For My Indulgence (side blog)

His thumbs stroke down over your trachea, running along it to feel the ridges.

He doesn't let you kiss him yet; he teases you away from a full one, even though your mouth is opening to press the wet silk of your tongue against his. He seems to find this funny, especially when a tiny whine gets needled out of you after the third pass.

"Come on," you sigh against him.

"What's that, love?"

"Kiss me."

Oh, his eyes. Danger lurking brightly, luminescent under a filmy veil.

"You want me t' kiss you, hm?"

"Why am I here?" You suddenly break out, pushing at him to no success, feeling a pinch of embarrassment at your cheeks and and eyes and tits and cunt. He's barely left you space to slide off the stool. "I-I gotta go. I'm gonna be late for work."

"Mm, she doesn't like t' be teased, eh."

You don't want to put your hands on him, so you lock your forearm ups in a dukes-up position and push toward his body. "No! I don't." It surprises you by how raw it comes out.

Simon's arms are coming up and his hands are now cupping your face, which would look romantic but for his thick, scuffed elbows resting on your shoulders, nearly weighing you down. He probably looks like he's going to pop your head clean off the rest of your body. "Sweet girl like you. Too soft for those games, eh."

"No." Defensive. Too defensive.

He gives you a humiliatingly knowing smile, almost a mercy. "Yeah. Too soft. Maybe you just wanna feel good, huh." No question mark in the gravelling, thick voice.

You don't answer, you can't, but your thighs squeeze together and he knows.

Gently and slowly, he takes your cross-body bag off, setting it on the counter. Your only barrier. A loud skidding sound and he's dragging the stool away and chucking it behind him, clanging onto the grease-marked floor. "Shut the door."

You pull it closed, or try, but it's got a funny sticking latch that you can't figure out and the longer it takes you, the more embarrassed and inflamed you feel. Then, there's a dark rumble of a chuckle at the back of your neck — god he's so quiet, how the fuck did he get closer in this already-cramped space without you noticing? — and he reaches over you, the curve and sanctuary of his armpit resting on your shoulder damply as he pulls the latch and twists it funny. Cranks it once to test it. You turn your head slightly, and the wave of him pouring off his skin and t-shirt is thicker than the humidity.

You're the type who has sex almost exclusively after showers, and your cunt is throbbing at the acridity of him, that nose-crinkling density of smoke and sweat and grease. He doesn't smell like sex, but he smells like how sex with him might feel. Harsh and staggering and obliterative of anything else but.

"You smellin' me, love?" Fuck, his voice is right there, pressed into the hollow of your ear. He's not touching you anywhere else, but his fingers might as well be in your cunt. A cold shiver runs over you, setting goosebumps across your bare flesh.

You turn your face, shamed, back to the door, staring blankly at some certificate taped up shoddily. Simon Riley, it says his full name. You're not sure it suits him.

His arm presses down harder, and then the other one is doing the same on the other side, until he's got you in some strange MMA-like hold, chin propped closer to the crown of your head than your shoulder. You almost laugh, and then his hands land on the door. Your head, between his locked arms. A dark laugh heating your neck.

A gasp slips out of you when he breaks up your soft summer flats with his steel-toed boots, widening your stance. Then, a heavy knee and thigh are braced between your legs, and all of a sudden, you are pressed against the door. Forehead under the certificate.

"Think she wants t' feel good. Wants me t' take care o' her."

A moan as diaphanous as late summer steam pours out of you, like a teakettle announcing itself.

"Ohhh," he breathes out, ghosting your crown. "I'll take such good care of you," he croons, and then he begins to rock his thigh up until it hits your cunt squarely. Your head punches back, nowhere else to go. Trapped in this cage and rutting against it like an animal desperate for any sort of substance.

"That feel good, love?" He repositions slightly, raises his leg higher until you're lifting off the floor, the slippery soles of your flats scraping gently. As you lose your balance, your tits push out to overcorrect your tipping. "Where you gonna hold on?"

There's nowhere else. You hook your arms up until your fingers curl around the meat of his forearms, holding on tight. Hysterically, you think that it looks like his arms are next going to come down on you like a rollercoaster restraint, the steel band that cages you in and keeps you from falling out.

He shifts his leg back and forth, holding you up. A fucking thigh for a seat.

"There you go."

You breathe out a whining sound.

"Nah, don't be embarrassed. I got you. Y'wanna feel good, use me, love."

It's not the rough texture of his jeans against the thin fabric of your pants. It's not the breadth of him pressing everywhere, nearly hitting every spot under you. It's not his thick, tattooed arms banded on either side of your head, your fingers gripping for dear life.

It's his voice, telling you that. It's his smell, drenching your back, dripping down, way deep down.

It's not embarrassment that stills you. It's the wanting. The sheer intensity of it engulfing you out of the blue.

Your fingernails bite down into his skin and he groans coarsely and that's when you start rocking. A slow measure, testing it out, unsure. He can't see your face. All he knows is your first name. These are the things you hold onto as you start to keen, clamping and unclamping your dangling legs around his, still uncertain that he's got you.

Your hips begin grinding faster, deeper, rocking your clit downward to find the friction, and he works with you now, shifting his thigh exactly so it resists where you need it to, the hard grip of denim making you moan even through two layers of cotton.

"Oh my god."

Despite the strangeness and newness, you are bolting to your orgasm like a wild horse that's been penned in, frantic for the exit, for release.

His stocky arms are holding you up. Damp with exertion, marked up from your fingernails, but steady. His breath is hard and laborious behind you, nearly against you, so fucking close.

"'m taking such good care of you, huh?"

You squeeze your inner thighs and eyes at the same time, clenching everything down to ride him, sweat running through your hair now, down your nape. "Oh, fuck. Oh my god."

"Nah, lemme hear you." And then he bumps his thigh up abruptly, jolting the start of the orgasm through you, as your fingers nearly pry off his arm, so slippery now.

It's a sobbing, breaching orgasm, rushing and hitching out of you, and it feels like you're on a fucking rocking horse, grinding yourself to a screeching finish. You feel a nail break skin but you can't stop the sounds, the words, the onslaught of everything pouring up and out of you —

— under your sounds, his own — sweet thing, s'good, that's fuckin lovely now, feelin' that pretty cunt on me — until you're drenched in tears or sweat or him.

one. he was extremely handsome, so you weren’t the only one that paused their work to watch him swan by to the office kitchenette on his break.

you weren’t dumb enough to think you ever had a chance but jealousy was harder to bite back around this time of year when your family started asking if you’d be bringing someone special back over christmas break.

two. kyle was a colleague, so even if you did have a chance in hell, you told yourself it wouldn’t work out anyway. office gossip was rife and brutal.

three. kyle was charming. like disney prince levels of sweet and charismatic; some days it genuinely felt like he was flirting with you before you’d remember where you were. it felt silly to be so easily swooned next to the office printer.

so yeah, he may have been easy on the eyes but god help you it wasn’t easy dealing with the unrequited school girl feelings when you were meant to be working.

you’d worked together for almost a year now; gaz was a transfer from another branch and had arrived with spectacle and eager whispers earlier in the year. and his presence meant, for the first time in the six years at your work place, you were considering skipping the christmas party.

you didn’t think you’d be able to keep yourself from saying or doing something stupid, even if you didn’t drink. the exciting mix of shitty christmas songs on repeat, ugly jumpers, the promise of a week off uninterrupted, and the office’s weird secret santa meant you often forgot yourself and acted less like it was a work do and more like you were out with friends.

you weren’t the only one, and you were always far from the most embarrassing person there each year, but kyle changed things. kyle got you tongue tied and had your hands feeling grabby and clammy when they should be staying firmly by your sides.

he was catnip and you couldn’t help but purr.

you’d been doing your best to keep your distance over the last few weeks, not wanting to embarrass yourself after accidentally catching one of the other office girls be turned down gently in the break room by gaz, but now you needed his help.

simon riley, you pouted as you stared down at your secret santa name.

despite having worked here the least amount of time, kyle was closer than most to simon. you didn’t know much about the man and although you were tempted to just buy him a decent bottle of booze and be done with it, it felt presumptuous and lazy. hell, the guy might be sober in which case a kick to the teeth would be just as welcome.

and you liked christmas. you liked giving gifts, getting into the holiday spirit; so you wanted to buy something the guy would like. hence, kyle’s help.

you waited until you saw kyle leave price’s office and scampered over to his cubicle, squatting next to his chair to avoid nearby stares and attention. you really weren’t exaggerating when you said the office gossip could get rife over the littlest things…

kyle raised his eyebrows in surprise amusement at your sudden appearance. he turned slightly towards you so his knee knocked your elbow as you held on to his desk for balance.

“i need your help,” you whispered.

“dare i ask what for?” he joked, eyeing up your precarious position. his eyes flickered up to the cubicle opposite him, johnny mactavish’s desk you believed, the skin around his eyes tightening minutely to reveal crows feet before relaxing again when he looked back at you.

“it’s for my secret santa,” you said.

