#venustext

Typically Chris would have discouraged Leon from losing his shit, but even he couldn't argue with that sentiment. Arms crossed, they continued to stand back and watch, trying not to let the pity show on their faces.

You were once the U.S. government's most prized and expensive sniffer dog, a hybrid born of the most ideal combination of breeds for the job. You were highly effective and devastatingly accurate, lent out to the FBI, CIA, DEA, DHS, DSO, so many acronyms you lost count, tracking down bombs and drugs and cadavers and counterfeit currency, and anything else under the sun that left a minuscule scent behind.

Until eight months ago, when you were victimized in an ambush attack involving an aerosol respiratory agent that absolutely fried your sense of smell. No expense was spared trying to get you good and recovered, but it soon became obvious that the damage was irreversible. Without any other kind of training, that revelation just rendered you the country's most costly, sentient paperweight. That's where Chris and Leon came in.

By all metrics-- and whether they liked it or not-- Chris Redfield and Leon Kennedy were the poster children of their field in the hybrid program. Their canine genetics weren't distilled from domestic breeds, but instead from wolves. Unmatched in their strength, agility, and stamina, their tracking abilities second-to-none now that you were out of the game…

If anyone would be capable of training you from a soft puppy into a tactical canine, it would be Chris and Leon, and yet here you were, just a few weeks from graduating basic and barely meeting your marks.

You weren't particularly fast, you weren't very strong, and you were so used to relying on scent to guide you that you had a hard time gaining awareness of your surroundings outside of the ground beneath your non-functioning nose. They did everything they could, they really tried your best with you, but you really, really just weren't cut out for this. It was downright painful to sit here and watch you flounder.

As you finally reached the end of your training course several minutes behind your peers, Chris and Leon shared a pitiful, fed-up, communicative look; whatever it might take, they weren’t letting you flounder anymore.

If Chris and Leon had learned anything over their years of service to the government, it would be the value of good relations in high places, the value of a single strategic phone call, the value of being owed favors. Of course both men usually preferred to go about things the right way, but when the right way wasn’t working, what else were they to do but carve an alternative path of their own?

You weren’t just any little whelp, after all, you were more than worth the effort. They’d grown dangerously fond of you over the course of your time together. You were so earnest and sweet, so pretty and kind and so very lost, like a fallen angel. Looking after you became an unbreakable habit, and it awakened something in them that they hadn’t felt since they were… well, your age.

You awakened in them the urge to protect, the urge to claim, the urge to compete for the right to pin you down and mark you up with their teeth, the urge to retire, to build a home for you, and to spend the rest of their days breeding you up with litters to fill every room.

The urge to keep you all to themselves.

It wasn’t their fault that you smelled so good. Hell, it wasn’t even your fault. In your condition, you didn’t know. You were oblivious to how rich your own scent became during your heat, and you didn’t seem to react to the heady musk of their ruts, either. Maybe if your nose actually worked, you’d have long since caught on to their increasingly unprofessional interest in you, but for better or for worse, you appeared to be clueless as always.

That, and your painfully poor performance today, worked well to their advantage. Chris took out his phone as you trudged off into the locker room, and one call was all it took.

One call, and your career as a field agent was finished. You had been swiftly and quietly reassigned before you even got out of the shower.

"Hey," Chris caught your attention as soon as you stepped out of the locker room, arms crossed casually over his beefy chest even as his sudden appearance caused you to jump a little. Both him and Leon were leaning against either side of the doorway just waiting for you to come out, like two hunks in some cheesy movie. "C'mon, let's go get some dinner. We need to talk to you."

If it weren't for how calmly he spoke, the mere words 'we need to talk to you' would have sent your ears flat against your head and your tail between your legs, but as your eyes cast between the two of them in curiosity, you realized their expressions were less disappointed than you expected, given your performance today. They almost looked mischievous.

"Okay, sure… dinner sounds good," You reluctantly agreed, scrutinizing them now.

Leon reached out to take your athletic bag for you without even asking. Chris draped his arm around you and pulled you into his side while the three of you walked, his hand spanning across the entire width of your lower back to guide you. Their tails were swinging wide enough to brush with yours, and each other's.

Oh, they were definitely up to something.

“Why are you guys being weird?” You asked bluntly, nudging Leon with your elbow. If you were going to get either one of them to crack, it would more likely be Leon. “Am I in trouble or something? Look, I know my times were shit today, but I was honestly trying, and I swear I’m gonna get it eventually—“

“Relax,” Leon interjected, pinching your butt just to watch you jump. “You’re not in trouble, pup. Take a deep breath, or you’re gonna pop a blood vessel.”

Rolling your eyes, you took a deep breath and kept walking. “You didn’t answer my question all the way,” you huffed dramatically.

“I said we wanted to talk to you, didn’t I?” Chris spoke up, raising a brow at you in that subtle look of near-disapproval that almost always straightened you out immediately. “We’re gonna take you home, we’re gonna have some dinner, and we’re gonna talk. Just be patient.”

Just be patient. Hmph. That was a tall ask for you and they knew it, but you conceded anyway for fear of pushing their buttons. Despite your outwardly playful demeanor, you weren’t feeling great about yourself in the wake of today’s results. 

Plummeting from the height of your profession due to circumstances outside your control, deemed irreparably broken after several weeks in and out of experimental surgeries, training your ass off for months just to continue to fail and fail and fail… You were getting exhausted, your optimism was wearing paper thin, and these days it was starting to feel like the only people who believed in you, let alone cared about you, were Chris and Leon. You appreciated them deeply of course, but at this point, something had to give.

Something had to give, or, like Leon said, you’d pop a blood vessel.

Chris and Leon’s shared apartment, thankfully, was something of a sanctuary for you. You always felt protected and cared for within these walls, and the only thing you didn’t like about it was that you couldn’t smell anything, but that wasn’t their fault.

The pair all but ordered you to relax on the couch while they convened in the kitchen to make dinner, and as you sank lazily into the cushions, you wished you could bury your nose into the navy blue fleece thrown over the arm and breathe in their scent, or even the faintest hint of detergent, cologne, sweat, something. Sure, thousands of people live completely normal lives with no sense of smell, but how many of them were canine hybrids like you? Scent wasn’t just your career, it was your compass in so many aspects of your life.

Scent was what told you if you could trust someone. Scent was what told you if a building was safe. Scent was what told you when you were home. There was so much more to it than just wishing you could fully taste certain flavors again, or catch a fresh autumn breeze, or enjoy a fragrant candle. You felt completely detached from the world as you were genetically engineered to experience it.

“Alright, pumpkin, dinner’s just about ready. Come set the table,” Leon poked his head out from the kitchen, the low vibration of his voice working like a charm to soothe the tides of your anxious mind.  You could practically already hear him ratting you out to Chris for being too hard on yourself— a big no-no— and that was more than enough to redirect your train of thought for now.

So you popped up from the couch with a nod and followed in his footsteps, thoughtfully setting the table with silverware, plates, and water glasses, humming a little tune to yourself while you worked. It was your adorable mannerisms like this that made Chris and Leon love you so much in the first place. You couldn’t be any more precious if you tried.

Unless you were to be waddling around the house with a bellyful of puppies, of course, but they were working on that. All in due time.

Dinner was relatively simple, but hearty, a hot bowl of soup with crusty slices of bread to go with it, sure to replenish all you’d lost after a long day of physical exertion. With your back turned while you set the table, it didn’t require much sleight of hand for Chris to stir a little something extra into your portion to help the process along, just a few supplements to promote fertility and prepare you for what was to come.

Both men joined you in the dining room to serve the meal, and now that you were all sat, the air in the room went immediately tense as you stared at them in anticipation.

The dining room was quiet aside from the faint sound of the TV in the other room, and the dull clicking of silverware. It would have been peaceful if you weren’t so eager to hear what they wanted to talk to you about. Sitting here wondering made you feel like you were going to explode.

“C’mon, pup, eat,” Chris ordered gently, nodding to the bowl in front of you. “You had a very busy day today.”

Stubbornly, you groaned, picking up your spoon to take a few bites. It’s not that you weren’t hungry, of course, you were just anxious, and they knew that. Your mannerisms were almost laughably simple to read, which made them feel a bit bad, but hey, they couldn’t just let you leave your dinner going cold. It was made special just for you.

“You’re killing me,” you whined, scooping up a bite of soup with your bread nonetheless, always with the dramatics. 

Leon chuckled at your display, ears flicking with amusement, and while Chris was usually the one to call the shots, the blond chose to step in and offer you a compromise. “Three more bites and we’ll talk, okay? And no cheating, I mean real bites.”

That seemed to work, and you nodded, albeit with a bit of grumbling at his pulling the plug on any potential cheating before you even had a chance to try to get away with it. The two wolves shared a silent look of understanding while your attention was captured by the meal in front of you, and once you were finished with those three agreed upon bites, it was Chris who accepted the responsibility of starting the conversation.

“You’re not such a big fan of field work, are you, sweetheart?” He asked, tone delicate so as not to freak you out— you weren’t in trouble, far from it. “All the shooting and fighting and running around?”

Looking down at the table, your ears laid low, you gave a half-shrug and mumbled, “I don’t mind the running around part.”

Both men cracked a little smile at this, their own ears flicking with amusement.

“Of course you don’t mind that part, silly baby,” Leon teased, “but, honey, the rest of it… it makes you miserable, doesn’t it?”

You didn’t respond for a beat, gaze still fixed down at the table while you tried to gather the right words, idly stirring your spoon through your bowl just to fidget. The last thing you wanted to do was disappoint them. They’d put so much work into preparing you for this final evaluation, so much time and effort into helping you learn the ins and outs of field operation, and you didn’t want to just give up.

But they saw the conflict raging in you and they knew what you were thinking, and it wasn’t fair, not to you, not at all.

“Hey… it’s okay if you don’t like it, puppy. No one’s mad at you, no one’s disappointed, no one’s in trouble,” Chris reassured you, reaching across the table to gently tilt your chin up with one curled knuckle. “That’s actually why we wanted to talk.”

Heat crept up the column of your neck as you met his eyes, recognizing the kindness and care in them, feeling him disarm you in real time. What you didn’t know was just how carefully Chris was trying to phrase this, that Leon was squeezing the meat of his thigh under the table to ground him and encourage him.

It was much harder to navigate breaking the news to you than they forethought.

“Listen, sweetheart, me and Leon and some of the higher-ups have been thinking that field operation might not be a good fit for you,” he continued delicately, the pad of his thumb swiping gently back and forth, caressing the curve of your jaw. “We were… informed today that you’ve been reassigned.”

Chris did feel rather guilty in the back of his mind for phrasing it that way, like it wasn’t their idea in the first place, but they were in too deep to turn back now, and he was already getting a little bricked up thinking about fucking you after dinner. He’d beg for your forgiveness later if he had to.

Your expression went through a series of emotions— first shock, then guilt, then questioning— and for as reassuring as Chris and Leon were being right now, it was hard not to feel utterly lost again. As far as you knew, reassignment meant you’d probably never see them again, just like the team you used to work with before you were injured. To be taken away from Chris and Leon as a result of your own failure to perform would kill you.

“D-Does that mean I won’t get to be with you anymore?” You asked hesitantly, voice weak and quiet due to your thinking you already knew the answer.

And that’s where Leon stepped in.

“Actually, pup, it means the opposite,” he interjected, all too happy to be the one to give you the good news part of this. “You get to be with us all the time now, and we get to take care of you forever. No more training, no more guns, no more worrying for your life or for ours. Doesn’t that sound nice?”

Your breath hitched and your brows pinched together in sudden confusion, that deep sense of grief and devastation that was preparing to descend upon you just… halting for a moment, paused in the tunnel of your throat.

It did sound nice, but it sounded too nice, like there was more to it that they weren’t telling you, another shoe left yet to drop, and surely there had to be. You’d been branded a sunk cost enough times to know that the government didn’t like to fund things it wouldn’t be seeing a return on, and you were far too young to retire, so what was the deal?

Reading the look on your face with impressive accuracy, Chris couldn’t stand to watch any longer as you sat there clearly fearing the worst, so he chose to speak plainly.

“They’re thinking we’d make some good, healthy litters together, sweet girl,” he said, reaching across the table to squeeze your hand. “That’s a nice idea, isn’t it? Settling down, havin’ our pups…”

Consciously or not, your ears perked up halfway at this, flicking with interest. You wished you could say you hadn’t really put any thought into something like this before, but come on, that would be a lie. You liked Chris and Leon a lot, they were so sweet to you, and so very handsome— it was only natural that you’d dream girlishly from time to time about playing house with them, what your babies might look like, what Chris and Leon might be like as fathers…

And how big their cocks are, and how amazing it would feel to take them both at once…

Now wasn’t the time to be dreaming, however, with both of them watching so closely for your reaction. You nearly let a drop of drool slip past your lips before you snapped out of it, hand flying up to wipe your mouth. Smooth.

A smug look of knowing washed over Leon’s features, his fingers drumming on the table to coax your attention on him, his sharp left canine bared in a lopsided smirk. “Oh, you really like that idea, don’t you, little one?” He drawled, reaching across the table to nudge your hand away so he could swipe the pad of his thumb along your plush bottom lip, tempted to dip it in and make you suck on it, but he wanted to get you squirming a little more first.

“L-Leon—”

“Don’t lie to me… you like it a lot, baby, I can see it on your face,” he cut you off, intent upon not letting you deny it. “You were never built to be out there fighting and risking your life, were you, pup? You were never ‘sposed to be put in danger like that, our poor, precious girl… It’s no wonder it didn’t work out for you, huh? You didn’t do anything wrong, you just knew deep down that you were always meant to be a mommy…”

Your wide eyes darted up to look at Chris as if you were begging him to step in without being able to form the actual words, a timid whine making its way out instead, but unfortunately for you, he wasn’t interested in cutting you a break. Why would he? Leon had made such good progress.

“Leon’s right, you know… you smell so fertile, I’ll bet we could get at least two pups out of you on your very first litter…”

“Just two?” Leon puffed, “I’m shooting for three.”

“Yeah, right, old man, all you’re shooting is blanks,” Chris countered with a playful growl, turning to nip at Leon’s nose with his teeth, the movement allowing him a decent moment of cover to readjust his pants under the table. Just as soon, though, he made no effort to conceal the path his hand took from his own lap to the crotch of Leon’s jeans, palming his partner’s stiffening sex through the denim.

Leon’s head tilted back with an airy groan and his tail beat dumbly against the frame of his chair, hips bucking up slightly. Your jaw was stuck open now and you shifted in your seat, the movement bringing your attention to just how slick you were, standard issue cotton growing sticky and warm beneath your athletic leggings.

Dinner sat long forgotten on the table in front of you, but that didn’t mean you weren’t affected by what Chris gave you. To witness this would have flustered you regardless, but right now you were flushed red and practically dripping— with every passing moment, you were losing your ability to think straight, almost like you were going into heat. Swiping your hair away from your face with shaking hands, your lips parted for oxygen, drinking in slow, shallow breaths in an attempt to regain control of yourself, but every lungful of air you breathed was teeming with their pheromones. You were only getting dizzier.

And they were loving every second of it. Grinning slyly as he continued to knead Leon through his jeans, Chris couldn’t help himself, “You’re lookin’ a little flushed there, puppy. Maybe you should go lay down.”

Your eyes locked with his, and within what felt like only a single moment, Leon was up from his chair and circling the table to tug you out of yours. Before you could fully register the movement, let alone respond to it, he was tossing you over his shoulder like you weighed nothing and carrying you deeper into the apartment.

“Chris!” You yelped out of habit, but once again, the older wolf had no interest in lending you a hand. He was following right along with you both, and once you crossed the threshold into the bedroom, he shut the door behind you all with a decisive click.

Leon tossed you down upon the center of the bed less than gracefully, immediately caging you in so he could bury his face into your throat, breathing you in with desperation between needy kisses and possessive bites. Positioning himself at the head of the bed just above you, Chris guided your head up to rest in his lap as Leon’s attention crept lower and lower down your body, until his strong nose was pressed to your navel.

Heaven, Leon thought to himself, this must be what heaven is like.

Your scent was peppery and sweet, creamy with fertility. His hands balled up into fists clutching the fabric of your shirt and he tore it off of you without a second thought. Encouraged by the revealed expanse of bare skin— and your failure to protest— your leggings were similarly ripped apart directly thereafter. Without missing a beat, Leon grabbed you at the thighs and spread your legs so he could situate himself between them, head ducking forward to huff wantonly at the sodden fabric of your undies, tongue darting out to taste them.

Reaching down to flick him in the forehead, Chris scolded him playfully, “You plan on coming up for air anytime soon, or am I gonna have to make you?”

Leon responded with a humorless grunt, clearly just as lost in the throes of hormonal lustfulness as you were. Nonetheless, he acquiesced, nipping at the crotch of your panties with his teeth before sitting up to his haunches and countering, “We gotta make sure she’s prepared first. Don’t wanna break her on your knot.”

You tensed a bit upon hearing this, but Chris quickly shushed you, scratching behind your ears reassuringly. “We’re not gonna break you, honey.”

He scooped you up beneath your arms to pull you up into more of a sitting position in his lap, and only now did you notice he’d already undressed. While you were busy ogling every rippling inch of his tanned skin, Leon was stripping too, the temperature in the room rising exponentially. Try as they might to remain cool, Chris and Leon were panting just as much as you were.

You could feel the weight of Chris’ stiff cock pressed up against your lower back, making you whine and squirm to get closer, intoxicated by the idea of sitting on it. But you knew Leon was right— you had no hope of taking even one knot comfortably without more preparation, no matter how wet you were.

“F-Fingers, fingers, please,” you all but babbled, taking it upon yourself to shimmy your panties down to mid-thigh. You were desperate for something thick and warm to claim the empty space between your walls, a void that felt like it was only carving deeper into the pit of you.

From the start of your very first cycle, the doctors were always timely with your monthly inhibitor— it didn’t negate the symptoms associated with going into heat entirely, but it absolutely did dampen them. You’d never felt your heat with such intensity before, and that was by careful design— a pinch of cinnamon among the additives to your meal was all it took to counteract your inhibitor, which was nearing the end of its four-week lifespan anyway.

Maybe Chris and Leon would even luck out and, moving forward, you’d subconsciously associate the intensity of your heat with them.

“Shh, shh, alright, baby,” Chris cooed in your ear as he worked in tandem with Leon to tug your panties off the rest of the way. His massive palm then sank down between your legs, fingers spreading apart your slippery folds, and with a subtle nod to Leon over your head, he added in a sultry murmur, “Let’s get you good and taken care of.”

Leon was on you in a second, prints pressing deep into your hips as he rutted into the mattress and lapped at your sweetness, tail swinging back and forth in a haphazard pendulum of dumb weight. Through the incomprehensible horny fog that hung over his head, Leon was determined to commit the taste of you to memory so that he could discover how it might change once you were finally pregnant.

Sucking your clit between his lips with a low moan, Leon took advantage of your surprise to push his index finger past your tight little hole, his other hand keeping your hips steady so you wouldn’t accidentally hurt yourself when you bucked. A sharp whine pushed up from your throat but it wasn’t one of displeasure. Far from it. You were clenching around him like you were trying to suck him in, and what kind of gentleman would he be if he didn’t oblige?

“Mm, there you go, good girl,” he groaned, flattening his tongue on you to lick a broad stripe from your hole to your puffy clit. “Takin’ daddy’s fingers like a fuckin’ dream…”

“Yeah, you are,” Chris agreed without hesitation, gently stroking the boundaries of your cunt in a soothing motion that spread you open wider, allowing Leon to sneak a second finger in with the first. “Gonna take our knots with no problem at all, aren’t you, pretty girl? ‘Til you’re all fucked full…” 

The way you squirmed and twitched in Chris’ lap only worked more blood to his dick, but thankfully he was a much more patient man than Leon, whose hand was plunging in and out of you at a measured but shaky pace. You were dripping like a faucet and kicking your legs out over his shoulders, clutching the portion of grey-blond hair between his wiry ears in a white-knuckled fist.

Leon only unlatched from your cunt to breathe, dragging in a series of heavy breaths before his teeth sank deep into the plush, creamy flesh at the inside of your right thigh, marking you. The sting of it was quickly followed by Chris’ own claim bite where your tender neck met your left shoulder.

The sharp sensation rushed through you and forced goosebumps to rise along your skin, head falling back against Chris’ chest as you whined and convulsed around Leon’s fingers, tumbling over the cusp of an intense and unexpected orgasm. But it didn’t dampen that heat in you, it didn’t offer any relief— if anything, as the tides began to calm, you were only left wanting more. More and more and more, want turning quickly to need.

As Leon withdrew his slick fingers from you, your head was spinning, upper half falling forward as you braced yourself on your elbows, spine sloping down to the mattress in a languid arch to present yourself to Chris. You could feel the cool air of the room chilling the arousal that leaked out from between your soft lips, hole pulsing and squeezing around the mere idea of his length.

“Please, please, please,” you whimpered, tail curled up to the base and wagging timidly side-to-side, like it was just beckoning him to sink into you. “Gimme pups, gimme pups, please—”

You couldn’t see his expression, but Chris was sweating, caressing your hip with one hand while the other tugged at his aching cock, already sticky and leaking down his clenched knuckles. “Fuck, baby,” he groaned, “look at that pretty pussy… you showin’ off?”

Nodding dumbly into the bedding, you felt Leon’s hand come forward to card through your hair, making your eyes flutter comfortably shut. He was stroking himself too, every pump of his hand signified by a subtle schlicking sound of his own pre marrying together with the mess you’d made on his fingers.

Chris started with two fingers first. His were just a little bit shorter than Leon’s, but much thicker, stretching you out more. It was just so adorable, the way you gasped and mewled and rutted back into him while he carefully scissored your hole further open. The anticipation that vibrated through you only ramped up their own.

“You’re gonna look so pretty knotted up, aren’t you?” Leon smiled down at your flushed form. “And even prettier with a bellyful of puppies…”

You drew in a breath to respond but didn’t have much of a chance before Chris replaced his fingers with the heavy head of his cock, each and every rigid inch sliding in without resistance. As his hips rutted forward to become flush with your bottom, the air was punched from your lungs and expressed in a needy cry. Heat bloomed through your middle as he went still for a short moment, but you didn’t need still, you needed babies.

