This I Read For Fun…QuestionMark??

Perfect weekend.

Then the sky split open.

The rain started before sunset. By midnight, the roads were flooding and the power kept flickering hard enough to make everyone nervous. Leaving was impossible. Trees had fallen somewhere down the main road.

Thunder cracked.

Then the power flickered.

Once. Twice.

Then nothing.

Darkness swallowed the living room.

"Shit." Marcus's voice rumbled from somewhere behind you, that deep growl that did things to you. "That's it. Power's out for real this time."

Your other friends groaned from their spots scattered around the living room; Sarah curled on the loveseat, Derek sprawled on the rug, Jenna and Tom sharing the armchair by the dimmed fireplace.

But you? You'd been the last one through the door when the storm hit, which meant the only spot left was the corner of the small couch. The corner already occupied by Marcus's massive frame.

Your best friend since freshman year. The person who knew every embarrassing thing about you (well... almost everything). The werewolf who'd grown from lanky, awkward teenager into a muscled beast with dark fur and emerald eyes that made your mouth dry.

He'd patted the cushion next to him when you'd hesitated. "Come on. Promise I don't bite."

You'd perched there nervously at first, your weight barely grazing his denim-clad leg, body angled awkwardly so you wouldn't have to touch him. You wore tights, black tights because Jenna said casual night, but they fucking squeaked against the worn couch fabric as you shifted.

"Settle," Marcus whispered so the others wouldn't hear. His hand found your hip, fingers spreading across. "You're gonna fall off like that."

"I'm fine."

"You're trembling."

Were you? You couldn't tell anymore. His body heat rolled off him in waves, that particular warmth and musk he gave off, and every small adjustment you made brought some new part of you into contact with some new part of him.

Lightning cracked.

Sarah squealed.

Derek snorted.

And Marcus's hand slid from your hip to your thigh. Resting there. His palm cupped the outer curve of your leg through those stupid, stupid tights. His thumb stroked absent circles against the fabric. The motion hypnotic. Unthinking.

He doesn't know what he's doing, you told yourself. It's just Marcus. He's always been tactile. He's always touched you without thinking.

But his thumb traced higher. Then lower. And your muscles started unknotting without your permission. Your spine softened. Your pelvis tilted backward. Your body curved toward him like a flower seeking sunlight.

"You're wound tight," he observed, still pitched for your ears only. "When's the last time someone took care of you?"

"Marcus—"

"Shh. Just breathe."

Another crack of thunder.

You jumped. Your shoulder blades met his chest. And his arm came around you.

Oh.

Oh no.

His cock was already half-hard against your lower back. A thick bar of heat that nudged against you when he shifted, pulling you deeper into the cradle of his body. Your breath caught in your throat and stuck there.

"There you go," he purred. "That's better."

While you hyperventilated, his hand continued moving.

Up your thigh. Down. Wider each time, coaxing your legs apart millimeter by millimeter. Until you realized you were practically sitting back on him, your knees spread open, your tights-clad pussy pressing against the ridge of his zipper.

"Marcus." Your whisper barely existed. "People can see—"

"They can't see shit. Lights out. Phones are dying. Phones are dead, actually. Look around, sweetheart."

You did.

The cabin existed in shades of gray.

No one was looking at you.

No one could see Marcus's hand on your thigh.

"See?" His thumb traced the inside of your knee. "Nobody's paying attention. So stop being afraid."

"I'm not afraid of—"

"No? Oh... I see..."

"What?"

"You smell sweet." His nose brushed your temple, inhaling. "Really sweet."

Heat flooded your face. "I—I don't know what you mean."

"Mhm." Another inhale. Longer this time. His chest expanded at your back. "You do."

His thumb pressed lightly into the inside of your thigh and you bit back a moan. "Wait..."

"There it is," he said, voice rough. "You’re not scared of the storm. So tell me what’s got you this worked up while sitting in my lap, sweetheart."

"Nothing."

He chuckled. "Liar. I can smell it. That sweet, wet pussy scent. And I know you didn't piss yourself." His thumb traced higher. "This is arousal, sweetheart. Your cunt's dripping. Leaking all over my jeans. I can feel it through the denim."

Oh god.

Your face incinerated both at his words. Your core clenched. Fuck, he was right. More slick bloomed between your thighs, soaking through the thin gusset of your panties, darkening the tights above your seam.

"Why?" he murmured. "You can tell me. I'm your best friend."

That's the problem.

Your throat closed around the words. You'd been hiding this for years. You liked him. Had always liked him. Because of him, your dreams had turned into something you couldn't admit to yourself, let alone to him. The way you'd touch yourself at night, imagining his hands, his mouth, his—

"I... I don't know..."

"Bullshit."

"Wh—no, I didn’t—" you stammered.

"Shhh, easy now," he soothed. "I need to check. Make sure you're okay. Spread those legs for me."

You hesitated, biting your lip, but instinct and hunger made you obey. Shyly, you parted your thighs more. He tutted and his hands hooked under your knees, prying your legs wider apart and outside his.

"Like that. Good girl."

Behind you, his muscular hips shifted.

The hard column of his cock, (and god the sheer size of the thing) nudged the cradle of your ass. You felt it jump against you as he settled deeper into the couch. His free hand came up to your waist, fingers splaying across your stomach, and he pulled you flush against his chest.

"Feel that?"

He rolled his hips. Just a small, testing movement.

His cock dragged against your pussy through all those layers. Denim. Tights. Panties. Still, you felt the inhuman thickness pressing against your clothed slit like it wanted to split you open right then and there.

"Fuck... mmhp!"

He covered your mouth before another sound escaped. Shoved two thick digits past your lips and pressed down on your tongue.

"Don't want them hearing how desperate you are, do you?"

In the dim glow of someone's dying phone—Sarah's, probably, because she'd been conserving battery, you could see the room. Sarah scrolling, oblivious. Derek still watching the rain. Jenna and Tom tangled together in the armchair.

No one was looking.

No one saw Marcus's hand slide down your belly, over the mound of your pubic bone, until two thick fingers pressed directly against the soaked fabric covering your clit. You whimpered mutely and wiggled on his lap.

"Be good," he murmured, his finger pulling away from your clit. "Why are you trying to run from me?"

"’m not—" you mumbled through the fingers in your mouth.

"You are."

His nose skimmed behind your ear, breathing you in again.

"You know the funny thing?" he said softly. "You started soaking through those little tights the second you sat beside me."

"No-mphhh!"

"You did." His fingers pumped in your mouth, ruining your ability to think. "Been feeling you squirm this whole time. Every time you shifted, your cunt leaked a little more. By the time the lights went out, you'd already soaked through."

"St-op... mphh... teasing..."

"But it's cute." His fingers danced over your tongue. "You were perfectly fine around everybody else tonight. Laughing. Eating popcorn. Playing board games like a normal person." His hips rolled again, grinding his length against your seam. "Then you sit on my lap and suddenly you're a mess."

You whined low, hit by the absolute truth of his words.

He smiled against your skin. "You wanna know what that tells me, sweetheart?"

You couldn’t answer. Your teeth had sunk into his fingers, your hips moving without your permission.

"It tells me this isn’t the storm making you wet.” His mouth brushed your temple. "It’s me."

You couldn't answer. You gyrated slightly, rocking against him. Your ass grinding against his lap, your tights-slick pussy dragging across his trapped cock, seeking friction, anything to ease the awful, wonderful ache building between your thighs.

Marcus's fingers returned, teasing your clit through the tights. "That's it. Use me. Take what you need."

His hips answered your rhythm. Thrusting up against you in counterpoint. And god, he got even harder; you could feel the shape of his cock clearly. The broad flare of the head. The heavy shaft. The weight of his balls.

He was huge. Bigger than any human of course, and somehow your body craved that stretch, even though you knew it would break you open.

Your thighs quivered. Your stomach clenched.

The pressure in your core built and your rocking turned frantic, while you suckled at his fingers, grateful for something to keep you quiet. He kissed your cheek. Curled his digits, caressing the soft palate of your throat.

"That's right," he rasped. "Choke on my fingers while I use this pretty cunt through your panties. You're so fucking wet I can feel it creaming."

He wasn't wrong. Your arousal had soaked through everything. The ridges of his jeans caught on your clit through the tights, sending sparks up your spine, and your eyes rolled back as he altered his angle.

"You want to cum. You want to soak through your tights and make a mess all over my cock, right here, with everyone in this room."

You shook your head frantically around his fingers.

"It's going to happen, sweetheart." He laughed darkly. "I can feel you fluttering. Your cunt's trying to milk something that isn't even inside it." His hips circled, grinding his length against your seam, and you felt the heat of him even through the denim. "You're gonna cum. But when you do, you're gonna do it quietly."

Oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck—

Your orgasm overwhelmed you.

A silent, powerful thing that ripped through your spine and had your thighs trembling against his legs. Your pussy pulsed against his trapped cock, your hips rocking in staccato jerks as you rode out the pleasure on his lap.

Your mouth opened wide around his fingers but no sound came out except a muted "guhhhhh—"

Saliva spilled down his knuckles. Behind you, Marcus's entire body went rigid, his cock throbbing against your twitching pussy through the denim, and he let out a breath that was almost a whine.

"That's my good girl," he whispered, pulling his slick fingers from your mouth. Strings of spit connected his knuckles to your lower lip. "So pretty when you fall apart for me."

You slumped against his chest, panting, vision blurring at the edges. Your walls still pulsed in little aftershocks that made you clench around nothing. You could feel the wet spot you'd left on his jeans.

Suddenly, the power flickered back on.

The lights blinded you.

"Well," Sarah said, glancing up from her phone, "that was dramatic. You two okay back there?"

"I'm fine," you mumbled, hazy and embarrassed.

Thankfully, Marcus had acted before anyone could notice a thing. He'd shifted you fully into his side, one arm wrapping around your waist while the other pulled your legs across his lap. You were tucked against his chest, curled into the warmth of his chest.

His jeans were ruined.

So were you.

But nobody could see it.

"She's scared of thunder," Marcus said smoothly.

Derek snorted. "Didn't take you for the type to do cuddling, Marc."

"Everyone needs something." Marcus's voice dropped, pitched for your ears alone. "And some of us are about to get everything."

------------------------------------

GO TO PART 2!!!

The storm didn't stop.

And you... you became a ghost in the cabin.

Flitting from room to room, always one step ahead of Marcus. When he entered the kitchen, you suddenly needed something from another room. When he settled on the couch, you remembered something you'd left upstairs. When he looked at you, you found something fascinating to study on the opposite wall.

Candles got lit because the power was still unstable. Sarah made boxed mac and cheese while someone else burned popcorn in the microwave. You laughed at jokes you didn't hear and ate food you couldn't taste.

And through all of it, you felt Marcus watching.

When midnight came, everyone started claiming sleeping spots. One took the upstairs bedroom. Someone called the couch. A sleeping bag was rolled out near the fireplace while voices argued over blankets.

You waited until nobody paid attention before escaping to the attic.

Bad idea.

The second you stepped out into the hallway, a large hand wrapped around your wrist.

Marcus.

He didn’t say a word. Just dragged you down the hall toward the downstairs bedroom. His bedroom. You knew because it was saturated with his scent. The storm growled outside as he pulled you inside after him.

"They won't hear us down here," he said, closing the door. The lock clicked. "Not with the storm."

You stood in the center of the room, trembling, your tights ruined, your thighs sticky. The room was small; paneled walls, a pull-out couch, a single window showing nothing but rain.

Marcus circled you like the wolf he was. His dark hair was messy from running his hand through it all night. His broad shoulders tense under his gray hoodie. His beautiful green eyes glittered in the low light.

"You really thought you could ignore me all night?" he asked.

You swallowed hard. "I wasn’t ignoring you."

Marcus laughed. "Yeah? So that’s why you wouldn’t even look at me after grinding all over my lap?"

"I wasn’t grinding—"

"You came on my jeans."

Your mouth snapped shut.

He stopped directly in front of you. Towering over your smaller frame. His body blocked out the window, the door, the rest of the room.

"And then you avoided me for hours." His jaw flexed. "What exactly was your plan there?"

"I didn’t know what to do."

"You could’ve talked to me."

"I panicked!"

"You panicked?" His eyebrows lifted. "Sweetheart, you’ve been acting nervous around me for months. You think I didn’t notice?"

Your sighed. Of course he noticed. Marcus noticed everything about you.

Thunder cracked outside. Instinctively, you flinched.

"You know what pissed me off the most?" he asked quietly.

You shook your head.

"The fact you acted embarrassed." He inched even closer. "Like what happened between us was a mistake."

"It wasn’t a mistake," you mumbled before you could call the words back.

"Good," he drawled. "Because I’m done pretending this is normal best-friend shit."

Your heart hammered.

"We crossed those lines a long time ago," he said. "You know it. I know it."

He was right.

For a long time now, you'd lost track of what was normal.

The way you slept curled against him during movie nights, his arm around your waist. The way he growled at guys who flirted with you. The way his hand would linger on your thigh too long, and your fingers would trace his chest longer than they should. The way he looked at your mouth. The way you looked at his.

"I’ve wanted you for years," he admitted. "And now I know you want me too. So no." He shook his head. "I'm not backing down. You made a mess of my jeans. You take responsibility."

"I—"

"Do you know how hard I am right now?" He grabbed your hand, guided it against the front of his fly. The bulge there was obscene; a huge column straining against the denim, so large your fingers couldn't wrap around it.

"This is what you did to me. Thirty minutes of grinding that sweet little cunt against my lap, and now my cock's so fucking painful I can't think straight."

Your mouth watered.

"See something you want?" He unbuttoned his jeans. The zipper came down, tooth by tooth, and when he reached inside and pulled—

God.

His cock was huge. Thick, long and flushed dark red, the head shiny with pre-cum, thick veins running along the underside. His balls hung fat, drawn up tight against his body.

He wrapped his hand around the base and pumped. A bead of fluid leaked from the slit and dripped down the shaft.

"You're going to make it up to me," he said, stepping closer. The head of his cock nudged your hip, leaving a smear of pre-cum on your shirt. "And then you're going to remember that no one else gets to touch what's mine."

"I-I'm a free woman—"

He grabbed your jaw. His fingers dug into your cheeks.

"Free?" He laughed, and there was nothing friendly in it. "You are mine. You're not free because you have someone who belongs to you: ME. You think I'd let anyone else put their hands on you? Watch you squirm and cum?"

His thick thumb shoved past your lips. Pressed down on your tongue. You tasted his salty skin.

"Marc.... mmmhp—"

He leaned in closer. His musky scent filled your nose. Made your pussy clench.

"I'd kill them," he said, matter-of-fact. "I'd tear their throats out with my teeth before I let them see what's mine. That cunt belongs to me. These tits belong to me. Every wet, dripping sound you make, every time you clench around nothing thinking about my cock—mine."

You whimpered around his thumb. Your nipples hardened under your shirt. Heat flooded between your legs.

He released your jaw, stepped back, and smiled. "Now strip for me."

You arched a brow, smirking up at him. "Strip me yourself, wolf. You said you're mine, right? Come and take what's yours."

A deep growl and he lunged, his mouth claiming yours. His tongue coaxed your lips apart, while his hands yanked at your shirt. He peeled it off, then clawed at your bra, snapping the straps and tossing it aside. Your tights came next until you stood naked except for your drenched panties.

"What's next, sweetheart? Tell me what you want. This wolf who belongs to you. What do you want him to do?"

You gazed up at Marcus, your best friend for years, and saw something feral looking back. Was that side always there? What had you missed and why did you love it so much? This possession in his eyes. The absolute adoration. They set you on fire. He set you on fire.

"Please," you whispered.

"Please what?"

"Please fuck me. Please... I need your cock inside me. I need you to split me open on it. I've been thinking about it for months, about how big you are, about how it would feel—"

He kissed you again, all teeth and tongue, his hand fisting in your hair while the other ripped your panties down your legs. He lifted you like you weighed nothing, spun you around, bent you over the arm of the pull-out couch.

Fabric rustled behind you. His deep grunts as he stripped off his clothes. You glanced back. he was naked. Tall. Furred. Muscled. Every inch the werewolf he was. He dropped to his knees behind you, hands spreading your cheeks apart. His tongue dragged over your slick folds, making your toes curl.

"Fuck, this pussy." He lapped again. "Pretty little pussy that squirted so hard for me."

"Marcus... oh fuuuck..."

"Hold still." His tongue flicked your clit while his thick fingers probed your slit. One digit pushed in. Then a second. Stretching you wider.

You gasped, choking on a moan as he pumped them, your juices squelching around his knuckles.

"Marcus—mhnn, it's too much—"

"I know, sweetheart," he whined, pumping steadily and licking your trickling juices. "I know you're so fucking tight. Hasn't had a real cock in ages, has it? But you'll take every inch of my fat dick anyway, won't you? Because you're my good girl."

You nodded frantically.

"Words."

"Yes—fuck yes, I'll take it, just please—"

The head of his cock nudged your slit.

You'd thought you were prepared.

But nothing, nothing, could have prepared you for the way he impaled you, the burning stretch of that thick crown spreading your muscles inch by inch.

"Fuuuck," you sobbed. "Too big—can't—"

"Shh. You can." His hips rolled. Sank deeper. You moaned brokenly. "Taking me so well. Look at that—" His thumb found your clit, rubbing in circles. The pleasure-pain short-circuited your brain. "—your pretty cunt's swallowing my cock because it was made for it."

With a wet squelch, he was in. Bottomed out, his hips flush against your ass, his balls pressing against your clit. You could feel every ridge of him, every pulsing vein, the way his cock stretched your walls so wide you swore you could feel yourself in your throat.

"Inside," you gasped. "You're inside—"

"All the way." He sounded wrecked. "Feel that?" He shifted his hips, and you felt the bulge of him moving inside you. "Feel how deep I am?"

You couldn't answer.

Your mouth hung open. Drool dripped onto the couch. Your eyes rolled back.

"Hnng—fuck, you're tight—" He fucked you. Slow strokes that pulled almost all the way out before sinking back in. Your walls clenched around him, tried to hold him, and he snarled. "Shiiiit—

"Marcus—"

"Not gonna last." His hips picked up speed. The couch creaked beneath you, shoved against the wall with each thrust. "You feel too good. This perfect, wet, gripping cunt—"

He grabbed your hips. Angled you up.

The next thrust hit a spot that made stars burst behind your eyes.

"HGNNN—!" you sobbed. "Right there—oh fuck, don't stop—"

He didn't.

Brutally, his hips snapped against yours. Each stroke hammered that spot until you couldn't breathe, couldn't think, could only ride higher and higher.

SLAM. SLAM. SLAM.

"Gonna bust," he warned. "I'm gonna fill this pretty cunt up. And then I'm gonna keep you on my cock until it takes." His rhythm faltered. "Until everyone upstairs smells it on you. Until they know."

"Yes—yes—"

"From now on, you belong to me. And I belong to you. No one touches me and no one touches you. You understand?"

So filthy. So possessive.

You came on his next thrust, your whole body convulsing, your pussy milking his cock as he fucked you through it.

"Guh—guh—guh—"

"Fuck—aah—" Marcus's hips stuttered, his rhythm breaking. His cock swelled inside you, the knot at the base spreading your slit wide. You mewled at the stretch. Felt the first hot spurt of cum flood your channel. "Hnnnnng— take it—"

Splorch. Splorch. Splorch.

He kept you impaled, pumping ropes of his seed deep into your pussy while you clenched around him, taking everything he gave. His knot locked you together—it was impossible to pull out. He slumped over your back, breathing ragged.

"That," he said, "was just the beginning."

It was minutes later when his knot finally deflated. He pulled out. You winced at the emptiness and the feel of his cum dribbling down your thighs. He spun you around, kissed you wetly, and wiped his thumb through the mess between your legs.

Then he brought that thumb to your lips.

"Lick it," he demanded and you wrapped your lips around his digit, tasting yourself and him together.

"Good girl." He smiled. "Bed. I want to hold my girlfriend."

You blinked, pretending innocence. "Girlfriend?"

"You are the one and only lucky girl."

You grinned. "Lucky doesn't cover it. From besties to this? I want you forever, boyfriend. Cuddle me and knot me to sleep every night."

"Deal," he drawled, kissing your forehead. "You're stuck with me now."

Three months.

Ninety-two days of dreaming about green hands and amber eyes and the smell of herbs.

Ninety-two nights of touching myself in the dark, remembering the weight of his thumb on my clit, the stretch of his fingers in my ass, the clinical way he'd said "beautiful" while staring at my pussy.

When the summons arrived for my next quarterly examination, I read it seven times. My hands shook. My thighs pressed together. And when I walked into his office exactly on time, I wasn't wearing underwear.

Doctor Korsh looked up from his desk. His amber gaze dropped to my chest,my nipples already hard beneath the thin fabric of my shirt then back to my face.

"You're early."

"I couldn't wait."

His mouth didn't smile. His eyes did. "Please undress."

The examination table waited in the center of the room. Same crinkling paper. Same overhead lamp. Same tray of instruments that gleamed like threats. But something was different about him today. The way his tusks caught the light, the way his trousers fit tighter than I remembered, the way his nostrils flared when I pulled my shirt over my head.

"No bra today," he observed.

"No."

"Underwear?"

"Didn't bother."

His pen paused over the clipboard. "You're anticipating the examination."

"I'm anticipating you."

A long silence. Then he set down the pen and stood, and the room shrank around his shoulders. "Come here."

I walked to the table. He didn't help me up this time, just stood there with his arms crossed, watching me hoist myself onto the crinkling paper. I shivered.

"Spread your legs."

I obeyed. He stepped between them, his thighs caging mine, and looked down at my exposed pussy with the same expression he'd give a fascinating specimen.

"Already wet," he drawled. His finger traced my outer labia, gathering the slick that had been building since I walked through his door. "You've been thinking about this."

"Every night."

"Touching yourself?"

"Yes."

"Did you come?"

"Every time."

His finger pressed deeper, slipping between my folds to circle my entrance. "How many times?"

"Once. Twice. Sometimes three."

"And what did you think about?"

I swallowed. "Your hands. Your voice. The way you said good omega."

His finger slid inside me—one thick digit, no warning, no preamble. My hips jerked. My pussy clenched around him, greedy and shameless.

"Your lubrication response is even stronger than last quarter," he said, clinical despite the way his knuckle pressed against my inner walls. "I'll need to check your oral cavity first. Open."

He withdrew his finger and brought it to my lips. I opened. His finger slid across my tongue, salt and musk and my own taste, and I sucked without being told.

"Good. Now show me your throat."

I opened wider. He pushed deeper, index and middle finger together, pressing down on my tongue until I gagged. My eyes watered. My throat convulsed around his knuckles.

"Breathe through your nose."

I tried. His fingers pressed deeper, bumping the back of my pharynx, and the gag reflex tried to buck him out. He held steady.

"Swallow."

I swallowed around his fingers. The muscles of my throat clamped down, and he made a low grunt that vibrated through his chest.

"Excellent. Your gag reflex has desensitized since last quarter." He withdrew slowly, dragging his wet fingers across my lower lip. "Lie back."

I lay back. The crinkling paper crunched beneath my shoulders. He adjusted the overhead lamp, and the heat washed over my bare breasts. My nipples had tightened into hard peaks, areolas crinkled and dark.

"I'm going to examine your mammary tissue manually today," he said. "No clamps. I want to see your natural response."

His hands cupped my breasts, massive green palms that covered almost everything, thumbs brushing across my nipples in strokes so light they felt like whispers. My back arched.

"Sensitive?"

"Yes."

"Good." He pinched my left nipple between thumb and forefinger, rolling it gently. The sensation shot straight to my core. I felt myself gush. "You like that."

"Y-yes."

He pinched harder. Not painful—not yet—just firm pressure that made my hips rock against the paper. His other hand found my right nipple, pinching and rolling in tandem, and I heard myself whimper.

"Look at you," he murmured. "Wet and whimpering and I've barely touched your cunt."

"Please—"

"Please what?"

"I don't know—"

"You never know." He twisted both nipples at once, a turn that made me cry out. "That's what I like about you. You don't pretend to understand your own body. You just let me figure it out."

He released my nipples and stepped back. His trousers strained against his erection, a huge ridge pressed against dark fabric, a wet spot blooming where the head touched the material.

"On your knees," he said. "Face me."

I slid off the table. The tile was cold against my bare knees. He stood above me, massive and green, and his hands went to his belt.

"I need to calibrate your oral depth," he said, unbuckling. "My fingers only reach so far. For accurate measurement, I need the real implement."

His trousers fell. His cock sprang free, thick as my first, green, ridged, the head already glistening with pre-cum. His balls hung heavy beneath, drawn up tight against his body.

"Open."

I opened. He stepped closer, and the head of his cock pressed against my lips—warm, smooth despite the ridges, tasting of salt and something musky. I opened wider. He pushed inside.

"Just the head," he rasped. "Suck."

I sucked. My cheeks hollowed. His pre-cum leaked across my tongue, bitter and thick, and I swallowed without thinking. He groaned... a low, gravel sound that made my pussy clench around nothing.

"I'll give you more."

He pushed deeper. The head slid past my lips, past my teeth, bumped against the roof of my mouth. I adjusted my angle, and he slid further—two inches, three, the ridges catching on my tongue.

"Breathe through your nose."

I breathed. He pushed deeper—four inches, five, the head bumping the back of my throat. My gag reflex fluttered but didn't trigger. He noticed.

"Desensitization is working." His voice had gone rough, less clinical. "Take more."

I took more. Six inches. Seven. His cock filled my mouth completely, stretching my lips around its girth, and still more waited outside.

"Breathe."

I couldn't. His cock blocked my airway completely—nothing but the ridge of his shaft against my soft palate, the head pressed against the entrance to my throat. Panic flickered. My hands came up to push his thighs, and he caught my wrists.

"No. Hold still."

He held me there—five seconds, ten, fifteen. My chest burned. Spots danced behind my eyes. And then he withdrew, just an inch, and air rushed down my throat in a desperate gasp.

"That's your limit," he said, still holding my wrists. "Seven and a quarter inches to the soft palate. We'll work on getting you past it."

He pushed back in. This time, when the head bumped my throat, he pressed harder. My throat opened, not by choice, but by reflex, the muscle giving way like it had been waiting for this moment and he slid deeper.

I gagged. My throat convulsed around his shaft, and he groaned—a deep, guttural sound that vibrated through his cock and into my skull. His hips pressed forward, and I felt him in my esophagus, in my chest, in the back of my nose.

"There," he breathed. "There she is."

He held me there, his cock buried in my throat, my nose pressed against his belly. I couldn't breathe. Couldn't swallow. Couldn't do anything but kneel there with tears streaming down my cheeks while his fingers pinched my nipples.

"Nnngghh—"

"That's it. Take it. Take all of it."

He withdrew. Air flooded my lungs. I coughed, gasped, sobbed and he pushed back in before I could catch my breath. Deep. Deeper than before. His balls slapped my chin, and his fingers kept pinching my nipples, rolling them between thumb and forefinger until the sensation blurred into something that wasn't pain and wasn't pleasure but was everything.

"You're close," he observed. "Your nipples have darkened. Your breathing is erratic. Your cunt is dripping down your thighs."

It was true. I could feel my slick running down my inner legs, pooling on the tile beneath my knees. Each time he pinched my nipples, my cunt clenched. Each time he pushed into my throat, my hips rocked forward, seeking friction that wasn't there.

"I'm going to come," I gasped when he withdrew again. "No, you're not." He pulled his cock from my mouth. It glistened with my saliva, veined and thick. "Lie back on the table. I need to examine your nipples more thoroughly."

With trembling legs, I moved and lay back. The paper stuck to my sweat-slick skin. He positioned himself beside the table and bent over my chest—his tusks grazing my sternum, his breath hot against my areolas.

"I'm going to suckle you," he said. "I need to test your milk duct response. Even non-lactating omegas often produce colostrum under sufficient stimulation."

His mouth closed around my left nipple. Not gentle. His lips sealed tight, and he sucked, pulling my entire areola into the heat of his mouth. His tongue pressed against the peak and I felt something deep in my chest release.

"Oh fuck—"

He suckled harder. His cheeks hollowed. His tusks pressed against the sides of my breast, blunt pressure that anchored me while his mouth pulled at my nipple like he was trying to draw milk from stone. Nothing came—not yet—but my body didn't know that. My back arched. My hands tangled in his hair. My poor pussy spasmed around nothing.

His free hand found my other nipple, pinching and rolling in rhythm with his suckling. The sensations layered—suck and pinch, suck and pinch, his tongue laving the peak while his fingers twisted the other.

"You taste like nothing," he murmured against my breast. "But your body doesn't know that. Your body thinks you're feeding a child. Your body is preparing to let down."

He switched to my right nipple, sucking it into his mouth with the same ferocity. His hand moved to my left, pinching hard, and I felt the connection—nipple to cunt, cunt to brain, a direct line of pleasure that bypassed everything else.

"Your pelvic floor is contracting," he observed. "You're going to come from this."

"I can't—that's not—"

"You can. You will." He sucked harder, his tongue flicking the peak, and I felt the orgasm building like pressure behind a dam. "Let go. Let your body show me what it can do."

His teeth grazed my nipple, just scraping, the barest edge of pain and the dam broke.

I came.

No clit stimulation. No fingers inside me. Just his mouth on my nipple and his hand on the other, suckling and pinching while my pussy convulsed in rhythmic waves. My hips bucked off the table. My thighs clamped together.

"That's it," he breathed. "Good omega. Good girl."

He didn't stop. He kept suckling through my orgasm, prolonging it, drawing it out until the pleasure turned sharp and then sharper and then too much. I tried to push his head away. He caught my wrists and pinned them above my head.

"One more," he said. "I need to see refractory response."

"No—I can't—"

"You can. You will."

He returned to my left nipple, sucking it into his mouth with renewed vigor. His free hand slid down my belly, through my wet folds, and pressed two fingers inside my soaked pussy. His thick digits stretched me open while his mouth pulled at my breast.

The overstimulation made me sob. His fingers curled, pressing against my front wall, finding that spongy spot that made my vision white out. His thumb found my clit—swollen, hypersensitive, screaming—and pressed down.

"Come again," he commanded. "Now."

I shattered. My walls clamped down on his fingers. My nipples burned. My throat released a sound I'd never heard myself make—a raw, animal whine that bounced off the walls and came back to me distorted.

He held me through it. His fingers stayed inside me. His mouth stayed on my nipple, gentle now, just holding the suction while I shook apart beneath him. When the convulsions finally stopped, I lay there gasping. Tears had tracked down my temples into my hair. My thighs trembled. My pussy pulsed around his unmoving fingers.

"Refractory response: negligible," he said quietly. "You recovered in under thirty seconds. That's exceptional even for an omega."

He withdrew his fingers. I whimpered at the emptiness.

"Roll over."

