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shotmrmiller · 5 months

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I'm your only situationship.

A/N : yall i stayed up til 324 am writing this. I felt like if i went to bed still only having it as a thought and not on 'paper' thats unacceptable. If i gotta think about this then so do yall! it was also supposed to be a small one shot but it got wildly out of hand im not sorry.

18+ MDNI

TW: typical smut, EXPLICIT mmkay im talkin clutch ur pearls explicit.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗

Simon had finally come home from a grueling 6-month mission. All he wanted was some Kentucky bourbon with you at your favorite seedy bar.

Once he was home, Simon cleaned up, put on a black clinical mask, and sent a text to you to meet him there. As he finished his first glass of the night, a rather attractive young woman approached him, asking if she could buy him a drink.

“Isn’t it supposed to be the other way around, lovie?”

“Not at all. This is after all the 21st century. I’m simply asking— wouldn’t want any missus at home getting upset.”

“There’s no one at home for me, lass.”

“Well then, how about you get yourself another glass, my treat, and we’ll see where this night takes us?”

He slightly nodded —he’d never say no to a free drink— and as she left to order a drink, he took his phone out to text you again.

“C’mon, pet. I’ll cover the tab. Too good f’me, now?”

His phone vibrated a minute later.

“I can’t today, Si.”

“Why not? I know you don’t go out on Sundays.”

As the young woman came back, drinks in hand, he lifted the screen to read your response.

“I’ve got a dick appointment~ It’s been a year and then some and I’m gonna claw at my walls if I don’t get a fix ASAP.”

Simon goes tense— soft blues hardening to a silver and he’s gripping his phone so hard it might crack. He pulls up your contact and calls you within seconds.

“Hiya, Si!”

“What the fuck is a dick appointment?”

“Oh,” you giggle. “I forget you older folk don’t know ‘bout that. It’s just a one-night fling. No commitments or nothin'.’ Exactly what I need right now.” You don’t tell him that the reason you’ve practically regrown your hymen is that when you’re best friends with Simon, every other male in existence pales in comparison.

“Anyway Si-, he’s getting here in like an hour-”

“No.” And hangs up.

The young woman who’s casually rubbing his bicep and shoulder gets practically flung off of him, as he gets up off the bar stool so fast it’s falling back with a loud clang, and he’s yanking his leather jacket on and pulling on his leather gloves so hard they’re about to become fingerless—

“Hey! I thought you didn’t have a girlfriend?!”

One gloved hand gripping the front door, he turns his head slightly to her and says, “Pet, with how good I’m gonna fuck her, she won’t even have to ask to know she’s mine.”

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗

You’re standing in the bathroom with your liquid eyeliner in one hand and phone in the other, staring at the ended call screen. ‘Weird,’ you think, then shrug and put the phone down. ‘Maybe the call got dropped.’

You finally complete the look with your false lashes when there’s a very hard knock on your door. You frown as you look at your phone screen. ‘7:14 pm’. You know the guy said at 8 and you’re in one of Simon’s big shirts he always forgets and your hair is still tied up in an oversized pink and white polka dot scrunchie— The pink leopard print booty shorts you’ve got on will suffice.

The second time there’s a knock it’s even louder.

“Jesus Christ, I’m coming!”

You open the door and say, “I’m sorry I took so long, I—”

Simon flies past you, with a rough shoulder bump and you turn to look at him and he’s almost sprinting to the bedroom, slamming the door open—

“Simon, what the fuck? What’re you doin—”

“Where is he?”, he snarls.

“Who?! Are you talking about my date? He’s not getting here til 8! And why’re you slamming doors in my apartment like you pay my rent?!”

You see Simon deflate immediately at the important part of your answer and chooses to ignore the rest as he takes off his jacket and walks to your hall closet to hang it. Closing your door and locking it, you growl out,

“You need to leave. I haven’t even finished getting ready. I promise I’ll—”

“No, pet.”

“Will you quit interrupting me! Simon, I swear—”

“Pet.”

You’re holding a scream behind your teeth, about to rip the hair out of your scalp when you see Simon take one loop of his mask off from around his ear and then the other. You gape. You’ve seen Simon without his mask— that isn’t the reason you can no longer find your voice. It’s the way he put his gloved middle finger in between his teeth and pulled it off so sensually. You can feel your cheeks and ears radiate heat from just seeing the tip of his pink tongue. Christ, you’re down horrendously.

You open your mouth to say something, anything, to distract yourself from the fact that you’re getting wet over an interaction so chaste when Simon is touching your ass, giving it a hard squeeze, before moving down to the back of your thighs and lifting you up. You startle at the movement and throw your arms around his neck out of habit, hoping he won’t drop you in the move to your bedroom.

He presses you against the wall with his hips, then grabs both of your ankles from behind his lower back and hooks the back of your knees over his forearms. Simon noses your jaw and starts grinding his clothed erection deliciously hard over the definitely wet spot on your shorts and growls out,

“If you think,” grind “that I’m gonna allow My,” grind “Girl,” grind—and you whimper in his ear, “get fucked by some little cock two pump chump,” he gives a forced chuckle, “you must be daft, pet. Or maybe you’re doing it on purpose, eh? Trying to get my attention? Well, you’ve got it now. “

He moves his face to hover his lips over yours— you can lightly smell the bourbon he drank earlier— and he whispers, “You ever like this and I’m around, you come to me. And if I’m away, you wait for me like a good girl and when I come back I’ll give this,” he taps your pussy over your shorts, “greedy little cunt all the cock it can take.”

With a shaky breath, you nod before he kisses you, his bourbon-flavored tongue curling against yours, and you’re moaning into it because you’ve wanted this for too long and he’s finally touching you. Curling your fingers into his ash-brown hair, you move your mouth to his neck, to the right of his adam’s apple, took a bit of skin between your teeth and sucked.

Simon hisses, dips his fingertips into your flesh hard enough to bruise, and all but yanks you off the wall to toss you onto your bed.

You yelp as you bounce from the force of his throw— you’re still bouncing on the bed when Simon grabs the waistband of your shorts and knickers to pull right off, which you’re grateful for because the grey knickers you got on aren’t what anyone would wear for a first, second nor third impression.

Simon grabs both of the back of your knees with one hand, goddamn bear paws, you think, before you feel his tongue in between your lips— so warm and wet and fuck, you needed this, needed him— and he flicks his tongue up and down on your clit. He sticks his long middle finger into you and it goes in without resistance, you’re slippery, drooling over his wrist and finger that’s curled up into the rough patch of nerves against your gummy walls, that he’s pressing into, over and over. God you’re about to come, your legs shake in his one-handed hold and you’ve got a white knuckle grip on the forearm you’re sinking your nails into—

Simon pulls away. You were so close, your eyes start watering because he can’t possibly be this mean to you but then you see him shove his tongue in between his middle and ring finger, eating up your nectar when he says, “The first time I’m gonna make you come, it’ll be on my cock. I want to see the frothy white cream you're gonna leave at the base.”

You’re nodding hysterically at this point, anything for him to make you come, anything for him. With a twirl of his index, he’s telling you to get on all fours. Scrambling, you turn over and arch your back— resting your head on your forearms— and you feel his calloused palms run down from your spine to your ass cheeks before he gives it a spank.

“You have a condom?”

You shake your head and you mewl out, “No, but I’m clean.”

“Good. I don’t want anything between us.”

You arch your back further, pressing your ass further into his hips when you hear his belt buckle clank and zipper open. Simon brings his palm to your other cheek, reddening it.

“Fuckin’ hell, pet. Look at you spread out for me.”