So you shifted beneath him and began to fuck yourself on Chris’ dick, working up to a fervent pace where every twitch of your thighs felt like lightning, but it didn’t stop you. It thrust you forward. All your mushy little brain could think to do right now was fuck and fuck and fuck until you couldn’t move anymore, until you couldn’t even keep your eyes open. Lucky for you, that was the only outcome that would stop them, too.

Chris gripped you at the waist to hold you steady so he could truly start pounding into you, losing himself in your silky cunt. You were squeezing him so perfectly and he couldn’t look away, pupils blown open wide as he watched you suck him in deep, dripping creamy white along the length of his shaft.

“You’re perfect, pup, just… j-just perfect,” he rumbled in your ear, leaning over your back to kiss and nip at your throat between gasps for breath. “Perfect little puppy, such a good girl… swear I could fuck you forever…”

Losing his patience by the minute, Leon had to stop touching himself just to keep from blowing his load early, but he was throbbing with the need to penetrate you. He could already imagine how good you must feel just by the look on Chris’ face.

“C-Chris, Chris… fuck, I’m… gonna fuckin’ bust,” he shuddered, “please…”

And Chris could tell by the look on Leon’s face that he wasn’t joking. His meaty hands printed into your skin with the effort it took for him to slow down, one hand sliding up the length of your spine to tug you up by the back of your neck like a little baby whelp.

“Think you can handle that right now, princess?” He asked in a breathy whisper, lips ghosting along the curve of your slack jaw.

Once more, you were nodding like a bobble-head, bleary eyes catching between the sight of Leon’s cock, and the sight of Chris’ hammering up beneath the soft skin of your belly. You didn’t have much capacity to wonder if you could handle them both right now, because you just so desperately wanted to anyway.

“Alright, then,” he replied in something of an affectionately patronizing tone, like he didn’t fully believe you, but he gestured for Leon to join you regardless.

Leon scrambled forward on his knees, spreading your legs open as wide as they could comfortably rest so that he had a good, clear path to you. Hooking one leg over Chris’ hip until you were upright and sandwiched between them at the head of the bed, Leon ground himself up against you, carefully angling his tip until it caught on your hole. All three of you buckled at the feeling, your breath caught in your throat and tears leaking down your chin as Leon bucked up into you, tongue lapping at every stray teardrop in a series of stilted, needy puppy kisses.

The gruff wolf was all but whimpering and whining against your skin until his head fell back in pleasure, teeth gnashing at his own lip just to maintain focus while Chris gradually approached his earlier pace, if not a bit shaky now with the added friction of Leon’s firm, swollen sex dragging back and forth alongside his own. They could feel every little dip and ridge of one another, every throb of each other’s veins, and while they knew they had a long night ahead of them in terms of helping you through your heat, they were getting dangerously close already.

In the midst of everything, you were pretty sure you came twice more just in the time it took Leon to push into you too, and your body wasn’t giving you any signs of stopping soon. You were wetter than ever and twice as incoherent, babbling complete and utter nonsense into the hot, heavy air just to cope.

“Oh, sweetheart, you’re so cute like this,” Chris growled against the crown of your head, trying his best to hold off for as long as he could, but it was all just too much— balls drawing up tight, he grunted, “You ready?”

All it took was the first semblance of please making its way past your lips for him to lose it, holding you down firmly in his lap. Rope after rope of his cum flooded into you, finally sating some of that burning emptiness you felt. You went all but limp between their firm bodies, shivering and twitching and crying in ecstasy, in relief, yet another wave of near-overwhelming rapture licking over exposed nerves. 

And then his knot began to swell. You jerked in surprise at first, but he just shushed you, nuzzling against the nape of your neck while he continued to hold you still. The weight of your clenching walls and the slickness of Chris’ spend sent Leon over the edge too, while you were distracted, and with two baseball-sized knots expanding to fill any and all empty space in your poor little cunt, you quickly realized you wouldn’t be moving anytime soon.

“O-Oh, ow,” you wept, trying to squirm a bit, but they wouldn’t let you.

They were mindful to check that you were okay, of course, because as much as it would have killed them to risk wasting any cum that could otherwise be getting you pregnant, they weren’t going to keep you knotted tonight unless you really wanted them to— this was presumably your first time, and would be considered a lot for anyone’s first time.

But you just clung to them. Any little adjustment they made was met with your grabbing hands pulling them close again, and a quiet, tearful whine. Splaying his hand out, Leon delicately rubbed your tummy to help you relax while Chris kissed you all over and massaged some of the tension from your trembling thighs, bucking gently up into you just to hear you squeak.

“You did so good, puppy,” Chris mused, “gonna make such a pretty mama.”

You were in so much pain, you were hollering and crying so hard you could barely get a breath in, and apart from holding your hand, he was powerless to help you. It was gutting.

"Shh, shh... you're doing so good, baby, just breathe with me, just breathe," He said to you, trying to manage his tone to be as reassuring as possible, but the stress had long since become him.

How could it not? He was watching his own lover split apart while conscious, pleading with the universe to ease the pain, even with an 18-gauge needle in the spine. You were miserable, and you were terrified, and Leon was terrified too. Perhaps even more than he'd ever been, because this wasn't supposed to be happening yet. He was supposed to have at least another month and a half to pamper you and watch you grow, at least another month and a half to prepare for this. 

Not to mention he wasn't entirely fond of the swarm of nurses in your face and between your legs, the rotating door of doctors and specialists working on your exposed body with absolutely no capability of understanding how important you were to him, how special and sweet you were, how little you deserved this.

It did occur to him, in the midst of all the noise, that perhaps this was the wrong idea. That he shouldn't have forced the one person he loves the most in the world to suffer like this on his behalf. That maybe he'd made a grave mistake that he could never atone for, a mistake that would surpass anything he's ever experienced in its devastation.

But all of those fears crumbled to ash when he saw her for the first time.

Monday, December 21, 2015. Winter solstice. 3:36 a.m.

She was so pink. She was so, so small, so pink, and so angry to be alive, but she was alive and crying. She was alive.

In that moment, Leon experienced whatever the opposite of blacking out was, a shot of pure adrenaline down his spine that made everything shine a little brighter. He didn't even realize he was crying with relief until he turned and saw that you were, too. You were barely cognizant, what with the delightful cocktail of shock and panic and pain medication coursing through you, but you were conscious and aware— at least for now— limp with exhaustion aside from clutching Leon's hand for dear life while the professionals got to work sewing you up, and he couldn't help but swipe your slick hair away from your forehead to shower you in tearful kisses.

"My good girl... I'm so fucking proud of you," He spoke into your hair, pressing a heavy kiss to the crown of your head as his free hand cradled your cheek, holding you as close to him as he could physically manage. "I love you so much... I love you..."

You weren't really registering much other than the pure relief of it all, but Leon couldn't blame you. In his eyes, he just witnessed you creating his entire universe, and you deserved all the rest you could get. You'd certainly need it in the coming months.

And even just the coming weeks, as many as it might take for her to incubate and grow a bit.

She was alive, and she was as healthy as she could be, considering the circumstances, but Christ, she wasn't even done cooking yet. She was so little, weighing in at just three pounds, seven ounces, and she looked more like a gummy bear than a baby. She was hooked up to so many machines in the NICU that he could barely stand to even watch after a while, for his own peace of mind.

But he couldn't relax, either, so Leon just stayed at your bedside for most of the night, watching you sleep. Killing time. Occasionally he would wander off for a walk up and down the halls, or to the cafeteria for a bitter black coffee to jump his brain, or he would linger by the window into the NICU for a while to watch her sleep, to see her pink and yellow baby blanket just barely rise and fall with every tiny breath so he could know for sure she was really here. And then he'd repeat his rounds all over again.

The nurses promised him over and over again that she was healthy, that there was no cause for concern at this point, but that didn't really stop him from concerning himself quite severely. He wasn't even sure he understood his own metric for what it would take to get him to relax at this point, so he just stopped asking questions after a while.

Walk the halls. Bitter black coffee. Check on baby. Walk back. Check on you. Wash, rinse, repeat. Eventually the nurses were looking at him like they were debating offering him an Ambien under the table just to calm him down, and perhaps because he'd grown so used to avoiding drawing attention to himself, that was when he finally decided to just sit his ass down at your bedside and stay there.

In his boredom he found that the TV was perpetually stuck on the Hallmark channel, streaming from an endless well of corny, poorly written holiday movies that left more than enough to be desired, but it was better than nothing. Leon couldn’t stand the silence, and at least it kept his mind somewhat occupied while he thumbed through that heavy book of baby names.

He’d already found one he liked— Abigail— but that still left room for one more. He couldn’t even decide if he thought that should be her first name or her middle name. All he knew was what the book told him, flowery words describing the meaning of the name as that of my father’s joy, and that was quite true, wasn’t it? She was his firstborn, and more than that, her mommy was you. Nothing in the entire universe could possibly stand to make him happier or more joyous, and thus Abigail was fitting. But how was he supposed to find another name to describe her when he hadn’t even had the opportunity to get to know her yet?

Or was this secondary name his opportunity to start a thread of her destiny for her?

It’s not like he never asked you for your opinion, you had just chosen time and time again not to give it to him. You were almost completely impartial when it came to talking about the baby, so regardless of how badly he ached for your participation in planning for the life you’d created together, he had long since become bitterly used to making decisions like this on his own.

With a deep sigh Leon let the book rest in his lap, fingertips drumming on the wooden armrests of his chair in thought of the kind of life he wanted for his baby girl. All he could think was that he wanted her to run, play, and be happy. He wanted her to be good to the world and he wanted the world to treat her even better in return. He wanted to ensure she’d never have to worry about a thing, that she would grow up kind and quick and a much better woman than he ever was a man.

He wanted her to be gentle and sweet and protected, like a princess, his jubilant little baby princess.

Lifting the book once more, Leon opened it back up to its table of contents and skimmed over the lines for the millionth time, only now he actually had a vague idea of what he might be looking for. The book was structured in sections, the first being cultural and regional names, the second being historical and literary names, and the last section was an alphabetized glossary of them all in one. It was exhaustingly organized and comprehensive to the last detail, but hey, so was he.

Tracing the page with two fingertips, he found the historical section of the table and went down the line, skimmed over architects, artists, explorers, war heroes, religious figures… all the way down to royalty.

Leon’s hope wavered a little bit when he found most of the names under that section to be underwhelming or flat-out bad when paired with ‘Abigail,’ but his mind had been set on that for so long that he’d already decided he wasn’t budging on it. He was toying with the idea of taking a break from his search for the night, until an entry on the list of princess names caught his eye. In his exhaustion, he must have previously overlooked it.

Charlotte.

“Charlotte Abigail,” Leon mumbled aloud, testing the name on his tongue. “Charlotte Abigail Kennedy…”

It flowed from his lips like a beautiful waltz.

The enticing scent of Leon's umpteenth black coffee was the first thing you noticed when you woke up, followed by the dull, full body ache that weighed you down to the hospital bed. Your head was throbbing, your eyes and throat were stinging and dry from overexertion, but more than that, you felt something like relief.

Yes, it was definitely relief, because any amount of pain in that moment felt like reprieve in comparison to active labor. And maybe you were still a bit fuzzy from the meds, but you weren't complaining.

Slowly, you blinked awake and took in your surroundings, the room quiet aside from the occasional beep of electronic medical equipment, and the subtle, rhythmic rumble of... Leon snoring?

Tilting your head, you saw Leon right there at your bedside, coffee untouched and still steaming on the little tray next to him. His legs were outstretched, arms crossed at his chest, and he had his head tilted back with that comically large book of baby names split open to rest over his face, blocking the fluorescent lights and rising sun from his tired eyes. You just watched him for a moment, knowing he'd likely spent all night fretting over you until he couldn't keep his eyes open anymore.

For as much as you would have loved to just lay there and enjoy the quiet for a moment, though, you knew it was probably wiser to let him know you were awake. At least that way you could talk him into forfeiting his coffee.

"Hey," you spoke up gently, your voice hushed with sleep and a bit hoarse, "I'm pretty sure the shop in the lobby sells bookmarks."

He jolted a little and then stirred, gravity pulling the heavy book down until his arm shot up to catch it and lift it from his face with an exhausted look of surprise. "Y-You're awake—”

"Gimme that," you interrupted, arm outstretched in a dramatic show of grabby-hands at the paper cup of coffee placed just outside your reach. You could barely even remember the last time you were allowed a sip of coffee, and having to lay here smelling it but not tasting it when you so sorely needed it was torture.

Leon blinked once or twice in confusion, clearing away the haze that clouded his frayed neurons, and as his eyes followed the path between your fingertips and the shitty cup of black coffee he'd fallen asleep before having the chance to drink, he couldn't help but puff out a little laugh, handing it off to you without hesitation. For fuck's sake, you'd earned it, hadn't you?

The cup had been sitting there idle for just long enough that its contents weren't blistering hot, but perfectly drinkable. You took a quick sip, and then another, nose scrunching up for a moment because it tasted more like a dirty ashtray than it did coffee, but somehow it still went down like liquid gold. At least the taste was enough to keep you from drinking it too fast.

"How do you feel, pup?" Leon asked, tracing the curve of your cheekbone with a delicate thumb. As joyful as it was to see you awake and in decent spirits, he had to ask, because it's not like you were just waking up from any old nap. He watched you split apart last night. He could still smell your blood. Surely you had more to concern yourself about than caffeine.

Setting aside the cup, you searched your mind for the right way to articulate how you felt right now, but found it exceptionally difficult to encapsulate what all was going on up there after giving birth for the first time. So, you decided to start with how your body felt and work your way through it from there.

"Sore, like a bowling ball went through me... but it's not unbearable. I think the pain meds are still working," you began, tilting your head to let your cheek squish into the palm of his hand. "I feel a little numb and groggy."

With a sympathetic hum, he nodded, leaning over you to smooth your messy hair back and press a kiss to your forehead. "I'm not surprised, baby, you do seem a bit silly. They drugged you up pretty good," he said, speaking from experience, "but at least you're not in too much pain."

A beat of surprisingly comfortable silence passed between you two as you finished waking up and Leon just stared at you, as he often did. While the air between the two of you felt thankfully free of tension, it wasn’t without anticipation, nor was it without the presence of that massive elephant.

You knew she was okay because if she wasn’t, Leon would be having a nuclear meltdown, but you barely even got to see her before you passed out, so you didn’t know how okay she was. 

“Where is she?” You asked gently, hands fidgeting in your lap.

“She’s in the little incubator, but they said they could bring her in here when you woke up, if you were feeling well enough,” he answered, looking up at you through his lashes like a pleading puppy as he asked, “are you?”

You felt a rush deep in your chest that you couldn’t explain, emotion, and you found that your head was bobbing up and down in a nod before you even thought about it. You didn’t need to think about it. Of course your feelings about your situation and this baby were… complicated, to put it kindly, but you spent seven-ish months cooking the damn thing, so you might as well take the chance to hold her and get to meet her, right?

Leon didn’t waste any time scrambling off to get a nurse, and as you sat there waiting, you couldn’t help but wonder what she was going to be like. You weren’t ignorant of the fact that newborn babies didn’t have strong features yet, but you wondered if she would have any hair on her head, or what she would feel like in your arms, or what little sounds she might make. The few short minutes it took for Leon to return with your baby and a couple of nurses felt like a million years.

The door opened, and your heart stopped beating for a second. Your mouth dried and your eyes burned with tears.

She was so little.

Even swaddled up in a blanket, her tiny body was barely the width of Leon's forearm, her little head rested in the crook of his elbow while her socked and blanketed feet were tucked in the palm of his hand. Everything you felt in this moment was truly overwhelming— fright, nerves, and perhaps even a bit of pride, because come on. You made that thing. Willingly or not, you made your own little human, and in a removed context, that was crazy.

She was so little that you were almost afraid to touch her, trembling as Leon lowered her into your arms, but right away there was something about having her near that felt familiar to you.

Like an old friend.

For a long few minutes, you just cried. Deep, ugly, open-mouth cries that made your entire body feel weak. You couldn’t possibly get ahold of yourself, or even begin to understand how you were meant to.

Stooping down to kiss the crown of your head, Leon spoke gently into your hair, voice thick with emotion, “I-I named her Charlotte. Charlotte Abigail.”

Oh, how pretty. Internally you had to admit that he chose well, whatever his reasoning was.

“A beautiful name for a beautiful girl,” you sniveled, thumb caressing the thin, tender skin of her cheek, your chest throbbing as she squirmed and poked the tip of her tiny tongue out. “I-Is she okay? Are there any issues?”

The nurses calmly explained to you that she seemed to be regulating her temperature well enough on her own, but that the incubator was a precaution that would allow you and Leon the opportunity to get some actual rest. Her blood tests didn’t show any concerns and her oxygen levels were okay, but other than that, it was too soon to tell if anything else might be off, and they spared you the anxiety of getting too specific about the potential complications just yet. She would likely be spending at least 30 days in the NICU for good measure.

You, on the other hand, would be well enough to be on your feet as soon as the numbness wore off. That wasn’t to say it would feel good if you did, just that it was possible and wouldn’t kill you, though Leon would probably need to help you around for a few days… as if he needed the doctor’s order to do that.

Once they were sure you were healthy and comfortable, the nurses stepped out and for the very first time, it was just you, Leon, and your child.

“I’m so proud of you,” Leon whispered, watching you reverently. The sun had risen enough now to drench you in a saintly glow, your skin radiant and dewy with motherhood, your eyes glittering with tears as you gazed down at the sleepy baby cradled in your arms. “You’ve come such a long way, puppy, and just look at what you made for me. Look at what a perfect little angel you made for daddy.”

Letting out a slow breath from your nose, you resisted the urge to react to that. He’d done a pretty decent job of acting normal since you went into labor, and you didn’t realize how badly you were hoping he would keep it up until he ruined it with a brisk return to form. Perhaps the blame was on you for getting too comfortable with your expectations that high in the first place.

What felt especially unfair about it, however, was that his phrasing got beneath your skin more than you thought it would. Telling you that you’d come such a long way, and all because you made a perfect baby for him.

For daddy.

You’d only just had the chance to allow yourself to feel some kind of a bond with her, and Leon was already claiming ownership over it without a second thought. You wanted to snap at him that not everything was about him, that it wasn’t your goal to please him even if something you did made him happy, but you just couldn’t bring yourself to say any of it.

Charlotte hadn’t even been born for 24 hours yet, you couldn’t start fighting in front of her already.

You stood in front of the window with Charlotte swaddled tightly in your arms, letting her watch the glittery, falling snow outside in an attempt to calm her. She was red in the face and hollering with all the power in her little lungs— which was a lot, you’d come to learn— quite cranky about the fact that your milk was taking its time to come in. In defense of your boobs, the girls thought they were going to have eight more weeks to prepare than they ended up getting.

But at a certain point you just had to wonder when enough might be enough. You knew it wasn’t your fault, that your difficulty producing breastmilk so soon after going into premature labor didn’t reflect negatively upon your ability to love and provide for your daughter, so why did it feel that way? You were trying to keep ahold of your emotions for the sake of your daughter while wondering somewhere in the back of your mind if you were even fit to care for her, if it was your fault that she was starving.

“It’s common for newborns to lose a little bit of their birth weight in the first few weeks, especially waiting for mama’s milk to come in,” the attending nurse calmly explained to you as she changed the sheets on the bed. “Don’t be so hard on yourself, dear. There’s no guide to being a new mother.”

“Thank you,” you replied over the shrill cries of your daughter, letting some of the tension drop from your shoulders. Leon had told you nearly the same thing practically a thousand times over the past few days, but it was hard not to convince yourself that he didn’t know what he was talking about and was just spouting nonsense to make you feel better. It felt more legitimate coming from a professional.

Once she finished up changing the bedding, the nurse offered to take Charlotte for a while if you needed a break, but for right now, you didn’t really mind. Having her close was supposed to stimulate milk production, as you’d been told, and for lack of a better way to put it, you sort of enjoyed hogging her from Leon. He’d stepped out for the morning to check in at work and grab a few things from the house, so he wasn’t here to take her anyway, but you felt it was your responsibility to seize every available opportunity to bond with her. You needed her to know that you were there for her, that you weren’t budging, and that you never would.

Being alone with her was a treat. She really was so cute, just a teeny tiny little thing, and you could have already sworn she had your nose. She was pretty.

“Oh, Lottie, Lottie, Lottie,” you sighed affectionately, cupping the back of her head to cradle her close to your shoulder, gently swaying and bouncing on your feet. “What am I gonna do with you, huh?”

As expected, her only response was a continuation of shrill cries. Part of you worried that your presence wasn’t comforting her at all, but every time you slowed in rocking her or made any move that she perceived as you getting ready to put her down, she hollered louder and clung to you for dear life. Clearly she knew where her bread was buttered.

You crossed the room in slow, bouncing steps, trying to keep her distracted just long enough for you to sit down with her in the rocking chair. Little as she was, your arms were getting tired from holding her up, and you just needed a bit of a break from it. Pressing your lips to her soft forehead, you breathed in through your nose and began quietly singing to her.

“I’m… a lonely little petunia in an onion patch, an onion patch, an onion patch,” you hummed, “I’m a lonely little petunia in an onion patch, and all I do is cry all day… boo-hoo, boo-hoo…”

It was an old, old song, and you weren’t even really sure where you remembered it from, but Charlotte seemed to enjoy it, and it felt fitting enough right now. Dragging in a breath, Charlotte reached up to rub her eyes with her chubby little fists, wailing cries beginning to soften down to weepy whimpers. It was victorious moments like this that almost made you forget how you got here.

“Hey, sweetheart,” came Leon’s voice from behind, reminding you exactly how you got here, “how are my girls?”

Almost immediately, Charlotte started screaming again.

Sighing out an exhausted breath, you turned over your shoulder to watch Leon approach, trying not to let it show on your expression just how annoyed you were that he’d ruined her calming mood right after you managed to get her there.

“Cranky,” you answered him simply.

Leon clicked his tongue and moved to sit at the edge of the coffee table in front of you, reaching out to brush your hair away from your face with a sympathetic gleam in his eye. “No milk yet, huh?”

You shook your head.

“Oh, puppy… I’m sorry.”

The look on your face gutted him. He could tell you were blaming yourself in some way, feeling guilty for not being able to produce quite yet, but his mind wasn’t lingering anywhere near blaming you for this. You’d already been through so much just to deliver the baby— if anything, he’d be more surprised if these next few weeks were to proceed perfectly after that. You were a superhero to Leon right now, a goddess, and not even gods or heroes were exempt from hardship, from plain bad luck.

