#riddler fluff

The smell of rust filled your lungs as you ran; every breath tore at your throat, and shards of broken glass cracked beneath your shoes, echoing through the cursed hallway. Because this wasn’t just an abandoned asylum. As Edward had told you over and over again, years ago this floor had been designed specifically for the “dangerous” schizophrenic patients, and its architecture had been built deliberately like a maze. Corridors that looked identical to one another. Rooms carrying the same numbers. Passageways that brought you back to the very place you started from when you thought you’d found a dead end. Crooked lighting systems installed in the ceilings to distort a person’s sense of direction… It had all been designed not only to trap the body, but the mind itself.

Most of the walls were covered in moss. Layers of old green paint peeled away in strips, damp wallpaper bulged outward like diseased skin, and above some of the doors, patient names could still barely be read beneath the rust. The building felt less like it had been abandoned for years and more like it had been silently breathing, waiting, watching you.

You didn’t dare look behind you because you had no idea how closely Edward was following you. That was exactly what was wrong with him—he never approached you like a normal person. Every interaction you’d ever had with him in Arkham had become twisted inside his head. Your kindness toward him, the way you listened to his ramblings, solved his riddles, stayed beside him a few minutes longer so he wouldn’t feel alone… he had mistaken all of it for love. And when he saw you with Bruce, the fragile world inside his mind had cracked completely. In his head, you had already belonged to him.

That was why he had kidnapped you. Why he had dragged you all the way to this rotting building outside Gotham and locked you inside the very floor where patients had once gone insane and slaughtered each other. Edward knew every path here. He had described it to you before with that disturbing gleam in his eyes, like it was all some kind of game.

“If you choose the wrong door,” he’d said, smiling, “you end up right back where you started… just like liars do.”

Your trembling hands shoved against the heavy iron door, and when you stumbled inside, the room greeted you with the silence of a tomb.

There were two rusted hospital beds inside. One had been overturned; the other still wore a filthy white sheet stained with rotting brown marks. Half of the ceiling lamp was shattered, and the wind slipping through the open window stirred the sheet ever so slightly, making it seem as though someone in the room was breathing.

The mirror above the sink was completely cracked. When you looked at your reflection, you could barely recognize your own face.

You collapsed into the corner, clamping both hands over your mouth as your heart pounded so violently you were terrified Edward would find you from the sound alone.

The silence here wasn’t normal silence. Even when the building was quiet, it whispered. Metal scraped somewhere far away. Water dripped steadily from the ceiling. Sometimes the wind rushed down the corridor and echoed like a muffled moan. And then you heard him.

Not his footsteps.

His voice.

From somewhere deep within the corridor, his calm voice rose almost playfully:

“It’s not nice to tell lies,

It’s not nice to tell lies…

You’ll be called a liar,

You’ll be called a liar…

Don’t make it a habit,

Don’t make it a habit…

Or you’ll repent…

You’ll repent.”

The final word stretched through the hallways as an echo, and your eyes slammed shut instantly because Edward did this on purpose. This was his favorite way to terrify you. Before physically catching you, he wanted to break your mind apart first.

You covered your ears and buried your face against your knees, your breathing turning ragged as your shoulders trembled uncontrollably.

“Stop… make him stop…” you whispered to yourself. Because hearing his voice dragged you right back to Arkham—to the way he used to stare at you with that strange admiration burning behind his eyes.

Edward had never been the type to scream. That was what made him worse.

Even when he spoke softly, it felt as though he were peeling your skin away and looking directly into your mind.

A door slammed somewhere in the corridor.

Then another.

Then another.

As though he were randomly entering rooms one by one. But you knew that was a lie because Edward never did anything randomly. This was part of the game too. He wanted you panicked. Wanted you unable to guess where he’d come from next.

Your fingers tangled into your hair as you squeezed your eyes shut tighter—and then you noticed the darkness beneath the door shifting.

Someone was standing outside.

Your breath stopped completely. You tried not to make a sound, but when terror takes hold of the body, even your own heartbeat becomes impossible to silence. The stillness beyond the door stretched on and on.

Then Edward spoke from the other side, his voice almost amused. “You know… most of the patients on this floor thought they’d found the exit, only to end up back in the same corridor.”

Your eyes burned with tears, but you fought not to cry because you knew he loved this. He loved seeing you powerless. Loved seeing what fear did to you.

“And do you know the most tragic part?” he continued softly. “Some of them never realized they were lost at all.”

His footsteps slowly began to retreat, and for a few seconds you desperately wanted to believe he had finally gone. But just as you dared to breathe again, a sudden theatrical shout exploded from somewhere deep in the corridor:

“TA-DA!”

Then his laughter spread through the darkness. Not from outside the door. Not from down the hall.

From somewhere impossibly close.

As if it had come from inside the room itself.

He sounded so confident, so exhilarated, that you screamed in terror, convinced he had found you. But he hadn’t.

It had been a bluff—a trap meant to force you into revealing yourself. And in the end, it worked, didn’t it?

His voice remained unnervingly calm, and that was the worst part of all. Beneath that calmness, there was something festering—resentment, obsession, fury—all waiting for the perfect moment to sink its claws into you.

“Ah… so this is where you are, little piggy,” he laughed softly. “Don’t make Daddy work so hard. There’s nowhere you can hide.”

You cried in sheer horror, your eyes locked on the door as if staring at it hard enough could stop it from opening. If he truly found you, you’d shove him aside and run. You’d run with everything you had.

Trembling violently, you pushed yourself upright, gripping the edge of the filthy bed stained with old blood, urine, and rot. Sweat rolled down your forehead and mixed with the tears streaming along your cheeks. Damp strands of hair clung to your face until you shakily brushed them aside, widening your blurred field of vision.

A low growl came from beyond the door.

“There you are, piggy…”

That word again. The name he used whenever he wanted to humiliate you.

The second the door burst open, you bolted toward the opposite corner of the room. You had no space to escape where you’d been hiding before. And now he stood directly in front of you.

You broke into hysterical sobs.

“WHY?! WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?! WHAT DID I EVER DO TO YOU?!”

He didn’t even seem to hear you.

When you looked into his brown eyes, all you saw were cruel plans soaked in sadism.

The moment he stepped close enough, you lunged at him without warning, shoving him back with all your strength before trying to run.

You made it out of the room.

You were already sprinting down the massive corridor when the Riddler suddenly roared behind you—

“TOO EASY, Y/N! WAY TOO EASY!”

Just as you had finally begun to pick up speed, a brutal force yanked at the back of your neck.

Pain exploded through your skull in an instant as Edward twisted his fist into your hair and jerked you backward so violently that your entire body lost balance. Your head snapped back involuntarily before your spine and knees slammed against the floor with a deafening crash.

Broken tiles, rusted metal fragments, and scattered rubble dug into your skin as a muffled cry tore from your throat, the impact knocking the breath straight out of you.

The hospital floor was freezing cold. Dampness seeped through the thin fabric of your clothes and into your skin while your palms scraped against the ground, leaving raw cuts behind. But Edward didn’t care about any of it.

He still hadn’t let go of your hair. His fingers were tangled so tightly at the roots that it felt as though he were trying to prove he could control your entire body just by holding you there. And that was exactly the point.

More than hurting you, he wanted you to feel his control over you.

“Stop running…” he whispered through clenched teeth. His voice wasn’t loud, but somehow that only made it worse. Every moment he tried to suppress his anger made him more frightening.

As he dragged you back to your feet, he pulled upward by your hair, forcing your neck taut until a trembling breath slipped painfully past your lips.

Your eyes brimmed with tears as you begged him.

“Please… Edward, don’t…” But every time you tried to pull away, his grip only tightened.

Your bodies kept colliding as he forced you down the dark corridor. One of his hands remained locked in your hair while the other wrapped around your throat, his thumb pressing beneath your jaw as he yanked you toward him, controlling the direction you moved.

The struggle between you was so close, so suffocatingly physical, that you could feel his breath against your face. Edward’s uneven breathing brushed near your ear one second, struck the side of your neck the next. And somehow, instead of only terrifying you, that closeness carried a strange, unbearable tension beneath the fear. Because Edward wasn’t touching you with anger alone.

You could feel his obsession bleeding into every movement.

The pressure of his fingers against your throat mixed with the burning pain in your scalp until your body, even while desperately trying to escape him, was forced to remain constantly aware of his physical presence.

Stumbling through the corridor, your shoulder smashed against the wall, the rusted surface scraping painfully across your arm—but Edward immediately dragged you back toward him, so close you nearly collided with his chest.

Behind his glasses, his expression looked completely unraveled now. Jealousy, rage, and that sick, obsessive desire he felt toward you had blurred together into something unstable.

“Were you this scared when you kissed him?” he asked quietly. And as he said it, his grip around your throat tightened just a little more.

Your heartbeat staggered unevenly inside your chest because there was a suffocating line between Edward wanting to hurt you and Edward wanting to be this close to you. And what terrified you most wasn’t just how strong he was.

It was the way he seemed to enjoy touching you.

By the time Edward dragged you to the end of the corridor, you were barely walking anymore—more stumbling than moving. Your bare feet splashed into freezing water, the sharp edges of cracked tiles slicing against your soles with every step while filthy water surged up around your ankles.

The dark, stagnant water flooding the hallway reflected the broken wires hanging from the ceiling and the sickly green light above, making the hospital look less like a building and more like the inside of a rotting nightmare.

The hem of your thin dress was completely ruined now, soaked to your knees and stained with rust and grime. Your damp hair clung heavily to your back; every time Edward jerked you forward, dark strands spilled across your face and stuck to your lips .You were out of breath.

Exhausted from trying to escape, yet too terrified to stop because the anger in Edward’s grip kept growing stronger.

When he suddenly yanked you toward him, your chest slammed hard against his. You stumbled, and immediately his hand wrapped around your throat again. His fingers were cold. But his grip burned.

It was painfully obvious that he enjoyed controlling you, and that realization twisted something else into your fear—something tense and unbearable. Behind his glasses, his gaze had darkened completely now. The way he looked at you felt conflicted, as though he wanted to destroy you and claim you at the exact same time.

“What are you going to do to me…?” you finally whispered.

Your voice trembled. You couldn’t even tell anymore whether it was from fear, lack of oxygen, or simply from having him this close to you.

Edward didn’t answer right away. He just stared at you. His head tilted slightly to the side, almost like he had been waiting for you to ask. Then a small, unstable smile slowly formed at the corner of his mouth.

“First,” he said quietly, sliding his thumb along your throat, “I’m going to punish you.”

Your heart tightened painfully in your chest.

“Because that man ruined you.”

“Before Bruce Wayne…” he murmured, stepping closer. His breath brushed against your face, and instinctively you tried to lean away—but your back had already hit the wall. “…you were so much more innocent.”

“Edward—”

“No.”

His voice sharpened instantly.

“No. You’re going to listen to me.”

One of his hands pressed against the wall beside your head, completely trapping you in place. The damp surface stuck coldly against your back, the thin fabric clinging to your skin.

Edward stood so close that you could feel the movement of his chest every time he breathed. And when his eyes dropped to your lips, your stomach twisted violently because for a few terrible seconds, you truly thought he was about to kiss you. His face moved closer and closer until the tip of his nose almost brushed yours.

Your lips parted involuntarily.

Fear and tension locked your entire body in place. But he didn’t kiss you.

He only smiled while looking at you. And somehow, that was worse.

“You know I wasn’t lying…” you said desperately. “I cared about you. I really did. But I… I was never in love with you.”

The second the words left your mouth, something in Edward’s expression changed.

Instantly.

Completely.

As though something he’d been holding inside himself had finally snapped.

When his hand suddenly tangled harshly into your hair again, pain stole the breath from your lungs. He forced your head back and slammed you harder against the wall. Behind his glasses, his eyes looked wild now—unsteady, almost insane. “Shut up,” he hissed through clenched teeth.

The hand around your throat slowly slid upward until it gripped your jaw instead. He stared at you so intensely that even trying to look away felt impossible.

Like he didn’t just want to see you.

Like he wanted to crawl inside your mind.

“You played games with me,” he said, his voice dropping lower and lower. “You smiled at me. You talked to me. You solved my riddles. You made me feel special.”

“I was just—”

“JUST WHAT?!”

His voice echoed violently through the corridor, rippling across the water.

Your breathing quickened.

When Edward leaned closer again, his lips lowered near your ear, his voice now barely above a whisper. “I still love you,” he murmured. “That’s the most tragic part.”

You shivered when his fingers brushed against your throat again because his touch was rough, yet disturbingly careful at the same time—like someone who didn’t want to hurt you, but wanted to make you completely his.