You feel warm velvet over steel over your slit before he slowly pushes inside, not all the way but about a little over half of his length, remembering that your g-spot is a little closer to the front. Fast, relatively shallow thrusts hitting your spot with almost clinical precision have you reeling, your orgasm about to break you, mind and body. Hands tightening painfully, you shatter— loud, high-pitched whines, ringing in your ears and pussy pulsing around Simon’s thick girth— and god, Simon doesn’t stop thrusting. He keeps the same smooth rhythm and you’d think he’s unaffected by the tight vice your pussy has him in— but you hear him, low, deep groans and a tighter grip on your hips telling you otherwise.

He pulls out to bend over your back, completely covering it, and he murmurs in your ear, “I hope you didn’t think we were done. My girl wanted a fuckin’, now she’s gonna get it.”

He takes off your pink, silly scrunchy and you see it around his tattooed wrist before he grabs your hair into a makeshift ponytail and is leaning back up and forcing your back to arch under his pull. You feel his leg at the height of your hips— propped up, foot flat on the bed and knee bent and the other straight on the floor and all you can think of is how this man is gonna kill you with his cock.

Simon snaps his hips forward, fist full of hair pulling back, stretching and filling in one strong thrust, bottoming out. He gives you no reprieve, no time to get used to how fucking deep he is, and sets an intense, firm pace that has you feeling a pinch below the navel every time his hip bones slap against your ass, balls to the clit and you love it. Every pinch in your lower belly has your pussy making a squelching sound and you can’t help yourself— you reach underneath your body to feel how split open you are with two fingers, encasing his cock and feeling the skin drag with them as he pulls out.

That has him hissing air between his teeth, he’s about to come but doesn't want it to be over so he pulls out, and opens your cheeks to spit in your furled hole, before pressing in with the pad of his thumb, and you’re almost screaming. He moves back a bit further to spit in your pussy, not that you need it— you’re drenching the sheets underneath you— and now he’s spearing you with his tongue before curling it, getting your juices pooled on it before coming back up, lips smacking, and he grabs your hair in his ponytail and now he uses his other hand to curls his fingers and palm over the front of your throat and that's all it takes for your vision to darken and arms go limp but he’s again, fucking you through your orgasm and this time you leave a creamy white ring at the base of his length.

“Oh, fuckin hell.” He groans out and it sounds desperate and you know he’s close.

“Come in me, Simon. Please fill me up, I promise I’ll keep it all in.”

He gives a strained chuckle and says, “Pet, I can barely pull out of a driveway much less this tight little cunt.” He squeezes your throat hard, strands of hair popping out of your scalp and his cock feels massive, the pinch in your stomach feels like a cramp from how deep he is and he lets out a low drawn out moan that lasts 3 thrusts— and then there’s warmth filling you up, so much so it leaks from the sides of where you two are connected. Simon lets go of your hair and you fall face-first onto the bed, exhausted. Defeated. Back properly broken. You officially know what it’s like to get fucked within an inch of your life and you love it.

He pulls out slowly, with a hiss from both of you and with one hand on your left cheek, he spreads you to look at your stuffed hole.

“Fuck. I love seeing me drip out of you.”

You’re about to tell him to sod off when the doorbell rings and the both of you stiffen and lock eyes. With a mean snarl, Simon grabs a towel from your bathroom and his mask before stomping his way to answer the door, pink obnoxious scrunchy still on his wrist.

˗ˏˋ ★ ˎˊ˗

#call of duty #cod #cod mw2 #cod smut #simon ghost riley x reader #simon ghost x reader #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon riley #simon riley smut #simon riley x you #simon ghost riley smut #simon ghost x you #ghost cod #cod mwii #ghost mw2 #ghost simon riley #call of duty smut

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hydrobunny · 11 months

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meet me in the pouring rain

tags: comfort, established relationship, aftermath of fights, happy ending!!!!!

obviously, you two had your fights. it would be stupid to think you didn't: stupid to assume the two of you were constantly perfect.

you curl up by the door of your bedroom, trying to stop yourself from crying.

you hated this. you hated how you had expected anything different. of course sae itoshi would choose football over you. it was what he had been doing for his entire life.

but why had you thought today would be something different? just because it was your birthday?

you had asked him if you two were doing anything so excitedly, so stupidly. he had looked at you with the blankest expression you had seen.

and of course when you tried to press the matter, he had snapped at you that he was busy- to not bother him before practice.

and the words had spewed out of your mouth, telling him to get on with it and get out of the house.

sae hadn't argued further, merely blinking at you in vague confusion before slamming the door behind him.

he hadn't returned for lunch. and with the sheer amount of rain outside, you knew he couldn't be practicing still. (well, you mused, there was a slight chance.)

but that meant he had to be taking shelter somewhere away from your home, somewhere with other people.

lightning crackled outside. the rain was really coming on in droves now. you curl further into a ball and listen to your own heartbeat, steady and calming.

the notification sound of your phone was a scare, and you flinch, hard. you look around for the source of the noise. the dings continue on and on.

when you finally find your phone, you're stunned to see the contact sae <33

the messages are a clear change from his usual short ones, practically an entire chain of frantic words. it's a drastic change compared to the dead silence he's been giving you today.

y/n

fuck i'm sorry

i didn't mean what i did in the morning

i forgot the date i'm so sorry

y/n?

i'm outside. you don't have to come if you don't want to. i'll stay.

you stare at that last message. sae was-

you run to her window, heart rate rising. you can barely see past the sheer amount of rain slamming down.

but sae was there. you can make out his vague form, the rain unforgivably landing on top of his head.

you almost fall down the stairs with how fast you run down. you skid to a stop in front of the door.

your hand turns on the knob.

“sae,” you breathe out.

sae looks at you with a bouquet of soaked roses and a small box, looking more like a drowned rat than the boyfriend you knew.

“you're going to get sick,” you sputter. “what were you-”

“i love you,” sae interrupts, eyes glowing with an intensity unfamiliar to you.

you've only seen that look on the field, when he's truly concentrating.

"i'm so fucking sorry," he continues. "i need you to know that you are my first priority. i know i don't act like it- but you're the best thing that's happened to me."

your mouth hangs open, your voice weak. "come inside."

he does. you gently take the roses from him and place them on the table. he pockets the box, and you don't question him.

sae waits patiently for you to speak.

"i'm sorry too," you finally say. "i shouldn't have-"

he grabs onto your hands, squeezing reassuringly. "don't apologize. im the one who forgot. it's not-it'll never be your fault."

you swallow. "i love you. but you should really go change-"

"before that," sae digs back into his pocket and pulls out the neatly wrapped box. "here."

the wrapping paper gives easily underneath your nails. you eye the box warily. it's clearly jewelry, so you crack the thing open-

"jesus christ-" you fumble the box.

sae catches it easily, raising one eyebrow.

"you got a ring?"

"it's not what you think it is." he hums, gently taking the ring out of the box. it's a pretty little thing, all delicate and fragile looking. "my proposal wouldn't be this tacky."

you stare at him. "so the ring is..."

"a promise," he answers as he slides it carefully onto your finger. "for a better one eventually."

the blood rushes to your face immediately. sae doesn't seem phased at all, even if he's just confessed that he's going to marry you.

"i-"

sae sneezes. once, and then twice.

you grab his arm. "okay. you are getting into some warm clothes."

he frowns, but follows you up the stairs anyway.

when the two of you reach the bedroom, you stop him by the door.

"you know, i only wanted two words."

his head tilts almost imperceptibly, confusion leaking-

sae smiles. "happy birthday."