“could ruin the fun and the surprise of the whole thing if i knew who you had,” he said and sucked his teeth dramatically, really leaning into playing hard to get. “slippery slope from there, i’d probably be able to figure out the rest of the office by friday. i don’t think i can take part in destroying christmas like that.”

“kyle,” you whined frustratedly and tapped your fingers impatiently on his desk. you blinked your eyes extra wide. “don’t make me pout at you; my puppy dog face isn’t cute at all, it’ll make you cringe. do you want to see a grown woman embarrass herself like this? ‘tis the season to be giving, garrick.”

kyle licked his lips and looked away from you to his computer for a moment, swallowing thickly as he did. he cleared his throat before looking back at you and fondly rolling his eyes. “fine, go on then. since i am known for being benevolent, don’t want to scarper my reputation just because you’re a cheat.”

“i am not a cheat, fuck you,” you hissed and pinched his calf through his work trousers, revelling in his hiss and flinch. “he’s just not very chatty with me. which is fine! but i want to get him a good present anyway, you know?”

“who?” kyle asked a little too sharply, concern and something else colouring his tone.

“simon,” you whispered. leaning out of kyle’s cubicle to check the man in question wasn’t suddenly there and overhearing your conversation.

kyle’s shoulders relaxed at the name. “oh, yeah, he’s not chatty with anyone, babe. don’t take it personal.”

you melted at the nickname and how he jumped to reassure you, but you shook it off.

“i’m not, but it means i don’t know what he’d want,” you said. “can’t exactly ask him either without being obvious.”

“yeah, that’s not exactly subtle,” kyle agreed. “ok, leave it to me, yeah? i’ll sort it out.”

“thanks, ky,” you dropped your hand to his knee and squeezed before standing and walking away. it was only as you dusted off your knees that you realised how that would look worse than simply hovering around his cubicle for all to see would have. fucking office gossip…

you gritted your teeth and smiled before heading back to your own computer, keeping your head low and eyes aimed at the floor, none the wiser to the teasing look johnny was sending kyle.

— —

gaz dropped off the gift on your desk, already wrapped, a week later with a promise to let you know the price to pay him back at a later date. however, he continually managed to dodge the topic every time you brought it up until it was suddenly the last day of work and the party was in full swing.

you’d laughed when tina had brought out a mini disco light and plugged it into the wall, cheered along with the others as it lit up the bland walls in spots of red, yellow, green, and blue. with half the office lights off, just enough to set the tone but not too much to make set the floor into darkness, you started to dance alongside your colleagues to wherever playlist gina had put together this year.

it didn’t take johnny long to pull out the karaoke from storage and he hadn’t hesitated to get it started while your floor managers, john and kate, had brought through the ordered food and ‘smuggled’ drink for the evening.

an hour in, you’d managed to dodge every offer to sing successfully and had had your fill of the food, but you kept anxiously looking over to the gifts piled on the otherwise cleared centre desks. specifically, you looked between the wrapped box you knew belonged to simon and a daintily tied gift bag with your own name on the sparkly tag.

“this is easily one of the better work christmas parties i’ve had to go to,” kyle said as he sidled up next to you.

“i think what makes it good is that it’s not mandatory,” you said. “everyone that wants to go home does, and the rest of us either enjoy a free piss up and a meal or stay to witness…” you gestured to the ensuing chaos around you in the little office. “…all of this.”

“and the gift reveal,” kyle added, nudging you knowingly.

“yeah, taking it home but not knowing who got you until the new year would eat me up, i’d stay each year if only for that,” you said.

“hope someone got you something good then.”

“i just hope you haven’t fucked me over with simon’s gift,” you joked. kyle liked a prank, but he wasn’t one to put someone in an awkward position, you knew that.

“gaz! there y’are, been looking all over for ye,” johnny said a touch too loud as he got closer. in one hand he held a drink and in the other he held a battered looking mistletoe. “gi’s a kiss, garrick,” johnny said leaning in and kyle leaned back.

“don’t think so, mate. i saw that plate of scotch eggs you scarfed down, not chancing what that’s like on your breath an hour later,” he jibed.

“heart breaker, gaz. i needed the strength for my rendition of sweet transvestite.” he said, but didn’t seem all that put out; happily ignoring kyle’s muttered, it’s not even a christmas movie, mate. it’s halloween. instead johnny turned to you with a glint in his eye. “but you won’t leave me hanging, will ye, hen?”

“she wouldn’t kiss you under the influence, never mind the mistletoe, you melt,” kyle answered before you had chance, and pushed johnny away from you with a huff. “go find simon to set you right.”

“ah know when ah’m not wanted,” johnny said and backed away with his hands raised in placation. he caught the eye of someone else, and his grin grew back easily enough. “oi! alex, get a duet lined up - me ‘n you!”

you chuckled and shook your head. “probably for the best you said no to him.”

“mm, why’s that?” kyle said, tilting his head towards you.

you swallowed thickly staring up into his deep brown eyes.

“couldn’t just leave it at him, you’ve got half the office wrapped around your little finger,” you joked. “you’d be stuck kissing people for hours, queuing for the chance.”

“is that so?” he asked. “only half the office?”

you snorted and bumped your shoulders together.

“there’s only one person i want to kiss at this party,” he admitted to you softly.

you looked up in curiosity - in hope - and he swooped down to peck you quickly. there and gone again, the smell of his aftershave lingering longer than his lips as he stayed hovering just a little closer than before to gauge your reaction in the dimmed lighting.

one hand had lifted to cup your upper arm gently and you leant into it.

“ky…”

he licked his lips and your eyes flickered down before focusing back on his questioning gaze. was that ok? can i do it again? can i do more? will you kiss me back?

all unspoken but you felt yourself nodding ever so slightly anyway.

“we should get out of here,” he suggested hopefully, a lilt of uncertainty hitching his tone ever so slightly higher at the end. “unless i’ve been reading this wrong?”

you nodded, then shook your head, then huffed. “uhm, yes to leaving, and no, you haven’t read this wrong.” you bit your lip before grabbing his free hand and leading him to your desk. when he realised you were grabbing your coat and bag, he grinned and squeezed your hand before jogging over to collect both of your gifts from the pile.

you met him closer to the exit but before you could get to the elevator doors, you paused and looked around the room. you bit your lip again but your expression was a little more pensive.

kyle laughed, reading your mind and knowing you were after finding out who had bought your gift.

“i’m your secret santa,” he revealed with an almost shy look. “you can open it with me later,” he promised.

without a second glance to the partying office and the few knowing faces that had caught sight of gaz’s hand held tightly in yours, the pair of you left with giddy smiles interrupted by excited kisses and rushed steps.

— —

the next morning, with your head throbbing a little from the alcohol and body aching pleasantly from your time with kyle, you opened your gift.

you lifted the pair of mittens up gently with a fond pull to your brow. they were uneven in size, the colour of the wool changed drastically on the wrist of the left one and it looked like a pattern had been attempted on the thumbs, but not entirely successfully. they were clearly handmade, and not necessarily by someone well practiced, but even clearer was the care and time that had been put into them.

any possible growing doubts or regrets for having slept with kyle left your body in an instant as you tried to bite back the warm, fond feeling bubbling in your chest.

kyle had made you mittens after hearing you complain about the cold for the last couple of months. he could’ve bought you a pair, could’ve gotten you a gift card so you could pick a pair out yourself, could’ve even commissioned someone to hand-make you them. but he hadn’t. instead he’d spent hours making you them himself. in fact, it looked like he’d probably learnt to knit just for this project.

the man in question walked into the bedroom just in time to catch your dopey grin and he shuffled over to the bed sheepishly.

“d’you like ‘em then?” he asked as he climbed back into bed with you, clad in just his boxers. he handed you one of the mugs he was carrying and you sighed happily at the familiar deep scent of hot chocolate.

‘do you like them?’ as if the answer could have ever been no, as if your heart wasn’t growing three times bigger, and the urge to attempt to suck his soul through his dick as part one of your twelve-part-christmas-thank-you wasn’t trying to take precedence over breathing as you stared at him, ugly mittens still in hand.

You count the cold bucket bath you give yourself from the garden pump as penance for the night before, each splash of icy water meant to wash away the guilt.

The peeks you snuck when he came downstairs says nothing’s amiss, that he’s clueless. He seems oblivious to what you overheard, but that makes it worse somehow. You scrub harder. When your mind inevitably returns to the sounds he made, you squeeze your bar of soap until it cracks in half.

Watching the water swirl down the tub drain, you silently recite your grand this is where we part ways speech one more time.

You forget most of it.

“You want to run that by me again?” 

You squirm in your seat, knees bumping the table. A bead of nervous sweat tickles the back of your neck. There’s no reason to feel like this. In trouble. But you do. You feel in trouble with John.

His fingers are wrapped tightly around his fork. Forearms flexed, a vein standing out on his temple. His brows are drawn down a hair, his lips set in a line. Of course, he was in the military. Just looking at him, facing this unhappy expression—you’re nervous.

“I think,” You tack the words onto your declaration, hobbling it. “I’m going to stay here. This is as good a place as any.”