“I’m going to fix you,” he whispered slowly. “Whatever that man took from you, I’m going to take it back.” Then he buried his face into your hair. His fingers slid through the damp strands as he inhaled deeply. “And in the end…” he said, his voice muffled against you, “...I’m going to make you mine.”

When Edward dragged you into the room, you immediately felt that even the air inside was different from the rest of the hospital.

This didn’t look like an abandoned patient room. It looked like a torture chamber where people’s screams had soaked into the walls for years.

The massive surgical lamp hanging from the ceiling still worked, but the light flickered every few seconds, illuminating the room in broken flashes. Metal pipes stretched overhead, and a deep mechanical hum vibrated through the walls, filling the entire room with a suffocating resonance.

In the center stood an old electroshock table covered in cracked leather restraints. Dark brown stains had seeped permanently into the material over the years, and beside it sat a rusted machine with loose wires still hanging from its side.

That was the moment you understood. Truly understood. Edward wasn’t just trying to scare you. He hadn’t only meant to punish you. He was actually going to do this. And the instant that realization hit, every piece of control inside your body shattered.

“No… no, no, no…” you began gasping breathlessly as you staggered backward. The moment you saw the table, panic swallowed everything else. Your bare feet slipped across the freezing floor, wet strands of hair sticking to your face while your filthy clothes clung heavily to your skin.

All you could think about was reaching the door. But Edward was faster.

The second his hand locked around your arm, your entire body seized with terror. You shoved at him, clawed at him, truly struggling now—wildly, uncontrollably.

Your breathing had turned ragged. “Edward, please— no, you can’t do this—”

“I can,” he answered calmly. And that calmness terrified you even more because there was no rage in his expression anymore. Only horrifying certainty. “Because I’m trying to help you.”

When he dragged you toward him again, your palms slammed against his chest, but you couldn’t stop him. He pulled you toward the table while your legs scraped across the floor, striking against the metal supports beneath it. That was when the panic completely consumed you.

Fear shredded your thoughts apart.

“Let me go!” you screamed, your voice cracking violently. “Edward, please!” But he only stared at your face, almost as though watching you like this convinced him he was right.

“I don’t understand why you’re so afraid,” he said while forcing you down onto the table. “Bruce Wayne approved of this too. And he’s not even a doctor.”

For a split second, your movements froze.

Edward noticed. And smiled. “Don’t lie to yourself,” he murmured, tilting his head slightly. “I know who really has influence over the Arkham board. I know how he manipulates the doctors.”

“You’re wrong…” you whispered, but the strength in your voice had already collapsed.

Edward shoved you firmly onto the table, and the second the surface touched your back, your entire body shuddered from the freezing cold.

You kept struggling, but Edward had clearly been waiting for panic to weaken you. First he pinned your wrists, then threaded the old leather restraints through the rusted buckles, tightening them securely around you.

Every pull of leather against your skin made your breathing faster. Every metallic click echoed through the room. And when your ankles were restrained too, you finally understood that you were truly trapped.

The surgical light burned directly into your face, making your eyes ache. Your hair spilled over the edge of the table, damp strands sticking to your throat. “I hate you…” you whispered eventually, tears filling your eyes. “I hate you, Edward…” And that was the moment the atmosphere in the room changed.

Edward stared at you silently for several seconds. Then slowly stepped back. At first you thought he was going to lose his temper. Scream at you. Maybe turn the machine on immediately. But he didn’t.Instead, he slowly lowered himself to his knees. The movement was so unexpected it stole the air from your lungs.When he lowered his head and gently took your bare foot into his hands, your whole body tensed because his touch wasn’t rough anymore.

It was disturbingly careful.

His thumb slowly brushed away the dirty water marks from your skin, tracing the tiny cuts along the sole of your foot while he looked at you like you were something fragile enough to break. And that look was terrifying. Because there was as much reverence in it as violence.

“Look what they did to you…” he murmured hoarsely.

The moment his lips touched the top of your foot, your body jerked involuntarily. There was nothing romantic about it. Nothing safe. If anything, it terrified you even more because Edward’s love wasn’t normal love. It was obsessive. Suffocating.

The kind that strips away your humanity.

His eyes closed as he kissed your filthy foot, almost as though he were touching something sacred. Then his lips slowly moved upward toward your knee while his hands stroked your leg, his warm breaths brushing against your skin.

“You have no idea what I’d do for you,” he whispered. “If I had to… I’d kill everyone.”

When he lifted his head to look at you again, there was something genuinely insane burning behind his eyes now. “Bruce Wayne doesn’t deserve you.” His fingers drifted slowly across your knee. “He ruined you. He scared you. He changed you.”

Then he rested his head lightly against the edge of the table, his hands still wrapped around your leg. “But me…” he whispered shakily, “...I love you exactly as you are.”

The restraints were digging painfully into your wrists. Every time you tried to move, the leather tightened harder against your skin. Meanwhile, Edward’s touch only became slower. Gentler.And that contradiction made the room feel even more suffocating because the man restraining you to an electroshock table was looking at you as though he worshipped you. And somehow—that was more terrifying than the machine itself.

Lying restrained on the table, you could feel even his breathing beginning to change because the fragile admiration in Edward’s eyes was slowly turning into something else.

At first, you could still see the part of him that loved you—the part that trembled whenever he touched you. But within seconds, that expression would fracture apart, replaced by something cold, calculating, almost emotionless.The shift was so sharp it felt as though two completely different people were living inside the same body .One moment, his fingers traced the tiny cuts on your legs as though they genuinely upset him. The next, every trace of warmth vanished from his face, and he looked at you like nothing more than a problem waiting to be solved. So when he finally spoke again, you noticed the difference in his voice immediately.

Calmer.

More controlled.

More dangerous.

And the moment you realized that, you forced yourself to think through the fear again because Edward’s greatest weakness had always been himself.

His need to be seen. To be understood. The way he confused love with intellectual intimacy.

So you looked at him, trying to steady your breathing, suppressing the panic in your eyes while softening your voice. “Edward…” you whispered slowly as the restraints bit into your wrists. “You’re scaring me, but… I’m trying to understand you.”

Silence filled the room. Edward looked at you. For a long time. Too long. And then he smiled. But it wasn’t the same smile as before. This time, there was no warmth in it. It was the smile of someone who realized you were trying to pry him open and look inside.

“You’re trying to manipulate me,” he said calmly.

Your heart lurched violently, though you tried not to let it show.

Edward slowly rose to his feet. The flickering surgical light split his face in half—one side hidden in shadow while the lens of his glasses reflected the pale glow.

He barely looked human anymore. More like the walking remains of a shattered mind. “This is my favorite part,” he said as he began pacing around the room. “The part where people try to use their intelligence after fear sets in. Because this…” He smiled faintly. “This is where you always make mistakes.” His fingers dragged slowly across the electroshock machine, and the metallic scrape tightened your throat.

You watched him carefully, trying to understand which version of Edward stood in front of you now. The one who knelt before you? The one who kissed your feet? Or this man studying you like a living experiment? Maybe they had always been the same person.

“I’m going to ask you a riddle,” he said at last, turning toward you. “It has two answers. Technically, both are correct.” The corner of his mouth curved upward slightly. “But only the answer I’m thinking of will set you free.”

You closed your eyes for a brief second because you knew him. You had spent countless hours in Arkham watching the way Edward thought. The way he chose answers. The way his ego mattered more to him than logic itself.

Even his truths were emotional. Edward leaned closer. “When does a person stop being themselves?” he asked softly.

The room fell silent. Only the hum above you remained. This was exactly the kind of riddle Edward loved. “Your mind” could have been the answer. “Your heart,” too.

But Edward had never been ruled by logic alone. He saw himself as the tragic hero of some doomed love story. And you were his psychiatrist. You knew which answer he wanted.

You lifted your eyes to him. “When they lose the person they love,” you whispered.

For a split second, the expression on Edward’s face froze. And that was how you knew you had chosen correctly.

But then—something changed. His eyes darkened. And he smiled. “Wrong answer.”

Your breath stopped. “No,” you said immediately. “No, that’s the one you’d choose. I know you, Edward.”

“Then you don’t know me well enough.”

“You’re lying.” Your voice came out sharper this time. “You’re doing this on purpose.”

Edward stared at you silently for several seconds. Then suddenly moved. The instant his hand tangled violently into your hair, pain tore the breath from your lungs. He yanked your head backward by the roots, exposing your throat completely while forcing your spine harder against the table. Your body arched involuntarily. The restraints burned against your wrists as they strained tighter. And Edward just watched you. Hungrily. Almost reverently. Like he could no longer tell the difference between hurting you and touching you.

“Why are you doing this…” you whispered, your voice trembling now.

Edward didn’t answer. His gaze wandered slowly along your throat, watching the frantic pulse beating beneath your skin, studying the way fear moved through your body.

Then he leaned closer. Closer. Until his breath began brushing against your lips.

Instinctively, you tried to pull away. But you were restrained. You couldn’t escape.

For one second, you thought he was going to kiss you. Then he actually did. The moment his lips crashed against yours, it wasn’t gentle. It was meant to silence you.

Hard.

Hungry.

Out of control.

The hand tangled in your hair still hurt, forcing your head back painfully while your jaw trembled beneath the pressure. Fear surged through your body like electricity as his mouth pressed harder against yours, stealing the air from your lungs. It didn’t even feel like Edward was kissing you. It felt like he was trying to claim you. Like he wanted to stop you from speaking, thinking, resisting him entirely.

When the kiss finally broke, your lips hurt. Edward rested his forehead against yours, his breathing ragged now. “I hate that you can figure me out…” he whispered hoarsely. “And somehow I still can’t stop thinking about you.”

Then suddenly he pulled away. And his expression changed again.

Empty.

Emotionless.

When he walked back toward the machine, the sound of the metal switches echoed through the room. Your breathing quickened as Edward picked up the wires, an almost peaceful look settling across his face. “This is going to hurt a little,” he said calmly. “But afterward, you’ll feel better.” As his finger hovered over the switch, he looked at you one last time. “And in the end…” he murmured, broken admiration flickering in his eyes, “...you’ll finally be cured.”

Before lowering his hand onto the switch, Edward watched you for several long seconds. The flickering surgical light overhead spilled across his face, pale reflections glinting against the lenses of his glasses.

In that moment, everything in the room felt horrifyingly vivid.

The smell of rust mixed with the scorched-metal scent of old wires. The groaning pipes above sounded almost synchronized with your pulse, vibrating through the ceiling in slow, suffocating waves. And you were struggling against the restraints now.

Your wrists had turned red beneath the leather straps, deep pressure marks bruising your skin. Every attempt to pull free only made the old restraints tighten harder, burning against your flesh. Your ankles scraped painfully against the metal footrests while your bare feet curled involuntarily from panic.

Your breathing had become uneven.

Fear wouldn’t let your lungs fully fill anymore; every breath stopped halfway.

“Edward, please…” you begged, your voice breaking apart. “Don’t… I don’t want this… please…”

But he wasn’t listening anymore.

Or maybe worse—maybe he was listening and truly believed this was part of helping you.

Standing beside the machine, his expression had changed again. The man who had kissed you harshly only moments ago, who had tangled his hand in your hair, seemed gone now.

In his place was a cold, clinical calmness. And somehow, this version of him was even more terrifying because he no longer looked at you like a person.

He looked at you like something broken that needed to be fixed.

As his fingers adjusted the wires, there was almost a gentle attentiveness in his movements. Combined with the rusted torture equipment surrounding him, it created something deeply sickening.

“Sometimes people are afraid of healing,” he said calmly. “Because they become attached to their pain.”

You shook your head frantically from side to side. Your hair spilled over the edge of the table, damp strands sticking against your throat while tears slid down the sides of your face toward your ears.

Fear had completely overflowed your body now.

Your shoulders trembled uncontrollably, your back arching slightly off the table each time you struggled against the restraints.

“Edward, no— no, please, I’m begging you—”

Suddenly, he stopped.

A slight crease formed between his brows.

Then he looked at you as though he had just remembered something important.

That expression—you recognized it.

It looked exactly like the moments doctors in Arkham had when examining a patient.

“Wait a second,” he murmured softly to himself.

When he began searching through the metal tray beside the machine, your breathing became even faster because you couldn’t understand what he was doing. The sound of rusted instruments clinking together echoed through the room until finally he found a small, old mouth guard.

It had yellowed with age, its edges worn down, but Edward picked it up carefully.

“I forgot,” he said as he approached you. “You could break your teeth.”

Your stomach twisted violently.