#itoshi sae x reader #sae itoshi x reader #sae x reader #blue lock fluff #blue lock #blue lock x reader #hydrobunny #why do they not have a porch with a roof? who knows

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familyvideostevie · 23 days

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time you will not spend alone

joel miller x fem!reader, 18+ mdni romance at the end of the world is this: flowers, lazy nights in bed after long days, and savoring every moment | or, joel makes you something. jackson!joel au, fem!reader, fluff, maybe a bit cheesy but idgaf, ellie cameo cause i can't do a damn thing without her, tommy gets some page time here too, smut (riding, unprotected p in v sex, some finger sucking lol), tenderness, gift giving | 5.7k a/n: i think this is the last part of the just and just as series for the foreseeable future. thank you for reading about this little au and these two lovebirds! i adore them. thank you @frannyzooey and @macfrog for your eyes and support on this. and thank you everyone else for being patient. <3

Spring sweeps into the valley seemingly overnight. The peaks remain snow-capped but the bare branches of trees between the evergreens begin to bud. Chilly mornings lose their bite and frost turns to dew and every day there is more light.

You've always thought Jackson looks its best in winter, but it's a damn sight to see as life and color return. And the latter is your favorite part -- the rolling hills outside the walls and the forest patrol paths are dotted and then overflowing with flowers.

It makes you feel more alive. Patrol isn't a freezing ordeal anymore -- it's an opportunity to see the remaining beauty in the world.

Today's shift is short and easy but you find yourself lingering, running your hands through pine needles and turning your face to the sun. Your horse is happy to munch on a patch of grass in a clearing just off the main trail, but your patrol partner is less than impressed.

"Are you serious?" Ellie moans. "You're stopping again? What the fuuuuuuuuck."

She sags in the saddle. The pout on her lips makes her look like a kid sent to bed without supper rather than an almost-twenty-year-old forced to spend some extra minutes in the fresh air. Shimmer has no problem chewing on some weeds despite her rider's moaning.

"Let me enjoy the sun," you say. "When you get older you'll appreciate the little things, too."

You hop off your horse and Ellie sighs loudly.

"Jesus, you're not that old," she mutters. "Seriously, what are you doing?"

You sweep your arms around you, gesturing at the meadow. "These flowers are nice," you tell her, pointedly. She adjusts the rifle slung over her shoulder. "I think I'm going to pick some and bring them home."

She snorts. "Oh, is Joel suddenly into flowers?"

You ignore her bait and crouch, gaze sweeping over the array of colors in front of you. You tried to learn the names of flowers years ago when you found a book on them in an old bookstore but they never stuck. Purples, pinks, and yellows, large petals and small ones, delicate yet hardy to survive the world past its end.

Joel isn't a fussy man. Young fathers don't get to be, and anyone alive these days sheds that impulse just as quickly. He's happy to wake up every day with you by his side, his kid in the garage out back and walls around everything he loves, keeping it all safe.

It makes it both easy and hard to please him -- you want to give him everything but he seems to want nothing. A perfect paradox, a puzzle to solve.

God, you love him. You love spring, you love Joel. Everything feels good.

So, you start to gather stems, snapping them at their bases, humming as you work.

"How do you choose which ones to pick?"

"Fuck," you gasp, careening forward onto one palm and looking over your shoulder. Ellie is off her horse and much closer than before, standing directly behind you. "Jesus, you're stealthy."

She shrugs, her smirk a pleased slash across her face. "You're oblivious as fuck."

You roll your eyes at her.

"Seriously," Ellie says, crossing her arms. She jerks her chin at the small bouquet you've got in one hand. "How do you make it look so nice?"

"Oh, so we've moved on from the making-fun-of-me part of this?"

She crouches next to you, elbows on her knees.

"I, uh -- " Her cheeks go pink, freckles standing out against her blush. "Dina likes flowers."

You bump her shoulder with yours. "I'm going to be so nice and not tease you."

"Fuck off," she scoffs, tucking her smile into her shoulder.

It's quick work. Ellie follows your lead, balances out the blooms she picks with some leafy weeds. She ties them together with one of the minimum four spare hairbands she has on her person at all times -- bits of cloth, occasionally a rare unused elastic from before if she's found some on patrol.

"Isn't it kinda shitty?" she muses, nimble fingers turning her bouquet this way and that to admire it. "We're killing them. The flowers, I mean."

"Little late to have a conscience about killing," you say lightly. The two rabbits she pulled from Jackson snares hang from her saddle. You've seen her in action, too -- gun raised, hands steady, blood splattered across her cheek. It's not an accusation, far from it. Violence is a language you both speak, one she's known for most of her still-short life.

She rolls her eyes, every bit a teenager. "Whatever."

You sigh. "You're right, though," you say. "There were whole shops dedicated to this before. Selling flowers, making bouquets and centerpieces and all that shit."

She probably knows this, but she lets you describe it. Ellie soaks up bits of the old world like it will materialize before her if she listens hard enough. Joel says it was much worse when she was younger, right after they settled into Jackson. She wanted details about everything and watched every movie she could get her hands on. You think she was satisfying her curiosity, sure, but also that she was trying to understand him better -- but didn't know how to say so.

"Weird," she mutters. "And you just...bought them for other people?"

"Or yourself." You pat her shoulder and stand. Your horse tries to nibble on your flowers before you haul yourself back in the saddle. "It was just a nice thing to do, I guess."

"Killing something to make someone else happy," Ellie says with a dry laugh. She tucks her bouquet in the crook of her arm once she's back in the saddle. "I guess everyone does that these days."

It's absurd when she puts it that way, but it's true. You've all got blood on your hands. You would kill for this girl, for Joel, for pretty much anyone in Jackson. And you have.

The flowers are for Joel, they're for your house, they're for you. Something beautiful to bring home alongside your dirt stains and scarred hands, your haunted eyes and nightmares. No one is spared those.

It's only mid-morning by the time you get back to the wall. You and Ellie left at dawn, short sticks drawn for the early shift. She leaves you in the stables with a mock salute and a shout of thanks, practically jogging to Dina's to give her the flowers.

You're untacking your horse when you hear familiar laughter, a deep chuckle and Ellie's faint indignant protest.

"Mornin'," Joel says from behind you. "Was hopin' to catch you at the gate."

"Can you hold these?"

You blindly extend the hand with the flowers. His fingers carefully extract the bouquet and you return to brushing out your horse.

"Does this have somethin' to do with Ellie runnin' out of her with flowers of her own?"

"Never let anyone say you're unobservant, Joel Miller."

He snickers. You leave your horse with a final pat on the neck and thanks for a job well done.

When you face Joel, he looks tired -- he's been pulling extra long days replacing windows and roof tiles after the winter's damage. God knows that man never seems fully rested, but it's a little worse when the seasons change.

He's told you time and time again that standing two stories off the ground is a hell of a lot safer than fighting some Infected on patrol, but you still worry. Just like you know he worries about you beyond the walls, how he's a little tenser whenever you're not in sight, whenever he hasn't seen Ellie for a few days ‘cause they're both busy. It's just how he loves. It's how you both love.

You make no move to take the flowers from him, instead brushing some sawdust from his shoulder.

"Did you have a job already?" you ask.

"Small one. Fixin' a crooked over mailbox." He looks pointedly at his full fist. "You gonna explain now?"

"They're for you."

Joel blinks once, twice, brows furrowing like you're speaking a different language. Maybe a few years ago you'd start to feel self-conscious, unsure of your romantic gesture and insecure in his reaction. But now, as fully in love and connected to this man as you are, you lean in.

