#satplotdb

You flick the sole of his foot with your middle finger. Bastard doesn’t even flinch. His toes curl up a little, though.

He turns the page. “Nice shower?”

“Your big ass used up all the hot water,” you say, and pinch his ankle in retribution. “Scram.”

“I fucking got here first,” he sneers, but he folds his legs up for you to sit. The hem of his shorts slips down, but only a bit, caught in the thick of his thigh.

You sit, and then gather his legs over your lap. He has to bend his knees up a little, and turn his hips to the side to better accommodate you, but he does it without complaint. You put your feet up over the coffee table, though, and he clicks his tongue at you. Baby, we got this at a flea market. The things he gets all prim and proper about, honestly. Mind you, were this Dick’s table, he’d be lugging his nasty gear boots right on top, muck and all. You ignore him, slide down on the cushion a little until you’re comfortable. Hold onto his calves for support and then rest your hand there, wrapped around the meat of it, hard muscle solid under soft skin.

Throwing your head back over the back of the couch, eyes closed, you start tracing the smattering of scars that litter his legs, following the raised skin here and there, down and back up again. Jason doesn’t protest. The silence stretches, placid and long, sinking into the afternoon with nary an interruption. The clock ticks in the kitchen. The pages drag against one another as he reads on. Your breathing echoes his, clear and steady. In and out. In and out. Fingers on his skin.

Your thumb brushes the back of his knee, and the rhythm breaks with his soft gasp.

“Thought you came here to nap,” he grumbles.

You open your eyes and turn your face towards him without raising your head. “I’m not sleepy,” you say. Not at all, in fact.

He raises an eyebrow at you. “So what? You’re just gonna sit there and play nice in silence?”

A smile slowly unfurls in your face. “I can play with you, baby, I’m just not sure about nice.”

Jason drops his book to his chest and huffs. “I fucking knew it. I saw you stalking towards me from the hallway like some sort of—fuck, I don’t know, a tiger or some shit.”

“It’s not my fault you’re hot,” you laugh, bending over to press a kiss to his knee, fingers curling around the underside. Unable to help yourself, you nip at the flesh of his thigh right above it, gentle. You rest your cheek against his knee, and gaze at him.

Jason runs a hand through his hair, looking conflicted. “We just showered,” he complains. The tuft of white hair pokes out between his fingers. His other hand drums on the spine of the book. “Edgar is about to banish Heathcliff.”

“Fuck Heathcliff.”

Jason rolls his eyes. “All this time and I can’t get you to appreciate the true value of classic literature.”

“You can keep reading.” You shrug one shoulder. “I just wanted to suck you off.”

Jason groans, throwing his head back over the armrest. “Like hell I can,” he mutters, burying his face in his hands. The book slides down his chest and clatters to the floor unceremoniously. Jason pays it no mind. It’s clear to see why. He’s already half-hard from all the petting, his dick more noticeable under the red fabric. If you craned your head, you could probably see the tip poking out. You poke your tongue at the inside of your mouth, trying not to make it too obvious that your mouth is watering. You fail, and probably miserably, considering Jason’s sharp eyes are turned on you, dark and serious, when you glance back at him.

“C’mere,” he says, reaching out towards you, and you shift on your hips to crawl up his body, slotting yourself between his legs.

Jason catches your mouth halfway, a hand on the back of your head. You brace yourself on his chest and on the slope of the armrest as you kiss him, nip at his lip and eat up the soft sigh he breathes into your mouth. It’s so immediate with him, the way you go from zero to a hundred. He sneaks under your skin, an ache, a hunger to satiate. Kiss him deep, open-mouthed, filthy, pressed against the cushion, heart rabbiting under your hand. Engulf him, eat him. He was correct: for him, you are an animal.

He breaks off the kiss, then turns his face to the side to pant. You press a kiss to his jaw, his hot breath in your ear all you can hear. The hand on your head smooths down your hair, heavy the way all his bones are heavy, and then he catches your mouth again. Softer now, more languid, not a single kiss but a stream of them, one after the other, interrupting the former with the beginning of the next. It’s sweet. He’s sweet.

Jason presses his forehead to yours, holds you there for a moment. You try to catch your breath, but unlike him, you do not close your eyes. He’s too beautiful to miss out on. His eyelashes sweep over blushing cheeks, his lips red and puffy where you bit him. A long scar curves under his left eye, swoops over the cheekbone and ends, crooked, around the corner of his mouth. Your heart throbs inside your ribcage, that stuttering rhythm tinged in dread. Such violence has been wrought upon him. What can you do to help him? How can you touch him so that he knows he can be touched, without the pain, without apology? Where to touch, what to do? How to let his body know it’s not made to be a war zone?

At a loss, all you can do is raise a hand to cup his cheek, brush your fingers against his jaw. He settles into the touch, always starved for it. A soft sigh escapes his lips, content, charged. You kiss his cheek and prop yourself up on your elbow. He thumbs at your waist, and then nods. Another kiss, slow and sweet, grateful, because you can’t help yourself. Jason relaxes into your mouth, underneath your wandering hands. Slides down the couch, neck resting marginally more comfortably on that throw pillow.

You kiss down his jaw, lick at his collarbone. He’s quiet, exhaling slowly. When you push his shirt up and tell him to hold it there, he grasps it with stiff fingers. His chest distends under your mouth and you are suddenly struck with this intimate awareness of his living, his being right there, warm and breathing and alive underneath you. His skin is clean and sweet tasting, and he smells like his big bottle of lotion, milk and honey and wheat. You chance a bite on the side of his pectoral, gentle still, and are regaled with taste and sound and feeling: skin under your teeth, his ribs moving as he shifts, a soft gasp caught in his throat.

Jason’s eyebrows are drawn together, eyes closed, when you glance up at him. A hand fisted in his hair, the other one still holding up his shirt. The first time you did this for him this way—the first time it mattered, when it wasn’t just Red Hood in an alleyway looking for release, but Jason, your Jason, writhing underneath you—he barely looked at you. Couldn’t muster up the courage somehow. Sometimes he gets in this slow mood, caught up in himself, sweet and tender and so willing, and you feel the enormity of your responsibility not to break this fragile trust settle upon you, like a mantle of your own. It must show on your eyes, how you feel about it.

You mouth down his torso, sliding down the couch as you go along. The smell of him grows thicker the further down you go and your mouth waters just thinking about him in it. You dig your fingers on the waistband of his shorts, pulling them down a little, so you can nose at the thick hair poking out, suck a bruise where the swell of his belly connects to his groin. Jason groans, and he squirms, seeking friction, but you hold him steady with a hand. The armrest bumps into your butt way before you expect it to, and you just get down on the floor instead of trying to arrange Jason’s legs to fit you in. The tile’s hard under your knees, and Jason cracks open an eye when he hears you hit the hard surface, but you pay him no mind, hands on his thighs, spreading them apart.

“Look at you,” you say reverently.

Jason throws an arm over his face, muttering something against the crook of his elbow.

“What was that?” You say, sliding a hand up his inner thigh. It’s so hot between his legs. You push the legs of his shorts up as far as they’ll go, and watch his cock caught in the fabric, thick as anything and already soaking through the layers. Jason shifts his hips, trying to press himself against the side of your hand, and you take pity on him, start palming him over the fabric. His cock jumps at the contact, the little patch on his shorts growing darker as you slide your palm over him. He’s so wet, Jason, every time you touch him, leaking almost as soon as you set hands on him, spurts so much cum it’s a little astounding. It didn’t always used to be so, he says, but it must’ve changed after he came back to life. You make it worse, he’d accused once, like you’d ever feel bad about that.

“I said,” he huffs, "you don’t have to look so damn excited.”

“But I am,” you say, feeling an emptiness in your gut that can only be called hunger. You meant to be slower, take your time prying him apart, but—“I just want you so much.”

You lean over to suck at the wet patch on his shorts, lips catching the head of his cock through the layers of fabric, and Jason curses up a storm in surprise.

“Baby,” he whines, which might as well be hurry.

You hook your fingers on the waistband of his shorts and pull them down, dragging the underwear along. Jason snorts when you slide them off his legs entirely, but he moves where you want him to move, stretches one leg long over the couch at the tap of a knee, calf hooked around the swoop of the armrest, the other leg braced on the floor beside you. His cock bobs up when he repositions himself on the couch, smacks against the side of his leg, and you lick your lips in anticipation.

“I love those shorts, you know,” you say, conversationally, kissing down the inside of his thigh. The hardy muscle flexes when your teeth scrape the skin and a thrill rushes through you. You bite down, harder than usual, and Jason’s groan turns into a moan as you lick the wound, tongue flat against the mark of teeth. I’ll eat you whole, Jason, you think. Watch out.

“Uh-huh,” he mumbles in response, breath shaking as you get closer to his dick, sucking and biting and kissing the reddened skin better as you go. He shivers, drags a hand up his abdomen and rests it over his heart. Bet he can feel your hot breath ghosting over his balls, brushing up his shaft.

God, and it’s a good cock too. Thicker than any you’ve seen before, looking plump and full and ready. It sits straight between strong legs, in a bed of dark hair, waiting for you. You’ve had it in your mouth several times before and it’s still as thrilling as the first time you knelt before him, looking up through your eyelashes as you nuzzled up against his leg, hot breath clouding the sharp midnight air. Pre-cum beads on the tip, and you dip your head forward to catch a taste, wrapping a hand on the base.

“Yes,” you groan. Just what you wanted.

“Ah, fuck,” he curses, squirming again.

“Jason,” you chastise, pushing down on his hips, but it comes out garbled on account of the dick in your mouth.

Jason makes a little noise which could possibly be another curse or an aborted moan, but he keeps himself valiantly still even when you swirl the head of his cock in your mouth, enjoying the taste. Your hand strokes up the shaft, not too firmly just yet. Getting reacquainted. Jason’s dick’s not the sort you can just take into your mouth without a little adjusting, not unless you wanna choke, and you’re not there just yet. You pop off just to lick where your hand is stroking, and let go of his hips to fondle his balls. Jason exhales harshly, hips buckling, and his dick slides across your cheek, trailing pre-cum as it goes.

“Shit,” he breathes. “Sorry.”

You shake your head in quiet apology, and brace yourself on his knee to actually take him in your mouth properly. Working your jaw, you slide down his cock, slowly, trying to adjust to the girth of him. If he wasn’t so burly, you could be faster, but as it is, you breath through your nose and take him as far as you can go, little by little, until your nose hits the wiry hair at the base. Spit gathers at the edges of your mouth, dribbling. He sits far enough down your throat that it skirts the edge of uncomfortable, and when you swallow involuntarily, throat working around him, you feel him throb.

“Shit,” he repeats. His hand buries in your hair, but his touch is featherlight.“Shit.”

Slowly, you come back up, the drag of him out of your mouth an incomparable experience. Nothing else measures up to the weight of him in your mouth, the smell of him so strong, his thighs around your head. Except maybe getting fucked by him. That you like a lot.

Jason’s dick is not the sort you can deep throat like that so suddenly, not without hurting your throat, so you go back to lavishing the head with attention, and stroking him with your hand. Take him back in your mouth halfway, bobbing up and down, setting a punishing rhythm while he writhes underneath you. In the silence of the living room, all you can hear is the squelching of your spit and his ragged breathing.

He falls apart so beautifully, deep shivers that wrack his whole body, groans that turn into moans. He makes you wanna want him forever, more and more and more. Every sound he makes you want to hear it again, draw it out, make him sob. You spread his legs further apart and get a hand between his asscheeks. The lube—there’s no lube here, it’s on the other room, and you’re not prying yourself off his dick to come get it, not when you’ve managed to get him moaning so beautifully, pulsing in your throat when you sink down all the way, his hand fisted on your hair. So you just circle the rim of muscle, finger wet on the mix of your spit and his pre dribbling down your chin, and rub at it. Jason cries out, and clenches around nothing, and you feel heady with the want, thinking soon, soon, in just a minute. I’ll give you want you want, baby, anything you want.

He’s coming forward, bending over your head, driving his cock deeper down your throat, and you think, yes, that’s fine, I can take it. Don’t know if you whisper it, if you try, if it sounds like anything at all, because then Jason’s hand closes around your shoulder and he’s pushing you off him, and you think, dazed, no, I wasn’t done. I want more as his cock slips out of your mouth and hot cum spurts out right on your face. Some of it lands on your shirt, but most of it’s on your cheeks, your mouth. God, he cums so much. Jason pants above you, hand on the base of his cock, and he only hisses when you go back and suckle out the last bit of cum that spurts out.