I couldn't. My body wouldn't obey. He flipped me himself, on my hips, turning me onto my stomach, arranging my knees beneath me. The paper crinkled. My face pressed into the cool surface.

"Ass up," he said. "I need to examine your anus again."

I pushed my hips up. He made a sound of approval and his fingers parted my cheeks.

"You're still wet from your orgasms. Your perineum is glistening." His thumb pressed against my pucker, circling. "I'm going to use more fingers this time. I need to assess your capacity."

Lubricant dripped onto my hole, cold, then warm from his body heat. His thumb pressed inside, just the tip, and I pushed out like he'd taught me.

"Good. Relax."

His thumb slid deeper. Then his index finger joined it, two thick digits stretching my rim, burning in that good way that made my toes curl. He scissored them apart, opening me, and I heard the wet schlck of lubricant and my own arousal.

"Breathe."

I breathed. His middle finger pressed against my opening—three fingers now, the stretch intense enough to make me whimper. He pushed them inside slowly, watching my hole stretch around his knuckles.

"There. That's your limit for fingers." He withdrew, then pressed back in, fucking me with his three thick digits while my rim clung to them. "But I need to check deeper than fingers can reach."

I heard his belt buckle. The clink of metal. The rustle of fabric.

"I'm going to use my cock now. Anal penetration is the only way to assess the full depth of your rectal canal. If it's too much, tell me. But I suspect you can take all of it."

The head of his cock pressed against my anus. Warm. Slick from my saliva and his pre-cum. He pushed, and the stretch burned—three fingers hadn't prepared me for this, for the sheer girth of him pressing against my tightest hole.

"Push out," he commanded.

I pushed. His head breached me—a pop of pressure, a sudden fullness that made me cry out. My rim clamped down behind the ridge of his cock, sealing him inside, and he groaned.

"Tight. You're so tight."

He pushed deeper. Each ridge of his shaft caught against my inner walls, dragging, claiming. I felt him in my pelvis, in my spine, in the back of my throat. His balls pressed against my perineum, and he was only halfway in.

"Breathe through it."

I breathed. He pushed deeper. Another inch, another ridge, the stretch spreading through my entire body. My cunt was dripping, soaking my inner thighs, and I realized with distant surprise that I was enjoying this. The fullness. The helplessness. The way he filled me so completely that I couldn't think.

"All the way," he grunted. His hips pressed against my ass, his cock buried to the hilt inside my rectum. "Look at that. You took all of it."

He held still, letting me adjust. His hands gripped my hips and his breathing came in ragged bursts.

"You're squeezing me," he said. "Your sphincter is fluttering. Does it hurt?"

"Y-yes. No! I don't—"

"That's the right answer." He withdrew an inch, then pushed back in. The drag of his ridges against my inner walls made me moan. "I'm going to move faster. I need to map your internal sensitivity."

He fucked me faster, as promised. Long strokes that pulled almost all the way out before pushing back in, each thrust accompanied by the schlck schlck of lubricant and the slap of his balls against my pussy.

"Your anterior wall has significant innervation," he observed, thrusting deeper. "You're moaning every time I hit it."

"Nnnhh—yes—"

"And your posterior wall is sensitive too. Feel that?" He angled his hips, pressing against a different spot, and I sobbed. "Yes. There."

He took me harder. His hands left my hips and grabbed my shoulders, pulling me back onto his cock with each thrust. The ridges scraped against my walls, sending sparks up my spine, and I felt another orgasm building. I'd already come twice, but there it was, coiling in my belly like a spring.

"Come on my cock," he ordered. "I want to feel your ass squeeze me while you fall apart."

His thumb found my anus—already stretched around his shaft—and pressed against the rim. The extra pressure sent me over. I came screaming. My ass clenched around his cock, milking him, pulling him deeper. He groaned and his hips jerked, his cock swelling inside me.

"I'm going to fill you," he growled. "Your rectum can absorb my seed. It's part of the omega bonding process."

"Yes—"

He exploded. Hot ropes of his spend flooded my ass, more than last time. I felt each pulse, each spasm, each jet of his seed painting my inner walls. He kept thrusting through it, shallow strokes that pushed his come deeper, and I collapsed onto the table with him still inside me.

For minutes, we lay there. Him on top of me, his cock softening inside my ass, his breath hot against my neck. The paper had crinkled into nothing beneath us. The lamp hummed overhead.

"Doctor Korsh," I whispered.

"Korsh," he corrected. "Just Korsh."

"Korsh." I turned my head, and his tusks brushed my cheek. "I don't want to be your patient anymore."

His body went still. "What do you want?"

"I want to be your omega."

Silence. The lamp hummed. His cock twitched inside me.

"You're serious."

"I've never been more serious about anything."

He withdrew carefully, watching my face for pain and rolled me onto my back. His amber eyes searched my face, looking for something. Deception. Uncertainty. He didn't find it.

"I'm not gentle," he said. "I'm not kind. I'm clinical and demanding and I will push you further than you think you can go."

"I know."

"I will examine every inch of your body every single day. I will document your responses. I will keep you on that table until you can't remember your own name."

"I know."

"And I will protect you," he added softly. "With my life. With my body. With every weapon I own. If you're my omega, no one touches you. No one examines you. No one even looks at you without my permission."

I beamed at that. "I know."

He cupped my face in his massive hands. "Then yes," he smiled, a rare smile. "I'll be your alpha."

He kissed me. Not clinical. Not examining. His lips pressed against mine, his tusks bumping my chin. I kissed him back. When he pulled back, we were both breathing hard.

"The examination isn't complete," he said, reaching for his clipboard. "I still need to check your cervical position."

"Korsh."

"Yes?"

"Shut up and fuck me."

He laughed and tossed the clipboard across the room.

"Best suggestion you've made all day."

He lifted my hips, positioned himself at my entrance and pushed inside. No examination this time. Just him. Just me. Just the two of us, together, in the quiet room that smelled of herbs and sex and our new bond.

He kept me on that table until dawn. My cervical position got checked seven times. My clitoral response got documented in triplicate. And when I finally limped out of his office, sore and full and grinning like an idiot, he pressed a piece of parchment into my hand.

Appointment: Daily. Indefinite.

Subject: My omega.

I showed up the next day. And the day after. And every day after that.

Some examinations, he used instruments. Some, he used his hands. Some, he just held me on the table and told me I was beautiful while his fingers traced patterns on my skin.

But every single one ended the same way.

With him inside me.

And me, finally, exactly where I belonged.

--------------------------

I want an orc doctor too...

The human city was forbidden for all fae to journey to. Not only was it dangerous to simply cross over the sea between it and your island but everything was toxic. From the buildings to the soil, the pines and red maple trees you knew so well could never grow in such a tainted place. Despite how much you were told to never enter the human city of metal and glass, you still found a way to reach it.

The elders of your flutter never told you how amazing it truly was; the streets glowed like the sun even in the darkness of the night, the humans who dressed in strange clothes with indescribable patterns and colors impossible in nature. Tall banners and colorful tents lined the streets with symbols and items you couldn't recognize. There were so many smells, collecting together into something deep and complex. It was beyond whatever could be made by nature and was indescribable .

As the night went on, you found yourself looking down at a quieter part of the city from your perch atop a tall stone crowned building. You watched the much smaller metal buildings —like carts but with nothing to pull them— go up and down the black stone path and make their loud, strange noises. You recognized the cross on the highest point of the building, the elders said it meant the building was a church but when you looked around inside, you didn't find any bells. You thought it was strange but the sheer level of rot in the wood said a lot. It was just like what your elders told you: "Man is master of progress at the price of preservation." Hiding away in tiny pockets of nature was the only way for your kind to survive up to today.

It was also a way to limit inherent fairy mischievousness.

Then, you were suddenly knocked off your perch by a massive, feathered force! Your wings managed to catch you by reflex but you were still through a yard through the air. When you turned back to where you were sitting you saw an owl. It loomed from where you were perched like a monument to an old god. Its eyes were wide, unblinking and focused on you.

"Fairy," he said finally. His voice was stern and echoing. It made you feel like a child being scolded. "You shouldn't be here."

You apologized before you realized. "I'm sorry, I just wanted to visit," you said in a small voice.

"Fairies cannot leave the island. It isn't safe," the owl said, "It is illegal." He was right, not only was it dangerous, but it was also illegal for fairies to enter 'Domain of Man'. You even wanting to visit the city was something of a crime itself.

"I know… I'm very sorry."

"Leave this place now. Return to your island or face judgment," said the owl calmly, each syllable was a threat. Two pigeons flew down to each side of the owl. Reinforcements.

"Oi! Ya' hear that glitter glues!", one pigeon shouted with a thick accent.

"Stay outta our territory, dust fly!", added the other.

You cried, "But I didn't do anything wro-!"

"Silence!" his voiced echoed. "For such frivolity of the laws, fairy, you shall face judgment." With a screech the owl dove at you with the two pigeons close behind.

The next thing you knew, you were being chased by the owl and pigeons. Forced to speed around corner and under street lamps, making dives and rises with only your tiny, insect-like fairy wings. Try as you must, you were caught by strong pigeon talons latching onto your arms. You fought and you fought like Hell but could do little more than dangle.

"Hola~" It was voice that was dark and teasing, smooth and cruel.

That wasn't one of the pigeons…

Suddenly you were jostled, something inside the pigeon snapped —a sharp, loud snap— and you were let go. Finally flying again, you watched as the bird plummeted to the streets below. You heard a loud 'bang', the pigeon corpse landed on one of the tiny moving metal building and it's blood splattered all over the roof.

You dove for shelter on one of the roofs. That was when you you saw him. He soared past you -tailed by the owl and remaining pigeon- and eclipsed the moon. He was a massive bat, maybe just as big as the owl. He spread his wings wide like a dominance display before he dove right back at his pursuers.

He went right for the other pigeon and tackled it to the roof top of the building you were hiding at. Your body cringed at the loud dragging sound but you still forced yourself to peek over the roof's lip. There you saw drag stripe of feathers and blood. Your eyes darted from the trail to the bat and his victim and back again. You heard a loud crunch and like that, the pigeon stopped fighting. Its wings dropped limply to the floor but the bat kept going. It offered no grace, in the pigeon's final moments. It just ate. The sounds of wet pops of organs being punctured and tearing of sinew were flooding your ears.

The world was spinning. Your vision kept blurring but you were able to see the bat rise from his prey -blood and pigeon viscera coating his face and dripping down his chest- and he turned to you and smiled. Every tooth was coated in thick red. Somehow you managed to snap yourself our of your terrified trance. After some stumbling from your hiding spot, you flew away as fast as your thin fairy wings could fly. You were unnoticed by the owl from before as it swooped in to attack the feeding bat.

Feeling safe enough —after you don't know how long of flying— you found a tall tower to hide in. It was the old, bell-less church from before. Crawling into the hollow mouth of one of the gargoyle statues, you saw that it opened up to the inner crawlspace of the tower. He wouldn't find you here. Just then you heard him.

"¡Sal, sal, pequeña hada!"

You gasped. It was voice that was dark and teasing, smooth and cruel.

You turned and saw the bat from before.

With him so close you were able to really see just how massive he was: twice, almost three times bigger than any fairy you've met and with a sturdy build to match wide shoulders and a muscular chest and arms. His dark brown fur was smudged with blood, mostly on his long maul. He tilted his head to the side when he saw you, almost curious as his eyes traced you up and down.

"No pienses que no te vi," he said softly with mock friendliness.

"Hello?" you forced out through quivering stutters.

When his eyes met yours, his smile got wider and his eyes got darker.

"I'm a fairy," your vice was shaking and your eyes were wet, "I'm not…! I'm not food."

The bat's eyelids lowered coyly as he cocks his head to the other side. "Of course you're not," he said as he wiped his mouth with the back of his wrist and grabbed your arm. You felt so small in his claws. "Now where are my manners? I am Emidio," he said and kissed your hand, "And what might I call you, pequeña hada?"

You gulped thickly as you smelled blood on his breath. Despite your better judgment, you gave him your name.

"Bello. Un nombre bello para una mujer bella. A flower in all but name," there was a carnal heat to his voice and a part of you stiffens. Emidio was right in front of you now. Now your height disparity was obvious -you barely reached his chest- he combed his claw through your hair and brought the fistful up to his snout, he took a deep whiff. "And you smell just as sweet," he said. You smelled blood on his breath. The metallic aftertaste made your head spin.

"That's… That's very nice of you to say," your voice was weak and trembling. You managed to pull yourself away from his hold, "But I think I should maybe leave. My family will start to miss—"

Before you could finish you were knocked to the ground. You looked down at your chest and you saw massive claw marks tore open your clothes. Your heaving breasts were exposed to the cool air, now with new long, weeping cuts across them. You looked up and were met with dark, dominating eyes.

You tried to get up -your wings flapping desperately- but you were knocked back to the floor. You were folded into a triangle: on your knees with your face to the ground and your ass in the air. Your breath was squeezed out of you with how forceful your chest as he pressed himself against your back.

You screamed when you felt him press his metal band against your shoulder, just above your wing. It was so cold and it burned into your muscles like a brand. You didn't feel the pain anymore when you smelled cooking meat.

"Trying to fly away already? Very amusing, florecita." His breath was hot in your ear.

You tried to crawl, clawing yourself out from under him but he used his claws to pin down your hands to the floor. You let out a shriek from the sudden pain of your poor hands getting crushed.

"But I plan on having you for a little longer." Then you felt something hot, hard and damp in a fleshy way grind against your privates. You quivered as you felt the weeping tip of his cock poke at your pussy lips, just barely entering.

"I have big plans for you and it would be a shame if you left so soon," he said, before thrusting his big-as-your-thigh sized cock into your unprepared cunt.

It hurt! Each thrust like a punch to your guts that got deeper and deeper. You felt felt your every muscle in your lower half get stretched to beyond their limits. His cock shoves your organs upwards in a rhythmically growing and shrinking mound under your skin. Your cheeks burned from your own tears as he fucked you mercilessly. You were ripping at the seams, feeling a trickles of blood and precum run down your thighs.

"My cock is too big for hadas… and your cunt is too tight. It can barely fit," his smooth, spiced voice now had a gravely growl to it and made your stressed muscles clench harder around him. "But it feels so good!~" he moaned.

"Too…! Too much!" you cried in a raspy whimper, "Don't—! …stop!" It was getting harder to speak from all the pressure to your chest and diaphragm.

"OOooOoooh, cariño," Emidio moaned into your ear. It made your head spin, but maybe it was from your lack of breath and the thunder-like beating of his heart didn't much help. Each pulse rang through your bones like a hammer to a bell.

"Since you insist~" he hummed, equal parts teasingly and cruelly. Emidio's furious pace eventually became uneven, like he wasn't able to keep his own tempo. Even in your fogging mind could tell he was close and it disgusted you to think about, but you were too. Just then, you came, spraying out cum in waves that gradually decreased in intensity until there was nothing left.

You cursed your body for reacting like that. You shouldn't have felt like that but you did.

Without warning, Emidio slammed his hips against you in a single bone shattering thrust. His thick spent flooded your abused pussy. You felt his semen pool in your cervix, it was so hot you felt like it would melt a hole out of your stomach. With what little room you had left in you, Emidio's cum gushed out of you in thick streams. Emidio didn't stop after his climax, he kept fucking your limp body. You felt his cum slosh against his dick. It felt like he was simultaneously fucking his cum in and out of you.

Before you could register being flipped onto your back, the sudden emptiness in your core struck you like a stone wall. From immediately going from stuffed to bursting to empty and gaping. Your combined spent dripping out of your opened hole in thick globs and puddled under you. You let out a pained moan as your stained, strained vaginal muscles flex around nothing. In that moment, you almost considered this feeling of emptiness was more painful than being filled, but that thought was short lived. In the span of a breath, you were filled to beyond capacity. With how big his cock was, your clit sat right above it and was rubbed against mercilessly.

Now on your back, you saw the fist-sized bump in your stomach disappearing and reappearing in a painful rhythm. Dizzy from being hypnotic rhythm, your head fell back onto the hard wood floor with a loud 'thunk'.

"Please… I'm begging," you managed to croak out, "Stop…!"

You just heard Emidio chuckle.

Despite the pain and the darkness, you were still able to see Emidio's face hovering, seemingly miles above you. The tapetum lucidum of his eyes made them glow in the low light like a pair of moons. Your eyes welled up with tears again, making everything blur and swirl together.

"What a precious little morsel you are, mi flor. Such a good pet," he said darkly, grabbing your face, squishing your damp and burning cheeks with one hand and adjusting legs with the other. He moved them so that your ankles were touching your bruised collar bone in a mating-press. The whole time, his cock didn't leave you longer than it took a thrust. "I could just eat you up, starting with those big, wet eyes."

Then he took a big, smothering lick across your face. Like a tentacle, Emidio's tongue slithered from your cheek to under your chin.

You cried but that just allowed Emidio entry into your mouth. His tongue was long and thick, quickly filling your mouth and inching down your throat. Your eyes went wide, feeling your jaw painfully stretch wider and wider just to accommodate Emidio and his invading tongue. When you tried to force a breath, you choked on him so you were forced to limply accept his kiss, let Emidio's tongue pump and swirl around your mouth.

His lips, his breath, his tongue, it all tasted like gore. It made you sick yet it also made you hungry for more. To your own shock, you kissed back. Emidio was pleasantly surprised by how you deepened the kiss and he rewarded you with more. You moaned around his tongue as you felt something break through the pain like a flower sprouting through a boulder. It was the feeling of ecstasy! You felt like you were melting into him. You became a pliable mass of warm, willing clay shaped by him from the inside out. That was when you felt your body tighten up all the way down to your knuckles clenching so hard they turned white, and shake uncontrollably before you sprayed your white-hot spent all over Emidio's crotch fluff.

But then he broke away and wrapped his massive claw around your neck. Emidio squeezed it warningly. You whined out something unintelligible as you reached up to him as a silent beg to kiss you again.

With hooded eyes and a sly grin, Emidio said, "Oh, you look so good like this and you're taking me so well. I think I'll keep you." His cock twitch inside you and his fur tickled your hardened clit. "For as long as we both breath, you will be my sex pet, my broodmare and, of course, my mate."

With each word you felt his hold on your throat get tighter and tighter. Every breath you took made a high pained squeak. It was getting harder by the moment to keep looking straight as your eyes began to roll back.

"Nod if you understand, cosita," Emidio ordered.

With the little strength you had left, you nodded. Then Emidio's claws finally loosened just enough for you to take a breath, which you did so eagerly. You gulped in air in loud wheezes, filling your lungs after full minutes of choking.

"Muy bien," Emidio hummed. He kissed you again, which you accepted eagerly. Your tongue swirled around his and you felt like you were swallowing Emidio's long tongue bit by bit.

Your weakened, shaking arms reached up to wrap around Emidio's thick neck. You barely had the strength to hold him. His short, fine yet dense fur was soft to the touch. The sweat on your skin made the little hairs cling to your fingers. You carded your fingers through his mane, making Emidio purr into your mouth. His purrs echoed off your insides, sending tremors all throughout your body.

Emidio's thrusts were slow now, but they were more powerful than before. It felt like his dick was going deeper and deeper each time: from the tip kissing your cervix to penetrating it.

Out…

SLAM!!

Out…

SLAM!!

Out…

SLAM!!

You never felt this level of pain before but you also never felt this level of ecstasy either. It was like finally being full when you never knew until then you were starving. It was comparable to love and you loved the feeling, or at least that was what your cum drunk mind was telling you.

You were close yet again! Your velvety inner muscles tightened around your bat lover, making him let out a loud hiss.

"Eres mío…" Emidio said between growling breaths, not even a gasp away from your lips. His lips were still wet from yours; a short string of saliva connecting you. His pace quickened: still rhythmic and dominating.

"¡…SOLO MIO!" he roared before climaxing for the second time.

In a thrust more powerful than any before, plugging you up like a cork in a bottle, his cum flooded you again. It was as alien and welcomed at it was the first time.

You looked down at your midsection, seeing a myriad of purpling bruises littering your skin. Even with your blurred vision, you saw how extended your stomach was: you looked like you were 4 months pregnant. Your hands —it felt like they were controlled by someone else— caressed your swollen stomach. Your skin was hot to the touch. When you pressed down, Emidio's cum inside you almost felt like an unpoppable bubble in your tummy.

"Don't worry yourself, cosita. You will be with pup very soon," Emidio said between heavy breaths. He brought his claw up to your face to wipe tears from your cheek.

You smiled as he nuzzled his snout into your hair. 'That would be so nice…'

Thoughts of being pregnant with Emidio's children and living on his massive cock lulled you to sleep. Before you were fully fallen, you felt him leave you. Without his fur against your skin, you felt naked beyond words. When his cock left your used opening, you whined. Unable to move any part of you, you were forced to feel Emidio's cum spill out of you.

"Tapas~" Emidio lick his lips before you fell unconscious.

EPILOGUE

You awoke to the familiar feeling of something in your mouth and the bitter taste of metal of your tongue. It tasted like meat. The smell of damp flesh was thick in the air made you wet and hungry for more. Your face was held in place by a pair of huge paws. They held you gentle enough to feel romantic, yet at the same time hard enough for you to not escape.

Not that you would want to.

Your eyes slowly opened to see that it was Emidio kissing you. Looking into his dark eyes made the night before flash before your eyes, from the horrifying start to the cervix-erupting end.

"Emidio," you moaned around his tongue. His name dripped from your lips like warm honey.

"We leave at night-fall," he said, breaking your kiss.

"What?" you mumbled. Your mind body were still too weak to do much. All you could do was limply let Emidio lay you back down on your nest(?) and wrapped his vast wings around you. He took care to not touch you with his metal band. Instinctively, you nuzzled into his fur, breathing in his scent.

"To the jungle, away from this cold place." He hissed at the word 'cold'. "How can anything grow in such cold… This is no place for pups to grow to a reasonable size."

He continued, this voice turned nostalgic, "You won't miss this freezing wasteland, florcita. The jungle is a paradise of color and sun. Our pup will grow big and strong —much like his father— with warmth on his wings and his belly, always full of the tastiest of birds, lizards and smaller, lesser mammals… and far, far away from the filth humans. They won't take us from our home again."

"I love you, Emidio," you moaned sleepily.

Over time, you found solace in accepting this harsh reality, making peace with the truth that your marriage was merely a political arrangement, binding your noble house to his in a web of duty and allegiance. It was a bitter truth to swallow, yet you resolved to fulfil your part in this grand tapestry of power and lineage, even as your heart ached for something more.

This wasn’t the worst fate you could have endured, you knew that well. You were surrounded by a multitude of maids to attend your every whim, feasting on the finest delicacies the realm had to offer, and your future son would rise as the heir to the iron throne. Yet, the last point bore a certain weight, for the honour of ruling was often shrouded in peril and intrigue.

It's not that Valarr found you unsightly or undesirable, far from it. In his eyes, you were a vision of beauty, with hair that shone and skin as smooth as the finest silk. You possessed the enchantment of a siren, beckoning sailors to their doom upon treacherous shores.

However, he kept busy in the web of politics, far too entangled in the affairs of state to fall for your siren song just yet. His gaze was set on aiding his father to rule the realm wisely.

But all it took was one evening for Valarr to finally see the woman in you, not just a beautiful maiden he was to wed, awakening a desire he had kept locked away for too long.

In your private chambers, the dying fire flickered, casting warm shadows across your freshly bathed skin, still faintly fragrant with honey and dates—a scent that wafted through the air like an aphrodisiac. He had stopped by as he did each night, but this time it felt different.

You turned to him, a sweet smile curving your lips, your hair left loose, untamed, and perfumed, an allure he had never before witnessed. Gone were the elaborate gowns and intricate braids. A soft blush on the apples of your cheeks, feeling almost naked in the rather flimsy nightdress.

This was something else. This was raw.

As he lingered in the doorway, his gaze roamed over your figure, dressed in a nightgown, the fabric sheer enough to unveil the gentle curves of your body in the dim light.

Valarr had never seen you in such a state of unready before. As if the Gods had conspired to unveil your softness.

It was like tossing a scrap to a famished wolf—his breath quickened, sweat beading on his brow, the air thick with a growing warmth that made the chamber feel as though it had reached a fevered pitch. The sight of you stirred something deep within him, illuminating the desire he had kept locked away until now.

For a moment, it seemed as though Valarr's throat had gone dry, his gaze fixed upon you. The sheer nightgown's fabric betraying just enough to fuel his imagination, the soft candlelight playing a teasing game with your curves.

He took a step closer, closing the door behind him with a quiet click. His eyes roamed over you, tracing the contour of your hips, the gentle swell of your breasts. His voice, normally controlled, now held a rasp that betrayed his desire.

"My lady," he murmured, his voice low. His eyes drank you in, lingering over the slope of your shoulders, the gentle arch of your neck. The sweet scent clung to your skin, adding an intoxicating edge to the moment.

He took another step forward, the distance now mere inches. His hand moved of its own accord, his fingers gently tracing the line of your collarbone, the touch soft yet possessive. "You look…" He swallowed, his eyes finally meeting yours. "Breathtaking."

You blushed, feeling goosebumps rise on your arms as he grazed your skin. Feeling such a gentle touch for the first time from him, swallowing with slight nerves. "My prince, do not be silly. I am simply in my nightgown," you joked with a light tone, your voice breathy.

You felt a warm flush spread across your cheeks, and a shiver coursed through you as his fingertips danced lightly upon your skin. It was a gentle caress, unlike any you had ever known from him, igniting nervous anticipation in your belly that made you swallow hard. “My prince, do not be foolish,” you bantered softly, a teasing lilt gracing your breath. 

“I am clad in my nightgown.” Your words hung in the air, sweet as honey, while your heart raced at the intimate closeness between you.

He hesitated, fingers barely touching your collarbone, worried he might cross an unwelcome line. His mind raced with thoughts that made him ache, nearly choking on his words.

“I’m not joking. You look... ravishing." The word fell from his lips like a confession, barely above a whisper. "Like a goddess made flesh,” he breathed, his voice thick with desire. Valarr’s gaze devoured you, trailing down your body to the low neckline that had him yearning and weak in the knees.

Valarr swallowed hard, realising he had never allowed himself to acknowledge the depth of his attraction to you until now. He felt blood rush to his cock so fast it almost made him dizzy, breeches tightening against his bulge.

His hand drifted lower, fingertips brushing the swell of your breast through the thin fabric. He felt your nipple stiffen at his touch, betraying your arousal. The air between you crackled with tension, heavy with unspoken desires.

You gasped as Valarr's fingers brushed your soft breasts, your nipples stiffening instantly at his touch. "Valarr," you breathed out, instinctively arching your back to press your breasts more fully into his palm. Your eyes fluttered closed, body burning with a sudden, intense ache that made your core throb.

"Touch me," you murmured, voice husky and low, a plea laced with newfound hunger. Your own hands moved to cover his, holding his touch against you as you felt your heart pounding. The cool air and your racing pulse made your skin prickle with goosebumps.

Now that you'd had a taste, you could never go back.

Your tongue darted out to wet your lips, the action slow and deliberate, an unspoken invitation. The air between you felt electric, heavy with the promise of passion about to be unleashed.

Unable to resist any longer, Valarr cupped the soft mounds fully, thumbs grazing over the hardened peaks. He leaned down, breath hot against your ear as he murmured, "As my princess commands..."

Valarr leaned down and captured your lips in a searing kiss. His mouth moved over yours hungrily, tongue delving past your lips to taste you deeply. One hand remained at your breast, kneading the soft flesh, while the other slid down to grip your hip, pulling your body flush against his.

He could feel his own heart pounding in his chest, his cock throbbing almost painfully against his breeches.

You kissed him back clumsily, but with growing fervour. Your tongues tangled awkwardly as you let out a muffled moan into his mouth. Your hands clutched at his shoulders, fingers digging in as you tried to steady yourself and simultaneously pull him closer.

Gods, but he kisses like a starving man, you thought dizzily, your own hunger rising to match his. You could feel the evidence of his desire, hard and insistent, against your stomach. It thrilled and intimidated you in equal measure.

Valarr's hands slid down to grip your rear, squeezing the firm globes as he pulled you harder against him. He could feel your body melting into his, your soft curves moulding perfectly to the hard planes of his body. His hips rocked forward, grinding his cloth-covered erection against your core, seeking friction even through the layers of fabric separating you.

Breaking the kiss, Valarr's mouth trailed down to your neck, his teeth grazing your pulse point. He nipped and sucked at the tender skin, determined to mark you as his own. His hands slid under the hem of your nightgown, calloused fingers skimming up your thighs, leaving goosebumps in their wake.

Valarr was inexperienced, having lived a sheltered life and never visiting the brothels as his cousins often did. But he was a man—a Targaryen. He instinctively knew where to trace his fingers.

"I want to taste you." He whispered, voice shaky with how many thoughts and feelings were swirling inside him.

Driven by a yearning that stirred deep within, he needed to taste you, to have your honey on his tongue.

You let out a shaky sigh at his bold confession, the breath catching in your throat for a fleeting moment. "Taste me?" you inquired, uncertainty lacing your voice. 

Your knowledge of intimacy came from books or your handmaiden, who kept the description of the act rather vague. Teaching you that the main purpose of a man and woman being together was to reproduce.

Valarr's hands slid further up your thighs, thumbs brushing the sensitive skin at the apex. "Here," he murmured, voice low and thick with desire. "I want to put my mouth on you, taste your essence, feel you come undone against my tongue..."

"Forgive me, I forget myself. This is new for me too." His thumb caressed your inner thigh soothingly.

I want to put my mouth on your sweet cunt until you're writhing and begging for more. That is what he truly wanted to say, but he kept his baser instincts at bay.

Your eyes widened, and you let out a breathy gasp, "Oh! I see..." You bit your lip, a blush spreading across your cheeks. "Well, I suppose that could be... pleasant." You trusted him; that's what made you agree almost embarrassingly quickly.

Valarr's heart raced at your breathy consent. Slowly, almost reverently, he eased you down onto the bed, settling between your parted thighs. He gazed up at you, eyes darkened with lust and a hint of tenderness.

"Pleasant doesn't begin to cover it," he murmured, hands sliding further up, thumbs brushing maddeningly close to your core.

With that, he leaned in, breath ghosting over your clothed sex. Then, he pressed a soft kiss to your mound, breathing in your scent before pulling the fabric aside.

Gods, she smells divine, he thought, mouth watering.

Your stomach fluttered nervously asyou felt Valarr's breath ghosting over your most intimate place, thighs clenching instinctively. A breathy, almost mortified whimper escaped your lips as he pushed your nightgown up and exposed your womanhood to his hungry gaze. "Ah," you gasped, cheeks flushing crimson. Yet, you made no move to stop him, pulse quickening in anticipation.

Valarr paused, looking up at you with a mix of hunger and tenderness in his mismatched eyes. "Shh, don't be nervous," he murmured. "I would never hurt you, my princess."