"If you're too manly to carry flowers through town --"

You make to take them from him but he snaps out of his daze and wraps an arm around your shoulders, pulling you to his chest in a smooth motion.

He also holds the bouquet in the air and out of reach.

"Hey, now," he says. "Hands off. These ain't your flowers."

"I picked 'em," you remind him, poking him in the ribs for good measure.

He flinches just a little but doesn't move. His embrace is warm and familiar and you sink into it. "Gettin' romantic," he mutters and brings the flowers back down to eye level to examine them.

"I'm just trying to catch up to you," you say into his jacket. He huffs and his palm rubs a slow line up and down your arm.

You wiggle out of his embrace to shoulder your pack.

"I am pretty romantic," he muses.

It's true. Even if he's joking and even if no one but you gets to see it, Joel has always made sure you feel loved. Courtship and romance look different these days, but it still comes naturally to him -- loving. Dinner dates, jewelry, and trips to the airport have become a battered paperback, a sharpened knife, and bloody knuckles, but it rings just as true. He loves you and he loves his family the best way he knows how – by keeping you all safe.

And you do your best to convey the same thing. You tell him, of course, but you also mend his shirts and chop wood when his back is acting up, and you look after his kid like she's your own.

Joel deserves to know that he can receive all that he gives, too – the protection, the tenderness, the beauty. Moments of softness and rest where he knows he’s taken care of, thought of, that he matters beyond the things he can do for everyone else.

So, you also do things like bring him flowers.

Sometimes you feel like it will never be enough. You will never have enough time to show him how much he means to you, how he's saved you, how important and cherished and loved he is. How good he is.

Joel reaches for your face with his free hand. He traces the line of your cheekbone with his thumb and smirks when you inhale sharply. Another patrol returns and the stables are suddenly louder and more crowded than before. If you're both free for the rest of the day, you want to drag him up to your bedroom and spend the hours there. You want to show him, for the millionth time, how much you love him.

"Okay, Mr. Pretty Romantic," you say, grabbing his hand and tangling your fingers together. "Let's go home."

___

Joel is hiding something from you.

The flowers last for a week and you watch him eye them and smile every time he enters the kitchen.

But after they droop and go in the compost pile, something shifts. Something subtle, sure, but you spend most of your waking hours looking for or at Joel, so you notice.

He starts keeping his workshop door closed. Normally you'll sit and watch him work, or he'll teach you a few chords here and there on the guitars he's making, but your lessons move to the porch and the upstairs hallway loses the scent of wood glue and stain.

In fact, he actively steers you away from the room altogether. He's all just needs a deep clean and it's messy, is all. It's not rocket science -- he's making something for you, clearly. But giving him a hard time is too fun to pass up.

One night, you and Ellie wait at the bottom of the stairs. There's a dinner and movie night in the old church and you're taking the opportunity to make it a family outing.

"You coming?" you holler up the stairs. You hear the door creak open.

"Gimme a second," he calls back down.

"Jesus," you mutter. You tap the side of Ellie’s sneaker with your boot. "You know anything about that?"

Honesty is important between all of you, but you know Joel and Ellie need to have their secrets. There is too much tangled history between them for you to understand it all. It's important to you that they have a relationship all their own, even if it means they scheme.

Ellie is examining her switchblade with intense focus. "I might," she says with a smirk. "He's a lovesick loser, I'll tell you that."

You lean on the banister and raise your eyebrows. "Do you remember when you asked me how to embroider so you could put Dina's name on her jacket?"

The knife swings closed with a snick and she rolls her eyes at you, cheeks pink.

"Shit, dude," she says. "Why do I tell you anything?"

"She liked the flowers, though, didn't she?"

Ellie crosses her arms and smiles at whatever memory she's seeing in her mind. "Yeah," she says. "She did. Jesse gave me so much shit, though --"

The door upstairs closes and Joel's heavy footfalls cut her off.

"Finally," you grumble. He trods down the stairs, arms half in his jacket when he catches sight of the two of you. "Are you hiding state secrets in there?"

"What the fuck does that mean?" Ellie asks.

"Might be," is all he says. He's got that twinkle in his eye that means mischief but he looks proud of himself. You can let him have this, whatever this is. You trust him and you'll find out eventually.

"Alright," you say, pushing off the banister and heading for the door. "You're going to breathe toxic fumes with the door closed."

"No, seriously," Ellie says. "What kind of secrets would a state be keeping?"

"Ain't nothin' toxic in there," he says lightly. He bumps Ellie's shoulder with his. "C'mon."

She throws her hands up in the air. "You know, it's shitty when you ignore me."

"Did you hear somethin'?" Joel says to you.

You shake your head, swallowing your laughter. "No," you say. "Nothing."

"Assholes." She pushes past you and down the steps onto the street. "I'm going to make sure there are no mashed potatoes left when you get there."

You don't mind letting Joel do whatever he's up to in all of his spare moments. It does mean you have more time to yourself, so you pick up some extra wall shifts.

And when one of those shifts is with Tommy? Well, you can't help but needle him a little bit about it all.

"Do you know what your brother is up to?" you ask him.

The wind today carries some lingering winter bite, so you've got the collar of your coat pulled up around your ears. Tommy’s hair whips around his face when he raises his eyebrows at you.

"Gonna have to be more specific," he says. "My brother is always up to some shit."

"I think he'd say the same thing about you."

Tommy laughs. He's got the reputation for being the more easy-going of the Millers, but you know he's more a match for Joel than most think. Out in the world, they work as one, silent and deadly, always in step when it counts. They still speak a language all their own with just a look and you see so much of them in each other when you pay attention.

"Well, I learned it all from him," he says. He adjusts his grip on the rifle and sighs. "I happen to know what you're talkin' 'bout, though."

"Is he just telling everyone but me?"

"Nah," Tommy scoffs. "Asked me and Ellie for help, s'all. And you know he tells that girl everythin'."

You both smile for a moment at your fondness for them.

Tommy clears his throat. "Does it bother you? Him keepin' a secret?"

You know Tommy won't let your answer get back to Joel. He's asking as your friend, as your kind-of brother. He's asking because he cares.

A patrol crests the hill, green flag waving in the air. They whistle and shout for the gate to be opened.

You step closer to Tommy so he can hear you. "No," you say. "I just like to gossip."

"Don't I know it," he chuckles. "You two are the eyes and ears of this damn town. Knowin' everything."

"Except what happens in my own home," you tease.

He shrugs. "You'll like it, if that helps," he adds.

"I know I will."

You look out at the world beyond the wall and smile to yourself.

Joel has made you a few things over the years. He works wonders with his hands all the time: Beautiful, intricate carvings for the house, for Ellie, for new babies in town. The wall of guitars, not to mention the ones he's made for kids to learn on in school. You're better at sewing than he is, but he's pretty damn good – fixing up pillowcases and blankets and clothes of all kinds. Joel is a craftsman.

Hands that hold you can also pull a trigger, punch until there's nothing left, and craft a work of art.

And he knows you. He pays attention -- there is a reason behind everything he does. If he's making you something, you know you'll love it.

"Strange, ain’t it?" Tommy says. You turn to him, a question on your face. "World ended and here we all are, happy. Makin' shit for each other. Gosspin'."

You sigh. “Took a lot to get here.”

“Damn right,” he says with a long whistle. “Lotta shit behind us.”

“Do you ever regret it?” you ask.

Tommy considers your words. You two talk plenty, but you’ve never really spoken about the past. Joel tells you whatever you want to hear about the years before you knew him, so you’ve got a pretty good picture of their lives after the outbreak.