He stares at you like you’ve gone mad. The silence stretches, and since breakfast is long gone from your plate, you cave and fill it with nervous chatter.

“It’s private. There’s a fireplace. A roof overhead. I thought you’d be happy. You don’t have to babysit me anymore.”

He doesn’t address that. “What will you eat?”

Your face almost hurts from how quickly it heats up. “I have food left. I can ration whatever else I find here. There’s still some bits in the garden, too. We haven’t checked everywhere. What if there’s a root cell–”

“And when all that runs out?”

“I’ll go to a neighboring house. Scavenge.”

He snorts, humorless. “You couldn’t even steal from a service station.”

“I stole from the garden and cupboards, didn’t I?” you counter, weakly defensive.

He huffs a short, sharp laugh that makes your stomach turn. “Darl, it’s not stealing if the owner’s dead.”

You blink at him, confused. “What?”

He leads you to the shed, which you avoided yesterday because of the smell—sweet and rotting, thick as syrup in the air. Rot that John had blamed on expired food from the warm refrigerator and freezer. When he unlatches the doors and pulls them open, light floods in.

The smell isn’t food. It’s a man. 

He’s just starting to bloat. His shirt blotched with stains, darker in some places, and dotted with a swarm of flies. You make out stab wounds that puncture his chest and the red slit across his throat. You take one step back, breath stalling.

“Reckon that’s the former tenant.” The way he says it—he’s detached. He’s definitely seen bodies before. Made some. “Found him here like this. My guess? Someone came through, robbed him, and he didn’t go quietly.”

You stare at him, wide-eyed. “W-Why didn’t you say any–”

The rest catches in your throat. Your stomach turns violently, and you double over, gagging. Dry heaves wrack your body, your eyes watering from the smell and the image burned behind your lids. You’ve seen dead people, but not this close. You hear the doors shut, cutting off the sight, and then John’s hand is on your lower back. His other hand anchors itself in your belt loop at your hip with a finger, keeping you from pitching forward.

When the nausea ebbs, you rub your palms on your knees and straighten. Beneath the pounding of your pulse, the facts begin to click into place.

You turn toward him, voice hoarse. “And you let me sleep downstairs alone? What if they came back?”

“I would’ve heard,” he explains simply. As if it is a dumb question. “Figured one night of decent sleep was worth the risk.”

It doesn’t add up. None of it does. You think of the fire he stoked, how the smoke must’ve been a beacon. Your stomach knots all over again. 

“How long do you think he’s been dead?”

John looks past you toward the garden, jaw working. There’s a faint strain in his expression, like it genuinely bothers him that he had to show you the body, knowing you’d have dug your heels in if he’d just told you you couldn’t stay here alone.

“Couple days.”

A couple days. Close enough that whoever did it might still be out there. That he felt comfortable letting you sleep a whole floor away.

He steers you back inside and lets you go when you reach the sofa. For a moment he just stands there, hands on his hips, the same flat, appraising look he wore the first time you met. It isn’t threat assessment so much as a brusque and practical concern. For you, though, it twists the other way: an uneasy niggle that he’s not telling you everything. Still, that whisper has been with you since day one of this journey, and that old refrain loops: if he wanted to hurt you, he would have done so already.

Your eyes flick to the knife on his hip. He could probably hurt you in a hundred ways. You should count yourself lucky he hasn’t found a reason to. Yet.

You force a queasy smile. “Don’t suppose there’s anything I’ve got you’d trade for that knife? Or your pistol?”

He smiles back in a way you assume is supposed to be sympathetic. “‘Fraid not, love.”

Leaving the cottage is harder than you expect. The thought of what could be sits like a stone in your stomach, deep regret mixed with disappointment. Hesitation to move on with John.

It feels like every time he gives you another sliver of himself—knowingly or not, you think, heat blooming in your face at the memory of last night—it comes with a warning light. A reminder to keep your distance before you start wanting to close it. As you pack, you look at the photo of the two of you. The Prices. He wants the polite girl he met at the bakery. You want the smiling man in that picture. Not the one who keeps dodging your questions. Trouble is, you’re not sure if you want the answers at this point.

John refuses to bury the man, saying it isn’t your place and not with the state the body’s in, so you do the only thing you can think to do. You tuck a few drooping flowers into the shed handle as a thank you. It feels wrong to leave without an offering, as poor as it is.

At least you were right about one thing. The cottage had more to give. After a final thorough search, you come away with goodies. Between the two of you, you carry a couple pounds of tinned and dry goods, and a tote bag tied to your pack with the last of the garden’s offerings.

You take one last look at it from the gate, then take John’s hand, and let him help you over.

Walking gives you too much time to think. 

You keep hoping for another empty cottage, but no such luck. Every evening, John points out the faint glow of lamps or the smoke rising from chimneys. Every place is seemingly occupied. He doesn’t even entertain the idea of popping down to a village, leading you instead along winding, zigzagging trails he cuts through the countryside, always avoiding the main roads and the general populace.

It’s nearly impossible out this way. It seems you’ve found the herd that left you behind in the city. It’s as you predicted. Plenty of folks had the same idea as you to flee the city to perish somewhere less dreary and stifling.

This means crossing paths is inevitable, despite John’s efforts. You pass people all day long.

Farmers still dutifully tending their flocks. Fishermen knee-deep in brackish ponds. Other nomads lugging handcarts stacked with the last of their lives. At least once a day, someone flags you down to trade supplies or information.

With John at the helm though, each encounter is as brief as he can make it. People seem decent enough, if not a little cagey, but he’s short with them, and makes it abundantly clear he’s comfortable using the weapons he carries if need be. No one seems to strike him as harmless the way the old pensioners in that encampment had. 

His hand never strays far from his holster. The other almost always finds you.

If you drift too far from him, he reels you back in—hip to hip, his palm firm at the small of your back or hooked in a belt loop of your jeans. A warm shepherd’s crook to keep you from getting too close. A silent this one’s mine. It makes the impression he says it would. Nobody stares at you too long.

That illusion holds until one morning, not even an hour into the day’s walk.

Three men crest the hill ahead of you, scattering a herd of sheep in their wake. John doesn’t break stride, only flicks his fingers behind him in a silent summons. You quicken your pace until you’re beside him, and his hand finds yours, enveloping it, while the other hovers near his sidearm.

The men stop a few paces off, squinting down at you both. They look better fed than most—dirty, sure, but not gaunt. The one in the center does the talking.

“You wouldn’t happen to be coming from Gloucester, would you?”

“No.” From John, that’s practically an essay. He shifts, stepping slightly in front of you.

The man’s mouth twitches. “Ah. Then I s’pose you haven’t seen a woman pass this way, have you? Pink dress, short hair. About thirty?”

You squeeze John’s hand, stomach dropping at the question.

“No.” he repeats.

The men exchange glances. The talker gives a little shrug, half-grin curling his lips. “Shame. We think our friend was feeling blue and all. Everyone’s got to face the end of the world their own way, yeah?”

John doesn’t answer.

The grin widens, tone turning breezy. “Right, well. If you’re heading toward the border,  I wouldn’t if we were you. Heard rogue soldiers out of Hereford are stopping travelers. Clearing houses, centralizing supplies…Looking for company.”

His eyes flick over John’s shoulder to you.

John’s grip on your hand tightens. “Noted.”

“You wouldn’t be open–”

“No.”

John’s voice is flat, final, the kind of tone that makes your insides knot. He hauls you forward, unholstering his pistol with the same motion and giving it a casual, unmistakable gesture. Move.

The men oblige, though not without smirking among themselves. A few chuckles follow. One calls after you, mock-friendly, “Good luck, then!”

When you glance back, one of them winks and blows you a kiss.

John doesn’t let go of you for another mile.

A storm looms on the horizon, and you’re already soaked through by the first cold mists when the argument over where to make camp starts. No patch of trees is going to cut it, not with that heavy quilt of cloud rolling in. 

You take a chance on a big farm whose fields you cut through, aiming for the darkened barn. You’re not looking forward to sleeping in smelly hay amongst what sounds like horses and smells like pigs through the doors, but it’s at least dry. But as soon as John reaches for the doors, a voice cracks behind you.

“Stop right there.”

The two of you swing around, John instinctively grabbing your arm, but you stop. It’s a gangly teenage boy in a raincoat and wellies, holding a cricket bat.

John’s hand goes to his hip and you elbow him hard in the ribs.

“John, he’s just a kid,” you hiss.

“He’s not.” he responds, and then you see a man cutting down the meandering path from the house, an iron poker in hand.

“Get away from my son,” the man barks, raising the poker.

“John, don’t,” you latch onto his arm as his hand drops to his holster, wrapping yourself around his forearm like an anchor.

“Darl, if you don’t…”

“We’re armed!” you shout at the man, which makes him stumble. “Please, stop. We don’t mean any harm, we just want to get out of the rain.”

“Macsen? What’s going on out there?” A woman’s voice follows.

“The whole bloody family,” John huffs, trying to subtly shake you off, your bags knocking together.