“Stop,” he slurs, drawing in big breaths. “‘s too much.”

You pull away, blinking. Jason hangs his head over you, eyes closed, trying to catch his breath. You rest your forehead against his knee, lift a hand to wipe the cum off your brow before it can get in your eye. Glancing up at him to make sure his eyes are still closed, you smear it surreptitiously on his red shorts. The tile is still hard and cold underneath you, and your knees are already hurting, but you sit back in your haunches with a beating heart and a great amount of satisfaction.

Jason opens his eyes slowly and observes you for a moment. His hand comes up your throat, stroking gently, feeling the way it moves as you swallow. Then his fingers come up to grab your chin, index and thumb. You gaze back expectantly, waiting for what he has to say, feeling your belly thrum with excitement when his eyes flick all over your face, still dark, still hungry. He likes this, you can tell. His cum drying on your face, beginning to itch. His tongue slips out to wet his lips, and you wonder if begging for a kiss is too pathetic.

“You just washed your face,” he chastises, stroking at your chin, though there’s no real reproach. You shrug a shoulder haughtily, and he shakes his head, smiling. “C’mon,” he says, patting your dirty cheek. “Let’s see if you can make it to the bedroom for round two.”

Your eyes flick to the discarded book on the floor, eyebrows up in disdain. “What about Heathcliff?”

You’d thought you’d thrown them out.

By the time you finish flipping your apartment on its head, you are farther even from reaching any sort of understanding. Your search does not produce any more abused underwear, but a close of inspection of your scrap bag (which is to say, clothes that need mending or will be turned into kitchen rags) reveals neither of the other two pairs you’d finally gathered the courage to bin, but hadn’t yet thrown out. (Because you still had to decide whether the blouse with the underarm gash was salvageable, and it’s still there!)

Sitting on your couch, still holding onto the torn underwear, you remain perplexed. They’re not even sexy panties. You specifically make a point not to buy anything but the most practical of underwear, because they’ll end up in the trash sooner rather than later. They’re not anything that would invite temptation at the best of times, much less the depravity implied in the deterioration of this particular pair. Fear eludes you, because it cannot make light to the depths of your bafflement. This, this situation is not something that happens to people like you.

And from Grayson of all men?

Because it must be him who’s been stealing your underwear. The stains are cum, plain and simple, so it can’t be any of the girls. Grayson is the only man that stops by, the only one that spends any time in your apartment, in your bedroom. You’ve left him there alone multiple times. For you to shower. For him to take a nap. For you to catch a long call outside. Any of those times, he might’ve been—

It could’ve been the plumber.

You fold over yourself, chest pressed to your knees. “It could’ve been the plumber,” you repeat, unsurely.

Could it really?

.

“Dick,” you say, next time you have time to catch up with him. You’re having a late breakfast at the diner—more of a lunch than a brunch, but you’re eating pancakes, so. “What do I do if someone’s been stealing my underwear?”

Grayson chokes on his coffee. To be fair, it’s not something one brings up out of nowhere in polite conversation. Still, you shovel a mouthful of syrupy pancake in your mouth and watch him.

“Someone’s stealing your underwear?” He coughs. The tips of his ears are pink. You wonder if it’s genuine or if he can control that sort of thing.

“I think so,” you say, pushing a bit of hash brown aside before the syrup can touch it. That’d be gross. “I’ve had a few pairs of panties go missing. I’m sure I haven’t tossed them out, but last Sunday I did a deep clean and found nothing. I can’t think of anything else that could’ve happened to them.”

“I see,” he says, just a little stiffly, but nods. It could be awkwardness, though Grayson’s never struck you as the type of man that’d be queasy about female underwear. Not that, if he were the culprit, queasy would be a word to describe his relationship to your panties. “Has there been any signs of forced entry? Anything else gone missing?”

“Nope,” you respond, popping the p loudly. You’re being extra playful, extra nonchalant—a challenge. You should dial it down. “All my valuables and documents are where I left them, and my locks haven’t been tampered with. Short of Nightwing dropping by for a visit, I doubt anyone but me’s been riffling through my drawers.”

This seems to throw Grayson for a loop, but considering what he asks next, perhaps you just phrased it wrong. “You know Nightwing?”

You roll your eyes. “Of course not. I only meant that Nightwing’s about the only person who could come into my apartment without me noticing, what with being a vigilante and all that,” you say. And then, after considering it a bit longer, you amend, “well, him and the Batman. But I seriously doubt Batman’s had a hand in my underwear drawer.”

Grayson’s disgusted face rips an honest laugh out of you. He huffs and tries not to smile as you make fun of him, and suddenly, it’s like none of this has happened. There isn’t any torn and stained piece of fabric stuffed into a bag underneath your bed, and there is no suspicion weighing heavy on your shoulders. There is only Dick Grayson, your friend, and the times he’s silly when he doesn’t mean to be.

He still walks you through the process of reporting every crime that may be involved in that situation—trespassing, theft, sexual harassment, if not assault—and tries to placate the fears you don’t let on. “It may be another woman at the Laundromat,” he suggests, “who is only envious of your good taste in, um, undergarments.”

“Oh, please,” you mock. “If it was another girl, she would’ve grabbed one of my tops, or, like, a cardigan. No self-respecting woman would go for my ugly, Fruit-of-the-loom panties.”

Grayson rolls his eyes. “They’re not ugly.”

Ah.

“Because you’re so well acquainted with how they look?” You say dryly, trying to play it off, but you watch. And he sees you watching, because Grayson’s not stupid.  Far from it.

He could play flustered. He could even play unapologetic. What he does is pause delicately, and then—

“Well, at Donna’s Halloween party—”

“Ohhh, my god, shut up.” You launch forward, pressing your hands over his mouth and nearly taking the whole table with you. Grayson laughs against the skin of your palms, the sensation uncomfortable but inevitable. You’re burning in the face, and glaring daggers. “We agreed not to talk about that.”

Grayson shrugs arrogantly, and mumbles around your hands, “I wasn’t the one that pulled my skirt up in the middle of billiards because I felt hot.”

“It was hot,” you say, huffing, and retract your hands. There’s a little bit of spit in your palm, which you wipe with a semi-disgusted look. Worse yet, your hurried silencing-of-man has left you with a big glob of syrup smattered across your chest. Grabbing some napkins, you chance a dirty look at Grayson. “It’s all your fault.”

“What,” Grayson asks with a smirk, leaning his cheek on his propped up hand. “You flashing the crowd or soaking your shirt in maple syrup?”

“All of it.” You scowl at the dark stain seeping sticky and wet into the cotton of your t-shirt. Your tits are going to be unbearable in a minute. In the reflection of the glassware, you observe Grayson watching you swipe at your chest. You wonder what he would’ve done if you’d ordered the cinnamon rolls with the runny cream cheese frosting they’re so famous here for.

He’d mixed up the drinks for you at Donna’s party too.

“This is impossible,” you sigh, standing up. “I’m going to the bathroom to clean up. Don’t stick me with the bill.”

“Don't take too long, then,” he says, but if the teasing tone is any softer today than usual, you elect to ignore it.

.

Come Monday, you get an idea.

It’s a crazy, dangerous idea that you immediately dismiss out of hand. But it continues to nag at you all throughout the week, an itch you cannot scratch. Friday evening, you find yourself staring at your kitchen island, fingers tapping the weathered laminate. Considering.

He could kill you.

It is not unlikely, though Grayson doesn’t seem the type. But they never do, do they? That’s how they find the girls down in the dumpsters, features contorted into a furious mask of betrayal on what’s left of their faces. They never seem the type, and then they get you alone while you trust them, and you never see the light of day again.

An underwear thief might’ve been something you could’ve ignored—a vaguely uncomfortable reminder of the depravity of man and a light weight on your bank account—were it not for the pair of panties you’d found. You’re not stupid. You know what he did. He’d waited until you were out, or showering, or otherwise occupied. He had dug around your clothes bag, pressed the dirty fabric to his nose and inhaled. He’d taken his cock out of his pants, and fisted it harshly, blood booming, tugging at it quickly because you could come in any minute.

But it hadn’t been enough. His fingers had dug into the little tear—perhaps it hadn’t even been his fingers first, but his tongue—and still it hadn’t been enough. He’d torn it open so that the head of his dick would snag just so as he pretended to fuck you, and not the empty space between his hand and your panties. With every slide, his dick touching the same place that your pussy had leaked onto. That must’ve made him screw his eyes shut, his head loll back. Fucked up little indirect kiss that it was.

Then he’d come on the rag, sputtered thick, hot cum on the same fabric that’d tugged and wrapped around your pussy. It was almost good enough, almost the same.

Almost. Not just it yet.

That’s the thing about escalation—about provocation, which is what your plan would be. The statistics say most cases of this behavior, particularly when focused on a single victim (and you don’t know what to call the cum-stained panties shoved under your bed if not focused), tend to develop into more grievous offenses. Stalking. Cameras. Assault. Confronting him is risky, but leaving it up to chance is the same as leaving it up to him.

You simply do not want to leave it up to him. You do not want to be caught off guard. You want to see it coming.

Whatever it is he’ll do.

If it even is Grayson, you think. If it isn’t…

The banner on your laptop screen pops back up, grabbing your attention. LAST CHANCE! It reads, bright and yellow. BOOK YOUR TWO-DAY, ONE NIGHT TRIP TO THE LOVELY HILLS OF…

The clock ticks.

You book the trip.

.

YOU: hey

YOU: connie just bailed on me for our weekend getaway

YOU: wanna go hiking with me ? lol

GRAYSON: this weekend?

YOU: yeah

YOU: all paid. on connie bc shes dumb and a traitor

YOU: we’d be leaving sat 7am and returning sunday evening

GRAYSON: haha oh connie

GRAYSON: it’s an overnight trip then?

YOU: yep i rented a cabin but nw its two bedrooms

YOU: we only have to share a bathroom

YOU: is that okay?

GRAYSON: yeah. it’s cool

.

Grayson picks you up Saturday morning, seven o’clock on the dot. It is perhaps unwise to allow your only means of escape to be his own vehicle, but you figure they can trace it back to him if anything happens. Besides, it’s not like you own a car to drive around. You move exclusively on public transport and, like, Lyft.

He loads your gym bag (clothes + toiletries) and backpack (hiking equipment + first aid kit, because you’re nothing if not paranoid) onto the empty, kidnapping-tool-free trunk, and you set off on your way. You command the aux cord and blast an annoying kpop girl group playlist to bother him, and he sings merrily back at you because fuck you, he likes this kind of music.

The three hour ride is spent mostly singing and talking, with a brief interlude where the sun lulls you to sleep. Grayson turns down the music, puts on the calmest indie album on your library (you probably shouldn’t let him touch your phone, but it’s not like it’s the first time), and lets you nap. You half expect to wake up with his hand on your thigh or your neckline askew, but you’re just… mellow and a little cramped.

Dick is still driving, almost to the campground. He has rolled his sleeves up, gorgeously tanned skin wrapping tight muscle. You know he’s strong, even if you don’t quite understand how strong yet. His face is calm, free of worries. Not warm. Not particularly inviting. He’s just looking ahead, driving. A normal man driving a normal car.

Why me? you want to ask. Of all people in the world—because it is suddenly, sharply clear to you that Dick Grayson, so handsome, so charming, could have any person in the world he so desired—why you? There is nothing special about you, or your relationship with Dick. Prior to this, you had never even given the man a second thought. So why?

What had you done?

“You up now?” He asks, smiling.

“Yeah,” you say, voice hoarse. Slowly, deliberately pushing that last thought out of your mind, you unfold yourself, crack your neck and roll your shoulders. “Christ, that’s stiff.”

A little smirk wounds up on his lips. “That’s what she said.”

“Ugh.” You swat at his shoulder, and he laughs. Lord, he does not make it any easier to bear.

.

Hiking is fun. You do not get quartered in the woods, which is always a pro.