"Can I tell you somethin’?” Tommy asks. You nod. "Alright. I – I never thought I'd see my brother this happy again. And I wish every damn day that Sarah was here to see it. To know him this way, to meet Maria. To know you and Ellie."

Joel has said the same thing before and it’s an honor greater than you can ever explain.

"When I saw him and that girl a few years ago, I thought --" Tommy clears his throat. "I thought maybe he’d made it through all the shit we did. And I was right. She brought him through it. And now he’s here, doin’ stable life shit we dreamed about before."

"Ellie is a force," you say, a little surprised to find your voice watery. The love between Ellie and Joel is fierce and powerful, evident to anyone who witnesses it. They would do anything for each other, even though they're mending.

"She is," he says. "And so are you.” He sighs and runs a hand through his hair. “Shit, I don’t know where I’m goin’ with this. Point is – seein' him love you, too, shows me he’s through it. He's alive again, you know? And I’d do all the shit we did over again just to get us all here. So, no. I don’t regret it."

It’s nothing you haven’t thought before, but the words work their way into your heart and sit there, heavy and warm.

“Damn,” you say. You swallow and give him a wide smile. "If you keep going, Tommy Miller, I will start crying and that would embarrass us both."

He laughs and blinks a few times. You join in, wiping your eyes.

"Alright, I won't," he says. "Jesus, all you did was ask what he's doin' in that workshop."

You clap him on the shoulder. "I won't tell anyone you started blubbering on duty."

He snorts. "Ain't that generous of you.”

Days pass. A week. You almost forget about Joel's project because he spends less and less time in the workshop and more on tasks around town as the days get longer. You're both busy -- chopping wood, planting bulbs for the fall, helping de-shed the horses. There's always work to be done.

After a particularly long day on your feet, you come out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel to find he's gotten home while you were in the shower.

"Hey, stranger," you say. You're mostly dry but some water drips down your back and you shiver. Joel is leaning against the headboard on top of the sheets without his shirt, reading whatever book he's onto now.

"Didn't hear me come in?" he asks. He sets his volume aside and pulls off his glasses.

"I was too busy coming back to life under some hot water." He probably heard you singing off-key to some long-lost song stuck in your head for the millionth time. "And you're quiet as hell, Joel."

He shrugs.

You just look at each other, the intimate gaze of two people who know every inch of each other and never tire of it.

The sleep pants he wears to bed this time of year are lightweight, thin enough that you can see the outline of him from here. His stomach is soft where he's bent at the waist and the trail of hair above his waistband is dark, darker than the rest of what's on his chest.

The golden expanse of his skin just begs to be touched, so you make your way over to him in your towel. He makes room for you to perch on the edge of the bed, the bare skin of your thigh pressing into his pants. His palm rests on your knee.

"I haven't seen much of you lately," you say softly. "’Cause of that damn thing you're working on."

His fingers press into your skin.

"Ain't patience a virtue, or something like that?"

"Whatever magic you're working better be worth waiting for," you tease.

Joel's hand resumes its path up your leg and he smirks.

"I can work some magic right now," he says.

You laugh, throwing your head back as his fingertips edge under the towel.

"That was awful," you say. "I should get dressed in all of my layers right now and go sleep on the couch."

You pull away from his touch so you can straddle him, your towel only held on by one hand at your breasts.

Joel snickers. "But then I wouldn't be able to do this."

Nimble fingers find your cunt between your spread legs and you gasp a laugh, one hand on his shoulder to balance you in his lap.

"Smooth," you manage. His other hand tugs on the towel and you release it, your slightly damp skin breaking out into goosebumps in the air of the bedroom.

Joel drags his lips between your breasts and you feel his smile.

"Christ," he says. "You comin' outta there in just a towel and you expect me to go to sleep?"

He pulls his fingers from you and frames your face with both hands to drag it down to his in a lazy, thorough kiss, like he's savoring each moment.

His tongue traces the seam of your lips and you let him in readily, arms wrapping around his shoulders as you grind down on the hardness you can feel through his pants.

"I've missed you," you say, dragging your tongue along down his jaw. His fingertips press into your bare hips hard enough to bruise, but it's a grounding touch rather than an urgent one. You want to take your time because you have missed him, and you think he feels the same way.

"Sorry, sweetheart," Joel groans, dragging your lips back to his. "It'll be worth it."

You pull back to look him in the eyes. The hazel-grey is almost totally taken over by his pupil, but his gaze softens when you cup his cheek and smile.

"I know," you say, and mean it. Naked in his lap in your bedroom, you mean it. You always mean it. You always trust him.

Joel kisses you once, twice, and you pull on his lower lip with your teeth when he pulls away. His nostrils flare and before you can tug his cock from his pants, he holds two fingers out to you.

You laugh, circling his wrist and bringing the digits past your lips. You swirl your tongue around them and really take your time with it, laving at his knuckles before releasing them with a pop.

His cock twitches beneath you and he huffs.

"You're an easy man to please, Joel Miller," you tell him, tugging down his pants and letting his shaft spring free. You stroke him root to tip and he hisses.

"Nah," he manages. "It's ‘cause it's you."

He follows his words with a circle of your clit from his spit-slick fingers.

"See?" you gasp. "Romantic."

It's a bit crowded, his hand rubbing your clit and yours slowly jerking him, but neither of you rush it. You pant together, dotting lazy kisses on any piece of bare skin you can reach. You breathe him in, the combination of sweat and gun oil and fresh detergent that's just Joel. A rush of tenderness hits you so suddenly your nose stings.

"Joel," you say, a bit ragged. "Joel, can you --"

A gentle hand on your face brings your foreheads together, his eyes on yours.

"Whatever you want," he groans. "Whatever you want, it's yours."

You can't help it -- you laugh. Brightly and happily, almost in disbelief that this man is yours. Real and solid under you right now, beside you every night. Yours to love and cherish and all the rest.

"You laughin' at me?" he grumbles, though you can tell he's fighting a smile.

"I just love you, is all," you say. You probably don't say it enough. You and Joel show each other every day, so much so that you can't imagine he doesn't know. As it is, you feel loved by him with every move he makes, every time he looks in your direction, every time he says your name.

"And I want you to fuck me," you add.

It's Joel's turn to laugh.

"Now who's the romantic one?" he says.

You rise from his lap and settle onto your back on the other side of the bed, stretching with your hands above your head.

His eyes follow the line of your bare body, fondness and hunger recognizable in his gaze.

"Always so damn pretty," he grumbles. "Prettiest thing I've ever seen."

"Flirt," you tease.

He rises to his knees and pumps his cock a few times with his fist. You spread your legs for him, knees bent up against your chest.

He settles between your knees and you lock them around his hips. Joel honest-to-god winks at you before dragging two fingers through your folds to make sure you're slick enough.

"Ready?"

You nod. He enters you in one practiced move and you groan in unison as you adjust. It takes some shuffling but he finds a position he can hold, and you wrap your arms around his neck.

Joel fucks you slow and deep. Each drag of his cock against your walls curls your toes and drags whines from both of your throats. He keeps up his usual babel -- doin' so good, feel like a dream, so damn tight, cunt's a fuckin' miracle -- and you press your hands into his bare back like he's a life raft.

Sweat beats on your brow, your chest, everywhere, and you suck bruises into his neck as his thrusts get a little frantic. Your own orgasm sneaks up on you, the pressure building and building and building until it snaps without warning.

"Joel -- Joel, fuck, I --"

You clench around him and he chants your name, that's it, baby, come on my cock, and buries himself to the hilt to finish inside you.