“No— no, I don’t want it—”

You tried turning your head away, but his hand immediately closed around your jaw. His fingers held your face firmly while he stared directly into your eyes.

There was something horrifyingly loving in that look.

The kind of love that tries to protect the body while destroying the soul.

“You’re going to be okay,” he said quietly. “Just trust me for a few minutes.”

Then he slid the mouth guard between your teeth.

The instant the taste of old plastic filled your mouth, panic surged even harder because that single movement made everything real.

This was no longer a threat.

It was about to happen.

You tried shaking your head, muffled sounds escaping around the mouth guard as you thrashed against the restraints. Your chest rose and fell rapidly, your thin clothes sticking to your skin from sweat.

The light above burned painfully into your eyes now. And Edward just watched you.

With admiration.

As though seeing you like this didn’t upset him—it only made him feel more attached to you.

Slowly, he leaned down.

When his lips pressed against your damp forehead, your entire body tensed because despite how gentle the kiss seemed, it was terrifying.

It didn’t feel loving.

It felt possessive.

He wasn’t acting like a lover trying to calm you.

He was acting like someone trying to repair a broken toy before it shattered completely.

“Breathe,” he whispered close against your forehead. “I’m right here.”

Then he pressed the switch.

The first sound was small—just a low electrical hum rising from inside the machine. But even that noise alone was enough to lock every muscle in your body tight.

Your eyes widened instantly. Your breathing faltered. The crackling current running through the wires echoed violently against the metal surfaces of the room while Edward stepped back and simply watched you.

And in that moment, the most horrifying thing in the room wasn’t the electroshock machine.

It was the peaceful expression on Edward’s face as he looked at you.

The moment he pressed the switch, it felt as though your body stopped belonging to you.

At first, a thin, burning pain shot upward through your spine. Then every muscle in your body seized all at once, arching violently against the table without your control. The restraints dug deep into your wrists, the old leather straps cutting painfully into your skin because your body was instinctively trying to escape—but there was nowhere to go.

The mouth guard muffled your scream, reducing it to broken, strangled sounds swallowed by the room. Your eyes slammed shut involuntarily before flying open again; the surgical lamp above blurred in and out of focus, the entire room trembling as though submerged underwater.

The pain wasn’t only physical. It felt like the electricity was threading itself between your nerves, tearing apart your thoughts themselves. Your fingers curled violently inward. Your bare feet stretched toward the metal edge of the table, even the muscles in your soles trembling uncontrollably. And Edward simply stepped back and watched you.

The expression on his face was horrifying. Because he didn’t look afraid. He looked happy. There was a light in his eyes now. Watching you thrash helplessly, watching your body lose control, watching your tear-filled eyes wide with terror—it looked as though he had finally reached something he had been chasing for a very long time. His fingers drifted across the controls of the machine while he tilted his head slightly, studying you. In that moment, he didn’t look like the Riddler. He looked like a man admiring his own obsession.

“There…” he breathed softly, almost reverently. “There’s the real you…”

Another wave hit.

Your back arched violently off the table, a muffled scream tearing from your throat while the veins in your neck strained visibly beneath your skin. Tears streamed sideways toward your ears, damp strands of hair sticking to the metal beneath you. You tried to think through it. Tried to hold onto something. But the electricity shattered everything apart. Time itself seemed to warp. Seconds stretched endlessly while sounds blurred together.

Edward took a few slow steps toward you. “Look at me,” he said gently. “Look at me, sweetheart.”

The word made your stomach twist in disgust. But Edward either didn’t notice— or didn’t care.

If anything, his expression softened further as he approached. He seemed to love the way fear had reduced you into something vulnerable and broken.

When his fingers brushed along your cheek, your skin trembled involuntarily because your body was still spasming from the shocks.

“You were never like this with him,” he said, his tone sharpening slightly at the mention of Bruce. “I’m the one who really sees you. The real you.”

Then he adjusted the switch again.

This time, the pain hit harder.

Your entire body locked rigid, your head falling helplessly to the side while muffled cries broke through the mouth guard in shattered sounds. Your shoulders shook violently, your chest heaving desperately for air. Your heart pounded so fast it felt ready to split through your ribs. Even after the current stopped, your muscles refused to relax immediately. Small tremors continued rippling through your body while ragged breaths tore unevenly from your throat.

Edward never looked away from you. As though watching you like this intoxicated him.

“You know…” he murmured quietly as he moved closer again, “people always say love destroys people.”

The corner of his mouth curved faintly upward.

“But even while I’m destroying you…” he whispered, “I still love you.”

When he sat down on the edge of the table, the metal groaned softly beneath his weight. His hand rose slowly to your throat, fingertips gliding across your sweat-damp skin.

His touch seemed gentle. But by now, you knew that didn’t make it safer. Because the most horrifying thing about Edward was the way he blurred tenderness and violence together until they became impossible to separate.

“Even when you said you hated me…” he whispered, leaning closer to your face, “…I still didn’t want to stop touching you.”

Then he closed his eyes and rested his forehead against yours. His breathing was still uneven, almost as though the machine had affected him too.

“One day, you’ll understand why I did this,” he murmured hoarsely.

His trembling fingers brushed your hair behind your ear.

“And when that day comes…” he whispered, broken devotion flickering in his voice, “…you’ll finally love me back.”

Even after the electricity stopped, your body didn’t immediately feel like your own again. And that was the most terrifying part.

The pain was gone, but its effects still lived inside your nerves. Your fingers continued trembling in small, involuntary spasms while the muscles in your legs tightened and released on their own. Your chest rose and fell unevenly, never seeming to draw enough air into your lungs—as though your body had forgotten how to breathe and was now operating on survival instinct alone.

The surgical lamp above blurred in and out of focus. The light expanded, shrank, disappeared completely for a second, then returned again. The edges of the plastic mouth guard tasted metallic against your tongue, and your teeth still ached faintly. Sweat had gathered at your hairline and run down your neck, damp strands sticking to your cheeks. Beneath the restraints, your wrists throbbed painfully. And Edward watched all of it in silence. As though studying the results of an experiment. But what burned in his eyes was far more personal than scientific curiosity.

Something sicker.

When he stepped back toward the table, even the sound of his shoes against the metal floor was enough to make your stomach tighten because your body had already begun conditioning itself to his presence. The second you sensed him near you, fear spread through your muscles before it reached your thoughts. And realizing that something else stirred beneath that fear made you hate yourself. Because Edward’s touch no longer felt like only a threat.

After the electroshock, your mind had become blurred, your sense of reality fractured. The rest of the world felt submerged in fog while Edward remained the only thing that seemed painfully clear—his voice, his breathing, the warmth of his hands.

That realization horrified you.

When Edward began undoing the restraints, your first instinct was to pull away. But your body didn’t obey.

Even after the leather loosened around your wrists, you couldn’t immediately move your arms. You only lay there trembling weakly against the table. Your muscles were so exhausted that even moving felt heavy now. And when Edward noticed that, a strange, softened satisfaction crossed his face.

“See?” he said quietly. “You’re not fighting me anymore.”

The satisfaction in his voice made your stomach twist, but you couldn’t gather enough strength to answer him. Your lips remained slightly parted, your breaths warm and uneven.

When Edward leaned down and carefully removed the mouth guard, your jaw trembled involuntarily. The instant his fingers brushed against your lower lip, your entire body shivered.

This was fear.

It had to be. But your body was beginning to lose the ability to separate fear from everything else. And Edward seemed to notice.

His thumb lingered against the corner of your mouth for several seconds too long. When his gaze dropped to your lips, there was a hungry admiration in his expression—as though he found you even more beautiful like this, broken apart.

“You look so beautiful when you look at me like that…” he murmured hoarsely.

You shook your head weakly from side to side. “No…” you whispered. But even your voice no longer sounded like it belonged to you.

Edward, however, didn’t interpret it as rejection.

He interpreted it as shyness.

“You’re still trying to keep me at a distance,” he said calmly. “But I saw the way you looked at me a moment ago.”

Your heart clenched painfully. Because you were terrified he might be right.

While your mind had been splintering under the shocks, Edward had become the only fixed point in the room. After every wave of pain, his was the first face you saw. During every desperate struggle for breath, you heard his voice. And now your brain was beginning to confuse that with safety.

The realization panicked you internally while simultaneously making it harder to think clearly.

When Edward slid his hands beneath your waist and slowly helped you into a sitting position, your head fell weakly against his chest without your permission. The second you realized it, you wanted to pull away— but your muscles were still weak. And Edward smelled like sweat, metal, and faint cologne.

A real human scent.

In the middle of the hospital’s rotting stench, he felt like the only thing alive.

That frightened you even more.

Edward exhaled softly into your hair. His fingers moved slowly across your back in calm, rhythmic strokes meant to soothe you. And that was exactly what made it disturbing. Because the same man who had strapped you to the table was now comforting you.

“You can feel me now,” he whispered near your ear. “I understand you better than he ever could.”

You closed your eyes because your head was spinning. But Edward interpreted that differently.

His arms tightened around you slightly, as though he believed you were finally moving closer to him.

Then his lips touched yours again.

This time, it wasn’t rough like before.

It started slowly. And somehow, that made it worse. Because for a few seconds, your body didn’t immediately push him away.

Your lips were still numb. Your breathing remained uneven. As Edward kissed you, one of his hands slid behind your neck, fingers threading gently into your damp hair. And for just a few terrible seconds— you felt like you forgot to resist.

The realization turned your stomach violently.

When Edward finally pulled back, there was an almost intoxicated happiness in his eyes.

“There…” he whispered, resting his forehead against yours. “You’re finally letting me in.”

While Edward held you half-upright against the table, the low mechanical hum of the room still echoed inside your skull. The metallic sound of the electroshock machine felt lodged somewhere between your nerves now, refusing to fade away.

Your head felt heavy. Thinking itself was exhausting. And your body no longer felt entirely like yours; tiny tremors still rippled through your muscles while your shoulders shivered involuntarily. In moments like this, the human mind could begin confusing danger with relief. Because after intense pain, slowness, silence, and physical contact could all be mistaken by the brain for safety.

You knew that. That was why every time Edward touched you, one part of you wanted desperately to pull away— while another part of you relaxed in a way that horrified you. And it felt like something inside you was beginning to rot because of it.

Edward could feel it too.

Maybe that was the most terrifying thing of all.

The way he looked at you had changed now. He no longer resembled only an obsessive lover; he looked like someone who had finally recovered something precious after believing it lost for years.

When his fingers rose to your face, his movements were astonishingly slow. His thumb brushed away the dampness beneath your cheek first, almost carefully trying to decide whether it was sweat or tears.

Then his palm closed gently around your jaw.

The touch wasn’t harsh.

But it was possessive.

As he tilted your head upward slightly, he looked into your eyes with such intensity that for a few seconds, everything else in the room seemed to disappear.

“Look at you…” he whispered hoarsely. “Look how badly they frightened you.”

The words twisted painfully inside your stomach because he was the one terrifying you. But Edward’s mind no longer accepted that reality.

He viewed the pain he caused as some kind of purification—something that stripped you down and brought you closer to him. He broke you apart, then convinced himself that only he could put the pieces back together again.

When he leaned closer, his lips touched your forehead first.

The kiss was long.

Heavy.

There was almost no lust in it—only a strange, warped tenderness. And somehow, that made it more disturbing. Because he no longer felt like a lover.

He felt like someone pathologically protective.

His lips lingered against your damp forehead for several seconds before moving lower—to your temple, then your cheek. Every touch was slow, careful, almost ceremonial.

As though he wasn’t trying to comfort you.

As though he was trying to transform you into something that belonged to him.

Meanwhile, you struggled to regulate your breathing.

When Edward’s mouth drifted lower along your jawline, a thin shiver slid down your spine. Your body was still hypersensitive from the electroshock; every touch felt far more intense than it should have.

The warmth of his lips lingered against your skin, making your heartbeat speed up, and that realization panicked you because you were supposed to fear him. And you still did. But now something else had begun mixing into that fear.

Something that humiliated you.

Something that made you disgusted with yourself.

Edward misunderstood it completely.

When his fingers threaded through your damp hair and tucked the strands behind your ear, a strange softness settled across his face.

Like he truly believed you were finally beginning to surrender to him.

“You’re not trembling anymore,” he whispered.

He was lying.

You were still trembling.

Just not only from fear anymore.

When his lips reached your throat, your breath caught involuntarily. He lingered there, directly over the frantic pulse beneath your skin. At first only his breath touched you.

Then his lips did.