“It’s fine,” you said with a slow sigh, “the nurses swear we’re getting somewhere. There was some of this… I don’t know, like… clear, sappy stuff that came out this morning, and they said it’s good for her, so…”

Nodding gently, Leon took your hand and squeezed it, trying to get you to actually look at him. “Well, that’s a good sign, right?”

“I think so… I don’t know. I hope so.”

“I hope so, too, baby.”

A few moments of silence fell between you— aside from the screaming newborn, of course— and Leon continued to think about how proud he was of you. When he first brought you home with him, you were adamantly against the idea of having babies, let alone being pregnant at all. But you took it like such a champion, nourished and cared for your child anyway, his child, and even after going into labor unexpectedly early, your priorities and your focus still remained on her.

He couldn’t confidently say he’d have been as brave if it were him. That alone gave him a lot of reflecting to do.

“You’re incredible, you know that?” Leon asked, squeezing your hand again. “Absolutely incredible.”

“I don’t know about that,” you puffed out a dry breath, finally looking up at him. “Women have been birthing babies for thousands of years. I’m no different from any of them, unless you count panic-attacking myself into early labor, and even then I’m not the first. And I definitely won’t be the last.”

Shaking his head in affectionate disagreement, Leon said, “As far as I’m concerned, you didn’t just hang the moon, you molded it with your bare hands. Just… take the compliment, pup. You deserve it.”

A slight smile graced your lips for just a second, like you briefly allowed yourself to believe what he was saying. As much as it pained him to think about, Leon knew you hadn’t been given a whole lot of incentive to take him at his word on anything, but when it came to the praise you’d earned for making him a father, for growing his baby in you, it was so important to him that you knew he wasn’t just talking out of his ass.

So he spoke up again, following his praises with a gentle, genuine question; “Why are you being so hard on yourself?”

This gave you pause. He wasn’t wrong by any means— you absolutely were being hard on yourself here, in every way you could think of. The ways you’d been talking about and carrying yourself since he came home from San Francisco were indicative enough of that. It was like you were cowering from yourself, avoiding every part of you that made you you, like a mouse in a lab finally recognizing which buttons would shock you.

“She needs me,” you finally muttered, cradling Charlotte closer to your chest, even as she screamed your eardrum out. “She depends on me, I can’t just… fail her.”

“Fail her?” Leon whispered, encouraging you to continue.

Swallowing back nerves, you suddenly found you were having a difficult time making sense of what you’d been feeling lately, let alone putting it into articulate words. Still, you replied to the best of your frazzled, tired ability, “She was supposed to have eight more weeks… she wasn’t ready to be born yet, and I freaked myself out so much that I put her at risk. I’m so grateful that she’s okay, that it didn’t end badly, but Leon… it could have. It really could have.”

“I know,” he soothed. “I know it could have, but it didn’t. It didn’t. Look at her, she’s here and she’s alive and she’s healthy. She’s got strong lungs. She’s got your nose. She’s perfect, sweetheart, she’s absolutely perfect, and that’s not in spite of you, it’s because of you. I’ll repeat that as many times as it takes for you to internalize it.”

That framing of the situation was surprisingly insightful, coming from Leon, though you supposed he’d had some practice in forgiving himself over the years.

Sniffling, you nodded, letting out a shaky breath. “T-Thank you… daddy.”

He leaned in to kiss your forehead, and Charlotte began to settle.

You were so confused when you woke up in the middle of the night to Charlotte crying again— not because of anything she was doing differently, but because of how you felt. Sitting up in bed, you briefly glanced over at Leon to find that the commotion had roused him too, stirring him from a light sleep.

“I can get her,” he was quick to rasp out, voice clouded with grogginess, but for once, you put a hand on his shoulder to stop him.

“No, no, wait,” you whispered, your other hand kneading at your sore chest in an attempt to soothe the discomfort, but this wasn’t the same kind of breast pain you’d grown used to by now. They were tender and full to the touch, nipples stinging under your nightgown.

And leaking.

Eyes widening, you shot out of bed with a quiet, excited exclamation of, “oh, shit,” not even taking the time to mull over how silly it seemed to be so ecstatic that your nipples were leaking milk through your favorite nightgown. All you could think about right now was her. You could finally sate her hunger.

Leon sat up too, rubbing his eyes and leaning over to turn the bedside lamp on, trying to wake himself up enough to understand what you were acting so urgently about. Only once Charlotte’s cries were silenced and replaced with a soft, greedy suckling sound did he realize what was happening.

“Oh,” he gasped, stunned, “shit.”

You just laughed, completely unable to wipe the stupid grin off your face. Feeding for the first time felt really fucking bizarre, but with how happy you were that your daughter was finally able to eat, you couldn’t bring yourself to care even slightly. That was far from the biggest thing on your mind.

“She’s eating,” you beamed, turning over your shoulder to look at Leon, desperate to share this moment with the only person who could truly understand your relief. “She’s eating, Leon, she’s— she’s perfect. Holy shit.”

“You’re perfect,” he smiled wide, crawling out of bed to join you where you stood by the crib, his strong arms slinking gently around your waist. Pressing a kiss to the highest point of your cheekbone, Leon whispered in your ear, “I knew you could do it, puppy. I love you, I love you both so much.”

And now you were crying. You couldn’t help it.

Charlotte fed for a good long while that night, gulping down every stray drop she could find, and you and Leon just watched her in complete awe. She could barely keep her eyes open in her satisfaction, long lashes fluttering angelically upon chubby cheeks, her squishy little lips bobbing back and forth with every suckle as you both cooed at her and cheered her on.

Wiping away a drop of milk from her chin, Leon preened, “Oh, little Lottie… such a good eater, princess, my goodness…”

“Such a good eater,” you echoed, adding playfully, “must’ve gotten that from your daddy. He gets grouchy without breakfast, too.”

“Hey now, it is the most important meal of the day,” he pointed out to his own defense, very much in on the joke, though he couldn’t help but add another cheeky point that was reserved only for your ears. “Well… the second most important meal of the day, right behind dessert.”

Groaning, you rolled your eyes at him, “Cornball. You’re a horny, horny cornball.”

He only smirked, “Guilty as charged, pup,” and kissed you again.

Your mood improved a lot over the next several days, and Leon was so grateful for it. The timing couldn’t have been better for squashing your insecurities about being able to care for Charlotte. Waking up to feed her wasn’t something that stressed you out anymore, it was something that made you feel useful and needed, which you always were, but now you truly believed it. Leon joked more than once that he’d never seen you happier to whip your boobs out at any given time.

You were eating well, you were laughing, you were getting lots of good rest, and you were actually talking to him. Like, talking talking, not just nodding your head and pretending to follow along. You told him about your day, you told him how you were feeling, you commentated on TV shows together. Your unanticipated stay in the NICU was turning out to feel a lot more like a dream than a nightmare, and as such, he was almost reluctant to see it end.

But time marches on, as it always does. Part of him worried you’d go right back to being difficult once you were home and the novelty of new parenthood wore off. Part of him wanted to trust that you wouldn’t, because you truly understood everything now. Didn’t you?

The final week of Charlotte’s monitoring was dwindling down, and now that he wasn’t so preoccupied with worrying himself sick about you both, he couldn’t stop thinking about what you said to him before you went into labor.

‘Daddy, I have to tell you something.’

Whatever it was, you never told him. In the chaos of everything that happened right after, he almost forgot you even mentioned it, but it’d just been gnawing at him since the dust settled.

Leon wasn’t sure how to approach this with you. Talking about it clearly distressed you last time, even though you brought it up on your own, and he didn’t want to risk setting you off, but the intensity of emotion it brought was undoubtedly indicative of its importance. By principle, you should tell him if there’s anything he needs to know, right?

Maybe it wasn’t all that important. Maybe your reaction at the time was just a product of your condition, the hormones and anxiety, and maybe you hadn’t even thought about it since that night. Maybe it really wasn’t a big deal.

So why had it been so obviously eating you alive during the final leg of your pregnancy?

“Baby?” Leon asked quietly, tilting his head to look at you. It was three in the morning and you were laying in bed together after Charlotte finally fell back asleep for the millionth time, partly trying to get some more rest and partly preparing yourselves to have to get up again at any moment. But it was peaceful, and he hoped that would mean you were calm and comfortable enough to have this conversation.

Humming in acknowledgment, your eyes met his. He had his arm around you, thumb caressing you at the waist, your cheek against his chest. It was now or never.

“I’ve just been thinking lately… the night Lottie was born, you said you had something to tell me,” he began, pouring all his effort into coming off as non-threatening as possible, careful not to spook you. “The little lady interrupted you and I never got to hear what it was. Do you remember, sweetheart?”

At first you couldn’t move, completely paralyzed in his arms. Your initial inclination was to panic, of course, but for once in your life, the nerves weren’t manifesting like they probably should have been.

Or, rather, like they definitely should have been.

You resumed breathing, biting your lip while you tried to organize your thoughts and come to a decision. It would be a tough shot to lie right now, you knew that, and while you would have usually tried to come up with a convoluted way to worm yourself out of this, for some reason, you didn’t even really feel the need to right now. Leon had been in a great mood. You were pretty sure he hadn’t stopped smiling since Charlotte was born, and even leading up to her birth, he had been acting so gentle and loving with you.

But you still needed to cover your bases if you were going to be honest with him.

“Do you remember saying that whatever it is, we’ll handle it? That I wouldn’t be in trouble?”

Uh oh, Leon thought to himself, but didn’t dare let it show on his expression. That’s not a great start.

“I do,” he nodded encouragingly, “and that still stands.”

All you had was his word, and that was going to have to do, wasn’t it? Taking a deep breath, you tightened your arms around his middle as if preemptively pleading for mercy, and then you quietly admitted, “I-I broke the rules while you were away on that mission.”

He figured as much while speculating on what it might have been, so this didn’t really floor him too much yet. “Okay. What rules did you break?”

You hesitated for a beat, looking away to collect your thoughts and then back again, hoping he could see the guilt in your eyes, the regret.

“I went outside,” you whispered, feeling an awkward and unpleasant heat burning at your ears— shame. “I-I went on a walk, a long walk, and…”

Now it was Leon who wasn’t breathing. “And?”

“And I tried to get h-help.”

There it was. You tried to get help. Help. As if you needed any fucking help when you had Leon.

But then again, he thought, she didn’t have me. I wasn’t there.

His bottom lip quivered until he bit it back, stooping his head down to bury his face in your hair, hiding, both arms holding you tightly to him. He wasn’t sure how to feel. He thought he was prepared for anything you might have to confess, but this… this was devastating. This felt awful.

“God fucking damn it, puppy,” he wept, “what were you thinking?”

The realization that he was crying made you tear up too. He wasn’t angry, he was anguished.

“I-I’m sorry… I know, I’m sorry—”

“Did anything happen? Did anyone see you? Did anyone touch you?”

“No, no, n-nothing happened, no one touched me, I promise—”

“Don’t you ever do that shit again,” he sobbed weakly into the crown of your hair, clutching you to him like you’d fall apart if he let go, or perhaps like he would fall apart. “Do you hear me?”

You just nodded, stifling your cries with a hand over your mouth to keep from waking the baby. She was sleeping so peacefully in the crib a mere few feet away.

“I hear you, I hear you, I promise I won’t ever do it again… it was freezing and I was so scared, I… I couldn’t get home fast enough…”

Home. Was that what it was to you now?

“Good,” Leon said firmly, but not apathetically, sighing out a deep, shaky breath. “You don’t just have yourself to worry about anymore.”

You and Leon were practically tangled with one another, stuck together like glue as you desperately tried to soothe each other. Silence fell around you again.

The last time Leon remembered feeling this alive, well… he was still living, and that was a long time ago. When lonely and undead as long as Leon has been, it can be difficult to show restraint upon first contact with anything that evokes such emotion. 

But he did, for a while. You were just too cute, he thought as he stood over your slumbering body that first night. It wasn’t something he liked to make a habit of, but a light hunting season for him meant starvation through the winter, and he didn’t have much choice but to go wandering into the nearby little village for a quick bite to eat. 

Until he found you. 

You looked like a cherub sleeping there in your plush little bed, buried beneath a quilt he could only assume you made yourself. Precious, fragile. You looked especially fragile. 

And humans are so fragile, he thought. You smelled so sweet, it made his teeth ache just standing there staring at you without acting upon his festering need to sate his appetite, but he couldn’t bring himself to do it. He didn’t want to scare you, or worse, lose control of himself and kill you. 

He wandered silently around your little cottage in hopes of learning more about you. It was tidy but lived in, well-kept in a way that made him think you were probably a good homemaker. Your old leather boots sat by the door, dirtied by years of garden work and general wear. There was a little handmade ceramic candle holder on your bedside table, the candle in it burned nearly down to the base, and he wondered if maybe you’d held onto it because the piece was sentimental to you. Carefully arranged bouquets of flowers were strung together and hung up above the cracked window, likely to dry them out and preserve them. 

And suddenly he realized that maybe he would like to preserve a flower for himself. 

He couldn’t allow himself to feed from anyone in your village that night. If word spread around about a vicious animal attack or some other form of brutality, it would only hinder his ability to ultimately get to you, and he couldn’t risk that. Weak and delirious and ravenously hungry as he was, Leon forced himself to bid you adieu and stalk off into the night, back to his crumbling old castle in the middle of the woods… but not before leaving you a gift. 

His gift. The gift.

Your lips parted in a dreamy sigh as you slept, rolling over onto your back. He admired your face for a moment before he couldn’t take it anymore— if he didn’t leave now, you were going to become dinner, and he couldn’t have that. Hastily, he bit down on the meat of his palm and squeezed, watching as his old crimson blood bubbled up to the surface, and then he held it up over you.

Drip. Right between your rosy, plush lips. Even in your slumber your face scrunched up at the foreign taste, your heavy arm coming up to swipe at yourself like you were just trying to get your hair out of your eyes.

And just like that, he was gone, having taken his leave through the very same open window that gave him the idea. 

He wasn’t a monster, of course. He kept an eye on you as you experienced the very same pain he felt decades ago. 

The next day, you woke up later than usual feeling quite lousy. Your whole body was sore and weighty and, reasonably enough, you chalked it up to poor form while tending your garden the day before. It was an easy mistake to make from time to time, after all. But as the day dragged on, you only felt worse, so you retired to bed right after supper that evening. 

The day after that, you woke up in the early afternoon feeling awful. Your head was screaming with a migraine and your heart was beating slow and hard in your chest. You were sweating and shaking and could barely even open your eyes because the light hurt so bad. A friend stopped in to check on you after noticing how late of a start to the day you were getting, and almost as soon as she stepped in the door, she was rushing back out to the apothecary, begging the village healer to come check on you. 

The village healer loaded you up with tricks and tinctures and anything she could think of to break your fever or at least ease your pain. Dried herbs and poppyseeds and fungus ground up in the mortar and pestle, the paste slathered under your nose, on the bottoms of your feet, steeped into tea that was too hot for you to drink. None of it worked. At a loss for advice to give, the village healer urged you to drink plenty of water and rest, and to quarantine yourself. Couldn’t risk passing whatever you had to the rest of the community. 

You woke up drenched in sweat in the middle of the night and didn’t even have time to throw your quilt aside as you doubled over the side of your bed and vomited. This continued for a few moments until you could barely breathe, tears dripping from your eyes as your face reddened with strain and you inwardly resented yourself, knowing you would have to drag your sick body out of bed to clean up the mess you’d just made. You struck a match and lit the candle at your bedside and hesitantly peered down to survey the damage, only to be met with the image of your beautiful wooden floors drenched in blood. Reaching up to wipe your mouth with the back of your hand yielded the same result. 

As you stared at your own blood in horror, Leon stared at you in adoration from the other side of the window. For a moment your bleary eyes caught on the glass and he wondered if you saw him, but if you did, you didn’t react. 

Even at a distance he could hear your heartbeat continuing to weaken. Soon enough you would be just like him, a beautiful preserved flower, and better yet, you couldn’t be harmed. You wouldn’t change, you wouldn’t grow, you wouldn’t die.

Although your village certainly thought you did. It was a dreary, overcast day when the village healer decided to stop in and check on you, only to find you completely lifeless and splattered with blood where you laid. She had to be the one to break it to your family that you had lost your battle with whatever illness plagued you. Leon watched from the shadows as your father lifted your limp, blood-soaked body from your bed and held you close, sobbing, hesitating to admit to himself that you were gone.

By the end of the afternoon, as the sun went down and the drizzling rain refused to let up, the entire village was standing over your grave, watching you get lowered into the soft, soggy ground. 

Once everyone had paid their respects, Leon watched them all retreat to share a drink in your honor, hushed whispers revealing just how unsettled everyone was by your untimely demise. You were so young, they said, so bright and healthy and undeserving of your fate. They wondered what it meant for themselves, and only Leon knew it didn’t mean anything at all. Your illness wasn’t going to spread because he had what he wanted now, and that was you. 

As soon as the final candle was blown out for the night, Leon took a shovel from your garden and began to dig, the metal piercing easily through the soaked earth until it revealed the handmade box you’d been laid to rest in. He popped the top off and looked at you, your arms still crossed delicately over your chest with a beaded rosary tucked beneath your palms, a pale flower in your hair. Your family didn’t need to know they’d be spending the rest of their lives praying over an empty coffin in the ground. 

Leon scooped you up into his arms, cleaned up after himself and set off into the woods with you clutched to his chest like a princess.

It was a few days before you finally roused. Leon had barely taken his eyes off of you the entire time you slept, and admittedly, he was a bit grateful it had taken you so long, for your own sake. He watched over you and cared for you as the last of your body heat drained out and your fangs descended behind your lips. From what he remembered, that was the most painful part of the transformation, and you were lucky to have slept through the worst of it. 

When your eyes finally shot open, he could barely contain his excitement. In one swift movement you sat up on the couch, bringing one hand up to clutch at your pounding head, the other massaging your sore jaw as your worried eyes darted around the room to drink in your surroundings. Then and only then did your gaze finally land on Leon. 

The fright and confusion on your face were evident. He knew you would have a lot of questions, and he was prepared to answer them. 

“There you are, darling,” he greeted you warmly, the first words he’d ever spoken to you. “How are you feeling?”

"W-Where am I?" You rasped, throat sore and shot from vomiting up blood the other day. Once your new condition fully set in, you would heal, but for now you were still a touch miserable. "Who are you?"

“I’m Leon,” he was gentle in introducing himself, taking your cold, shaking hand in his own so he could brush a polite kiss over your knuckles, “and this is your new home.” 

You blinked slowly at him, brows furrowed as you mulled over what he meant, and you came up short. Tears welled up in your bloodshot eyes and you hesitated for a moment before asking him a question you were afraid to know the answer to; “Am I… Did I die?” 

Leon wasn’t quite sure how to answer that at first. He imagined that question being posed much later in the conversation, so it sort of caught him off guard. He took a breath and then replied gently, “Something like that, yes.” 

“Huh?” 

“Shh, don’t worry,” he whispered, kneeling on the floor beside the couch so he could get on your level, his cold, pale fingers tracing gently over your lifeless skin. “You’re safe, your family is safe, your village is safe. I’m just here to take care of you, my beloved, to guide you in this tricky space between life and death. Do you trust me?” 

Strangely enough, you did-- or, rather, you felt compelled to. 

But that didn’t make the implications of your condition any easier on you. You were such a frightened little lamb, your cheeks hollowing and your eyes glowing like rubies and your skin tone taking on more and more of a pallid quality by the day as you refused to feed. He knew you would have some difficulty with this at first— after all, you were just far too sweet to kill anything— but he also knew you would only become weaker and more agitated if you continued to starve, and perhaps more grim, you would remain stuck in this odd limbo between death and vampirism. 

He tried everything he could think of. You wouldn’t drink animal blood, from the body or in a glass, and you certainly refused human blood in either form too. Every time he broached the topic of sating your hunger you would cower away from him and shake your head, eyes screwed shut as you continued to deny the reality of your situation. Starvation brought forth only misery, that much Leon knew, misery and longing and weakness and worse, everything he didn’t want for you. 

For two weeks you pushed back on the topic, insisting that if you couldn’t truly die, you would rather starve than take the life of another. As much as it pained him to see you this way, Leon appreciated that you could be so stubborn about your morals. He just wished it wouldn’t come at the cost of your own well-being.

He left you at the castle one night to go hunting himself. It wasn’t often he’d stumble into humans in these woods, especially during the winter, but he hoped he would get lucky for himself anyway. Leon burned a few hours stalking through the trees and all he had to show for it when he returned home was a few small animals that wouldn't last him more than two light meals, but it was better than nothing, he thought.

Then he stepped through the creaking castle doors and his nose perked up to the familiar rich scent of human blood-- thick and heady in the air, cloyingly sweet and indulgent. Intoxicated by it for the moment, it didn’t really dawn on him immediately what that meant… until he followed the scent from the foyer to the living room and found you. 

You were on your knees in front of the fireplace, hunched over the writhing body of the village healer, her eyes wide and glassy as she choked out gurgled sounds of agony and clawed weakly at you to let her go. You didn’t even seem to notice Leon as he entered the room, a concerned grimace on his face, though it was accompanied by a tangible sense of relief that you were finally feeding. 

“Sweetheart,” he said lowly, causing you to blink with confusion and look up at him through your lashes, the poor village healer’s carotid still clenched tightly between your teeth. “Easy now, you’ll make yourself sick.” 

Your brows furrowed and you bit down a little bit harder, siphoning out a few final greedy gulps from the woman before dropping her from your grasp, your eyes still trained on Leon as her weak body flopped limply to the floor. His eyes softened with empathy as he looked you over, gore dribbling down your chin and the front of your white dress, your stomach puffy like an engorged tick. Now that you weren’t feeding anymore it would seem you made the same realization he had, the fog of desire clearing in your brain to make room for the shame and discomfort. With a soft whimper, you reached for him with both arms outstretched, but otherwise didn’t move. 

Leon gave you a nod of understanding before scooping you up into his arms, pressing a soft kiss to your forehead as he carried you out of the parlor. “My poor baby,” he sighed softly, “It gets easier, I promise. I’m so proud of you.” 