He hovers above you on trembling arms long enough to press a sweet kiss to your lips before rolling off of you.

"Now I'm ready for bed," you say, panting.

You fling a hand out lazily and it lands on his chest. He intertwines your fingers and his gaze finds yours. You smile as you get your breathing under control.

Joel smooths your brow with a thumb. "Don't forget to --"

"I know, I know," you say. "C'mon, you know this isn't my first rodeo." You get up from the bed and head to the bathroom.

"You sayin' I'm a bull?" Joel calls after you.

"Save a horse, ride a cowboy!" you holler back, cleaning yourself up. "Didn't people used to say that?"

Joel doesn't answer you but you laugh at your own joke. You make your way back to the bed in old pyjamas and find him back in his sweatpants, feet flat on the floor like he's about to get up and go somewhere.

"Joel?"

He sighs, his shoulders moving up and down like he's bracing himself.

"It's done," he says. "Your surprise."

The confession stops you in your tracks.

"Oh?"

You know Joel better than mosty, but sometimes he's still a puzzle. The hesitation, the slight air of anxiety about him as he says it confuses you. Because Joel is good at taking care of people, and he has to know it -- those years he and Ellie didn't speak you know he left her things, know that he took care of her from afar as much as she would let him. It's just what he does, he uses his hands to beat and shoot and bloody – but also to carve and hold and love.

They're the same thing, really.

And he's made you something – one of countless gifts he's given you, tangible and not, throughout your relationship.

But he's nervous. As if you wouldn't love anything he made, anything he does. As if you're not gone over every part of him.

"Hm," he says. "Yeah. Let me --"

Joel gets up from the bed and pads over to the dresser to rummage around in a drawer. You meet him back on the bed and he's holding a square-ish parcel wrapped in cloth.

You gingerly take it from him.

"This is what you've been working on?" you ask softly. He nods.

You unwrap the cloth and find yourself holding leather-bound journal. The hide is smooth under your fingertips, scraped clean by hand and tanned a dark chestnut.The spine is about an inch wide, the whole thing swen together with neat stitches of what can only be catgut. A thinner strip of leather is wrapped around the cover and tucked into itself carefully. It must have taken him ages to make.

"Joel," you gasp. "It's...god, it's beautiful."

He tells you how he found it on patrol a few weeks ago. The cover was fucked but the paper was somehow fine, so he dried out the pages and rebound it with a hide he tanned himself. You run your hands over it again almost like you can feel his fingerprints all over it, the hours he poured into the pages.

The inside cover falls open easily when you undo the tie and you see letters in the bottom left corner of it. Your eyes sting.

Joel has carefully burned your name into the leather, each letter perfectly lined up with the next. You haven't had something with your name on it in years.

He clears his throat. "Ellie said she'd give you some of her pens. Show you how to refill 'em."

You look up from your gift and find so much love on his face you can hardly stand it. He was inside you not that long ago and somehow this is more intimate. You surge forward into his space and wrap an arm around his shoulders, burying your face in his neck.

"I don't know what to say," you confess. "Just -- thank you."

He runs his hand along your spine.

"S'nothin'," he says. "Just saw it and thought of you, is all."

You release him and shake your head in disbelief. This man.

"What should I write in it?"

Joel's cheeks darken a little. Of course he's thought of everything.

"Figured you could write about...all this." He waves a hand in the air like that explains anything.

"All what?"

He shrugs one bare shoulder.

"Life," he says. "Jackson. Folks here. Might be nice, havin' the memories."

You scoot closer to him so you're almost in his lap again.

"You want me to write down the gossip?" You mean it as a joke but Joel nods.

"You pay attention," he explains. "Someone's gotta."

You're not much of a writer anymore, haven't had cause to be in twenty years. But you do like to tell stories. You both do.

The pages are soft under your fingertips as you flip through them again. You're going to fill them with stories -- about this town, about Joel and Ellie and Tommy and the people you love. The people you've lost, too. The memories that hurt like bruises, like fresh wounds. But the good stuff, too. The gossip, the love stories, the plants in the yard and the flowers on the trails.

Joel has given you the ability to record your lives.

You reach over him to set the journal on the nightstand before you frame his face with both of your hands.

"I'm going to write pages and pages about you, Joel Miller," you whisper.

He huffs, cheeks warm under your palms. "That's borin'."

You shake your head and lean in until your lips brush and your eyes flutter shut.

"That's the story," you say. "That's my life. This is my life. You are."

“I love you,” he breathes. “So damn much. Y’know that?”

How could you not? You say so and kiss him firmly but without hurry. You’ve got lots of time. You’ve got forever.

#joel miller x reader #joel miller x you #joel miller smut #joel miller fanfiction #the last of us fanfiction

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livwritesstuff · 14 days

Text

Robin’s favorite part of Steve becoming a dad (and there really are so many to choose from) is getting to hear about all the ways his kids are learning how to push his buttons (as they absolutely should – Steve wouldn’t truly be a dad if he wasn’t being driven half-insane by their ridiculous antics).

“What are your children up to today, Steve-o?” she asked during a routine phone call.

And Steve replied, “Well, Moe spent half the night in time-out for fucking walloping Robbie with a hardcover picture book.”

“Why?” Robin snorts.

“Never figured it out, but later when we made Moe apologize, she said Sorry for hitting you with a book – which, you know, fine, she could have stopped there, but then she said If you just do what I say, I’ll never have to hit you with a book again.”

“Jesus, she’s like a fuckin’ mobster.”

“Tell me about it.”

Another time, Steve told her, “I think I lost the battle with Hazel’s hair.”

Robin made a sympathetic noise, because she was very aware of Steve’s ongoing crusade to manage Hazel’s unmanageable curls (they're actually pretty manageable, from what Robin has heard, the problem is just that Hazel won't let him).

“This morning I told her we needed to brush it before school and I think her exact response was Don’t people want to see the real me?”

Robin laughs, “Oh man, she’s so cute.”

“Don’t worry – she knows.”

One of Robin’s favorite updates is when Steve tells her, “We had to figure out how to address Robbie breaking into Moe’s fucking Webkinz account and spending all her fake money on gifts for herself,” and Robin can’t help a gasp, because she’s heard all about this Webkinz craze and just how big a deal it is to elementary-schoolers like Steve and Eddie’s oldest daughters.

“Holy shit, she’s diabolical.”

“Yeah. I mean, Moe probably could have picked a better password than password. Kinda thought she was smarter than that, actually, but…lesson learned, I guess.”

#do we remember webkinz?#was anybody else tricked into thinking your webkinz would die if you didn’t buy new ones?#i definitely was and there was simply no possibility of reasoning with me #steddie #liv’s steddie dads verse #steve harrington #robin buckley #steddie dads

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hamsterclaw · 1 month

Text

Yoongi’s a murder detective fighting burnout when he’s assigned the case that you and your former partner fucked up.

Paring: Yoongi x f! Reader

Genre: Detectives!Yoongi and reader

Rating: 18+

Word count: 6.6k

Warnings: Swearing, descriptions of murder, bloodshed and assault, sex, depression and burnout, mentions of guns

The flashing blue lights in Yoongi’s window are followed by the wail of sirens cutting through the early evening bustle.

Yoongi looks out the window. He’s three floors up from street level, there’s raindrops tracking along the dirty glass, the faint smell of mildew that accompanies any rainfall in this filthy city.

Under the table, his good leather shoes, the ones he saves for weddings and funerals, have rubbed a hole in the skin over his achilles. Yoongi had worn them for his disciplinary hearing today, the part of him that still wants to be a cop temporarily winning over the part of him that doesn’t.