You closed your eyes immediately because your body’s reaction terrified you. Your throat was already sensitive from the way your body had strained during the shocks, and now Edward’s slow kisses only heightened that sensitivity further.

The skin beneath his mouth shivered.

Your shoulders tightened involuntarily. And when Edward felt it, his arms tightened around you slightly.

“There…” he murmured softly, almost like he was speaking to himself. “Now you’re safe.”

The sentence echoed violently inside your head.

You weren’t safe. But somehow, in that moment, your body leaned just a little further into his chest.

The movement wasn’t conscious.

It came from exhaustion, fear, shock. But to Edward, none of that mattered because by now he interpreted every action through the lens of his obsession.

As his fingers moved slowly across your back, he began stroking you with slow, rhythmic motions, the kind someone might use to calm a frightened child. And that was exactly what made it horrifying. Because the man who had strapped you to the table and watched you scream was now trying to comfort you.

“No one has ever looked at you the way I do,” he whispered near your throat. “No one has ever loved you the way I do.”

His words thickened in the rotting darkness of the room while his lips brushed your neck again.

This kiss lasted longer.

His breath warmed your skin while his fingers slid slowly downward from the base of your neck. And that was when you began realizing the most horrifying truth of all: His touch disturbed you. But at the same time… it comforted you too. And that realization frightened you more than the electroshock itself ever had.

As Edward’s lips continued to wander along your neck, the fog inside your mind slowly began to clear; the heavy numbness that had settled deep into your body after the electroshock hadn’t fully disappeared yet, but your thoughts were beginning to reconnect with each other again. Your heart was still racing, though this time it wasn’t only because of fear, and the moment you realized that, your stomach tightened painfully. Because the strange sense of relief his touch created inside your body was colliding violently with the terror your mind still felt toward him. That contradiction was tearing you apart from the inside out. Your head rested weakly against his shoulder while you could feel the uneven rhythm of his breathing; erratic, but satisfied. As if he truly believed he had finally broken you enough to pull you closer to him.

Then his lips found yours again.

This kiss was slower; less hungry, more possessive. It didn’t feel like he was trying to silence you this time, but rather like he was trying to soothe something that already belonged to him. His fingers held your chin gently as he tilted your head, mixing his breathing with yours so he could kiss you deeper. The damp air inside the room had become suffocatingly heavy; the mold and decay clinging to the hospital walls mixed with the metallic scent of sweat lingering on Edward’s clothes. Every breath shared between your lips made you feel as though you were slipping further away from yourself.

And then his hands began to move.

At first, they only touched your shoulders.

The tips of his fingers slid slowly over the thin fabric covering your skin, and your body instinctively tensed because you immediately understood what he was about to do. You tried to pull away, but Edward didn’t let you go so easily; he rested his forehead against yours and let his eyes wander over your face for several long seconds. There was something deeply unsettling in that look—something that carried tenderness and possession at the same time. It didn’t feel like he simply wanted to see you. It felt like he wanted to completely uncover you.

“You don’t need to hide anymore,” he whispered.

The moment his hands moved toward the collar of your clothes, your breathing became uneven again. The fabric had already been clinging to your skin from sweat and the dampness filling the hospital air, and when Edward slowly slid it down from your shoulders, the cold air touching your exposed skin sent a shiver down your spine. You still hadn’t fully recovered; your muscles were weak, your head still spinning faintly. Even so, something inside you began sounding the alarm again.

“Edward…” you whispered weakly. “Stop…”

But Edward no longer heard your voice as resistance. To him, it sounded like frightened vulnerability instead. As his hands traveled from your shoulders down your arms, he buried his face against your neck again; his lips brushing your throat while his breath left warm traces against your skin. For him, violence and affection had completely fused together in this moment. He acted as though he was calming you down while slowly making you into something that belonged entirely to him.

When the fabric slipped lower past your waist, the cold air touched your bare skin fully, and your body instinctively tried to curl inward. You attempted to pull your arms toward yourself, but Edward gently caught your wrists and relaxed them again. That gentleness was terrifying because it felt as though he believed force was no longer necessary. His eyes wandered over your body with an expression that looked almost reverent, as though your trembling, broken state had become something sacred to him.

“Look at you…” he murmured hoarsely. “How could they leave you all alone like this?”

After those words, his hands continued moving slowly along your back; careful, patient, disturbingly tender touches. As though he no longer wanted to hurt you. But that was exactly what made it so horrifying, because the same man who had strapped you to that table and sent electricity through your body was now caressing your bare skin as if this were some twisted form of love.

And when you realized, despite all the discomfort crawling beneath your skin, that his touch was actually beginning to calm the trembling in your body, your eyes slowly fell shut.

That realization was darker than anything else inside the room.

As the hazy admiration in Edward's gaze grew increasingly heavy, the way he laid you back down onto the gurney possessed an almost ceremonial slowness. When your back met the gurney again, a fine shiver traveled up your spine; the cold surface, merging with the sensitivity that still lingered on your skin like a burn, caused your breath to turn involuntarily ragged. There was a peaceful expression on Edward's face as he carefully swept your hair over your shoulder and let it fall back. This peace looked so entirely wrong amidst the decayed walls and rusted equipment of the room that it made your stomach churn.

Then, he began to fasten the straps again.

But this time, his movements were different.

He wasn't rushing to restrain you like the first time; instead, he acted as though he were putting you back "in your proper place" with his own hands.

"Don't try to run anymore..." he whispered in a soft voice. "These aren't the things holding you back."

Following those words, when he slowly lowered his head, the air inside the room shifted once more.

Edward’s lips lingered just above your knee at first, leaving long, heavy kisses, as if rewriting you in his own mind through the touch of your skin. As his fingers slowly traced your legs, there was a strange sense of worship in his movements. He behaved less like a lover and more like someone immersed in a dark ritual. And then, he lowered his head a little further.

In that instant, every sound in the room transformed. His fingers found the outer lips of your labia, pulling them apart. When his tongue gently brushed against your clitoris, the humming of the pipes drifted away, and the buzzing of the lamp grew muffled. Nothing remained but your own breath—irregular, fragile, quickening all the more the harder you tried to control it.

Edward’s touches felt less like words now and more like shadows; something not directly seen, yet spreading through the entire room. As his tongue flicked between your clitoris and the opening of your vagina, the tension in your body fractured somewhere between fear and surrender. Because what you were experiencing wasn't merely physical; the boundaries of your mind were shifting as well.

Edward could feel this.

Occasionally, he would lift his head to look at you, a nearly peaceful hunger in his eyes. It was as if seeing you so utterly vulnerable triggered a twisted protective instinct within him. He was the one who had hurt you, yet now he was assuming the role of the one calming you down.

"No one can take you from me now..." he murmured in a husky voice.

Your fingers curled involuntarily beneath the straps. You turned your head to the side and closed your eyes tightly, terrified of the responses your body was giving. You were afraid of this room, of Edward, and of yourself. Yet beneath all this fear, in that dark void opened in your mind following the electroshock, the sinister sense of relief brought on by his touch continued to linger. The capillaries in your clitoris were so intensely stimulated that Edward quickened his pace and hardened his movements with your every breath.

"Did you see that?" Edward said, letting his breath brush against your skin as he tilted his head. "You cannot resist. Because this is not a war. This is... love. You and I. The soul of this room and our own souls. They all want the same thing: the truth."

Finally, he moved. As he removed his white shirt and vest, every motion was controlled and theatrical. Beneath lay pale, almost translucent skin and lean muscles. As he unbuckled his trousers, the metallic clink resonated sharply in the silence of the room. "Now," he said, "the real part of our experiment begins."

His body possessed lean yet hard contours, and as he leaned down over you, the hardness of his erection was tangible proof of his power and desire at that moment. When he climbed on top of you, you felt crushed beneath his entire weight on the gurney. While the cold fabric bit into your back, his skin felt like fire.

"Don't get weary now, doctor," he whispered right into your ear, his warm breath seeping into your hair. "This is our first night together. Our love will reach its purest form."

Without any warning—not slowly, but all at once—he entered you. In that instant, it felt as though your body was being torn in two. The pain was sharp and searing, forcing its way in as if tearing your vagina. A scream caught in your throat but wouldn't come out. Warm tears streamed down your cheeks. Edward did not stop. He began to move his hips rapidly, rhythmically. With every thrust, the metal legs of the gurney screeched against the floor, creating ripples in the water on the cracked tiles. The flickering light caught and lost the mixture of pain and pleasure on his face.

"Look," he said, grabbing your hair and pulling your head back. You were forced to look into his eyes. "Look at your body. It is taking it in. It accepts it. Because this is the way it is meant to be."

He was lying. Your body wasn't accepting it; this was an assault. But... within that damp, bloody space between you, something was changing. Amidst the pain, involuntarily, a sickening leak of pleasure began. This betrayal by your own body was louder than the screams of your mind. This was exactly what Edward wanted: to break you both physically and mentally, to make your body defy your mind, and by forcing you to witness it, to inject guilt into your veins like poison.

"There it is," he groaned, quickening his pace. "Did you see that? You want it. You want it more than ever."

His words pierced into your mind, one by one. Yes, a part of your body wanted this. This humiliating, painful, filthy union. It was like a form of punishment, a form of reward for that melancholy, self-destructive piece inside you. You felt yourself lifting your hips toward him. In that moment, you knew something inside you had broken. You couldn't fight back because you had no strength left to fight. There was only this invasion, this surrender.

With a cry, Edward ejaculated. As his warm semen exploded inside you, your entire body convulsed. It wasn't the tremor of an orgasm, but that of a final collapse. As he got up off you, his penis slid out of your vagina, and blood mixed with fluids trickled down. Standing over you, he pushed his glasses to the bridge of his nose. He looked down at your naked, pale body, your broken state, your hands and feet bound to the straps. His face held a mixture of triumph and, strangely, pride.

"You are magnificent," he finally said, his voice exhausted yet pleased. "You are exactly as I imagined. Shattered, yet... beautiful. So beautiful."

“Dammit.”

It came out quieter than it felt. Soft, almost polite, like the word had tripped over his teeth on its way out. He wasn’t angry, not really—just tired. Tired of circling the same anxious drain. Tired of knowing exactly how to solve a thousand unsolvable problems, but not this. 

Not you.

Someone might’ve heard him, had anyone else lingered. But mercifully, he was alone. Had been for the better part of an hour, haunting the lounge like a nervous ghost. He’d half-registered the shifting people, the casual comings and goings of Injustice League members grabbing coffee, making personal calls, or just plain needing a moment. But they'd all filtered out eventually, and Edward... Edward stayed.

First, he sat. Then slouched. Then paced. At one point he’d laid on the couch like a tragic Victorian figure, forearm flung over his eyes, until the automatic lights dimmed and shamed him back to verticality.

Now, he was just standing. Rooted. Heart rabbiting beneath his ribs. He stood in front of the coffee bar—an unremarkable stretch of metal and glass—and stared at the faint outline of himself in the backsplash. The reflection wasn’t sharp, not like a mirror, but he could make out just enough to scrutinize. The stiff line of his shoulders. The twitchy motion of his hands as they tapped a rhythm against the counter—Morse code for I'm losing it, send help.

This was it. The final boss. Not a mission. Not a trap. Not even Batman. 

Just... feelings.

“Okay, okay, okay,” he muttered, squaring his stance like he was prepping for a debate. “Just say it like a normal person. Not like you’re delivering a riddle. Not like you're... trying to recite a dissertation."

He took a breath. Then another. Then your name slipped from his lips, shaped with hesitant reverence. A pause. Then—

 “I like you.”

He winced. A slow, full-bodied grimace like he'd just witnessed himself fall down the stairs on security footage.

“No, no—too simple. Uggghhh.” He slapped a hand against the counter and dropped his head. “They deserve better than this. They deserve a confession with gravitas. Drama. Maybe a sonnet.”

Edward sighed. Then straightened, like he was trying to make his spine remember it belonged to a man and not a melted question mark. His eyes flicked back to the backsplash—his warped reflection staring back like a rival, or maybe a lifeline. He squared his shoulders again, poking a finger at the glass like it was both a chalkboard and a confessional.

“Try again, dumbass,” he muttered, barely above a breath as he pointed at his reflection, coach and player in the world’s most pathetic halftime pep talk. "I like you. Like, like-like you. As in—I think about you when I shouldn’t." He huffed, shaking his head. "During briefings, when you’re asking smart questions. During missions, when you move like you were built for this and I have to remind myself to look away before I forget how to walk. And lunch—don’t even get me started on lunch. Watching you eat fries has done irreversible damage to my brain chemistry."

