had any sympathy for him, of course, but it fueled jokes and banter for the next five minutes of conversation. In the aftermath of that, Carrillo had made a comment under his breath about not understanding how you all managed to have time for all of that with everything else that was going on.

“Yea,” you said, just as quietly with a laugh, “I get that friends with benefits probably seems like a weird concept for someone who doesn’t seem all that interested in even having friends without benefits.”

If you hadn’t had so much liquid courage in you at that point, the look on Carrillo’s face would’ve stunned you into silence, maybe even into squaring up your tab altogether.

But as it stood, you weren’t fazed. Instead, you doubled down. “What?” There was extra safety in the fact that everyone else had diverted off into their own conversations—no one was listening to the two of you. “Am I wrong?”

“I have friends,” he said, unable to believe that he was entertaining the conversation with you, letting it be anything resembling an argument.

You arched one eyebrow. “Okay, sure. Let’s,” you took a sip of your drink, “let’s say that’s true.”

He shook his head at you. “You think that because I’m not sleeping with any of them that—”

“I didn’t say that,” you cut him off. “I didn’t even say that you don’t have friends. I’m saying that you don’t seem all that interested in having friends. Which, you know,” you shrugged, “whatever.”

He could see that there was something else on the tip of your tongue. He was logical enough to know that he should let it lie, but he was too stubborn to go on without asking. “What?”

“I just…” you shrugged, suddenly trying to pick your words carefully now that you realized the deep water you’d landed yourself in. “With everything you’ve had going on I’m just not exactly surprised that you’re not keen on people right now.”

He frowned at that. He knew exactly what you were talking about, and as much as he hated that you were bringing it up at all, he was at least thankful that you had enough grace to not blurt it out in obvious terms. If he hadn’t gone to the bar with all of you, he knew that his recent disaster of a breakup would’ve made it onto the gossip wheel. Fair was fair, after all, and it was quite the story for everyone else who was on the outside of it.

He let out a sound that was something between a hum and a grunt of acknowledgment. You were on precariously thin ice as it was but still you took another sip of your drink and forged onward, talking since he apparently wasn’t going to.

“Honestly it’d probably be good for you. It’s been a bit, right? Probably be good for you to blow off some steam if you haven’t already.” You said it so casually despite the fact that the two of you really didn’t have the type of relationship where you were usually offering unsolicited advice about anything, but especially his sex life or lack thereof. Again, if there had been any less liquor in your system, the look on Carrillo’s face would’ve had you melting into the floor.

But somewhere between that conversation and the moment you were in now, with him knocking at your door, the two of you had become friends with benefits. Maybe more benefits than friends, but still, you served a purpose for each other. He wasn’t up for anything serious after a brutal breakup, and realistically he didn’t seem like the most emotionally available man to begin with anyway. And you were too busy letting work take over your life to try and entertain a real relationship. But still, you were only human. He filled a need for you and vice versa.

There were rules to it. Things to keep it from getting messy. Part of you had to think that maybe that was a large part of the appeal for him. Structure was good—he knew how to navigate that. The two of you always met at your place—that was his rule. He never stayed over no matter how late it was—that was your rule. There were a few others you’d each put into place along the way. The big one, the unspoken one, was that if one of you started to feel any kind of off about it, you’d cut the cord on the whole arrangement. The whole purpose of it was to eliminate mess, not make more of one.

The beauty of there being limited friendship built into the actual arrangement was that when he showed up, you always knew why. It wasn’t like he ever turned up on your doorstep just for a drink and a chat.  So when you heard the knocks, you knew exactly what you were going to be in for. He wasn’t one for small talk with anyone, so it wasn’t as though you really had to entertain him very much before the two of you got into things.

There was only a matter of minutes between you unlocking your apartment door for him and the two of you peeling the clothes off of each other on the way to your bedroom. His hands moved quickly, with the same precision he showed in every other area of his life. In record time he had your blouse unbuttoned and on the floor, working the clasp of your bra with the same ease before moving to the buckle of your belt.