He leaned in, inhaling your scent deeply before placing a soft, open-mouthed kiss on your bare mound. His tongue flicked out, parting your lower lips, tasting your essence. He groaned at the flavour of you, eyes fluttering closed.

"Sweet gods, you taste even better than I imagined," he rumbled against your skin, the vibrations sending shivers up your spine. His hands gripped your thighs, spreading them wider as he settled between them.

His tongue delved deeper, exploring your folds with a growing hunger. He lapped at your essence, savouring the taste of your arousal. His hands slid up to grip your rear, kneading the flesh as he pulled you tighter against his mouth.

"Valarr~" you mewled, back arching off the bed as jolts of pleasure shot through you. Your fingers clawed at the sheets, bunching the fine linen in your fists as you gripped them for dear life.

What is this feeling? You thought dizzily, overwhelmed by sensations you had never known before. Soft, breathy mewls and whimpers spilt from your lips uncontrollably.

"So... so good..." you trailed off, unable to even articulate the depth of your pleasure, your body writhing with a hunger you had never known before.

Valarr groaned against your sex, the sound vibrating through you. Behaving more like an animal rather than a prince.

He sealed his lips around your clit, suckling the sensitive bud. His tongue flicked over it in quick, teasing strokes, drawing more of your essence.

Your breathing grew ragged, mingling with the obscene sounds of his suckling, filling the room with a symphony of lewd noises.

Valarr's thumbs spread your glistening folds apart, revealing your slick, little hole to his hungry gaze. "Exquisite," he breathed, the sight of your dripping sex making his painfully hard cock throb against his breeches. 

Unable to resist any longer, he leaned in and dragged the flat of his tongue along your slit, savouring your ambrosial taste, before delving inside your tight channel with a low moan.

He thrust his tongue in and out, fucking your hole with his mouth as his hands gripped your hips, pulling you harder against him. His nose brushes your sensitive clit with each thrust, the stimulation driving you wild.

Valarr's movements might have been clumsy, but he was too focused on making you feel good. Listening what exactly you seemed to like, ears trained on the pretty sounds you made for him.

He could feel your walls fluttering around his invading muscle, your body instinctively trying to draw him deeper. Nothing else mattered in that moment but bringing his princess to the pinnacle of ecstasy.

One hand slid up to splay across your belly, feeling it quiver beneath his touch as he pleasured you with lips and tongue. The other hand gripped your hip, holding you in place.

"Oh fu- gods!" You cried out, voice ragged with pleasure. Your body undulated beneath him, thighs quivering and clenching around his head. You could feel every drag of his tongue, every suckle and nip, stoking the fire building in my core.

Moans spilt freely from your lips, growing louder. In that moment, you cared not who might hear. Your fingers tangled in his brown hair, nails digging into his scalp as you held him to you, pushing his face into your cunny.

Valarr's eyes rolled back in bliss as he feasted on your dripping sex. The lower half of his face was entirely coated in your juices, but he didn't seem to mind at all.

"Ah, gods, I can't... I can't..." you gasped, voice breaking as your body began to tremble uncontrollably. 

He pushed his hand more firmly on your stomach, holding you in place so he could continue lapping at your cunt, making sure you couldn't run away from the pleasure.

A broken cry tore from your throat, eyes fluttering shut as a coiling heat gathered in your core. Valarr's grip on your hips held you in place, preventing any escape from the intense sensations consuming you.

His cock had been hard and leaking the entire time, pulsing against the mattress as fresh beads of precum kept staining his breeches.

Valarr's hips began to hump the bed instinctively, his painfully hard cock rubbing against the mattress as he lost himself in pleasuring you. The friction of the fabric against his aching arousal only heightened his lust, making him hump against the bed like a dog in rut.

Uncontrollable, near animalistic moans spilt from your lips, your body writhing beneath him. "Valarr!" you choked out, your voice ragged and raw with pleasure.

The coil of tension in your belly wound tighter and tighter, threatening to snap at any moment. You could feel the impending release building, your walls clenching and fluttering around his invading tongue.

You had never known such intense sensation. It felt as if you were possessed, leaving you a writhing, mewling mess.

Valarr's own body was wound tight, his cock throbbing almost painfully as he rutted against the bed. He needed to make you come, to feel your pleasure crest before he sought his own release. Only then would he allow himself the satisfaction of spilling in his breeches like a green boy.

He could only whine into your cunt, the sound muffled by your dripping flesh. He sees your body tensing. He knew you were close. He needed to taste your release, to feel you come undone against his mouth.

He sucked your clit hard, his lips sealing around it as his tongue flicked over the tip rapidly, pushing you closer and closer to the edge.

He could feel his own release building as well, his balls drawing up tight as he rutted desperately against the mattress, chasing his own end. But he focused only on you, determined to please you before seeking his own.

"Valarr!" You cried out, voice ragged and raw with ecstasy. Your body convulsed beneath his touch, back arching off the bed as you shattered into a million pieces.

"Mmhhh~" you mewled shamelessly, fingers fisting in his hair, holding him tight against your sex as you rode out each intense wave of your climax.

Valarr's own body seized, his cock pulsing hard as he found his release in his breeches. With a muffled cry against your sex, he found his own release, his body stiffening as hot seed spurted from his cock, staining his breeches. His hips jerked and shuddered as he came, the sensation of your quivering walls under his tongue pushing him over the edge.

He shuddered and twitched below you, gasping for breath as the intense pleasure of his climax rolled through him. Hecouldn't remember the last time he had come so hard, so intensely. The taste of your sex, the sound of your cries, the feel of your body writhing above him—it was all too much.

He held you close as you trembled and shook, his hands gripping your hips tightly as he helped you ride out each intense wave of your climax.

Finally, as your body went limp beneath him, he slowly pulled back, looking up at you with hooded eyes.

"Fuck," you panted, chest heaving as you stared up at the canopy above. "That felt... really good." You sat up on your elbows, meeting his gaze. "I didn't know men did that to their women." You admitted shyly, still catching your breath. "Can you do it again sometimes?"

Valarr smiled, a boyish grin spreading across his face as he gazed up at you. "Anytime you wish, my princess," he murmured, voice still rough from his own intense climax. "In fact..." He leaned in, placing a soft, lingering kiss on your sensitive mound, making your muscles twitch. "I look forward to it."

Valarr smiled, a boyish grin spreading across his face as he gazed up at you. "Anytime you wish, my princess," he murmured, voice still rough from his own intense climax. "In fact..." He leaned in, placing a soft, lingering kiss on your sensitive mound, making your muscles twitch. "I look forward to it."

He leaned in, capturing your lips in a deep, sensual kiss. You could taste yourself on him, the musky flavour of your release. His hands slid up your sides, cupping your breasts and kneading the soft flesh.

"I must be patient until we are married," he murmured against your lips. "I need to be proper. But once you are mine, I will have you every day if you only let me. I want to fill you with my seed until it takes, until your belly swells with my child."

Rolling onto his back, he gathered you to his side, one arm wrapped possessively around your waist. 

You sighed in bliss as he held you, relaxing into his touch. Finally feeling loved and appreciated in this union, caressing his chest softly while your lids grew heavy with sleep.

The lecture hall smelled of old parchment and candle wax. 

Professor Grimble's voice scratched through the humid air, his goblin voive rising and falling as he diagrammed transmutation circles on the floating chalkboard. You weren't listening. You hadn't listened in weeks.

Your quill moved fast, copying verbatim from Mira's notes that you'd borrowed before class. Same diagrams. Same annotations. 

Stupid. You knew it was stupid. But the practical exams were coming, and theoretical lectures made your brain turn to porridge.

"Miss y/n.”

You looked up. Professor Grimble stood at the front of the room, no taller than three feet, his green skin gleaming under the enchanted sconces. His yellow eyes were fixed on you. On your parchment. On Mira's parchment, which sat clearly visible two rows ahead, with identical smudges in the corner.

The class went silent. Forty students. Forty pairs of eyes swiveling toward you.

"Would you care to explain," Grimble said, stepping around his lectern with a gait that was entirely too deliberate, "why your transmutation circles are structurally identical to Miss Vane's?"

Your mouth opened. Nothing came out.

"Because you see," he continued, climbing the three steps to your row, his jeweled fingers trailing along the edge of a student's desk, "I've been watching. Week three, you copied Derrik's elemental theory. Week four, you lifted Sarai's binding runes verbatim. Week five—" He stopped directly beside you, close enough that you could smell the musk of him. "—you didn't even bother changing the ink color on Lydia's familiars essay."

Heat flooded your cheeks. "Professor, I—"

"Stand up."

You rose on shaking legs, your robes pooling around your ankles. He was so short. You had to look down to see the top of his bald head, the pointed ears that twitched with irritation. But his presence filled the entire room.

"Magic requires integrity," Grimble announced, turning to address the class while keeping one hand raised toward you. A green glow gathered around his fingers. "Raw power means nothing without the discipline to earn it honestly. Those who cheat demonstrate that they cannot handle the responsibility of true arcane study."

You heard Mira snicker from two rows ahead.

"So," Grimble continued, his eyes sliding back to you, dark and hungry beneath the academic disappointment, "I will administer a corrective lesson. One that you will not forget."

The green light flared.

It hit your chest—a spell you didn't recognize, didn't have time to identify. The magic didn't burn. It heated. A deep, cellular warmth that started behind your navel and radiated outward like someone had dropped molten metal into your core.

"What—" you gasped.

"It's a minor thermoregulation curse," Grimble said conversationally. "Designed to raise the body's internal temperature incrementally until the subject removes all constrictive layers of clothing. Rather useful for... motivational purposes."

The heat intensified.

Your skin prickled. Sweat beaded on your upper lip, between your breasts, along the backs of your knees. The robes that had felt light and airy moments ago now seemed like wool blankets in a summer sun.

Your thighs stuck together when you shifted your weight.

"You will get even more sweaty. Of course," Grimble added, "one could simply remove the clothing to make it better. By my calculations, you have approximately two minutes before you lose control. So..." He gestured vaguely at your trembling form. "Your choice."

The class was rapt. Forty students watching you drip sweat onto the stone floor. You could feel their eyes on your flushed cheeks, your heaving chest, the way your fingers twitched toward your collar.

One minute.

Your lungs felt scalded. Your vision blurred at the edges. The heat pooled between your legs with an intensity that had nothing to do with the curse's mechanics and everything to do with the way the Professor was watching you—his yellow eyes tracking every labored breath, every tremor in your hands.

"I..." you choked out.

"Time's ticking, Miss y/n."

Your fingers found the clasp of your robe. The metal burned against your skin. With a strangled sob that was equal parts shame and relief, you pulled it open.

The robe fell.

First the outer layer, heavy navy wool that hit the floor with a wet thump. Then the linen under-robe, sticking to your sweat-slicked body as you wrestled it over your head. You stood in your smallclothes: a thin cotton shift that was already transparent with moisture, your nipples dark and prominent against the damp fabric, your areolas tight and pebbled in the cool air of the lecture hall.

Someone whistled in the back row.

"Not enough," Grimble said calmly. "The curse requires all constrictive layers."

Your shift was plastered to your stomach, outlining every curve, every dip. You could feel your pussy throbbing—a response you couldn't control, couldn't explain. The heat was there, yes, but it wasn't just the curse anymore. It was the way Grimble's ears had gone rigid. The way his knuckles were white where he gripped the lectern.

You pulled the shift over your head.

Naked. You were completely naked in front of forty students. Your breasts bounced free. The triangle of hair between your thighs was dark with sweat, your outer labia swollen and visible beneath the sparse curls.

The curse released. Cool air washed over your exposed skin. You sunk back on your seat, breathing in relief.

But the professor didn't look away.

"Excellent," Grimble breathed. Then, louder, "Class dismissed. Miss y/n will remain for additional correction."

Students filed out with grins, whispers, backward glances that made your stomach clench. Mira gave you a pitying head shake that made you want to claw her eyes out. Then the door slammed shut, and you were alone with him.

Alone with the Professor.

He walked toward you slowly, removing his teaching robes as he came. Beneath, he wore practical clothes; leather vest, canvas trousers—but the trousers did nothing to hide what was pressing against them.

Gods above, the size.

"I told you on the first day," Grimble said, stopping inches from your bare thighs. He had to crane his neck to meet your eyes. "I reward talent. I punish laziness. But cheating?" His hand came up, green fingers pressing against your lower belly, just above your pubic bone. "Cheating requires special attention."

His touch was cool against your overheated skin. You shivered.

"Do you know what I'm going to do to you, Miss y/n?"

You shook your head, mute.

"I'm going to fuck the dishonesty out of that pretty cunt." He said it like he was discussing the weather. "And by the time I'm finished, you're going to beg me for the privilege of doing your own work."

His trousers came down.

His cock—gods, his cock—sprang free. It was disproportionate to his small frame entirely; easily ten inches of thick, veined green flesh, flushed dark at the head. But that wasn't what made your knees buckle.

The piercing.

A thick silver barbell through the head of his cock, the balls of the jewellery pressing against the slit. Another ring craddled the base of the shaft. The cock swelled even more and the Prince Albert that emerged from the urethra and exited beneath the glans, gleamed with pre-come.

"You like that?" He wrapped his hand around the shaft, pulling the foreskin back to expose more of the barbell. "Goblin custom. Every male gets pierced upon reaching maturity. It serves two purposes: enhances pleasure for both parties, and..." He stepped forward, the head of his cock brushing against your leg, the cool metal leaving a trail of goosebumps. "...marks territory."

You should run. Should scream. Should do anything other than sit here with your thighs trembling and your pussy dripping onto the chair.

But your body no longer belonged to you.

"Lie the floor. On your back," Grimble ordered. "Now."

You lowered onto the floor, it was cold against your ass, your spine. Small but supremely strong hands pushed your knees apart and stood between them. He was at the perfect height.

One green hand found your pussy. Two fingers pushed inside without warning, stretching you open, and you cried out at the invasion. Shlick, shlick, shlick; your juices were audible, embarrassingly wet, coating his knuckles as he pumped them in and out.

"Soaked already," he observed, pulling his fingers out and holding them up. Transparent strings stretched between his green skin. "The curse only raises temperature, Miss y/n. This response is entirely your own."

He was right. You hated that he was right.

"I—please—"

"Please what?"

"Please fuck me."

His grin showed too many teeth. "Good girl."

Positioning the head of his cock at your entrance was a sight. Your pussy lips parted around the thick, veined shaft, the piercing scraping against your clit as he pushed forward. Just the tip. Just the barbell. Your inner muscles clenched around the metal, the sensation so foreign, so intense that you nearly came on the spot.

"Breathe," he commanded. "You're going to need it."

He thrust.

All of it.

The world went white.

Ten inches of pierced goblin cock buried to the hilt in your cunt, your walls stretching impossibly around the girth, the ring at the base of his shaft pressing against your outer labia. You could feel the barbell moving inside you, the smooth metal sliding against your cervix with each pulse of his hips.

And the bulge—

You looked down.

Your stomach had changed, a visible protrusion low in your abdomen, a moving lump that traveled as he began to fuck you in earnest. In and out. Squelch, squelch, squelch, your pussy singing around him, producing more wetness than you'd thought possible, dripping down your thighs and pooling on the floor.

"Look at that," Grimble growled, one hand pressing on the bulge, feeling his own cock from the outside. "Look at how deep I am. You can see me inside you."

"Professor—oh gods—"

He picked up the pace. His tight, hairless balls slapped against your ass. Plap, plap, plap. The metal caught on every ridge inside you, dragging screams from your throat with each withdrawal.

"You feel that?" He angled his hips, driving the barbell against a spot that made stars explode behind your eyes. "That's my jewelry hitting your cervix. Every. Single. Time."

Your eyes rolled; the stretch, the burn, the impossible fullness. Your nipples ached, untouched, and you brought your own hands up to pinch them, rolling the hard peaks between your fingers, your areolas bunched tight.

Grimble's eyes locked onto the movement. "Touch yourself," he ordered. "Yes, such a slutty little student... play with those tits while I ruin your tight cunt."

You obeyed without thought, squeezing the heavy mounds, pulling at the nipples until they were dark and swollen. The sensation cascaded down to your clit, which was grinding against the base of his cock with every thrust, the friction building something enormous in your gut.

"I'm—I'm going to—"

"No." He grabbed your wrists, pinning them above your head. "You come when I say you come. Understand?"

Tears leaked from the corners of your eyes. "Please, please, I can't—"

"You can." He drove deeper, if that was possible, the bulge in your stomach became more pronounced. The ring in his glans was pressing against something vital, something that made your vision flicker. "You're going to hold it until I fill this tight little cheater's cunt with my seed. And then—"

His rhythm stuttered. The barbell inside you vibrated—some enchantment, some goblin magic you couldn't begin to understand, and that was it.

"Now," he snarled.

Your orgasm hit.

Your walls clenched around him, convulsing so hard you felt the piercing shift inside you, the rings pulling against your inner walls. Your juices flooded around his shaft, dripping off his balls, soaking the floor beneath you. He snarled, hips slamming forward, and you felt the heat of his release pump into your depths.

One spurt. Two. Three. He kept coming, filling you until it overflowed, until ropes of white dripped down your thighs and mixed with the puddle on the floor.

And then he pulled out.

The loss was devastating. Your pussy gaped for a moment before clenching down on nothing. A gush of his seed followed. Grimble tucked himself back into his trousers and smoothed down his vest.

"Tomorrow," he said, not looking at you as he gathered his papers, "you will submit your own work on elemental theory. Ten pages. Original research. Or we repeat this lesson."

You lay there, naked, ruined and dripping, unable to move.

"And Miss y/n?"

You croaked something unintelligible.

The goblin Professor glanced over his shoulder, yellow eyes gleaming.

You show up back at home a few months after your mom dies, knocking on the door in the middle of the night during a rainstorm after finally leaving your shit boyfriend. It’s just Brendon in that big old house now. When he answers the door, eyes heavy with exhaustion, wearing only gray sweatpants, you half expect him to turn you away. It’s not like you’re his real kid; he doesn’t have any real obligation to you without your mom in his life.

But he just sighs.

Shakes his head.

Opens the door.

He takes you by the hand and pulls you into the house, not saying anything about how you drip water on the floor or how you can’t stop crying. “Come on, princess, let’s get you into some dry clothes.”

He stands dutifully outside of the bathroom while you shower and emerge wrapped in a fluffy white towel that you know his housekeeper washes and folds. He’s never been good at the homemaking side of things; that was all your mom’s job.

Holding out a pair of his boxers, sweats, and a tee, Brendon tells you, “Sorry I don’t have any of your mom’s old clothes to give you.”

“That’s alright,” you reply, voice bashful and innocent as you take the clothes from him. “I wasn’t sure you’d even let me in, so this is better than I expected.”

His face falls at that. “Why wouldn’t I let you in?”

“Well, I dunno, mom’s not around anymore,” you reason, sounding so pathetic it takes you by surprise, “so I figured you’d just want to move on with your life or something.”

Brendon’s heart breaks and he immediately pulls you into a tight hug. He kisses your temple and tells you seriously, “Sweetheart, be serious now. I’ve been in your life since you were little, even if I’m not your sperm donor. You’re my kid, plain and simple. I’m never gonna let you stay out in the cold.”

Your lip wobbles as you search his devastatingly blue eyes. “But I’ve been so bad.”

“What, because you disappeared before your frontal lobe developed? Because you shacked up with some shithead who didn’t deserve you?” Brendon shakes his head and shrugs. “None of that matters. You’ll always be my baby girl. Get changed and get some sleep; we can talk tomorrow.”

–

“If you’re going to stay here with me, there have to be some rules,” Brendon starts as he cooks you breakfast. He took the day off work to reconnect with you, which you know is a big deal for someone with an important job like him.

You nod seriously, hoping he understands just how much this means to you. “I know I’ll need to pay rent and buy my own groceries and-”

“What? Rent?” Like the idea’s ridiculous, Brendon scoffs, “No, you don’t have to pay rent, angel. You don’t have to pay for anything. The asshole made you quit your job anyway, didn’t he?”

You can’t bear to look at him as you admit it with a nod. He pushes a plate of eggs, sausage, biscuits, and fruit in front of you before pouring a tall glass of orange juice as well. Beginning to pick around the plate, you ask, “So what are the rules, then?”

“You have to fix your lifestyle,” he replies, vague but firm. Then he clarifies some, “You can’t go partying like you have been. You’re getting eye bags from drinking and caffeine and sleep deprivation and you’re way too young for that.”

Your fingers fly up to your cheeks. “Am I really?”

“Yeah, you are,” he sighs, reaching out to cup your face, brushing his thumb over your skin. “You’re a beautiful girl; you shouldn’t be wasting your youth and your mind and your beauty on the bullshit you have been. If you’re in my house, you take care of yourself. And you listen to me. Got it?”

Biting your lip, you nod gently. “I can try.”

He touches your chin affectionately and says, “Good girl.”

Something deep inside of you stirs when he says that. And he notices. Your pupils dilate slightly, your lips part a bit, and you draw in a tiny sharp breath. He withdraws his hand, painfully aware of whatever’s just passed between you.

“We’ll eat breakfast and dinner together every day. I’m not a great cook, but I can make do or we can order in.”

“I can cook,” you tell him, perking up a bit at the idea that there’s something you can do to be helpful. “You have such a nice kitchen here – way better than the one I had with Tyler – it’d be a shame to let it go to waste. Let me make us meals; you’re way too busy to worry about that. It’ll give me something to do.”

“Great. You can take the Audi for grocery runs; I’ll leave my card here for you. Or you can use one of those delivery services, whatever.” He starts in on his own breakfast and smiles. “See? We’ll figure this thing out in no time.”

–

Brendon’s heart nearly stops when he gets home from work his first day back. You’re in the kitchen, barefoot, fresh-faced from the shower, wearing nothing but panties and one of his shirts; he’s promised to go to your ex’s place to collect your things this weekend, but the sight of you like that makes him reluctant. For a second, he’s so happy that his heart could burst. He knows how gross it sounds, but he’s missed having a woman in the kitchen, some pretty thing swaying along to music while stirring a pot on the stove.

There’s a sudden flash in his mind of you standing there with a heavy baby bump, humming, happy and held and perfectly safe under his protection. He can’t shake it from his head as he kicks off his shoes, quickly showers, and changes.

Then, as he heads to the kitchen but before you notice his presence, you take out a slim vape pen and take a long breath, blowing out the cloud with an ease that makes it clear this is a long-term habit for you. Before you can take another hit, Brendon storms forward and snatches it from your hand. You stare at him, wide-eyed like a caught toddler, as he hisses, “Do you have any idea how bad for you these things are?”

You throw your hands up and reply defensively, “I’m using it to quit smoking!”

“Swapping one addiction for another,” he sighs as he slips the pen into his back pocket. “Just because it’s not as bad for you doesn’t mean it’s good. You don’t need nicotine – you need a healthy diet, sleep, exercise, and routine. I’m a doctor, sweetheart, you can talk to me about things like quitting smoking.”

You nod and sigh, “I know, daddy. You’re right.”

It slips from your lips so effortlessly that it’s like syrup running down his spine. God, he loves how it sounds in your honey-smooth voice, tumbling from your sweet lips, 

When you see how his eyes widen, you immediately turn back to the stove and stammer, “Sorry, I- I’m too old to call you that. It won’t happen again.”

“No, no, c’mon,” he coos. He stands behind you and wraps you in a hug. You swear you can feel the outline of his cock pressing against your ass, but you write it off as nothing. “I don’t mind at all. You don’t care if I call you princess or sweetheart or angel, right?”

“Of course not,” you giggle, all sweet and feminine. “It’s nice.”

“That’s how I feel, too,” he assures you. The way his rough, masculine voice breathes down your neck makes you a little dizzy. “Just because you’re grown up doesn’t mean you can’t be my little girl; why shouldn’t you call me what you want?”

You turn around and plant a warm kiss on his cheek. “Thanks, daddy. I’m gonna work on the vaping, okay? I really want you to be proud of me. To show you how good I can be.”

He kisses your forehead. “You’re so special, baby. I just want to make sure you’re treating yourself as well as you should be.”

–

After you’ve cleaned up dinner side by side, you put on a movie and convince Brendon to watch it with you even though he insists he has paperwork to do for the hospital. You have your feet in his lap and he rubs them absently, no thought behind his touch, more like he’s using you as a stressball.

When the credits roll and you go to search for something else to watch, Brendon clicks his tongue, takes the remote from you, and turns the TV off.  “You should get to bed, sweetheart.”

“What?” You almost laugh as your eyes flick over to the clock on the wall. “It’s not even ten.”

He gives you a stern, knowing look. One of those looks where you always fold to whatever he wants you to do. He explains, “I don’t want you going back to bed after breakfast and sleeping until noon just because you aren’t working or in school. You need to get out of the cycle of being reliant on coffee to wake up; that means you need to get enough sleep to start with.”

You pout and reply, “But I’m not tired.”

He stands up and helps you to your feet, slinging an arm around your waist and guiding you toward the stairs. “You will be if you relax in bed for a while – no TV, no distractions. Just quiet and dark. You have to retrain your body with a good schedule.”

You walk up the steps ahead of him, fully aware that your ass is bouncing in his face in your tiny panties. Teasing him is just a part of your fun these days. You love to catch him staring and making him blush when you make fun of him.

In your childhood bedroom, which he’s promised to let you remodel however you want once you have your things again, Brendon watches as you wash your face and brush your face in the en suite bathroom. He likes to watch you. Likes having your pretty form filling his house with your light and life.

After you slip beneath the covers, he plugs your phone in across the room so you won’t reach for it while you’re trying to sleep, kisses you tenderly on the forehead, and shuts your light off. “Goodnight, princess. I’ll see you in the morning.”

You lean up again and go to kiss him on the cheek, half-missing and catching the corner of his lips. “Night, daddy. Love you.”

“Love you, too.”

–

The more comfortable you get living at home with Brendon, the more reliant you are on him. It feels so natural to you both. He’s big and strong and successful; you’re sweet and needy and helpful. You want to make him happy however you can and he wants to keep you safe and healthy the same way.

For a while, you can both write it off as finding a father/daughter relationship again in adulthood. But it’s becoming increasingly obvious that there’s more. When you go shopping on his credit card, you send him pictures of the cute little outfits you buy and he jerks off to them late at night, his hand made of white-hot shame and pleasure mixing in equal parts. When he rearranges furniture for you while shirtless, taking orders to make sure you’re happy with your space, you can’t help staring at his biceps, his back, and his chest, pathetically whimpering and trying to get yourself off but not quite able to after.

You just can’t take it anymore one night after spending a full hour trying to hit that spot in your pussy by yourself, your much shorter fingers not able to reach it. So you stand up in a huff, don’t bother tugging your underwear back on, and stomp down the hall to the room Brendon once slept in with your mother.”

Taking a deep breath, you knock tentatively and crack the door open. You’re a mix of giddy and nervous when you see he’s still awake, leaning back on the headboard with a thick hook in his lap.

When he hears the door squeak open, he looks up, slips the ribbon bookmark back in place, and asks with such a tender concern in his voice that you feel loved right away, “You alright, sweetheart?”

“I can’t sleep, daddy,” you reply, a bit of a bratty, desperate whine in your tone that makes his cock chub up. Padding into the room, he realizes you aren’t wearing bottoms and sits up straighter as you go on needle, “You’ve been so smart with everything since I’ve been here; I think I need your help.”

He pats the spot on the bed next to him. Setting his book down and shifting to the side as you crawl into his bed, Brendon prods, “Tell me what’s going on.”

When he lifts his arm, you snuggle underneath it and bury your face in his softly worn tee. “It’s kind of embarrassing.”

“C’mon, do you have any reason to be embarrassed with me ever?” Brendon lifts your chin with his thumb and forefinger, forcing you to make eye contact. All lilting and teasing, he nudges, “I’m a doctor. I’m your dad.”

“That’s the problem,” you groan, eyes flicking away from his once more. “I don’t think I’m supposed to talk to you about stuff like this.”

He chuckles now, clearly amused by your bashfulness, “What stuff would that be? Baby, you know as well as I do that you can talk to me about anything in the whole world that you need.”

You nod and quickly whine out, “I haven’t been able to make myself cum since the breakup and it’s driving me crazy.”

Brendon swallows thickly, his mouth going dry at just how pathetically needy you look right now, eyes watery, thighs pinched together, teeth pushing into your soft lower lip. He knows this is a crossroads for both of you. A moment where boundaries will blur or harden, where trust will be built or broken, based on how he responds.

So he’s careful at first. With blue eyes that brim with love, he cups your cheek and confirms, “Most importantly, that’s definitely nothing to be embarrassed about, honey, and you can always talk to me about your sexual health – whether that’s birth control or relationships or whatever. You’re safe with me.”

You melt under his touch. “Thank you, daddy.”

“Here, let’s get you comfy,” Brendon murmurs, maneuvering you onto your back, head on his pillow, legs spread just a bit. With his heart hammering in his throat, he does his best to keep his voice level as he offers, “Why don’t you show me what you do when you’re alone? Maybe that’ll help me figure out what you can be doing better. Does that sound okay?”

“Mhmm,” you reply, a little too eager, spreading your legs apart and squirming in a way that drives him clinically insane.

You go to put your hand between your legs the way you usually do, but Brendon catches your wrist and asks, “First of all, why are you still wearing your shirt? You usually stay partly clothed when you touch yourself?”

“Yeah, usually.”

“Why?”

“I dunno.” You shrug as your cheeks burn from a mix of nerves and arousal. “Just easier, I guess.”

“Well, you don’t want to rush things, even with yourself. Going slow and not skipping any steps just to get there faster will help,” he says. His fingers go to the hem of your small tee and he starts to lift it, ordering quietly, “Sit up a little for a second, princess.”

You help him shimmy your top off, leaving you completely naked save your frilled socks. He can see your breaths coming faster now as you feel exposed in front of him for the first time. With your breasts out on full display, Brendon can feel himself starting to lose control. You’re just so fucking perfect, every inch of you, and he has to let out a slow, controlled breath to avoid moaning and taking you the way he wants.

With a mix of eagerness and innocence, you check, “You’re sure it’s okay for you to help with this?”

“It’s my job to help you with this,” he clarifies, serious, like a teacher giving an important lesson. “Clearly, you’ve wasted time with stupid boys who didn’t do a good job and now you can’t even help yourself. All I want is to make sure you’re happy and healthy. This is another part of that. I’ve helped you make your tummy feel better with your diet and your skin get better with your sleep and your water. Why shouldn’t I make your little pussy feel better, too?”

“That makes sense, daddy,” you coo, on the verge of giggling from the way your brain is buzzing. “Okay, so I usually start by just kinda rubbing circles on my clit.”

He orders firmly, “Show me.”