It takes you and Dick most of the day to make it up the mountain and back. The man is as respectful as he’s ever been, which is to say sometimes he makes crude jokes and chases you with bugs, but he doesn’t touch inappropriately or stare at your tits. It’s not like you suddenly expected him to do it, but… apparently a part of you did, and now you’re left feeling slightly queasy about the fact that the only reason you’d taken him hiking was so that he’d keep  thinking about how sweaty your underwear must be.

It’s not Grayson, you think on the way back down. Dick is carefully stepping over a branch ahead of you, instructing you on where to place your feet. You’re staring at the nape of his neck, where sweat beads to curl the ends of his black hair.

Dick Grayson is your friend. He’s not your stupid panty thief. He’s just your friend.

The revelation hits you with both relief and a dizzying rush of fear, because if it’s not Dick, then that means there’s a lunatic out there stealing your underwear and cumming on it and planting it on your apartment for you to find. And you don’t know him. You cannot even begin to plan for it. He may be there right now, confused because you’re not home. Or perhaps he knew. Perhaps he’s been watching you all this time, running circles around Grayson who’s got fuck all to do with this, and laughing at you while he—

Jesus. What the fuck are you gonna come back to?

Your foot catches on the edge of a rock and you slip backwards and down the trail. Your back hits the soil with a muffled thump, a cloud of dust rising around you and clogging your throat. The fall reboots your brain to factory settings, mind going utterly blank for a good moment. It’s like you cannot process both the epiphany and the stunning hit, and your brain is left skidding as it tries to make sense of what just happened. Pain wafts from somewhere in your body, but you cannot even begin to divine where. You barely even register it’s there.

Dick rushes back to you, eyes wide and face pale with worry. He carefully turns you on your side, slips your stiff arms out of the backpack’s straps. Dick knows what to do when someone’s in an accident, knows how to move you, where to check. He’s all business when he runs his hands over your thighs, down your back, over your scalp. Searching for injuries. He asks you if you’re fine, asks: where does it hurt? You cannot speak. You can only stare back at him, his beautiful face covered in dirt only interrupted by the trails of sweat at his temples. As if it’s finally decided what to focus on, your brain kicks back in.

You sob.

It’s not him, you think with an animal sort of desperation that borders on hysterics. It’s not him. What are you going to do?

Dick scoops you up into his arms, pressing his cheek to the top of your hair. Strong and warm, his arms form a cage where you are safe from any danger. There, you sob even harder.

“It’s okay, you’re okay,” he soothes, smoothing a hand down your back. When he speaks, his lips touch your hair. “You’re not injured. It’s only the fright, baby. Only that.”

He’s right on all accounts, but he cannot even begin to comprehend what he’s telling you. Your mind cycles on a single thought, frightened and unseeing.

Why couldn’t it be you?

.

The cool-down period after those dramatics might’ve been the most embarrassing hour of your life if you weren’t so fucking drained by the end of it. Dick’s an angel throughout it all: holding you until you stop crying, saying nothing as he helps you the rest of the way down with your hand clamped on his, making light, one-sided conversation on the drive back without commenting on what happened. Meanwhile, you stew in shame to avoid falling back into panic.

Did you want it to be Dick? That option would’ve been much preferable in any situation—the devil that you know, as they say—but it could all be your own delusion prompted by feelings you weren’t even aware you held. The evidence of the underwear is undeniable: you do have a creep to deal with. But why must that creep have been Dick? What made you so sure you’d gone so far as drag him out of the city to—to what? Confront him?

What did you want from him?

You stumble into the cabin in a daze, so utterly exhausted you just want to drop on the bed and sleep this all off until the morning. As it is, you barely make it onto the couch. You must’ve been dozing off or staring into space for about fifteen minutes before Dick’s crouching in front of you and coaxing you into the bathroom. Your gym bag sits untouched on top of the toilet lid, and there’s bubbly warm water filling the tub.

You blink in astonishment. “You drew me a bath?”

“Yeah,” he says, setting a towel on the holder, and squeezing your shoulder as he steps back. His hair is wet, and the bathroom already muggy, which means he’s already showered. “The warm water will help with your muscles. You’re really gonna feel that fall tomorrow, you know. I don’t think we’ll be able to do the second part of the trail.”

“Okay.” You sit on the toilet, trying not to cry under the weight of your deceit and your disappointment.  “I’m sorry.”

“Hey, it’s okay,” he reassures. “It was just a little slip. Happens to the best of us.”

“We could go swimming?” you offer pathetically. You don’t have a swimsuit, but there must be a store nearby.

Dick smiles kindly. “Sure, if you’re up to it. Listen, you have your bath. I’ll go out and get us something to eat, yeah? I think I saw a diner on the way here that might be good, and if not, I’ll bite the bullet and buy the overpriced sandwiches we saw on the front office.”

Your throat closes up. He’s leaving? When you don’t even know what your next step is yet? The conjured image of the stranger waiting in the shadows of your home lingers at the edge of your vision, waiting for Dick to disappear so he can attack. Dick nods and goes to leave, when you, acting on your mounting panic, shoot out a hand to grab his wrist.

He turns back, eyebrows raised. You look up at him, equally stunned. The tiny, logical part of you being choked to death by your animal instinct still manages to chortle a quiet What the fuck are you doing? You do not listen to the voice of reason.

“Don’t go,” you say, and even to your own ears you sound absurdly freaked out. “Stay.”

Dick’s gaze turns warm and full of terrible pity, and to your utmost mortification, you start tearing up again. He takes the hand gripping his wrist into his own, intertwining your fingers with his, and crouches in front of you. “Is this about the thief?”

You suck in a breath. How did he—

He chuckles. “I figured you wanted to get away from the city to forget about that. That’s why you invited me instead of the girls, right? So I could protect you?”

He’s wrong. He is so, so wrong. You invited him to taunt him, to confront him, because you thought the worst of him. You… are such an asshole. When this trip is over and you’re back at your empty, cold apartment, there is no chance in hell you’ll be able to call on him for help. And Dick would offer, but with what nerve could you dare ask for it? Worse yet, if the faceless man did attack you, would you not deserve it after all you’ve done?

…which does not mean you don’t want Dick to stay despite your wrongdoing. The trip isn’t done yet.

“What if,” you say, licking your lips nervously, “what if he followed us?”

Dick nods seriously, squeezes your hand. “I personally think that unlikely, given what you’ve told me about the situation. The situation is at a stage where he has not given you any proof that he means to interact with you directly, or even threaten your safety. Following you this far—particularly with me as your company—would be a move too out of place for what he’s shown of himself so far. Granted, it’s not entirely impossible, but…”

“Yeah.” You screw your eyes shut, miserable.  Not like you can mention the ruined panties now. “I know.”

Dick observes you for a moment, and then sighs. “Look, I gotta get us something to eat. You’ve worked out too much today not to get some food into you. Whatever’s open now won’t remain so for long. What if we do this? Give me your phone.”

The recently broken suspicion (misplaced, you remind yourself) has not yet cleaned up any of the lingering hesitation, but you were the one that insisted on buying food on-site instead of bringing any from home, for obvious reasons, so you can’t exactly start complaining now. Vaguely puzzled, you paw at your pockets until the black square slips out, and you wordlessly hand it over to Dick. He retrieves his own from his back pocket, and quickly taps on them both.

“There,” he says, giving you back your own.

DICK GRAYSON

00:00:13.

CALL ONGOING.

It’s on speaker. When Dick speaks again, it bounces off the walls of the bathroom, a shadow voice chasing after his. “I’ll have you on while you take your bath. You don’t need to speak, just put the phone on the shelf and do what you have to. If there’s anything amiss, I’ll come running. Is that okay with you?”

You nod, speechless. Dick’s grin is bright as the morning sun when he leaves. On his recommendation, you lock the bathroom door and try not to jolt when he tests it. You hover impatiently as he grabs his stuff and locks up the cabin, giving you green light to start bathing. You still wait until you hear the sound of the car pulling out the driveway, echoing weirdly on the phone.

Peeling your clothes off your body while Grayson listens in is… weird and guilt-inducing in more ways than one, but in his absence, you find yourself so exhausted you can barely rouse some leftover shame. There’s dirt collected on your every crevice, and you’re going to have to scrub hard at your scalp to get the caked mud out. You’d been on the fence about washing your hair here, but now there’s no way to avoid it.

Sighing, you go lay your pajamas out before getting into the tub… and then curse yourself, the thief and everyone involved in this nonsense all the way to hell and back.

Dick’s voice crackles in the open line. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah,” you say, pressing the heel of your palm to your eyes. Unbelievable. “Just forgot to bring something.”

“You can grab anything out of my bag,” he offers. “I brought a shirt you can sleep in.”

“Thanks, Dick.” You sigh again. Whatever. You need to get on that tub before you have a breakdown or else you’ll never get clean. “I’ll see what to do.”

“No worries.”

The water’s divine when you lower yourself in. Just the right amount of hot: scalding, bordering on unbearable. You about manage to stifle a groan as you sink all the way down, muscles loosening up the longer you’re under. And you stew. You stew a while. Dick’s not very noisy as he drives, and you kinda forget that he’s there listening until you hear his muffled voice ordering who-knows-what. You take advantage of the fact he’s busy to lather yourself and scrub.

Fuck me if he’s not right, you think, looking at the side of your thigh. There will be a bruise the size of Texas on there come morning. You knead on your tired muscles, careful to keep the groaning to a minimum with the man listening in. Just because he’s not a creep doesn’t mean you’re going to turn him into one. Besides, you’re not really the whimpering type, even when it comes to sex—

—a statement which is swiftly disproven when your hand catches on a previously undiscovered, incredibly tender area of your side and you lurch forward with a sharp and throaty hiss. It’s a wet and guttural thing, ripped out from the depths of your chest, and it echoes on the enclosed space of the bathroom. Pain blooms bright behind your eyelids and for a good minute, all you can feel is the pulsating flesh at your side and the shaky breath leaving your lungs.

You hope Dick doesn’t make anything out of the panting and splashing that fills the air in the aftermath, but your hopes are quickly dashed when his voice comes in cheerily asking: “All fine at home?”

“Yep,” you bite, blinking out stars. “Just… scrubbing.”

“Ah,” Dick says delicately. “Listen, I’ll turn up the music so you can have some privacy. Do what you need to relax, I’m almost there anyway. Happy scrubbing!”

“I’m not—” you start, blood rushing to your face, but your voice is swallowed by David Bowie’s better hits.

You sit in stunned, mortified silence and not a little bit of pain, conditioner dripping down your back. What is this sudden tragicomedy? How come nothing’s going your way today?

Well, it’s not like you deserve anything going your way. You’d just about ruined your friendship with Dick on the very tenuous grounds of believing he was a creep with a penchant for your underwear out of all the women in the Gotham Metropolitan Area when, in fact, he’s so uninterested in you he believes you’re jerking off right this very moment and his first thought is… turning the music up.

You slump down the tub in despair and groan. Not like Dick fucking minds.

Yeah. You deserve everything you get.

.

Dinner is a relaxed affair, and it doesn’t last terribly long on account of how famished you are. The bath left you feeling loose and lax, and your threadbare pajamas, unglamorous as they may be, are just warm enough that you feel extra cozy this spring evening. Dick’s got a low fire going on the fireplace, and he’s somehow managed to acquire Chinese food, of all things, in his hunt for nourishment.

“Pretty good, though, right?” he says around a mouthful of noodles when you point out the absurdity of it.

You snort. “For a restaurant in the middle of nowhere? I’d say pretty fucking good, yeah. If you told me you had it flown in from that place on seventh and Bourne, I would honestly believe you.”

“That’s why you gotta run with me, Danger.” Dick winks at you, gesturing at the paper plate tittering precariously on his lap. “Who else can live it up like this with you?”

He’d been setting up your plates at the kitchen island when you’d come out the bathroom, had one look at the high and stiff chairs and noped right out of there and onto the couch. Dick had followed you with a fond shake of the head, and settled next to you. The TV above the fireplace had some movie playing you swear you’ve heard him talk about, but you haven’t been paying much attention.

Raising an eyebrow at him, you sip at your glass of sweet tea. Bit sweeter than your taste, but he’d gone to the trouble of preparing it for you so you couldn’t exactly complain. “Are you calling me Danger now? Is that supposed to be my superhero nickname?”

Dick snorts, lips tugging up in amusement. “Sure. I had another one in mind,” he says, “but I thought you might be offended if I named you Mudbiter.”