He ran a hot bath for you and left you to soak for a while as he got to work cleaning up the mess you’d made. The village healer was barely clinging to what remained of her life, and while he was extremely tempted to nurse her back to health and keep her around to continue feeding on, he knew it would hurt you. He could already tell you hated yourself for victimizing her in the first place, the very same woman who’d tried so hard to save your life just weeks ago and who was responsible for ensuring the health of the entire village, which included your friends and family. 

So he mopped up the blood, bottled what he could and wrapped her wounds to the best of his ability before compelling her to forget, dumping her just at the edge of the trees outside the village so someone would find her in the morning.

When he returned again, tired and dirtied from hauling an unconscious woman through the woods on your behalf, you were still relaxing in the tub. The water was tinted pink from all the blood and you still looked a bit swollen in the middle, but the color was returning to your skin and the expression on your face was one of such complete exhaustion that he wasn’t sure if you were actually conscious at first, until your gaze fluttered up to meet his. 

Leon let out a deep, sweet sigh, sitting on the bench beside the porcelain clawfoot bath as he took your hand in his and whispered, “What am I going to do with you, huh?” 

“I-I’m sorry,” you said just as quietly, bottom lip quivering as you continued to drift back down from your blood-induced daze. “I d-didn’t want to h-hurt her…” 

“Shh, shh, I know, darling,” his other hand came forward to pet gently through your wet hair. “She’s going to be alright, I made sure of that. But this can’t happen again, okay? I’ll help you get control of your urges, I promise, but you have to listen to me.” 

You were nodding along as he spoke, clutching his hand and shivering in the hot bath. Even transformed you were still fragile. Leon wanted nothing more than to care for you like the fine china you were.

It was fun watching you learn how to walk, so to speak. You were like a baby deer, taking careful steps and looking back at him for reassurance after each one, like his guidance was all you could think to cling to. While your gingerly approach to things was incredibly endearing, he loved watching you grow to love your new abilities with an innocent sense of excitement that he hadn’t seen in a long time, not in himself or in anyone else, really. 

You’d taken to exploring the rafters and the view of things from the ceiling, leaving the candles in your room unlit all night just so you could bask in how odd and cool it felt to see so well in the dark. It scared the moonlight out of him every time, when he would scour every inch of the castle in search of you just to find you perched criss-cross on the ceiling, lost in a lengthy novel in a pitch black room. 

But he would never scold you, never tell you ‘no.’ In his mind that was a very important lesson for you to learn, one that would open you up to endless possibilities and happiness in an otherwise bleak state of consciousness. 

So, when your small voice chimed in from the parlor ceiling one night and startled him more than he’d like to admit, and you asked him a deceptively simple question– “What now?”-- he knew exactly how he wanted to respond. 

“Indulge,” he said just as simply, sitting calmly down on the chaise lounge to look up at you, hanging from the rafters by your knees. “Let me ask you this. What’s something you’ve always wanted to do?”

You took pause, humming in thought for a moment. All your life you were never much of a forward thinker because you didn't really have to be. You lived your little old life moment by moment, taking extra special care to appreciate the here and now. You had good friends, a loving family, a beautiful community, food on your plate and a warm bed to return home to every night. That didn’t leave you wanting for much.

Finally, you spoke shyly, "I guess I always wanted to fall in love."

It was so quiet, if he was still human, he wouldn’t have heard you. But he wasn’t, and he did. The corner of his lip tugged up into an endeared and somewhat amused expression, baring the sharp edge of his right canine. 

Leon adjusted his posture, sinking back into the couch to gaze up at you, trying to pretend like he wasn’t looking between your legs where your upside-down position left your skirt flipped up nearly to your waist. He cleared his throat softly and cooed, “You poor thing, you’ve never loved before?” 

Your face burned and you avoided his eyes, stretching your arms out toward the floor just to give yourself something to do. “N-No,” you began, smoothing your skirt out over your thighs just to watch it ride up again. With a short huff of breath you pulled yourself back up into a normal sitting position on the rafters, staring up at the ceiling. “I guess I just never had the chance.” 

“What, not enough fish in your little pond?” He teased, quirking an eyebrow at you. 

You laughed, appreciating the way he eased the tension, but he wasn’t exactly wrong. “I mean, yeah, the dating pool made for a better puddle.” 

“I figured as much.” 

A comfortable silence blanketed over the parlor, broken only by the gentle crackling of the fireplace. You swung your feet idly back and forth, watching the warm flame as you asked aloud, “So… What does it feel like, then?” 

“What does what feel like?” He responded, but he knew what you meant. He just wanted to hear you say it. 

“Y’know…” You kicked your frilly socked feet, “Love?” 

“Well, sweetheart, that’s quite a broad question,” Leon began, patting the space next to him in an attempt to beckon you down from the rafters, and to his delight, the gesture succeeded. You dropped gracefully to the ground and fixed your skirt before curling up beside him on the other side of the couch, your legs tucked up beneath you. You couldn’t possibly be more adorable if you tried.

As you situated yourself at his side, he continued, “There are many different kinds of love. You love your family, and you love your friends, but you don’t love your family in the same way you love your friends, and vice versa. Correct?"

He watched your expression for a moment to ensure you were following along, and surely enough, you were. Your posture was relaxed but you remained dutifully at attention, just like a good little doll should.

Leon felt a pang of pride when you nodded.

“It’s the same thing, just a different kind of love. I’m not sure I know how to describe it, really,” he said, tracing his fingertips along your knee casually. “But I could show you?” 

“Show me?” Your head tilted with that innocent curiosity he loved so much about you, and his heart melted all over again. “Show me how?” 

He said something lowly and it took you a second to register it because right after, he took your chin in his hand and drew you in for a kiss. Only after your lips collided did your brain recognize his words as, ‘Like this.’ 

With one hand cradling the back of your head and the other still tracing little shapes on your leg, Leon’s embrace felt all-consuming and overwhelmingly safe. Through it all, you really did trust him. Your fangs knocked together as he pulled you closer to deepen the kiss, making your head spin and your brows furrow in concentration. It felt incredible, unlike anything you’d ever experienced before, but the nerves kept you tense and you couldn’t help but fear you were doing a poor job. 

So you let him lead. You resigned yourself to the feeling of his cold lips on your own and his tongue exploring your waiting mouth, his broad hands keeping you pressed against him and feeling slowly up the length of your thigh. His touch made you shiver and tingle in unfamiliar but exhilarating ways and when he eventually pulled away, you were left panting for breath and wanting for more. 

He watched your face in an attempt to gauge how you were feeling, and it was evident you enjoyed it. Leon felt a rush knowing he had effectively just turned a new leaf in your training. 

You had finally learned to walk. Now it was time for you to sprint. 

Leon brushed your hair away from your shoulder, baring your neck to him. He’d waited so long for this moment, for the chance to sink his teeth into you. He wished he could have tasted you fresh, when you were still living, but he would settle for the alternative, and truthfully, it didn't even feel like settling. Especially not when your syrupy sweet blood hit his tongue and pulled a deep, guttural moan from the core of him, his pearlescent eyes rolling back in a display of momentarily mindless rapture. It was unexpectedly hot to see him react to you in such a way. No one had ever expressed such intense need for you, and you were so hung up on it that you barely noticed your thighs subtly shifting together.

But Leon was observant as ever, of course, the movement in no way making it past his keen attention-- you were too precious, too virginal for your own good. He wanted to ruin you, he wanted to tear you apart piece by piece and savor you like holy communion, to pump your undead heart with his own two hands until the end of time, his beautiful baby, his fragile little doll, his corpse bride, his darling and beloved consort.

You were both gasping for breath as he pulled away from your throat, remnants of your tart cherry blood smudged around his pallid lips. Blessed be the gift of undeath, Leon thought to himself, for it granted him the ability to feed from you without consequence-- and vice versa-- to strengthen your bond in the most intimate way imaginable time and time and time again. It still made you dizzy, of course, light and a bit tingly all over, but Leon didn't see that as a bad thing, and as it stood, you didn't seem to either. 

He was just trying to come up with a smooth way to tempt you into tasting his own blood, but found himself pleasantly surprised by your initiative. 

"Can I try?" You practically purred, your sweet voice all hushed and breathy as your dainty little hand crept up his shoulder, palm coming to rest at the leftmost side of his strong neck. 

As you caressed the pad of your thumb over the icy expanse of his skin, you couldn't help but notice the faint, scarred over marks that were dotted about, barely-there dips and craters telling a story that suggested decades of indulgence like this, decades of past lovers, and your heart inexplicably clenched in your chest. Suddenly you were overtaken with the desire to leave your own mark there, much more prominent and recent than any of those faded old others. 

Leon was quick to give you his consent, of course, and that was all it took for your mind to snap into a completely different mode of function. The highest points of your mouth were flooding with saliva and the lowest points were pooling with it, slicking your puffy lips as your tongue fell forward to drag a deep, wanton lick up the length of his cold carotid. Then, as anticipated, you helped yourself to a healthy bite of him. 

And just like that, you had discovered a new infatuation, as he knew you would. You were bonding yourselves to one another in real time, creating a connection that not even true death could break. 

You nearly went weak with how overwhelming it felt, like drinking down pure heaven, hardly even noticing you were moving for a moment as you crawled mindlessly into his lap to straddle him, grinding deep and slow. The pheromones in his sap made your head spin, bringing about the kind of spontaneous sensuality that you'd only ever felt after one too many glasses of mead, the kind that loosened your bones and tinged at your cheeks, the kind that called warmth to bloom at the pit of your stomach. 

The flavor of him was coppery and rich, but balanced, a bit dull from undeath but otherwise magnificent. That it was faint only made you want for more. 

"Easy, easy," Leon grunted quietly in your ear, reaching a hand up to card through your hair at the back of your head. "Don't drink too fast, little princess... just breathe..."

But it would seem you weren't really listening to him, and that needed to change. Thankfully, Leon knew just the way to grasp your attention. 

Letting one arm slip between your two bodies, he wedged his hand down, down, down, until it dipped beneath your skirt to close his palm over the sticky cotton of your panties. That you were already leaking through the fabric like a busted faucet was perfect. You were an absolutely perfect little untouched virgin, and thanks to him, your body would remain that way forever, ripe for his plucking.

Bringing down some pressure on your clit with the base of his palm, testing your reaction, he reveled in the way you whimpered on his throat and unlatched to finally suck in a breath, rutting to meet his attention without a second thought, so easily captivated by such slight stimulation. He couldn't wait to show you more, but he'd need to work you open first. He didn't want your first time to be painful, after all. 

Leon took you at the waist and moved to put you on your back, hovering above your spread out form on the chaise lounge and pinning you there in the most delicate way possible. Every bit of that attention to detail paid off. 

"My precious doll... my most delicate princess," he sighed reverently, stooping low to breathe you in at the neck again, laving his tongue over the bite he'd left just moments ago. "This is what true love feels like, and I wish to share it with you for eternity..." 

He let you ponder that as he continued, working you carefully out of your clothes, finding it cute how you seemed to shift and arch along with him to help him get you naked, like you just couldn't wait. In your pretty doe eyes, your undead life had just begun. 

It was a bit strange at first, feeling his finger sink into you, but it wasn't long before Leon was seeking out your soft spots and doing an excellent job of it, no less. He curled and pumped one finger carefully in you until he was sure you were comfortable, until he felt any remaining tension in your muscles melt away, and then he introduced a second. You were so wet and so absorbed by the feeling of it all that you almost didn't notice at first, but that delicious stretch was impossible to miss. 

"O-Oh," you quivered, head falling back against the plush velvet beneath you as you bucked into his hand. 

With an appreciative hum, Leon allowed himself to become a little less careful with his ministrations, watching your reactions with interest as he worked you open on his fingers, his infatuation with you growing more and more with every moan and whine, every flutter of your silky walls. 

"There you go, little one," he cooed, "you like that, don't you?"

Your response was barely more than an airy nod, but it delighted him anyway. How could it not? You were just too sweet for words, too cute to handle. You could've done or said anything in that moment and he would have adored it all the same. 

Nipping playfully at your throat, fingers still pumping dutifully in and out of your drippy cunt, his lips trailed up to your ear so he could ask in a sultry whisper, "Think you can take more?"

The next several seconds were a blur of impassioned movement, each of you weaving around one another to shed the elder vampire of his own ensemble, revealing his carved marble frame piece-by-piece. You were amazed by the strength in his shoulders, how smooth and soft his skin was from being kept away from the sun for so long, the dark blonde trail of hair that disappeared below his belt, only for its path to be revealed upon the long-awaited removal of his trousers. 

Leon's cock was painfully hard, tip flushed red and weeping with milky beads of precum as he freed himself from his confines at last. He felt the intense need to give it a few strokes with how pent up he was at this point, but he didn't see a point in wasting any time pleasuring himself when you were right there, skirt hiked up to your waist while you laid there panting and leaking your arousal all over his nice furniture. With a pout that pretty, it would be a disservice not to fuck you until you cried. 

He angled your hips with one hand and lined himself up with the other, pushing in slowly. Your expression screwed tight for a short moment as the swollen head of him caught at your hole, an opportune moment of distraction for him to sink in deeper, stretching you out until he hit the root, drawing a shocked cry from your throat that gave way to a pleasured whine just as quickly as it came. 

So he began to move, wanting to draw out that gorgeous sound for as long as you would allow him to hear it. Your cunt was so fucking tight, pulsing and squeezing around his shaft like you were made for it, made for him, delivered to him by fate so that he might just get to fuck you like this forever and ever, and in that moment, he knew he made the right choice in sharing his gift with you. For the first time in recent memory, the future felt bright. 

"L... L-Leon..." You babbled, hooking one leg over his hip for purchase just to find out it allowed him to prod that much deeper. You went boneless at the feeling, finding strength only in your ability to claw at his shoulders for dear life, the faint scent of his blood lingering in the air and making your head spin. "Feels... g-good... so good... don't stop..." 

He wouldn't dream of it. 

Fingertips printing into your thighs, he pulled your legs up to rest over his shoulders instead, driving you down into the soft couch in a firm mating press. You were nose to nose, needy lips catching and fangs clacking between filthy words and gasps for breath as you felt his presence envelope you fully. Leon was in you, on you, around you...

Leon was your home now. Leon was where you laid to rest. 

For the first time in your undead life, you felt your body licking with heat, temperature rising steadily at the pit of you and threatening to hit a fever pitch. Every inch of him lit you up from the inside. 

"Oh, my baby," he groaned, letting go of you with one hand just to swipe his silvery blonde hair away from his face so he could gaze at you like a work of art. "You're getting close, aren't you? Squeezing me so tight like that..."

"Yeah," you whined, even though you weren't fully sure what it even felt like to be close. You weren't dumb, you knew what orgasms were, you'd just never had one yourself, and as such, you had no basis for comparison. 

Leon aimed to fix that, to make damn sure you familiarized yourself with the feeling over the course of your shared eternity. 

His thrusts picked up with renewed vigor, the legs of the old chaise lounge scratching against the hardwood floors with every push forward, and he didn't even care. Everything else about life felt so worthless in comparison to you, the new center of his universe. The whole entire house could collapse and he would still be content, so long as he had you. 

And every time he remembered that he did have you, that you were here with him right now, squirming and rutting on his cock so beautifully, that he was all you had... it just drove him that much crazier, made him that much more determined to make your first time one you would never forget. He couldn't be happier to spend the entire rest of his endless life topping the last performance. 

You were losing your grip, struggling to keep your eyes open and eventually sinking your itching fangs into what you could reach of his throat just to push yourself a little higher, a little closer. The flavor alone made you purr against his skin, jaw clenching tighter, and the delicious sting of it was pushing him forward too. Now his biggest concern wasn't just making sure you came, but making sure that you came first. 

So he withheld, even as his balls drew up tight and ached to release, focusing instead on getting you there. 

"Don't be shy, princess, I've got you," Leon moaned into your ear, "let it happen... just let it happen..." 

Tears pricked at your eyes, the overabundance of stimulation rendering you down into a tearful little puddle, but it wasn't until he spoke up to encourage you that you realized you really were holding back, stalling yourself at the precipice like it was wrong to let go.

But it wasn't wrong. It was divine. It was indulgent.

Sucking back a mouthful of his blood, you unlatched from Leon's neck just to press your forehead against his own, your jaw stuck open in stilted whines and gasps for breath as that molten heat in your belly finally boiled over, and you discovered exactly what it was you were close to. 

Your spine drew up into an arch, toes curling over his shoulders as you came on his length with a cry, thighs trembling with strain. Leon had never been baptized before, but it felt like he was just now. He'd never felt so close to God as he allowed himself to finish deep inside your perfect pussy. 

You collapsed together in the afterglow, the parlor going quiet again as you both caught your breath and your bearings, a heaping pile of mess on velvet.

"Leon," you whispered, kissing some of the excess blood away from his cold skin as you innocently and earnestly admitted, "I... I think I love you." 

He cracked a fond smile at this, if only because he knew you would catch up in time. After all, you still had much to learn, and he didn't want to overwhelm you more than he already had for one evening. 

Loose gravel crunched beneath Leon's boots, uneven pavement glittering with moisture in the streetlights. It was somewhere between raining and snowing, the wind splattering his rosy cheeks with little drops of condensation, every breath puffing out in a visible cloud, head tilted down at just the right angle to protect the lower half of his bruised face from the cold while still being able to see where he was going.

He didn't have a specific destination in mind, and truth be told, he couldn't really read most of the signage around here anyway-- it was all in Mandarin, and his Mandarin was even less reliable than his Spanish, to put it gently. But he could read what he needed to, at least, enough to find the basics like food, bathrooms, lodging, or hospitals, and more importantly, he could discern the backlit lettering above the shop two doors down; antiques and collectibles. 

That was a phrase he'd familiarized himself with in damn near every language under the sun by now. 

A bell dinged quietly overhead as he stepped into the storefront, grateful that it was even open past 9 o'clock at night. It was only one room and didn't have much space to walk around, but every available surface was stacked to the brim with knick-knacks of all shapes, colors, sizes, and price points under no apparent system of organization. Where some might be overwhelmed or put off by the volume of things to look at, Leon felt his heart skip a beat with excitement. He still had some time to kill before his transport back to the States was due to arrive, and not a single minute of it would be wasted overlooking any potential gems. 

Judging by the horrified stares he was attracting, Leon could imagine he looked fucking insane right now, clothes still splattered with wet, rotting blood and the barrel of his gun practically still smoking in his holster as he towered over a shelf in the back corner, scrutinizing a darling little plush bear in one hand and a set of hand-painted matryoshka dolls in the other like it was the hardest decision he would ever have to make. 

Ultimately, he chose not to decide at all-- money wasn't a factor, so why not buy both? If it weren't for the issue of luggage, he'd just say 'fuck it' and buy out the whole damn store. Unfortunately, helicopters tended to be quite limited in space. 

Self control was a skill Leon used to have mastered, perhaps even too well-- for a long time, every uncomfortable, unsightly, pesky little emotion was pressed down into a condensed cube to be neatly packed away in the very back corners of his brain, boxes upon boxes of dense feelings continuing to pile up and take over more and more space up there until the pressure became too much, the lid blew, and he went off the fucking handle. It wasn't something he was proud of by any means, all those long months blurred into mush through a lens of alcoholism and other reckless behaviors, but what he did try to let himself be proud of was his relative success in making it to the other side. 

That, of course, was a feat he did not accomplish without help, nor would he ever claim to. Chris Redfield was instrumental in his recovery in more ways than one, and at times, without even realizing it. He was a listening ear, a dealer of tough love, a trusted confidant...

...and the reason he had you. 

For obvious reasons, Leon had never gone out of his way to get a pet in his adult life. It just felt irresponsible with the inconsistency and uncertainty of his work situation, even with all the money in the world to spend on trainers and walkers and boarding and... whatever else, but at that point, it would feel less like a pet than an accessory, and Leon didn't have much interest in material. Never saw the need for it. Then one day Chris woke him up in the middle of the night banging on the door to his apartment with a gift he never expected.

"She's a... what?"

"A hybrid. She's a human-canine hybrid, Leon." 

Leon glanced between you and Chris with skepticism in his eyes, only to find the same look peering back at him in you. It was almost kind of funny that he'd have a hard time believing there could be such a thing as a human-canine hybrid, considering all he'd seen in his line of work, a thought that made his shoulders and his expression relax almost instantly. 

You were a real cutie, that was for sure, tucked behind Chris and staring up at Leon through your eyelashes with this grumpy little look on your face, a plush, patchwork bear clutched to your chest. The toy was equally as vibrant and colorful as your clothing, if not a bit worn with time. Your ears were long and droopy, your tail hanging low but swishing side-to-side with cautious interest, and the longer he studied you, the more he became endeared by you. 

"The B.S.A.A. rescued a group of hybrids from an illegal facility a few weeks ago, but finding accommodations for them isn't as simple as it sounds," Chris continued, resting a hand on your shoulder in an apparent move to reassure you. "Long story short, the people who were in charge of that facility aren't too happy about the acquisition, and the hybrids aren't safe at the B.S.A.A. anymore. Would you be willing to shelter her for a while?" 

The firm look in Chris' eyes-- and the fact that he just had to bring this up with you right in front of him-- made it clear he wasn't really asking. No mind, Leon would have done it anyway. It just would have been nice to have had a heads up to rectify the state of the apartment. 

"Yeah, of course," Leon nodded gently, stepping aside to allow you and Chris further into the apartment. "Make yourself at home." He caught the way your head tilted up a bit, as if you were studying the scent in the air, and he supposed it made sense that you likely were.

That was four months ago. And for the past four months, Leon quite enjoyed having you around. You were silly and playful, always bounding around the apartment with a toy clenched between your teeth or lounging in the sunny spots in front of the windows, pawing at him for belly rubs and treats and infinite tug-o-war matches. All that being said, you were equally stubborn, resisting him at every turn like magnetic repulsion, always kicking up a fuss seemingly just for the sake of it.

He wasn't sure. You were tough to read. Not only did some of your canine personality traits make you a bit forgetful and distractible at times, but you were also just terribly inconsistent with your affections, and he wasn't always sure what to make of it. All he knew was that he was determined to win you over in one way or another, and if he was going to do that, he'd have to figure you out first, and so far that was shaping up to be quite the herculean task. At least it seemed you would be here for a while. 