Feeling a little hopeless, he laughed at himself, the sound dry but fond. His fingers slid back through his hair, tousling it into an auburn crown of frustration.

"And I know you’re probably into someone cooler. Someone who doesn’t speak like their mouth is hardwired to an encyclopedia. Someone charming. Charismatic. The kind of person who knows how to make a move without having to rehearse it like a courtroom deposition…" 

He swallowed. Then, softer, "But I’m trying. God, I’m trying. Because if I don’t tell you soon, I’m going to short-circuit every time you so much as breathe near me. I already stammer, fidget, knock things over—I’m practically an animated error message when you’re in the room. And that is not a sustainable lifestyle. So—" Your name caught on the edge of his tongue. He hesitated, like saying it aloud might make it all too real— "...I-I like you… And... and I’m trying so hard not to ruin it by telling you in the most Edward Nygma way possible. Which is to say—badly. With poor pacing. And analogies. And at least three footnotes. Or, godforbid, a riddle…"

He leaned forward, pressing both palms flat on the counter, eyes locking with his reflection like he was trying to convince himself this wasn’t the stupidest thing he’d ever done.

“Okay—that wasn’t bad. Now. One more time. With feeling. Maybe less rambling. Maybe…” He took a breath. Let it out. “Maybe like you believe it—”

“You could just say it to me.”

Edward jolted. His head snapped up with such force he nearly unbalanced himself, whipping toward the doorway like someone had rewound reality and hit play too fast. For a heartbeat, he just blinked, staring at you as if you’d stepped out of a hallucination.

You were there. Not in his head. Not in the glass. Real. Leaning against the frame with your arms crossed, casual in that devastating way you had. Like you weren’t aware of the hurricane you’d just walked into. Like your smile wasn’t already unraveling him at the seams.

His brain stalled. Froze. Rebooted somewhere between panic and prayer.

"...How long were you standing there?" His voice had shrunk to something small and embarrassed, like it was trying to hide behind his teeth.

You tilted your head. “Long enough to hear the part about fries.”

He winced, visibly. A hand scrubbed over his mouth like he might erase the last five minutes from existence.

“And I’d really like to hear it again,” you added, stepping forward. “You know—said to me.”

There was no teasing in your tone, not really. Just a kind of quiet sincerity, soft as velvet and twice as dangerous. An open door he wasn’t sure he deserved to walk through.

Edward blinked. Once. Twice. As if your presence needed time to process, buffer, and load in full HD. Then he straightened up fast—like someone about to stand trial—and tugged at the cuffs of his sleeves with quick, fidgety precision, as if dignity could be tailored back into him with fabric and focus.

"R-right. Yes. Of course. To you. I can... do that." A beat. It took effort not to get locked on the glimmer in your eyes. That soft glimmer, that gentle curiosity—it disarmed him more effectively than any superpowered threat he’d ever faced. He actually had to shake his head, then take a deep breath. His chin lifted, his eyes narrowed. Then, firmly: "I like you."

The corner of your mouth tipped up before stepping forward just enough to enter his space—just enough for him to feel your warmth.

“Better,” you murmured. “Now try it again… without looking like you're preparing for an oral exam.”

He laughed—a breathy, uneven sound, like the release valve on a too-full heart. “Okay. One more time.”

Edward ran a hand over the back of his neck, expression sheepish, posture softening as the tension gave way to something quieter. Something real. His shoulders dropped slightly, and he looked at you from the corner of his eye—like the full force of his feelings might be too much if aimed directly.

“I like you,” he stated again, gentler now. “And I think I’ve been trying to say it in riddles...”

You tilted your head. “And now?”

His gaze didn’t leave yours this time. When he spoke, his voice was low, vulnerable, steady. “Now I’m just hoping you’ll say it back.”

After that, he wasn’t sure what he’d expected. A laugh, maybe. A grimace or nervous look. The quiet shuffle of your feet as you backed away. Some kind of mercy.

But instead, you just smiled softly.

Not a grin. Not a smirk. Not one of the carefully curated expressions he’d imagined in every hypothetical. It was smaller than all of that. Unhurried. Like you weren’t shocked or even surprised—just there, with him, steady as gravity.

“You’re lucky I like the weird ones.” 

It wasn’t said cruelly. You didn’t weaponize it. No sarcasm, no scoffing. Just the faintest lilt of playfulness, the kind that slipped under his skin and warmed everything it touched.

Edward blinked. His chest thudded in his ears. His mouth twitched like it wanted to smile, but forgot how.

You took a half-step closer. Not enough to crowd him—just enough to prove you weren’t afraid. To make it even worse, or better—the jury was still very much deliberating—your hand reached up, slow and intentional, until your fingers brushed his tie. And stayed there. You didn’t yank or pull or do anything remotely scandalous. You just toyed with the fabric—soft little tugs, like you were adjusting it, straightening it, claiming it. Your knuckles grazed his chest, and Edward thought he might actually combust.

“And for the record,” you murmured, eyes finding his—half-lidded, sharp, unreadable in the most intoxicating way, “I’ve known for a while.” Your lips twitched. A smile barely contained. “You weren’t exactly subtle. But I was waiting to see how long it would take for you to implode.”

Oh.

Oh god.

The bloom of heat on his cheeks was so fast it should’ve had its own weather forecast. His hand shot up, uselessly scrubbing along his jaw, like that might do something about the heat scalding through him. But it didn’t help. Nothing helped. Not when you were still standing there like it was nothing—like you hadn’t just unraveled him with your fingers and a single, stupid sentence.

And worse—worse—you didn’t look away. You didn’t mock. You didn’t vanish like some hallucination conjured by emotional exhaustion. You stayed. Still smiling. Still close. Still casually holding his heart between your fingertips and treating it like something worth being gentle with. You knew. You liked him. You’d waited.

Edward swallowed hard. Tried to assemble words that made sense. Came up with gibberish. Tried again.

“I—I’m not always this bad,” he mumbled, which was objectively false, and judging by your raised brow, you both knew it.

You tilted your head, amused. “You’re worse, usually.” Then your voice softened, that teasing gleam still dancing in your eyes. “But it’s cute.”

Cute.

He was going to die. Right here. In front of the coffee bar. Cause of death: you. Yet—when he looked at you again, really looked—something inside him, something that had been shaking since the moment you walked in, finally went still.

Because you weren’t laughing. You weren’t walking away. You were smiling at him like he’d done something brave. Like this wasn’t a catastrophe—it was a beginning.

Maybe not the one he’d rehearsed. But maybe the one he actually needed.

Did you like this? Check out the rest of the PLEASE DO NOT FEED THE RIDDLER series!

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A quick internet reverse search brought up your digital profile. Ed was quick to dissect it. He wanted to throw up when he found out you were the daughter of Kellan L/N, third child of his. He didn’t know he had any other children than his sons. They were a bit older than you anyways. Edward had a small dislike for the L/N sons, your older brothers. He’s found douchey photos online of them partying on yachts with other women and expensive alcohol. How would their wives feel about that? All funded by their dad. He definitely also engaged in these activities. Pictures dating back thirty/forty years depicted your father cheating on your mother. 

Slamming his computer shut, he pulled out his phone. His notepad sat next to him as he scrolled through your instagram. 

24.9k followers. Impressive. 

Edward scrolled through your photos. He figured out your best friend was named Hazel. She was the daughter of a senator from another city. Not his problem, other places corruption. You had been friends with Hazel since about ninth grade, when you started posting on Instagram. 

You didn’t have many recent posts with your brothers. The age gap in the family must have simmered your relationships once you got older. You last posted a picture of you and one of your brothers in 2018 for a birthday post. He found old birthday posts of yours. The last one was around a year ago, you were due to turn twenty three about next week. He scoffed as he looked at the pictures from your birthday last year. Cabo trip, all funded by daddy. You were probably on a plane to go somewhere exotic for your next birthday already, he thought. 

What angered him the most was the party photos. You seemed to be close with Bruce Wayne. One of the men he hated the most. Bruce had no online presence minus the photos you would occasionally post of him. How has he never seen this before? 

Party in upstate with Bruce. 

Bruce Wayne at a party?

Picnic with Bruce. 

No way Bruce Wayne actually went on a picnic. Staged. 

Bruce’s banister is so beautiful, I couldn’t help myself. I needed a pic or two. 

She’s at his manor? 

Jealously filled Edward. Of course Bruce Wayne got the most perfect girl. He had everything he didn’t. 

He angrily flicked through the comments and was relieved when he saw the constant denial of a relationship between you two.

@hzljohnson so when is the wedding?

@y/nl/n in your dreams

Even her best friend wanted this to happen. 

-

@gthmnews13 Is this an official relationship confirming post? The fans are going crazy!

@y/nl/n Me and Bruce are only friends. 

An official news source? Can’t they leave her alone? 

Edward threw his phone to the floor. He was sick at looking at your picture perfect life. 

He knew something deeper was going on. 

On some of the sub chains he had been on recently, there was unrest. Something was about to be exclusively leaked about politicians in Gotham. Sure, everyone says that all the time. But Edward had a feeling this was big. It was a file that supposedly held career/life damaging documents for people, going all the way up to potentially the mayor. Edward giddied to himself, laying back on his couch and looking at the newspaper clippings he had pasted on his ceilings. The feeling of excitement rose. This next few weeks were going to be great. 

***

Your father knew. The pictures she threatened to leak would come out eventually. It was just a matter of when. He was smitten when he met her at the Iceberg Lounge. She was just a little older than his own daughter. He, and many other politicians, only knew her as Kat. He figured she just wanted a taste of the expensive life, and this was the only way she knew how. She certainly had the facilities to be in her position. Kat began almost exclusively spending her time with him. He payed the best. After a few months of this, she demanded a large sum of money. When he denied it, she dropped the bombshell. She was pregnant. 

Your father was almost certain the child wasn’t his, and brushed her off. He offered to pay for her abortion, but this just made her angrier. It wasn’t until she came back with a subpoenaed paternity test is when he knew she told. Told who, he wasn’t sure. A lawyer, judge, who knows. 

And it came back that he was in fact the father of her unborn child. 

He shut out Kat, getting her banished from the Lounge. Denying her any more money, she promised to leak the photos of them together. Pictures at the lounge, at dinner, in bed, the paternity test. Everything she had documented throughout their affair. 

Your father promised then to make small payments for her and the child, but she was more interested in the pay from the newspaper’s that they would give for these pictures. 

That was four months ago. No word from Kat, no news from the media. 

He sat in his office thinking about the past events when you burst through the doors. “Y/N!” he announced, standing up to give you a hug. “Hi dad,” you smiled, sitting across from him. “What is the reason for the visit? How is the apartment treating you?” he asked, cracking his knuckles. “It’s nice. It’s all really nice,” you said. “I was wondering if I could borrow some money for my birthday.” 

You always said borrow to make yourself feel better. You never payed him back. But what was he for then? A dad who never payed much attention in your life. He had to compensate that somehow. 

“Where is it this year? London?” he asked. “I-I was thinking something more lowkey. A night out in Gotham.”

Your father sighed. “I don’t think that would be such a good idea.” 

“Why?” you asked, crossing your arms. “With all these Riddler attacks…” “Dad, trust me. I can handle myself.” you scoffed. “Y/N, sweetheart. He is strapping bombs to people. People who I worked closely with.” he sighed, rubbing his forehead. “Yeah, people you work with. I don’t work with you.” you said, pursed lips. 

A moment of silence lingered between you two.

“I guess,” he sighed. You squealed and hugged him, thanking him. “I’ll wire you the cash!” he yelled after you as you were leaving his office. 

***

Edward sat at the counter, doodling away at his drawing. He was copying the cheap print on the diner wall, adding his own details. Making it more his style. He was too interested in his artwork and his coffee to notice you walk in. 

You would have never usually chose this spot. The nearest Starbucks was closed for the night, and you were craving caffeine. You had to write a speech for the Animal Shelter you had been volunteering for. You donated a large sum of money to the place. And tonight was the night you were going to write your speech.

“Can I have a large black coffee?” you asked the waitress. “That all?” she asked. “Um, a slice of pumpkin pie too.” 

Edward perked up and looked over, realizing this stranger had just ordered his exact order. 

And the stranger was you. 

His heart skipped a beat. He set down his coffee a little too hard, causing a bit to spill on his artwork. You looked over at him.

Edward swore to himself internally, knowing he completely fucked up. 

He looked back up at you, and you gave him a slight smile. You looked down at the picture he was drawing, now covered in droplets of coffee. 