“Haha, you are soooo funny,” you say sarcastically, reaching over to rap him on the head. He dodges out of the way before your knuckles can make contact, and catches your finger in his mouth. The bite is gentle, but wet. You quickly retract your hand in disgust to wipe down while he laughs merrily at you. “You’re a gross little boy, Richard.”

“How are you going to fight crime if you recoil at a little spit, Mudbiter?” He taunts, altogether too happy to consider the ridiculous idea. “They’ll splatter way worse things on you back home.”

His innocuous comment brings you right back to the cum-crusted panties underneath your bed, and your mood sours immediately. Put upon, you begin stacking the dishes on the coffee table.

You slap his hand away when he tries to go for a last bite. “Stop calling me Mudbiter.”

“Don’t wanna,” Dick says, stealing a piece of broccoli from your plate before you can take it away. “If you can walk straight tomorrow, maybe I’ll let you graduate into Airtreader.”

You scowl at him. “You know, Nightwing would never treat me like this.”

“Ha,” Dick huffs, amusement taking a darker tone. You think he means it when he says, gaze a little unfocused, “Nightwing would tear you to pieces if he ever had the chance.”

Belatedly, you remember Dick’s probably met the guy, what with the whole Wayne ward thing. Actually, he’s probably even worked with him. You remember Nightwing became a regular hero at Blüdhaven right around the time Grayson got settled at the station. That piques your interest, but something about the way Dick’s jaw ticks puts you off asking too many questions. There may be some bad blood there you can’t get to right now.

“I thought you said I was dangerous,” you say as you return to the couch, breaking into a yawn in the middle. Dick scoots over so you can lie down, and takes down the blanket on the back of the couch to lay across your lap and his. “You don’t think I could take him?”

“Nah,” he says. The way he looks at you is slightly mocking. He really must know him. And he’s never introduced you? The bastard. “You’re a danger, but you’re not particularly dangerous.”

“A danger to who?” You ask. The elegantly raised eyebrow is an insult to your person.

As punishment, you shove your cold feet on Grayson’s lap. He takes them with a roll of the eyes, pinches the skin at your ankle in retribution. He leaves a hand wrapped around it, the warm weight of it surprisingly comforting. In less than a minute’s time, you find yourself supremely comfortable, and just about ready to snooze.

“My sanity,” he responds dryly, a moment too late.

“Cannot be that bad,” you mumble. Your lids are feeling very heavy all of a sudden.

“Mm,” Dick hums, turning to the screen. “You’d be surprised.”

You flit in and out of sleep, half there and half away. The weight of Dick’s hand on your ankle is just about the only anchor that holds you to the mortal world. Every time you feel it lift or shift, you rouse back up to follow up the conversation you’d dropped twenty minutes ago. Dick entertains your babbling, but he’s watching the screen intently. It’s been a while since you’ve lost the ability to follow the storyline. You think the spymaster may be cheating on his wife. In your half-dreams, you are both spymaster and wife, and Dick takes turns as the villain and the homewrecker. At one point, you cannot tell whether the quiet murmuring’s coming from the screen or from the man at your side.

“Oh,” someone breathes. You lazily open your eyes to find Dick gazing down at you in a daze. “You’re not wearing any underwear.”

You flush, searing under your skin. From far away, you feel a little shame curl up inside you. You’d hoped he wouldn’t notice. The reason you’d cursed out God and all his disciples back in the bathroom was because you’d forgotten to pack a second pair of panties for the night. Your half-baked plan had been to string Dick along all day with the reminder of how sweaty and nasty your underwear must be, and then plant it on the shared bathroom during the night to see if he’d take the bait. You’d been so concerned about which pair of panties to put on that you’d forgotten to bring a second pair for when you had to change out of them.

It will be fine, you’d thought. Your pajama pants were threadbare, but not to the point you could tell right away you’d gone commando. Not unless you got real close, anyway.

Huh.

Much too late, you take stock of the position you’re in. Dick still has your ankle clasped in his hand, but your leg is folded at his waist, and half his body is on top of you. His other hand is currently resting at the curve of your hip, tracing over the thin fabric where the seam of your underwear would be, if you had any on.

“Oh,” you croak, looking into Dick’s dark and hungry eyes. Huh, you repeat numbly in your head.

He wants to eat you alive.

“It is you.”

But there’s nothing you can do about it. You’re fast asleep before the revelation even sinks in.

.

You awaken to a room filled with dim light and the obscene sounds of being eaten out.

Coming to is a slow and disorienting transition, a process to which the obscurity of the room both contributes to and eases somewhat. Whatever it was that Grayson drugged you with has made you sluggish and it takes your mind ages to fully capture what is happening. Your body not so much. It twitches and shakes, flushes and tightens. As you ease back into thinking, you can begin to decipher some of the input it sends you: your thighs quiver with exhaustion, your skin itches underneath all the moisture, and the wound on your side throbs like a bitch.

Then there’s the pleasure.

The pleasure is involuntary but readily felt. Once you manage to recognize it for what it is, it eclipses almost every other feeling. Except terror. That one sneaks up on you, steadily building as your eyes become accustomed to the darkness and you begin to make out details in your surroundings. You are in your room at the cabin—another transgression, but at least you haven’t been taken to a hidden dungeon in New Jersey. The surface underneath you is so soft you cannot be anywhere but the bed. The room is stuffy, thick with human heat and the smell of sex which means this has been going on a while.

Laboring under great duress, with the sloppy desperation of a frenzied mind caught in an unresponsive body, you manage to lift your neck. Three facts are readily made known to you. First, you’ve been stripped completely naked. Second, both your tits and most of your torso are splattered with fresh cum. And third… your legs are spread wide open, and house between them a flushed and sweaty Dick Grayson.

Your head lolls back as he crooks a finger and rubs against a spot that makes your breath rush out of your lungs as if you’ve been punched. Fuck. His fingers are inside you. Grayson’s tongue flattens against your throbbing clit with a little moan, low in his throat, and whatever half-formed thought was on your brain promptly shatters when he starts pumping his fingers in and out. He’s good at it, of course he is. He eats you out with an ease and skill that indicates extensive practice, and with such gusto that your puzzlement only increases. You feel yourself start to coil in anticipation, core melting into liquid gold, and panic. It’s too soon, even though you know it can’t be the first time you’ve come tonight. You’re not ready. You just woke up!

Harried, you attempt to draw his attention but your limbs are weak and numb. Your fingers twitch on the sheets and, god, are they rumpled. Stained. What has he been doing with you?

Your squirming only manages to drive Dick’s fingers deeper into you, and he uses his hand to steady your hip at such an angle that you cannot help the cry that escapes your throat. Well, shit. You were trying so hard to keep quiet. In a room that’d been hosting only the squelching of his fingers inside you and the labored breathing of your two bodies, your cry fills the air. Dick tenses between your legs, and your stomach churns in apprehension. He lifts his head.

Fuuuuck, you think desperately, locking eyes with the man.

He is gorgeous. The sweating has made a mess of his hair, sticking to his temples and curling all sides. It lends a beautiful sheen to his skin in the lamplight, which is complimented by how flushed he is. The tops of his cheeks are dusted in red. His lips are slightly swollen and dark pink, and the entire lower half of his face is shiny with what you have to assume is your own cum. Worst of all: his eyes, hazy and unfocused. In those first few seconds after your eyes meet, you see the picture of a man who’s spent hours between your legs and enjoyed every second.

Then his gaze zeroes in on your conscious presence, and it sharpens like a knife. When he speaks, his voice is hoarse and hot, right against your pussy. “You’re up.”

Don’t—, you think, but it’s out of your hands. You go hard and tense, and then the dam breaks. You come against Dick’s chin, spasming around his fingers with a loud cry. He blinks down, bewildered, and you shut your eyes in mild despair as the waves of pleasure break on you. Mind blank, you hold onto whatever’s near until it’s over.

But it isn’t over.

Dick dips his head down to suck on your clit eagerly, fingers moving again in renewed vigor. Your eye twitches, your legs tremble. It’s too much stimulation altogether too soon. Pleasure becomes indistinguishable from pain. You squirm against him desperately, and the hand gripping your hip harshly pins you down against the bed. Dick is strong, much stronger than you’d first thought. It’s not even five minutes later you’re openly sobbing, mumbling whatever pleas cross your brain to get Dick to stop.

“I know, my love, I know,” he soothes you, like he’s listening, like he even cares, but he dips his tongue inside you as he does and you know he doesn’t give a fuck about anything other than tasting you. “I just need one more, okay, baby? Just let me have one more, right on me. Come right on my tongue, pretty girl.”

He’s insane. He’s fucking insane. Can’t he see the way he’s driving you mad too? What’s worse, now that you’re awake, he’s suddenly chatty. Every time he mumbles against your cunt, you feel the vibrations of his voice travel into your flesh. It’s a litany of so good for me, baby, and fuck, cry more like that, and it works, goddammit. You like hearing him praise you. He ruts against the mattress every time he speaks and his voice acquires a broken little whine that’s got you clutching the sheets just to keep yourself from grinding on his face. The shame and disgust that color your pleasure are still not enough to sour you from the feeling.

“Dick,” you gasp when it’s close. Your hands make their way into his hair and pull. Hard. He moans into you like it’s you sucking him. “Dick—!”

It’s like hearing his name makes something snap inside him. His arm slides under your hips, lifting you and bringing you even closer somehow. Your knee hooks on his shoulder, talon finding purchase on the firm plains of his back. It must hurt, the way your nails dig into his scalp, but if it does, the pain only spurs him into action. At this point, the way he’s fucking you is too fast and sloppy to be good, but you’re both riding on the same desperation and you really are so very close. It’s a twist of his tongue and a suck on your lips that does it, popping the bubble and sending you crashing down with a rush.

You do wail his name. It’ll weigh heavy on your conscience in a minute.

Dick holds you steady as you come, lapping up everything that gushes out of you. It’d be horrendously embarrassing if it weren’t so fucking hot. This whole affair is beyond saving, morally speaking.

The cool down is worse this time, but when you start crying out no’s and pushing Dick’s face away, he actually goes. It may be because this time you’re pretty serious about gouging his eyes out and he can tell by your tone. You lay there, boneless and half-delirious, as he presses his forehead to the swell of your stomach and mutters apologies against your skin. His hands rub soothing circles on your outer thigh, your side, but you’re too out of it to relay to him how much it stings.

“You did so well, my love,” he murmurs, kissing his way up your abdomen. You wonder if he doesn’t find the dried cum gross. You would. “So good and sweet on my tongue.”

His mouth stops to suck another bruise between your breasts, and your legs twitch involuntarily. You feel a smile spread across his face, and he sucks along the underside of your left tit, which must be sweaty as all hell. Not, much like your cunt, sweet whatsoever. Nothing about this makes sense to you. What is he doing? How does he find this arousing? When his teeth graze your nipple, you cry out again.

“Wait,” you beg, “please.”

Dick doesn’t listen to you. A wet mouth closes over your nipple, so hot your eyes flutter closed. His tongue is no less skilled here, and he plays with you like a doll. The hand on your side palms his way up to pinch and fondle your other tit, thumb brushing over your nipple and then pressing his blunt nail in to make you tense and hiss. Every little sound you cannot swallow seems to be music to his ears, making him babble incoherencies.

You thrash a little, upset because you told him to wait, everything is so wet, and you feel so drained—and all he can talk about is how much he likes your tits? But Dick’s hovering above you now, your hips bracketed by his knees, and when you brush against his hard cock, he lets your breast slip out of his mouth with a ragged moan and grinds. The idea of taking him inside you right now, when every nerve on your body is screaming for respite, makes you go loose as a rag doll.

He takes some pity on you, which only means he keeps playing with your tits and doesn’t breach your entrance. The head of his cock rests heavily against your clit, threat and taunt both. He’ll do it tonight. You cannot imagine any way he will not take you while he has you. That’s been painfully clear since the moment you woke up. What would be the point of this otherwise?

(What is the point of this? When he could’ve asked, and you—)

“Ah,” you croak, tearing up. You turn your head to the pillow to smother a sob. This is so stupid.             