With the way he guarded your little treasures during the flight home, one might assume he was smuggling something, but he just couldn't stomach the thought of coming home without something to present to you. The hardened federal agent was determined to crack a smile out of you on his terms, to get you to admit what you both knew to be true. 

You had a crush on him. A big, fat, embarrassingly all-encompassing crush on him, and you rejected the idea of owning up to it so staunchly that it was turning you into a bit of a brat. That was the one thing he could read about you, and it drove you up the wall. 

He certainly wasn't judging you. It would be an absurd lie to say he didn't have a big, fat, embarrassingly all-encompassing crush on you too-- he'd be insane if he didn't. But the back and forth was far too enjoyable, and Leon was always up for a good natured challenge. 

See, self control was something Leon had worked really, really hard to regain a handle on, and when it came to his drinking and brooding, he certainly had... but when it came to you? Not by a longshot. That being said, he would rather be pouring himself into courting you than pouring himself another bourbon. That's what he used to shut up that little voice in the back of his head that questioned whether or not he was putting too much energy into this, banking too much on it. 

It was innocent, right? It's not like you were a bad influence or whatever. If anything, a lot of nights that he would have spent at the bar were instead being spent at home playing with you. Surely that had to be a net positive, especially considering you would have otherwise been getting poked and prodded at in a lab. 

Stepping back into the apartment for the first time in weeks, Leon hadn't even bothered bringing his duffel bag in with him from the car, the only thing in his arms being the wrinkled paper bag from that antique shop. His own belongings could wait. As soon as he shut and locked the door behind him, stepping out of his shoes, the first thing he noticed was how quiet it was. 

No lively music from the shows you liked to watch, no little bumps or growls from you playing toys, no quiet padding of your feet across the hardwood from you coming to see who was at the door. He glanced at his watch, finding it was only half past nine in the evening, and while you often proclaimed to abide by a healthy bedtime for yourself, you had a habit of napping all day and bouncing off the walls all night. Something was amiss.

Stepping further into the apartment to investigate the scene, Leon peered into the living room. The lights were on, the TV was off, there were a few toys strewn about the couch and the floor, but not a glimpse of the sweet puppy who left them there. Odd. Suspicious. Maybe even staged. 

His lips came together in a whistle meant to grab your attention, knowing your sharp ears would hear it from anywhere in the apartment, even if you were sleeping. When that call garnered no response, he began to wonder if you were mad at him. After all, he was supposed to return almost three days ago, and while Chris had been able to stop by and check on you when he had the time, it just wasn't the same, and you didn't do well with loneliness, and Leon knew that. 

Turning on his heel to head deeper into the apartment, he continued to find you nowhere. Not climbing the countertops in the kitchen, or playing under the dining table, or even reluctantly having a bath. As he reached the end of the short hallway, there were only two doors left to open. 

Leon tried another whistle and called out, "Hey, pup? I'm home!" 

He waited, and listened... and heard nothing. Your bedroom door was closed, and it looked like the light was on in there, judging by the subtle glow spilling out beneath it, but still, no response. 

His bedroom door, however, was cracked open. The overhead light was off but the bedside lamp was on, and his dirty laundry basket was tipped over on the floor. When he stepped forward to turn it upright again, he thought he saw the bedding shuffle out of the corner of his eye. Closer inspection of the bed brought the case of his missing puppy girl drew to a close. Your soft tail was peeking out beneath the edge of the covers, the markings and patterns in your fur being undeniably familiar to him now. 

It was perfect timing, really-- he was just about to tip over into the realm of worrying about your safety, but now he was back to just worrying you were mad at him... and he couldn't help the amused grin that tugged at his expression. 

"Is that a little puppy in daddy's bed?" He asked aloud, his tone taking on a smitten and adoring lilt. Once again, he received no response... at least not verbally. Quietly setting down that paper bag, he stood there and watched with his arms crossed as your tail fluttered to life in response to his tone, the tip silently patting the sheets in a lazy and reluctant little wag that you might have actually gotten away with, if it weren't for the fact that your tail was in plain view. 

He was initially going to try a few more times to get a response out of you, hoping to make sure you were okay and to see if you wanted to talk, but he quickly realized that wasn't going to work with you. You weren't all doom and gloom like he tended to be, you were silly, you were playful, you were fundamentally kind. A lighthearted approach wouldn't work with him, or with most of the people he dealt with on a day-to-day basis, but it would almost certainly work with you. 

"Well," Leon stretched his arms up with a dramatic groan, "Since there's no puppies in the bed..."

And then he playfully toppled over the lump in the bedding, bracing himself on his elbows so as not to actually crush you, of course, music to his ears being the muffled squeal of stubborn discontent that sounded out from beneath the covers.

"Leon!" You whined, arms squirming around beneath him in a desperate flurry of moves to find the edge of the blanket, tugging it down to free your face for some air. Soon enough your head poked out from beneath the covers and your eyes were already narrowed into unamused slits at him. 

But that wasn't really what caught his attention about the look on your face. You were panting for breath, your ears flopped back lazily and your hair an absolute mess, your skin hot to the touch and clammy with sweat. Now his eyes were narrowed at you in suspicion, because you were certainly frustrated, just... not the kind of frustrated he was anticipating, if his suspicions were found to be correct. 

"You look guilty," He commented, brow raised as he took you by the chin and tilted your head this way and that, as though in observation. "Why do you look guilty, puppy?" 

"I'm not," You were quick to defend yourself-- much too quick, in Leon's opinion-- and you stubbornly recoiled back from his hand, continuing to squirm and resist beneath him. "You're squishing me!" 

You planted the palm of your hand dead in the center of his face in an attempt to push him away, the bedding slipping further down in the process to reveal your flushed collarbones and shoulders, both of which were bare. Were you naked? In his bed? 

He took you by the wrists to pin your hands down with ease, staring down at you in scrutiny. "Don't lie to me, sweetheart," He said, tone firm, but not unkind. "You're red as a tomato." 

With a stubborn whine, your ears flattened back against your messy head in what could only be read as shame, and that certainly wasn't what he was going for at all, even with the compromising position he had you in at the moment. It was just meant to tease you, but you looked mortified, and he could only imagine why that might be. 

"Puppy," He softened, letting go of your wrists, one hand taking you by the cheek to gently caress you. "You know I can't help you if you don't tell me what's going on." 

Your mouth fell open and then snapped shut again a time or two, a clear indication that you were tripping over your words in search of the right ones. Finally, you managed, "It's... I-It's hot." 

"Then why are you all bundled up, huh?"

You didn't even really need to admit it at this point, because it was clear as day what was going on here-- after all, Chris had warned him this might happen, that hybrids could have... intense reproductive cycles-- but he also wasn't going to push it if you just wanted to ride it out on your own. He wasn't an expert on this, he didn't know exactly what you needed, and he didn't want to overstep and freak you out.

That being said, the thought that you'd retreated to his bedroom, desperate to surround yourself with his belongings in his absence just to cope with being in heat, was a remarkably good one.

This time you didn't seem to have a retort, still writhing under him and trying to push him off of you, which wasn't new behavior for you, though this time he did take it upon himself to give you some space instead of continuing to mess with you. 

"Alright, alright, relax, daddy's not making fun of you--" 

"You're not my daddy," You interjected stubbornly, but just like always, the rosy, searing blush on your face betrayed how you really felt about the topic, even as you added, "Stop trying to make me call you that!" 

Leon dearly and sincerely adored you, that much was to be sure, but your hard-headedness could run him ragged sometimes, when you'd dig your heels in so hard about things that seemed so innocuous. Whether or not you should be expected to call him daddy-- which he regularly enjoyed teasing you about but would never legitimately force you to do-- didn't feel like the biggest issue at hand here. Not by a mile. 

How was he supposed to focus on that when you were just... burning up? Panting for breath and shaking and whining? Oh dear God, this wasn't good, and for as much effort as he was putting into focusing on your wellbeing, it was becoming increasingly difficult not to focus on the way his pants were beginning to feel uncomfortably cozy in the front. He brought one hand down between you to adjust himself only to find he'd unintentionally solicited a faint, but distinctly needy moan from you in the process, presumably because you'd touched you somewhere he hadn't necessarily meant to. 

"G-Go away, Leon," You insisted, eyes screwed shut as you turned your head to the side and maintained that stubborn frown he knew so well on you. "Get off of me!" 

But your tail was wagging in an absolute blur, thumping mindlessly against the damp sheets and knocking in between his knees at an intensity that was impossible to miss. Leon's eyes narrowed and he bared his teeth in an intrigued grin before finally sitting back on his haunches, still straddling you, but at least freeing your upper half. 

"Leon, quit--" 

You poor dear, you were so, so close to finishing that sentence, if only it weren't for the way Leon swung one leg between your own, driving his knee right up to the apex until you felt the muted pressure lavish your clit. Whatever you were about to say fizzled out on your tongue and instead popped out in a string of whimpers, your back arching up off the bed. The movement caused the bedding to slip down just a little bit further, confirming his suspicion that you were in fact naked, at least from the waist up.

Taking the soft globe of your breast into the palm of his hand, Leon let his thumb brush over your already pebbled nipple and asked lowly, "Oh, c'mon, pretty puppy... you're totally sure you don't want daddy's help? I think you're just being fussy..."

Your chest rumbled with a little growl, but it was more of a moan than that, and the fiery glare on your face was the perfect image of it. You were pissed, and quite frankly, it was a good look on you. Maybe even one of his favorites. Suddenly you were baring your teeth at him too, just pretending it was in the opposite way. You were such an open book to him. 

"You're being mean," Huffed the stubborn little puppy, but of course, Leon could be meaner. 

So he was. Leon snatched the covers off the bed in one quick swipe, and what was revealed to him beneath had to have been a thousand times better than anything he might have expected. You were naked, yes, but tangled between your legs was a pair of his sweatpants, undoubtedly retrieved from the depths of the overturned laundry basket, the grey cotton soaked through in patches with slick all over the crotch and thighs. 

Fucking Christ, you weren't just getting off to the thought of him, but also the scent of him, the feeling of his clothes on your skin, and presumably, an idea not unlike what he was already teasing you with; letting you rub one out on his thigh. 

Squishing your cheeks in one hand, he said firmly, "Look at me. Do you honestly feel like I'm being mean to you?" 

There was a pause while you stared at each other, your eyes searching his own skeptically. It didn't really seem he was messing with you, no, in fact he appeared like he really wanted to help you. The back and forth was fun and he enjoyed the little game you'd made out of getting to know each other, but when it came to your comfort and wellbeing, he wasn't interested in being forced to solve puzzles. You couldn't really blame him. 

"N-No," You admitted. 

"Exactly, so just... simmer down, will you?" 

This time Leon didn't give you another chance to tell him to fuck off. He scooped you up at the waist and pulled you to your knees, drawing your body close to his until you were straddling his left thigh. Eyes wide, you stared at him stiffly, like you were too afraid to move. Huffing out a breath, he rolled his eyes with a smirk and gripped your hips, tugging you down until you were finally bearing your weight on him. 

For as fast as your pointed teeth sank into your bottom lip to quiet yourself, it didn't even matter. You still let out a pleasured whine, ears flat against your head and your tail hung low, the tip swishing in a reluctant little wag that patted the outside of his knee with every other beat. 

"You're too precious for your own damn good," He grumbled, thumbs brushing soothing circles into your hips. "Y'know that, pup?"

Breaths falling short, it felt like your head was full of warm mud, teetering for balance on your neck as your upper body tipped forward to grasp at his arms. As expected, Leon caught you effortlessly, steadying you by cupping your face in his hands so he could look you right in your braindead little eyes, your noses almost touching as your tongue lolled out in lazy gasps.

It was obvious he wasn't going to get much more out of you in the way of words at this point, so it was a damn good thing you had that pretty tail knocking about. He figured all that wiggling was the closest he'd get to a literal window into your mind. 

"Go on, then," Leon smoothed your hair away from your sticky forehead, still mindful to hold you upright. His tone was low and, as always, far too sweet for you... but it was so nice, it vibrated down to the base of your spine and made you dizzier. You were just about to fulfill what he was encouraging you to do when he added wryly, "You've already made such a mess, don't get shy on me now." 

A quiet whimper stuttered from your dry throat-- you couldn't sit still anymore, he was being evil and he knew it, downright evil... and you typically would have stuck up your nose at him and brooded on it for a while, but you didn't even have the strength of mind for that at the moment. You hardly even realized you were already rocking your hips back and forth against the clothed meat of his thigh, nails threatening to snap under the pressure as they begged to sink past his shirt and into his muscles. 

It was pleasant, sure, but it wasn't nearly enough, especially not after hours and hours and hours of tossing and turning in his bed, rubbing yourself nearly numb with your fingers and your toys and his pillows and his clothes, aching for something tangible and warm to nurse the pain away. You let your forehead rest against his own for a moment to catch your breath, hoping to find the right angle, but you just weren't getting what you needed, and the frustration alone made your glassy eyes sting with the threat of tears. 

That just wouldn't do. 

"Oh, you really made a mess, didn't you, sweet girl?" Leon cooed sympathetically, shushing your delicate cries. Thumbs skimming over your burning cheeks, he asked quietly and carefully, "Why don't you let daddy lick it up, hm?" 

Your expression scrunched up in a weak pout and your empty little head bobbed up and down in an airy nod, and just as soon as you gave him that go-ahead, he was moving to make it so. You were on your back in seconds, Leon's broad hands spreading your plush thighs apart to make space for himself between them, and for as cool and composed as he was trying to appear right now, he couldn't help the low moan that made it past him just at the sight of you. 

Sure, he'd seen more than enough by now to guess that you were wet, but you weren't just wet, you were dripping all over yourself. It was all he could do to collect as much of you on his tongue as possible, groaning at the taste and dragging you closer by your hips until he was as close as he could get, the tip of his nose buried against the curls at the lowest point of your mound as he lapped you up with abandon.

You were writhing and crying, legs kicking out at the stimulation before drawing back up to dig into his shoulders and pull him further into you, into the mess of you. He'd managed to find it somehow, to become that something tangible and warm and redefine it, unraveling you from the root with a sanguine sense of desperation that was tempered by his undying commitment to treating you like you were made of glass. 

Your tail was curling up tight against the base of your spine, your chest was heaving for breath, you couldn't keep your eyes open anymore, and he hardly could either. 

But he also couldn't stand not to. If you had the capacity to pay attention to small details, you might have noticed his eyes were just as bleary and drunk as yours were. Leon recorded your every movement in his mind like scripture from this angle, his own hips rutting down into the bed while yours bucked into his mouth, and it was only when he found the strength to pull away for air that he found a moment to reorient himself in reality. 

His lips were puffy, rosy, and slick with you as he caught his breath, two fingers toying with your puffy, aching clit in the absence of his tongue. It was almost like muscle memory for him to reach up with his free hand and pat your belly, an affectionate hum ringing from him at the near-immediate reaction it got out of you, even in a state like this. You were squirming and arching beneath him as your quivering body fought to determine priority over the attention brought by either hand, a rather endearing dilemma to have found yourself in. 

"Oh, my poor baby," Leon preened, lavishing the inside of your right thigh with kisses. "You're so cute..." 

Unable to help himself from letting you have the best of both forms of pampering, he replaced the tips of his fingers with his tongue yet again, freeing both hands to pet your soft tummy. The movements were lazy, but sure enough, your tail was going off as fast as it could while you laid there shivering and whining and clawing at him, tumbling over the edge into release before you could come up with a way to warn him first. 

As if he would have cared anyway. A warning wouldn't have changed anything. Hell, it might have even spoiled what turned out to be a dizzying moment of unabashed indulgence for him. 

Gentle, adoring hands kneading delicately at all your favorite spots, Leon willfully deprived himself of oxygen in pursuit of every drop of your syrup as it flowed from you, knowing he would come to regret being wasteful later if this should turn out to be a one-time thing. He lost himself to the throes of hedonism for several drawn out moments until he was confident you were licked clean, until he came to again and realized you had gone completely limp in the wake of your expenditure. 

Rolling over onto his back, Leon spread out just as bonelessly across the bed as you did, the both of you a sorry sight of sweat and heat. He spent several minutes trying to find a way to break the silence. With the haze of lust wearing off a bit and clearing up space in his mind for more intelligent processes, Leon was already beginning to dread the inevitable conversation this would warrant between the two of you.

Lucky for him, that was so far outside of the realm of your current train of thought... or lack thereof. You certainly felt better, but that didn't mean your brain wasn't mud anymore. Little else mattered to your muggy, muddled mind but the here and now. 

In an unexpected move, you rolled onto your side to rest your head against his chest. The way you struggled to meet his eyes was enough for him to know you were likely still struggling to talk, or maybe you just didn't really want to, but the olive branch you'd extended demonstrated your agreeable state, which was more than he could've said for you half an hour ago. 

Shit, half an hour ago he was still hoping a couple presents from his trip would win your affections, yet here he was with the taste of you lingering on his lips, your naked body curled up to him for comfort. 

Leon had it all figured out from the day he met you, the first day of kindergarten. The two of you were going to be just like the movies, just like the storybooks– you would grow up as friends, blossom into lovers, marry young and start a family, and everything would be exactly as it should be. He would have fulfilled his purpose, and you would have fulfilled yours. All would be right in the universe.

And he wasn’t exactly far off, for a long time. You were attached at the hip through elementary school, somehow managed to stay friends through middle school and after an awkward, smitten kiss shared in the empty auditorium, you began dating in high school. It was perfect, he thought. He didn’t even have to pull that many strings.

You went to prom, got drunk for the first time, learned to drive, all in each other’s company. You had each other’s virginity. You’d seen, touched and savored every inch of each other. There was almost nothing you didn’t share.

It wasn’t too long after graduation that Leon applied to begin training at the police academy, just like he’d always dreamed of. It was a solid profession with plenty of benefits for both of you and it would give him the opportunity to help people, ticking off all the boxes of what he wanted for himself. It was perfect, it was safe.

No one was surprised when he soared through the police academy with impeccable marks. You were such a little angel when he graduated, showering him with kisses and sweets and letting him pound you into the mattress for a whole weekend to celebrate. And when his application in Raccoon City was accepted, you did exactly as he hoped you would and you followed right along with him.

Of course you would follow right along. You didn’t know what life without Leon meant. You couldn’t even conceptualize what that would feel like and you had no intention of finding out, but that was fine by him. He was happy to be your rock, your guidance, your big, strong boyfriend who would hold your hand and follow you through everything. 

With Leon, you would never be alone. You would never be far from home. After all this time, he was your home, exactly as your lives were designed.

For the first few months of living in Raccoon City, the two of you shared a cozy apartment. It was a little worse for wear, but it was cute, and it was a fun way to start your adventure into young adulthood together. He was happy to handle all of the spiders and quadruple check the locks every night if it made you feel safer, if it gave you an excuse to come crying to him like a beautiful angel whenever you were frightened.

Bumps in the night, creaks of the pipes, the skittering of the upstairs neighbor’s little dog, they all sent you folding into his arms, shaking like a leaf, crying for him to protect you. He was your knight, and God were you his perfect little princess. The apple of his eye, the one and only object of his affection. No, not his affection, his obsession.

You were all he thought about, day and night, for more than half of his 21 years of living. Everything he did, every breath he took was with you in mind. You were the only living manifestation of complete and total perfection, every inch of you crafted with care and divinity. Your lives fit together like puzzle pieces– hell, your bodies fit together like puzzle pieces. You were meant for each other.

It wasn’t long after you moved that the job you had lined up fell through, and you were left reeling. Moving away from home just to fall flat on your face was a massive blow to your self esteem, especially considering your parents practically screamed a hole through the phone at you about it. The next few days were spent sulking around the apartment, trying to pick up the pieces and choose a completely different path for yourself.

And there was Leon to hold you while you cried. To make dinner every night and dote on you endlessly, to pamper you with gifts and to insist over and over that he could make rent on his own, that he didn’t mind if you needed a little more time to wallow before finding a job… and to console you when your search for employment would prove fruitless once again.

He was there to tell you it wasn’t your fault, that the job market was just rough right now and that no matter what, he would be there to take care of you.

Weeks stretched into months and you still felt like you were spinning out, even with Leon by your side. Every single day was beginning to feel the same and you didn’t know what to do, all you knew was that you couldn’t imagine living the rest of your life like this. Something had to give and Raccoon City clearly wasn’t it.

Leon came home with a big smile on his face, just like any other day, but today was extra special. He’d finally had his one year review at the police station, and he was getting a sizable raise. He couldn’t wait to tell you he was gonna get you out of this shitty apartment and into somewhere nicer. He couldn’t wait to sneak his way down to the jeweler in search of a ring. The storybook life he had laid out for you was coming to fruition right before his eyes.

But you were quiet over dinner, and you looked exhausted. You wouldn’t even meet his eyes as you picked at your plate.

He was just about to ask you what was wrong when you finally spoke up, “I-I think I need to move back home with my parents.”

Silence. He felt like he had been shot.

“It’s just that… I know you said you’re happy to take care of bills and everything, but I just feel terrible every day being a burden and I think I need a chance to figure things out and get back up on my feet. I don’t even know what I’m doing with my life anymore.”

His expression fell and his heart ached, any and all excitement he had about his situation now gone in an instant. All the money in the world meant nothing to him if he couldn’t share it with you, and to see you so lost and scared made him feel like he fucking failed you, his poor, sweet princess who looked to him for purpose and protection and partnership. 

Leon wasn’t stupid. He knew that allowing you to move back in with your parents could potentially be a death sentence to your relationship. When people aren’t around each other anymore, it’s only natural that they drift apart, and Leon could not let that happen. It wasn’t even an option in his brain. Something had to be done and something had to be done now, before your lease was up in a few months, before push came to shove and you would finally have to make your choice.

He wasn’t even really sure where he got the idea. It wasn’t something he’d ever considered before, mostly because he didn’t think he’d ever be put in this position.

A few nights after that conversation, Leon couldn’t sleep. It was well past two in the morning and you were peacefully asleep beside him while he stared at the ceiling, entirely lost in thought. He witnessed the worst and darkest of humanity at work every single day, but nothing scared him as deeply as the idea of losing you. 

Eventually he got out of bed as carefully as he could manage, not wanting to wake you with his troubles. He only planned to get some water and maybe a minute or two of fresh air to clear his mind, but what he didn’t plan to get was some inspiration. 