He wonders if this is what burnout feels like.

His superior, Kim Namjoon, had called him into his office after the hearing to tell him he was on probation, to clean up his act because he wouldn’t be so lucky as to get off next time.

The truth is, Yoongi had known while he was pressing the suspect’s face into gravel with his booted foot that it would come back to bite him on the ass.

He’d done it anyway.

Yoongi’s never been kind to scum who exploit children, but his partner, Jung Hoseok, had seen something in Yoongi’s face that day that had made him report Yoongi.

Yoongi doesn’t blame him. Hoseok has been his partner on and off for five years and he’s as sterling as they come. His moral compass is as strong as it was the day they graduated from the academy, despite all the fucked up shit they’ve seen.

Unlike Yoongi.

Yoongi was never black and white to begin with and now he’s so far into the grey he scares himself sometimes. It’s never been his goal to be the kind of cop who metes out his own justice.

Only madness lies that way.

Anyway now Hoseok’s been reassigned temporarily to narcotics, supposedly a break from homicide, and Yoongi’s partnerless.

Probably not for long, there’s always some hungry rookie wanting the credibility of working homicide.

Yoongi sighs, closes the file he’d been skimming. It’s well past seven, there aren’t any open cases that need his immediate attention and he figures he might as well go home to his apartment and his cat, Kenzo.

The pavement’s slippery under the smooth soles of his good shoes, Yoongi pulls his coat tighter against the early autumn chill as he walks the five blocks to his apartment.

The smell of fried wontons fills his nostrils as he passes a conduit street in the back end of Little China, Yoongi’s tempted to stop and pick up dinner.

He’s tempted every time and succumbed yesterday so he soldiers on, not without a pang of regret. He regrets food choices because he’d rather that, than think about his actual regrets.

The bang of a gunshot when he’d been two minutes too late to what then became a crime scene.

Fucking some girl with a cute face because he hadn’t been man enough to treat Mara the way she deserved.

Choosing to stay in homicide even after it had become clear to him that he had plumbed the depths of human depravity. Scarring his psyche repeatedly because it’s easier than making the active choice to request a transfer.

Yoongi unlocks his door, toes his shoes off, hangs up his coat.

There’s a flicker of movement in the corner of his eye, a flash of grey fur as Kenzo skitters across the entryway, close but not touching him.

It’s the kind of greeting Yoongi can get behind.

He pours out a serving of dry food into Kenzo’s dish, heads to the fridge to reheat yesterday’s wontons.

Eats standing at the tiny kitchen island, cracks open a beer to wash it all down.

He catches sight of his face, pinched in the scowl it seems to fall into more often than not these days.

Jesus, is he getting old?

Yoongi avoids looking at his reflection again as he showers. Changes into the same t-shirt he’s been wearing for weeks, contemplates watching porn just to take the edge off, but decides he can’t be bothered.

He falls into sleep, deep and dreamless, wakes up with an almighty crick in his neck just before dawn from the way he’d been huddled in a tight ball under the covers.

He knows he’s not right, but he’s been not right for so long Yoongi wouldn’t even know where to start putting himself together again.

***

Redemption comes in odd packages, Yoongi thinks, as he looks up a case he worked on six months ago, a shady businessman on the fringe of organised crime who’d got high as a kite and beat a sex worker to death.

He’d been killed on the way to serving out his sentence in the cushy prison in Busan his fancy lawyer had managed to negotiate, crushed in the back of the transport vehicle when it had been t-boned by a lorry.

Apparently a freak accident, Yoongi doubts it but he’s also not going to look too closely, it’s out of his jurisdiction and he’s too jaded to mourn the loss of another brutal asshole. They’d had to identify the sex worker by her dental records and DNA, her face had been unrecognisable.

There’s a knock on the frosted glass panel on his office door, Yoongi looks up as Kim Namjoon walks in, followed by the latest hungry rookie angling for a stint in homicide.

‘Min Yoongi, this is Y/N L/N,’ Namjoon says. ‘She’s a new transfer in from the Seoul branch.’

Yoongi doesn’t have to fake his disinterest as he nods politely at you.

‘What’s the case?’ he asks.

Namjoon looks pointedly at the crime scene photo blown up on Yoongi’s screen.

Yoongi waits.

He can feel your gaze on him, but he’ll get to that later.

The anticipation of a new case never gets old, he’s been in homicide since he graduated off the beat ten years ago and he no longer thinks it’s sick of him to get excited about another murder.

It’s the thrill of the hunt that he lives for, the translation of nebulous facts and witness statements into a puzzle that he can solve.

Yoongi’s damn good at his job. It almost makes the sacrifices in the rest of his so-called life worth it.

Namjoon hands Yoongi a case file, crisp, sharp edges waiting to razor his fingertips open. Flat.

Inside, the standard cover page, then a note that makes Yoongi sit up straight out of his slouch.

He looks at Namjoon to find Namjoon’s already looking at him.

‘The reaper of Seoul?’

Yoongi realises as he says the words out loud how it sounds.

The capture and subsequent conviction of the serial killer who’d terrorised the citizens of Seoul for three years had made headlines nationwide.

Last year.

‘Yeah,’ Namjoon says, the tension in his jaw evident now that Yoongi’s looking at him properly.

Namjoon glances at you. ‘It would seem he never left.’

You shift your weight and your eyes meet Yoongi’s.

‘My partner and I broke the case,’ you say. There’s a brittle smoothness to your voice that Yoongi recognises as a paper thin facade over the hauntedness underneath. ‘Turns out we didn’t.’

***

The note in the case file is a single sheet of letter paper, lined in blue.

The handwriting is precise, neat between the lines.

Oh dear.

Better luck this time?

Best regards from your neighbourhood Reaper.

Yoongi looks at you, sitting across the room at the desk Hoseok’s temporarily vacated.

You’re staring at your screen, face backlit in blue, expression unreadable. You’re in black, nondescript knitwear, your hair pushed back from your face, eyes narrowed.

He clears his throat. ‘You worked the case with your partner.’

It’s a statement you answer to like a question.

‘It was the first case I picked up when I joined homicide,’ you say, turning to Yoongi. ‘It started with -‘

‘Kim Seulgi,’ Yoongi says.

You nod, almost grimacing at the name of the Seoul Reaper’s first high profile victim.

‘Her family wanted answers.’

Kim Seulgi had been born of Seoul’s elite, an architect with her grandfather’s firm who had picked up a number of accolades for her work on the National Opera House.

She’d been engaged to an equally accomplished classical pianist, Jeong Minho, and had been the only offspring of her wealthy parents.

She’d disappeared three days before her wedding, only to turn up on her wedding day, floating in the Hangang, dressed in the clothes she’d disappeared in.

You say, ‘She was an ambitious first target.’

‘Was she the first?’ Yoongi asks.

The flicker in your eyes tells him this isn’t the first time you’ve considered this.

‘My partner Kiho.’ There’s strain in your voice. You start again. ‘My partner, Kiho, and I thought he’d killed before.’

You shrug. ‘The captain felt we were wasting time looking back into his early years.’

Yoongi says, neutral, ‘Budgets are limited, your case must have passed the thresholds for plausible deniability.’

‘It seemed to fit,’ you agree.

Your eyes meet again. ‘Not all of it, though.’

Yoongi knows, intimately, what it’s like to not be certain. Sometimes all you have is your instinct. It’s one thing to build a case no reasonable person would doubt, but you’re also betting on your gut. You’re betting on being a good enough detective to know that the pieces fit, without forcing them to fit.

You’re betting on being honest with yourself, and Yoongi knows more than anyone how tempting the lies can be.