“John.” you hiss again.

“They said they’re trying to get out of the rain,” the boy tells the woman who appears beside him with a lantern. 

The man puffs up his chest, poker still raised, eyes narrowing through the rain. “Liars,” he spits. “You’re after something. Probably looking to steal.”

“Please, we aren’t thieves. We’re heading to–” you swallow, fighting the urge to glance at John. He’s heading to Hereford. You’re chasing a vague promise of somewhere ‘pretty and safe to die.’ “West,” you manage. You rush to add your name and, “...this is my husband, John. We just want to sleep somewhere dry.” Your eyes dart to the woman, pleading.

The woman gives her husband a look, and you feel your expression working its magic. “Mac…”

“West?” he interrupts. “Be more specific. We’ve been hit six times now. I’m not losing another bloody animal.”

“Hereford,” John twists his arm enough to break your grip and catch you by the strap of your bag.

The man’s eyes rake over John’s vest, the holster at his hip, the rifle slung across his shoulder. “You a soldier?”

“I am.”

“Cool,” the boy mutters under his breath, lowering the bat.

“Give us a moment,” the woman says firmly, touching her husband’s arm. She pulls him aside, their heads ducking close. The boy lingers, fixed on John’s gear with adolescent fascination.

You catch snippets of their argument through the wind—Macsen tense, full of distrust. The woman is gentler. Something about how she’d want someone to help them. Then the boy chimes in, louder. Shrugging. “Things can’t get worse anyway.”

You give him a small, nervous smile. Good to know teenagers still find time for sarcasm, even when the world’s gone to hell.

After another minute, the couple breaks. The woman’s won the argument, judging by her husband’s scowl.

“You don’t have to sleep with the horses,” she says. “There’s an old bunkhouse out on the other side of the house.”

Relief floods through you. “Thank you,” you say quickly, grabbing John’s arm as they lead you around the property. Rain pours down now, heavy enough to blur the lantern light. “We’ll be gone by morning.”

“You better be,” the man grumbles, but he doesn’t look back.

The bunkhouse smells musty. It’s damp in the corners. Cobwebs hang off the ceiling. Mouse droppings are scattered under the beds. 

Still, the roof is solid, and the walls keep the wind at bay. Beggars can’t be choosers.

The only dripping comes from your wet clothes, hung over the empty bunks to dry.  The lantern you borrowed from Nicola—Mac’s wife—casts a weak, amber light, barely enough to light up your corners.

There’s no bedding or cot, just your sleeping bags. You curl into yours, burrowing deep, trying to trap what little warmth there is, and John takes the spot closest to the door. He’s slow tonight. Boots set neatly beside his space, rifle leaned beside them. He’s reassembling his sidearm, inspecting each piece before it clicks back into place.

You watch the side of his face, the silvers in his beard standing out in the lantern’s weak light. You want to think about the cottage again, indulge in that memory, but your head is elsewhere. 

John’s going to Hereford. He’s military. Special forces. What if that’s what this is–what those men meant? Him marching off to die with his soldier friends, and bringing a souvenir along?

You start to ask, but the thought withers on your tongue. Only a faint, aborted “Are you going to…” slips out before you stop yourself.

John hasn’t hurt you. He told you that night at the Greggs that you were safe with him. You remind yourself again—he would have done it already.

When you find a good place to part ways, he’ll let you go. You have to believe it.

Still, you want intel. Even if it gets you in trouble with him.

“So…Hereford. I assume you’re heading back to base?” you say at last, staring up at the underside of the top bunk. The wood’s carved with names and places from all over the world. You reckon this used to be a workaway.

John sets his pistol aside and runs a hand through his hair. He scratches at his beard, then reaches over to turn out the lantern. “I have something to retrieve there,” he says as he plunges the shelter into darkness.

You can’t help yourself. “No drop-offs?”

He doesn’t bite. There’s only the shift of his sleeping bag. You wait another long minute before trying again.

“Do you think the soldiers are really doing that?”

This time, he does respond—tired and wary. “Doing what?”

You pick at the bag lining. “Taking things and company.”

He doesn’t hesitate. “Without a doubt.”

Sleep drains out of you in an instant. You jolt upright so fast your head nearly bangs the bunk. “Really?”

“It’s the end of the world. Large groups of men with stockpiles of proper weapons—they’ll be the ones who take whatever they want.”

“That’s…”

“Don’t know why you’re surprised, love,” he sighs. “The closer we get to impact, the more the world falls apart. People start showing their true faces.”

You try to push back, clinging to the softer moments you’ve seen. “But we’ve met good people—t-the campers, travelers…the family who let us stay here.”

John scoffs. “If I didn’t have my kit, that man would’ve tried to bash our heads in. Good people do ugly things when they’re scared and backed into a corner. It’s going to get worse than that old man in the shed. There’ll be more like him before it’s done. When push comes to shove, the men with sticks use them. They’ll kill to get what they want, especially now that there are no consequences.”

He pauses, exhaling. Frustration hangs off his every word. “A couple good deeds don’t cancel out human nature.”

You lie back down. “You’re a soldier,” you whisper, your heart pounding. The cudgel of reality swings back down on you, held fast in John’s fist. It drives a dark thought straight to the surface, and with a bolt of what feels like idiotic defiance, you fling his own words back at him. “Are you going to kill to get what you want, now that there are no consequences?”

The bunkhouse falls quiet, then John sighs.

And it really is sloppy. Wet, messy. Your poor cunt swollen and dripping, leaking so much that it starts to puddle on the starchy sheets below. His Lieutenant is a big man, and he feels a pinch of sympathy swell at the fuckin' sight of you—limp, like a doll; wrists bound above your head, skin inflamed and chaffed from struggling to get out.

On the end table, he spots a water bottle and scattered tablets. Sleeping pills, he's sure. Something to keep you docile and quiet while he's called away from the divine split of your lax thighs, and sent halfway across the city by Price. Leaving you all alone, unattended. Unable to do anything except wait for him to get back so he can stretch that sore, messy cunt on his cock all over again, fill you right back up—

Poor thing.

But he can't really deny that the modicum of sympathy he feels is scrapped together from the sludge at the bottom of a dry well. Just droplets in the palm of his hand, and honestly—it's more jealousy that Simon got to you first instead of real pity because he'd be lying (hand on a Bible, fingers gripping the beads of a rosary—i shall not lie) if he said that the sight of you hasn't been haunting him since the moment they wandered into the diner. His mind spinning debauched thoughts of you—dressed up pretty in soft pink and chocolate brown—from the moment you wandered over to his table, looking like a dream. Like a cutout from a porno magazines his dad hid inside the shed in an old shoebox.

Just the sweetest little thing.

And he's not the only one.

They've all been prowling around you a little bit since landing in your sleepy-eyed town—asking for more coffee even though it tasted like shit and was burnt to hell, just to keep you close. To keep you coming back to their table as they soak in their fill.

Price dropping rasping sweetheart's and love's and thank you, darlin's that they all pretended not to hear. And Simon—

Well. He sees now where all those lingering stares, the ones that made Johnny's hackle raise, hair standing on end, led his Lieutenant, and what they meant. He thought it was wariness at first—or maybe that's just what he told himself late at night when he pulled his shirt up his navel, fingers grazing the thick trail of course hair to the soft, sensitive patch of skin at the base of his cock. Thinking about the way his Lieutenant looked at you. A whisper in the back of his head that screamed wrong and no and look away, she's fucking mine; little bites, nips, he couldn't hold back even when his hand curled around the base of his thickening cock, drawing twisted, ugly fantasies of what Ghost might do with a pretty thing like you.

And fuck—

What that did to him. Does.

It would be another lie if he said he's never thought of it before. Got off on the idea of it. Something that started as a cut—just this little papercut that he kept scratching and scratching until it tore, splitting further apart. Opening wide, like a chasm. This gaping hole that pulsed around the thought of his Lieutenant. A sick little thing that throbbed around the shape of him. The absurd width and the way he moved—like a mean, old dog Johnny would sometimes find prowling corners on the outskirts of town. A grizzled tiger with broken teeth, snapping it's maw at anything that got close enough to eat. Just this awful, mean looking thing in size and shape and temperament. Hard, jagged lines. Solid like a brick. And then—

You. Recoiling when he curled a massive paw around the cup of coffee. His palm swallowing it whole when you could barely get your fingers to meet around the thick of the base. The size difference clicking in a way it sometimes did when pretty, feisty things would try to step toe to toe with him and have to glare up, up, because they barely even reached his chin.

The urge to overpower. To claim. To tuck something smaller and softer than himself beneath the bulk of his body, hiding his kill from view.

He's always been the driver, not the passenger. The one in control. The main character, not the one watching from the sidelines, though—

But he really can't get the thought of Ghost swallowing up someone the way he did with the cup. A stomach-churning thought. Just a sick obsession burning in the back of his head—the massive brute rutting against you. The juxtaposition between the big, nasty beast and the pretty thing beneath him crying out because he's just too big burns him sometimes.

And he should help you.