You had asked him to stop at the store on his way home from work to pick up a few things you needed, and the bag was still sitting on the counter. He took it upon himself to grab a few things he needed, too, and among the items left in the bag was an unopened box of condoms. At first his eyes skimmed over it without much interest, but it wasn’t long before he froze where he stood and turned to look at the bag again.

Leon wasn’t sure what came over him. He didn’t really feel like himself, it was like he was watching his next moves from a third person perspective, hovering above, detached. For a moment he even wondered if he was sleepwalking, or if this was a dream. He stared down at the box in his hand, carefully opened it, and pierced a hole in the center of each and every one. He tucked the packets back into the box and brought it with him on his way back to the bedroom, stashing it in the usual spot in the bedside table.

On his side, of course.

He tried to go back to sleep, but he couldn’t help but just watch you. You were so pretty, so peaceful when you were dreaming, such a nice contrast to the stress and insecurity over finding your life’s purpose that plagued you in your waking hours.

But Leon already knew your life’s purpose. He reached out, gently brushing your messy hair away from your sleepy face so he could admire you more fully, and all he could think about was how much happier you’d look with a ring on your finger and a baby in your belly. Maybe an unexpected nudge in the right direction would set you back on the correct path and make you come to your senses about moving back in with your parents.

You huffed out a sleepy little breath from between your plush lips, stirring in the bed and peeking open your eyes to look at him. It was clear you weren’t fully conscious yet, but you were trying, squirming closer to him to tuck yourself into his chest.

“W’time is it?” You mumbled, rubbing your eyes.

He smiled fondly, petting your hair and pressing a kiss to the crown of your head as you cuddled up to him like a sweet little baby bear, and he tried to pretend he hadn’t accidentally made himself hard as fuck thinking about knocking you up just to get you to stay with him. Somewhere deep down, he knew it was gross, he knew it was wrong, he knew it could violate your trust in so many ways.

But Leon was nothing if not a yearner, a hopeless romantic who couldn’t bear the thought of life without you by his side. He’d done everything right by you and you were still straying away from him, and that just wouldn’t do. It’s an act of desperation, he thought to himself, justifying his actions into the ground, I just want her so badly I’m not thinking straight, all pleas for forgiveness he would store for later use.

“It’s late, baby,” He mumbled into your hair, breathing in the scent of your shampoo. “I’m sorry if I woke you up.”

You just shook your head and tightened your arms around him, clearly on the verge of dozing off again. Perhaps if the circumstances were different, he would have just let you, but he wouldn’t be awake in the first place if it weren’t for the extreme sense of urgency he felt.

His broad, warm hands engulfed you, one cradling the back of your head while the other rubbed your lower back, tapering off to paw at your hip. Your shirt– well, his shirt– had ridden up nearly to your waist, baring your cute panties, your soft belly and your plush thighs to his gaze. He swiped the pad of his thumb along your hip, imagining your bone structure spreading open to make room for his growing baby.

Leon didn’t take the time to talk himself out of it before his fingertips were sneaking down between your legs, slipping beneath your panties and finding your clit with practiced ease. The sensation was enough to jerk you awake again, a quiet mewl tumbling from your lips as you rocked into his hand, so sleepy and out of it and just so very cute.

“Leon?” Your voice was thick with sleep, but airy and light with sudden onset desire. That was all he needed to know he had you right where he wanted you.

“Shh, shh, you’re alright,” He cooed softly, following up the soothing whispers with a few gentle nibbles and bites to the shell of your ear, knowing that such attention always melted you into a puddle. “You’re alright, pretty baby, I just wanna play with you. Can daddy play with his sweet angel?”

You squirmed in his hold for a second, pondering his proposition while barely awake, but it wasn’t long before you were nodding into his shoulder and peppering his collarbone with wet kisses in return. It never took much to convince you when he spoke to you like that, so adoring and saccharine. 

“That’s my good girl,” He mused, invigorated by your consent. Almost instantaneously he became more heavy-handed with his touches, fingertips massaging firm, purposeful circles around your clit, occasionally dipping down to collect your growing arousal and bring it back with him. “You’re all mine, you know that? Never gonna let anyone else have my baby.”

Poor you. Clueless of his intentions, you interpreted that sentence in a much different way than he really meant it. But, ignorance is bliss, and what you felt right now was nothing short of blissful.

You poked your head up just to catch his lips with your own in a wanton grasp for more intimacy, a signal of your agreement, like you were giving yourself to him. He knew it was wrong that you didn’t fully realize what you were agreeing to, but again, he compartmentalized that, deciding that was a problem for his future self. What mattered right now was securing your place at his side for the rest of your lives.

He could feel the way your hips were stuttering, he could feel how short your breaths were becoming against his lips, and he knew you were getting close. Grunting into your mouth, he forced his hand further down your panties and sank two thick fingers into your hole, stretching you open for him. The intrusion was quite a bit less gentle than you were used to from him, drawing a shocked whimper from you, but you soon began to relax once more when he curled up into your sweet spot, sending you boneless. 

“D-Daddy,” You whined, nails biting into his shoulders. “Hurts… Slow, slower…”

A shiver rolled over his body, that of immediate guilt. He knew he was being a little rough with you, and he certainly didn’t want to hurt you, but…

“Fuck, I can’t help it,” He groaned, “Been thinking about this pussy all night, princess, I need you like air…”

You could hear the desperation in his tone, and even more you could feel it in the way he touched you like he was starving, like he was stranded in the desert and you were an oasis. Softened by this– and entirely hypnotized by his praise– you resigned to the feeling, allowing him to play with your body as he pleased. He was rutting into nothing without even thinking about it, his cock woefully hard and straining against the front of his grey sweatpants.

He wanted to prepare you properly, he really did, but he was so revved up and needy, he didn’t want to risk blowing his load anywhere but inside you. That wasn’t an option. Hands shaking, he pulled away from you just long enough to kick his sweatpants off and reach for one of those condoms, silently resenting the fact that he had to wear one at all, but he had an appearance to keep up. 

He tore the package open haphazardly with his teeth and rolled the condom on, shuddering deeply. His grasp was tight on your thigh as he pulled it up and over his hip, his other hand pushing your dainty purple panties aside to guide his cock into the heavenly, pillowy walls of your ethereal cunt.

Fuck, you were so fucking tight, clenching around him, whimpering and whining and writhing like a perfect little puppy in heat. Leon’s teeth sank into your shoulder as he bottomed out in you, and he almost could have sworn he felt the tip of the condom rip open even wider. The image alone had him moaning like an animal, pinning your quivering body to his own while he rolled his hips, fucking you deep and hard and slow, savoring every single stroke of your slippery walls around his aching cock. Every meeting of your hips was joined by obscene squelching with the way you were practically sucking him in.

“G-God, fuck,” Leon growled, his face contorted with pleasure. You and Leon had always had what you considered to be an active and healthy sex life, but you’d never seen him quite so beside himself with raw lust. Whatever drove him in that moment was primal, and you could feel it in his every movement, his every breath, see it in the wild look in his eyes.

His pupils were like dinner plates as he gazed down at you, stamping your forehead with kisses and feeling over every inch of your body. “Look at you, just look at you… Such a perfect little dolly for daddy to love on forever and ever, huh? Oh, my princess…”

You were lightheaded with arousal, every nerve ending in your body lighting up with white hot pleasure. You could barely even form a sentence, just nodding along as he moaned out his praise and letting him manhandle you like a ragdoll. Perhaps his words had more than a modicum of truth to them.

“F-Feels so… so… fuck, daddy, feels so good,” You babbled mindlessly, head falling back to the pillows beneath you. He was overwhelming your senses, taking over every corner of your mushy brain. The room was dark and you were still a bit delirious with sleep and to that effect, nothing existed in your world right now but daddy, daddy, daddy…

He laughed softly, pressing a kiss to the spot on your shoulder he’d so harshly bitten earlier, the pace of his thrusts not faltering for a second. “Yeah? I’ll bet it does, judging by the look on you,” He teased, nipping at your throat. “So pretty when you’re all fucked out.”

Your back was arching up off the bed, your eyes rolling back and your walls pulsing around him. Addicted to eliciting pleasured reactions from you, Leon wedged one hand between your two bodies, flattening his palm on your lower belly before pressing down.

Stars. You saw stars. A broken, high-pitched cry ripped from your throat, and you didn’t even have the capacity to hope the neighbors didn’t think you were being murdered, because you didn’t care. You could feel every rigid inch of him inside you, dragging over every nerve, his cock stuffed so deep that you swore you could feel him in your throat. Toes curling and your nails raking down his naked back, tears were beginning to prick at your eyes– you were close.

That was a good thing, though, considering he was too, and he could only hope the wet heat of your release would mask the feeling of his own. Leon sealed his lips over your own once more, swallowing your broken, needy cries as he fucked you to completion, letting his hand fall a little bit lower until his fingertips were on your clit again.

Your body twitched at the stimulation, thighs clamping down tight around his hips as you sobbed into his mouth and soaked his cock with your gushing sex. “Daddy,” You wept, clinging to him for dear life as he fucked you through your high, his own spilling out in sync. “Daddy, daddy, daddy…”

“Shh, I’ve got you, baby, I’m right here,” He cooed, taking your bottom lip playfully between his teeth before pressing a gentle kiss to the tip of your nose. “Just stay put, you’re doing so good for me, angel…”

His hips continued to piston forward as he hoped to force as much of his cum into you as he could manage, while still maintaining the believable illusion of protection. He intended to put every last one of those tampered-with condoms to use, though he wondered silently to himself if you might give up and just let him take you raw once you were to inevitably find out you’re pregnant.

You were a weeping, shivering mess in his arms, thighs clenching and twitching around him as he shushed you and babied you, petting your hair away from your tear-stained face and stamping you with delicate kisses, still stuffing his cum into you with shallow thrusts. He couldn’t wait to see you blossom right before his eyes. He couldn’t wait for you to realize your purpose was right here with him. He couldn’t wait to have you to himself for the rest of your days, his princess.

Leon remained sheathed deep within you, even as he softened, wanting to make sure you stayed plugged up well. But, he also couldn’t resist the warmth and wetness of you, how comforting it felt to be enveloped by you.

“You just stay put right there, okay, princess?” He reiterated quietly, lips brushing over your brow in a loving kiss. “Want you to keep daddy warm for the rest of the night. Can you do that for me?”

As if he even had to ask. You would have done practically anything for him when reduced to such a bleary, agreeable state of mind. He knew you all too well.

You just nodded like a bobblehead, dreamy, doe eyes staring up at him through teary lashes, hanging off his every word like gospel. He tucked you in even closer to his chest, cradling you with such adoration, his hips rocking forward every now and then just to get a reaction out of you, and to remind himself this was real.

He wasn’t at all surprised that you were able to fall asleep like that, stuffed full of cum and sated like a good little princess deserved to be. In a perfect world, you would never have to move again, just stay there in his lap forever and soak up every drop of him you could take. 

In the coming weeks, that box of condoms wouldn’t last long. The only thought on his mind day in and day out was bending you over every surface in the apartment, and you thought nothing of it. Of course you noticed his sudden, insatiable lust for you, but you assumed it was a symptom of knowing his beloved girlfriend was just a few short months away from potentially leaving. He was only grasping at every inch of you he could commit to memory, right?

In all fairness to you, you weren’t exactly that far off.

Your tired eyes pried open at the familiar feeling of Leon rutting up against you, gripping at your hips like you would disappear if he didn’t. The morning sun was just barely beginning to peek through the windows and the bed was warm, it was a lovely way to wake up, one you would never get tired of.

Or at least you never thought you would. You loved Leon— and his sexual prowess— very dearly, but you also loved being able to sleep through an entire night without interruption, and you hadn’t been getting much of that over the past several weeks.

“Mnh… Leon, babe,” You grumbled, burying your face back into your pillow. “Not today. I’m exhausted.”

He was taken aback by this at first, and then his expression fell with disappointment. Leon had gotten so used to breeding you dumb every morning before work that he wasn’t confident he could go back to functioning without it. Regardless, Leon knew that continuing his attempt to seduce you while you were this grouchy would be a death sentence, so he opted to take the path of least resistance. 

After the moment or two it took for him to process that decision, Leon’s touches quickly shifted from provocative to soothing– he was no longer grasping at your hips but wrapping you up in his arms, pressing gentle kisses to your temple and cheekbone as if to regain your good favor.

You hummed contentedly, relaxing back into his embrace. Leon always warmed up like a heater in the night, and you were more than happy to bask in it. His muscular frame was like a weighted blanket and his presence alone was usually enough to knock you out like a light, but for some reason, you were struggling to fall back asleep. Every second felt like five minutes and despite your best efforts– and your complete and utter exhaustion– sleep refused to reclaim you.

Biting back the urge to blame Leon for waking you up in the first place, you huffed out a breath and rolled over in his arms, hoping the change in position might be just what you needed.

Wrong. Very, very wrong. Something about the movement made you dizzy, nauseous, your stomach twisting into knots. You wanted to say something, but you weren’t even sure what to say. It came on so suddenly that it caught you off guard and you weren’t even fully confident you would be able to get up at first.

You whined his name quietly, nuzzling into his chest and wrenching your eyes shut in an attempt to reorient yourself, your arms closing around your middle instinctively.

“You alright? What’s the matter?” Your sweet boyfriend asked quietly, brows furrowing with concern. He could feel your body trembling against his own, your back rising and falling with short, shallow breaths.

Now it was your throat tightening, too, and the second your mouth started to flood with saliva, you knew what was about to happen. Leon didn’t stop you when you writhed out of his embrace and stumbled out of bed, depending on muscle memory alone to get yourself to the bathroom with how woozy and ill you felt.

You just barely made it to the toilet in time to vomit. The cold tile felt nice on your knees, but the impact, not as much. It wasn’t long before Leon materialized at your side with a glass of water and a cold washcloth to hold over your forehead, rubbing your back and already silently conspiring to call out of work and give his poor, sick angel the princess treatment all day.

You collapsed back into his chest with a deep shudder, reaching for the water in a desperate attempt to wash the taste of bile from your mouth. He ended up grabbing it for you, raising it to your cracked lips and helping you take slow, measured drinks.

“There you go, pup,” He hummed, rocking you gently in his lap, his poor little darling princess. “I’m sorry you’re not feeling well.”

Your eyes fluttered closed, a sense of relief washing over you at last. Maybe you just caught a bug, or ate something your body didn’t agree with, or your stress and exhaustion were finally catching up to you. Surely you would feel better within a few days.

“I’m okay,” You whispered, reaching for his hand and squeezing it affectionately. “Thanks for taking care of me.”

Leon smiled, a burst of warmth spreading through his chest. You couldn’t possibly imagine what that meant to him, considering he chose to interpret it in whatever way felt most validating. After all, no one could take care of you like Leon could, and they wouldn’t have the chance to try, anyway. Not over his dead body.

Stooping down to kiss the crown of your head, Leon’s every word was thick with syrupy sweetness, “My baby, I would be so lost if I didn’t. Taking care of you is like breathing to me.”

And he meant every part of it. He didn’t just mean it, he showed it. He showed it when he held your hair back, and he showed it when you realized you couldn’t even remember when you’d had your last period. He showed it when you sent him to the drugstore in the middle of the night for pregnancy tests, and he showed it when you broke down crying at the results, wondering how this could have happened.

His favorite part was showing it when you tearfully called your parents and told them you were staying in Raccoon City, not because you had found a job, but because you were pregnant.

“I can’t believe they’re choosing to react like this, sweetheart, I’m so sorry. They should be happy for you, and it’s awful that they’re anything but happy for you,” He said, voice low and soothing, tone purposeful. “I’ve got you, princess. I’ve got you. I’m gonna take good care of you and this baby, and we’re gonna be happy. Alright?”

Leon tipped your chin up with his knuckle, making you look at him. Your cheeks were red and your eyes were puffy with tears, droplets still clinging to your little dolly eyelashes.

It wasn't at all difficult for Leon to talk his way into some time off after what happened in San Francisco- - the D.S.O. owed him big time for the damages to his Ducati and his psyche, and with the nightmare of a cover-up they already had on their hands as a direct result of an incident like that occurring on U.S. soil, Leon was the last of the government's concerns. For once, that worked out in his favor. 

Naturally, every spare second of time he now had was spent attached to you like a leech... often more literally than figuratively. 

"F-Fucking Christ," Your jaw unhinged in a needy cry, hot tears leaking from your eyes which had been rolled far back in your lids for a while now, a length of time you couldn't possibly approximate if you tried. 

Your arms were shaking with strain as you reached over your taut, pregnant belly to claw at Leon's hair, yanking him closer, desperate to soothe that nagging ache of desire that had plagued you constantly as of late. He had one broad hand pinning your left thigh to the bed while the other alternated between gripping at your hip and smoothing over your bump. 

Pulling away from your cunt to gasp for air, his lips rosy and swollen and gleaming with you, Leon's fingertips printed hard into your skin, but never enough to hurt. "God, look at you," He mused, trailing a line of wet kisses from the hood of your clit to the highest point of your round belly. "Really popped while I was gone..." 

In the absence of his mouth, his calloused fingers sank deep into your hole, feeling absolutely no resistance with just how deliciously slippery you were. 

Spreading your legs as far as he could with one hand otherwise occupied, Leon ground the heel of his palm against your engorged clit while pumping in and out of you, nipping at the plush, warm flesh of your tummy as he cooed, "Aren't you just a pretty little puppy mama, stuffed up nice and full with daddy's baby? Couldn't hide that gorgeous belly anymore if you tried, huh? Poor thing..." 

Something changed between you and Leon following his return from California. Months ago, a statement like that from him would have made you start angry crying. You always used to hate it when he would rub your helplessness in your face just to break you down-- as most people would-- but now it held a certain kind of catharsis to just go along with it. 

Maybe it was because his intentions felt different now, too. Given your pitiful track record, you didn't feel comfortable asking him what happened while he was gone, but you had gathered that something happened to shake him. 

He was clingy to begin with, became even clingier when you got pregnant, and now he was tightening his grip again. Except this time, it didn't feel quite as aggressive or controlling as usual, it felt desperate. It felt fearful, but it also felt relieved, like kissing the tarmac after a particularly turbulent flight. 

Worse yet, your demeanor toward him wasn't much different. At this point it didn't seem as though he knew about your outing, and for as sweet as he had been since the second he returned home, you were terrified that he could somehow find out and snap at any moment. 

So, you threw everything you had into gaining his good favor, proving to him that you were a good, obedient pup who would never dare take advantage of his trust in you to do something so stupid and dangerous, and maybe then, if he were to find out, you could preemptively soften the blow. Maybe he would see that you had learned your lesson, that you corrected your behavior on your own and understood the error of your ways, that you understood the importance of following daddy's rules and had long since learned the hard way never to question him again. 

It ate you alive a little bit to keep it from him, for fear that your failure to be honest with him might come back to bite you later, but you didn't feel particularly inclined to walk yourself into a punishment over a mistake you had absolutely no intention of ever repeating, either. 

Your vision blurred white as his tongue slipped back down to flutter over your clit, his long, thick fingers reaching deep into your guts to untangle the delicate thread of your arousal. He was groaning in response to the flavor of your essence, the vibration sounding through your whole body and carrying electric pops of pleasure with it, your own wanton cries melting in with the chorus of wet noises that accompanied his devouring of you. 

"Fuck, you're so fucking perfect," Leon panted into your folds before stooping forward to seal his lips over your bud once more, drinking you in with an obscene slurp. "My blushing, breeding bride..." 

"Daddy," You cried out, voice light and airy with need as you rutted up toward his face and devolved into mindlessly repeating yourself, "Gonna cum, gonna cum, g-gonna cum..." 

He chuckled, hooking his fingers inside you abruptly just to send your poor, dumb little puppy brain spinning out and to coax more of those precious noises from you. "Oh, are you?" He teased. "Are you gonna make a pretty little mess all over daddy's fingers, darlin'? Gonna give daddy something sweet to lick up?" 

He hadn't even finished speaking and you were already nodding, the upward lilt of his tone being the only thing it took for your hazy brain to know you were being asked something, which naturally meant that whatever it was, the correct answer was yes. You weakly tried to grip at his hair again, only to draw an amused puff of laughter from him as he watched you struggle. 

"Can't even reach over that bump now? Oh, poor princess... Looks like daddy bred you up too good, didn't I?"

Whimpering, you nodded, giving up your attempt to grasp at his hair in favor of the simpler option, allowing your shaking hand to rest over your swollen stomach as you came undone. Being seven months pregnant was no fucking joke, as you'd come to learn, and while you'd spent the bulk of your pregnancy so far obsessing over your discomfort with the physical changes, recently your self esteem had very much taken a backseat to all the other bullshit that came along with growing a baby. 

Your boobs hurt. Your back hurt. Your hips hurt. You were waddling more than walking, you couldn't stop crying, you constantly wanted to fuck, and to top it all off, you were beginning to leak strange fluids from your vagina and your nipples on occasion. With everything you had going on, you couldn't possibly handle worrying about your appearance, too-- at least you could sleep at night knowing you never had to worry about giving Leon the ick. 

Writhing and twitching as Leon dragged your orgasm out for as long as he could manage, the room was spinning around you, your jaw dropped in a high pitched cry of his title on repeat until you had no choice but to gasp a breath in. He continued to pump in and out of you down to the knuckles while he sipped from your cunt like a fountain, knowing you could take it-- or rather, that you would take it. 

"One more f'me, doll?" 

A deep, guttural shiver tore through you. It didn't matter whether you were to agree or not, because you knew it wasn't really a question anyway, so you didn't bother giving him a clear answer. You just clawed at the sheets and tried to prepare for what he decided to give you. 

His denim eyes darkened, pupils swallowing up much of the familiar color as he zeroed back in on your dripping sex with fierce determination. Locking his arm around your thigh, he dragged you down the bed until you were pressed flush against his face, the bridge of his nose bumping against your puffy, sensitive clit with the motion. The veins in his bicep rose beneath his skin as his muscles tightened to pin you firmly in place, and then he took off like a wind-up toy car. 

It was like you were watching him surrender control to something other than himself in real time. The fire alarm could have started going off right in that moment and you figured he wouldn't have even flinched, at least not until he'd had his fill of you, not until he'd delivered upon that promise to work just one more from your poor little body. 