You lick your two middle fingers and snake them between your legs, parting your lips a bit and finding your clit. Brendon sits back on the bed and watches you collect wetness from lower down before spreading it over your clit. He tsks sympathetically and asks, “You were trying for a while, huh? All wet and swollen.”

With a sad nod, you reply, “I just can’t read that special place inside me.”

“You try to just use your fingers? How?”

Easily obeying as your brain starts to go fuzzy, you reach your other hand down and curl the fingertips of your middle two fingers inside your needy hole.

Eyes trained on your perfect cunt he asks roughly, “You don’t use a toy or anything? A dildo?”

You protest right away, “Ew, no, of course not!”

Brendon smacks your thigh – the gesture shocks you to your core, even the lightest slightest pain making your nerves sing – and reprimands, “Who made you think it’s not okay to use toys?”

“Well, I dunno, my ex, I guess,” you explain. Your voice is getting breathier now as your fingers speed up. Brendon’s attention is a lot hotter than any of the thoughts you can conjure up behind your eyelids. “I thought- thought that made me slutty. If I needed something like that.”

“God, that boy,” Brendon nearly growls. “Honey, there’s absolutely nothing wrong with using the things that were designed to make your pussy feel good. Boys say that when they don’t want their girl to know what ‘good’ is because if you can get yourself off with a vibrator, why would you keep a shitty boyfriend around?”

A conspiratorial giggle escapes your lips. “Will you get me some toys daddy?”

“Of course I will, angel,” he assures. “You should have whatever you need to feel good. I’ll show you how to use them and everything, make sure you know what you’re doing.”

Suddenly, your eyes sting with tears, lip wobbling as you look up at this man who’s made your life so much better for no reason except how he loves you. “You’re so good to me.”

“That’s because you’re mine,” he soothes, rubbing his hand over your calf. Then his hand moves – slowly, like he’s trying not to spook you – up your inner thigh. He carefully removes the hand that’s desperately trying to get deeper into your pussy and squeezes it a couple times. “For now, though, you definitely need something nice and thick in there to hit that special spot. You really want me to help?”

Your eyes snap up to his and you nod. “Please, daddy, I’m so achy. I need it really bad.”

“Good girl. I’m so proud of you for telling me that,” he praises as two of his fingertips brush your pussy’s entrance. You suck in a sharp breath at the feeling and then stop breathing altogether when he begins to push them inside. The stretch is so good, stingy and bright, and you already know he’s gonna be able to help exactly how you need. Once you’ve taken him to the second knuckle, feeling like you couldn’t possibly be stretched any more, Brendon reminds you with a hand on your lower tummy, “Breathe, honey. You’ve gotta breathe.”

Your mouth falls open and a breath rattles in. Your back arches and you let out an angelic moan.

At your intense reaction, Brendon pushes his fingers the rest of the way in and asks you quietly, “Has anyone ever touched you like this?”

Shaking your head as he begins to move his fingers inside of your cunt, you admit, “My ex only ever- Fuck, daddy, that’s the spot right there.”

“I know, sweet girl, I can feel it,” he says. He curls his fingers back toward himself, right against that perfect textured spot that makes your toes tense. “What were you saying?”

Trying hard to focus, you tell him, “He only ever put his dick down there.”

Brendon groans, almost like a growl, as if that response causes him physical pain. “Did he ever eat you out?”

Your face wrinkles up and you look down at him, giving up rubbing your clit because you’re so distracted. “Like use his mouth on me? Why would he do that?”

“Alright, this is officially fucking unacceptable,” Brendon announces. He pulls his fingers from your pussy despite your pathetic, begging whines and stands up. You watch with a curious expression as he strips his own clothes off. You’ve never seen his cock before and your eyes widen; it’s gotta be twice the size of the only other one you’ve ever seen in person. Brendon climbs on top of you, caging you between his strong arms, and says, “I’m gonna show you how a man is supposed to treat his woman. You can’t go out in the world thinking it’s okay for a guy to just get his dick wet and move on. If you’re gonna be someone’s girl, they need to treat you right in life and in bed.”

Tentatively, you reach up and touch his harsh jawline. Your voice is an anxious whisper as you ask him, “What if I don’t wanna go back out in the world?”

Hopeful but not quite ready to let himself think it, Brendon pushes, “What do you mean, princess?”

“Maybe I just wanna be your girl now,” you say softly. Eyes averted, you murmur quickly, “I like being home with you. Like when you come home and tell me about your day while I make you dinner. Like when we go shopping together and when you make sure I brushed my teeth good enough. I wanna be yours. I don’t wanna go back out there and try to be with anyone else.”

He can tell it’s taking all your bravery to say it and you’re terrified of being rejected by him, so he doesn’t bother with collecting his thoughts. He crushes you into a kiss that’s claiming and rough and so much more intense than any you’ve felt before. You whimper into it and he swallows the sound down, cupping the back of your head and grabbing your waist and grinding down against your thigh.

When he pulls back, your pupils are blown wide and your breaths are fast. He drags his lips up your neck and purrs against your ear, “Then I’m gonna show you how I treat my woman so you never want anyone else again.”

You’re totally unable to speak as he trails kisses down your body, between your breasts, over your stomach, along your hips, up your thighs. Worshipping every inch he can reach without getting out of the position he needs to be in. As he bends to hover his lips above your clit, he looks up at you and orders, “Now I’m gonna eat you out and I want you to play with your nipples, baby. Just figure out how you like it. I want you to have fun with them because sex is supposed to be fun, not some chore. I’ll take care of this pretty pussy. That sound good?”

You squirm, skeptical, and ask, “You’re really gonna put your mouth on me? What if it tastes bad? What if-”

“Good girls don’t argue with their daddies,” he cuts you off, shoving his two fingers back into your cunt without preamble, stealing your breath away as he does. It reminds you how much pleasure you think Brendon could give you that nobody else could. “Are you going to be good or are you going to be a brat?”

“Good,” you squeak out, suddenly desperate to know what he wants to show you. “I trust you, daddy, I promise.”

“That’s my girl. You just keep on trusting me and you’re gonna have the best life in the world. Gonna make you feel so good. Treat you like the princess you are every fucking day.”

Then he descends on your clit. He’s slow and purposeful at first, letting you get used to the new sensation, which is soft and wet and nice, even if it’s a little strange at first. Combined with his fingers inside of you, it definitely feels good. When his tongue gets firmer and more urgent, almost mimicking the way you play with your clit, a moan like you’ve never heard from yourself busts out of your throat. He groans in response and the vibration makes your head spin.

Because you promised to be good and listen to him, your hands travel up to cup your breasts. You try out massaging them, rubbing your nipples, rolling them, whatever you can think of that might feel good. Having that to focus on lets you completely relax, not in your head with Brendon between your legs. He’s so smart; he must’ve known you’d be nervous to have him down there, smelling you and tasting you and seeing everything from that angle. He gave you something else to toy with so you wouldn’t get insecure.

With gratitude bubbling up, you start to moan more and more. You’ve never liked your own sounds during sex, but that’s because they’ve always been forced to some degree. These ones just tumble out constantly, breathless and sing-song and honest. He seems to like them, too, because he’s rutting down against the mattress like a teen humping the pillow. The sight makes you burn down to the wick with lust because you realize he wants you bad.

Suddenly you start to feel a tingly, bright sparkly something in your lower stomach, connected to your pussy by a thread that’s being wound tighter and tighter by Brendon’s fingers inside of you. He doesn’t rush you through the feeling, lets it grow and build, setting a steady course that you know you can trust completely.

When you cum, it’s with a loud cry and shaking legs. You’ve never felt something so strong; your own fingers could never make you feel this good. You feel a flood of your wetness pulsing from your cunt and you feel so fucking embarrassed at the idea that you’re going pee on Brendon’s face that you try to wriggle away.

But he won’t let you. He growls and shoves you into overstimulation, lapping up your juices, not relenting until you’re crying and thrashing. His hands keep you tight against his face even as he lightens up, kissing your clit, sweetly nibbling your thighs, letting you come back down to earth.

“I’m sorry, daddy,” you whimper as you start to catch your breath. “I don’t know what happened. I’ve never peed like that before and I couldn’t control it and-”

“What?” Brendon laughs hard as he pulls back to look at you incredulously. “Baby girl, you did so good. Sometimes when a girl cums extra hard, she does that. There can be a whole rush of liquid; it’s not the same thing as peeing.”

“It’s not?” You tilt your head to the side, relief filling your shaky body as Brendon grabs a towel from his en suite bathroom and starts to clean you and the sheet up. “What is it then?”

“Well, the research isn’t great right now because we’ve always under-studied women’s bodies,” he explains as he tenderly rubs the towel over your pussy and your thighs, “but most people think it’s a mix of liquids. Some of it comes from the bladder, yes, but it’s diluted by fluids from this special gland you have called the Skene’s gland, which is sort of like a man’s prostate.” Then he chuckles and shakes his head, cheeks a bit pink, as he adds, “Trust me: I’ve tasted both, and they’re not the same thing.”

You smack him on the arm and fall into a fit of laughter. “Ew, daddy, gross!”

Brendon shakes his head and gets into the bed next to you, holding you close. “It’s easy to think that, but I promise that all sorts of stuff you think is weird or gross can actually feel really, really good when you’re with the right person.”

You heard the commotion before you saw him. The Targaryen encampment was a hive of activity, servants hurrying with trunks and tapestries, grooms leading horses to the picket lines, guards taking up their posts. You had arrived a day earlier, traveling with your family, separately from your husband despite his insistence. The roads are dusty, he himself had said, after all, with that faint curl of his lip that might have been concern or might have been disdain. You will arrive fresh and rested. I will not have my wife looking like a Dothraki crone at her first great tourney. So you had come ahead with a small retinue, and you had waited.

Now he was here.

You remained in your chair within the pavilion, a book open on your lap that you had not read a single word of in the past hour. Your heart was beating too fast, a traitorous thing that had never learned to be calm around him. It was not fear, not precisely. It was something more complicated, something that knotted in your belly and made your breath come shorter and your skin feel too warm.

You heard his voice outside, giving orders, and then the flap of the pavilion was thrown back and he stepped inside, bringing with him the smell of horse and leather and something else, something that was just him.

“Wine,” he said to the air, not looking at you. He shrugged off his cloak and tossed it over a chest. “I told them to bring wine. If it is not here by the time I have removed my boots, I will have someone flogged.”

You said nothing. You watched him sit on the edge of the camp bed and work at his boots, his long fingers deft on the buckles. His silver hair fell forward. He was beautiful. You had thought so the first time you saw him, standing in your father’s hall with that faint, mocking smile and those impossible violet eyes, and you thought so now, even knowing what lay beneath the beauty. Perhaps because of what lay beneath it. You had never been able to untangle that knot.

A servant appeared, breathless, bearing a silver tray with a flagon of wine and two goblets. Aerion waved a hand dismissively. “Leave it. Go.”

The servant went. Aerion poured himself a goblet of deep red wine, swirled it, inhaled, and took a long drink. Only then did he seem to notice you, though you knew he had been aware of you from the moment he stepped into the tent. He was always aware of you. It was one of the things that made him so unsettling.

His violet eyes traveled over you slowly, from the crown of your head to the tips of your slippers, and you felt the weight of that gaze like a physical touch. You wore a gown of pale blue silk, cut low enough to be pleasing but not so low as to be vulgar, your hair dressed simply but becomingly. You were not a great beauty, you knew. You were pretty enough, with good skin and kind eyes and a mouth that smiled easily, but you were no silver-haired Targaryen princess. You were just you. And he was Aerion Brightflame.

“Well,” he drawled, setting down his goblet. His smile curved slowly, lazily, like a cat stretching in the sun. “How very fortunate. A pretty wench has finally found her way to my tent.”

Your spine stiffened. Your hands tightened on the book in your lap. “Aerion.”

“I wonder,” he continued, as if you had not spoken, “what brings you here. Looking to earn some silver for your services, perhaps?” He leaned back on his hands, his legs spread slightly, his entire posture one of indolent amusement. “I am told I am generous. When the service pleases me.”

Heat flooded your cheeks. It was anger, you told yourself. Only anger. Not the other thing, the thing that made your thighs press together beneath your skirts. “You are my husband.”

“Am I?” He tilted his head, feigning surprise. “I had forgotten. You must remind me. Wives and whores are so easily confused, are they not? Both warm. Both willing.” His smile sharpened. “Both so very eager to please their prince.”

You rose from your chair, the book sliding forgotten to the cushion. “If you wish to play games, Aerion, find someone else. I am not in the mood.”

“Oh, but you are.” His voice dropped, losing some of its mocking edge and gaining something darker, something that vibrated in the air between you. “You are always in the mood for me. I can see it in your eyes. I can smell it on your skin.” He inhaled deeply, theatrically, his nostrils flaring. “Like honey. Like summer. Come here.”

Your feet carried you forward before your mind could catch up. You hated that. You hated how easily he commanded your body, how your legs moved to his voice as if pulled by strings. You stopped a few feet from him, close enough to see the small scar on his jaw from some childhood mishap, the way his pupils had swallowed the violet of his irises.

“I am your wife,” you said again, quieter this time.

“Yes.” He reached out and caught your wrist, his grip warm and firm but not painful. He tugged, gently, and you stumbled forward until you were standing between his spread knees. “You are. And yet here you are, in my tent, dressed unbefitting your station, looking at me with those eyes. What is a prince to think?”

He released your wrist and patted his thigh. The gesture was casual, but his eyes were fixed on your face with an intensity that made your breath catch. “Come. Sit. Show me what a pretty wench does when she wants to earn her silver.”

You hesitated. The game was cruel, you knew. It was like him, to push and push until you did not know whether you wanted to slap him or kiss him, until the lines between anger and desire blurred into something indistinguishable. But beneath the cruelty, beneath the mockery, there was something else. You had learned to see it, over two years of marriage. A flicker in his eyes, a slight softening around his mouth. He wanted this game, yes, but he wanted you. He wanted you to play it with him, to meet him in this strange space he had created, where you were both more and less than husband and wife.

You lowered yourself onto his lap.

His hands came up immediately, settling on your hips, fingers pressing into the silk of your gown. “There,” he murmured, his breath warm against your throat. “That was not so difficult, was it?”

“I am not a whore,” you said, your voice steadier than you felt.

“No,” he agreed, and his lips brushed the curve of your jaw, feather-light. “You are not. A whore would know what to do. A whore would have her hands in my hair by now, or her fingers on my laces. A whore would be rocking against me, seeking her own pleasure as much as mine.” His teeth grazed your earlobe. “You, my sweet wife, are sitting on my lap like a startled doe. It is charming. It is also, I confess, somewhat frustrating.”

You turned your head and met his eyes. They were so close, those violet eyes, and they were laughing at you. But there was warmth there too, a heat that had nothing to do with mockery. “Then teach me.”

Something shifted in his expression. The lazy amusement remained, but beneath it something kindled, something hungry and intent. “Oh,” he breathed. “I intend to.”

His hands slid from your hips to the laces of your gown. He did not fumble, did not hesitate. His fingers worked the knots with practiced ease, loosening the silk until the bodice gaped and cool air kissed your skin. You shivered, and his smile widened.

“First,” he said, his voice a low murmur against your collarbone, “a whore does not sit still and wait to be undressed. She participates. She wants the business concluded quickly, so she may move on to the next customer. She is efficient.” He tugged the gown down over your shoulders, baring your breasts to the warm air of the tent. “She does not blush like a maiden on her wedding night.”

You could feel the heat spreading down your chest. But you lifted your hands and began to work at the laces of his tunic, your fingers less deft than his, trembling slightly. He let you struggle for a moment, watching your face with those intense violet eyes, before he covered your hands with his own and guided them.

“Like this,” he said, and his voice had gone rough at the edges. “Slowly. There is no rush. The customer will pay for your time regardless.”

“You are the customer,” you pointed out, your voice breathless.

“I am.” He shrugged out of his tunic, letting it fall to the floor of the tent. His chest was lean and pale, dusted with fine silver hair, the muscles shifting beneath his skin as he moved. “And I am a generous man. I will pay for every moment.”

His hands found your breasts, cupping them, thumbs brushing over your nipples until they tightened into hard peaks. You gasped, your hips jerking forward instinctively, and he laughed, a low, pleased sound.

“There,” he said. “Now you are beginning to understand. A whore knows her own pleasure. She takes it where she finds it, because the night is long and there are many customers. She does not wait for permission.”

He shifted beneath you, and you felt the hard length of him pressing against your thigh through his breeches. Your breath caught. You rocked against him, experimental, and his eyes fluttered half-closed.

“Yes,” he breathed. “Like that.”

His hands slid down your body, gathering your skirts, pushing them up until they bunched around your waist. The air was cool on your bare thighs, and you shivered again, but it was not from cold. His fingers found the waist of your smallclothes and tugged, and you lifted your hips to help him, your body moving without conscious thought now, driven by a need that had been building since the moment he stepped into the tent.

“Now,” he said, his voice a dark purr, “you will take what you want. I am merely a customer. A paying customer. Do you understand?”

You did not understand, not entirely, but you nodded anyway. His hands settled on your hips again, guiding you, positioning you. You felt the blunt head of him pressing against your entrance, and you were slick and ready, your body traitorously eager. You sank down onto him, taking him inside you in one slow motion, and the sound he made, a low, guttural groan that seemed torn from somewhere deep in his chest, made your inner muscles clench around him.

“Gods,” he muttered. His head fell back, his throat exposed. “You are...you are...”

You did not let him finish. You began to move, rocking on his lap as he had instructed, finding a rhythm that made pleasure spark up your spine. His hands tightened on your hips, fingers digging in hard enough to bruise, but you did not care. You were watching his face, watching the way his composure cracked and crumbled, watching the mocking prince dissolve into something rawer, something more honest.

“Look at you,” he said, his voice strained. “My pretty little whore. Taking what she wants. Riding me like a...like a...”

His words broke off into a groan as you shifted your angle, finding a spot that made you both gasp. You braced your hands on his shoulders, your fingers digging into the pale skin, and moved faster. The tent was warm, filled with the scent of wine and sex and the faint sweetness that always clung to him. Outside, you could hear the distant sounds of the tourney grounds, horses, voices, the clash of practice swords, but they seemed very far away, from another world entirely.

He was watching you now, his violet eyes wide and dark, his lips parted. The mockery was gone. The game was forgotten. There was only this, the slide of your bodies together, the wet sounds of your joining, the way his hips bucked up to meet your downward strokes.

You leaned forward and kissed him. He kissed you back with equal ferocity, one hand leaving your hip to tangle in your hair, holding you close as his tongue swept into your mouth.

When you broke apart, gasping, he pressed his forehead to yours. His eyes were squeezed shut, his brow furrowed as if in pain. “I cannot...you are too...I need...”

You did not know what he needed. You were too far gone yourself, the pleasure building and building like a wave preparing to crash. Your rhythm faltered, became erratic, and you buried your face in the curve of his neck, breathing in the scent of him.

His arms came around you, crushing you against his chest. One hand splayed across your bare back, holding you close, while the other gripped your hip, guiding your movements. His mouth found your shoulder, and he kissed the skin there.

You shattered. The pleasure broke over you in waves, making you cry out against his throat, your body clenching around him rhythmically. He followed a moment later, his hips jerking up into you, a low groan tearing from his lips as he spilled inside you.

But Aerion, being Aerion, did not let up.

His grip on your hips tightened before you could catch your breath, holding you firmly in place atop him. You were still trembling, still gasping, your forehead pressed to his shoulder, when his voice came again: that same lazy, mocking drawl, as if nothing at all had happened between you.

"What a pretty girl you are," he murmured against your hair, and you could feel his lips curve into a smile. "So eager. So willing. If you please me well enough, I may take you back to Summerhall as my paramour."

You stiffened in his arms. He was still playing the game. Even now, with his seed still warm inside you, with your bodies still joined, he could not simply be your husband. He had to be this: this infuriating, impossible creature who needed to twist everything into something strange and sharp.

"Aerion..." you started, but he cut you off, his hand sliding up your spine to cup the back of your neck.

"I'll even put a babe in you," he continued. His other hand pressed against your lower belly, where his seed was taking root, if the gods willed it. "I would wager you would give me a beautiful child. Silver hair, violet eyes. A true dragon." His thumb traced a slow circle on your stomach. "A son. You would like that, would you not? To give a prince a son?"

Your breath caught. The words were part of the game, they had to be, but there was something in his voice, some thread of genuine yearning, that made your heart clench. He wanted a son. He had always wanted a son. It was the reason he had married you, or so he claimed. A wife to give him heirs. A warm body to fill with dragon seed. Nothing more.

But his hands on you were gentle now, even as his words remained cruel.

"You are so soft," he breathed, his lips brushing your temple. "So supple. I would wager you make good coin at tourneys. Rotating through tents, spreading your legs for any knight with silver in his purse." His hips shifted beneath you, a small, lazy movement that made you gasp. "But I would keep you for myself. I am a jealous man. I do not share what is mine."

You pulled back enough to look at his face. His violet eyes were half-lidded, his lips curved in that familiar mocking smile, but there was a tension around his jaw, a tightness that betrayed him. He was waiting for something. Waiting to see if you would play along, or if you would break the game and demand he be your husband instead of this strange, cruel stranger he pretended to be.

"A prince's paramour," you said slowly, finding your voice. "That is a generous offer. But I have heard the prince of Summerhall already has a wife."

Something flickered in his eyes. Satisfaction, perhaps. Or something softer.

"His wife," Aerion said, and his voice changed, the mockery falling away like a cloak dropped to the floor, "is a vexing creature who does not know her place."

There it was. The shift. You were his wife again, and he was your husband, and the game was over. Or so you thought.

"She came to Ashford days ago," he continued, and now there was a genuine edge to his voice, a sharpness that had nothing to do with play. "With her own house. Her own retinue. As if she were not a Targaryen. As if she were not mine."

You opened your mouth to protest, but he was not finished.

"I arrived today and found my wife already ensconced in my pavilion, wearing a gown of pale blue silk that any merchant's daughter might own." His fingers plucked at the fabric pooled around your waist, his lip curling. "Plain. Unadorned. No jewels. No finery. As if I had not bought her a dozen gowns finer than this. As if I had not given her rubies and sapphires and pearls enough to drown a lesser woman."

"I thought..."

"You thought wrong." His hand came up to cup your face, his thumb tracing your lower lip. His touch was gentle, but his eyes were hard. "You are a Targaryen now. My wife. When we travel, you travel with me. Not ahead, not behind, not separately. With me. At my side. Where you belong."

"I did not want to slow you down," you said quietly. "You said the roads were dusty. You said..."

"I said many things." He leaned forward and pressed a kiss to the corner of your mouth, brief and fierce. "I am your husband. It is my right to complain about dusty roads while you ride beside me. It is my right to be irritated by your presence and comforted by it in equal measure. You do not get to escape me so easily."

You stared at him, your heart beating too fast. He was impossible. He was infuriating. He was looking at you with those violet eyes, and beneath the irritation, beneath the princely arrogance, there was something that looked almost like hurt.

"You were lonely," you realized aloud. "You arrived and I was not with you, and you were lonely."

His jaw tightened. "I was bored. There is a difference."

"Is there?"

His hand slid from your face to your throat, not squeezing, just resting there, a reminder of his strength, of the power he held over you. "Do not presume to know my mind, wife."

But you did know. Marriage had taught you to read him, to see past the barbs and the mockery to the man beneath. A man who did not know how to say I missed you without wrapping it in thorns. A man who had been raised to believe that wanting someone was a weakness, and so he pretended he wanted no one at all.

"And this gown," he continued, his thumb stroking the column of your throat. "You will not wear it again. Not in public. I have bought you silks and velvets. I have given you the jewels to wear. You will wear them. All of them. At once, if you must. I will not have the realm whispering that prince Aerion cannot care for his wife."

"No one would think that," you said.

"They would." His voice dropped, and for a moment, the mask slipped entirely. "And what if someone had seen you, dressed like this? What if some knight or lord had mistaken you for a common wench, a camp follower, and dragged you to his tent?" His grip on your throat tightened fractionally. "What would I have done then? Burned the entire tourney to ash? Killed every man who looked at you? You are mine, and you walk about looking like anyone might have you, and I cannot..."

He stopped. His breath was coming faster, his chest rising and falling beneath your hands. His eyes were wide, wild, and you realized with a start that he was genuinely afraid. Not of losing you to another man, Aerion Targaryen feared very little, but of the rage that would consume him if anyone tried. Of what he might do.

"Aerion," you said softly. You lifted your hand and touched his face, your fingers tracing the sharp line of his jaw. "I am sorry. I did not think."

"No," he agreed, but some of the tension bled out of him. "You did not."

He turned his face into your palm and pressed a kiss there, his lips warm and surprisingly soft. Then he kissed your wrist, the inside of your elbow, the curve of your shoulder. His hands slid down your body, over your ribs, your waist, settling once more on your hips.

"I will wear the gowns," you promised, your voice breathless as his mouth found the hollow of your throat. "And the jewels. All of them. I will look like a Targaryen princess."

"You are a Targaryen princess." His teeth grazed your collarbone. "My princess. My wife."

"And I will ride with you," you continued, your fingers tangling in his silver hair. "Always. I will not go ahead again."

"See that you do not." He lifted his head and looked at you, and the mockery was gone from his eyes, replaced by something fiercer and far more dangerous. "I will not be parted from you again. I find I do not care for it."

Before you could answer, his hands tightened on your hips and he guided you into motion again. You gasped, your body still sensitive from your first release, but he did not stop. He moved you slowly, rocking you against him in a rhythm that made pleasure spark up your spine all over again.

"Aerion," you managed, your voice unsteady. "I am...your breeches...I am drenching them..."

"Let them be drenched." His voice was rough, his breath coming in short pants against your throat. "I have other breeches. I have a hundred breeches. I will ruin them all if I must."

You could not argue. You could barely think. He was moving you faster now, his hips rising to meet yours, and the wet sounds of your joining filled the tent. His hands roamed your body: your breasts, your waist, the curve of your backside, touching you everywhere, as if he could not get enough of the feel of you.

"You are prettier than any wench," he panted, the words tumbling from his lips like a confession. "Prettier than any woman I have ever seen. My pretty wife. My sweet wife. You are always so...so warm...so perfect for me..."

His words dissolved into a groan as you clenched around him, your own pleasure building again. You buried your face in his neck and let him move you, let him take what he needed, because you needed it too. You needed this: this fierce, consuming thing between you, this fire that burned away all pretense and left only the raw truth of your wanting.

"I am going to..." he started, but he did not finish. His body arched beneath you, his hands gripping your hips hard enough to bruise, and he spilled inside you with a broken cry. The sensation pushed you over the edge after him, your body milking him greedily, drawing out every last drop of his seed.

For a long moment, you simply breathed together, your bodies still joined, your hearts pounding in tandem. You expected him to release you, to let you slide off his lap and find your feet. Instead, his arms tightened around you, holding you in place.

"Aerion," you said, shifting slightly. "I should..."

"No." His voice was firm, though still roughened with pleasure. "Stay."

"But I am..."

"Stay." His hand pressed against your lower back, keeping you flush against his chest. "I like you here. Warm and soft and full of me. You will stay until I say you may move."

You squirmed, and his grip tightened. A small, cruel smile curved his lips, the first hint of the old Aerion, the one who liked to push and test and see how far you would go for him.

"Uncomfortable, my love?" he asked, his voice a lazy drawl once more. "Good. Think of it as penance. For leaving me to ride alone. For wearing that plain little gown. For making me worry."

"I did not know you worried."

"I did not know either." He said it lightly, but there was something raw beneath the words. "It was a most unpleasant discovery. I do not recommend it."

He leaned back on the camp bed, pulling you with him, so that you were sprawled across his chest. His hands roamed your back in slow, idle strokes, tracing the curve of your spine, the dip of your waist. His eyes were half-closed, his expression one of sated contentment, but there was an expectation in the set of his mouth, a silent demand.

You leaned down and pressed your lips to his throat, just below his jaw, where his pulse beat slow and strong. He made a small sound, not quite a sigh, not quite a groan, and tilted his head back, offering you more of his neck. You kissed your way along the elegant line of his throat, feeling the vibration of his hum of approval against your lips.

"That is better," he murmured, his fingers tangling in your hair. "My sweet wife. My dutiful wife."

You dragged your tongue along his skin, tasting salt and the faint sweetness that always clung to him. He shivered, and you felt a surge of power. He might command you, might order you about and mock you and play his cruel games, but here, in this, you had power too. You could make him shiver.

You kissed his jaw, the corner of his mouth, the high curve of his cheekbone. His eyes had fallen fully closed now, his lips parted, his breathing slow and deep. He looked almost peaceful. Almost gentle. You knew better than to believe it entirely, Aerion Targaryen was never entirely peaceful, never entirely gentle, but in these moments, after he had spent himself inside you, when your body was still wrapped around his, he came close.

He smiled, a real smile, not the mocking curve he showed the world, and pulled you down for a kiss. It was slow and deep and thorough, his tongue sliding against yours, his hand cradling the back of your head as if you were something precious.

When he finally released you, his eyes had sharpened again, a new hunger kindling in their violet depths.

"Now," he said, and his voice was a dark promise. "Let us see how sturdy this makeshift bed truly is."

Before you could respond, he rolled, taking you with him, and suddenly you were on your back on the camp bed, staring up at him. His silver hair fell around his face like a curtain, his eyes burning down at you, his body still joined with yours.

"Aerion..."

"Quiet," he said, but there was no cruelty in it. Only want. Only need. "You owe me. For the lonely ride. For the plain gown. For every moment I spent wondering where you were and whether you were safe."

He began to move, slow and deep, and you forgot how to speak.

The bed creaked beneath you, a rhythmic sound that matched the thrust of his hips. He braced himself on his forearms, his face inches from yours, his eyes never leaving your face. He watched every flicker of pleasure that crossed your features, every gasp, every moan, as if he were memorizing them.

You reached up and pulled him down for a kiss, and he groaned into your mouth. His rhythm faltered, became more urgent, and you wrapped your legs around his waist, pulling him deeper.

The bed creaked louder. Neither of you cared.

"Give me a son," he gasped against your lips. "Give me a son, and I will give you anything. Everything. Just...give me..."

The bed gave way with a splintering crack that echoed through the tent like a thunderclap.

One moment you were beneath him, your back pressed into the thin mattress, your legs wrapped around his waist as he drove into you with that single-minded intensity that only Aerion Targaryen possessed. The next, the wooden frame splintered and collapsed, sending you both tumbling to the ground in a tangle of limbs and furs and broken slats.

You gasped, more from surprise than pain, your hands flying to grip his shoulders. Aerion barely paused. He grunted as the bed gave way beneath him, catching himself on his forearms before he could crush you, and then he kept moving.

"Aerion," you managed, your voice breathless and startled. "The bed..."