Wants to, too. Really, he does. Wants to be your knight in shining armour, rescuing you from the big, scary man who tied you to his bed and ravaged you like this, made that poor, little pussy ache when he stretched you on his fat cock. Wants to so bad—

But he wants a taste even more.

Wants to lick your messy, abused cunt until his Lieutenant isn't dripping from you anymore. Until the only thing glistening on your folds is his spit and your slick. Maybe—if he has time—slide inside your poor pussy and fill it up again, like he wasn't even there in first place. Ghost wouldn't even know the difference, would he? Would come back to you leaking all over the sheets, just like he left you. Ready for seconds (or fifths, sixths, considering the fuckin' mess between your thighs, and goddamn, if that isn't one of the hottest sights he'd ever seen—); pretty little cunt ready for that fat, thick cock to split it apart again, stuff it full of cum all over again—

He palms his cock, thoughts of calling for help dissolved into a keening in the back of his head; just this unignorable, urgent need to eat. Hunger like he'd never felt before, strong enough that just looking at you splayed out like the helpless little victim you are, leaking and messy and full of fucking cum that isn't even his, is making his belly growl. He'd cut his own arm off at this point for just a fucking taste—

And he gets it. Drops to his knees at the edge of the bed, wrapping his hands around your thighs before he pulls you into his mouth for that first, scorching lick—

And it's salty, bitter. Thick. Ghost's cum tastes pretty fucking gross, really (something he isn't too surprised by considering the man's diet mainly consists of barely cooked red meat, Marlboros, and bourbon)—or maybe he just doesn't have the acquired taste for it—and he winces, a little, thinking about the dried remnants of it around your mouth, how many times you had to drink down the same, briny taste; but it's not—

It's not enough to make him stop.

Underneath the brine of it, the fuckin' smell of you and his Lieutenant dense in his nose, he can taste you. Sweet. Earthy. Slightly metallic—like the first lick of a papercut, and it makes him whine in the back of his throat, rasping out a muffled, slurred, poor baby before laving his tongue over your abused cunt, soothing the ache Ghost must have left behind. The stretch that was probably on the wrong side of too much, turning his milky cum a pretty strawberry pink.

You poor fucking thing—

He can feel just how swollen you are when he splits your bruised folds apart with his fingers, peeling them away so he can dig his tongue into your tender, chaffed hole to scoop out a mouthful of pink-tinged cum that pools inside of you. Salty and bitter and so fucking perfect, he could almost weep. It spills down his chin, stains his shirt, and despite the several swallows he takes, feeling the slimy, thick cum oozing down his throat, there's still so much of it. A thought that makes him whine, that has him rutting against the side of the bed like a dog because god, you're so fucking full, aren't you?

His hand presses against your pelvis—fingers pushing into the space between your lower belly and mound to push more cum from your cunt, sitting like an eager fucking thing between the split of your thighs, mouth open, tongue out to catch anything that spills from you. Fingers pushing and pushing. Swallowing it down, one mouthful after the other—

Ghost, when he'd changed after a mission that got him a little too messy, was just this jumble of scar tissue and thick pelt, and that's where it should have ended. Eyes politely averted, maybe a crass joke at his Lieutenant's expense (handsome, my bloody arse), but he couldn't stop looking at the thing dangling between his gnarled thighs. The way it hung there, swaying between his legs. Thick and fat and uglier than anything he'd ever seen before. The urge to ask—fuck, LT, how do you ever get pussy with a hideous thing like that?—crawling up his throat as he stared and stared and—

got harder than he'd ever been in his entire life, coming so fucking hard, that his belly ached after

—and he thinks of it now. Almost the width of his wrist soft, and how much bigger it must have gotten when he peeled your panties away, unveiling the pretty, slick split of your cunt. His hand slides up your belly, resting above your belly button where he knows the tip of Simon's cock would reach by memory alone, and how deep he'd speared it into you. Stretching you out around his fat cock, making this pretty pussy swallow every fuckin' inch—

He cums, then, rutting against the side of the mattress, head fuzzy with nothing but the thought of Simon ruining your cunt, coming inside of you over and over again, the taste on his tongue—sweet, wrecked pussy, and bitter, cherry-tinged cum—

He grunts, groaning into the swollen mess of your cunt before shoving his tongue as deep inside of your fluttering, swollen little hole as he can get, and still, somehow, finding the taste of Simon even after his belly feels stuffed full with it.

A dream, he thinks, rubbing his mouth and chin over your messy, wet folds; the silken, swollen split of a tender, well-fucked cunt the most heavenly thing he'd ever felt against his skin. And the fact that all that pink-tinged cum soaking into his stubble belongs to his Lieutenant is something that just wrecks him more than he thought it ever would. A fantasy spinning behind his eyes as he imagines the way you'd have cried and thrashed and screamed when slid that hideous fucking cock inside of your tight cunt, balls slapping against your seam hard enough that he feels the irritated, burning skin above the plush dents of your ass cheeks. How terribly he must have treated you, such a sweet little thing, as he heaved above you, hands curled around your hips, maybe digging into your waist, as he pulled you back into each thrust just to make sure this sweet cunt he risked so much to fuck, to ruin, took every, hard earned inch. Rutting into like a beast, a man starved. The way he looked down at you probably taking on the same shape and colour of that look Johnny saw in his eyes when you turned your back to the table, shoulders tensing like you knew there was a tiger hiding in the bushes behind you.

Pretty, dumb little prey too bracket by the idea of safety indoors and the cellphone inside your pocket to notice the behemoth of a man luring in the shadows after you clocked out for work, following you to your car before he scooped you up and slaked his hunger on this little cunt Johnny can't stop fucking with his tongue either, too eager for another sip despite how sore he knows you must be. Stretched wide around something thicker than his own wrist, insides feeling like the same papercuts he itched to madness in the back of his own head.

Poor thing, he thinks again when you stir, letting out a sluggish little whimper. But it's a muted sense of sympathy. Like the oooh and ahhh of an ambivalent crowd; humming along in obligation instead of real pity because despite how tight your little hole gets around his tongue when he curls it inside, and the darkening of that pretty, pink-tinged cum to rose-red, he's too hungry to stop.

This is the first real meal he's had in years, and no matter how much you wince and whine, he knows he has to take what he can before the predator returns to finish off your bones.

Later, with his belly full and his lips sticky with dried cum and slick, he finds his way back to the diner with the document in hand, ignoring the piercing look Ghost sends him and offering up an easy grin.

Lax and nonchalant because the man will find nothing amiss when he gets back to his room because Johnny had no reason at all to go into the bedroom at all. He'll open the door and see you splayed over the mattress, pussy wet and messy and still leaking cum—

(pink-tinged, of course, because Johnny got a little carried away himself by that sweet clench of you around the thick of him. something he'll coo about and apologise for later when he sneaks back inside for another taste—)

But what he forgot was the keen eyes and sense of smell on an apex predator, and when Simon snatches him up by the scruff of his neck before shoving him against the wall with a hungry, snarling, teeth-clacking kiss (that's more of an eating, really; a devouring that makes Johnny's cock throb and his stomach whine in longing), all he can say is whoops when Simon growls out,

cw: suggestive language and content, mature language and content, smut, unprotected piv, breeding kinks, cumplay, oral, graphic depictions of violence + gore + murder, depictions of assault and bodily harm, dubcon, obsession, possessiveness, halloween/horror movie vibes (18+)

The one thing that no one can outrun is time.

It's not possible to pause; you cannot escape the path that it moves, the only thing you can do is keep moving with it until your feet catch up. Even when you can't hear the clock ticking, you know it's still moving because everything else moves along with it, at the same pace, always.

No matter who you are or what you do, it's not something you can buy. It's not something you can block with a heavy door or weaken with a solvent. As small as the ant you step on and as large as the wave that pulls you under, time is an inevitable hook.

One day, it will wrap a hand around your ankle and tug; and there will be nothing for you to hold onto to keep you from falling.

You end your podcast right on the hour. You hit the button on your monitor, stopping the stream, and you lift your headphones off and set them down onto their little stand. You sigh as you rest your head in your hands, scrolling through some of the comments. You smile a little at the praise; you just finished your multi-part series about a real-life serial killer that had yet to be caught. It has been your most successful series to date—you had interviewed actual stakeholders in the investigation, including the family of one of the victims and a detective from one of the police departments that hoped your global audience would be able to help them gather clues or information. The new information and your extensive research made your re-telling of events more recent and more exciting.

You prided yourself on discussions about true crime primarily based on factual evidence and little assumption. Of course, there is always room for interpretation sometimes, especially when caught killers don't give reasons or motive for the things they've done, but the evidence is always laid out in a particular way that you've always believed will lead to putting the puzzles pieces of a crime back together. It's all in how you look at the full picture. Sprays of blood have origin points of trajectory. The murder weapon has ownership, fingerprints, sometimes residue from where it came from. The cause of death can tell a lot about what kind of killing has occurred—sixty stab wounds were more personal than a single gun-shot wound.