“S-same order I get,” he managed to spit out. An explanation. “Is it any good?” you asked him, leaning your hip against the counter waiting for your order. “Is what?” he asked, intimidated by your beautiful presence. “The food?” you smirked, cocking your head. “O-oh, yeah. It’s great here.” he said, letting out a small smile. The waitress set your food down on the counter space next to him. 

You never usually spoke to strangers like this, but this man seemed kind. You were in a need for good company anyways. Everyone around you always seemed fake. Hazel, your brothers, your father, Bruce. All monetary based relationships. You craved something natural. Something real. 

You took the first bite of pie and shook your head. “This is amazing,” you said astonished. “Best pie in all of Gotham,” Edward said. “You, sir, might be right about that.” you smiled, wiping the corner of your mouth with the napkin. 

“Y/N,” you introduced yourself. “Edward,” 

Ed never was this social. The last time he spoke to anyone in this depth was a co worker, probably years ago. It just broke his heart watching you, so perfect, about to be ruined by the corruptness of Gotham. Just another victim to the dirtiness of the city. 

The two of you went on conversing until closing time. You asked him about his drawing, if he did other drawings, what he was interested in. When you tried to solve some of his riddles, his heart fluttered. You liked the innocence in him. He didn’t know who you were (at least to your knowledge) and treated you like a normal person. It was hard to explain to him and still seem normal what you did with your life. Edward admired that you volunteered for a living. Giving to others who had none. If he would have had someone like you in the orphanage, his life would have gone a lot better. He just knew it.

When you two separated at the end of the night, you never expected to see him ever again. You cursed yourself on the subway home that you should have gotten his number. He was so innocently adorable, someone wholesome. You needed that in your life. Hazel would ridicule you for your ‘poor choice in a man’. Your brothers would bully the shit out of him at family functions. But you didn’t care. He was real. 

Edward knew he would see you again. He would make sure of it. You were the one thing in Gotham that wasn’t bad. You sparkled in a city of grime. 

He thanked whatever god was looking down on him. He was granted the experience of meeting you, out of the thousands of people in Gotham. You. 

***

Edward tracked your almost every move. He sat in his discreet car across the street of your apartment. He found the new purchase documents online. He had to unscript some of the documents, but found your address easily. He would see you get chauffeured to your volunteer sites. This week you went to the animal shelter, along with a homeless shelter. He admired that about you. You would get home at around four/five pm, which gave you time to get ready for the night activity. Every night you would either have friends over, leave to go to the diner (which you secretly did in hopes of seeing Edward again. He didn’t know this was the reason.), have dinner with your mother, or have a night in for yourself. Lights out at about ten, and you would wake up at seven. Your whole routine down to a point. 

He would stand in the corner of a store on the street. He knew you walked this way everyday to reach the volunteer center. And today, the same god smiled down at him because he was given this bit of information. 

“Hazel, the Fort Adolphus venue is fine. Yes. It’ll be fun, I promise. Yeah, I think seven is a good time…”

Edward froze when he heard this. Your birthday, he assumed. It was two days away. And Fort Adolphus was one of the most prestigious venues in Gotham. Only a senator would be lucky enough to book it. And give it to his daughter to use for her birthday party. 

***

Edward arrived at the venue at four pm. He quickly seeked out one of the party coordinators. Distracting him, he took him into a back closet and tazed him. Stole his clothes, and locked him in. He would be out for a few hours, the taser was powerful. 

And with that, he did what he did best. Blend in. 

You arrived at 6:30. You wore a black minidress, with a sheer torso. You had gold chains as straps. The fabric was bunched up to give a ripple affect. Your hair was curled, and makeup was on perfectly. Edward noticed you when he heard your black heels click on the marble floors. You looked like a goddess. 

“Welcome to the Fort Adolphus venue Miss L/N, let me find a coordinator to help you get settled,” the woman at the door said. She noticed Edward standing around and doing nothing and called for him.

He had just made fate happen. 

“You! Sir!” she called out to Edward. That is when your eyes met again. Your eyes lit up, giving him a smile. “Ed?” you asked, joining his presence. “Funny seeing you,” he chuckled, pushing his clipboard against his waist. “He can escort you to your private back room.” the woman at the door said. “Right,” Edward confirmed, playing along with his role. 

“I didn’t know you were a party coordinator,” you said, watching your team pile out of your car. Hair, makeup, wardrobe on standby. “I’m not,” he said, realizing he made a mistake. “Uh, one night only. Temporary gig,” he managed to get out before raising suspicion. The two of you got to a room labeled ‘Back Room A’. He hoped it was the one for you, and to his luck it was. Gifts laid across a wide table in the middle of the room. Expensive alcohol and food was on the opposite wall. A large couch and a vanity also sat in the room. “There you are,” he said awkwardly, opening the door. “Will I see you tonight?” you asked him as he was about to shut the door. “Um…” Edward thought. “No, I’m only pre-party crew.” he lied. Definitely wasn’t going to stick around. He wasn’t a party person anyways.

He was expecting you to close the door after that, but you didn’t. You got out your phone. “I meant to do this at the diner, but do you have a phone number? Well, of course you have a phone number, I’m just asking if-” “Yeah sure, um…” he said, interrupting you. 

Y/N L/N just asked for his phone number. Oh my god. And she was nervous about it!

After you exchanged them, he began to slowly close your door to give you some privacy. You grabbed his hand on the door knob, and looked directly in his eyes. 

“Ed?”

“Yes?”

“Thank you.”

“Y-your welcome. May I ask for what?” he stuttered. 

“Being real.”

Part 2

-

You swear you recognize this car.

It’s not like it’s all that generic, either. A little burgundy sedan, just old enough to have one whispering to themself, “Huh, what a neat car,” but not so old that it’s antique. It lives somewhere deep in your mind that you’re not quite sure of. God, it’s familiar…

You brush it off. Maybe you just remember it from the parking lot at the press office.

You glance over at the man in the driver's seat, bathed in red light from the traffic signal overhead, to find him white-knuckled around the steering wheel and staring absently ahead through the windshield. The car ride up until now has been characterized by a loaded silence, as if there's things both of you could be saying but aren't. Granted, it has only been about a minute or so since he all but sped out of the parking lot at the hospital, but even so, that's about halfway down to Grange Street, where your car is parked.

The doctor was wise to warn you not to drive. Not only are you dead tired, nearly dozing off in the passenger side of Edward's car, on top of that your mind is still foggy from the sedatives in your system. It takes you a good couple seconds to realize the stoplight before you had changed, even while you were zoned in, unconsciously, on the bright colors.

He doesn't touch the accelerator. Instead, he just gazes blankly into the road ahead, brows furrowing.

You don't have half a mind to follow his line of sight. "Edward," you whisper, "The light's green."

He seems startled by your voice. "Oh, yeah. Sorry."

The engine hums back to life and the car rolls through the intersection, only to slow to a halt a few meters later upon reaching a police road block. So that's what he was staring at.

"I-I think I know another way around—"

He moves his grasp to the gearshift, sliding it back into reverse and throwing his arm over the back of your seat to look through the rearview window. He's leaning over the console and you can feel his warmth again, his closeness bringing with it that same electricity that you missed. The weak glow of streetlights ahead paint his skin— his face, his clavicle exposed by the loose collar of his shirt, the space where his jaw meets his neck— and he looks like a sculpture, all smooth porcelain and fine detail.

You stop him with your fingers against his chest, telling him something about seeing your car up ahead and how you could just walk over to retrieve your bag and house key to save time. He doesn't necessarily realize your exact words. All he's aware of in that moment is your touch.

Edward just nods abstractedly, and then you're getting out of the car before he can even come back to his senses. He misses you immediately. Watching your every move, something heavy in his chest tugs at him and begs to reach for you. He can't let you leave. What if you get in your car and drive off? And then he'll never see you again. It's safer for you in his car.

Shaking away the thoughts rambling on in his mind, he surveys the alleyway for anything— or anyone— that might become an issue along your walk down to your car. Even upon finding nothing, he's still tempted to get out and walk with you. Just to make sure. But he doesn't.

His eyes find you again, halfway into your car and bent over the seat as you reach for your bag. Jaw falling open just slightly, his breath hitches, neck craning forward as if it'll get him a better view. Unconsciously, he commits the scene to mind; the dip of your spine as you disappear into the vehicle, how the light from the moon and the neon OPEN sign above hits the curve of your ass, the way you sit back onto your heels to stand upright. He follows your arms as you stretch them into the air, your back arching almost impossibly and head falling back against your shoulders. He can only imagine the sound you must have made when you stretched like that, the satisfied groan leaving your lips and the sigh of content as you relaxed your body again.

You must be so sore from the hit you took, and that bed at the hospital couldn't have been comfortable. The things he'd do for you, if only you'd ask him... he knows he'd treat you so well. Every aching muscle you could possibly have, he'd be willing to rub it to relief. Anything that could inconvenience you, he'd be there to eliminate it for you. He would kill for you. It wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that he already has.

Anything, if it means you’d forgive him for the way he hurt you tonight.

But before he can indulge further in his thoughts, his passenger side door swings open and you sink down into the seat, bag in your lap. You look over at him and offer a warm smile, as if to silently say, "You can start the car now, I'm ready." And somehow, he understands, as he offers back a whisper of a grin and turns the key in the ignition.

"So, uh, where are we headed?" he asks, as if he doesn't already have your address imprinted in his memory.

And none the wiser, you tell him: "Oh, I'm in the Sycamore Apartments, over on Fifth Street." He flicks his blinker on, nodding before you even finish your sentence. The silence falls over you both again, and the clicking noise fills the car.

"Thank you for driving me home, by the way. I really appreciate it," you say, desperate to break the ice. He just waves you off as if it's the most normal thing in the world. As if you two aren't basically strangers— at least, as far as you're concerned.

"It's nothing. Really, it's for my sake. Peace of mind, I guess." Though it's dim in the car, you swear you see that tiny boyish grin again. He never did smile much. When he does, even just a little, it makes something in your chest flutter. Like you're sixteen again and passing a cute guy in the hallway.

"What," you tease, your tone thick with sarcasm, "Couldn't trust me enough to make it home on my own?"

His eyes blow wide in panic. "Oh, I— No, that's not what I meant at all! I just—"

"Edward."

He looks at you, his cheeks turning dark. You can't help but to laugh. He's so easy. "I was just kidding."

"Oh," he murmurs, settling back into his seat. He raises a brow, removing one hand from the steering wheel to lean his elbow on the center console, all calm and collected like. Clearing his throat, he tells you, "No yeah, absolutely. I uh, knew that from the beginning."

You chuckle again, pulling another smile from him. "Oh did you, now?"

"Yeah. What, you don't believe me?"

"No dice, Mr. Nashton."

He exhales slowly, like a content sigh. You notice his breath hitch, almost undetectably, as you shift in your seat and lean against his forearm on the console to look out the window. He swallows audibly. "You know, you really ought to stop calling me that," he mutters, turning onto Fifth Street and slowing in front of your apartment.

"Why's that?" You turn to him. The muscles in his arm tense as your skin slides against his sleeve. "I think it's got a nice ring to it."

It makes him want to press you face-first into a wall. "It makes me feel like I'm at work."

"Hm, fair enough." Collecting your bag from your lap, you sigh. You're not ready to let the moment go, uncertain of when you'll see something like this again. You two, alone in his car...

You stop yourself before you can get too deep. What, have you got a crush on him or something?

He's looking at you as if he's got something to say, eyes dropping briefly to your lips and then to where your chest meets his forearm. Your eyes, however, don't leave his face. You're so close you can watch every thought in his mind play across his features, but somehow not close enough to distinguish what any of them mean. You're stalling...

Oh, what the hell.

"Do you maybe want to come inside for a few? I think we could both use a drink after... tonight." Maybe you aren't thinking. Or maybe you are thinking, just not with your head. Either way, the thought that illuminates his face right then is clear as day— Yes.

"Are you sure? It's late..." The way he's looking at you is begging you not to change your mind. The idea sits in the way back of your head, screaming, Don't let him inside! But you've already made your decision.

"Yeah it’s late, but I'd feel bad, you know? If you drove me all the way home and I didn't even pay you back." He thinks about it for a moment, having a debate in his own mind that lasts a good few seconds. It's not long, though, until he cuts the engine and nods.

“I’d love to, actually.” Worrying now that he sounds too forward, he adds, “It’s been a while since I’ve had a good drink.”

You grin, satisfied. Trying your best to choke down the childish excitement that bubbles up in your throat, you turn from him and pull up the lock-knob on the car door. Right as you swing your legs out the open door, there he is— looking like a phantom, tall and slender against the distinct Gotham gloom— holding out his hand to help you up.