"I noticed." His voice was strained, his hips never slowing their relentless rhythm. The furs beneath you provided some cushion against the hard ground, but you could feel the broken slats of the bed frame pressing into your back through the layers. He shifted, adjusting his angle, and a broken moan escaped your lips.

"You are..." you started, but the words dissolved into a gasp as he hit that spot deep inside you, the one that made your vision blur.

"I am what?" His voice was a dark purr, his violet eyes gleaming down at you in the dim light of the tent. Sweat gleamed on his brow, and his silver hair hung in disheveled strands around his face. He looked wild. He looked beautiful. He looked like a dragon in human form, all fire and hunger and terrible grace. "I am your husband. I am a prince. And I am not going to let a poorly constructed camp bed prevent me from taking what is mine."

Your laughter surprised you, a breathless, slightly hysterical sound that bubbled up from somewhere deep in your chest. "The bed is in splinters."

"Then I will have lord Ashford pay for a new one." His hips snapped forward, hard and deep, and your laughter turned into a moan. "He should have provided sturdier accommodations for a prince of the realm. It is his own fault if his furniture cannot withstand proper use."

Proper use. As if this was proper. As if anything about Aerion Targaryen could ever be called proper.

Aerion did not slow. If anything, he seemed to find new vigor in the destruction, his pace increasing until you were gasping and clutching at his shoulders, your nails leaving crescents in his pale skin.

"That is it," he breathed, his forehead dropping to yours. His eyes were squeezed shut, his brow furrowed in concentration. "That is...yes...you feel..."

He did not finish the thought. His rhythm stuttered, became erratic, and then he was spilling inside you. You cried out, your back arching off the furs, your body clenching around him as wave after wave of pleasure crashed through you.

You lay there, tangled together on the ruined bed, your chests heaving, your bodies still joined. Aerion's weight pressed you into the furs, and you could feel the hard edges of broken wood beneath you, but you could not bring yourself to care.

Finally, he stirred. He lifted his head and looked down at you, and there was something soft in his violet eyes, something that only ever appeared in these private moments, when the mask slipped and the real Aerion peered through.

He pulled out of you slowly, and you winced at the loss, at the sudden emptiness. But before you could mourn it, he was moving down your body, pressing kisses to your skin as he went. Your throat. Your collarbone. The valley between your breasts. Your ribs. And then, when he reached your belly, he stopped.

His hands framed your hips, his thumbs tracing slow circles on the soft skin there. He pressed his lips to the curve of your stomach, just below your navel, the place where, if the gods were kind, a child might one day grow.

"This," he murmured against your skin, "will surely have a babe put in your body."

Your breath caught. You lifted your head to look at him, at the silver hair spilling across your stomach, at the reverence in his touch. He was not mocking now. There was no cruelty in his voice, no sharp edge of humor. Only want. Only hope.

"A son," he continued, his lips brushing your skin with each word. "A strong son. A dragon. I will fill you every night of this tourney, and every night after, until your belly swells with my child. Until the maesters confirm what I already know, that you were made for this. Made to carry my heirs."

Your hand found his hair, your fingers threading through the silver strands. He kissed your belly once more, lingering and soft, and then he lifted his head. His eyes met yours, and for a moment, you saw everything: the loneliness, the fear, the desperate need to prove himself, to leave a legacy, to be more than just a second son with a dangerous reputation. You saw the man beneath the prince, and your heart ached for him.

Then the moment passed. He sat up, stretching with the lazy grace of a cat, utterly unbothered by his nakedness or the wreckage surrounding him.

"We will sleep in lord Ashford's castle tonight anyway," he said, waving a dismissive hand at the ruined bed. "This was merely for the afternoon. A place to rest between the lists and the feast. It matters not if it is broken."

You looked at the splintered wood, the torn mattress, the furs scattered across the ground. "The servants will talk."

"Let them talk." He rose to his feet in one fluid motion, utterly unconcerned with his nakedness. His body was lean and pale, muscled in the way of a man who trained daily with sword and lance, and there was a fine sheen of sweat still glistening on his skin. He looked like something from a tapestry: a warrior, a prince, a creature of myth made flesh. "Let them whisper about the passion of prince Aerion and his lady wife. Let them wonder what we do behind closed tent flaps. I care not."

He found his breeches, miraculously intact, unlike the bed, and pulled them on. Then he turned back to you, still sprawled on the furs, and something flickered in his eyes.

"You should dress," he said. "I am going to find more wine. The servants here are incompetent, and I will not suffer dry throat because of their laziness."

He crossed to you, leaned down, and pressed a kiss to your lips, brief but thorough. Then his hand found your hip, and he pinched, just hard enough to make you yelp.

"That," he said, straightening with a smirk, "is for breaking the bed."

"I did not break the bed. You broke the bed."

"The bed broke because of your..." He gestured vaguely at your body, still disheveled from his attentions. "Your enthusiasm. Your movements. Your inability to lie still while your husband takes his pleasure."

You stared at him, incredulous. "You were the one..."

But he was already gone, sweeping out of the tent with the arrogance of a man who had never been forced to finish an argument he was losing.

You lay there for a moment longer, staring at the tent ceiling, your body still humming with the aftershocks of pleasure. Then, slowly, you sat up and began to put yourself to rights.

The gown was a lost cause, crumpled and stained and likely unwearable until it could be properly laundered. You found a simple shift in one of the trunks and pulled it on, then a robe of soft grey wool to ward off the afternoon chill. You combed your fingers through your tangled hair, doing your best to tame it without a proper brush, and splashed water on your face from the basin in the corner.

When you emerged from the tent, the afternoon sun was warm on your face. The tourney grounds sprawled before you, a sea of colorful pavilions and snapping banners, of knights and squires and smallfolk milling about. The sounds of the lists drifted on the breeze: the clash of practice swords, the shouts of men, the whinny of horses.

You found a camp chair just outside the tent flap and settled into it, careful not to stray far. Aerion's words echoed in your mind. You will not leave my side. You will stay where I can see you. You had promised, and you meant to keep that promise, even if he was not here to enforce it.

The sun was warm. The chair was comfortable. You let your eyes drift half-closed, your body still pleasantly sore from the afternoon's activities. A small, secret smile curved your lips.

Footsteps approached: heavy, hesitant footsteps, the tread of a man who was very large and trying very hard to be quiet. You opened your eyes and found yourself staring up at a veritable giant of a man.

He was tall, taller than any man you had ever seen, easily seven feet, with broad shoulders and thick arms and hands the size of dinner plates. His face was plain and honest, with a strong jaw and kind eyes and a thatch of unruly brown hair. He wore a simple tunic of green and brown, well-made but not fine, and he carried himself with the careful awkwardness of a man who had never quite grown accustomed to his own size.

He was also staring at you with an expression of profound discomfort.

"Begging your pardon, my lady," he said, and his voice was deep and rumbling, like distant thunder. "I did not mean to disturb you. I was looking for...that is, I was trying to find..."

He trailed off, his brow furrowing. He looked at the tent behind you, the black-and-crimson Targaryen pavilion, and then back at you, and something like confusion flickered across his honest face.

"You are the hedge knight," you said, because you had noticed him earlier. Everyone at Ashford had noticed him, if only for his size. He towered over every other man in the camp, a great shambling giant with a boy squire at his heels and a look of perpetual bewilderment on his plain, earnest face. "The tall one. I saw you near the lists this morning."

"I am," he confirmed, and he seemed surprised that you had noticed him at all. "Ser Duncan, if it pleases my lady. Though most call me Dunk." He hesitated. "I was looking for...there was a knight I knew once, Ser Arlan of Pennytree. I thought someone here might remember him. I have been asking at the tents, but I fear I have lost track of which ones I have visited and which I have not."

"I am sorry," you said gently. "I do not know the name."

His shoulders slumped, just slightly. "No one does. It has been many years. I thought perhaps...but it does not matter." He made to leave, then stopped, his brow furrowing again.

"My lady," he said slowly, "are you…are you well?"

You blinked. "I am perfectly well, Ser Duncan. Why do you ask?"

He shifted his weight from foot to foot, his big hands opening and closing at his sides. "It is only...I saw prince Aerion enter this tent some hours ago. And I heard him say...that is, I could not help but hear..."

"I am well," you said quickly. "Truly. There is no cause for concern."

But Ser Duncan was not a man who let things go easily. His honest face was troubled, his brow deeply furrowed. He took a half-step closer, lowering his voice as if afraid of being overheard.

"Was he...did he hurt you?" The words seemed to cost him something. His jaw was tight, his eyes earnest and worried. "The prince. I know his reputation. I know what they say about him. If he was too rough with you, if he forced you..."

"Ser Duncan." You held up a hand, stopping him. Understanding was dawning, slow and strange and almost amusing. He did not know you. Aerion had most likely said something vulgar, and then he had seen you - a woman in a plain gown, no jewels, no finery, enter that same tent. And he had drawn the obvious, if incorrect, conclusion.

He thought you were a whore. He thought you were a camp follower, a woman paid for her services, and he was concerned, genuinely, deeply concerned, that the prince had been cruel to you. That he had hurt you. That you might need help.

It was so earnest. So kind. So utterly, completely mistaken.

"The prince did not hurt me," you said, and you could not quite keep the amusement from your voice. "I assure you, Ser Duncan, I am quite unharmed."

He did not look convinced. "If you are afraid to speak, my lady, I understand. Princes are...they have power. They can do things. But I would not let him harm you further. I would..."

"Ser Duncan." You leaned forward slightly, your voice gentle. "What do you think I am doing here?"

He hesitated. His face flushed a deep, ruddy red. "I...that is...it is not my place to judge, my lady. A woman must do what she must to survive. I know that. I have known many good women who..." He stopped, clearly floundering. "I only meant that if the prince was cruel, if he did not pay you what you were owed, I would speak to him. I would make it right."

You stared at him for a long moment. Then, despite yourself, you laughed.

It was not a mocking laugh, you did not have it in you to mock this earnest, well-meaning giant of a man. It was a laugh of genuine, surprised delight. He thought you were a whore awaiting payment. He thought Aerion had used you and cast you aside. And he, a poor hedge knight with nothing but his honour and his size to his name, was offering to confront a prince of the realm on your behalf.

"You are a good man, Ser Duncan," you said, wiping your eyes. "Truly."

He looked confused, and faintly wounded. "I do not understand. If you are not...then why are you..."

Before you could answer, a familiar voice cut through the afternoon air like a blade.

"What is this?"

Aerion emerged from between two neighboring pavilions, a flagon of wine in one hand and two goblets in the other. His silver hair was still disheveled, his tunic only half-laced, and his violet eyes swept over the scene before him with a sharpness that belied his casual posture. He took in you, seated in your camp chair in your plain grey robe. He took in the enormous hedge knight looming over you, his big hands raised in an awkward, abortive gesture.

"I leave my wife alone for a handful of minutes," Aerion said, his voice soft and dangerous, "and I return to find some great lumbering stranger hovering over her like a vulture over carrion. Explain yourself."

Ser Duncan went pale. He took a hasty step back, nearly tripping over his own feet, and raised his hands higher in a gesture of surrender. "Your Grace, I meant no harm. I was only...I did not realize...that is, I thought she was..."

Your mind raced. You saw the path this conversation was about to take: the hedge knight's earnest confession, Aerion's cold fury at being thought the kind of man who would pay for a whore when he had a wife, the potential for humiliation and violence that would follow. Ser Duncan did not deserve that. He had been kind. He had been concerned. He had offered to help a woman he believed to be in need.

"He was lost," you said quickly, rising from your chair and stepping between the two men. You placed a hand on Aerion's chest, feeling the tension coiled in his muscles. "He was looking for a tent, someone he knew once, a Ser Arlan of Pennytree, and he lost his way. He stopped to ask me for directions. Nothing more."

Aerion's gaze flickered from the hedge knight to you. His eyes narrowed. "Directions."

"Yes." You kept your voice light, pleasant. "He is new to tourneys of this size, I think. The camp is a maze. Anyone might lose their way."

Ser Duncan, to his credit, was not a complete fool. He latched onto the lie with the desperate gratitude of a drowning man seizing a rope. "Yes," he said quickly. "Yes, that is it exactly. I was lost. I asked the lady for directions. Nothing more, Your Grace, I swear it. I would never...I did not mean..."

"You should be grateful to even gaze upon her," Aerion interrupted, his voice dripping with bored disdain. He did not look at the hedge knight. He looked at you, and some of the tension bled from his shoulders, though his posture remained rigid with proprietary pride. "Let alone speak to her. She is a princess now, by marriage if not by birth. Her face is not for the likes of you."

"I am grateful," Ser Duncan said, and he sounded it. "Truly, my prince. The princess was most kind. Most generous with her time. I thank her. I thank you both."

"Yes, yes." Aerion waved a dismissive hand, already bored with the interaction. "You have gazed. You have spoken. You have been granted more than you deserve. Now fuck off."

Ser Duncan did not need to be told twice. He sketched a hasty bow, awkward and unpracticed, the bow of a man who had never quite learned the proper forms, and retreated with impressive speed for a man of his size. You watched him go, disappearing between the pavilions, and felt a small pang of sympathy. He had meant well. He had been kind. And you had lied to protect him from your husband's wrath.

Aerion's hand closed around your wrist. "Inside."

He did not wait for your response. He tugged you back into the tent, letting the flap fall closed behind you. The ruined bed still lay in splinters on the ground, the furs scattered, the evidence of your afternoon's activities plain for anyone to see. Aerion ignored it. He set the wine and goblets on a chest and turned to face you, his arms crossed over his chest.

"A hedge knight," he said flatly. "A great lumbering hedge knight, looming over my wife, making her laugh."

"He was lost," you said again, keeping your voice soft. "Nothing more."

"He was looking at you." Aerion's jaw tightened. "The way men look at things they want."

"Aerion." You stepped closer to him, reaching up to smooth the collar of his unlaced tunic. Your fingers brushed his throat, and you felt his pulse leap beneath your touch. "He was a poor hedge knight who lost his way. He asked for directions. I gave them. He was grateful. That is all."

"He wanted you," Aerion said again, but some of the sharpness had faded from his voice. "I saw it in his eyes."

"He wanted to know if I was well." You rose on your toes and pressed a kiss to the corner of his mouth. "He heard sounds from the tent. He was concerned. That is all."

Aerion's hands found your waist, pulling you closer. "Concerned. About my wife. As if I would ever harm what is mine."

"You play rough games, husband. You cannot blame a stranger for misunderstanding."

"I can blame anyone I like. I am a prince."

You laughed, and the sound seemed to ease something in him. His grip on your waist gentled, his thumbs tracing slow circles through the wool of your robe.

"This gown," he said. "This grey wool thing. You look like a septa. A very pretty septa, but a septa nonetheless. I will not have it."

"It was the first thing I found. My other gown was..."

"I know what your other gown was." His smile curved, sharp and satisfied. "I remember removing it. I remember every moment of removing it." He leaned down and pressed a kiss to your throat. "But you cannot wear this to lord Ashford's castle. You cannot wear this to the feast tonight. You cannot wear this anywhere that anyone might see you and think I do not dress my wife as befits her station."

"Then take me to the castle," you said, your voice soft and coaxing. "Lord Ashford has given us chambers. Let us go there now. You can rest properly before the tourney tomorrow, on a real bed, not this splintered mess." You gestured at the ruined camp bed. "And I will try on every gown I brought. Every jewel. You can choose which one you would like to see me in for the feast."

His eyes darkened. "Choose?"

"Choose." You reached up and traced the line of his jaw with your fingertips. "I am your wife. I should dress to please you. Should I not?"

He stared at you for a long moment. Then, slowly, his lips curved into that familiar, dangerous smile. "You are playing me."

"I am pleasing you. There is a difference."

"Is there?"

You smiled and said nothing.

He kissed you and then released you. "Very well. To the castle. But if I am to rest properly, wife, you will be resting beside me. I did not travel all this way to sleep alone."

"I would expect nothing less."

a/n: You can donate on Ko-fi, your support helps me write more: https://ko-fi.com/catbayunthestoryteller <3

The porch sits right on the edge of it, a little island of yellow lantern light with you cross-legged in your chair, enamel bowl in your lap, fingers slick with bean juice. Crickets grind away in the ditch, frogs answer from somewhere near the pond, and the heat that pressed on your skin all day finally lets go a little, turning soft and damp and heavy instead of mean.

Your daddy, Joe, stands out by the road with a cigarette, just that small orange coal drifting up and down whenever he draws on it.

He’s mostly shadow, hat brim pulled low, shoulders a dark cutout against the pale strip of dirt lane. The smoke hangs around him in thin gray strands, catching the lantern glow before the breeze worries it apart.

The wagon makes itself known before you see it.  A tired rattle carrying over the fields long and low, iron and wood complaining in a way that could belong to any old rig on any old night. 

The mule steps out of the dark first, ears flicking, hooves whispering in the dust, harness creaking, then the wagon-bed, then the man riding it, the whole shape of him hunched against the evening like the road’s been sitting on his back.

He climbs down slow, not careless, one boot testing the ground, then the other. He isn’t tall; not one of those long, scarecrow boys you see come through town sometimes. He’s put together closer to the earth than that, thick through the shoulders and arms, weight settled in the meat of him instead of stretched out. 

Shirt pulls across his chest where the fabric has been asked to hold too much too often, sleeves rolled to his forearms, muscle and old work written in the dust and veins there. Suspenders run straight over his torso, holding everything decent, but there’s something loose under the neatness, a restless set to the way he carries himself, like he’s got more energy than his frame knows what to do with.

His hat sits low enough to shade most of his face until he steps up nearer and the porch light reaches for him.

“Evenin’, Sir,” he says, voice a slow scrape, low and worn, like it’s been dragged over gravel and cigarettes for years. 

The vowels don’t belong to your county, not exactly, but he leans into them like he’s been practicing, trying to make them fit the dirt under his boots.

“Evenin’,” Joe, flicks ash toward the ditch without turning. “You Remmick?”

“Yes, sir.”

He takes off his hat then, presses it to his chest in a gesture that seems to be humble, and in that little bow you see the line of him clear. 

Hair dark and close-cropped, stubborn where it’s tried to wave up and been tamed with water and a hand. Jaw rough with stubble that looks more forgotten than stylish. 

There’s a hardness around his mouth, something that could tilt into a grin or a snarl with not much provocation either way.

When he straightens and lifts his eyes, they cut toward the porch, and you feel it right away when they land on you, as sure as if somebody laid a hand on your bare ankle.

A limp green bean hangs between your fingers, ends torn and wet.

His gaze drifts, following your calves where your skirt’s ridden up, running along the slope of your shins and the span of your knees pressed together, sliding up the line of your apron and the thin open V between your collar buttons where the night air pushes in against your skin. 

He looks like he’s reading you, not just seeing you, taking his time over every line.

You go still, sharp-aware of every place your dress touches your body and every place it doesn’t.

The bean pieces drop into the bowl as you lower your eyes to the boards. The porch wood is dark and warped from years of feet, knot-holes winking like little eyes in the dim.

You fix on those, on the small wet snaps and soft taps of beans piling against enamel. Anything that is not the feeling of a stranger’s stare walking up and down you like a man checking fence.

“Baby,” your father says, voice flat, cigarette smoke curling out on the word. “Say evenin’.”

You wipe your hands on your apron and stand, bare feet quiet on the boards. “Evenin’,” you say, polite as sunday, letting the rest of what you feel sink down where it won’t show on your face.

Remmick smiles like he hears it anyway. It isn’t wide or warm. Just a slow tug at one corner of his mouth, a small, crooked tilt that never quite reaches his eyes.

“Evenin’, miss,” he answers, and there’s a drag in that word miss, the s held just long enough to make it catch.

Miss, when he could have asked for your name, when any decent man might have. Your father hasn’t offered it yet, so you keep it closed up in your mouth.

“Girl oughta be in bed this hour,” Joe mutters, eyes on the yard, not on you. “Ain’t no call for her to be sittin’ out like some boy on watch. Night’s for men workin’, not for women gawkin’.”

The words land on your shoulders like an old coat, familiar weight, old smell.  You bite down on what you want to say and feel it burn on the way down.

“I’m finishin’ the beans,” you tell him instead, hands tightening on the bowl till the rim bites into your palms. You don’t bother trying to explain that the dark sits easier on your skin than the hard white noon does, that the night gives you a little space to stretch.

You can feel Remmick watching you still, not with that sloppy hunger you’ve seen from boys in town, all elbows and gawking.

This is like he’s comparing what he sees to something he’s held in his head a long time. 

“Don’t reckon there’s any harm in her gettin’ some air, Sir,” he says after a moment, pitched low, as if he’s offering reason and not meddling. “So long as she stays where you can see her.” He tips his head, and his eyes make another lazy path over you, unashamed. “World’s rough for a girl on her own.”

Your daddy snorts, jaw tightening just enough for you to notice. “You just worry ‘bout them fields, son. I didn’t hire you to advise on my girl.”

The almost-smile on Remmick’s mouth doesn’t quite leave. “Yes, sir,” he says. “I’ll give all my attention to what you’re payin’ me for.”

He keeps his words aimed at your father, but his gaze is not that obedient. It flicks back to you when he says attention, and there’s weight in it, promise, something that makes your skin prickle fine all over. Something in you bristles right back, lifts its head like a barn cat whose tail’s been stepped on.

You draw a breath and set the bowl against your hip. “Where you want him sleepin’?” you ask your father, eyes fixed out over the yard so you don’t have to meet either man’s stare straight on.

“In the old place.” Joe jerks his chin toward the smaller farmhouse slumped beyond the well—a squat little shape where the lamplight doesn’t reach, half-eaten by shadow. “Closer to the barn. Got a bed and a stove. Man don’t need more than that.”

Remmick turns to look at it, and the lantern light catches his eyes in a strange way, making them flash for an instant like there’s something slick behind them.

The little house sits there like it’s been waiting, windows dark, door shut up tight, roofline sagged just enough to look suspicious.

“That’ll do,” he says. “I’m a night sort myself. Easier workin’ when the sun’s gone and the air ain’t tryin’ to boil you clear through. Less trouble all around.”

He says it easy, like it’s about sweat and shade and nothing else, but you hear the way he shapes night in his mouth, the soft way he lets it roll off his tongue, and something in your belly curls up smaller and sharper.

“Heard you don’t care much for daylight,” Joe says, watching him out of the corner of his eye.

Remmick’s jaw shifts, a muscle ticking like it wants to answer on its own. He glances at you, quick and bright, before he looks down at his boots. “Sun don’t care much for me,” he finally drawls. “Burns me to char if I let it. Always been that way. Doctor said I got delicate skin.”

The word sits wrong in your ear as soon as it’s out, delicate, dangling over this stocky man with forearms roped up in tendon and dirt ground into his knuckles, hands that look like they were made to break things, not handle them gentle. 

It slips out of you before you can catch it, quiet and skeptical. “Delicate,” you repeat, eyes finding his without meaning to.

He catches that and settles into it like a cat into a warm spot. “You don’t think so, miss?” he asks, voice a touch softer now, gaze steady and unblinking.

You ought to let it pass. Ought to dip your head and let the men talk over you, let delicate lie between them like some joke you weren’t meant to get. 

Instead you hold his stare in the lantern glow, take your time looking back the same way he did to you, tracing the faint hollows under his eyes, the line of his nose, the mouth that looks used to biting down on words and maybe on other things too.

“No, sir,” you say finally, after a beat that stretches long. “You don’t look delicate at all.”

Something shifts behind his eyes at that, something pleased and sharp that makes your heart knock once, hard, against your ribs. The corner of his mouth tugs just a shade higher.

“Then I suppose I’ll have to live up to what you see,” he murmurs. “Would be a shame to disappoint you.”

Your daddy grinds his cigarette out under his heel, done with this line of talk. “You can unload what you got, then I’ll show you the place,” he says. “Got work waiting for nobody. You ain’t too tired from sittin’ on a wagon all day, are you?”

Remmick rolls one shoulder, hand rubbing the back of his neck. The stretch shifts his shirt over his back, pulls the fabric across solid muscle there.

You feel your breath snag for half a second and hate that it does.

“Wagon ain’t heavy,” he says. “I’ll get settled quick, then you can put me to whatever needs doin’.”

Joe nods and starts toward the dim outline of that little house, his boots crunching through the loose gravel near the well. The lantern light falls behind him with each step until he’s just another moving patch of dark.

Remmick lingers at the foot of the porch. He settles his hat back on his head, brim bringing his eyes into shadow again, but you can still feel them.

“You finish them beans,” he tells you, voice gone softer, aimed up at you like a secret. “Man works better with a full belly.”

There’s nothing in the words you could point to and call wrong, nothing on the surface you could carry to your father and hold up like proof.

Still, the way his gaze drifts down and back up as he says them leaves something slick and uneasy under your ribs. Heat crawls up your neck, hot in a way that has nothing to do with the air.

“I’ll see to what’s mine,” you say, gripping the bowl till your fingers ache. “Same as you should see to yours.”

His laugh is low, a rough little sound that lives in his chest and doesn’t quite make it to his teeth. He dips his head a fraction, like you’ve handed him a dare instead of brushing him off. “Oh, I intend to,” he replies. “You can count on it.”

Then he turns and walks after your father, stride easy, body moving with a loose sort of purpose. His shadow stretches out along the yard behind him, tossed strange and long by the lantern, then swallowed up as he and Joe move past the well. 

The small farmhouse waits ahead, black windows staring, door a darker cut in the wall. It looks, for one breath, like it’s swallowing the two men whole.

You stand there with the lantern hissing softly at your elbow and watch the dark take them. 

When the yard settles again, when their footsteps fade and the crickets creep back up to full volume, the space between the barn and the house does not feel the same. It’s as if something else has stepped into it and sat down, something you cannot see but can sense just the same, like a pressure change before a storm.

You sit again, bowl back in your lap, fingers finding another handful of beans by habit alone. The wet snap of them breaking sounds too loud in the hush, echoing in the hollow boards under your feet. 

Every few seconds, your eyes drag toward that low silhouette out past the well, toward the little house that is not empty anymore.

You tell yourself you’re only minding where your father put a stranger. 

The first night after he arrives, he walks the fence line while you wash dishes.

You hear his boots dragging through the loose gravel near the yard, then the softer sound of steps in the grass. 

The screen door hangs open to let the air move, lantern burning low over the sink. Your arms are wet to the elbow, suds creeping up your forearms as you scrub at a pan that’s older than you are. 

Out past your own reflection in the dark window, you catch a small shape of motion—the swing of a lantern out near the barn, then the shorter, solid outline of him moving along the fence, checking posts, rattling wire. 

He doesn’t look up at the house that you can tell, doesn’t lift the light toward you, just keeps on with that steady pace, head bent. 

Still, your shoulders hunch like you’ve been caught at something you haven’t done. The glass fogs a little with the breath you don’t remember letting out.

You tell yourself it’s good your father found a man willing to walk the property at night. That’s what you tell yourself as you rinse plates and stack them, as the little yellow circle of his lantern slides back and forth along the edge of your sight.

The second night you have to bring him his supper, because your father ‘forgets.’

It’s late by the time the last of the pots are scraped and put away, your back aching from standing, hair pasted to your neck. Joe leans back in his chair, radio humming low on the table, and says without looking up, “That boy eat?”

You still your hands on the dishrag. “Ain’t seen him at the table.”

“Damn it,” He grumbles, more at himself than you. “Told him come in if he heard me holler and I ain’t never thought to holler. Fix him a plate and take it down. Man don’t work right hungry.”

You swallow whatever you were about to say about whose job it is to feed farmhands, scrape together a plate from what’s left—two biscuits gone hard at the edges, a ladle of beans, a piece of ham with more bone than meat—and cover it with a clean cloth. 

The air outside hits your damp skin and feels cooler than it ought to. The night smells like dirt and hay and whatever’s blooming along the ditch. 

The smaller farmhouse sits out near the barn with a faint thread of light leaking around the edges of its curtain, not bright enough to spill onto the yard. You walk out there, skirt brushing your ankles, plate balanced careful in both hands.

You knock, knuckles soft on the wood. For a second there’s nothing, then the faint scrape of a chair, the hush of someone crossing a small room. 

The door opens only halfway. He fills the gap, shoulder and chest just there, heat and sweat.

“Evenin’,” he says, voice a little rough, like he hasn’t used it since sundown. “You lost?”

You hold the plate out, not stepping any closer than you have to. “Daddy forgot to call you in. Told me to bring your supper.”

His eyes go to your hands first, to the way your fingers wrap the rim of the plate, then to the food, then back up. 

He doesn’t reach right away; he lets the moment stretch, his gaze traveling from your wrists up your arms, lingering on the damp on your skin, on the few stray strands that have worked loose at your temple and stuck there. 

“That’s mighty kind,” he says at last, taking the plate so slow his fingers brush yours. 

They’re not as rough as you expected, just warm and solid, the pads of them catching against your knuckles. “Hope he didn’t drag you out here from your bed on account of me.”

“I wasn’t in bed,” you answer, because lying feels worse than telling him anything true. “Kitchen don’t clean itself.”

He makes a small noise at that, somewhere between agreement and amusement. “No, ma’am. World’d fall apart if it weren’t for everything women do men don’t think about. Least he can do is call me in for a plate now and then instead of sending you.”

You don’t like that it sounds almost gentle, that there’s no clear edge you can grab onto and call wrong.

You nod once and start to turn away, wanting the room behind that door to stay his business and not have to wonder what’s in it.

“Miss?” he says, and you stop even though you don’t want to. “You tell your daddy I’m obliged. To him and to you.”

You keep your eyes on the yard. “He’ll hear you tomorrow.”

“Maybe I like the thought of you carryin’ my thanks,” he says, voice dipping lower.

You don’t answer to that. You walk back toward the big house with your empty hands and you feel his eyes between your shoulder blades all the way to the porch steps.

Another night you pass him by accident at the pump.

You come around the corner of the house with a pail in each hand, too focused on not sloshing well water onto your skirt to notice him right off. 

He’s just there suddenly in the lantern’s edge, sleeves rolled high, suspenders hanging loose at his hips, hair damp with sweat or water; you can’t tell which. 

The pump squeaks once as he lets go of the handle. Moonlight catches the wet on his forearms, the curve of muscle there, the scar that runs pale along his left wrist like a rope burn that never faded.

You stop short, pails swinging. “Didn’t know you were usin’ it,” you say. “I’ll wait.”

He tips his head, that same little crooked half-smile thinking about showing up. “You scared I’m gonna dirty the water, standin’ too near?” His accent is thicker tonight, as if he’s tired of smoothing them for everybody’s sake.

“I ain’t scared,” you say. Your voice comes out flatter than you mean it to, which only makes him watch you harder. “Just got taught not to crowd folk when they’re at work.”

“And here I thought you were just bein’ polite,” he murmurs. He steps back from the pump, gives you room to pass. “Go on, then. Wouldn’t do to have Mr. Joe’s girl haulin’ from the ditch ‘cause I hogged the handle.”