Crimes of passion. Crimes of vengeance. Crimes of evening the scores, split-second reactions, love and obsession and irritation. It was fascinating and horrifying to you all at once, and you love that your telling of these stories and events could resonate with such a large audience. There is importance in giving victims remembrance and attention. There is significance in talking about how innate systems fail victims, in how the occurrence of violent crimes in certain places can be perpetuated by environments, failing governments, and societal expectations. It gives a platform to discuss mental health and advocacy for different groups.

Your most recent spotlight case is unique; normally, you like to discuss cases that have been solved. You like to poke holes in the investigations and talk about what went right and what went wrong, from beginning to end. This time, however, you discussed a case that hasn't been solved yet. A serial killer that originally seemed to be based in the UK, that seems to have now gone international. United States. Canada. Mexico. Argentina. Italy. Germany. Their hands are in many places, their mark left just subtle enough to identify them as you followed their crimes from one country to the next.

You've nicknamed him Ghost. You discussed in part two extensively about how the signature and manner of the killing can only be done by a man. You don't prefer to reduce killers down to their gender or sex, as the ability to kill is not reduced just to those single factors, but this one in particular makes the most sense to you. A man is the most likely to kill in this way.

There is a particular way he leaves his victims. Some of them have been gutted and carved with great precision and care. Others have been murdered by a great distance with a single gunshot to the head or right through the heart; one of his victims, a giant in the world of human trafficking, was hit straight through the femoral artery and left to bleed out and suffer straight through to the end. A deliberate killing—he had the ability to give him a swift end, but he chose not to.

Sickening. Admirable. Interesting.

You've deduced that he must have a military background and be from the UK. His first few kills were identified around the London, Brighton, and Manchester areas, and all were similarly killed with a precise gunshot wound to the head or heart. From the bullet casing found on the scenes and the angle of the bullet, investigators had placed their killers from at least a thousand yards away.

His more personally-killed victims were outside of the UK. Traffickers gutted in the deserts of Mexico. Child predators run over in the hills of Colorado. Domestic violence perpetrators hung up to bleed out in Capri, Italy. He was traveling the world and cleaning up the streets, overpowering his victims and terrifying them until their very end. Statistically, there were more men in the service than women, and with the size of some of his victims, it was very unlikely that anyone except a man was committing such crimes. Men tend to be more driven by their testosterone as well; anger, violence, the need to release energy in such a terrible and nasty way. You weren't completely omitting the idea of a killer that wasn't a man, but you felt it made more sense to go with statistical and deductive reasoning.

Your Ghost is ruthless. Kills without remorse. Illusive. He leaves no evidence except for a bullet casing that's untraceable or a victim with too much of themselves missing to make any sort of conclusions. No one wanted to believe that all of these murders could be by the same perpetrator, but there were too many similarities in death circumstances to make you think it was anyone except for your Ghost.

My Ghost, my Ghost, my Ghost.

You tried to keep the admiration out of your voice, but it was hard. The people your Ghost killed were illusive themselves; their cases getting thrown out of court, their pockets too deep for any systems to hold them accountable. He strung them up and rung them out, and while you had to condemn him for killing outside of the law, he was a vigilante that you saw as all too redeemable. Maybe you were letting it get too personal. Maybe you were not looking at the cases through an objective lens. Maybe you had reviewed too many cases where murderers and killers slipped through the hands of the law too easily, serving just a couple years for causing nothing but terror and destruction, and you were letting your Ghost's heavy hand be the hammer of God that you wished so badly to wield yourself.

Your Ghost was judge, jury, and executioner, and you liked him that way. You liked him free and anonymous and hiding in dark corners. You liked that when systems worked in favor of wrongdoings, your Ghost kept the balance where he could. He has a Rolodex of people on a hit list, and he was going through them one-by-one.

Every time you read about someone new eating the shit they dealt themselves, you hoped it was your Ghost.

Your cases shift. The next case you discuss mentions the father that murdered his entire family, slipping away from accountability when the evidence brought by the state was thrown out due to the lack of a warrant when the murder weapon was obtained. He was walking free in Cincinnati, Ohio, working a day job and sleeping in the same house he murdered his family in.

When the same man is reported missing a few weeks later, you pretend not to notice. You pretend to be surprised when someone mentions it, how awful it must be that something so tragic has occurred, but at night, in your bed, you dream about your voice being the invisible hand that drives his own. You the brain, he the muscle.

You the judge, he the executioner.

Your favorite day of the entire year is October 31st. Halloween, your favorite holiday, a day filled with festivities and warm lights and cool weather and sweets. There's a party later that you're eager to attend, and you get to host your Halloween special showcase. You usually tell scary stories and host a special guest, and it's always a good stream with an influx of new subscribers and viewers to join in on the spooky theme.

Tonight is no different. You get hundreds of new subscribers, host a paranormal investigator to discuss their upcoming web-show, and a user going by redthread141 donated $1,000.

Your costume is intricate, something you made yourself. An angel costume with heavy wings, a white silk dress with a leather corset around the middle. You've decorated the whole outfit with feathers and pearls and rhinestones so it glitters and moves with every swing of your hips. It's cheesy, sure, but it's Halloween, and you like the contrast of horror and innocence melded into one holiday.

Your friends are terrible pranksters. As soon as you make it to the pub, everyone is dressed as interpretations of a ghost. Some of your friends have draped sheets with holes cut out for their eyes over their heads, others have bought cheap Ghostface masks and swung plastic daggers in your face. It's funny, and it makes you laugh, and it's subtly a celebration of all your success with your recent series. Your show is really resonating with people, and you've got a good thing going on.

It's cool outside when you step out for a breath of fresh air. You take a seat on the curb, digging your heels into the pavement, and when you rest your head on your knees, you smile at the figure you see smoking a cigarette next to the streetlamp. It's a man, a big one, leaning against the pole as he stares at you with a cold gaze. He wears a mask that's pushed up out of the way so he can take another drag of the cigarette, and you smile at him as you meet his eyes.

"I like your interpretation," you say softly. His mask is crudely DIY, with a skull faceplate sewn to the front. He wears all black, a hoodie over his head and windbreaker overtop, dark cargoes tucked into thick boots and skeleton-painted gloves to hide his hands. He licks over his teeth when he realizes you're talking to him. "Of Ghost. It's cool. Creepy. Did you make it yourself?"

He flicks the end of the cigarette, dropping ashes, and when he blows out a breath of smoke, he nods once in your direction.

You stand up a little too fast, stumbling a little. There's a lot of alcohol in your system, but you steady yourself with a few steps before coming towards him to admire his costume a little closer. You smile up at him, shaking out your wings, and when you put your hands on his chest, you coo at the feeling of fat and muscle underneath.

"Mmmm…" You tilt your head back so you can look up at him better. He's much taller than you, big and broad, and you slide your hands boldly down his pecs before settling around his solid middle. He flexes a little under your touch, and you bite your lip. "I think I like your costume the best. Everyone else's is kinda stupid. Yours is the real deal, huh?"

He tilts his head to the side, like a predator studying prey. His eyes rake over your face, splaying you open, and your lips part gently as you stand on your toes to get closer to him.

"W-Will I see you inside?" You hiccup, blinking up at him. He stares for a few more moments, not moving, and then he nods once again. You smile, a little giggle leaving you, and you drop your voice to a whisper. "W-Wait, what's your name? I forget."

He tilts his head to the other side, and you put a hand over your mouth to stop your louder laugh.

"Oh right," you snort. "Ghost."

You're warm and tingly all over back inside the pub. Your leg bounces as you sit at the bar, your lips wrapped around a plastic orange straw as you stare at the door and wait for the mysterious Ghost to come back inside. Your drink is spilling tufts of delicate clouds from the dry ice the bar procured for special Halloween drinks, and you whine when every man that comes up to you isn't the big, giant skeleton-man you met outside. You wonder which one of your friends invited him—maybe it would take your mind off your anonymous admirer if you got your back blown out by a tall bear-man in your very own bed.

You never see him come back inside, which disappoints you. You nearly jump out of your body when you turn around and see he's standing right behind you.

A nervous giggle leaves you. His hood leaves a dark shadow over his face, and you gasp with delight when you see him there. Your hands find his chest again, and you lean forward, chin resting on his chest, staring up at him with sparkly, wet eyes.

"Ghost," you whisper, relaxing when you feel his big paw-hands gripping you by your waist. "I-I didn't see you come in. I thought you were leaving me hanging."

You pout a little, your lashes fluttering, and he leans down towards you, saying nothing but shaking his head. Your pout falls, and a smile comes back, and a little squeak leaves you when he bends down far enough to press the front of his mask against you, his covered lips touching your own. You laugh, giving him a kiss back, and you whine when he grips the back of your seat and tugs you forward. You grip the front of his jacket and hold onto him tight, your feet kicking a little as he moves you so easily with nothing but a flex of his big arms.

"I like calling you Ghost," you murmur. "Is it—" You hiccup, "—okay if I call you Ghost?"