"You're always dripping wet when you're being good, baby," He praised, licking his lips salaciously at the taste of you on his tongue as he continued lazily pumping his fingers in and out of your drooling cunt. "I bet you were so horny without daddy around to keep you sated..." Leon unexpectedly withdrew his fingers, admiring how they gleamed with your juices before bringing them up to smear a stripe across the mound of your full stomach. 

But the digits returned almost as quickly as they were withdrawn, stretching you open with a third and sucking your clit up into his mouth simultaneously, silky tongue catching every last little drop of arousal that dared to leak out of you.

Leon groaned softly, his cock twitching eagerly in his boxers. The sight of you squirming on the bed with a puffy bellyful of puppies that he put in you was almost enough to drive him wild-- knowing that he was the only source of relief from your raging lust was enough to drive him insane and then some, fueling his obsession limitlessly. 

"Just beg nice and pretty for daddy, baby. Beg for me to stuff you up with babies so you don't feel alone." He instructed firmly, two fingertips taking an aching pace at your clit as he spoke. 

You didn't usually like giving Leon any wins. It just wasn't your style... or at least it didn't used to be. 

But you did anyway. You writhed and convulsed and shattered practically on command, your vibrating thighs attempting to stick shut around his head as the noises that fell from you melted down into mindless babbles, and unabashed begging. Before that mission, he would have moved to stop your thighs from shutting him out, but not now. Not since everything changed.

A car door opened and shut, a set of keys jingled, the lock clicked, and you couldn’t move, just staring wide-eyed at the door from the base of the stairs as it swung open to reveal your captor, who froze at the sight of you, too.

His duffel bag dropped to the floor beside him, long forgotten in Leon’s mind as he feasted his eyes upon the image of you for the first time in over a month— or at least for the first time since his phone broke. He nearly fell to his knees with relief. 

“Oh, puppy,” He sighed out, tears pricking at his tired eyes, overwhelmed with the insatiable need to feel you in his arms again. In just a few short strides he crossed the distance between you and embraced you so tightly, it was almost crushing. 

Euphoria, pure and uncut, a high unachievable in this universe by any other means. That was the only way Leon could think of to describe what he felt in that moment. 

Pulling back to look at you, he cupped your jaw with one hand while the other pushed its way up beneath your shirt, finally feeling the soft, round warmth of your bump under his hand again, and he almost could have sworn he felt a little kick. He was beaming now, vibrating with excitement, almost at a loss for words entirely. 

Almost. 

“My beautiful fucking wife,” He laughed, a single tear breaching the threshold of his eye to drip down over his reddened cheek. “You’ve grown so much…”

You couldn't argue with him there. It felt like you'd doubled in size since he last saw you, your ripening belly putting every shirt in the house to the test over the several weeks he'd been away, and you weren't even done cooking yet. Not nearly.

Now he really did fall to his knees, and Leon's hands came forward to tug your shirt up, baring your rounded middle to him. In no time at all, his lips were scattering across the smooth surface of your skin like delicate rain, his warm hands cradling either side of your stomach as he hoped to himself that he might feel his child kick again, that he might feel them squirm. His lids fell shut as though he were in a dream, or maybe he was reminding himself that he wasn't.

The entire time you felt like you were holding your breath. You didn't know what to say. You didn't even know how to feel. You couldn't tell if you were going to throw up from relief, or from fear. Maybe from guilt? Regret? 

Or was it just from the root of his progeny in you? You just didn't know, and as the minutes melted away from you, it all began to collapse into itself until your skull became an echo chamber of blaring alarms and racing thoughts and... and... 

"Daddy, I m-missed you," You choked out, one hand coming down to thread into his hair while the other raised up to your mouth, quieting your cries. You weren't even sure if you were just saying that as a defense mechanism, or if you actually meant it, and you couldn't even bring yourself to care. Maybe you did mean it, if only a little. "I-It was so quiet, it was so quiet..." 

"I know, I know, I'm sorry," He spoke against your taut skin, locking his arms around your hips to tug you even closer, his cheek squished up against you. He was well over a week out from his last shave, the gruff shadow on his face tickling you as he continued, "I don't ever wanna have to leave you like that again, baby. Never ever. I'm so sorry--" 

"W-What if you didn't come back?" You cut him off, bottom lip wobbling, "How long was I supposed to wait? What was I supposed to do?" 

He shook his head at this and cut you off firmly, determined to nip that line of thinking in the bud. "Don't say things like that. It didn't happen that way and it's never going to, do you hear me?" 

"W-What even happened?" 

"Do you hear me, puppy?" 

For a moment, you hesitated. Wasn't the whole issue with his job that he had absolutely no power? That there wasn't an assignment he could turn down, or a day he could take off, or a report he could slack on, or an order he could defy? How could he say with any certainty that this wasn't going to happen again? That it might not be worse next time? 

And why did you even care? 

Weeping, you nodded. "I h-hear you. I hear you, daddy."

"Good," Leon's right hand rubbed measured, soothing circles along your belly, subconsciously mapping the feel of your gravidity beneath his palm. He would keep you just like this forever if he had the power to, heavy and radiant with his fruit, though he couldn't wait to meet the growing baby in there, either. It was a constant struggle of the mind. "I don't wanna miss one more second of this."

And as such, he wouldn't. 

"Shit," Leon grumbled under his breath, standing aside to observe the shelf he'd just hung on the wall before turning over his shoulder to gauge your opinion; "Does that look level to you?" 

Humming in thought, you took a step back to get a better perspective. Now able to compare the little white shelf with the rest of the nursery decorations on the pale, lemonade colored wall, it became quite evident why he was concerned-- it might as well have been diagonal. 

"It's pretty skewed to the left, babe," You answered him honestly, one hand perched to support the small of your aching back while the other rested atop your belly. 

Narrowing his eyes in concentration, Leon joined you where you were so he could look at it from your angle, and yeah, it was pretty fucking off. With an exasperated puff of laughter at his own expense, Leon shook his head and approached the wall again to start taking the screws out. "Well, I guess it's a good thing I didn't go into carpentry." 

You laughed too, because he was right. Every last one of those little wall decorations had been a headache to put up, and the furniture was another thing entirely. Just days ago you spent an entire afternoon watching him lose his mind over the incoherent instructions included with the crib you'd begged him to order, hence why it took him half the week to cool off enough to deal with the shelving. 

"Well, if you would just let me try..." 

But he was already shaking his head 'no' before you made it more than three words through that sentence. He gave you an affectionate look of disapproval before reminding you, "Nope, no way. Pretty puppies don't get to play with sharp tools and heavy things." 

You poked your tongue out at him playfully, he poked his right back out at you, and then returned his attention to the task at hand. 

With your input, Leon adjusted the shelf and stepped back to observe it again, nodding in satisfaction only once you did too. "Happy with that?" 

"Maybe," You grinned, "Can I put the stuff up there?" 

Leon raised a brow, "You think you're tall enough to reach?" 

"Probably not... but you could lift me?"

He softened at this. Leon would be a fool to pass you up on such an adorable request, although he couldn't help but give you a deep, playful sigh anyway as he opened his arms to you. "Alright, princess. Hop up." 

You were all too giddy to do so, letting him lift you up by your hips to reach the shelving. One by one, he handed little trinkets off to you for proper placement, his muscles bulging against his shirt but not even shaking beneath your weight. It was equal parts sweet and a reminder of your weakness in comparison to him, which you felt quite numb to by now, for better or for worse. 

Once you had both feet back on the floor, the afternoon melted away in the nursery. With your due date creeping up faster and faster, the preparation felt never-ending, like every time one thing got scratched off the list, another three were added. But in a weird way it was sort of nice-- it gave you both something to do, and whether or not it made sense, you actually worked quite seamlessly together. 

Every onesie, every set of sheets, every furniture piece, every toy, every binky and bottle and blanket had to be washed and sanitized and then washed again, and put into place. If it didn't yet have a place, one had to be arranged for it. Every outlet had to be plugged with safety covers, every cabinet had to be childproofed, every sharp corner had to be padded. As expected, Leon was unwilling to take any risks, and you supposed you couldn't blame him. You didn't really want to take any either, knowing the remainder of your life was about to be judged by your ability to raise Leon's children. 

What else were you supposed to do, though? Leon sucked, the kidnapping sucked, the IUD thing sucked, the pregnancy thing sucked, everything sucked. But unless the universe would decide to cut you a break by smiting Leon where he stood, your situation would remain unchanged for the foreseeable future, and you just had to deal with it. Like it or not, you nailed that coffin shut when you came crawling back home that day. 

And honestly, you still weren't entirely convinced he didn't know you tried to escape. He hadn't said a word about it, he hadn't even alluded to it, but it was still like you physically couldn't stop yourself from overanalyzing his every move just in case. At the same time, you were constantly filtering yourself, playing the perfect princess, strategizing your every word until you couldn't even remember how you felt before you started acting. 

Sometimes you wondered if you even were acting anymore. 

Times like now, as you relaxed in bed together at the end of the busy day, each of you propped up against the headboard and engaged in your own task. Leon was flipping through a book of baby names the size of an encyclopedia while you worked your way through the unnecessarily excruciating crossword puzzle in today's newspaper, your pen slipping into the next box over when a particularly strong kick to your organs caught you off guard.

You let out a barely audible oof, resisting the urge to roll your eyes as soon as the pain dulled-- the first several times you felt your baby moving in there felt like a horror movie, but now that you'd made it well into your third trimester, it was a sensation you'd become quite exasperated with. You weren't a monster, of course, and even you found it sort of cute after a while, just not while you were trying to relax... or focus. 

Or not get kicked in the ribcage, which was most times. 

"You okay?" Leon asked softly, reaching out to rest his hand on your bump. 

"Yeah," You huffed, sitting up a bit to get more comfortable and hopefully soothe the unborn little one, your hand coming to squeeze his own in the process. "She's just training for her black belt or something." 

It came out so easily you didn't even think about it, like discussing the weather. But your phrasing certainly didn't make it past Leon. 

He froze, setting his book aside to look at you in complete bewilderment. "She?"

"What?" 

"Did you just say she?" 

Oh, yeah. Huh. Fuck. 

For a moment you just stared at him blankly, unsure whether you were about to be in trouble, and his expression wasn't really giving you any pointers. Nervously, as you'd come to be conditioned by now, you just blurted out the truth, "Y-Yeah, I did." 

Outwardly, you were frozen just as solid as he was, but inwardly, you were bracing yourself for nuclear fallout. After all, that's what you'd done that for in the first place, right? To irk him? To hurt him? To get under his skin? 

But suddenly you were retroactively regretting that decision. Just as soon as you said it, you were silently drafting an apology, maybe even an excuse. Maybe you could tell him the doctor just said it without even asking. Maybe you could blame it on nothing more than a slip of the tongue-- you just wanted a girl so bad that you must have said it without meaning to... but not even Leon would believe that. 

Right as you were drawing in a breath to respond, Leon spoke first. His gaze was intense with emotion, tipping your chin up so he could meet your eyes and ensure you got a good sense of his elation. "Pretty puppy, are you serious? We're having a daughter?" 

You were glad he forced you to look into his eyes, because what you found there was unexpectedly disarming. It wasn't rage, or betrayal, or authority, like you'd been preparing yourself for. It was vulnerable and adoring, hopeful, like the only reason he even asked was out of fear that the answer might be no, and any expressed excitement would be for nothing. 

"Yeah," The tension in your posture dissolved, "We're having a daughter."

A broad smile set in across his face, his eyes welling with tears as he regarded you with both hands on your belly. Shortly thereafter, you were both surprised by the distinct feeling of your unborn daughter landing a kick beneath his palm, and that really did him in. Leon was all but weeping now, lavishing your baby bump in smooches and happy tears. 

Leon genuinely didn't go into this with a preference on the sex of his first born. He wasn't concerned about 'male heirs' or any of that other macho bullshit. He just wanted his darling wife, and a whole brood of healthy, happy babies. Knowing now that the seed he'd planted and nurtured so lovingly in your womb was growing into a girl, a beautiful baby girl, he felt like he'd just had the wind knocked out of him in the most incredible way. 

A daughter. You were giving him another beautiful angel just like yourself to protect and adore. Christ, he was so overjoyed that he didn't even entertain the idea of asking you why you didn't tell him until now, because he didn't care. He should have been there in the first place instead of letting himself get infected like an idiot, instead of rotting away on the cell block floor at Alcatraz while you were all by yourself learning the sex of your baby. His baby. 

What a fucking let down, He thought to himself. What a complete and utter fucking let down. 

Nearly a year he'd spent trying to convince you he would always be there to hold your hand, that he would take care of anything and everything for you, especially as far as supporting your pregnancy was concerned, and he failed you. You went into this scared to death of him and becoming a mother, yet you placed all of your trust on his promise to ease your burdens, and he failed you. 

You trusted him, and he failed you. His darling little puppy mama, his beloved wife. He could hardly breathe. 

"Y-You shouldn't have been alone," He choked out, lips brushing over the surface of your skin. "My two sweet princesses... I'm so sorry. I-I can barely even think about it." 

Of all the emotions you expected from him in this moment, remorse certainly wasn't high on the list. You couldn't do anything but just watch him at first, stunned, and briefly wondering if he was testing you. But there was no way, right? Leon didn't strike you as the type to be able to cry on command-- he barely even cried when he needed to. Maybe you should just accept the win of getting anything resembling an apology from him. 

You swallowed that paranoia back, having convinced yourself enough to relax for now. Threading your fingers through his hair, noting silently to yourself that he was probably overdue for a cut after his last mission, you attempted to soothe him with his own reassurances to you, "Don't think like that, okay? You're here now, we're all safe, and it's never going to happen again. That's what matters."

He knew you were only saying that to make him feel better, but it melted his heart just as much that you were trying at all. Not long ago, you would have been content to just watch him hate himself. You might have even thought he deserved to.

And you did, of course, just not for this. He had a lot of things to be sorry about, and his scary government job that he had no control over just wasn't one of them. Over the months you'd managed to gather that Leon dealt with a lot of guilt around the people he couldn't save, and probably also the people he'd been forced to hurt. Even if it wasn't technically a direct result of his occupation, you were beginning to realize that what he'd done to you wasn't exempt from that laundry list of regrettable life choices. 

What you felt toward him these days wasn't exactly sympathy... but it wasn't exactly not sympathy. The lines blurred more and more every day, and the further your pregnancy progressed, the less capacity you had to be distraught about it all the time. You had bigger things to worry about, obviously. 

Things Leon would rather worry about too, as you were reminded by the heavy thud of that book tumbling from the bed, propelled by the shifting of the covers. 

Leon crawled atop you, knees perched at either side of your hips on the mattress. Slowly, he slipped his fingers beneath the hem of your nightshirt to draw it up and over your shoulders, laying bare to him all but what lay beneath your panties, and without incident, to boot. 

As you'd come to expect by now, he was pressing feather-light kisses all along the rounded surface of your stomach at the first opportunity. Reaching forward to take your chin between his thumb and forefinger, always careful to ensure he had your full attention, Leon whispered, "Do you like the way your belly looks, sweetheart?" 

Not really, was your immediate thought, but right after that, it was, well... I don't know. Do I? 

Your heart clenched in your chest as you stared down at his hands roaming the swollen surface of your baby bump, committing every square inch to textile memory by feeling along the curve of it, by brushing his lips over the feathery stretch marks that had bloomed there in his absence. To say you didn't like it would be a complete and total understatement, but with Leon scrutinizing your every move in an effort to gauge your emotions, you were having a terribly difficult time finding the right words to speak. 

Finally, you admitted, "Depends on the day." 

Which was true. It tasted bitter on your tongue to give him the satisfaction of even insinuating you enjoyed this, but there were times in which you would gaze at your reflection and pretend to be someone else, and in that removed context, you found the woman in the mirror to be quite the cute little pregnant lady-- but Leon didn't need to know all that.

"It'll be okay," He promised, resting his chin atop your bump and breathing in deep, entranced by the heavenly scent of motherhood that clung to you now. "Before long you'll come to love how beautiful you look with daddy's baby in you."

Stroking gently down your sides, unable to ignore just how obvious it'd become that your breasts and the dips of your waist had filled out with the evidence of his claim over you, Leon's cock was starting to tent up in his boxers. He couldn't get enough of you if he tried, even if you didn't want anything to do with yourself. He would take you all, over and over again, let every rejected piece of you flow over him until his cup runneth over. 

Meanwhile, you were wondering to yourself what 'before long' even meant to him. You were already 30 weeks pregnant and barreling toward your due date. It's not like there was long left for you to come to love it-- most of the time you didn't even like it. 

But the sex was so good. That, even you couldn't deny you'd come to love. 

"Daaaaddyyy," You whined, long and drawn out as the throbbing head of him pushed past your sodden hole, tunneling deep into you with a low groan from the throbbing core of his chest. 

He could barely keep his eyes open, right hand gripping the meat of your thigh to pin you open while the left steadied you at the hip, and the sounds you made were nothing short of heaven to him. The wet suction of you pulsing around him, the incoherent whining and weeping that knocked from your plush lips with every inch you took. 

"You're so damn eager to get fucked aren't you? Poor thing," Leon coaxed you cruelly, even as he could hardly get a breath in himself. There were certainly worse things in the world than having a dedicated partner so keen on servicing you; his possessive nature coupled with your hormonal neediness had turned this unwilling partnership into something undeniably effective and powerful. 

As soon as he was sure you were comfortable, his thrusts picked up pace steadily, and as usual, he couldn't help the way his hand crept up from your hip to your rounded tummy. You looked perfect like this, absolutely perfect, down to the molecule. Such a proper little puppy bearer you were, almost to term with your first litter yet already crying out for more, your swollen tits bouncing, your nails biting into his skin and your eyes rolling back in your head, your pretty pussy clenching around his shaft at half the pace of your beating heart. It was an image he wished he could frame, an image of you that only existed in his mind's eye until now.

"Such a pretty, pretty princess," He mused, bringing his hand away from your belly only to swipe his hair back from his sweat-slicked forehead, and then it was promptly returned to its place with a gentle pat to gather your attention there, to just how big you'd gotten. Every rigid inch of him set your insides on fire, feeding a white hot pit in your core that smoldered through your blood and seeped all the way up to your shrinking little brain like rot. Like an infection.

"D-Don't stop," Your words came out in breathy, stunted, braindead mewls, oh, so fucking braindead. Poor puppy, you were so focused on pleading for him not to stop, you didn't even realize you were cumming already, convulsing, sobbing, cunt sucking his cock in so nice and deep that daring to remove it might as well be considered sacrilege.

And it was to him. Oh, God was it sacrilege to deny you the pleasure you so deserved. Everything he did was for you, for the privilege of spreading you out upon your altar and feeling your holy body accept him, beckon him, cleanse him.

"I'm here, darlin'..." He prayed to you, "I'm right here."

"I fucking knew it. I knew you were guilty as sin," Leon scoffed, tossing his cards on the table in exasperation. Bulging arms crossed over his chest, he shook his head and added, "Colonel Mustard, you conniving piece of shit." 

Your lips parted with a nervous laugh, followed by a slow, discreet exhale to steady your heart again, only when he wasn't looking, of course. Hearing him say things like that just set your fucking teeth on edge, but even with the little spike of anxiety he caused, you had to admit to yourself that it was a bit funny. 

Gathering up the cards on the table, you flashed him a playful smile and asked, "Did you wanna play again?" 

You only looked up from shuffling the deck when you realized he was taking longer than expected to respond. Chillingly, that's when you noticed he was just studying you with an expression of neutrality that gave away nothing about what he was thinking. That rarely ever meant anything good for you. 

Naturally, Leon didn't miss the way your pupils narrowed to pinholes in alert beneath his scrutiny. Perhaps in an attempt to disarm you, he cleared his throat and relaxed, reaching forward to help you reset the game board. Instead of answering your question, however, he asked you one instead. 

"Something on your mind?" 

"No," You replied quickly, "Why?" 

His eyes narrowed just a teeny tiny bit, barely even recognizable if you weren't looking right at him, if you didn't know him well enough by now. Or did he narrow his eyes? Were you just imagining things? 

"You seem jumpy." 

Shit. Shit. Shit.

Immediately, you began to beat yourself to hell for letting your guard down. As far as you knew, you were doing so well. He hadn't suspected a thing for so long, and of course you had to go ahead and fuck it all up for yourself over a game of Clue. 

Taking a shaky drink of water, you swallowed nervously before responding, "Oh. I'm sorry."

And now his eyes were going a bit narrow. When it came to you, a non-answer like that was a pretty solid indicator that you were hiding something, but Leon was beginning to learn that he couldn't scare you off too early with the interrogating-- he needed to take more of a delicate approach if he wanted to get anywhere with you, especially if he wanted to get anywhere with you willingly. 

With a fond, gentle tone and a relaxed posture that he hoped would encourage you to open up, Leon asked, "Sorry for what, pup?" 

Again, your vocabulary, your tongue, your lungs, and your brain were failing you in succession, taking turns lighting up your poor, exhausted neurons like an overloaded switchboard. He sounded sincere, he looked sincere, but... But it's Leon, you still managed to think to yourself, and your heart squeezed tight with every other syllable. Then, somewhere in there, you thought, But... it's Leon. And now you really didn't know what to do.

He had been so kind to you lately. Even you had to admit to yourself that a lot of your hesitation to trust him in the month since he returned was just the product of your own overthinking. You couldn't come up with a single thing he'd done or said to you since he'd been back that would give you any incentive to lie to him. In fact, all that came to mind only proved the opposite. 

He'd been remarkably consistent with rewarding your newfound honesty, even if it wasn't always exactly the kind of honesty he hoped to hear. The fact that you even made the effort at all was proof enough to Leon that you cared to consider his rules, and the fact that you were honest with him even when you knew you might get in trouble meant you trusted him to help you. 

Admit it or not, like it or not, you cared. You trusted him. Your hesitation to answer-- which, to note, was making him sick with anticipation-- proved your inclination for obedience in its own way. Those were sentiments he had to remind himself of as he continued his effort to navigate a conversation despite you not giving him much to work with yet. You were certainly a tough nut to crack, but he'd never felt so motivated to accept the challenge. 

Taking your dainty little hand in a reassuring squeeze, he cooed, "My sweet baby... It's okay. Daddy won't ever be mad at you for telling the truth, you know that, right?" 

Oh dear God, he's laying it on thick.