You move past him, the damp of his skin ghosting near your elbow, the smell of iron and sweat and something like tobacco clinging to him. You set a pail under the spout and work the handle, arm moving in a practiced rhythm.

The pump groans, then warm water shudders up from below, splashing cold over your fingers when you misjudge the first rush.

His gaze sits on your hands again, on the bare forearms you didn’t bother covering because it’s night and there’s no sun to scold you. “You do all that yourself?” he asks. “Water, cookin’, everything inside?”

“Me and Mama,” you say, though your mother’s cough has been bad enough lately you both know it’s more you than her. “Daddy’s got the fields.”

“And now he’s got me,” Remmick says, watching your arm work. “Guess I’m supposed to make life easier ‘round here.”

“Then do it,” you answer, a little sharper than you meant. The second pail fills and you swing it away, careful not to splash your toes. “Don’t stand around talkin’ about it.”

For a heartbeat there’s quiet. Then he laughs, low and delighted. “There she is,” he says under his breath, as if he’s been waiting on that bite. 

When you glance over, he isn’t offended. He looks satisfied, eyes bright, lean mouth curled up. “You keep snappin’ at me like that, miss, I might start thinkin’ you’re sweet on me.”

“Or you might start thinkin’ wrong,” you shoot back, lifting both buckets. The weight drags at your shoulders, but you’d sooner drop in the yard than ask him to carry them.

He doesn't offer, just watches you walk away, and you can feel that as keenly as the pull of the water on your arms.

There are other little moments like that, small as splinters. Like, when you cross paths in the barn one evening when you go to check on a cow that lowed funny through your window. 

He’s already there when you reach the threshold, one hand on the animal’s neck, murmuring something soft and nonsense in her ear. 

She calms under his touch, sides heaving slow, eyes rolling less. The lantern hangs from a nail overhead, throwing golden light over the dust in the air, over his shoulders, over the cow’s hide. 

He glances up when he senses you, and for a blink his irises flash almost too light, as if the lantern’s in them and not above him. Then they’re ordinary again, a color you could name if you got close enough, and he’s saying, “She just didn’t like the thunder,” even though the sky’s been clear all day.

You lean on the stall rail, arms folded, watching his hand move in slow strokes along the cow’s neck. 

The steadiness of him with animals makes something twist in you, something like reluctant respect and something like fear, because if he can soothe two thousand pounds of nervous flesh with a voice and a touch, what could he do to yours if he ever decided to try.

On another night you fix a tear in one of his work shirts at the kitchen table because your father plops it there and says, “Stupid fool’s gonna walk around with his arm hangin’ out if someone don’t thread a needle.” 

You mutter that Remmick has two hands and surely they can manage a seam, but you fetch your sewing basket anyway. 

The fabric smells faintly of him, sweat and field and that odd metallic thread that’s been nagging at the back of your senses since he arrived. 

You push the needle through worn cotton and wonder how a man gets a rip that clean across the bicep, by snagging it on barbed wire or nail head, without a single bloodstain around the torn edge.

He shows up to collect it before you take it down yourself. Don’t know how he knows it’s ready, but he’s at the door not long after you knot the last stitch, hat in hand like he’s paying a call.

Your father’s gone out back to piss or smoke or both, your mother’s dozing in her chair, so it’s just you in the quiet kitchen with your fingers still sore from the work.

“You didn’t have to,” he says when you hand the folded shirt over. “Could’ve walked around indecent a day or two, see if anyone complained.”

“My father would,” you say. “Don’t like loose things on his land.”

He takes the shirt with his good arm, the other rolling his shoulder like it aches. The lantern throws his eyes into little warm coins. 

Some nights you only see him from a distance.

Through your bedroom window when you should be sleeping, you catch the sway of his lantern again and again, marking his rounds. In the moonlight, his stride is compact, efficient, not showy. 

He moves like someone who’s spent a long time walking alone, someone who knows better than to waste steps. He never seems to stumble, never misjudges a rut or loose stone.

You watch him slip between the barn and the smaller house, in and out of shadow, and you tell yourself you’re just making sure he’s where he should be, that you are only doing what your father would want.

You notice, too, the nights when the light in his window stays on longer than makes sense. Long after your father’s snores have settled and your mama’s breath has evened into sleep, after you’ve lain there staring at the ceiling until your eyes burn, that far-off square of yellow will still be sitting out there at the edge of your sight. 

Sometimes you think you see the shadow of him cross it, head bowed, shoulders hunched, moving back and forth in a tight little path, but when you squint it’s gone.

Once, you step out onto the porch for air and catch him already looking.

You don’t see him at first; you just feel that prickling awareness that has become his signature in your body. 

Then your eyes find him where he’s paused near the barn, one hand on the fence post, the other hanging loose at his side. No lantern this time, just moonlight on his face, flattening all the hard parts, making his eyes look too bright and his mouth too soft. 

He doesn’t look away when you notice him. He doesn’t call out or tip his hat in greeting. He just stands there in the dark, steady as another post, and lets you decide whether to step back inside or stay where the night can see both of you.

You stay a breath longer than you should, chest tight, heartbeat stepping up loud between your ears. Then you reach for the door, fingers curling around splintered wood, and it feels, for a strange second, like you’re the one retreating and he’s the one who lives here.

By the time a week has worked itself around, his presence has braided into the place.

The horse knows him, ears twitching toward his voice before dawn. The dogs have quit barking when his boots scrape the yard at dusk. Your father has stopped watching him like he might bolt and started calling for him when something heavy needs lifting. 

The small farmhouse doesn’t look so empty now; you’ve grown used to the idea of a man’s breath in there, a man’s boots by the door, a man’s shadow on the curtain.

You’re the one still wary, nerves still stretched thin every time you feel his eyes, even if nobody else in the house seems to notice how often that is. 

You catch him in little reflections—a sliver of him in the pump’s metal, in the window glass, in any surface that throws back light—and he’s always looking your way. 

Not always outright, not always rude, but always aware of you. Always clocking where you are in the yard, whether your sleeves are rolled, whether your hem rides high on your calf or hangs proper at your ankle.

You tell yourself it’s just because there’s not much else worth watching out here.

You don’t quite believe it.

Clouds bruise up toward the horizon, swallowing the moon a few bites at a time. You’re at the kitchen table with mending in your lap when you hear it—one sharp, panicked bawl from the barn that cuts straight through the hum of crickets and the low murmur of your father’s radio.

You’re on your feet before you think about it, thimble still shoved on your finger, needle stuck tight in a loop of thread. 

Your father says something about “damned horses spookin’ at their own shadows” but doesn’t move from his chair.

His back’s been bad all day; he’s been walking like every step hurts. Mama’s dozing, her breath a thin whistle. 

So you grab the lantern from its hook, light blooming up in a hot bloom that stings your eyes, and head out barefoot into the yard.

The grass is cool against your soles, damp from the thick air. The little farmhouse where Remmick sleeps has a strip of light at the curtain-bottom, but you don’t see him outside. The barn looms ahead, big and dark, door standing half-open like a mouth. Another low, fretful sound comes from inside, not as sharp as the first but enough to hurry you along.

“Easy now,” you call as you slip in, lantern held high. “Hush yourself, girl, I’m comin’.”

The barn swallows the outside sounds. In here it’s hay and dust and the soft shuffling of hooves, the rustle of wings up in the rafters. 

Your mare stamps once, snorting, eyes rolling white when the lantern light hits her. You cross the packed dirt quick, set the lantern on a hook so you’ve got both hands, and reach for her halter, stroking her long face.

“It’s just the weather actin’ strange,” you murmur, words more for yourself than her. “Ain’t nothin’ gonna hurt you.”

She settles a little under your voice, but her muscles are still tight, skin twitching under your palm.

You’re so focused on her that you don’t hear him until he’s already in the doorway.

“Somethin’ wrong?”

His voice slides through the gloom, low and rough. 

You jerk a little, head snapping toward the barn entrance. He’s just inside the threshold, lantern in his hand turned down low, throwing more shadow than light. Sleeves rolled, suspenders hooked proper tonight, hair damp at the temples like he’s just come in from a hard walk. 

“Lord,” you mutter, heart kicking hard. “You move too quiet. Thought you were a ghost.”

He lets out a short huff of a laugh. “Not yet.” The lantern swings by his knee as he steps inside, setting the hay shadows dancing. “Heard her fussin’. Figured I’d check before she took it into her head to kick through a stall.”

“She just spooked,” you say. “Storm brewin’ somewhere.”

He comes up nearer, close enough that you can see the sheen of sweat along his throat, the bead of something darker at the cuff of his shirt where it brushes his wrist. 

His gaze does a quick, automatic sweep of the stall—manger, bucket, the mare’s flanks, your hand on her halter—and then it hooks on you, like it always does, like there’s a string between his eyes and your skin.

“You shouldn’t come out here by yourself at night,” he says, quiet, not rebuking exactly but not gentle either. “Barn full of spooked stock, any one of ’em could knock you right off your feet. Ain’t proper for a girl to be runnin’ around after dark alone.”

“That girl’s got ears,” you answer, voice tight, stroking the mare’s neck to hide your own nerves. “She can hear you fussin’ without talkin’ over her head.”

His mouth does that little tilt again, amused. “Reckon she can,” he says. “Reckon she don’t listen half as good as she ought, neither.”

You’re just shaping a sharp reply when it happens.

Something cracks outside, a dry, sharp sound—maybe a limb breaking, maybe a board settling wrong, maybe thunder grumbling way off where the clouds are thickest. 

It doesn’t matter what it is. The mare flinches hard, shoulder slamming sideways. The stall rail shudders under the hit, and you’re standing too close, lantern throwing crazy shadows as the world jolts.

Your first instinct is to get out of the way. You jump back, skirts swishing, hand flying off the halter. You pivot toward the stall opening and catch—not air, not clear space, but the edge of an old nail head that’s been working itself loose from the post for years.

The sound of fabric tearing is loud as a gunshot in the barn.

It rips from just below your hip down the side of your thigh, a long, rude run that opens your dress like a mouth. 

Cool air hits bare skin where cotton should be.

You gasp, more from the exposure than pain, and slap your hand down, fingers clutching at the split to keep it from gaping wider.

For a heartbeat you stand frozen, lantern light swinging, breath shallow, your leg half-bared through the torn seam.

You don’t have a slip on under this dress, not a proper one. It’s too hot. You’ve got plain cotton drawers and a whole lot of skin, and you know without looking that the tear has gone high, high enough that if you weren’t grabbing it shut he’d be seeing places no man has any business looking at on you.

“You all right?” Remmick’s closer before you register him moving, his boots whispering over packed dirt. His lantern clanks against a beam as he hangs it up. He reaches for you by pure reflex, hands coming to your arms, steadying you where you’ve stumbled.

“I’m fine,” you snap, too quick, humiliation burning your face, neck, chest. “Let go.”

You twist away from his grip, turning your hip, trying to angle the torn side away from him. 

The dress shifts anyway, hem dragging through straw, and there’s a flash of thigh where your fingers don’t quite cover everything. You feel the rush of blood under your skin like you’ve been slapped.

His eyes drop before you can stop them.

It’s an instinct with him just like yours, hungry and automatic. His gaze hits the split, the glimpse of your leg, and sticks. Time slows down around that look. You see it happen, see the way his pupils widen, see the quick, sharp inhale he tries to hide.

“Jesus,” he breathes, almost soundless.

You yank the torn fabric tighter, the motion making the rip strain up higher, edge brushing the curve where your thigh meets your hip. Your whole body feels like a lantern flame, exposed and flickering. “Don’t you look,” you hiss, low and furious. “Turn around.”

One of his hands lifts, like he might actually offer to cover the tear for you, fingers curling as if they want to fit over the place you’re guarding. He stops himself, hand hovering for an awful second near your hip, close enough that you feel the heat of him even through the thin cotton. 

“Ain’t my fault you went tearin’ yourself open on every nail in the county,” he says, tone trying for light and landing somewhere rougher. 

His eyes drag up slow, from your knuckles clenched in the fabric, up the bare strip of thigh he already saw, up the shape of your waist and the heave of your chest. “Maybe you should let me look and make sure you didn’t cut that pretty skin to ribbons.”

The way he says pretty makes your stomach flip and your teeth set.

“I ain’t cut,” you spit. “And I sure as hell don’t need you inspectin’ me.”

He should look ashamed. Though, he doesn’t. There’s color high in his cheeks now, not from heat, not from work. His mouth’s gone a little slack, like he’s holding back words. His gaze keeps sneaking back to the place your hand guards, greedy, any time you aren’t staring right at him.

“If you say so,” he murmurs finally. “Wouldn’t want to offend your delicate sensibilities.”

You hear the echo of his earlier lie in that word, delicate, and decide if you stay here another minute you might do something you can’t take back, like slap him or cry or both.

You shift your grip to catch more fabric, bunching the torn side up in your fist so nothing shows. It makes walking harder; you’re hobbling, half-skipping, desperate not to let the skirt fall. “You see to the mare,” you manage, chin up, eyes burning. “I’ll fix my dress.”

He steps back enough to let you pass. As you squeeze by him in the narrow space, your shoulder brushes his chest, your bare calf bumps the hard line of his boot. 

“Careful,” he says, voice quiet, right by your ear. “Would be a shame if the rest of that dress gave up and left you standin’ in nothin’ at all.”

You don’t give him the satisfaction of a reply. You duck your head and hurry out, every step measured so the torn seam doesn’t pull, one hand clamped between your thighs, lantern bumping at your knee. 

The night air on your exposed skin feels wrong, every stray breeze finding its way up under the rip.

You keep your eyes fixed on the glow of the house, on the square of the kitchen window, on anything that is not the barn behind you.

You slam the kitchen door with more force than you mean to, startling your mama awake, mumble something about a nail catching you and make straight for your room. You don’t light your own lamp; you don’t want to see what he saw. You stand there in the dark with your back to the door and your dress torn open under your hand, heart hammering, ears roaring, shame and something hotter and uglier twisting up together in your belly.

Down by the south fence, in the smaller farmhouse, Remmick sits on the edge of his narrow bed with the easy, humming satisfaction of a man who’s been saving something up.

He lit the lamp as soon as he stepped in, not out of any real need for light but because he likes the way it throws shadows, likes the way it paints dim gold over bare wood and gives him something soft to look at while his mind runs back over the evening. 

The room is small and warm from his own body heat, close enough that every breath feels shared with the walls. Old wood, dust, a curl of tobacco from the roll-up he finished outside, and under it all the ghost of you clinging to his clothes—soap and starch and sweat—make a thick little stew in the air.

He shrugged out of his shirt as soon as the door shut, tossing it over the chair without bothering to check if the seam you mended had held. 

The rip in the fabric is nothing next to the rip in your dress that he can’t stop savoring. He works the buttons of his trousers loose without hurry, fingers moving with the contented patience of a man about to sit down to a meal he’s been smelling all day.

He doesn’t try not to think of you. That would be a waste of a perfectly good night.

He leans back against the wall, boots kicked off, pants open at the fly, and lets the picture come as easy as breath. 

You in the barn with your hand clapped between your thighs, dress split wide, that slick little strip of thigh flashing when the cloth slipped. The way your eyes flared when you realized he’d seen, outrage and mortification and something bright under both. The sound of your voice when you told him not to look, like you already knew he was going to anyway.

“Hell,” he mutters, half laughing under his breath as his cock swells heavy against the thin barrier of his briefs. “Ain’t nothin’ on this earth I’d rather think on.”

His palm drifts down over his belly, fingers tracing a slow path to the bulge at his groin. Even that light touch makes him suck in air through his teeth. 

He presses his hand over the outline of himself, feeling the hot, solid weight of his cock straining upward, and a low, pleased sound curls up out of his chest. He palms it once, a lazy roll, enjoying the way it kicks against his fingers like it’s eager too, then he slides his hand inside.

Warm cotton gives way to hot skin. He wraps his fist around the thick base of himself and exhales like he’s been holding that breath since the barn, relief and hunger tangled up in it. His cock sits heavy in his grip, veins standing up, the head already wet where precum has gathered from how long he’s been walking around hard on the memory of you.

“Look at that,” he murmurs, voice low and rough, thumb smearing that slickness over the swollen tip. “Worked up over one little tear. You’d laugh yourself sick if you saw me now, wouldn’t you?”

The thought of you seeing him like this, spread out on his narrow bed with his trousers open and his cock standing full in his hand, only makes him harder. 

He drags his fist down slow, savoring the drag from head to base, then back up again, the friction sharp and sweet all at once. The first few strokes are measured, a man settling into a rhythm he plans to enjoy, not something hurried and guilty he has to choke down.

He lets his head tip back against the wall, eyes slipping shut so he can see you better behind his lids. 

Not the church version, not the good girl with the hem tugged just so and the buttons done up high. 

The barn version. Lantern light sliding over your bare thigh, the tremble in your fingers when you clutched at the rip, that split second when your hand wasn’t fast enough and he got the clean, unearned look he’s been replaying ever since.

“Shit,” he breathes, hand tightening, the slide of skin on skin picking up a little speed. 

He drags his fist down again, slower, getting a feel for every inch, for the way his cock swells harder in his grip with each pass. Arousal slicks his thumb, gathers at the crest of the head, and he spreads it with an easy, greedy little twist, working it around until the slide turns wet and smooth. 

His hips lift into his own hand without much prompting, body eager after nights of walking around with you on his tongue and in his teeth and under his nails.

“Bare leg,” he mutters, watching his hand move now, eyes half-lidded, lashes throwing shadows on his cheeks. “Goin’ about your business like you ain’t got that tucked up under your skirt. Like I ain’t seen it now.”

He remembers exactly how the tear opened, how the cotton gave and the seam surrendered, how your thigh flashed in the jumpy lantern light. 

That first raw glimpse lives in his chest like a hot coal. Skin smooth and soft-looking, the curve of muscle under it, the sweet thickness where it met your hip. 

He remembers your drawers too, plain white cotton clinging to you, riding that line between demure and lewd when the fabric shifted wrong.

His hand moves faster at that, instincts catching up with memory. He curls his fingers a little tighter, pulling from the heavy base up to the slick crown, milking a fresh bead of precum up with each stroke. 

“Bet you went home and stitched that dress up neat as a Sunday virtue,” he says, voice roughened by breath. “Head bowed, lips bit, pretendin’ that leg ain’t still there underneath, smooth as cream and just as soft. Bet you can’t stop thinkin’ about me seein’ it neither.”

He can picture you at your little table, lamp burning, needle in hand, fingers trembling just enough to make the thread snag. Your face hot, your mouth set, your thighs pressed together under the cloth as you sew shame into every stitch. He imagines you tugging that seam tight, that same hand that clutched the torn fabric now working the needle, every pull a memory of his eyes on you.

His free hand slides down his belly, fingers pressing over the flexing muscles there, holding them tight as he fucks up into his own fist. The bed creaks under him, wood complaining, but he doesn’t slow. He spreads his legs wider on the mattress, giving himself more room to move, and the extra slack lets his strokes lengthen, his hips roll, everything turning into a slow rhythm.

“You know what I see when I close my eyes?” he asks the ceiling quietly, dragging his thumb across the slit. “Not that pretty little mouth tellin’ me not to look. I see that hand of yours slip. I see that dress fall open just a little more.”

The picture in his mind sharpens: you, back against a stall post, hand too busy clutching at rough wood to hold your skirts closed, light catching on the full line of your thigh as the rip edges skid higher. 

He imagines the flap of cloth falling aside, full view of your leg from knee to hip, drawers pulled tight over the mound between your thighs, a faint darker patch where heat and sweat have gathered.

His cock throbs in his grip at that. He grits his teeth, pushes his palm down hard, and his hips jerk, chasing the pressure.

“Yeah,” he growls softly. “That’s it. Dress up around your waist, showin’ all that sweet flesh. You holdin’ on to that wood like it’s gonna save you, eyes full of righteous fury while your body’s tellin’ on you.”

His fingers slip lower on the stroke, pausing to cup his balls, rolling them in his palm, feeling the tight, heavy pull there. The sensation punches another sound out of him. He goes back to his cock with renewed urgency, arm working harder now, hand pumping.

He lets himself wander further than any real moment has gone. Lets the memory of that tear turn into something else, something he can taste.

He imagines stepping in close before you can bolt, one hand catching your wrist, the other gathering your torn skirt up and out of his way. Imagines your gasp, that little sharp intake he already knows, your bare thigh hitting his hip as he pins you to the stall. Your panties stretched tight over the soft swell of your cunt, his fingers pushing up against the dampening cloth, feeling how hot you are through the barrier.

“Pretend you don’t want it,” he murmurs, throat rasping. “Try to act like you ain’t gettin’ wet for me while you fuss.”

The words sound vulgar and right in his mouth. His cock swells at it, the head aching now, sensitive with every pass. He squeezes at the top, thumb pressing just under the crown, and his whole body shudders, pleasure rushing up his spine.

“Be a good girl,” he hears himself whispering to the woman in his head, the one pressed to barn wood with her dress in tatters. “Spread ’em for me, let me see what you’re hidin’.”

His hand flies now, finding a quick, dirty rhythm. His breath comes rough, each inhale catching, each exhale spilling out in curses and half-formed praises.

“You’d flush right up to your hairline,” he pants, head rolling against the wall. “Act all offended while your thighs tremble and that pretty thing between ’em throbs. Might even cry a little, wouldn’t you? All sweet and scared and soaked.”

The image of you crying—eyes bright, lashes wet, lips bitten—while your body betrays you sends him right to the edge. His balls draw up tight, cock jumping in his fist, veins standing out under his skin. Heat coils at the base of his spine, that familiar pull gathering everything in, ready to snap.

He spits into his hand for more slick, doesn’t even bother wiping his mouth. The added wetness turns his strokes into something obscene, the sound echoing in the small room. His forearm snaps, muscles burning, chasing the crest bearing down on him.

“Come on then,” he grits. “Show me.”

He imagines hooking a finger under the edge of your drawers and pulling the cotton aside. Imagines the first sight of you bare between your thighs, folds swollen, maybe already glistening, all that heat finally out in the lantern light instead of tucked away in shadows and good manners.

“That’s it,” he rasps, voice breaking, hips jerking harder into his fist. “Knew you’d be pretty there. Knew you’d be soft.”

The wave hits with no ceremony; it slams through him like a mule kick. His whole body locks, stomach clenching, heels digging into the thin mattress, head thumping dully against the wall. 

A groan tears out of him, rough and strangled, half-swallowed behind clenched teeth. His cock jerks in his hand, once, twice, then again, spilling hot over his fingers and across his stomach in thick, pulsing ropes.

He rides it out, hand still working, strokes shortening but not stopping, milking every last drop. Cum coats his knuckles, drips over his fist, slicking his grip until his palm slips on the softening length. 

“Fuck,” he breathes when he can breathe again, voice low and wrecked.

His strokes slow, then ease off altogether, fingers loosening their grip. 

For a moment he just sits there, chest rising and falling, wrist slick and heavy, cock giving a few last, half-hearted twitches in his hand. Sweat cools on his forehead, a bead sliding down along his temple.

He looks down at the mess on his belly, streaks shining in the lamplight, dripping off the side of his hand. There’s no disgust in the way he examines it; if anything, there’s pride. A crooked smile tugs at his mouth, lazy and satisfied.

“Look what you pulled out of me, and you weren’t even here,” he murmurs, more pleased than ashamed. 

He wipes his hand across his stomach, smearing instead of cleaning, fingers drawing idle patterns through the stickiness before he drags them off onto a wadded-up shirt at his side. 

The cotton takes the worst of it, darkening where it soaks, but he doesn’t fuss about the rest. Let it dry on his skin. Let it sit there as a reminder.

He tucks himself back into his briefs, though he doesn’t bother fastening his trousers all the way, leaving the fly gaping a little for air. 

His body feels loose and heavy now, bones sunk deep into the thin mattress. The edge is blunted, that sharp hunger dulled to a warm, low thrum, but it’s not gone.

He leans his head back and lets his eyes drift half-closed, the lamp still burning low. 

In the quiet, he can almost hear you tossing under your own quilt up the rise, feel the echo of your indignation, imagine the way your fingers might trace absent circles over the mended seam of your dress while you tell yourself you hate him.

He runs his tongue along the back of his teeth, savoring that thought as much as any touch.

“Gonna see it torn again,” he says softly, not quite a promise, not quite a threat. 

The lamp flickers, a tiny flame fighting sleep. Outside, crickets scream and something small scurries through the grass. 

The little house settles around him with soft creaks and sighs. He closes his eyes fully at last, the picture of your bare thigh and your furious face smoothing together into one sweet, ripe ache he’s already wondering how soon he can taste again.

Most nights Remmick does his rounds like he’s supposed to, lantern swinging at his knee, gate latches checked, fence wire plucked and listened to like strings. 

But once he knows the map of the place in his bones, once he has counted every post and measured every path, his feet start wandering off the straight lines your daddy would like him to walk. 

He learns where the shadows fall thickest under the pecan tree by the side yard, where the dark under the eaves hides a man from anyone glancing out through lamplight. 

He learns just how far back he can stand and still see into the kitchen window when you’re up late, sleeves rolled, forearms wet to the elbow, talking to your mama while you scrub a pan. 

He learns that when you think everybody’s settled, you lean your hip against the counter and tilt your head a little while you dry your hands, and that little shift of weight does things to your dress you’d never let it do in town.

He finds out you like the back porch at night even more than you like it at dusk. That when the work is done and your parents are loud in their sleep, you slip out with a glass or a cup and sit with your legs stretched, ankles crossed, toes tracing idle circles on the board beneath them. 

From the fence line he can see the shine of lamplight on your bare shins when your hem rides up, can see the loose, tired way you soften back into the chair. 

He watches you tilt your face toward the dark yard like you’re asking it questions it hasn’t answered yet, listens to the little sounds you make—half-sighs, half-hums—that never show up when anyone else is awake. 

He leans on a post with a cigarette hanging from his fingers and looks until he’s had his fill, no hurry in him, nothing but a lazy, steady satisfaction in knowing you have no idea.

He learns your bedroom window, too. Where it sits in relation to the oak, how far up the slope he has to stand to see its square of light. 

The first time he notices the curtain isn’t quite shut, it’s by accident; he’s walking back late, boots slow on the path, when a slice of movement catches his eye. 

Curtain gapping, lamp turned low, you moving around your room in that soft circle people make before bed. 

He stops in the shadow of the tree without even thinking, shoulder to rough bark, the leaves above him murmuring in a wind that doesn’t get down into the yard. 

From there he can see you in fragments—an arm as you reach up to unbutton, a brief glimpse of the side of your neck, the line of your shoulder as fabric slips. 

He tells himself he’ll move when you’re done, that he’s only making sure you got in safe. He stays until the lamp goes out.

The night he sees you in the bath, there’s not even that thin excuse.

It’s late enough the frogs have worn down to a sleepy chorus and the crickets sound drunk. A low, warm fog sits over the fields, pressing scents in close: damp earth, animals settled in their pens, soap drifting thin from the open kitchen window where somebody forgot to latch it right. 

He’s finished his rounds early, all the work of the night sitting behind him instead of ahead, and he feels that restless itch under his skin again, that soft, prowling urge that has nothing to do with fences and everything to do with you.

The house is a square of softer dark against the sky, only a couple of windows holding light. 

He knows which is which now without having to think about it. Kitchen, front room, your parents’ room. The little back room off the side where the big galvanized tub sits when somebody’s been lucky enough to haul enough water. 

Tonight it’s that one glowing gentle behind its thin cotton curtain, lantern hanging somewhere just out of sight, making the fabric look like a pale, breathing thing.

He circles wide, slipping along the edge of the yard where the grass meets the packed dirt of the lane, where the shadows from the trees throw him one more thin cloak. 

The bath window is low, glass fogged a little from steam. The curtain is drawn but not all the way, left a thumb’s width open on one side—enough for light to leak out in a narrow spill. Enough, if a man stepped in close and angled himself just right, to see inside.

He comes up under the sill, breath slow, boots quiet, and lays his palm flat against the siding to steady himself. The boards are cool and rough under his fingers. He leans his shoulder into them and tilts his head, lining his eye up with that careless little gap.

Heat hits him first, a wet, sweet breath rolling out into the night. The lantern inside throws shadows high on the wall, flickering over the curve of the tub, over the length of you in it.

You’re sunk down in the water with your knees bent, one leg drawn up just enough for him to see the shape of it under the surface, the other stretched straighter, foot braced on the far side. 

The water glows around you, gone cloudy with soap, clinging in beads to your skin where it’s out of the tub. 

Your shoulders show above the rim, bare and slick, drops running down in slow trails. 

Steam curls off your chest, off the slopes of your breasts where they rise from the water, soft and heavy, nipples pebbled tight from the heat or the air or both. The lamplight loves them, catching on every curve, laying little gold crowns on each peak.

Your head is tipped back against the rolled towel you’ve wedged between neck and tin, eyes closed, lips parted just enough for breath. One arm drifts along the tub’s edge, fingers dragging lazy patterns through the thin scum of soap there, the other resting across your stomach.

He watches your ribs move with each inhale, the slight swell and fall of your belly under your palm.

You're so unaware of him that it feels almost holy.

He drinks it in like it’s what he came here for all along, no flinch in him, no apology. His gaze roams where it will. 

From the line of your throat down to the hollow between your collarbones, where a small puddle has gathered and overflowed in slow rivulets; down over the slick, shining hills of your breasts, the way they shift just a little with every breath, the way the waterline cuts across them. Lower, to where the curve of your stomach disappears under the opaque water, hinting at more, promising everything.

You shift, lifting one arm to drag the washcloth over your shoulder. The washcloth trails over the round of your shoulder, down the outside of your arm, across the swell of your breast, nipple tightening even more when the rough cloth skims past.

You don’t seem to notice the way your own body responds; you’re too busy chasing day-dirt away, lifting your arm to scrub your neck, tilting your head to give yourself better reach.

From his vantage, he sees everything. His hand tightens on the siding, knuckles going white, that buzzing hunger flaring up bright and hot behind his eyes.

He stares, not making a sound.

You work the cloth down your arm and set it aside, then slide both hands into the water, scooping and pouring over yourself. 

You lift your leg a little, knee rising higher, water spilling off in sheets, showing him the smooth length of your thigh all the way to the place where it vanishes back under the cloudy surface. The muscles there flex as you shift, your toes stretching, calf defined a moment before settling again. 

For a brief second, the water thins enough he can see the shadowed shape where your thighs meet, softened by the haze but there, real and mouth-watering.

His eyes go dark on it, pupils swallowing light. He leans in a fraction more, cheek almost touching the glass, breath fogging the edge of the pane where it meets the frame. 

Every small move you make sends little waves across your body, playing light over the parts he can see, hinting at the parts he can’t.