Shaking and too preoccupied with not making it all too obvious that you’re crying, you do not notice Dick has moved until his hand closes on your chin and turns your face towards him. He is so close you can see the sweat collecting under the line of his hair, the slight sheen of his dark eyes searching yours. It’s a heavy gaze, meaningful but undecipherable. You may have left all language behind the moment you crossed this threshold. He finds nothing inside you of what he seeks.

His hand shifts to cup your jaw, a steadying weight. A sigh escapes your lips, and you inch towards the warm touch despite the slight dampness. His other arm wraps around your waist and pulls you closer, flush against him. When his cock brushes against your leg, a leaking hardness trapped between you, his eyelids flutter closed and his fingers tighten their hold. But he doesn’t buck. The consideration is much belated and strange, but also sweet, you guess. You take the time to catch your breath.

Dick runs his fingers down your back, building a steady rhythm that has lulls you into the first moment of uncomplicated pleasure of the night. He stares at you all throughout it, though you keep your eyes affixed to the ceiling. Looking at him straight on makes a knot form on your throat. Sometimes, he skirts the edge of the tender patch on your side; each time, you tense up and sleep is chased away. You think you know why he does it. He wants you present, with him.

Maybe he shouldn’t have fucking drugged you in the first place.

Frustrated, you hide your face in the crook of his neck. You feel before you hear his breath hitching, the discrete rearranging of limbs. This must be some sort of torture for him. Does he get off on it? You don’t get why he’s holding back now. Why he didn’t hold back before all this. Why the drugging. Why the underwear. Why not ask. You wonder if he had been planning to kill you and your easily accessible pussy just distracted him.

You wonder what he will do after this. There has to be an after, even if only for him. Fear coats the back of your mouth in a thin bitter film. I want to see it coming, you tell yourself to calm down. A smidge of control over a situation that spills outside your means. I only want to know it’s happening when it does.

Grayson’s hand splays between your shoulder blades and holds there steady. His voice is rough and a little choked. “I’ll let you go,” he says, hot breath tickling your hair, “if you want.”

If you want?

“I can press charges,” you say, lifting up your head to look at him straight. It’s not a threat but a fact.  “I can tell everyone you know.”

“I know. You ought to,” he agrees readily, bright-eyed, and it’s like back at the dinner, when he was walking you through filing a report against every single one of his crimes. The same man who believes in justice and comeuppance—and accepts his share of the blame without any guilt behind it. Sick son of a bitch.

You push back against him, raising yourself on your elbow. Dick glances at your tits for a second, but trains his eyes back on your face when you snap your fingers at him.

“I could ruin your life,” you say, torn between anger and incredulity. “Do you not think I can?”

“I wish you would,” he replies, wrapping a hand around your wrist. His eyes search yours, begging. What for? He lifts your wrist to his mouth, presses a sweet kiss against the pulsing blood. “I wish you’d sink your hands into my life and tear it to pieces. I don’t care what you do. But touch it. Mark it. Make it yours, make me—”

“Are you listening to yourself?” You interrupt callously. A laugh bubbles up your throat, a nasty, hysterical thing that titters between a cackle and sob. “What is wrong with you?”

Dick closes his eyes at the sound, hiding his mouth behind your palm, eyebrows drawn together. Upset? Upset at what? As if he has any right to feel anything but shame. And perhaps it is shame what he’s feeling, confronted so obviously with the realities of his betrayal, but what does it matter to you. What do you care what he’s feeling.

“Don’t,” you say, rushing forward and gripping his chin in that same hand, tight enough your nail digs into the skin. The change in position takes him by surprise, allows you to shift atop of him and steady yourself on his chest. He still grips your wrist, but his wide-eyed gaze is fixed on you. Good. “You can’t hide now, Grayson. You can never hide anymore. Everything I say, you must listen to. Everything I ask, you must answer. You owe me that much. We were friends!” You shout, a wet cry from deep in your chest. Fuck his tender little gaze, the stuttering heart underneath your hand. “If you’d asked, I would’ve said yes. I would’ve come to you willingly, so why—why?”

This threatens to be too much for him. You can see it in his face. For the first time during the night, shame peeks through, clouded by lust and a little bit of sorrow. He must know what he’s lost by pulling this ridiculous move: your loyalty, your affection. What does he think he’s gained?

Still, though he struggles, he heeds your words, and answers around your fingers. “But it wouldn’t matter,” he says. Honest. Strangled. His eyes affix to the ceiling, can’t quite look at you straight. “No matter how many times we fucked, you’d always leave. Even if I managed to coax you into a relationship, you’d never be fully there. It matters this way, doesn’t it? It will never stop mattering.”

You blink back tears. “I could’ve loved you,” you say, voice trembling. “I could’ve learned.”

Dick gives you the saddest look you’ve ever seen from him. It’s a look that speaks volumes.  You remember, just barely, that night at Donna’s party, a night you’ve done your best to forget. Your lips tighten. You can’t say he isn’t right.

“We are friends,” he says. “I know you. Better than you think. I’ve watched you—and I’ve tried my ways to make a mark in your life.”

“By stealing my underwear?” It feels good, the way he flinches when you dig your nails into the plush skin of his cheeks. “By dragging me here, drugging me, fucking me while I’m asleep?”

“I never—ngh—ugh,” he squirms underneath you. He likes the pain. Unconsciously, you slide a bit downwards. “Only my fingers. My mouth.”

“Noble of you. Way to go, pervert,” you sneer, and you feel the way he twitches beneath you. Ah, you’ve slid a little too far. Dick’s eyelids flutter closed. He grips your hips, holds you down just enough so your cunt slides against his cock, not to penetrate. It’s a wet, pleasurable drag now that your nerves aren’t literally on fire. He’s been leaking precum for a while now. You allow Dick the grace of this act, if only for the pleasure of watching him get riled up and flushed again. There is no end to your wonder here: how a man so eternally composed and upright can succumb to such vileness only for the privilege of this feeling. From you.

What an idiot.

“Maybe,” Dick pants, lips pulling on an infuriating smirk, and you realize you’ve said it out loud, “but you’ll never forget me now, won’t you?”

Now you’re angry all over again. You pry his left hand from your hip with both of yours and drag it up your soiled body to your mouth. Dick watches you nuzzle against his palm, so big against your face, so warm and rough. Your lips close around the meat of his thumb, and suck, first delicately, then hard, at the tender skin, never taking your eyes off his. Dick’s cock throbs against your cunt, hips stuttering dangerously. When his pace quickens, growing sloppy, you bite down.

Hard.

“Ah, ah—” You catch Dick mid-moan. The sound draws out, long and broken, as he tenses underneath you, the one hand still holding onto your hip digging painfully at the tender spot on your leg. He sputters thick, hot ropes of cum right on his abdomen, which you watch shoot until it becomes small rivulets dribbling out. It’s… a lot. Dick makes a bit of a mess, it seems. You want—

It makes sense to you, that it is his hand and not yours. Not to Dick. He watches through half-lidded, exhausted eyes that widen as you bring your intertwined hands to smear the cum on his abs, using his fingers to spread it and then bringing it up to your mouth. You observe the thick, white liquid coating Dick’s fingers with an odd sort of wonderment—still hot from inside him. Soon to fill you up. Dick groans as you place his fingers inside your mouth, tongue swirling around first, and then sucking them clean. His dick manages a last, struggling jolt, and you release the hand with a pop and a satisfied, mocking smile.

Dick throws that arm over his face, muffling against it what you think is a string of curses. What would he do if you decided to lick the rest? As if reading your thoughts, Dick peeks from underneath his arm, not exactly despairing, but a very near yet happier thing. His eyes rake over your naked body, still sporting now-matching cum stains; tits out, thighs spread at either side of him, the head of his dick barely peeking out beneath your pussy. It’s an obscene little picture, and you play act the whore for him to stir all the quicker.

“You’ll be the death of me,” he mutters, fingers fluttering at the juncture of leg and hip, eager to touch. You let him. You allow it to happen.

I only want to see it coming, you think. Control. I only want to know it’s happening when it does.

"Damn right he does!" Someone laughs.

"I wouldn't do that with yours," Stevie insists, a little too brightly. Whatever they'd been snorting in the bathroom earlier is running his course through him. "I can tell she's good quality—a real T10. Not like the others."

Dick tilts his head, seemingly confused. T10—that's code. Tier 10s are the people they sell at the closed auctions for the elite. The man next to Stevie shoves him at the shoulder, displeased, and Stevie half sobers. Dick raises an eyebrow at the man—Fred is his name, he thinks.

"You know Stevie," Fred says, winding an arm around Stevie's neck and pressing his face to his shoulder. Stevie coughs, but if the mild asphyxiation bothers him, he doesn't make any other sound. The atmosphere's a little gelid now. "Can't trust what he says."

"Mm. That's still my wife he's going off about," Dick says coldly. That seems like the move. Fred's sizing him up.

"Of course." Fred smiles widely. His teeth are perfect. He grabs the back of Stevie's head and pulls it up so he's looking up at Dick, pupils blown wide. Dick can only hope he doesn't pee his pants. The day's been long enough. "You wanna say sorry, Steve?"

"S'rry," Stevie slurs.

Dick rolls his eyes. "Whatever. Keep him in check."

He turns to leave, not hiding this time how miffed he is as he gathers his jacket from the valet, and has almost given up on this interaction when Fred calls his name. Dick looks over his shoulder, impatient.

"You should stick around after work tomorrow," Fred says pleasantly. Eyes carefully bland. "Stevie and I will show you a little something to make up for today, yeah?"

Gotcha.

Dick shrugs, appeased. "Sure thing," he says, and books it back home.

Doing undercover work has a few upsides. The first of which is he doesn't run into anybody as he makes his way to the high rise apartment he's been leasing for him and Kori. The penthouse takes the whole floor, and nobody stays there past six on Dick's orders, so he doesn't have to worry about dropping his suit jacket on the floor, hanging his tie from a sconce as he goes. His dress shoes end up somewhere behind him, each in different places, and he's rolling up his sleeves, unbuttoning his shirt as he rounds the corner to the kitchen. Hanging out with these dudes always makes him feel filthy, and he can't wait to make use of the massive bathtub in the master bathroom. Second upside.

Here's the third:

Kori looks up at him, a beautiful, broad smile breaking on her face. "Hi, baby!"

She's dressed very prettily today. Her thick mane of fiery hair is gathered high in a pony, the visor she'd been wearing earlier in the morning nowhere to be seen. She'd switched the polo for a tank top that Dick eyes appreciatively for how low it sits on her chest, but she'd kept her tennis skirt and high socks on. The skirt, a beautiful baby pink, is pulled up enough by the movement of her hips that Dick can see the the straps of her harness peeking under the fabric. Pink to match.

You, in contrast, are wearing nothing. Bent over the kitchen island, hands clawing at the other edge, your face contorts in a dry sob as Kori drives her hips into yours, relentless. Dick can tell you've been at this for a while. Kori smooths a hand over your lower back, happily loving, and you make the weak effort to pull yourself to your elbows. This regales Dick with a glimpse of your chest, spilling over the marble and covered in little bruises. Experience means he can picture Kori pressing her glossy mouth to your skin, your brows knotting as she sucks, how you cradle her head in your arms like she's something precious. He imagines you held her there against you, trying to keep her entertained until Kori's patience ran out and she abandoned diner for a bite of you.

Dick admires the vision the two of you make, watching Kori bend over your body to press a kiss to your shoulder and then bite down over the same spot. The jostling must make the strap go deeper because you keen and kick your legs a little. Kori laughs, pets your hair, turns her face to Dick with a mischievous grin in her face. Dick's heart flutters a storm.

"Pretty, right?" She says proudly.

"Kori," you gasp, bending your arm back to grab at her. Kori grips your hand in hers, presses a kiss against it. "Ko—ah! Kori!"

Kori nuzzles against your neck. "More?"

Dick thinks it's quite the opposite—you look so spent—but then, like always, you go against his expectations. You nod, once, twice, in quick succession, altogether too desperately for someone who Dick is sure has to have come at least three times so far tonight. His mouth feels dry. Kori smiles again, and straightens up. She grips your hips, lithe fingers digging into the fat at your sides, and pulls out almost entirely. The strap is big, Starfire purple glossy with your slick. Kori smirks down at your lower back and slams back in. You cry out, head lolling down. Dick wants—wants to be there, to bite the flesh that spills over between them, wants to kiss Kori's knuckles, wants to join the both of you.