His lips moved hungrily against yours. Slow and steady hadn’t ever been the pace with the two of you, but you could feel a different sense of urgency this time. You wondered what happened before he decided to come over. It wouldn’t be the first time either of you took your problems out on each other. Neither of you had ever made any complaints about it.

He undid the button and zipper of your jeans, easily pushing them down past your hips, down just enough for them to pool around your ankles on the floor. Once the backs of your legs met the resistance of your mattress, his hand slid up from your hip, trailing up your stomach until it stopped in the middle of your chest. He pushed with just enough force to get you to fall back onto the bed.

You took his hand in your own, went to pull him down onto the mattress with you, but he didn’t give you the chance. Pulling his hand back, he reached up and peeled his polo off over his head, discarding it somewhere on the floor with the mess of your own clothes. You watched with bated breath as he undid the buckle of his belt with one hand, using the other to run up your calf, over your knee and onto your thigh.

It seemed like your eyes diverted for all of a second, and suddenly he was on you. Climbing up your body, all rough palms and grazing teeth. You felt his lips against your neck and you reached, threading your fingers through the short hair at the nape of his neck. The second his teeth sank into you, your grip on his hair tightened in turn. You heard the hiss he let out, and you felt the smug satisfaction start to settle in.

Then his lips were on yours again, as desperate as he’d ever been he slipped his tongue into your mouth as he ground his hips against yours. you moaned into his mouth, arching into the contact as you slid one hand down between you, wrapping it around his length. He instantly bucked into your hand, the reaction practically involuntary as he pulled his mouth off of yours.

“Fuck,” he cursed, low and quiet, one hand balled into a fist on the pillow beside your head, other hand on the side of your face. The pad of his thumb rested beneath your bottom lip, almost enough to pull at it if he hadn’t been so distracted by your grip on him, the motions you knew would piece him apart.

His hand slid down to the side of your throat, and you felt your heartrate already speeding up. But then he reached and pulled your hand away, separating the two of you. He was already flushed, breathless, and you weren’t much better considering the two of you had hardly gotten started. It wasn’t the time to ask questions, but the look in Carrillo’s eyes had you wondering if maybe you should.

He didn’t give you the chance. Any attempt you were going to make to try and check in was cast aside as he slid back down your body, lips and tongue trailing the whole way down until he hooked your legs over his shoulders and dove directly between your thighs.

It was your turn to let out a curse, a string of them really, as your thighs clamped tighter around his head, fingers weaving into his hair as his tongue worked you over. Your back arched, fingers tugging harder on his hair as he tried to lose himself in you, tried to use you to cure some sort of insatiable hunger inside of him. It was a fool’s errand that you would let him run on forever if it kept him between your legs the way he was. You had no hope in stopping the moan that came out of you when he slid his fingers into you, legs trembling around his head as he pumped them in and out of you.

“Fuck,” you practically whined. “Don’t,” you lifted your head off the bed just enough to look down at him, the sight of him nearly enough to send you over the edge all on its own, “don’t stop.”

Whatever had sent him to your door had him feeling more agreeable than usual, because he did as you said without a moment’s hesitation. Even when the coil inside of you snapped, when you were lying pliant and breathless on the bed with your legs still lazily draped over his shoulders, he didn’t stop.

It wasn’t until you gently raked your fingers through his hair and let out a soft, unsteady, “Horacio,” that he paused long enough to look up at you, to revel in the mess he’d turned you into. The thought crossed his mind as he looked at you, as he carefully brought himself back up to your face, that he was still good for something, for someone. Despite everything pointing to the contrary, he might still be the right thing for someone. Maybe even you.

You were about to say something more when he kissed you, taking away the opportunity. You didn’t fight him, hand cupping the side of his face as you tasted yourself off of his lips. His hips shifted and you could feel him, still ready, still twitching.