“Well, thank you,” you chirp as he raises you into the night air. “Quite the gentleman.”

He laughs through his nose. “Hardly.”

There’s a certain danger to the way he responds. Like a warning. You don’t think too much of it as you’re gliding up the metal stairway to your front door, shaky-legged and eager to get inside, but upon looking back on it later it all made much more sense.

While you’re standing there, fumbling to get your key in the lock, your gaze drifts. And your heart catches for a moment, at the sight of it. You’re sure now, Yeah, it’s definitely a crush.

There he is, climbing the steps up to your front porch, blond hair askew and falling into his face as he’s careful not to slip. You turn back quickly, plunging the key in. The lock clicks and you disappear inside.

“It’s a bit of a mess,” you admit, hurrying to gather your coat from the back of the couch and stow away the empty takeout box on the end table. “I wasn’t really expecting anyone.”

He chuckles, something quiet and gentle, but still it rings through the small room. Shutting the door behind him, he assures you his place is worse. Your guest glances around, taking in the color of the walls and what covers them, and what’s on the tables and how you didn’t seem to know how to close a set of blinds to save your soul. Committing it all to memory. So this is how it looks from the inside. There’s that picture he always sees through the window.

“You can have a seat, if you’d like.” You brush past him as he’s looming awkwardly in the doorway. “What, uh… what do you drink?”

He trails you into the kitchenette, dropping into a chair just beside the counter. Reaching up to the cabinet above the table where he’s sat, you find yourself nearly leaning over him to get to the alcohol. He peers up at the shelves as you pry open the wooden door— it’s been a while since you’ve dug into it.

Crown Royal. Shitty vodka from your friend, a housewarming gift. Cognac you brought to a party a couple months back, and returned home with, unopened. Your collection was slim, but you assured him, “I’ve got wine in the fridge as well, if you’re interested.”

“May I have a glass of wine?”

You look down at him. And he’s gazing up at you, eyes soft. So polite. “Of course, that would have been my choice as well.”

He smiles again. He’ll remember that.

He likes this view of you. Leaning into the fridge, hunting for something, brows furrowed. There’s something domestic about it. And while he realizes it’s just a fantasy, in the moment you’re finding the wine he allows himself to slip into a world where you both are here, together, coming home from work and settling in for a drink. One where he’d make dinner and let you rest in his lap on the couch afterward. You’d fall asleep together, wake together, over again…

Clink.

The sound of glass colliding with cheap marble yanks him from his thoughts. There you are again, just inches from him, pressed against the countertop as you concentrate on pouring the wine. Careful not to spill and stain the surface. He always loved how you looked when you focused.

Once both glasses are half-full, he rises and takes one in his hand. “Thank you,” he hums, and he raises the glass to his lips for a leisurely sip. You don’t realize his eyes locked on you while you stare, his mouth forming perfectly around the rim of the glass. Catching yourself, you glance away.

“No need to thank me. It’s the least I could do.” You settle beside him, hopping up to sit on the counter while he leans his hip against its edge. Chuckling, you remind him, “The wine isn’t even that great.”

You don’t trust yourself to hold the glass, so you release it from your shaking hand to the surface beside you. “Oh, I’m not picky,” he all but whispers. “Besides, it’s not every night I get to drink with friends. I’d be stupid to complain.”

You huff out a sarcastic breath. “It’s not every night my boss is in my apartment, either.” You meet his eyes again. He’s holding you there, and he’s not even touching you. His eyes have gone stoic.

You’re pressed between him and his desk. Holding each others’ gaze, waiting to see who breaks first. Testing the waters. How far can we push it?

“I suppose I’m not complaining either, though,” you add. There’s a beat of silence as he ponders his next words, eyebrows raising as he takes another lazy sip from his glass.

“Since when am I your boss?”

You feel your cheeks warming, and finally you look away. “Well, maybe that wasn’t really the word for it, but you know what I mean. You’re definitely my superior, but I guess you’re not really my boss— that would be a little weird, actually, you don’t really seem like the boss type…”

Amidst your rambling, he mutters, “It would certainly complicate things.”

And you pause. He furrows his brows, as if he wasn’t expecting you to hear that. A hint of panic splashes across his face.

“Complicate things?” you urge him.

He shakes his head, beginning to turn away. “It’s nothing.”

“No.” You reach for him, fingers curling around the loose fabric of his sleeve. He tenses, his body stuttering for a second, but he doesn’t leave. He stays there, right where you hold him. “What did you mean?”

A doe-eyed stare falls on you again as he cranes his neck over his shoulder to look at you. And there you are. Locked in eye contact again, silently challenging one another as the room becomes pressurized. Pressing you two together until someone breaks. You feel his muscles tensing and untensing beneath your fingertips as he chooses his words.

I just want a straight-forward answer, Edward.

“It’s just a bit strange for someone’s… superior, to be in their home this late, no?”

“I thought you said you weren’t complaining.”

Your breath is speeding up. You’re sure he notices, because his is speeding up, too. He turns back to you again, this time bringing him so close to you that you feel the chill of his belt against the skin of your outer thigh through your clothes. It sets your senses alight, your entire body tingling to attention at the slightest touch. And there it is again, that hand coming down to post on the edge of the countertop beside you, keeping you tucked between him and something so suffocatingly unmovable for the second time that month. Except this time, his confidence is dormant. He’s all whispers and soft linen, his bottom lip stained red.

“I’m not,” he murmurs. Head tilted forward, even with his hair falling down into his face, his eyes still gleam in the dim light from the kitchen lamp as he looks down at you. You can almost feel his breath on your face as he continues, almost silently, breathlessly, “I told you. I would be stupid to complain.”

Your back is arching into him instinctually. The need for him is primal, unlike any way you’ve ever needed someone prior. Your eyes are resting on his lips, recalling how they pursed around the glass, curled into a gentle smile, caught between his teeth sometimes when he’d think. Wondering if you could taste the wine on his tongue. He’d make it taste so good.

His jaw hangs as he exhales a shaky breath, leaning in further to place his glass down next to yours, right behind your far hip. He doesn’t draw back his hand. His hair, stringy and soft, tickles your forehead. His entire body is close. Close enough you could almost feel his lashes against your skin as his eyelids fall slowly shut. Hesitantly, he maneuvers his hips to slink between your knees, quick to return to that sphere of closeness you both have created.

You’re hardly breathing. Feeling weightless on your perch at the counter, you brace your palm against his warm chest to keep your balance. His heart pounds mercilessly against the skin. Trailing upward, you gently brush the hair from his face.

How far could you push it?

Your lips meet. Featherlight at first, but he doesn’t last long. His hands curl around your hips, drawing you against his body as your own rest against his arms, in his hair, anywhere you can find purchase. The pain in your finger is long forgotten against the sensation of him.

It’s open mouthed, sloppy and desperate. Small noises and wandering hands. It’s nothing like he’d ever imagined it would be. In a way, that only serves to excite him further.

His lips are chapped, but they’re warm and wet nonetheless and he kisses you as if you’re fresh air and he’s been drowning. His embrace is possessive. He tugs you into himself and groans something guttural, animalistic. He’s never letting go.

His mouth moves eagerly and without expertise, small sounds escaping the back of his throat as you press further into him. His touch slides tentatively up your back, only to crash back against the marble as he collapses into the dip of your shoulder. His ministrations don’t stop, and he probes the delicate skin beside your throat with his lips and tongue. Incoherent, he’s a mess, sobbing into your body how beautiful you are, how scared he’s been, how badly he needs you.

Please, please, he needs you. He needs you so badly his entire body aches. He’ll do anything. He knows it’s wrong, and he knows he shouldn’t want this, but he’s been so hungry for you for so long and it’s all he ever thinks about when he sees you.

You pry him away from your neck, which is now raw and likely marred by his ravenous mouth, by getting a fistful of his hair and tugging. The sound that leaves him is inexcusable, whining desperately like a bitch in heat, but all is made right again when you caress his face and thumb at his swollen lips.

His pupils are blown to saucers, peering down at you unwaveringly as he looms between your legs. Knowing well he’s hanging on your every word, you ask him softly, directly, “Do you want this?”

His face contorts like he’s about to cry. He sinks into your touch, burying his face in your palm, nodding frantically. “I do. M’want it, so bad… I need…”

“What do you need, Eddie?”

He sucks in a shaky breath. Eddie. He liked that. “You. You, you… I want to feel you, I’ve been thinking about you so long…”

You figure he could tell you about that later. For now, you guide his face back to your lips again, and whisper against his mouth.

“Have me.”

X X X

For being long and lean, he’s stronger than you expected. He sweeps you from the countertop with ease and hauls you off down the hall, hands planted firmly underneath your thighs to hold you tight against him.

You don’t remember telling him where your bedroom was. Once you lock your legs around his back and feel his hips— and something else— grinding right into where you need him, though, you can’t really bring yourself to mind.

Edward turns to nudge open the door with his shoulder, and he doesn’t even bother closing it. He’s too preoccupied with bracing his forearm against your back and laying you gently against your blankets, letting you down so easy he must have thought you’d break at the slightest touch. His body doesn’t separate from you. All of his weight is on top of you, around you, firmly against you. Your legs still curl snugly around him, with his face in your chest and his hands drifting up your thighs.

His hips are already rutting into you, restricted by the clothes that still, to his dismay, divide your bodies. The incessant throbbing between his legs tells him that he would have been perfectly content, had you told him to, to grind against you like a puppy until he got off, but once you tug at the back of his shirt collar he’s just as eager to be free of it.

He fumbles with the buttons on the sleeves, whimpering in frustration when they don’t come undone. “Here,” you prod. You take them between your fingers to help him, to guide him. Like Edward, they come undone quickly beneath your skilled touch.

Not even bothering with the buttons along the front, he yanks it over his head and discards it somewhere off the bedside. You glance in its general direction, but instead you’re greeted by the city staring back at you through the wide-open window.

“Edward,” you push at his shoulder, but he’s engulfed in kissing at your neck again. The most you get is a distracted hum. Squirming, you tell him, “We gotta close the window—“

“No.” He posts up on his elbows to get a look at your face, and his eyes are wild as they land on you. A surge of ferocity rips through him, uncharacteristic compared to how he was writhing against you not moments ago. “I don’t give a fuck who sees. Hell, they can watch. So they’ll all know.”

Let them all watch him as he makes you his. As he drives his dick so deep into you that he can be certain no one else will ever fill you so well again. And when you inevitably wake up tomorrow and dress for work, and try your best to cover his marks and bruises all over your neck with makeup or jewelry, let them peek out in the spots you missed and remind everyone in the office you’re not to be touched. Not to be looked at. Not even to occupy space in another’s mind.

His.

He’s back on you in an instant, tugging on your belt and then sliding down your body to rid you of your bottoms. His breath, hot and heavy, cascades against your inner thigh as he rests his face against it. Eyes closed, he nips at the supple flesh with his open mouth. The warm hand returns to busy itself with squeezing at your opposite leg.

Your fingers tangle in his hair, trying to draw him closer to where you need him. You lift your hips so he can remove your underwear. He dips his head between your thighs, mind going foggy as he takes you in.

A soft mouth accepts you without prompt. His tongue moves against you eagerly, lapping at the nectar that drips from your heat. Your head falls back against the pillows, losing yourself in the wet euphoria he gives you and the muffled noises he makes as he all but suffocates on you.

He doesn’t need to breathe. He’d never been so hungry— never had something so sweet ever graced his tongue. If he choked there, in between your thighs, he’s sure he’d have spent his afterlife bragging.

He lifts his head with a greedy inhale, filling his lungs as he was just starting to get lightheaded. Spit, among other things, coats his lips and the corners of his mouth, and his hair is disheveled from your pawing at it. The smile on his face is unlike any you’ve seen before— something adjacent to deranged. Manic. He’s just getting started.

“I’ve spent so long wondering how you taste,” he whines, rising into all fours to return to his place on top of you. He sits back on his haunches right between your spread legs, the dusting of blond hair on his chest catching the moonlight as his muscles move beneath the skin. The darkness of the room beyond him frames his body, but he seems to glow above you, humming with energy, while he undoes his belt.

His words finally register in your head. “You have?” you affirm weakly, finding it hard to breathe. The smile only widens, tongue pressing insolently against his bottom teeth.

“I have.”

Slipping out of his trousers and briefs, he leans over you again, pressing his nose into your temple. “You’re better than I could have ever imagined," he whispers, taking the hem of your shirt between his fingers. You get the hint. “I don’t know how I’ve possibly kept myself away this long.”