So he does. That's the easy thing about this. After all the hardship, he gets to join you.

He finishes unbuttoning his shirt but doesn't remove it. You like to take it off yourself, he remembers, though he doubts you'll have the strength. He walks over to Kori's side, heat simmering low in his belly. She perks up when she sees him approach, already leaning over you when he gets to her. Dick grins into the welcome kiss, taking Kori's face in his and licking into her mouth. Kori's response is immediate and enthusiastic, almost forceful—happy to see him. Happy to be with him. Dick's heart hammers in his chest. She makes him feel like a boy.

He tilts Kori's head back, fingers slotting under her jaw. Kori opens up with little resistance, going easy and pliant. Long gone is the taste of her lipstick, and instead all that remains is the familiar taste of Kori, a drink he would walk a desert for, and underneath, just a little bit of you. Dick chases the fading hint of your presence, the salt of your skin, the sweetness of your mouth, not to replace it with his own but to greet it. He is, perhaps, a little too forceful, but Kori moans when a hint of teeth makes its presence, and Dick likes the sound so much he feels his control slipping, trying desperately to be close, closer—

You whine beneath them. Kori hasn't exactly stopped, but the pace's all over the place and you clearly resent it. Dick breaks the kiss, forehead against Kori's, and they both chuckle. Glancing down, he sees you try to fuck yourself back onto the strap.

"That's hot," he says, voice thick.

Kori laughs, slaps him on the shoulder. "You're being a distraction."

"Sorry," he says, charming smile dancing in his face. "Let me watch?"

This close, the view is certainly engaging. Kori puts in a bit of flair for his benefit, drawing back a little so he can see the way her strap splits you apart. Dick holds up her skirt, peers down as she rocks into you in shallow, quick bursts. You're obscenely wet, folds glistening and fluttering around her. You hang your head down, a litany of Kori, Kori spilling out your mouth. The sticky film of your release webs over the strap as she pulls out and Dick knows Kori hasn't pulled out entirely since she first slid into you. If she didn't start fucking you here, then she must've carried you over here, the one place in the whole apartment where she could bend you over and have you teetering on your tiptoes. The strain on your legs means he'll have to massage them later and he feels himself throb with the thought of his hands on you.

Watching is a treat. Listening is almost better. You're never loud, at the beginning. All this began in shadowed corners and far off alcoves, hiding first from each other and then from everyone else. You're accustomed to reeling it in, not showing a reaction—the first few months of your relationship consisted of heated glances, passing brushes, and wandering hands under tables. Perhaps Dick and Kori did you a disservice, pulling you against shelves and pressing a hand over your mouth, enjoying far too much the way your eyes rolled back when your moans melted against their skin.

But if they work you enough, you stop caring. You let out your voice like you're doing now, a litany of delirious thought broken by choked moaning. He likes this about you, the way you always want to respond, to show that you're present. You fight so hard to be here with them. Kori shuffles on her feet, thinks better of it, and reaches down to grab one of your calves and fold your leg over the counter. You're halfway to falling, knuckles tight gripping onto the edge, and this new angle opens you up marvelously. Dick is hard as a rock and has to palm himself over his slacks not to lose it. He wants to taste. He wants to be inside you. He can barely form a thought.

You sob. It's real tears now. He feels lightheaded.

Kori presses deep and then goes almost all the way out, teasing. The flesh of your ass bounces when she thrusts back in, chasing you off the counter. Dick watches it jiggle, throbs in his pants. He reaches out, big hand splayed over a cheek, careful that his watch doesn't nick at your skin. Hm. Spreads you open a little more. His thumb rubs a little at your entrance, but Kori growls at him for butting in, and Dick moves his finger upward, to the little pucker there. You don't do this often, preferring to take them by turns, but he thinks…

He circles the rim, and then presses in. Just a little.

"Ah—!" You gasp, head thrown back. "Wait—ah!"

Mm. Dick thinks, throat thick with hunger. Maybe later.

"You said you were only going to watch," Kori chides. Might as well have told him to wait his turn.

Dick rolls his eyes, but acquiesces. Removes his thumb from your ass, not without a little squeeze, kisses Kori in the cheek and rounds the corner to the other side of the island.

You're holding on for dear life. Someone had the sense to take the spoon jar out of the way, but with the kitchen island empty, you have very little in which to find purchase. Dick approaches you slowly, carefully, so as not to spook you. He knows you're probably not all there right now. He settles in front of you, a move he imagines only seems to you as a shadow falling over you. You lift your head up, blinking out tears. This close he can see how wrecked you are. He moves into your space, cradling your face in his hands.

"Dick?" You croak. Your eyelashes stick together. Your cheeks are hot under his hands.

"Hello, sweetheart," he says.

"You're home," you say, moving as if to reach for him, but afraid to fall.

"I am," he hums. A wave of overwhelming affection passes over him. "Do you want a kiss?"

You nod obediently. Dick moves to kiss you, sweet and languid. You open up to him just as easily as Kori did, and Dick wonders at his luck, but he doesn't push you. He pulls back, strokes his thumbs over your cheeks. You close your eyes, and he presses a kiss to your eyelids, to your forehead, tilts your face and another to your cheek. You take his sweetness with a little gasp, and then return to search for his mouth.

The kiss lasts only a little, as you slip and have to grab onto his shoulders not to crash against the marble. Dick settles you against his chest, angles you so Kori can ram into you the way she likes it. Kori's really into it now, eyes closed, brows knotted. You grasp onto the front of his shirt, hide your face in the juncture of his neck. My sweet angel, he thinks, and kisses the top of your hair.

"You like it when Kori fucks you?" He asks, a whisper at your ear. Kori can probably hear, but he keeps his voice low anyway. You whine into his neck. Dick smooths a hand over the back of your hair. "You like it?"

"I— nhg—do," you struggle.

"It's good?" He strokes your temple. "Kori's cock is good, huh?"

You nod. "S'good." Your brow furrows, but there's a worrisome quality to it.

"Yeah?" Dick prompts.

"You—fuck, nh—you wanna…?" You trail off, but it's clear you're offering him to go next with Kori. Dick smiles, almost giggles. It's so like you to offer.

"I wanna see you cum," he says. The way you shiver against him tells him not only how you feel about that, but also that you're close. He rests his hand at your nape, holds you in place. "Want you in my arms, wanna feel you spasm against me. You look so good like this, do you know? I bet you feel amazing. Can't wait to be inside you."

"Want you too," you pant, legs spreading open just a little more. Like you'd take him too if he wanted to slip it in. Dick manages not to hump the island, but it's a very near thing. He has to kiss you, though. It's a sloppy kiss, a wet slide of mouths that turns into Dick swallowing the pretty sounds you make.

"You're gonna cum for me, right?" He says, petting your hair. He feels you tense in his arms, sees Kori piston into you in response. "You're gonna cum for me so I can taste it?"

"Dick, Dick—," you gasp, digging your nails into his shoulders. "I'm gonna—Kori, I'm—"

You come with a little whimper, a garbled mix of both their names in your mouth. Kori fucks you through it, while Dick smooths a hand down your back and presses kisses against your forehead. Enviable teamwork. Slowly, he feels your breath even out, and you pull yourself up and off him just a little. Coming back to yourself. Dick still hovers. You almost slump back against him when Kori finally, finally slips out of you.

"Good?" He says, stroking your shoulder. You nod. He smirks as he helps you cross your legs over to this side of the island. "Started early today, huh?"

"You were late," you say peevishly, taking care not to fall. "Are you gonna take a bath now?"

"What a polite way to say I smell."

"You do," Kori says, bouncing over to your side. You open your arms automatically, and she nuzzles against you like a happy kitten.

She hasn't taken the harness off, so it's a little funny. The hem of her skirt is wet with your release, which is a little less funny. In fact, seeing the two of you kiss, so sweet and pretty, the less funny it all feels. He's still so fucking hard in his pants he's a little surprised there isn't a wet spot through his boxers. He sticks to your other side, trades a few kisses with you and Kori and you again.

When his hand sneaks towards your clit, you part with Kori and smack his hand in irritation. "Let me catch my breath, won't you?"

"You said you'd let me taste you," he complains.

"You can have a taste," Kori says, pointing down at the strap hanging from her harness, still covered in your cum. The three of you share a look.

You cross your legs expectantly. Dick swallows.

"Guess the bath will take a little longer."

You cradle the phone closer to your ear, straining to listen. At some point when he'd first lowered himself onto your dildo, the phone had been so close to his mouth you'd taken his sharp inhale with a shaky breath if your own. Now the sounds he makes come muffled, though whether he's kicked the phone away or he's got his face buried in the sheets is impossible to discern. The image of him in that position comes to you with the crystalline film of a well-loved memory. Tim, rosy and sweaty with the effort of fucking himself without your help, wet hair sticking to his forehead, cheek pressed against the ironed bedsheets of his hotel bed, knees spread, his ass up in the air taking your dildo so well. He must be doing good, mustn't he? Must be thinking about you. How you'd line up right behind him, fingers digging at the skin of his hips, thumb pressing on the swell of his hipbone, the one that makes him gasp. Has he even taken his clothes off, or was he so desperate to get fucked by you that he's crumpled there with his slacks around his knees, his tie under his elbow? Needy, impatient—how is he coping without you?

You wanna be there with him. You really, really wanna be there.

There's some scrabbling at the line and then Tim's voice comes through, lustful rasp wonderfully clear at the other end of the line. "Do you?"

"Yes," you answer. Hoarse. "Yeah. A lot."

"Yeah? You wanna—mhh, ah-" He cuts off with a moan, the thought lost to the moment.

You close your eyes in despair. "You sound so sweet, Tim. I want to kiss you."

Tim moans again. "Kiss me," he asks.

"I am," you say, clutching at your comforter desperately. "I'm right there, baby. My lips on your shoulder. Can you feel them?"

"Yes," he breathes. "Can feel you i-in me."

"Fuck," you mutter.

Blindly, you palm at the bed until you sink your fingers on your largest pillow. It's not the right size, and it's a little too soft, but you're not really thinking about adequacy right now. What you're thinking about is the swell of Tim's ass, firm and perky ass cheeks spread apart on your cock. You reposition yourself to lay on your belly, held up by your elbows, and crawl over the pillow. You like taking him like this, too, even though it's a little inconvenient. The angle's not as good, pressed so close, and you don't pull out as far as you'd like, but when he whines, it's right in your ear, and you wouldn't trade that for anything in the world.

You rock your hips on the pillow, chasing the friction, head hung between your shoulders. Phone's got knocked away on your scrambling, so you drag it down towards you, place it between your open arms. Tap stupidly at it until the speakers blare out his lovely hiccuping. You hasten your rhythm at the sound, thrusting in time with him.

"Are you close, baby?" You ask him.

"I can't," he says, pleads. His voice is just this side of metallic, a miracle of steel and happenstance. "Please, I can't. I need you."

A wave of pained want crashes over you, suffocating. Why, why—? You curse everything—time, distance, the invention of air travel. You think about smoothing his sweaty hair back, about kissing his warm eyelids. The few comforts you can bring him, the small ways you endeavor to take care of him. He needs you. You grip the corner of the pillow.

"I've got you," you tell him. "You feel me? You feel me inside you?"

"Want you," he gasps. "Come here."

"I'm with you," you pant. "You feel so good, baby. Every time, yeah? You're so pretty, you're so—ah, fuck."

"Are you gonna—are you gonna cum? Don't pull out. Cum in me."

You falter, feeling the familiar pinprick of dissatisfaction. "I—I can't," you whisper. "You know I can't."

"Please," he begs. "Fill me up, please. I want it so bad."

Me too, you think helplessly. You want nothing more than that. Tim writhing underneath you, his sweet eyes hazy and lost as you pound him, the maddening heat of his walls enveloping you, sucking you in. Sweat drips down your temple and wets your eyelashes. You swear you see him between blinks, a mirage of soft, marred skin enveloping hard muscle. The long line of his throat beneath you, the delicate swoop of his collarbone, the beauty mark on the back of his left ear. Your heart beats madly in your ribcage, and you feel dizzy with affection. I love you, you think.

"Wha—what'd you say?" He says, disoriented.

Your eyes flutter closed, but you press on, "I love you."