When he pulled his lips off of yours, he sat back, kneeling as he grabbed onto your hips and turned you over so that you were lying on your stomach. Hands still holding onto you, he pulled you back towards him, leaving you braced on your forearms as he slotted himself between your legs. Your fingers curled into a thread-tearing grip on your sheets as he pushed into you. He moved slow at first, and you could feel the way he was fighting to show some restraint. But once he heard the tiny whimpered, “Yes,” you let out under your breath, he immediately picked up his pace.

Even with the stars behind your eyes, you could already picture the finger-shaped bruises he was going to leave on your hips. You pushed back against him, spurring him on as he brought one hand up to grip your shoulder, what little nail he had biting into the soft flesh there.

The only things you could hear above the sounds of your own ragged breathing and heartbeat, was the sound of his hips connecting with you, the scattered curses he let out under his breath the closer he got to release.

You felt the stutter in his thrusts as he finished, melting against you as soon as he did. You felt his forehead rest against your back between your shoulder blades, felt each heave of his chest as he fought to try and get his breath back. His hands loosened, acting gentle against you once more as he held you to him—not that you had the desire to move away anyway.

When he finally pulled away from you, he ran his hand up and down your back again. His voice was almost even as he asked, “You’re okay?”

You let out a breathless laugh as you nodded. It took more effort than you wanted to admit just to turn yourself over so that you were lying on your back again. Once you did, you looked over at him, making eye contact before nodding again and saying, “I’m okay.”

For a beat, neither of you moved or said anything. Carrillo didn’t move to get dressed and leave, you didn’t try to ask what had him in such a state when he showed up at your apartment. For a precious two minutes, the two of you existed in a limbo where there was simply nothing else, no life outside the walls of your bedroom.

Finally, he cleared his throat, looking over at you once more. “It’s late.”

Blinking a few times, you turned and looked at the clock on your nightstand. Your eyes widened when you saw the time, not having realized just how long the two of you had been at it. “Shit,” you said as you ran your hands down your face, “it is.”

The silence that followed spoke volumes. You waited for him to get up and start getting his things the way that he usually did, maybe even toss you something to pull on quickly so that you could follow him out and lock the door behind him when he left. But he was still. The longer you looked in his eyes, the more you realized just what he was waiting for. If he wanted to talk about what happened, you’d listen. That wasn’t against the rules. Staying over was, though.

“Something you want to talk about?” you finally asked when he made no move to start the conversation himself.

He was weighing the options, the pitfalls of opening up to you, the downsides of locking himself away. That was his issue, apparently—never quite showing or giving enough. Or so he’d been told.

“I can’t stay?” Another statement turned into a question. It wasn’t what he actually wanted to talk about, but it was the best he could do. Old habits die hard.

You sighed, head dropping back against the pillow behind you. You stared up at the ceiling for a moment, wanting to choose your answer to the question carefully. There was only one right answer, but you didn’t want to say it wrong.

“I don’t know what happened today, but—”

“Nothing happened,” he said, a little harsher than he meant to.

You paused, pressing your lips together in a thin line. “Okay, fine. Nothing happened. I don’t know what didn’t happen today, Horacio, but I think you should go.”

“Why?”

You let out a tired laugh. “Because that’s…that’s what we do. That’s why this works.” You paused. “Unless you don’t think it’s working anymore. Which means we need to be having a very different conversation.”

You could practically see the walls going back up in real time, not quite as effective as they had been before. “You’re right—I should go.”

He got off the bed, gathering his clothes off the floor and dressing himself as he went. While he was busy with that you went and grabbed an old t-shirt for yourself. Neither of you said anything as you walked with him to the door. It felt different this time. It wasn’t as though the two of you were the types to kiss goodbye—you weren’t a couple after all. But there was a tension in the air now that almost made you feel like he was waiting for something to happen.

Crossing your arms over your chest, you said, “Get some safe, yea?”

He nodded. “Yea.”

You couldn’t get a read on his expression, so you asked, “I’ll see you?”