He nods once, and you shiver a little. Maybe you're just too drunk. You're not thinking clearly. You're using this masked stranger to fantasize about the very personification of your anonymous killer. Your Ghost. Your man of mystery, that you think might be listening to you, taking hints from you, taking advantage of your silent offering as if to entice you—serenade you. He notices you, and he wants you to notice him, and now you're staring up at this big, beefy stranger and hoping you can put all of your explicit, terrible thoughts about another man you don't know doing just as you please him to. You're sick. You're twisted.

Horny.

You squeeze your thighs together, biting your lip.

"D-Do you wanna…" You breathe against the front of his mask, gripping the collar of his jacket now, tugging him even further down towards you so you can kiss him again over the mask. Your tongue pokes out to slide against where his lips would be, and he grunts, squeezing your waist a little too hard. "C-Closet—there's a closet—oh!"

It's pitch-black when he closes the door.

You giggle, swaying, and you shriek with delight when he uses those big arms to pick you up from under your thighs. You wrap your arms around his neck, leaning your forehead against his, and you whine as he presses his hips against yours and grinds up into you.

"C-Can—" You hiccup again. "I-I wanna kiss you—"

He grunts, and one of your hand falls so you can touch his masked face.

"P-Please? Please—" You gasp. "Let me kiss you—"

"No."

You whimper when his hand wraps around your throat and shoves you into the wall. You grip his shoulders tight, shivering, and your eyes flutter shut as he keeps rutting his hips against yours. You moan, entirely too loudly, when his cock slots against your cunt and he pushes up against your clit. Delicious, hot pangs of pleasure warm up your spine, and you cling to him for dear life.

You come fast, and you know it's because you're drunk. You grip the edges of his shirt, panting against his mask, and he hums, all satisfied, at the way you cry. You feel like a teenager, getting touched by your crush during a little game of seven minutes in heaven. This is better than heaven, cause it's definitely been less than seven minutes, and you are seeing paradise behind your eyes.

"I-I'm coming—" You whimper. "C-Coming…"

He sets you down onto jelly legs afterwards. You reach between your bodies, feeling under your dress, giggling when you feel how sticky and wet you are between the thighs. He crowds you against the wall, and your head bangs against it as he presses you into it.

"I wanna…" You lean up on your toes and kiss the front of his mask. It's like there's nothing behind his eyes as they look you over, but you think you feel his tongue on the other side of his mask, and the tease of it only makes you drool. "Will you…t-take me home? Pretty, pretty please?"

This role play thing he has going on is really doing it for you. You might be tipsy, but you're lucid enough to know that you would have never had the confidence to bring him home if you were truly sober. You're still so giggly as you open the door to your apartment, grabbing his gloved hands and tugging him inside as you shut and lock the door behind you. You flick on just the lamps, creating a soft, yellow glow in the room, and you light a few candles to set the mood before turning to face him.

You shimmy your angel wings off, tossing them aside, and Ghost just tilts his head to the side and watches you. You kick your heels off, smiling at him, and he puts a big hand on his chest and slides it low as he watches you fit two fingers under the straps of your dress and slip them off, the fabric pooling at your feet.

You think if you weren't drunk, you'd be much too shy to do this, too. This man is big and bulky, and there's a little voice in the back of your head that wonders if you're the kind of girl he would like. Soft, thick around the middle, in your thighs. Your insecurity vanishes the moment the dress falls—his hand grips his bulge, squeezing as he shakes his head and lets out a harsh breath at the sight of you.

You try to climb him like a tree, and he takes the weight easily. Picking you up with barely a sound, crowding you until he can tip over your couch and fall over on top of you. You slide your hands down his back, throwing your head back as he grinds into you, and your mouth falls open at the sound of his belt unbuckling.

"Oh—please—" You gasp. "Please, please, please—" You nudge your nose against his. "Won't you let me kiss you?"

He grips your jaw with a big palm, sitting up on his elbows. He stares down at you, eye-black around his eyes smudged by his sweat. It's now that you realize his lashes are blonde, and you smile up at him all relaxed and gooey under his touch. You close your eyes and stick your tongue out, and you are finally rewarded with the feeling of his lips. His tongue is wet against yours, saliva pooling between your mouths as you kiss all sloppy and hot. You close your arms around his neck tighter, crossing your ankles at the base of his spine so you can force him to lay over you. You moan into his mouth when you realize he's lowered his cargoes just enough, his cock hot and heavy between your bodies.

"Yes, yes, yes—" You pant, arching your back. He chuckles low, one of the first real glimpses of his voice that you get, and you want more of it. You reach between your bodies, wrapping a hand around his cock, and he hisses roughly as you squeeze the leaking tip. "O-Oh…" You lick into his mouth. "S-So…oh, y-you're big."

He growls at that. He falls from one hand, supporting himself on an elbow, and you give his cock a languid stroke as you giggle against his cheek.

"Easy, love," he finally speaks. He's got an accent, something deep and gravelly and English, and your eyes roll back in your head as you drink it in. "Drive a man mad like tha'."

You cup his cheeks, kissing him again, and you breathe all labored and wanting as he uses one hand to push your panties to the side so he can slide his cock between your folds.

"He speaks," you whisper, touching your tongue against his, and he doesn't give you any more words before he slips the tip inside and rocks your whole world. You don't have the kind of head space that asks him to wear a condom. You're so needy, so eager, that you need it, and you need it now. You sink your nails into his shoulders, locking your knees around his hips, and you laugh breathlessly as he hooks his arms under your knees and sinks all the way inside of you. You feel him so deep—he's in your stomach, that's for sure—and you squeeze around him tight. You've never been this wet, and you think that's your only saving grace.

You don't spend the whole night underneath him. You change positions quite often. You let him take you on your tummy, his thighs smacking against your own. You let him flip you over, his back against the couch, and you bounce pathetically on top of him as you try to match the fast pace he set. You close your thighs around his head, cunt grinding along his mouth, with the tip of his cock between your lips as you suck the taste of yourself off of him. You never undress him—he's fully-clothed, the fucking asshole—but you're naked and crying underneath him for most of the night. You don't count the orgasms. You don't count how many times you change positions. All you can do is nod and let him move you and then come again when he touches you like he knows you.

Like he knows me. Like he knows me. Like he knows me.

He's smoking a cigarette on your balcony. He's got his boots still on—the weirdo—even though you fucked him six ways to Sunday. His mask is still there, barely over his lips, and you smile as you pull the blanket over you a little more, tucking your chin under it.

He lingers after he finishes the cigarette. Paces slowly around your living room, gloved hand tracing over the outlines of you that are scattered across the flat. The pictures hanging on the wall, the books along the shelves. He pauses in front of your desk where your setup is.

Expensive, high-quality microphone. Your notebooks filled with your talking points. The streamdeck beside the speakers, the little glowing lights and knickknacks you keep around, the keyboard with the thocky switches that you spent an hour assembling all by yourself. You sit up a little, watching him as he rolls your chair back and admires the standing desk. You giggle when he uses the little buttons, making it rise and fall.

"Neat, right? Ergonomic," you wink at him. He spreads a few of your notebooks out on the desk, and you watch with a curious eye as he picks up a particular one and opens it. The pages crinkle from all the writing, and you swallow. "I…that's my…work."

His gloved hand stops on a particular page. He drags a finger over the words written there, and you clear your throat.

"Uhm…I have a podcast. I do like…" You rub your eyes. "True crime. Investigate cold cases and things…like that."

Ghost looks over at you for a brief moment before looking back down to read. You stand up, holding the blanket over you. He eyes you, squinting, and you point to your bedroom.

"I'm just gonna…get dressed really quick. I'll…be right back."

You smile nervously before padding to your room, dropping the blanket to find some clothes. You slide on a pair of underwear after a trip to the bathroom and slip a pajama shirt on over your head. You look in the mirror as you fix up your hair a bit and wipe the makeup that's smudged, and then you go to open your bedroom door again.

You shriek when you run right into Ghost. He's standing there like a brick wall just on the other side of the doorway, and you put a hand on your chest as you step backwards, your heart thumping.

"Jesus!" You gasp, laughing. "What the fuck?"

He's holding out your notebook to you. It's open on a page, your writing extremely scribbled.

Is he talking to me?

It's been crossed out, but not well enough—you can see it clearly through the strokes you tried to put through the words. You hold your hands close to your chest, cradling them there, and you read the words a couple times over before looking up at him.

"Those are just my work notes. For the stream. It's not…" You shake your head. "Those are private!" You laugh, swiping the notebook from his hands. He tilts his head to the side, narrowing his eyes, and you lean up on your toes. "You are just a nosy Nelly. It's…just research stuff. If you wanna know more, why don't you just watch the episodes, huh?"

He steps forward, and you're forced to step back. You clutch the notebook close, frowning.

"Hey. T-This is my room. I didn't invite you in."

He steps forward again, and you put a hand on his chest.

"Hey. Ghost. It's not funny. I'm serious."

The bedroom door creaks as it shuts behind him. Your hands shake a little, and you step backwards again, putting distance between you. He's intimidating in the dark. He's all bulk, all muscle, all too much for you to take on just by yourself. He could lift you with one arm, the fucking man he is, and you swallow and shake your head.