Tim's gasp turns into a loud, long keen, choked at the end in a little stutter of noise, like he'd lost all his air in the middle. The sheets rustle, his voice fades into unsteady breathing and a little "fuck! Fuck!"

You laugh in surprise, hips slowing down on the pillow. "Did you come? Tim. Did you?"

It takes a minute before Tim's panting on the other end of the line, closer now than before. The metallic tinge to his voice softer. He must've gotten off speaker. You sit up on the pillow, a knee on either side, and pick up the phone to do the same.

"Well, yeah," he says, churlish. "You told me you loved me. What was I supposed to do? Not cum?"

You laugh again, bright. "Maybe wait until I came too?"

"You haven't come yet?"

"Need you here," you say, voice inevitably dipping low. "You know I don't like touching myself. I like it when you do it."

Tim groans., muffled. You imagine him on his back, an arm thrown over his face, and giggle. "That's it," he says, "I'm buying tickets back tomorrow morning. Fuck the Board, fuck the shareholders, fuck—fuck Bruce."

"I thought you were there on behalf of Drake Industries?"

"Then fuck me, I guess," he sighs.

You'd made fun of him earlier, walking back to his apartment. Summer was here, and it made its presence known. Sensibly, you'd worn a hat, but Dick was rawdogging the midday sun. Sweat collected at his temple, ran its trail down his neck, and you had to think about something else, something other than the flat of your tongue pressing over his skin to follow. So you'd snorted, watching him try and fail at huffing his bangs out of his eyes, the plastic bag with your assortment of snacks and melting popsicles swinging off his wrist, and said, "ever met a pair of scissors, my man?"

So now you're here, doorknob digging into your kidney every time you try and put some distance between you. He'd set the chair right across the mirror, which rested above the puzzlingly large vanity, and the space between mirror-vanity-chair-Dick-door was barely enough to fit you in. You'd tried keeping the door open, of course you had—it opens to the hallway, you're not stupid—but it swings inwards and every time you moved, it kept hitting the wall, and this is a rental… and so on and so forth. So closed is really the only option you have if you want to keep some range of movement, short of pushing the chair against the door and climbing on Dick's lap, which is no option at all.

(He'd say yes if you offered. You would never.)

"Stop snickering," you grumble, sneaking a hand around the wing of the chair to poke him in the side. Dick, sitting cross-legged, knocks his knee against the edge of the vanity and groans. Good. "You think I'm joking? I've watched that stupid Brad Mondo video like ten times already. If you keep moving, I'm giving you a bald patch on purpose."

"Uh-huh," he says. Giggles. Idiot. "Should I get a bowl from the cupboards? I've never had a bowl cut before, but the idol guys Steph likes to watch on her phone seem to rock 'em. You think I'd look good like that?"

"I think you should get professional help."

"Oh, that's way past me."

"From a hairdresser," you stress, picking up the swords again. Scissors. The scissors again. They might as well be swords in your hands, though.

"I trust you," he says simply.

You sigh. It's because he does things like this that you'd be better off hating him, really. The man peers into the wound, digs his thumb in and asks if it hurts. If you like it. And you do, is the thing, you love the little moments. The crumbs of affection, freely given and unimportant. It hurts to have him inside you, but you live for the stretch, for the itch of the tears drying down your cheeks. You're a masochist, simply put, and he's your unknowing sadist.

"You should trust a licensed professional with the $26 a decent cut is worth," you say instead of all that. Because why would you say that, even.

See, that's the other thing in the up and down of this friendship. A lot of it feels pretty pointless. Not the happy stuff—not the talking, not the getting along. Not the walks on the sidewalk, the sun blaring down on you. Not the movie nights and the shoving each other for popcorn. Not even the grievances, big and small, and rare as they've become. But this, the… the expectation. The pause before the step. The constant second-guessing, the self-vigilance. The waiting around to see if you've been found out, even though Dick knows, even though he bears it so kindly, so patiently. Every moment you set your hands upon him, asking yourself is this innocent enough? and knowing it isn't, and knowing he knows and lets you anyway. Out of pity. Out of love.

Not, crucially, out of interest.

You think he'd do whatever you asked him for at this point. Your friendship's something of a rubber band. It changes shape, it constricts around time and opportunity to squeeze out passing and enduring enjoyment. You take care not to stretch it too far so it doesn't snap on you, sting you all the way to hell, but by this point it's pretty sturdy. You text most days, and you've got his brother's number, and whenever he disappears, he always comes back around.

So he'd do it, really, if you asked. If you came to him, and pleaded with him sweetly on your knees, and said would you teach me? Would you show me? He'd set his hands on you, and he would. He would teach you. He would show you. And he would do it with care and attention, mouth pressed against the divot between your ear and your jaw, and he'd mutter loving nothings that'd ring out true in the cloying dark because he does love you. He does. You love him back. That's no trouble to admit.

But he doesn't want to, is the thing. His gaze will slice across a crowd and pick you out of every person in the room and say I want to spend my afternoons with you, but he won't mean it like that. His eyes will flit over your body, and he'll say you're cute, but he's not thinking about it the way you want him to. You linger in his thoughts the way the comfortable simplicity of a morning cup of coffee does, something you want and seek and look forward to, but not something you crave.

Which is fine. Well within his right. It's just the way the chips fall.

His neck is warm when you hold it, rotate his head just a little to the left to inspect the place you'd been working on before. It's hot inside the bathroom, and it's not just you, it's the half-hour you've already spent cooped up in here, and the bad ventilation courtesy of the sad, little window over the shower head. His skin is almost damp, too hot to feel clammy, and you gotta get the two of you out of here soon or you'll end up getting heatstroke.

You set Dick up just right, and he blows his bangs out of his eyes, ruining the parting. Again.

"I will recede your hairline well before your time," you threaten, pressing the side of the scissors under the line of his jaw.

Dick works his throat, the muscle moving under the cold metal of the blade, and you hold the scissors a little tighter so they don't slip. He throws you up a flirtatious smile, drawls a seductive, "promise?"

"Ugh," you groan, more for the show of it than anything else. You have to play act it, over correct and be more brusque than you'd like. The hand resting on his shoulder slides up to grab a fistful of hair, so soft between your fingers, so much of it to cut, and shove his head down.

Dick makes a sound half between surprise and—well. You do not question that. Eager to move well past it, you inspect the back of his hair with critical eyes, and are pleased to find it laying mostly okay. It's a little shaggy, really, but it suits him. Few things don't.

"Don't be so rough," he says, and your guilty grip slackens. Then, unnecessarily, he adds, his voice gravelly, "I'll start getting excited."

"Shut up, Dick," you tell him, for lack of a better response. Sometimes he makes it worse on purpose.

You make the next cuts in silence. He's pliant underneath you, moving where you tell him, twisting this way and that. Doesn't mind you shoving his toothbrush and soap over the toilet—

"Get a shelf, man."

"It's a rental," he whines.

—or having to press against the knobby bars of the chair when you have to get your ass over the corner of the sink to get his bangs straight. When he sees you concentrating, he shuts up, but when you're deliberating or faffing about, he makes conversation. He'd make any barber's day, honestly.

"I think," you say, curling over his shoulder and running your fingers through the floppy bits of hair over his ears, "we're officially done."

Dick inspects himself in the mirror, turning his face left and right. You slide your hands down to grip the back of the chair, expectant. He doesn't seem unhappy, but he has the tendency to keep a straight face when he's evaluating. You kinda like the way his eyes go sharp and assessing, but then again, that's not a thought to entertain for too long. He grins at you through the mirror, and then drops his head over the back of chair, knocking against your knuckles.

"I like it," he says. "Do I look handsome?"

You snort. "I said it was done, not that it was good."

Dick pouts. "So I don't?"

A modest shrug. "I think it could be worse."

"You're so mean to me sometimes." He sighs. He does look handsome, choppy bangs and all, and you'll tell him later, but it's good practice for him to work for it. You won't reap those benefits, but some poor devil will.

"A barber would've sung your praises."

"Mm," Dick hums, uninterested. God, you hope he's not considering coming to you for all your haircuts.

You slide your hands out from underneath his head, rest them on the swoops at the very ends of the back of the chair, but he doesn't move. He's watching you now, bright eyes inscrutable. You look back on, holding his electric gaze. I am watching you watch me, you think. All our lives, we'll watch each other. And that's enough.

A tendril of your hair slips down your temple, hangs above you both. Dick lifts his arm to catch it, twisting the end around his finger.

"Should I cut yours, too?" He asks, far more quiet than before. You know what he's asking. His fingers through your hair. His hands on you.

You want to kiss him. You want to swipe back the hair off his forehead and press a kiss there. You want to feel his throat move under your fingers as you kiss his eyelids and his cheeks. Want to watch his mouth part when you hover right above it. The desire's so immediate, even now, even after all this work, as though it's never faded even a little, always at the ready right beneath your skin. He's watching you watch him, and he can see it brewing in your eyes.

Instead, you slap a hand over his mouth, widen your eyes at him, and go, "hell, no!"

he looks up, resigned to lose a few more minutes of his precious time. it's not your fault that tim's feeling so irritated right now. sleepless night after sleepless night pouring over this case have dragged him out to this café at a monstrous hour of the morning because he couldn't stand staring at the four walls of his bedroom knowing he's been getting nowhere. he's not getting anywhere here either, but at least the brew's better.

really, any other time, tim might've entertained it. straightened and smiled charmingly, gestured for you to sit, paid for a treat on top of the coffee you're carrying. you look very sweet and nervous—white-knuckling the back of the chair, smile straining but firm—which he likes. easy to unnerve, but with a spine. just his type.

not today, though.

"what is it?" he says, eyes flickering back to his computer screen. just polite enough not to get a scalding latte thrown on him. he does not need third degree burns right now. he's close enough to calling it quits and committing some murder as is.

even as the silence stretches, you don't leave. tim is not feigning disinterest—he is disinterested, he just wants you to leave, so he looks up again, eyebrow raised. you're staring at him, unreadable expression in your face. and the longer you look at him, the more something pricks at the back of his neck. an uneasy feeling washes over him.

then you grin. broad and amused. tim blinks, dumbfounded. what? he was just gearing up for those burns and now you're grinning?

"hey," you say, voice way lighter than before. maybe you take rejection super well? "can i sit here?"

of course not. tim sighs, rubs the bridge of his nose.

well, whatever. he can commend perseverance. maybe a little distraction won't hurt. he can always leave.

"sure," he says, gesturing to the chair. "just be quiet."

"you got it."

you make true with your promise. the table's big enough that you can sit across him, pull out your own laptop, and work in silence without bothering him, and as soon as you get in the groove of things, it's as though you're all alone in this café. tim's not so lucky. if you had cast a spell on him, it would not be quite as effective as your silent, unbothered presence is at distracting him. the fact that the case's not moving at all—no matter where he prowls, searches, spies—is not helping. after an hour of fruitless pondering and texting steph and duke (monitoring the switch in the patrols, more like), he gets up to grab another americano. whatever. it's cold outside.

you pay him no mind, only nodding when he asks you to watch over his stuff.

it's a little annoying, actually.

he studies you as he waits at the counter for his name to be called. that same sense of unease pokes at him, a thread waiting to be pulled to unravel… what, exactly? certainly what he is feeling now is a sense of recognition, but where has he seen you exactly? he tries to picture you in the places he frequents and fails miserably. then maybe he hasn't seen you in the flesh, but elsewhere… photos? just now he was going through the victim's family archive. again he fails to place you.

the victim is a 26 year old, white male doing a masters in arboriculture and urban forestry. he'd been working on mercey island to study the degradation of a specific type of tree around the sewage treatment plant. had taken line 1 on angelo and mysteriously wasn't on the train when it got to arena. police had determined the subject had gotten off in bolland to catch the ferry and slipped in the banks. (why would he even take the ferry? the connection with line 5 was two stations away and it would've taken him straight into newtown, a few blocks away from his apartment instead of going all the way round to rogers basin and then what? catching a cab? paying triple fare? c'mon. some of us aren't stupid.)

so the common sense explanation was they'd killed this guy to shut him up about something. the issue was what he'd found out and who had killed him for it. almost everybody in the family agreed with this. steph was of the opinion the guy had not really found anything, but he'd gotten close enough. he and barbara thought he'd managed to hide something given the general paranoia he'd exhibited in the cctv vids from his last few hours alive, but where he'd put it was far beyond him. even if he hadn't, the people who'd killed him certainly believed he had and it was a grave enough offense to warrant a rush job on this guy's murder. a visit to ivy was par for the course in flora related cases, but she'd refused to lend them a hand and so tim was drawing blanks on the hows, the whys and the where.

until you. a possible connection.

he looks at you again. his parents had been pretty important wall street brokers. your coat is tailored. your phone's seems like a recent acquisition.

maybe.

he settles down in his seat with his steaming cup and slides a raspberry croissant over to you with a smile. you stop typing, arch an eyebrow at him.