A shuttering groan escapes from deep within his throat just at the sight of you. Now completely bare, you let the shirt fall from your fingers, raising your arms above your head to toss it to the floor. His hands follow, pinning your wrists.

“I don’t think I’ll ever be able to again.”

You feel it. Warm and thick, pressing into your thigh. His head drops to the crook of your neck. By instinct, you let your legs drift further apart, all but inviting him inside.

He moves his hips at an excruciating pace, sliding his dick slowly against your skin, so close to where you need him. Every so often, he loses control, his hips bucking forward despite his best efforts. You squirm beneath him, mumbling desperately, dumb from arousal— “Please, Eddie”— but he doesn’t relent. His grip around your wrist only tightens.

“Say it. I need to hear you say it.” Holding you down with one hand, he hooks the other under your knee to poise his dick right against your hole. Barely breaking the surface.

Your mind is reeling. “Please!”

“As nice as you sound when you beg,” he quips, panting, “I want you to tell me you’re mine. I need… I need to hear it. Need to.” His fingers dig into your thigh. “Say it. Who do you belong to?”

What little composure he had before is long lost. His entire body trembles above you, like a live wire about to erupt into flames. His cock jumps against your skin, aching to be inside.

“You—!” Your breath is cut short. The stretch that burns between your legs makes your entire body feel limp, giving itself to his touch as he shapes you around his dick.

“Oh my god,” he breathes. Only making it halfway inside before you clench around him, he slides back out to the tip. He releases your wrists, setting you free to let your hands roam again, and slides his arms around your waist as he holds you down onto his cock. Teeth scrape against your throat, weakly resisting the urge to bite down.

His thrusts soon become erratic and quick, reaching deeper inside of you than you ever thought possible and breeding you like a rabbit. Whining, babbling incoherently, gazing at you thoughtlessly, his eyes are lidded— Mine, mine, mine.

“Feels so fucking… oh god, so tight…”

Your fingers tangle into his hair, holding on for any essence of control. Tightening your grip into a fist, you feel his jaw fall open in a silent scream. The mewl that escapes him is pathetic. He likes that. He loves that.

"That feel good, Eddie?" It leaves your lips like honey. He nods fervently into your neck, abandoning the air of dominance he'd played with earlier. The warm body above you, inside you, melts into your touch, offering himself to you. Begging you to take him.

And you do.

It comes naturally, telling him how good he feels, how good he is for you, good, good, good. The bruising rhythm of his hips falters as he loses himself in your praise, mumbling things you couldn't understand and heating the skin of your bare chest with his breath.

You give him another tug. He yelps, his dick stilling within you while you hold his head up to face you by his hair. Glossy eyed, you swear there's tears sliding down his cheeks. Pathetic.

"What happened, baby?" You clench around him, just to hear him squeal. He does. "Not so big and strong anymore, huh? What happened to all that confidence?"

His face twists, and a small sob wracks his frame. He goes to return his face to the crook of your neck, but he's stopped by another yank to his hair.

"Ah—!"

"Use your words, honey. Why are you crying?" A tinge of worry invades your question, but something in you screams in delight at the way you've broken him. At just how easy it was.

There's so much he could say. How he never believed he'd get this far. He could tell you just how many nights he'd spent, dick deep in his fist, thinking about this, and how he can't even contain himself now that it's finally happening. How he's waiting to wake up from this cruel dream to an inevitable wet spot of cum on his mattress, as he has done frequently in the past. The way he needs you right now, to fill you and let you claim him, to hear you decide he's worthy of even the littlest passing thought. To beg you to use him if it means he can take up space in your mind. He wants to sink into the softness of your skin and let you hold him there. How the second he felt you squeezing his dick, he vowed never to leave your bedsheets— he'd stay there, in your bed, waiting for you all day until you return home so he can lay in your arms again like a lapdog. He'd let you whore him out for your own pleasure. Reduce himself for a warm body for you to use if it means he got to be yours.

He can’t bring himself to say it. Instead, he opts for a weak whimper as he tells you, "Need you..."

It wasn't a lie. In this moment, you're the oxygen he breathes— the only thing registering in his mind is how your body moves against his. Committing it to memory for when he inevitably has to let you go. Once you wake up tomorrow and realize who you've taken to bed. The way you'll look at him—or not look at him, even worse— in the days to come. The crushing reality that he will have to return to his spot across the street and observe you from your window again, teased by the events of tonight and the remnants of your touch on his skin.

But you're facing him now, picking apart his expression with eyes unwavering, glowing with adoration. Fully aware and generally sober, you know it's Edward Nashton.

You see him.

He's pulled back to reality by the breathiness of your voice, whispering to him, Oh, come here, baby. The voice from his dreams calling to him again.

Without hesitance, he collapses back into you. His hands squeeze your hips, anchoring you to him as his hips pick up in speed.

His dick slides against your walls with ease, and you feel him twitching inside of you. You caress his back, coaxing him toward his release, chasing your own. He moans softly, mindlessly, " 'm gonna cum..."

The weight of his body lifts away from you, just barely enough to make space for his fingers to snake between your bodies and stroke you. "Cum with me," he begs, "Please, I wanna... wanna make you feel good."

Feeling the coil deep in your belly, you dig your nails into his shoulderblades and buck your hips into his touch. It doesn't take long, between his mewling in your ear and the heat of his fingers against the sensitive skin between your legs, until you're almost there, clinging to him and clenching unwillingly around his cock.

"Eddie, I'm close—"

"Please cum, please, please... oh, my god, I wanna— I wanna see you." He posts on his elbow so his face hovers above yours, your breath mingling with his and making you dizzy.

You bring your trembling palm against his cheek. He watches your eyes roll back into your skull as your release washes over you, your entire body jolting with the force of it. The low groan that leaves you sends him toppling over his own edge, burying himself deep within you and spilling himself into your body. He lets his forehead fall against yours, a thin veil of sweat dampening his skin. The room fades into a half-awake sort of silence as each of you breathe each other's air, recovering.

When you open your eyes again after a long moment of basking in his closeness, and your own fullness, you find him already gazing down at you. The look in his eyes isn't any different from ones you've received in the past, but this time, it makes sense.

Desire. Unadulterated need. Infatuation.

Reverence.

With the hand on his cheek, you guide his lips down to yours. The kiss is nothing like your first of the evening. It's slow, languid, offering you both time to truly taste one another. To become one entity, joined at the mouth, for a brief time until you both come up for air and he collapses against the mattress beside you.

The moonlight plays on his features, sending shadows that frame his face like he’s Renaissance art. Suddenly he's bashful again, toying with your fingers as he asks you, "Should I let you get to sleep?"

You intertwine your hand with his.

"Stay."

《♡》

PART FOUR SOON

<taglist>

@yelenas-lova

@alicefallsintotherabbithole

@notevanpetersbuthisgf

A pained gasp startles you once again and you turn to face the figure lying by your side, his actions being the apparent source of your disturbed sleep as you watch the lump in his throat moving rapidly to manage his panicked breathing. Distress is clear on his expression, so boyish without his signature glasses perching on his nose, and he releases another soft whimper which carries across the small bedroom.

“Don’t.”

Blinking in surprise as he speaks with clarity, you can tell that his mind is still lost in unpleasant dreams and your body stills so as not to disturb him any further.

“I didn’t do anything.” He pleads, face twisting into open upset at some unseen figure who appeared to be threatening him. “I promise! I didn’t do anything. Please don’t.”

Another nightmare.

Edward spoke little of his early experiences growing up in the orphanage but from reading between the lines and taking note of the odd placements of mild scarring which littered his body, it was clear that his past haunted him. It drove his focus in the daytime but the price of that righteous anger were the terrors which plagued him in the night when his subconscious was at its most vulnerable.

Cutting off your thoughts with a soft yelp, his body jolts in place as though struck, and the surprise of the movement knocks you from your voyeuristic trance.

“Eddie, wake up.” You mutter, rubbing at his bare shoulder with an open palm as you attempt to pull him gently from his broken sleep. “You’re dreaming.”

Your calming efforts are in vain as his eyes snap open in blind panic and his left hand lashes out towards your face; the total lack of recognition in his eyes registering in your thoughts as the side of his hand connects with your lower lip.

Grunting at the sharp pain of impact, your own hand flies to your lip and the wetness there is immediate as you realise that the hit has caused your teeth to break the skin. Your tongue appears to lick away the welling droplets of blood as your hands drop to his chest, applying a centring pressure which forces his eyes to lock on to your own as you speak.

“Eddie, relax. It’s just me. Only me. In our bed.”

Each short sentences in punctuated by a soft shushing noise which visibly takes the tension from his shoulders as he relaxes beneath your palms. His sandy hair is plastered to his forehead by sweat and you take one hand off his covered chest to brush the strands away from his eyes.

“What time is it?”

His voice is groggy and much lower than usual, roughened by his waking state, and his eyes seem to loom in the darkness as they stare up at you, unblinking.

“It’s just past four. You’ve been in bed for about two hours.” You swallow and the blood on your lips leaves a metallic taste on your tongue as you continue. “You were having a bad dream.”

His eyes are haunted by whatever had been tormenting him but a hint of sadness seeps through his features as his gaze dips to your lip and the clear mark there.

“Did I do that?”

“Yes.” There was no point in lying to him.

He always knew.

Leaning up from the bed, the sheet covering his torso slips down to expose the pale expanse of his chest and you can see a faint pinkish tone where your hands had pressed down on him earlier. His back straightens as his head tilts towards you, one hand breaking free of the sheets to raise itself hesitantly to your face.

Keeping your head steady, you allow him to run his thumb along your lower lip and you hold back the wince as the pad of his finger brushes across the fresh cut.

“Fuck.” He hisses and the self-loathing is clear in both his tone and the unfamiliar cursing as his hand pulls away quickly, once against fisting itself in the off-white sheets. “I’m sorry.”

“You didn’t mean it.” You soothe him, wrapping your hand around the undefined muscle of his upper arm as your fingers hold him in place gently. “Don’t worry about it.”

“I was dreaming of there,” he confessed with a breathy stutter, “of being back there and unable to leave. They never liked me doing my puzzles. Always trying to accuse me of doing things as an excuse to punish me.”

As he spoke, his breathing grew more and more shallow, chest moving quickly in the dim moonlight which flooded in from the open window until you lift your hand and place it softly on his cheek to bring his attention back to you.

“A bad dream, Eddie, and nothing more. Lie back down.”

He follows your command without hesitation, body flopping back on to the uncomfortable mattress as the sheet lays abandoned around his hips and you are quick to follow suit as you slip back down into your original position at his side.

Snatching his hand within your own, you give it a firm squeeze as you raise his arm an inch and he follows your unspoken instruction. Lifting the arm up fully, he allow you to slip beneath it as you press the side of your head against his chest, the sparse hair there tickling the skin of your cheek as you exhale deeply.

From this position, you can hear how wildly his heart is dancing a samba beat and the frantic nature of it tells you just how agitated he still is, despite your efforts. Slinging an arm around his waist, you pull your body closer to him and wrap your legs within his own in a messy tangle of limbs.

“Tell me a story.” You mutter in the quiet of the room. “Tell me how you solved one of your work cases and what clues gave them away.”

He enjoyed talking about his work; the challenge of uncovering digital fraudulence being one of the few outlets which he truly seemed passionate about. At least until the case went before a judge and was immediately dismissed for reasons of questionable legitimacy. It disheartened him and the injustice of it would often slip into the frantic ranting which possessed him in moments of stress; in those moments when the tight composure of his mild-mannered features would slip into something almost feral as a staunch bitterness manifested as wild threats and promises of vengeance.

“You know that information is confidential, kitten.”

But here and now, in the quiet of the night, he is much more subdued, and he offers his comment with a wry smile that you can feel in the words.

Frowning at the much-hated nickname, you pinch the skin of his hips between your fingers and his response is to tug gently at the hair which sits on the nape of your neck as he cards his digits through the hair there.

“Tell me,” you insist as you slip your hand from his hips to rest on his outer thigh, “please?”

“Do you want to hear about the secret case they have us building against a well-regarded member of the Sionis family? How much of their money is laundered through various shell companies?”

Nodding against his chest, you give a hum of appreciation at the suggestion but cannot help but tease him.

“It’s not much of a secret if you tell me.”

Giving a low chuckle, he is quick to follow it up with a hushed question.

“Why can a bank never keep a secret?”

Remaining silent, you tap against his thigh to indicate him to deliver the answer as your attention is split between his words and the much more settled beat of his heart as it thuds in your ear.

“Because they have too many tellers.”

Your response is somewhere between a giggle and a groan as you relax into his soft body and allow him to begin his sordid tale.