You sigh, the sound faint through the wall but clear. Your head tips a little to the side, cheek turning toward the window without quite facing it. 

One hand skims over your sternum, following the center line of your body until it disappears under the water. 

Your fingers paddle lazily there for a moment, moving along your own stomach, over the soft give of your lower belly. 

He imagines exactly where they’re drifting, what warm, slick places they’re brushing, even if you’re not thinking of it like that. Your face gives nothing away but relief, a tired little slackness, the expression of someone finally easing aches out of their bones.

“You ain’t got a clue,” he breathes, lips ghosting the words against the flaking clapboard. There’s satisfaction in it, not cruelty. “Bathin’ like Eve in a picture book with the curtain open and the devil on the outside lookin’ in.”

His hand, the one not braced on the wall, shifts restlessly by his side, brushing the front of his trousers. 

He doesn’t touch himself proper, not yet; this is looking time. He wants to be empty enough of the last time to fill up on this one entire. 

His fingers flex anyway, his palm pressing for a moment against the growing bulge, acknowledging it. His cock swells quick and eager, remembering the barn, welcoming the new fodder.

You lean forward to reach the soap, and the angle changes. 

For a breathless few seconds he gets the long line of your back, the way it curves from nape to waist, the hollow above your hips, the dimples that show when you move just so. Water slides off you in glittering trails, trickling down along your spine, pooling in the small of your back before spilling lower. 

As you sit back again, that same water slips over the round of your ass where it breaks the surface, catching the light along the curve, then vanishes under the cloudy bath.

He closes his eyes briefly, just to fix it, then opens them again. He doesn’t want to miss a thing.

You lather your hands, work the soap into your skin, fingers massaging into your shoulders, down along your collarbones. 

The more you scrub, the slipperier you become, water beading and running, foam clinging in thin streaks before melting away. 

When you finally slide your hands under the water, scrubbing lower, your elbows move in a rhythm that makes something low and obscene curl in his gut. 

He knows you’re only washing, just doing what needs doing, but to him it looks like a preview, looks like a rehearsal of things you haven’t yet learned to want.

He watches until the waterline creeps lower on the lantern as the bath cools and you sink down, chasing warmth. Watches as you finally let yourself relax fully, shoulders sliding under, just your face above the surface, eyes closed, breaths slow and even.

Only when you sit forward and reach for the towel hanging on the peg beside the tub does he ease back from the window. 

He knows if he lingers another second, if he sees you stand, water sheeting off every inch as you step out, he’ll plant roots under this sill and never leave. 

There will be other nights, he tells himself.

He peels himself off the wall, body humming, and slips back into the darker yard, breath still measured, strides easy. 

By the time he’s at the edge of the light, he has his lantern in hand again, held low, the picture of a man just passing through on his way to some small piece of work.

He doesn’t feel a lick of shame. What would be the use of it, when the memory of you in that tub is already lodged in his body like a polished stone, something he can roll under his tongue whenever he chooses. 

You’ll go to bed clean and soft, thinking maybe about chores and storms and the seam you mended this morning. 

He’ll go back to his little house with your wet skin behind his eyes and no confusion about what he plans to do with it.

The day’s been long, the kind that starts with a rooster and ends with your back feeling twice your age. 

By the time supper’s put away and the kitchen wiped down, your father’s in his chair with his boots off, socks so full of holes you don’t know why he bothers wearing them, radio mumbling low out of the corner. Your mother’s gone to bed early with a headache, door cracked just enough that you can hear her cough now and again.

You’re halfway through folding the dish towels when you remember.

Mama’s good jar of salve.

You can see it plain in your mind’s eye: small tin with the blue lid, the one she guards like treasure. 

She sent you looking for it just after dinner, when she noticed the raw place on your father’s wrist from rope burn and the darkening bruise on your own hip from where the stall rail caught you days ago. 

You’d gone to fetch more wood for the stove first, meaning to get the salve on your way back, and somehow it slipped right out of your head, chased off by smoke and scolding and the rush to get biscuits off the fire before they burned.

Your father’s already grumbled twice about the barn nail and told you if you’d been paying mind you wouldn’t have torn your dress, wouldn’t have bruises, wouldn’t have needed fussing. 

You can hear him in the morning if he finds that wrist still angry and your hip still tender. Can hear that disappointed click of his tongue.

You’d seen him hand the tin to Remmick earlier in the week, mumbling something about “keep this on hand, boy, in case you tear yourself up,” and watched the new hand tuck it into the pocket of his coat before heading down to the little farmhouse.

“That’s where it is,” you murmur, more to the quiet kitchen than to anyone. A little knot between your brows loosens when you place it. “Down there.”

You glance at the clock. It’s late enough the newsman’s gone off the air, early enough the world hasn’t quite tipped into the dead hours where the dark feels thickest. 

Outside the window, the yard is quiet, the barn a heavy shadow, the smaller house beyond it just a darker square against the field.

“Where’s that boy?” Your father mutters around his cigarette, not really expecting an answer. “Ain’t heard him come in for coffee. He out checkin’ fence or sleepin’ on my dime?”

“Out, I reckon,” you say, folding the last towel with a sharp little snap.

Truth is, you haven’t heard his boots either. You haven’t seen his lantern bob by the window. It’s been a soft, blank stretch of night, no sign of him.

You tell yourself that means he’s at the far end of the pasture or walking the ditch line. Exactly where he’s supposed to be.

“I’ll fetch Mama’s salve,” you add, already untying your apron, tucking it over the back of a chair. “She’ll want it first thing in the mornin’.”

Joe nods, smoke curling out of his nose. “Don’t you linger,” he says, not looking up. “Get what you need and bring your tail back in this house. I don’t want you down there visitin’ like it’s social hour.”

You bite back the urge to say you’d sooner visit the pig pen. “Yes, sir,” is what comes out instead.

The night air catches you on the porch, damp and soft, smelling of cooling dirt and a hint of something sweet blooming out by the fence. 

You step down barefoot, skirts whispering around your calves, the boards’ splinters familiar against your soles. The big house’s light spills just to the bottom of the steps, then gives up, letting the yard roll out into dark.

The little farmhouse sits a ways off, past the well, past the worn track where the wagon turns. All its windows are black. No orange seam under the curtain, no silhouette rising and falling against the glass. The barn is quiet too, doors thrown shut, only a thin line of moon-silver along the roof.

You latch onto the sight of that dark little house like proof. He’s not there. He’s out somewhere with a lantern and a bad attitude. 

You’ll be in and out before he knows you’ve even left your room.

You wrap that thought around yourself like a shawl and start across the yard.

The grass is cool and a little slick with dew under your feet, clinging between your toes. Crickets saw at the edges of things, frogs mutter down in the low spots. The well’s stone lip rises out of the ground like something old and patient; you ghost past it, keeping your eyes on the squat shadow of the farmhouse.

Up close, it looks smaller, somehow meaner. The door is shut, the porch bare save for his boots lined up neat off to one side. You take in that detail with a little flick of relief—boots off means man in bed, not loose in the yard—before another thought slides in behind it: or just inside.

You hesitate only a heartbeat.

The want to not get scolded in the morning, the want to have Mama’s salve where she can lay hands on it, outweighs the whisper of sense telling you this is foolish.

You lay your palm on the door and push.

It gives with a small, tired creak, the smell of the place rolling over you in a warm wave: wood, straw, tobacco, sweat, and that faint metallic thread you’ve started to think of as his alone. There’s a lamp turned low on the table just inside, wick pinched till the flame is barely more than a coal in a glass throat, enough to lay out the shapes of things and nothing more.

“Remmick?” you call, voice barely above a whisper, more habit than hope. When nothing answers—not a word, not a shift of boards—you let your breath out slow and step over the threshold.

The door eases halfway shut behind you, not latched. You don’t bother with it; you don’t plan to be here long enough to worry about what’s open and what isn’t. 

The room is small and spare, just like your daddy said it was. Bed against one wall, blanket rumpled from someone sitting, if not lying. Chair with a coat thrown over the back, shirt draped careless on top. Table with the lamp, a chipped cup, a folded knife. A shelf holding a few tin plates, a jar of coffee, the heel of a loaf.

You move quick but careful, eyes trying not to linger on the smaller things that say a man’s been living here—his belt coiled on the chair seat, his hat hanging from the peg, the empty space on the floor where his boots were. 

You head straight for the coat, remembering your father’s hand dropping the salve tin into its pocket.

You pinch the fabric between your fingers, easing it aside, but the weight you expect to tug at the hem isn’t there. The coat hangs light. You pat the pockets; they’re empty, save for a wadded rag and a stray button.

“Damn,” you breathe, annoyed, under your breath.

Maybe he moved it. Maybe he took it out so the tin wouldn’t fall and get lost when he shrugged the coat on.

You cast your eyes around the room, searching high shelves, low boxes, any place someone might set a small, important thing.

The table catches your attention next. You circle it, gaze skimming over the knife, the cup, the lamp. 

There, near the edge, half in shadow—a squat little tin no bigger than your palm, blue lid dulled with age.

You smile in spite of yourself and reach for it. “Got you,” you murmur, closing your fingers around the cool metal.

You pop the lid just enough to see the salve inside, pale and thick, smelling faintly of herbs and camphor, then press it back down with a soft click. The job’s done. Simple as that.

You turn, already thinking about the path back to the house, about slipping this into Mama’s hand and letting yourself be proud she won’t have to wonder where it is in the morning.

You don’t make it two steps.

There he is.

Standing in the doorway that leads to the small back room, shoulder braced against the frame like he’s been leaning there a while, like he grew right up out of the wood.

He’s shirtless, skin slicked faint with sweat, the rise and fall of his chest slow and easy. Suspenders hang loose against his hips, clipped to his trousers but fallen off his shoulders, framing the cut of his torso in dark lines. 

The lamp’s low light paints him in gold and shadow both, dipping into the hollow between his collarbones, skating over the plane of his stomach, catching on the trail of hair that runs down from his navel into the waistband of his pants. 

His arms cross over his chest, veins standing faint along the backs of his hands where they rest against his biceps.

His feet are bare. His eyes are not gentle.

“Find what you was lookin’ for?” he asks, voice soft, too soft, the scrape of it wrapping around the words like a touch.

Your heart gives one wild jump, slamming up against your ribs hard enough to hurt, then starts to run. 

You hadn’t heard him come in. Hadn’t heard the back door, hadn’t heard the floor protest, hadn’t heard anything but your own little fussing search and the tiny pop of the salve lid.

For a foolish second you think about hiding the tin, tucking it behind your back like a child caught in a pantry. You don’t. There’s nowhere to put it he wouldn’t see, and you refuse to give him the pleasure of watching you scramble.

Instead you hold it up just enough that he can see the blue lid glint in the lamplight. “My mama’s salve,” you say, surprised at how even your voice comes out. “Daddy gave it to you. He forgot where he put it. I came to fetch it.”

He doesn’t move. Doesn’t look at the tin for more than a passing glance. His attention stays on you, heavy as a hand between your shoulder blades. He rakes his gaze from your face down to the salve, then lower, slow as a man looking over a field he’s about to plow.

You suddenly know exactly how your dress is sitting—where the fabric pulls across your chest from turning too quick, where the skirt clings to your thighs from the damp in the grass, where your collar gapes just a breath more than it should because you didn’t bother with the top button in the heat. Your skin prickles under each place you picture his eyes touching.

“You always just walk yourself into a man’s house without knockin’?” he asks after a beat, one brow ticking up.

“This ain’t a house,” you reply, chin lifting a shade. “It’s a shack my father stuck you in so you’d be closer to the barn.”

Something like amusement flickers across his mouth. “Still mine for now,” he says. “Door was shut, wasn’t it?”

“You left the lamp on,” you shoot back. “Anybody with decent sense would take that as invitation in case of emergency.”

He uncrosses his arms then, letting them drop to his sides. The motion makes muscles jump in his chest, the lines of his shoulders shifting under skin. “And what’s the emergency, miss?” he asks. “That your mama’s medicine was sittin’ ten yards farther than you like it?”

His tone isn’t mocking. It isn’t kind either. It’s something in between, something testing. Like he’s poking at you with words just to feel where you’re soft.

You swallow, the salve tin suddenly heavy in your hand. “I said why I came,” you answer. “I’ll be goin’ now.”

You move to head toward the front door, the one you came in, but the room is small, and he doesn’t move. One pace brings you close enough to smell him. Another pace would put you near enough to brush him if you misjudged your route.

He shifts his weight to fill the doorway more fully, one hand lifting to rest on the frame to the side of him. It leaves his ribs bare, that patch of hair under his arm catching the lamplight. There’s a faint scar along his flank, pale against the warmth of his skin, old and ugly, like something tore him open once and he lived anyway.

“Seems a shame,” he says, looking at you. “You comin’ all this way just to snatch up a tin and run.”

Your pulse hammers harder. “It ain’t far.”

“For you,” he agrees. “For me it’s a long, lonely walk most nights. I might be grateful for a little company.”

“You got company,” you say, words a little sharper than you intend. “You got every cow, every dog, every fence post on this land. You don’t need me.”

He lets that roll over him like water off a duck’s back. “Maybe I’m tired of talkin’ to things that can’t talk back,” he murmurs. His eyes flick down to the salve again, then to your hand, to your wrist where your pulse beats visible in the hollow. “You tore yourself up any today, or you just borrowin’ this for show?”

“Bruise on my hip,” you admit before you can remind yourself you owe him nothing. The words come out stiff. “Ain’t your concern.”

“Everythin’ that happens on this farm’s my concern when it means workers showin’ up busted in the mornin’,” he says. “You do work, don’t you? Or are you just here to keep the place pretty.”

Heat flashes through you, quick and mean. “You've seen me work,” you say. “You've seen me at that pump, at that stove, out in the yard. Don’t you stand there half-dressed and ask if I do my share.”

His mouth twitches at half-dressed. He doesn’t bother to hide the way his gaze drops, quick, down the front of himself and back up, as if to say he knows exactly how much he’s wearing and how much you’re seeing. It’s deliberate, that small, shameless acknowledgement of his own body.

“Believe me,” he says, voice dropping lower, “I’ve seen you.”

The words land between you, heavy and thick. They mean more than they say. Every peek he’s stolen presses into the space they open up: your bare leg in the barn, your shoulders shining in the bath, your tired posture on the back porch, one strap slipping careless down your arm before you hitched it back up.

You don’t know about most of that. What you do know is enough to make your throat go dry.

“I ain’t supposed to be down here visitin’,” you say, trying to wrestle the conversation back onto some ground that feels steadier. “My father told you that when you got here. Told me too.”

His eyes gleam at the mention of your father, some dark amusement sparking there. “He told me to show you respect,” he says. “And I have. Haven’t laid a hand on you that you didn’t walk too close to yourself.”

Your mind trips over the memory of his fingers catching your arm in the barn, steadying you when your mare spooked. The way his hand hovered near your torn dress, heat just shy of your hip. The way he stood in the yard with his eyes on your mouth and called you miss like it was something he wanted to lick.

You draw yourself up as tall as you can manage in the little room, salve tin tight in your grip, refusing to yield the step he’s trying to take without moving his feet. “Then you’ll move,” you say, voice low but steady. “So I can go on home and keep livin’ my life with all that respect you’re so proud of.”

For a moment, you think he might laugh in your face. His lips part, teeth catching on his bottom lip, eyes glinting.

Instead he just looks at you.

It’s worse than if he’d laughed. He looks like a man deciding how honest he feels like being tonight. Like he’s weighing whether to keep playing at politeness or lay something sharper on the table between you.

The lamplight flickers, shadow jumping along his jaw as he tilts his head. “You walk out that door,” he says finally, nodding toward the porch, “and I’ll let you. I ain’t gonna drag you nowhere you don’t step first.”

Relief and something colder flick through you at the same time. “Good,” you start to say, but he isn’t done.

“But,” he adds, and that one little word lands heavy, “you come walkin’ into my place after dark again, all alone, dressed like that, lookin’ at me like you don’t know whether you wanna slap me or cry on me—well.” His gaze drops to your mouth and back. “That’s you steppin’. And I’ll take it as such.”

Your heart stutters, one hard misstep in its rhythm. “You overestimate yourself,” you snap, even as your fingers twitch on the tin.

He smiles then, slow and wolfish, the expression finally reaching his eyes in a way you haven’t seen yet. 

“We’ll see,” he says.

For a long, tight second, nobody moves. The walls feel closer, the air thicker, the lamplight too intimate. You hear the frogs outside, the creak of the house settling, the little wet sound of your own swallow. His bare chest rises and falls, steady, like he’s got all the time in the world.

Then he steps to the side.

The doorway opens up behind him, a narrow slice of night visible over his bare shoulder. It’s more space than you expected him to yield, less than you’d like.

You duck past, your shoulder nearly brushing his chest, the heat pouring off him making your skin prickle. You feel his eyes on the side of your face, on the line of your throat, on the way you have to hitch your skirt just a little to keep from tripping as you step over the threshold.

“Goodnight, miss,” he says softly, right by your ear, breath warm as it ghosts over your neck. “You be careful now. Dark’s full of things you don’t know about.”

You don’t trust your voice not to shake, so you don’t give him the satisfaction of hearing it. You just walk, bare feet hitting the packed earth hard, fingers biting into the salve tin so tight the metal cuts a little crescent into your palm.

Rough wood presses into your hips, edge digging a little where your nightgown’s ridden up, breath catching in short, shallow pulls because he’s got one big hand flat between your shoulder blades, holding you there, and the other is on your ass, fingers clawed into the thin cotton, bunching it up and away from your thighs. 

The lamp in the corner throws a low, mean light over the kitchen, just enough to show you the knot in the tabletop and the chipped plate someone left on the shelf, just enough to catch the shadow of his arm when it moves.

You came down here hot with it. Anger, mostly. 

At him for looking at you how he does, for crowding doorways and talking low in your ear. At yourself for feeling anything besides disgust when he does it. 

For weeks that feeling has sat under your skin like a burr under a saddle, rubbing everything raw—every brush of his eyes, every sly comment, every late-night glimpse of his lantern out in the yard when you should’ve been sleeping. 

Tonight it tipped over. Tonight you lay in your bed and stared at the ceiling and saw his bare chest in that little house instead, heard his voice saying we’ll see, felt your own body answer in a way that wouldn’t quit.

So you got up after the house went quiet, barefoot on the boards, heart in your throat. 

You didn’t bring a lamp. You told yourself you were just going to tell him off, to say plain that you didn’t want him looking, didn’t want him speaking to you sideways, didn’t want the innuendo and the smirks and the way he made you feel peeled without ever laying a proper hand on you. 

That was the story you wrapped yourself in as you crossed the yard, nightgown clinging to your knees.

He opened the door before you could knock, like he’d been standing right on the other side with his palm on the handle, listening.

You remember the way his eyes moved over you, slow, no shirt, just those loose trousers hanging low on his hips, lamp behind him making his shoulders look broad and his face unreadable. 

You remember his mouth forming your name, quiet and satisfied, like he’d been waiting to say it like this. 

You remember the way all that anger and want surged up together in your chest, wild and tangled, and how you said something too sharp, voice shaking, about him needing to keep his eyes to himself if he wanted to stay on your daddy’s land.

Now here you are with his hand on your back, pressing, holding you down exactly where you came—over his small scarred table in his small farmhouse kitchen—your own fingers gripping the edge in a white-knuckled clutch.

“Thought you weren’t supposed to be down here visitin’,” he drawls above you, breath warm near your ear, words rolling over your spine. “That what you told me?”

You glare at the knot in the wood like it did you personal harm. 

Your face is hot, your body even hotter, a slow, heavy throb deep between your thighs that started halfway across the yard and hasn’t done a thing but grow. 

“I ain’t visitin’,” you say, the words a little muffled by the way he’s got you folded. “I came to talk sense into you.”

His laugh is low and pleased, hand on your back sliding a little, fingers spreading, thumb settling along your spine. He presses down just enough to remind you who’s holding you where you are. 

“Is that what you call it,” he says, “showin’ up in your bed things after dark, sneakin’ through my door with your hands empty and your eyes wide? Talkin’ sense?”

His other hand cups your ass through the thin fabric, palm wide over you, squeezing like he’s testing a piece of fruit at the market. 

The nightgown has twisted up, hem caught high over your hips, leaving the bottom curve of you bare to his touch, only the cotton of your drawers between his fingers and your skin. 

Heat floods that spot, a sharp, shameful pulse that makes your breath catch.

“You been walkin’ around twitchy as a cat for days,” he goes on, hand kneading, thumb digging into the give of your flesh there. “Snappin’ at me, snappin’ at your daddy, gettin’ that look on your face every time you see me like you don’t know whether to spit or spit somethin’ else.”

“Shut up,” you hiss, mortified at how true it feels in your bones. 

You shift your hips, trying to wriggle away from that hand, and all it does is grind you back against his palm, soft cotton dragging over the swell of you, catching on the seam that runs right over the place you’re trying not to think about.

He makes a sound at that, low in his throat, rough and appreciative. “Yeah. There she is,” he says, words coming a little thicker now. “All that fire. You walked your own self down here, girl. Nobody dragged you.”

“I came to tell you to stop,” you manage, though the way your voice climbs at the end takes the bite out of it. His fingers curl, grab a little handful of your ass cheek through the cloth, and you feel the ache spike hotter. “Stop lookin’. Stop talkin’ like that. Stop—stop–”

“Stop makin’ you feel all twisted up?” he supplies, not unkind, just plain. 

His hand on your back softens, spreads, rubbing along your spine like he’s soothing a spooked animal even as the other keeps kneading at you. 

“Stop remindin’ you there’s more to be had in this world than hymns and beans and mendin’?”

You suck a breath in through your teeth. “You ain’t the only man alive,” you snap. “You ain’t special.”

His grip tightens, a hard squeeze that makes you gasp. “No,” he agrees easily. “But I’m the only one you marched down here to cuss out in your bare feet and nightclothes, so I’d say I’m doin’ something right.”

You hate how your body answers that, how something low in you liquefies at the thought of it, at the truth you don’t want to name. You hate the way your thighs press together of their own accord, seeking pressure, seeking relief, even as you hold yourself rigid under his hand.

He feels it. His palm slides down, fingers curling under the heavy curve of you, thumb dragging along the crease where your ass meets the top of your thigh. 

You’re hyper-aware of every inch, every callus on his skin, every place the old wood digs into your hips. When his hand moves inward, fingers bumping close to the center of you, you flinch.

“Don’t—” you start, panic and want knitting together, but the word thins out when his touch presses just a little firmer over the damp cotton there.

“You’re soaked,” he says softly, no mockery in it, just raw, hungry wonder. “Walked through my door mad as sin, all full of pretty speeches, and your cunt’s already cryin’ for somethin’ to hold on to.”

Shame scorches up your neck. “Don’t call it that,” you choke, mortified, the word hitting you deep and low and making everything worse.

He hums, thumb tracing a slow circle over that swell, pressing right where the cloth is clinging. The pressure is perfect, unbearable. 

“What you want me to call it, then?” he asks, voice brushing the shell of your ear now. 

“Your virtue? Your purity? That sweet spot between your legs that ain’t nobody touched?” His thumb moves again, firmer, and your hips jolt against your will. “’Cause I see it all over you, darlin’. You came here wantin’ me to stop, but your body came here wantin’ somethin’ else entirely.”

You shake your head, even as your toes curl, even as your lungs drag in another sharp breath that tastes like him and the lamp smoke and the hot, close air of this little house. 

“You’re—you’re foul,” you say, but it comes out thin, breathy. “You been lookin’ at me, watchin’ me, talkin’ to me like—”

“Like I know what to do with you,” he cuts in, a hint of impatience threading through his heat. “And I do. You think I don’t see what’s eatin’ at you every time you glance down at my hands, or my mouth, or lower?”

His fingers slide along the seam of your drawers, finding the little ridge where cloth meets cloth and pressing right there. 

It sends a jolt through you big enough you can’t muffle the small sound that drops out of your throat. 

His hand on your back pushes down, keeping you bent, letting you grind into that touch without rising off the table.

“Listen here,” he says, voice roughening, patience fraying. “You came. You’re here. You can tell me to stop and I will. I ain’t gonna take what you don’t hand me. But don’t stand there in my house, drippin’ on my floor, and try to lie about what you’re feelin’.”

The room seems to shrink around those words. 

You know he’s right. You also know how far you are from where you were supposed to be, from the girl who said she’d never let a man like him get close, from the girl who swore she’d keep herself intact till some tidy, respectable husband came along with a ring and a house and his hat in his hands.

You think about those men. Faces you’ve seen in church, in town, men who look at you when they think you’re not noticing with a hunger they don’t know what to do with. Men who’d apologize if their fingers brushed your wrist too long.

Then you think about this man, bare-chested behind you, hard and unashamed, his hand pressed between your shoulder blades, the other on you like you’re his to handle. 

You think about his eyes in the barn, on your torn dress. About the words he said in this very room, about stepping. About how you’ve been walking around with your jaw clenched and your thighs pressed together ever since.

“Tell me the truth,” he says, thumb pressing a little harder, his other fingers spread wide over the swell of you. “You want me to let go of you and send you back up that hill with your temper, you say it. I’ll move. You can go pray extra loud come Sunday.”

The lamp crackles softly, a tiny sound in the heavy dark.

“And if I don’t?” you hear yourself ask, voice small but steady. “If I say I don’t want you to move?”

His hand stills on your back for one beat, then both of them tighten—one pressing you down, one grabbing a handful of your ass like he’s staking a claim. A breath leaves him in a long, shuddery exhale that ghosts hot over your neck.

“Then I’m gonna take real good care of what you brought me,” he says, tone gone hoarse and thick, the restraint in it the only thing keeping you from shaking. “Gonna give you somethin’ to think about next time you lay awake in that bed of yours. Gonna fuck you on this table till you don’t remember what you came down here mad about.”

The word fuck lands hard in you, a punch and a promise all at once. 

You grip the edge of the wood like it’s all that’s keeping you upright, though you’re already bent, already braced.

“Say it,” he murmurs, leaning in until his chest brushes your back, bare skin hot where it touches the thin cotton. 

The admission sits in your throat like a hot stone. It feels enormous. It feels like stepping off a ledge.

“I want—” The word catches, but his thumb flicks over you again, sharp and sure, and your hips roll without permission, a little helpless grind that betrays every fight you’ve been waging with yourself. “I want you,” you gasp, shame and relief crashing together. “I want you to—to do somethin’ about it.”

He lets out a sound that’s almost a groan, almost a laugh, almost a curse, his body crowding you tighter, his weight a solid wall of heat at your back. “That’s my girl,” he says, and the possession in it makes your knees wobble, makes that core of you clench hard around nothing.

His hand leaves your back long enough to grab a fistful of your nightgown at the hem, yanking it up in one rough motion that leaves it bunched around your waist. 

Cool air hits your drawers, the bare backs of your thighs, the soft part just under your cheeks, and then his palm is there, skin to skin at last, cupping you hard. 

His fingers dig in, thumbs pressing outward, spreading you slightly, mapping the give.

“You’re shakin’,” he says, sounding pleased. “Ain’t even touched you proper yet.”

“You’re takin’ your time,” you manage, though the words shake too.

He chuckles, low. “First time’s never good when a man rushes,” he answers, matter-of-fact. “And I know you ain’t had nobody in you yet, feelin’ the way you do under my hand.”

Before you can answer, his fingers hook into the waistband of your drawers and tug. The fabric resists for a second, elastic biting into soft flesh, then slides down, dragging over your hips, over the swell of your ass, down the backs of your thighs until they tangle around your knees. 

He leaves them there, trapping your legs just enough you can’t kick or close up, just enough that you’re open and vulnerable and aware of it.

Cool air kisses you everywhere the cloth just left. 

You feel filthy, bare from waist to mid-thigh, bent over his table with your nightgown rucked up, your cunt exposed to the room, to him. It makes your head swim.

Then his hand is back, and there is no room for anything else.

He cups you from behind, fingers sliding through the slick heat of your folds, and you hear a sharp breath hitch out of him. “Oh, hell,” he says, reverent.

You make a broken, helpless sound that doesn’t sound like it belongs to you. 

No one’s ever been there before, not like this, not with fingers spreading you, rubbing through you, middle finger catching on that aching bud you’ve only ever touched in the dark with guilty hands. 

The sensation is lightning-bright, stabbing up your spine.

“Easy,” he murmurs, palm flattening across your low back again, his body curving over yours, caging you. “I got you. Gonna make it good for you before I stretch you around me. Don’t want you too scared to enjoy your first fuck.”

The way he says first fuck, like he’s staking a flag there, like he’s carving his name into it, makes something fierce flicker through you, a strange pride knotting up with the fear. 

You push back against his hand without meaning to, chasing more.

He feels it. “That’s it,” he encourages, fingers pressing deeper between your lips now. “Ask for what you want with that pretty body. Tell me where it hurts.”

“Everywhere,” you pant, honesty ripped out of you on a wave. “It hurts everywhere.”

He laughs, breath hot against your neck, mouth close enough you feel the shape of it. “That ain’t hurt, girl,” he says. “That’s need.” 

His fingers finally find your entrance, slick and hot and clutching, and he presses the pad of one inside, just the tip, testing. Your whole body clenches around that intrusion.

“You relax for me,” he tells you, tone sliding into something commanding. “Breathe.”

You suck in air, lungs burning. 

He slides the finger in a little further, thick and probing, opening you. 

The stretch is sharp, uncomfortable, but there’s an undercurrent of relief in it. He works it in and out slowly, letting you get used to the feel, letting your body learn the shape of him.

“That’s good,” he murmurs when he feels you soften around him, the praise lighting up something small and hungry in your chest. “See? You take my finger just fine. Gonna take my cock too when I’m done with you.”

He adds a second finger before you can brace, and this time the stretch makes you gasp loud, muscles clamping down. It burns, a deep, insistent ache, like you’re being pried open.

“Shh,” he soothes, his index finding that little bundle of nerves again, circling steady, sending sparks to chase the hurt. “I know. I know. We gotta loosen you up some or you’ll split yourself on me.”

The blunt truth of it makes you squeeze your eyes shut, face hot against your forearm. 

You can feel him behind you, solid, his chest glued to your back, his arm moving between your legs. When you manage to breathe past the initial shock, the burn eases, replaced by a full, pressurized feeling that fills your head with nothing but sensation.

He moves his fingers, slow at first, pumping them in and out of you in short strokes, stretching, coaxing. 

Your body starts to answer despite itself, hips rocking back in tiny motions, seeking that deep, sweet drag. 

Every thrust brushes against something inside you that makes your legs tremble, makes your breath hitch. 

“Listen to that,” he says, voice thick, and it takes you a second to realize he means the wet sound loud in the little kitchen as his fingers work in and out of you. “You hear yourself takin’ me in? That’s you wantin’ it.”

It’s filthy and true and you can’t deny it. 