Your bottom lip quivered as you tried to swallow back the lump beginning to take root in your throat, only to find you could barely even swallow around it. For four weeks he'd been nothing but sweet to you, clearly putting forth a concerted effort to make up for all the attention you should have been getting while he was gone. For four weeks he'd taken the care to alter his own habits and behavior just to prove that you could trust him to adore and support you through anything, and not just you, but your unborn daughter. 

And yet, for four weeks, you'd been lying to him.

All at once you were hit with a sickening pang of guilt that gripped at the centermost part of your gut and twisted it tight. That kindness you'd been enjoying so much was entirely unearned, and the longer you avoided confessing, the more you were taking advantage of him and his belief in you. 

"D-Daddy, I have to tell you something," You spewed, and it was only once you heard the pathetic wobble of your own voice that you realized you were weeping already. 

Truthfully, Leon was caught off guard. He always prepared for some degree of pushback from you, but this wasn't pushback. You were having a meltdown. Thankfully, he had quite a lot of experience with your meltdowns by now, and he had learned all the best places to start trying to pull you back from them. 

So he quickly entered coddling mode. 

"Okay, okay, shh, you're alright," He soothed, standing from his chair to kneel beside yours. One hand on your knee and the other still squeezing your own, Leon looked you in the eye as he continued, "You're okay, baby, you're not in trouble. Whatever it is, we can handle it. I'm just glad you're being honest with me now, right?" 

In your distress, you didn't really pay attention, but had you been as vigilant as you usually were, you might have noticed how strategically selected his every word was in the interest of encouraging you to spit it out without making you feel pressured. Whatever he was doing was working, because you were soaking it up and nodding along like a bobblehead, even trying to match your shuddering breaths to the pace of his own to calm yourself down, just like he'd taught you. 

Just like a good girl would. And all good behavior was worthy of daddy's praise, yeah? 

"There you go, there's my good girl. You're alright, see? Daddy's right here with you, and I'm not going anywhere. Just take your time."

But you'd already taken a month. You should have told him the second he walked through the door that day and saved you both the grief, but you didn't, and for that, you didn't deserve his kindness, you didn't deserve his good graces, you deserved whatever he would have coming to you. All that progress you'd made in controlling your breathing was shattered in an instant, your chest puffing with every sharp, ragged gasp for air.

You had to tell him. You should have already told him, and that was no one's fault but your own. Every moment that you continued to hesitate only made you a worse liar. You had to tell him and you had to tell him right now. Right now, right now, right now, right-- 

"I--" 

Everything stopped. For one dreadful moment that you had no idea would be your most recent memory of comfort for the next several hours, everything stopped.

And then it all started up again. One second you were about to spill your guts about what you did, finally finding the breath to speak, and the next second that very same breath was punched from your lungs by a staggering pain that spread quickly from the root of you and smashed everything it touched to bits. As soon as you were finished choking on thin air, any and all thought about your impending confession was seared out of your brain-- you could only scream. 

Leon went wide-eyed in an instant, clutching your hand and standing to his feet to quickly assess you. He was choking on air too, for once joining you in a momentary inability to speak, purely out of shock and confusion. Your eyes screwed shut and you were curling into yourself in clear agony-- whatever you were about to tell him didn't matter to him either, now. You weren't faking this. 

Taking your face in both hands, trying to get you to look at him, Leon did his best to conceal just how much he was panicking on the inside. He had to be strong for you, he had to be strong for your daughter. 

"Sweetheart, hey, you need to breathe," He spoke calmly, but quickly, smoothing your hair back so he could get a good look at you. "Can you tell me what's going on? What hurts?" 

"E-Everything," You gasped, and he was trying to come up with a nice way to ask you to be more specific when you continued. "M-My back, my hips, everything..." 

You were only able to get a couple breaths in before it happened again, this time with a mounting feeling of pressure taking over your entire lower half. It felt like you were going to pop from the inside if it continued any longer, like your hips were just going to crack and split apart, and it was only then that you realized what this could mean. Little did you know, Leon was connecting the dots too. 

"Okay, pup, I need you to listen to me--" 

"D-Daddy, this can't... t-this can't be happening, this can't be happening, it's too early!" You wailed, taking two fistfuls of his shirt and yanking with all your strength, like you were clawing at him for a solution, teary, fearful, stinging eyes pleading for your daddy to make it all go away. It ground his heart down into a fine, fine dust.

Especially because you were right to be distraught. It was too early, your due date was still eight weeks away, and he wasn't prepared for this to happen any more than you were. But he couldn't let it show.

"Listen to me," He interjected, his tone firm, but not callous. "I know it hurts, princess, and I know you're scared. I'm scared too, but we're gonna get you taken care of, okay? Right now, I just need you to breathe for me."

You nodded, hanging off of his every word in search of guidance, relief, something to hold onto. Staring into each other's eyes, he lead you through your breathing, thumbs tenderly caressing the tears away from your cheeks as they fell. It was like the room was vibrating with you. The few cycles it took to help you to get a handle on your breathing felt like an eternity, but he wouldn't dare proceed until he was sure you were getting some oxygen to manage the pain.

And, truthfully, he needed to think over exactly what to do. Whether or not you were actually going into labor like you both feared, it was abundantly clear that you needed medical attention-- thanks to his neurotic preparedness, there was already a 'go' bag stocked and ready in the nursery, but that meant he would have to leave you on your own for a minute to go get it. In your condition, he wasn't worried you would try anything if left unattended, he just couldn't stand the thought of you in such agonizing pain without him there to hold your hand. 

Unfortunately, it was necessary. 

"I need to run upstairs and grab your bag really quick, and then we'll get you in the car, okay? Just sit tight for a second, and keep breathing for me." 

He didn't wait for you to answer, because he didn't want to give himself the chance to keep hesitating. As soon as he finished speaking he turned on his heel and rushed off. Enough time had burned away already, time you could have spent in the hospital getting the help you needed. 

While Leon was upstairs, you were writhing in your chair at the table, one hand grasping at the edge of it as the other clutched weakly at your belly. Somehow you were actually managing to maintain the pace he'd set for your breathing, if only because that was the one thing you could stand to focus on while terrified and crying by the unwavering pain. 

It only felt like you blinked twice before he was pounding down the stairs, diaper bag stuffed to capacity with supplies and slung over his shoulder. Scooping you up into his arms, he quickly moved to cross the house and get you to the car, the distance between your seat at the dining table and the front door feeling like lightyears... especially when you wrenched your arms around him tightly, planted your slick forehead against his chest and screamed, a gush of watery, reddish liquid spilling out from between your legs and dribbling down the front of his jeans.

That piece of evidence, neither one of you could deny. Ready or not, at just 32 weeks, you were going into labor.

You were mad. You were so mad, all the time lately, and you were past the point of wondering if you had any right to be. 

It was late, nearly half past midnight, the only sound in the dim house being the unrelenting patter of fat raindrops on the windows. Leon, too, was late, like he so often was. Of course, you weren’t allowed to complain or ask questions about his high paying job, or his whereabouts, or the secrecy, where all those injuries came from or why he didn’t return when he said he would for the hundredth time.

All your life, you thought relationships like this existed only in fiction, the trope of the distant workaholic who dismisses his partner’s concerns with nothing but his wallet and his sexual prowess, piling diamond encrusted bandages upon months worth of neglect, bottled up grievances and novels left unsaid. It was a concept confined to old movies and paperbound romances as far as you were concerned, before you met Leon.

You weren’t unreasonable, and you weren’t dumb. You had gathered that his mysterious government job really was important and strictly confidential, and you trusted that he was telling you as much of the truth as was permitted by the powers that be. You knew he cared about you, you knew he would rather be home with you than running around at the beck and call of the most powerful people in the country. You knew it was never his intention to hurt you.

But your awareness of his love for you didn’t make it any easier to swallow the unending cycle of broken promises, nor the visible deterioration of his mental and physical health while his ‘work trips’ became increasingly frequent until they all started to just blend together. 

You became numb to it after a while. It seemed selfish to demand his time and attention when he couldn’t help his circumstances. Even bringing it up made you feel like a monster, and it was all because you loved him so completely.

And you loved him so completely. You had seen him cry with laughter and sob with grief. You had seen him burn toast, fall asleep with the TV on, forget how to tie a tie, dread a mundane phone call, mumble to himself when he thought no one was listening. You knew his philosophies on life and love and death, you knew him heart and soul, and so too did he know you.

Thus, you just ate it, wore yourself down until you finally accepted that all those bottled up grievances, novels left unsaid and extravagant bribes were worth the privilege of being his lover.

Your eyes felt dry as you stared at the clock, counting in your tired mind exactly how many hours had passed since he was supposed to be home. It had been a long, rough day that would have been draining enough on its own, but the evening proved to disappoint even further. 

Leon heard about the karmic disaster that was your day through a handful of rant texts you’d sent over the course of it, each one more unfortunate than the last. Sympathetic to your senseless string of rotten luck, he promised to cut away from work an hour early to return home to you with your favorite dinner and enough doting on to make your teeth rot. He did not, of course, come home early, and not only that, but he didn’t come home at all, and you couldn’t get ahold of him.

If this wasn’t such a frequent occurrence, you might have been more worried about his safety, or even more angry at him for leaving you hanging on a day like this one, but you had become so familiar with this whole song and dance that your feelings around it were dulled.

You were just about to give up and go to bed when your phone lit up with a notification. Following the several undelivered texts you tried to send asking if he was okay, he’d given a simple response that you knew would redirect the course of your whole entire night.

Headed home in 15. Be in the dollhouse

You had long since garnered that the dollhouse was more for him than it was for you, even if he seemed to believe it was the other way around. It was nice to be pampered and doted on and styled like a Barbie, until it became a way for him to avoid talking to you about anything important. But that was neither here nor there. Dolls don’t talk, and they most certainly don’t complain.

With a deep, measured breath you exited the bedroom and turned down the hall, to what used to be a spare room but was now more aptly describable as a boudoir. The door creaked open to reveal the delicate, feminine space, heavy satin drapes blocking out any potential prying eyes. Between two solid oak wardrobes was an ornate standing mirror, the walk-in closet to the right overflowing with opulent clothing that hardly ever saw the light of day, just the familiar warmth of Leon’s cerulean eyes. 

At the other end of the room was an antique, three-mirror vanity, stocked carefully with luxury makeup, designer perfumes and every last tool one might need to style your hair, down to a box of satin ribbons in every color with which to tie it back. Leon was never one to do things half-way, and dolling you up was no exception.

Piece by piece, you stripped yourself of your clothes, hands moving as slowly and purposefully as his own would, as if by instinct. Just like a doll would be, you undressed to nothing but a pair of delicate lace panties, and you took your place at the vanity, your posture straight and your hands folded neatly in your lap.

All there was left to do now was wait for Leon, to stare at yourself blankly in the mirror and ruminate, to let your thoughts scream and echo around in your head until it would all collapse into silence, putting you in the proper headspace of an empty-headed little Barbie for Leon to play with.

You didn’t so much as flinch at the sound of the garage door opening, or move a muscle at all at the muffled thudding of his footsteps ascending the stairs. Your lips parted with a slow, deep breath, your posture straightening up one final time before the knob turned, and you watched the door open behind you through the reflection in the mirror.

He looked tired. To be candid, he looked like shit. It was evident he had left immediately from whatever dangerous, world-saving thing he was doing to rush home to you, not taking the time to change or freshen up.

Leon approached you gently, reaching over your shoulder to let his rough fingers cup your neck and throat, tilting your head up just enough to make you look at yourself, and to adjust your posture.

“Such a precious little doll, sitting so pretty for daddy,” He whispered, stooping down to plant a kiss at the crown of your head. His hands smelled like iron and gunpowder, and his breath smelled faintly of malted liquor poorly masked with mint. If only you could have confronted him about it. You just swallowed, staring straight ahead where he was directing your gaze.

Reaching over your shoulder, Leon’s steady hand plucked a detangling brush from the vanity, running his fingers through your hair carefully with his other hand. He felt through the length of your soft locks, mindful as always not to tug at any of the little knots he discovered here and there. Shortly after, he was running the brush through your hair with gentle veneration, delicate, even strokes that nearly threatened to put you to sleep.

Leon watched your expression in the mirror as your lashes fluttered, your head lolling back as if mindlessly chasing the attention. A low chuckle fell from his parted lips. “Feels good, huh? I’ll bet it does. Your hair is so messy, baby… You weren’t playing by yourself all day while daddy was gone, were you?”

He was teasing you. A subtle grin begged to tug at your lips, and you let it. Still, you were sure to shake your head ‘no’-- after all, you couldn’t have him thinking you had taken advantage of his extended absence to be naughty, even if you had been awfully tempted to. 

Carding his fingers through your freshly brushed hair, he hummed in mock consideration for a moment, like he couldn’t decide whether or not he believed you. Finally, he turned you around in your chair to face him, tilting your chin up so he could give you a kiss. “I know my baby would never. Always the perfect princess for me, even when I’m not always the perfect daddy.”

That last part came out a little quieter, like he was ashamed to even say it out loud, but somehow still, it was the loudest part to you. You softened.

He noticed, and he, too, softened. The tension in the air dissipated a bit– it was still somewhere around here, likely waiting right outside the door, but it was no longer actively present, at least. Leon gave you another sweet kiss, this one to your forehead, before gently correcting your posture again.

Pushing your hair back with a soft, fluffy headband, he opened up one of the drawers in the vanity and began to take a few things out. First, a light moisturizer, which he massaged into your skin with a jade roller that was cool to the touch and just as relaxing as always. Your moisturizer was followed by a gentle under-eye balm, a thin layer of primer and a hydrating lip oil.

The way he moved was so fluid, so methodical, like a conductor before an orchestra, and you were his masterpiece. In Leon’s eyes, you might as well have been carved out of the finest, most expensive marble, and you were to be treated no less delicately.

He stepped out just for a moment to wash his hands, a clean slate for the next step of the process, your makeup.

You honestly don’t know how he did it. Judging by some of the techniques and products he would use, you could only guess he must have been doing his research online or something, though where he found the time to do so was another question entirely. His lines weren’t always clean, his blending wasn’t always perfectly smooth, yet somehow you always still felt he’d managed to upstage you with the finished product– perhaps it was because he could see you in a way you couldn’t see yourself.

“Daddy?” You chanced a whisper, but he was quick to press a finger to the plush of your lips, ever so gently.

“Shh… Just sit nice and still for me, alright, sugar?”

You nodded, and he resumed his work with a careful touch.

Soft brushes and plush sponges worked their way around the surface of your face, applying shadow and powders and liner, with Leon holding his breath now and then to ensure a steady hand. Your cheeks were rouged, your lips were glossed, your lashes were carefully curled and it was all topped off with a cooling mist of setting spray and a gentle kiss to the forehead.

“There you are, hm? My beautiful baby dolly,” He mused, reaching forward to tilt your head up by your chin, then to the left, then to the right, checking over his handiwork from every angle. Adding a dash of blush to the tip of your nose, he deemed your makeup complete. “Just perfect.”

Slowly, Leon turned your chair around again, allowing you to look at yourself, and yeah. Wow.

You looked gorgeous, you were glowing even. All of your best features were adorned with purposeful swipes of blush, shade and highlight, your eyes dreamy and sweet, your skin smooth and radiant. He let you look at yourself for a moment, just admiring the expression of awe on you– you were always exceptionally stunning, of course, but you looked all the sweeter in these sacred moments in which you recognized your own beauty.

Leon rested one hand on your shoulder to recapture your attention, his other hand coming forward to stroke your cheek. Your long lashes fluttered as you met his eyes in the mirror, a silent signal that your focus had returned to him. Now the hand that caressed your cheekbone was coming forward to take your own. He helped you up from your seat at the vanity and across the room, to the plush chaise lounge in front of that standing mirror.

The room filled with the quiet noises of rummaging, Leon sifting through drawers and racks of hangers stuffed with what had to have been thousands of dollars worth of designer, a stark contrast to his own attire of largely plain black shirts and jeans that had seen better days.

But you were his princess. Leon was just Leon, and Leon couldn’t possibly deserve as much as a princess.

Turning over his shoulder, Leon approached you with a simple pair of white stockings in hand, sinking to his knees right before the chaise lounge to put them on you. Your ankle looked so slight and delicate in his strong hand as he lifted your leg, drawing a line of kisses up the inside of your calf to follow while he rolled the stocking up higher and higher, until the hem reached just above your knee.

He repeated the action with your other leg, the movement of his hands fluid and practiced, but his breaths were becoming shorter, his kisses a little wetter and needier on your skin. Your own breaths were quickly falling in sync with his own just by watching him dial in on your sex, his calloused hands propping your legs up onto his shoulders so he could shuffle closer.

Gripping you by the hips to angle you up to his liking, he buried his nose into the seat of your thin lace panties and breathed you in deep, as though he were starving for oxygen. The tip of his nose nuzzled forward to brush your panties aside, and just as soon as your slit was bared to him, his tongue was darting out to taste it.

He spread it flat in a slow, languid stripe from your weeping hole all the way to your throbbing clit, his lips closing around the little bundle of nerves to coax it from beneath its hood. You sucked in a breath, your manicured nails printing into the lush material of the furniture you were perched on, trying as hard as you could to keep quiet and still, to allow him to guide you, to play with you as he so desired. Luckily, he wasn’t in too stern of a mood this evening anyway– you weren’t likely to be reprimanded for small errors like that, especially not while he was otherwise occupied.

“Fuck,” He growled lowly into your cunt, leaving white prints where he gripped your pillowy thighs just to ground himself. You could feel his body growing warm as he lost himself in you, lapping up every drop of your arousal with greed. For just a moment, his dilated, denim eyes flicked up to look at you, his rosy cheeks gently squished between your quaking thighs as he puffed out, “Just look at you, my dolly… Daddy’s favorite little toy…”

Your eyes screwed shut with pleasure as his hot mouth met your center again, and when they fluttered open, you caught sight of it all in the mirror. It nearly knocked the wind out of you.

Your dainty legs spread out over your gruff boyfriend’s broad shoulders, adorned in delicate white stockings that looked pure and bright against his tight black t-shirt; his sandy blonde hair damp and messy as he wedged himself between your thighs and drank from you like a fountain; your hair and makeup fit for a gala as your expression contorted with rapture… it could have been an oil painting.

Every swipe of his tongue up the length of you, every flutter along your swollen bud, every deep, wanton, needy groan had your eyes rolling back in your head, your thighs trembling and tightening around his jaw. Every inch of you felt featherlight with electricity as he worked his magic on you, more than capable of making you cum in three minutes flat, but opting not to for the fun of it.

Not that you were complaining. At times he could get carried away in his teasing, but tonight was not one of those nights. Leon wasn’t going to waste your time dangling you over the edge much longer than was strictly necessary. As soon as he noticed you were having trouble sitting still, quiet whines and sighs of pleasure occasionally slipping out from between your glossy lips, he knew it would be unfair to string you along any further.

Leon was practically making out with your folds, the room quiet aside from the slick sounds and lustful whimpers that accompanied his dining of you. Soon it was joined with the low, husky timbre of his voice as he groaned into you, “Gonna cum for me, baby? Gonna make a pretty mess all over daddy’s face?”

In all honesty, you barely registered his words, but all it ever took to get you nodding like a bobblehead was that upward lilt in his tone that indicated he was asking you something. That was all you needed to know that the correct answer was yes.

Smirking briefly to himself as he witnessed your eager and rapt approval, he doubled the intensity of his efforts, his hands wrenching tight into your thighs to pull you flush against his face, but more importantly, to keep you from wriggling away. He didn’t bother to shush you when a shocked yelp bubbled out of you, your body jerking in response to the added stimulation. After all, it was the response he was expecting, and the response he yearned for.

Your shaking hands darted forward to claw at his hair, half-lidded eyes catching your reflection in the mirror once more. Your skin was warm, your breasts heaving as your spine drew into a fine arch and your lips parted to gasp in all the oxygen you could get to your dizzy brain, heels digging into the prominent muscles in his back. He felt every quiver and twitch of your muscles and it only spurred him on. He ate you up like you were his last meal.

Your vision went white as your climax crashed over you hard– the sounds he made were obscene, a satisfied groan vibrating from deep in his chest at the syrupy sweet taste of your arousal. It was an essence he couldn’t possibly get enough of.

As you laid there panting, your legs shaking after the tension in them released, Leon’s eyes dragged up the length of your body with pride. He carefully pulled your panties back into place with a sweet kiss to the bow in the center of them and an affectionate pat to the thigh. 

“There’s a good girl,” He hummed, crawling up from between your legs to kiss you, his mouth still warm and slightly slick with your own spend. “A perfect little doll. All I have to do is pull the right strings to get you to sing for me, huh, princess?”

Once more, you nodded, eyes fluttering shut just for a moment as he kissed your forehead. Then, he stood to his full height again, one hand taking yours and the other steadying you by the dip of your waist as he raised you up to join him, wobbly knees be damned. After all, he wasn’t finished playing dress-up yet. He took a moment to ensure you had regained your balance enough to be able to stand without assistance before opening up one of the wardrobes in search of the remainder of your outfit.

Moments like these only piqued your curiosity in terms of how his brain worked. Sure, you’d been dating for a long time and it was safe to say you knew him quite well, but his penchant for compartmentalization never ceased to astound you. He possessed the sometimes frightening ability to just switch his brain from one mode to the next.

You were brought back to reality once more by the feeling of his lips on your neck. He murmured into your ear, “Arms up, darlin’,” and he barely even finished saying it before you were complying.

You lifted your arms, and he slipped a new dress over your head. There it was, the compensation for being home late, for dropping off the face of the Earth again. The dress was flattering and soft, a delicate blush pink color with embroidered details along the bust and white lace hemming. He drew up the zipper without resistance, and as it reached its apex, the fabric hugged your form perfectly, as though the garment itself was made with you in mind.

Leon kneeled down to straighten out your stockings, and then the skirt of your dress, his eyes scanning over you meticulously in search of any little imperfections that might need fixing. Finding none, he wandered over to where he’d left his jacket, fishing a baby blue box out of the pocket. You had become quite familiar with that blue lately– Tiffany.

Nestled in the slender box was a dainty diamond necklace that now rested right at your collarbones, the clasp in the back secured with a smooch. He carded his fingers through your hair one last time before turning you around to look at yourself in the mirror, his hands rested on your hips, head stooped low to smother the crook of your throat in kisses.

“What do you think?” He whispered in your ear, nibbling gently at the shell.