"a sorry for being rude earlier," he says, charmingly. raises his cup with a little laugh. "not a morning bird!"

you rest your chin on the palm of your hand, eyes twinkling in amusement. "is that so?"

tim nudges the pastry closer to you. "will you forgive me?"

your smile unfurls lazily and a little bit cocky as you take the croissant quite deliberately without touching him. "we shall see."

(kinda hot, honestly.

okay, focus.)

"are you an early bird?" he asks.

"mm, not quite," you say, peeling off the wrapper. tim knows it's still warm from having carried it over, but by the way it flops a little under your fingers, it must be from the last batch of yesterday's pastries. well, he would've bought you a new one if they had any.

he tries again. "so you've stayed up all night? you don't look it."

"you do," you say, popping a bite of the pastry in your mouth. a little bit of the raspberry jam sticks to your cheek. tim grabs his mug so his fingers he can't reach out to wipe it. what can he say. big fan of hygiene, him.

"big nights at work," he says, hiding a yawn behind his hand. "are you working overtime at your… job?" an embarrassed smile, well-practiced. "sorry, i don't actually know what you do."

"of course you don't," you say, simply. "i haven't told you."

tim's fingers tighten on the mug. "well, i am asking. in case it wasn't obvious."

you munch on another piece. the jam is still there. "why do you wanna know?"

right. why does he want to know? it wouldn't take that long to track you down and doxx you if he wanted to. would probably be easier. he could do it in his sleep, if that time were ever to come.

a man is dead, tim, he reminds himself. play nice.

"well, how am i supposed to pick you up after work if i don't know if you're working overtime?" he says, faux smoothly.

that shocks a laugh at out of you, and tim drinks only to hide the satisfaction of getting a hit.

"cute," you say, giving him a once over. "but i've got a boyfriend."

that's news. tim doesn't feel disappointed. not really. it's just another door shut in his face. he'll have to find another way in.

he shrugs. "that's a shame."

"well, don't play demure now," you laugh. "what are you working on? you've been staring the hell out of that screen."

tim smiles sheepishly. "do i look as stuck as i am?"

"little bit," you admit. "anything i can do to help?"

bingo.

"i can't say much," he says, "because the case is technically still ongoing, but i'm helping out the mayor's office trying to draft a proposal to improve the city's urban safety measures. coming up blank because i want people to be safe, but still be able to enjoy the city without everything being gated, you know? there's only a few pleasures in gotham, after all."

you nod, thoughtfully. "that's laudable. what are you thinking?"

"thanks. the most straightforward way—and cheapest, probably—would be to install railings, hire guards around the parks—"

"they're gonna be bought off immediately, dude."

"well, yeah. and the railings are not gonna deter anyone who's willing to gamble their life on line 1 being late. or jumping over to the beach and slipping down the bank, like that guy last week."

"slipping down… oh! you mean tony!"

tim blinks, affecting surprise. "you knew the guy?"

"yeah," you say, slipping into sorrow. tim shifts in his seat. well, of course if you knew him, you'd care. dude was dead. "we went to gcu together, got in the same study group for organic chem. he used to take the train with me every thursday, got off at the same stop and he'd walk me home. didn't talk to him much after college, but it's a shame he passed."

"must've been. he seemed young," tim says.

"he was! last i heard he was doing his masters. his poor mom's devastated."

his surprise this time is genuine. "you know his mother?"

"we didn't date, if that's what you're thinking," you rush to explain. "i used to live in chinatown back then, not so far from the banks, actually—the flooding was awful back in 2016, by the way, you should do something about that—and tony loves the sea, so he'd always take the ferry back home even though it was the long way around. i think he lived in the east end back then? but the ferry station was only like three blocks away from my apartment, and sometimes i'd make the journey over to his mom's house with him—just to see what it was like, you know? see the world through his eyes. tony loved nature. he loved it despite everything steel and concrete eating it up more and more. didn't even mind that the ferry had to pass blackgate if he got to stare at the open sea, even though i damn nearly pissed my pants every time we heard the noises—sorry, i'm talking too much, aren't i?"

"no," he croaks. clears his throat. "it's not too much."

"really? you look a little pale."

tim shakes his head. "it's fine," he says. "go on."

it is fine. he'd just forgotten. forgotten this guy was human. had friends. had family. people who missed him. who would continue to miss him even after the case was closed. forgotten what he was doing this for. not to solve a puzzle, but to give the people that he'd left behind the closure they needed. and the truth. always the truth.

"anyway, so we went a few times. we'd get off by loeb bridge and stay a few hours at his mom's house, and when it was about to get dark, he'd walk me over to grayson station and i'd take the green line back home. i sent his mom a message right after i found out—she really was distraught. the insurance company is making a right mess out of things. i hear they went to check over his apartment and apparently they left no stone unturned looking for the suicide note that was never gonna be there because when they left, it looked like they'd ransacked the place. it's disrespectful, is what it is, and just so his mum can't cash in the life insurance."

"the insurance company did that?" he asks. "are you sure someone didn't just… actually ransack the place?"

"who knows." you shrug. "but his mom said she'd left the place spotless before they came in, and i trust her. maybe you should tell the mayor about that. it can't be the first stunt those guys pull."

"no, probably not," tim says absently, tapping his fingers on the table. in fact, you've probably hit the nail on the head. it cannot be the first time they do this. he checks his watch. 07:34 AM. he can squeeze in a morning visit, why not? "listen, i gotta get going. i've got a meeting across town."

"oh, yeah, no worries." you wave him away. as he shrugs on his coat and stashes his laptop in his bag, you steal one of his pens to jot down something on a napkin. you slide it over to him. "don't be a stranger."

tim grabs it and turns it over. written on it is tony's mother's name and phone number. he knows this, because he already has them on file. he looks at you askance.

you wink at him. "help her make her case."

tim blinks, then grins. "will do!"

"it was nice to catch up with you!" you yell after him as he goes, waving. tim waves back, still grinning when he hits the asphalt.

two blocks away, stephanie pulls him into an alley. "you have the devil's luck, tim, you really do."

tim grins. "you got all that?"

"yep," she says, tapping on the comms device oracle gave her to upload the recording of the conversation to her server. "can't believe you had the comms on you."

he shrugs. "was listening on your patrol, that's all."

"ha! no one's paying you to babysit, control freak." she shakes her head. "can't believe you randomly walked into a lead when we've had no luck for days—"

"heh. what can i say? it's the—"

"—and coming from your ex of all people? dude."

"—talent of the master—what?"

"what?"

"what do you mean?"

"what do i mean by what? the lead? it's obviously the insurance company—"

"no, fuck that," he says. stephanie scowls, incensed at the nonsense and the interruption. tim doesn't care, he can't care, what does she mean? "my ex?"

"yeah? back in school—oh my god, you did not notice?" stephanie scrambles to get out her phone, furiously scrolling through her gallery, and then shoves a picture underneath tim's nose. "oh, you idiot—see?"

he sees. he sure fucking sees. right there, grinning up at him is.. you. the picture is one of an outing back in… what? junior year? it's you, and tim, and steph amidst a group of other high schoolers, absolutely demolishing the manbat special at batburger. he has his arm around you. fuck.

fuck.

"tim, tim, look at me, don't hide your face in your hands—you didn't notice you were talking to your ex?"

tim groans into his palms, slides down the grimy, disgusting wall onto the grimy, disgusting floor.

that's why you were familiar. that's why the sense of unease. that's why you were nervous—

oh, no, he'd been so rude. he'd broken up with you and then you'd tried being nice when you saw him again after all these years and he had forgotten about you.

"ha, ha!" stephanie laughs. is she recording? fuck, she's recording. tim tries to push the phone away, but she's quicker. "cass, can you believe this doofus?"

"badly done," cass says. oh, they're facetiming.

tim groans again, stands up to walk away. "i gotta—i gotta apologize— i have to—"

stephanie holds him back by the scruff of the neck, which is to say, the hood of his sweatshirt. "no can't do, mister. we've got to pay a morning call to that lovely insurance company playing whack-a-mole in our crime scenes. that's why you got the mother's number right?"

"oh, no," tim says, freezing. "was it… was it obvious i didn't know? is that— do you think — do you think that's why i got—"

"do i think the fact that you did not recognize your ex in the flesh directly influence the fact that you got the victim' mom's number instead of, you know, theirs? uh, yeah. man, you're hopeless."

"yep," cass echoes.

tim slumps back down to the floor in despair.

"You're chickening out," he says. Plainly. Trying not to sound accusatory.

Your head snaps towards him, and you scowl. "I'm not."

When you make that face, your lip juts out in a pout. Because you've been gnawing on it this whole time, it looks swollen and shiny with spit. Jason feels the cold shudder of disgust and arousal pass over him as the thought of your mouth stretched around him invades his mind for the umpteenth time since you proposed this. He thinks you would cower if he reached out to grasp your chin in his hand and trace it with his thumb like he wants to do, lean down and pull at it with his own teeth.

He almost does it before whatever leftover decency he's got catches up with him. You don't want any of that.

"'s alright," he says instead. Shrugs. Tries to locate a relief that's simply not coming to him. "Doesn't have to be today."

You search his face and immediately deflate. "You don't want to."

"It's not that." He sighs, shoulders drooping. You're so difficult. "You just seem... unsure."

You open your mouth, close it. Brows draw close. The hand still on his knee turns to absentminded tapping and he has to sit there and watch you think it through while pretending every little tap of your fingers isn't winding him up like a toy soldier, and not precisely for a walk. A stiff walk, maybe.

"I don't know," you confess, "that I could do a good enough job."

Jason thinks you could rub your cheek on his dick like a cat for all of three seconds and he'd probably come the hardest he's ever done it in his life regardless. But he can't say that, not without you legging it up and out of his apartment. Out of his life. There's a reason you're doing this and it sure ain't him. A flash of bronze skin and playful azure eyes comes to him unbidden, and he has to flex his fists where his arms lie on either side of his legs, stiff like a doll.

Not him for sure. But when's it ever been any different? It's just the way things are for Jason.

"It's not like I could tell the difference," he murmurs, quietly like he's a little ashamed too. He's not, though, but that'll pull at your heartstrings. This, too: "That's why you chose me."

That works, somehow, though not in the way he expects. The dismay in your face deepens for a second and then slips away into a grimace that you hide by pressing your forehead to his thigh. Jason startles, thinking—but you don't touch him like that. The hand on his knee slips down to grip his calf, and even though the proximity of your face has his spine puling taut and the wet warmth of your breath bleeds through the canvas of his pants to fog over his skin, he knows you're steadying yourself to reject him.

It's over, he thinks, closing his eyes. A relief in some respects. A deep, persistent ache in others. Wounds that do not close, the ever so familiar feeling.

Which is why it's so surprising when you rip yourself off him and, instead of standing up and saying the usual bullshit about Jason being such a bad decision, you lean back on the carpet and start unbuttoning your shirt with one hand. Your knees spread out underneath you, knock against his bare feet. Jason blinks.

"Show me," you say, gesturing at his pants with a little grimace. Not encouraging, really, but all you can do. "Just… show me how you get off and I'll try to, um. Mimic that. Yeah."

"Alright," Jason says, voice hoarse. You work your throat at the sound. "And the shirt?"

Only a couple buttons left to undo and the neck has begun slipping down your shoulder. Jason has never seen your collarbone before. It's stupid that that's what he's fixating on, but he is. The slope of your shoulder. The vein pounding at your neck. His chest aches, breath quickening. The lines come to him on their own, in a whisper as you undress. A thing of beauty is a joy for ever: / Its loveliness increases; it will never/ Pass into nothingness; but still will keep / A bower quiet for us, and a sleep / Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

Endymion, he thinks with some bitterness, after scrabbling for the origin. A fool after a mirage.