There's a coil tightening low in your belly, every nerve in your body funneling to where his hand is. Your grip on the table edge goes slippery with sweat.

“Remmick,” you gasp, not even sure what you’re asking for, only that you’re strung too tight.

“There you go,” he groans, fingers driving a little deeper, curling just right.

It hits without much warning. One second you’re climbing, the next you’re over the edge, everything snapping. 

Your body seizes around his fingers, clenching so hard it almost hurts, that coil unspooling in a rush of pleasure so intense it blanks your mind.

A breathless moan tears up your throat. Your thighs shake, knees nearly buckling, if it weren’t for his hand on your back and the table under your palms you’d be on the floor.

“That’s it,” he groans, riding you through it, fingers still working, still moving until you’re whimpering, too sensitive, twitching with each little aftershock. 

You sag against the table when it finally lets you go, chest heaving, sweat cooling on your neck. He eases his fingers out of you slow, gentle for the first time since you walked in, his hand sliding up to rest on your hip. You can feel his other hand at your back again, rubbing small circles, keeping you grounded.

“First one’s always a little wild,” he says, sounding almost fond. “You doin’ all right?”

You nod, or try to. Your head feels full of cotton, floaty and heavy all at once. “I—” Your voice comes out hoarse. You clear your throat. “I’m fine.”

“You’re more than fine,” he says, and there’s a smile in it. “You’re perfect.” He shifts behind you, and that’s when you feel it, really feel it—his cock pressed up against the back of your thigh through the fabric of his trousers. 

He’s been hard this whole time, you realize dimly, all that while he was working you open. The blunt head drags over your skin when he adjusts, the thickness of him obvious even through cloth.

Your stomach flips, fear and anticipation knotting together. “You’re really—”

“Oh, I’m really.” He sounds almost amused. “You wanted me to take you on this table, remember?” 

His hand leaves your back and you hear the soft, familiar sound of a belt coming loose, a buckle clinking, the rasp of leather through belt loops. Then buttons, quick and practiced, fabric shifting.

You suck in a breath, every sense straining.

A moment later, something hot and slick—not his fingers this time—nudges against your entrance. He slides the head of his cock through your slick folds slowly, up and down, coating himself in you, bumping your clit on the downstroke, making you twitch.

“Jesus,” he mutters, more to himself than you. “You feel that? How you’re grabbin’ at me already and I ain’t even in?”

You do feel it, and it’s terrifying. Your body recognizes him as something it’s meant to hold, meant to take, even as your mind stumbles over the size of him, over what this means.

“I—wait,” you say, panic flaring for a second, the reality of it looming. “Remmick, I’m—”

“I know,” he says, and for once there’s no teasing in it. “You listen to me. It’s gonna burn at first, then it’s gonna feel like you never should’ve gone without it this long. You trust me?”

You hesitate. He feels it in the way your muscles tense around the head of him. His hand comes up, fingers wrapping loosely around your throat from behind, thumb tipping your chin just a little. The touch sends a different kind of shiver through you, sharp and grounding.

“I ain’t gonna break you,” he says quietly, close to your ear. “I want you comin’ back to this just as bad as I want you right now.” His hips roll just enough that the blunt tip presses hard against your opening. 

The hand at your throat, the tone in his voice, the memory of his fingers and the way your body just came apart on them thirty seconds ago—they all crash together, and you find yourself nodding before you know you’re doing it.

“Go,” you whisper, the word trembling, but there.

He makes a sound then that’s half-growl, half-groan, all man. His grip on your throat tightens just a hair, his other hand clamping down on your hip.

“That’s my girl,” he says again, rough with need. “Hold on.”

The head of him breaches you with more resistance than his fingers ever met. 

Your body tries to clamp down, to keep him out, muscles fighting the stretch. He doesn’t slam in, but he doesn’t baby you either. He works himself in slow, steady pressure, teeth gritted, hips driving forward inch by thick inch.

The burn is real. It’s sharp, like you’re being split open from the inside. You gasp, nails scraping at the wood, whole body bowing. For a second it’s too much.

“Breathe,” he grunts through his own strain, hand at your throat sliding up to your jaw, thumb pressing at your cheek. “Breathe through it. You’re takin’ me. Look at you. You’re takin’ me.”

He isn’t wrong. Beneath the pain, there’s this breathless awe—at the size of him, at the way your own body yields, at the feel of being filled in a way you never have before. 

You force yourself to inhale, exhale, again, again. Your muscles flutter around him, protesting, then slowly easing.

When the broadest part of his head passes the tight ring of your entrance, the rest slides in easier, still stretching, still burning, but less violently. 

He sinks deeper, stopping only when his hips are flush with your ass, his pelvis pressed to your backside, balls snugged up against your cunt. You can feel him everywhere, heavy and solid in your core, pulsing faintly.

“Christ,” he rasps, the words hot against your neck. “I can barely think straight. Sweet girl, you just swallowed every inch of me.”

You exhale shakily, overwhelmed. Full doesn’t begin to cover it. You feel stuffed, stretched to the point of coming apart, and yet under the ache, something else is already starting—a low, thick pleasure that moves like honey, spreading outward from where you’re joined.

He holds still for a long moment, breathing hard into your hair, chest rising and falling against your back. His hand at your hip rubs little circles, the one at your jaw softening its grip.

“You tell me when it stops hurtin’ so sharp,” he says. “I ain’t in no rush, even if my cock’s yellin’ otherwise.”

You try to focus. The worst of the burn ebbs, leaving a throbbing soreness, but the sense of him—deep, impossible, yours—is starting to bloom into something almost good.

“Move,” you whisper, surprising yourself. “Just a little.”

He laughs, breath short. “Greedy already,” he says. “Alright.”

He pulls back, just an inch, maybe two, dragging that thick length along your walls. The friction is intense, raw and tender and electric all at once. Then he pushes in again, slower, watching for any flinch. 

Your fingers dig into the table, but you don’t cry out, don’t tell him to stop. Your body clutches at him on the way out, sucks at him on the way back in.

He does it again. And again. Each shallow thrust smooths the hurt a little more, replaces it with deeper sensation. The initial sting fades into a deep, stretching fullness that makes your knees weak, that makes heat lick up your spine in waves.

“That’s it,” he murmurs, hand sliding from your jaw back down to your throat, wrapping around it more firmly this time, not cutting your air, just pinning you, reminding you where you are and who’s holding you. “Now we’re gettin’ somewhere.”

He lengthens his strokes, pulling back farther, pushing in harder. The wet slap of his hips meeting your ass starts up, quiet at first, then louder, the sound of skin on skin obscene in the still night. 

Every push drives him deeper, nudging at something inside you that makes your breath jump, that sends little shocks through your belly, like he’s bumping the edge of something tender and secret and his.

Your body has learned the shape of him, stretching you from the inside. 

You can feel every ridge, every vein, the way the fat head spears through the tight clutch of you and then disappears into that deep, hot place that was empty your whole life and now is nothing but him.

His hand at your throat tightens, just a little. Not enough to cut your air, but enough to make each breath a thing you have to pull for, chest heaving against the table edge. His palm is broad and warm, thumb resting under your jaw, fingers curved along the side of your neck. 

Every time his hips snap forward, that grip reminds you he’s there; it pins you in your own skin so you can’t float away from what’s happening, can’t pretend it’s anything but what it is: you getting fucked open on a man’s cock in his kitchen like you were meant for it.

Then his hand drops. It slides down the column of your throat, over the dip of your collarbone, fingers spreading wide as they drag lower, rough palm grazing the top swell of your breast through the thin cotton. 

He cups you from behind, big hand wrapping around the weight of it, lifting, squeezing. The nightgown bunches under his fingers as he kneads, thumb rolling over your nipple until it stiffens hard, the fabric rasping just enough to make you whine.

“There,” he mutters, voice gone thick, like he has to taste every part of you. “Knew these’d feel good in my hand.”

He squeezes once more, harder, the pressure sending a sharp line of sensation straight down to where he’s buried in you, your nipple trapped between his thumb and the heat of his palm. 

Your back arches, pushing more of your tit into his grip even as his cock grinds deeper. 

For a second you’re caught between the drag inside and the rough, greedy hold on your breast, pleasure ricocheting between the two.

Then his hand is moving again, leaving your aching nipple peaked under the cotton, skimming back up over your breastbone, returning to your throat like it owns the place. His fingers curl back into their collar around your neck, thumb settling under your jaw, holding you where he wants you while his hips keep driving.

“Listen to you,” he groans, and you realize he doesn’t just mean your voice—wrecked and breaking on every inhale—but the wet, filthy noise your body’s making, the slick drag of his cock pulling out of you, the obscene squelch when he pushes back in, the slap of his balls hitting the curve of your cunt. “You hear that? That’s this pussy lovin’ every inch I’m givin’ her.”

The word makes your stomach flutter and your cunt clench down around him so tight he curses, hips stuttering. 

There’s no room for modesty now; everything between your legs is wide awake and telling on you. 

Every time he pulls back, your inner muscles chase after him, hugging, clinging, like you’re frightened of losing that fullness, like your body’s praying he’ll push right back in—and he does, like he’s answering a call.

He adjusts his stance, feet shifting on the rough floor, and angle changes. The next thrust lands different, deeper, the thick head of him driving up and forward to grind against a spot inside you that makes your vision white out around the edges for a beat. 

You jolt, a strangled noise ripping out of you, fingers scraping along the tabletop as your whole body goes tense.

“There it is,” he pants, catching that reaction, chasing it. 

He does it again on purpose, hips rolling instead of just snapping, driving that same path, making sure he hits that spot with the crown every time. 

“You feel that? Right there? That’s what you been needin’, girl. That ache way up high you ain’t never had a name for.”

He's right on it now, relentless. 

Each stroke is a steady assault, steady enough your body starts to learn the pattern, tension building with every collision. The soreness from taking him the first time smooths into a deep, hot throb that wraps around the pleasure, one feeding the other. 

Your toes curl, your thighs tremble, your stomach ripples around the intrusion like you’re trying to swallow him even deeper.

He slides the hand from your hip back around your front, into the slick heat between your thighs, and finds your clit like he’s been doing it all his life. 

His fingers are slick with your own mess, rough pads moving in tight, ruthless circles over that swollen bud. It sends lightning directly up your spine, straight to the base of your skull. 

You choke on a sound that isn’t quite a word and jerk against his hand; his arm around your throat holds you in place.

“Goddamn, you’re twitchy,” he groans, grinding his hips down so the bone of him presses your ass, so his cock bruises into that soft spot inside while his fingers roll your clit. “You gonna fall apart on me again? You gonna let me feel you squeeze all over my cock proper this time?”

Your answer is a breathless, broken, “Please,” your voice ragged, half sob, half prayer. 

The table shudders under the force of his thrusts now, the legs complaining in small creaks that match the rhythm of his hips. The lamp flame jumps in its glass, throwing wild shadows against the wall—a tangle of your bent body and his frame hunched over you, shoulders rolling as he works inside you like he’s plowing up hard ground.

Spit slicks your lips; you realize at some point your mouth fell open and just forgot how to close, breath dragging in ragged, wet pulls. 

You couldn’t be bothered to care if you tried; everything is narrowed to the hot place his cock is sawing through and the bright, brutal pulses from his fingers on your clit.

He can feel you climbing, feel your body drawing in tight around him, feel your channel starting to flutter. He growls, low and guttural, the sound pressed against the back of your neck. “That’s it. That’s it, squeeze me.”

His hand at your throat tightens a hair more, narrowing the world to his breathing and yours, the rush of blood in your ears, the drag of wood under your palms. 

The smallest bit of pressure makes every sensation hit harder; your body goes light and heavy at the same time, limbs tingling, cock-deep pull inside you the only thing that feels solid.

He pistons into you now with a steadier, punishing rhythm, cock dragging from the fat base at your entrance all the way to that deep end that makes your belly flip, then back again. 

Your ass jiggles from each impact, flesh rippling under his grip. His fingers at your clit don’t falter.

You can hear yourself now, high and ruined, begging without even knowing what for. “Don’t stop—don’t—Remmick, don’t—oh—oh God—”

“Mhm, use my name,” he hisses, hips crashing into yours, the wet slap echoing off the close walls. “You say it when you can’t hold yourself together no more.”

He leans forward, the sweat on his skin slick against the thin cotton of your nightgown bunched at your waist. 

His mouth finds the side of your neck, teeth scraping over the delicate skin there, then biting down just hard enough to make you gasp. He sucks, draws blood closer to the surface in a hot sting that only makes your cunt flutter harder around him.

Between the choke of his hand, the sharp pinch of his teeth, the relentless grind of his cock, and the ruthless attention on your clit, you don’t stand a chance.

The orgasm slams into you hard enough your knees buckle, your body trying to curl in on itself while he holds you stretched over the table. 

Everything constricts at once—your throat around his hand, your belly around the deep ache, your cunt around his cock. You clamp down on him with startling force, walls seizing, milking, clutching like you’re trying to suck him straight out of his skin.

You cry out. There’s no pretty word for it. Sound rips out of you high and raw, your voice cracking on his name. 

Your vision goes fuzzy with white at the edges, the kitchen shrinking to the rough wood under your hands and the thick, unyielding length splitting you and the brutal roll of pleasure ripping through you in waves.

“Fuck—fuck,” he grunts at your ear, the feeling of you spasming around him cutting through every ounce of control he has left. “That’s it, that’s it, girl, grip me—Jesus—”

He doesn’t stop moving, not really; he grinds through it, forcing his cock to keep sliding, short, deep thrusts, using the vice of your orgasm to wring everything he can from you. 

You’re shaking all over, thighs trembling so hard your feet skid a little on the floor, toes digging uselessly for purchase. 

Another rush of slick gushes around him, soaking his cock, dripping down over his balls, sliding warm along the inside of your thighs.

Your body keeps clenching in pulses, the pleasure cresting and breaking over and over until it tips toward something sharp, too much. You whimper, the sound small and shredded. His hand leaves your clit finally, stroking shaking skin instead, but his hips don’t stop.

The rhythm goes ragged, less measured, more frantic. His thrusts turn into short, hard ruts, like his body’s the one begging now. His fingers flex around your throat, then loosen just a little, thumb stroking your jaw instead as his breathing unravels.

“Gonna fill you up,” he groans, voice pitched low and rough. “You want that? You want me shootin’ deep in you, huh? Want to feel me leakin’ out you all the way back up to that house?”

The words, filthy as they are, punch right through your oversensitivity and light up something molten in your gut. 

Your sore, flooded cunt tightens around him involuntarily at the thought of carrying him inside you, his spend rolling down your thighs later when you climb into your own bed. 

You can’t shape the answer into full words; what comes out is some strangled mess that sounds like y-yes and a choke.

“Yeah, you do,” he snarls like he heard it. “You greedy little thing, comin’ down here pretendin’ you just wanna talk when your cunt’s hungry as hell.”

He drives in hard, once, twice, three more times, each thrust bottoming him out, pelvis grinding against the round of your ass. 

The slap of his hips is loud now, sloppy, wetter, your combined mess making the impact slick.

Then his whole body locks.

His stomach clenches tight against your back, jaw clamped against the side of your neck. A sound tears out of him, not quite human, something between a growl and a groan. His cock jerks inside you, swelling even thicker for a heart-stopping second, and then you feel it—hot, heavy spurts of him spilling deep, pounding against your cervix, flooding that space that’s been empty your entire life with a hot, liquid fullness.

He curses low and hoarse on each pulse, hips rocking in tiny, helpless movements as he empties himself, his own climax dragged out by the way your slick, oversensitive walls keep squeezing and fluttering around him. Every time your cunt milks him, another rope of cum kicks out of him, painting you inside.

“God—damn—” he grits, shuddering, one hand sliding from your throat to slap down next to your own on the table, fingers splayed wide, knuckles white on the wood. “You feel that? Feel me givin’ it to you?”

You do. You feel all of it. Every pulse, every twitch, every deep throb of him lodged inside, filling you, staking a claim. Your whole body feels stuffed, weighty, like he’s poured something molten into your bones.

The shakes take him then. You feel them where his chest is plastered to your back, quivers running through him in waves as his orgasm tapers off. 

His cock softens a little inside you but doesn’t slip free; your swollen entrance and the spent thickness of him keep you plugged together. Each small movement sends a slow, slick ache radiating outward.

For a long moment neither of you says anything.

He slumps more of his weight onto you without meaning to, and you sag under it, cheek pressed to the tabletop, breaths coming in harsh, uneven pulls. 

Sweat has glued your nightgown to your ribs where it’s still covering your upper body; where it’s bunched around your waist, the fabric clings damp to your skin with a mixture of your own wetness and his.

Eventually, he finds his voice, though it’s wrecked, scraped raw at the edges. “Jesus,” he mutters, words ghosting hot over the shell of your ear. 

For the first time since he pushed into you, he eases his hips back.

You gasp, a little shocked moan slipping out as his softening cock drags along your raw walls. 

When his head slips past your entrance, your muscles clench on instinct, reluctant to let him go, but gravity wins. He slides free, leaving you empty in a way that feels sharp, unfinished, even with his cum already starting to seep down, warm, from inside you.

Something thick and wet trickles out immediately, a slow, viscous roll that slides over your swollen folds and down the curve of your inner thigh. You feel it clearly, a hot trail in the cooler air of the kitchen. The knowledge of what it is, whose it is, makes your face burn and your belly tighten all over again.

He sees it too.

“Look at that,” he says softly, voice full of rough, satisfied awe. 

His hand leaves yours and slides down, palm cupping the underside of your ass, thumb catching one of those white streaks, spreading it lazily over your sensitive skin. You flinch, a little gasp escaping before you can stop it.

“Too much?” he asks.

“A little,” you admit, breath still stuttering. 

He makes a pleased sound at that, thumb dragging one last lazy stripe through the mess before he rubs his hand off on his own thigh. 

He straightens slowly, the absence of his weight making you sway for a second. His hands, empty now, come to your waist, smoothing down the bunched nightgown. He tugs it back into place over your hips, hiding what he’s done as best cloth can hide it.

Then he crouches a little, fingers catching the waistband of your drawers. They’re still tangled around your knees, sticky with your slick. 

He coaxes them up, guiding the cotton over your tender flesh, covering your cunt, trapping his spend where it is. 

The pull of the fabric against your oversensitive skin makes you hiss and bite your lip, but it also feels lewd and intimate in a different way—his cum pressed up against you, soaked into the cloth that sits right over your entrance.

He knows exactly what he’s doing, sealing you up like that. It shows in the way his thumb lingers a second too long at the gusset, pressing lightly, as if to make sure the material is snug, as if to feel one more time that he’s right there even with clothes between you.

“Gonna be walkin’ home with your panties stickin’ to you and a piece of me tryin’ to leak right back out,” he murmurs, voice a dark purr. “You’ll be thinkin’ of me every step.”

You make a weak noise, somewhere between a protest and something softer. Your legs feel unsteady when he finally helps you pull them fully into place, when he urges you upright with hands at your waist. 

When you stand, it’s like your bones have gone wrong—heavy at the hips, light at the knees, a deep, interior throb that makes you aware of your own body in a way you’ve never been.

He turns you gently, so your hip leans back into the edge of the table instead of your chest, so you’re facing him. His hair is damp and rumpled, a curl fallen low over his forehead, chest and stomach slick with sweat. 

His gaze sweeps over you, taking in the mussed nightgown, the bite marks blossoming at your throat and shoulder where his teeth worried your skin, the slackness of your mouth, the glassy shine to your eyes. 

Confidence sits easy on him; he looks like a man who’s put in a long night’s work and is proud of the job he’s done.

“You’re gonna cuss me tomorrow,” he says, voice low and a little smug. “When you sit down. When you walk. But you ain’t gonna regret it.”

You swallow, throat thick, his words settling warm and heavy between your ribs.

“No,” you admit, even quieter than before, and there’s no sense lying now. “I don’t… regret it.”

His mouth curves. “Good.”

You look away, suddenly aware of the time, of the silence of the big house up the hill, of how your mama and daddy are sleeping through something that’s gone and rearranged their daughter from the inside out.

“I need to go,” you say, voice small but steadying. “Before my father wakes up for water, or Mama starts callin’ and finds my bed empty.”

His hands fall from your waist, though not without one last, slow sweep along the curve of you, like he’s committing it to memory. 

“Go on,” he says. “Before I talk you into layin’ down on that bed in there and not leavin’ till the rooster screams.”

Your body responds to the image with an exhausted throb, a clench around nothing. 

You push off the table and take a careful step. Your thighs rub, slick, the damp cotton of your drawers pulling against you; you feel a fresh little leak of him inside you, a warm ooze that soaks into the fabric and clings. It makes you stutter a little, the soreness set deep in your core.

Remmick watches the way you move, jaw flexing, something like pride and hunger both tightening his face. 

He reaches for his trousers, tucking himself away, but he doesn’t bother with a shirt yet, doesn’t bother pretending he’s anything but what he is: the man who just fucked you on his kitchen table and filled you til you’re walking crooked.

You make it to the door on legs that still shake. Your fingers land on the frame as you pull it open, the cool breath of the night spilling in. 

Before you step out, you glance back. His eyes are on you, unreadable now, dark and steady in the lamplight.

“You come down here again,” he says, voice quiet, sure, “don’t pretend you’re just here for salve or scoldin’. You knock on my door after dark, I know what you’re askin’ for.”

You hold his gaze, the soreness between your thighs, the fullness inside you, the ache in your muscles all speaking louder than any denial you could muster. 

His eyes follow you out into the dark, low and pleased, and as you cross the yard barefoot, nightgown brushing your knees, his cum warm and sticky between your legs, you know he’s standing there in that doorway shirtless, watching you go with no shame at all, already planning just how he’ll take you the next time you come scratching at his door.

But you were older now.

And Oliver wasn’t like the other boy at all.

Whenever he kissed you, he did it with a fire that roared like the hearth of his cottage. It was warm and strong and powerful. He wasn’t afraid. You liked it. It’s why you almost pouted when he pulled away from you at the sound of your words.

He sat on his knees, his chest bare for you to place your hands on it, something you’d come to learn he liked.

But you didn’t move to touch him, instead pulling his sheets up to your frame, suddenly cold without him. He looked away in thought. You mistook it for regret.

“Oliver?” You blinked up at him.

After the war, it was crucial that you find a well-paying job to support your mother who’d been left lifeless in the absence of your father. The Chatterley’s had owned the mines in your town for your entire life, and Lady Chatterley was incredibly gracious hiring you as another maid. But the best part of your job wasn’t shopping for groceries or scrubbing linens in the wash room.

It was the man you met while running your fingers in the creek one warm afternoon.

“Got himself in a predicament, I’d say,” one of the maids had said in the kitchen. “What, with Bertha Coutts running around with other men while he’s out at war?” The other women murmured and shook their heads in disapproval.

You knew he carried a great weight on his shoulders from his previous marriage—current marriage, since she still hadn’t given Oliver the divorce he deserved.

But whenever he was with you, that weight seemed to lift itself. He’d managed to sneak you around the Chatterley grounds, hidden in the woods and lost in his sheets.

“Oliver?” You said again, reaching for his hand and covering it with your palm.

He blinked at you with an expression you couldn’t read—lust, restraint, or confusion.

Then, he looked down at your hand over his.

When he turned it over, returning the gesture, you noticed his touch was softer than it had been on your hips just moments ago.

You leaned forward and sat up close to him so his nose brushed yours, guiding his hand to your waist just to feel something from him. You weren’t stupid just because you were a young woman—you knew that sex was more than a transaction of wealth like your mother and friends made it out to be.

You wanted Oliver. Needed him in a depth of yourself that you didn’t know existed.

“It’s okay, Oliver,” you said sweetly. He didn’t know there were still women in the world as sweet as you, and you were the only one he needed. His other hand cupped your cheek almost instinctively. “You don’t have to be afraid.”

A darkness overcame his eyes, but it wasn’t necessarily frightening.

If anything, it consumed you with comfort.

“Oh, I’m not afraid, love.”

Without a moment to waste—because he only got you for so long before you ran back to the manor—Oliver pressed your lips to his again. He immediately pushed you back onto the bed, but not roughly or sharply. It was a gentle nudge and he went down with you, the weight of him pressing against your chest and core. His hand moved from your hips to your belly to your chest.

He squeezed the flesh of your tit, eliciting a quiet gasp from your lips that disappeared into his. Other than the soft sounds of the sheets moving, the birds singing outside, and the occasional moan from you, the air was pleasantly silent. The moment was for the two of you and no one else.

With your eyes closed in ecstasy, you felt his lips leave yours only to feel them again your neck, trailing across your collar bone to where his hand kneaded your breast. “I’ve barely touched you,” he said against your skin. You writhed under his touch with desperation.

You’d never been one to be desperate.

“Oliver,” you breathed his name like a song. He didn’t care about anything else then.

“You need me, love?” Oliver didn’t look up at you. He replaces his hands with his lips and latches onto the small bud on your breast, rolling the other one between his fingers. Your back arches into him, only feeling his warmth even more, as you nod with a whine. “Where?”

Oliver, a married man aged by the war, had experience. He knew exactly where you needed him, and the fucker was teasing you for it. “You know where.” You said, cut off by a moan as he presses himself close to your core. Just the simple pressure on your brag that was aching for him was enough to practically feel your skin blooming.

“Right here?” He asked cheekily. Curse the small grin he gave you.

The air was cold on the spot where his mouth was as he moved further down your body. He didn’t waste a single space of you without placing a kiss so that his touch is never gone for too long. He didn’t stop lowering himself until his head hangs above your mound, and when he saw your most vulnerable spot, he moaned.

“You’re beautiful, (y/n),” Oliver praises you like you’re a painting in the Louvre or a flower in the field outside his cottage.

“What’re you doing?” You asked suddenly.

His hands rubbed over your soft thighs, falling a little bit in love with how they felt in his hands. He knew right there and then that this was one of his favorite places in the world. “Don’t think about it, darling,” Oliver said tenderly. “I can love you in more ways than one.”

Once you nod and lay yourself back down, he exhales a warm breath against you. You shudder. “Easy, lass,” he called you. You didn’t know what to expect, but it definitely wasn’t the feeling of his tongue flat against your folds. They didn’t necessarily need the wetness, but it was oh so beautiful to feel against you.

You could feel his tongue sharpen and soften against the right spots. Your hips and legs squirmed at the feeling of Oliver’s mouth essentially feeding off of you. His tongue moved mercilessly against the most important part of you.

Then, you suddenly felt something tracing the outline of your opening before slowly plunging itself inside of you. You’d never known what it’s like to be opened. To be spread apart and picked open like a ripened fruit.

“Oh,” you let out softly as if there was anyone nearby to hear you.

He pulled his finger away before sliding it in again, soon creating a gentle rhythm that leaves your pulse racing. “Feel nice?” He whispered, slightly muffled from leaning his head into your leg. You nodded rapidly, unable to form words. “Breathe, darling.” Oliver told you before he slowly added another finger.

Two of them now stretched you open. His arms wrapped themselves around your thighs to still your ragged movements. Your knuckles turned white as you clenched the sheets in your hand.

And despite the uncontrollable fever rising in your core, you thought to yourself, I could stay here for the rest of my life.

But the moment is cut short when Oliver pulled himself away. You let out an unexpected cry at the loss of contact, mainly because you felt like you were on fire. Oliver moved towards you and kissed you again, but this time, there was a strange taste on his lips.

“What is that?” You pulled away to ask.

His brows furrowed. “What?” But he could smell it from his own breath. The man fucking laughs, “It’s you.”

It isn’t the most pleasant thing in the world to you, though it was also the first time you experienced it. “And you enjoy it?”

Oliver’s fingers fumbled the slide off his trousers, leaving himself in nothing but his trunks. You’d never seen a man so exposed like this. Your eyes lingered over his frame, taking in the image of him like it would make it last longer.

“It’s the best fuckin’ thing I’ve ever tasted.” He took your hand and guided it to the last piece of clothing on his body. He nodded when you looked up at him, and you slowly pulled them down. You stopped at his knees from the sight of his length.

He was hard and smooth, apart from the small bump of a swollen vein on the side. Oliver watched as you gazed at him. He would’ve been lying if he said he didn’t enjoy it. He slowly moved himself over you, and placed your hand over him. It was heavy in your palm. “Oliver, I- I don’t think it’ll fit.” You said almost in exasperation.

A gentle hand rested the back of your head on his pillows as he took his own length and slid it through your slick. The tip rubbed against your already sensitive pearl, and you moaned from the pleasure shooting up your spine directly to your heart.

“It will, darling,” he pressed a kiss against your forehead before you felt that same stretch from earlier, only it was stronger.

A shiver racked through your spine as your eyes fluttered shut, gulping down a small, “Oh, my god.” Your hands flew to his shoulders, sliding down his back to feel the way his body flexed and released with every movement he made. He entered you so slowly but so perfectly.

“Atta girl,” he whispered into your ear with only the slightest bit of restraint in his voice. “Take it just like that, (y/n), that’s it.” He could’ve fucked you to sleep right there. He could’ve twisted your hair in his fist and pulled your hips to his so you felt him right in the center of you, but he didn’t.

Because, unlike most men and many of the gentleman you’d encountered, Oliver had a heart.

You could feel it beating against your own, two unsteady rhythms somehow matching to create melody only you could hear. He continued to push himself inside until you could feel the base flat against you, allowing for the perfect amount of pressure on your most sensitive spot.

“Feel alright, love?” He asked, gently brushing loose strands of hair stuck to your face from the thin sheet of sweat on your skin. Oliver took your hand from his shoulder and placed it over your lower belly.

With one swift move, he retracted his hips so you felt nearly entirely empty before pushing himself into you again. Your mouth parted open, followed shortly by a delayed gasp at how euphoric something could feel. “Feel me right there,” he practically instructed you. And you could feel him. Just the slightest bulge with every thrust he gave you.

He didn’t quicken his movements any more, though if you could scramble to form words, you’d be begging for it. You only nodded in response, small whimpers falling from your mouth as Oliver’s hips began staggering. “Don’t stop,” you managed to say.

You could feel him shake his head against you. His chest rose with heavy breaths. “I won’t stop,” he said, partially to you and to himself. Feeling you clench around him everytime he fully covered himself again in your warmth was maybe the best thing he’d ever known.

And he didn’t stop. Not even when you felt his release shooting inside you, moaning into his hair as that euphoric feeling coursed through your body again. He felt it coat him in a hot slick.

Once he pulled himself away, the mixture from both of your climaxes dripped out of you. You sat up curiously and looked down only to feel a slight burn around where he’d stretched you. You gave a small wince and nothing else; it was slowly becoming a pleasurable pain.

“Now here, love,” he said. You looked up to see him leaning back on his arm, and in between his legs, his cock was still a solid weight in his lap. He stroked it lazily as if he was waiting for something better. “We’re not finished yet.”