"I…" You bite your lip. "I-I think you should go. I…had a nice time, b-but I think you should go."

Ghost doesn't move. He tilts his head to the other side, like what you said had no effect on him, and it probably didn't.

"I really." Your voice is small, and it shakes. "I really think you should go."

Your heart sinks straight into your stomach when you see the subtle shake of his head. Your eyes move to the space around him. It would be impossible to maneuver towards the door without him catching you. The window is a no-go—you live on the tenth floor, and you don't have a fire escape. If you want to get out of here, you'll need to improvise.

You'll need to be smart.

For all the fucking podcast episodes you've recorded and streamed, for all the scenarios of people in the same position you stand in just now, you wish you had thought of your game plan when things went to shit.

"You don't want to go," you say softly. Ghost stares still. His eyes drop, looking over you, slow and steady. If you had known you were going to be having sex with a crazed stalker of yours, you would have tried harder to tire him out. You purse your lips, straightening your posture, and he seems amused by that. His gloved hands twitch at his sides. "Then what are you here for?"

He keeps staring. He's still, won't move, and then you look down at the notebook in your hand.

Is he talking to me?

You close it after reading it again. Your fingers tremble as you run them down the cover, thumbing through the pages and pages of notes you have. Quick scribbles, frantic connections you've made, your hunches and your thoughts and your ideas about who your silent killer could be. He's an enigma in your mind but personified by your pen, and you've dreamed about the kind of thing he might be, have had countless different versions played in your head, but you've always thought it was a true stretch that he might be listening.

You picked up the phone constantly, and you never thought there was anyone on the other line—but fuck, you never did hear that dial tone, did you?

"I…" Your eyes sparkle. Tears. He sniffs under the mask when he sees them, and you stiffen when he reaches over and touches just under your chin with his knuckles. You curl into yourself, but you stop yourself from pulling away. You don't know why he's here, but he's obviously fascinated with you. He wants something. He wouldn't have come if he didn't. "I won't tell anyone that…t-that you were here. If you promise to go."

That doesn't satisfy him. He steps forward now that he knows he has you, and your head jerks as he grips you by the jaw and forces you onto your toes. It's frantic, the way he pushes his mask up, and he fists your hair as he kisses you.

You let him.

There was something to be afraid of. There was so much to fear; but as soon as his tongue touches yours, you let your feet shuffle closer, and then your mouth opens wide for him.

You pull away after the first few seconds of bliss, pressing against his chest to keep him a step away. You shake your head, whining, closing your eyes tight to keep yourself from looking at him again. The air around him is intoxicating, and looking at him draws you in.

"I can't do this—we—we can't do this."

You melt when he presses his mouth against your cheek. The hot air from his mouth warms your skin, and the way his hands trail down your back and around your waist is making you dizzy. No one has ever touched you this way; no one has ever made you feel like the object of all their affections, like the center of their gravity. His attention feels stripping, but it feels so good, and as you tighten your fingers around the fabric of his shirt, you know you shouldn't feel this way.

You know him better than most, you'd like to think. There's something about death that is just so intimate. There's something about killing—about its details, all the gory and scary ones—that is just so personal. You may not know his name, but you know where these hands have been. You may not know where he grew up, but you know the places he's been, the corners he lurks in. You know what his cock feels like inside of you, and you know that his face must be scarred to shreds based on the haphazard way they put his lips back together.

These hands have seen war. This body has been used—sold to the highest bidder, turned over in more than one grave, buried alive and then back to the surface. He came for it, for more, because he tasted blood, and he liked it. Fuck, what are you going to do with him?

What are you going to do with the perfection of one man?

Your fingers trace down between his pecs. He's all strength under your palm. He's been molded by time and by things much heavier than you. These hands wield the hammer of God, and those eyes have seen more in his three decades than many have seen in a thousand lifetimes.

"You want something from me," you whisper. With your eyes closed, you can only feel, and the step he takes closer to you envelopes you in warmth. You fall into him, head against his chest. "What is it that you want?"

To want. Do monsters want? This one does. Is he a monster? He can't be. His scars are telltale enough that he is made of flesh and bone. What he does is human because he is human.

You open your eyes. When you touch his face, you notice that his lashes are blonde. Pale.

"Are…" When you blink, a tear makes its way down your cheek, and he watches it fall. "Are you going to kill me?"

That gets a laugh. A deep-bellied, gravelly laugh. When he pinches your chin, your face grows warm, and you feel his kiss through the mask, that press of his lips against the side of your face as he bends to get closer to you.

You wonder if this is what they mean when they call it making love.

His glove hands intertwine with yours. He presses the backs of your hands into the mattress, breath hot as he grinds against your hot cunt. When he lets go to shred your panties out of the way, your hands slide up his sides, digging into his shoulders as he fucks you again.

The kisses feel more raw. His cock is so hard, swelled with blood—like you knowing and letting him have you is his ultimate wet dream. That place in your belly that his cock hits, he touches—he keeps a hand there, pressing down, and your thighs are shaking as you feel him thrusting up into that spot, determined to keep himself there, focused on the illusion that it's possible to carve the shape of his cock into you and keep it there.

"You…You c-came for me?" You whine. You want to cry with it, with the idea. "You knew…about me?"

"Y'r a lot o' things," he rasps. You nearly come just at the sound of his voice, drinking it in, and you reach down to press the heel of his hand hard against your clit. "Stupid…not one of 'em."

Ghost sits up on his haunches, leaning over you. He guides your legs up and over his shoulders, and you rest your hands on his forearms as he stares down at you. You arch your back, wiggling your toes, and he barely can handle a few moments of eye contact before he's coming inside of you.

You cry when he does. You reach down, eyes rolling back as you use your own sticky fingers to get yourself there. His hand falls to squeeze the side of your ass, and with his hard touch, you come, too, eager, wet, creaming. He draws his hands up your thighs, grabbing around your hips, and you pant hard. You lean your head back, eyes fluttering, and you nearly come again when you see Ghost moving his wet gloved fingers under his mask and hearing the sound of his tongue sucking on the fabric.

Ghost drags a blade down the side of your face once your eyes are back on him. His cock softening inside of you, he contemplates it for a moment—what it might look like if he turned the blade over and used the sharp edge against your soft skin. What color your blood might run if he ran it across your throat and let it soak the very cushions he made you come on. When he runs the edge of it over your pebbled nipple, you don't even cower; you giggle, fucking adorable, and he feels you clench around his cock.

Sick. Twisted. Inevitable.

When he runs the hilt of his knife against your bottom lip, his cock hardens all over again when you let your tongue fall out and you suck it into your mouth.

He's gone in the morning. Not even a boot print left behind to tell you he was there. The cigarette he had stamped out on your balcony is gone, and if it wasn't for the feeling between your thighs, you might have thought you imagined him.

You cry when you feel the empty spot in your bed. You cry because it's cold, and you cry because you miss him, and you cry because you know you shouldn't feel this way, but you do—you do.

You don't have the motivation for research. You sulk for hours, ignoring your phone and the way it rings. You're too upset for this week's episode that you were supposed to record tonight, and you're too mad at yourself for not latching onto him and forcing him to stay.

What did you think was going to happen?

Did you really think he was going to stay? Stick around? Admit to all of the horrible, terrible things that you know he's done and wait around for you to turn him in?

Would you have?

You swallow it whole, these awful truths, and you accept them. It's how you feel; you can't change that. You don't want to. He fascinates you, he intrigues you, and he fucks so good, he made you forget about murder, and for a man whose whole persona revolves around killing, you think that's a pretty good sign to keep him in your bed—

You barely blink at the e-mail notification. It's from one of your video editors, sharing a news article with you. You sigh, bored, hovering your mouse over the link before clicking it. Someone's dead—someone knew. Someone right outside the very pub you were at last night, someone found with a pack of roofies in his pocket and a cheap mask. There had been people complaining about him all night, apparently. There's a leaked picture attached to the e-mail.

The man is splayed out on the pavement, throat slit, arms outstretched—and he's wearing angel wings, positioned as if he's making a snow angel in the middle of the sidewalk. You swallow hard as you sit up, looking around your living room. You see the dress you were wearing still on the floor by the couch; your heels are still beside the coffee table.

You look back at the photo, cursing under your breath.

Those are your angel wings.

Is he talking to me?

When the phone rings, there is no caller ID. You stare at the phone buzzing in your hand, heart thudding as you slide your thumb over to answer the call. You put it to your ear, and there is silence on the other end.

"H-Hello?"

Nothing.

Is he talking to me?

The call does not end. When you bring the phone away to look down at it, the timer still goes up—there's someone on the other end. There's someone listening. You smile. So big, it hurts, this kind of smile.

You put the phone back to your ear, and you close your eyes.

"I saw what you did."

You imagine him there. Underneath you. You imagine him as big and imposing as he presents himself, and you imagine him holding you in a spot you can't escape and forcing you to put your eyes on his. You draw your legs together at the thought. Your mouth waters.