Now you’re the one watching him, taking the measure of him.

His email pings.

‘That’s the link to the full case file,’ you say.

You get up, carry a stack of notebooks to his desk.

‘Our notebooks,’ you say.

Yoongi looks at the stack.

Every cop’s got their own collection of notebooks, raw data and impressions that don’t always make it into official reports.

The equivalent of dirty underwear when you’re not expecting company versus lingerie when you’re down to fuck.

This close, he can smell your shampoo, bright and faintly floral.

You blink at him.

‘I need to sort something with human resources,’ you say. ‘I’ll see you later.’

In actual fact it’s 36 hours later when he next sees you, at 4am, at a crime scene.

***

The rain falling is more than a drizzle, enough that the tent around the victim is the first priority.

There’s an imprint of violence in the air, Yoongi knows you feel it too by the way your lips tighten as you duck under the yellow tape to join him.

You nod at him in greeting, then there’s silence as you enter the tent.

The victim’s on her front, face turned to the right, hand tucked under her cheek.

She hasn’t been dead long enough for livedo to set in, she would almost look asleep if it weren’t for the purple of her lips, the greyness to her complexion.

The bath of blood she’s lying in.

Yoongi can just see the edge of the gaping wound on her neck.

You wait until forensics turns her body over.

The top three buttons of her silk blouse are undone, her chest slick with blood.

Yoongi’s reading the crime scene like he’s reading you, and he knows what you’re going to say before you say it.

‘It’s him,’ you breathe. The devastation in your eyes makes it difficult for him to look at you. ‘Fuck, it’s him.’

***

You’re shivering visibly despite the hot coffee Yoongi’s poured you, despite the fact that he’s turned the heating in his ancient Hyundai up as far as it’ll go.

There are droplets of water in your hair, sparkling incongruously in the gloom.

You’re waiting till first light to knock on neighbourhood doors, the victim was found in a quiet cul-de-sac.

Two minutes from her own front door.

Not much chills Yoongi these days but that fact does make him pause.

The audacity of it.

He says, ‘I have a blanket in the trunk.’

You’re protesting but Yoongi gets back out in the rain anyway, grabs the blanket and gets back in.

Hands it to you, takes your cup as you drape the blanket around yourself.

‘It gets colder here than Seoul,’ Yoongi offers, handing you your coffee back.

‘We fucked it up,’ you say, and Yoongi knows that’s what you’ve been thinking since you saw the body.

He’s just been waiting for you to be ready to say it.

‘So make it right,’ he says, simple.

‘An innocent man’s in prison because Kiho and I fucked up,’ you say.

Yoongi doesn’t want to minimise it but he doubts the man you put away was completely innocent.

‘I read your notebooks,’ he says. ‘Who’s Jeon Bogyeol?’

There had been twelve murders before the arrest. All women in their late twenties to mid thirties, all living alone.

They’d all lived in the same part of Seoul, but apart from that there was nothing to link them that he could find.

You look at him warily. ‘He was a night watchman at the apartments of seven of the women.’

Yoongi waits.

‘We cross-referenced staff at all the addresses, and his name kept coming up. Like Jang Daeseong.’

You flinch at the name of the man convicted of the murders, as though it didn’t fall from your own lips.

You keep talking, though, your voice never faltering. ‘We never found any links between Jeon Bogyeol and the other five women.’

‘Did he have a history?’ Yoongi asks. He’s looking out the window at the first rays of sunrise, muted orange through the rain. His shoulder aches, an old injury he doesn’t think about except when he’s tired, and cold.

‘There was a neighbour,’ you say. You’re chewing on your bottom lip, a tell Yoongi’s noticed for the first time tonight.

‘She called the police once saying she’d seen Bogyeol taking a woman into his apartment against her will.’

You’re frowning. ‘The beat cops who responded to the call out said there was no sign of anyone else in his apartment. The neighbour moved away.’

‘Moved away?’ Yoongi asks, and you glance at him, understanding the sharpness in his tone.

‘I was going to look into it when the Chief shut us down,’ you say. It’s stated simply, like a fact, no sign of defensiveness.

Yoongi offers you more coffee from his flask.

‘Where’s Bogyeol now?’

‘When the new letter came in I looked him up,’ you say. The steam rising from your cup obscures part of your expression for a moment, but Yoongi can hear the tremor in your voice.

‘He’s less than fifty miles east of here.’

Dawn’s breaking, the rain’s finally starting to peter out, but Yoongi’s chilled anyway.

***

The morning sun is high in the sky by the time Yoongi and you finish interviewing the neighbours and the new victim’s friends and family.

Yoongi’s phone rings. It’s Namjoon.

‘Can you talk?’ Namjoon asks.

Yoongi mouths ‘Namjoon’ in response to your inquiring expression, puts some distance between you and him.

‘Yeah,’ he answers.

‘The post-mortem results are back, and the preliminary tox screen is negative. The ME’s put the cause of death as exsanguination.’

Yoongi processes this. ‘It’s the same MO as the previous Seoul reaper victims,’ he says.

Namjoon sighs. ‘Has anything new come out of your interviews?’

‘No,’ Yoongi says. The victim had been well-liked, none of the neighbours had seen or heard anything, and on the surface of it there were no conflicts he could see. Her boyfriend of two years had been away on a work trip, his location confirmed around the window of the crime.

Yoongi’s looking at you as you wait against the car, and when your name comes out of Namjoon’s mouth he’s already got an inkling of what Namjoon wants to know.

‘I reviewed the case,’ Namjoon says. ‘There are no obvious flaws or errors in their investigation.’

Yoongi grunts. ‘There was a lead that they didn’t follow up on.’

He fills Namjoon in.

‘I’ll follow it up.’

Namjoon says, thoughtfully, ‘I wonder where her partner’s working now.’

Yoongi’s surprised Namjoon doesn’t already know, to be honest, he’s always two steps ahead of Yoongi.

He flicks his gaze to you again. You’re still waiting against the car, and there’s a loneliness to your posture, a fatigued downturn to your mouth that makes him say, ‘Hey Joon, I’ll call you back, ok?’

He ends the call, unlocks the car.

‘We should get back and compare notes,’ Yoongi says. His voice has dropped the way it does when he’s tired, and shit, he is tired. He hasn’t slept well for a while.

‘Let me drive,’ you offer. You take his keys, and your fingers brush his for an instant.

The contact, brief though it is, makes Yoongi’s skin tingle.

He wonders if you notice his reaction, but you’re already sliding in, adjusting the seat, starting up the car.

***

Yoongi wakes when you’re parking the car, sits up, a little embarrassed.

‘I’m sorry,’ he says, looking to gauge your reaction.

‘Don’t be,’ you reply. ‘I would have done the same if you’d driven.’

There’s a hint of mischief in the curve of your half-smile.

‘You mumble in your sleep.’

Yoongi rubs a hand over his face. ‘What’d I say?’

‘I couldn’t make out any words,’ you tell him, but there’s a twinkle in your eye that makes him wonder if that’s really true.

Mara is the only person who’s shared his bed in recent years, and she’d never mentioned anything.

You swipe your ID to get into the station, hit the lifts.

In the dire grey lighting you look almost as tired as he does.

‘Coffee?’ Yoongi offers, when you pass the vending machine on the way to the office.

‘Yeah,’ you say. You’re on your phone, frowning over a text.

Yoongi passes you a cup.

‘Problem?’ he asks.

‘Kiho,’ you say. You look at him. ‘My old partner. He wants to meet up.’

‘It’d be useful to talk through the case with him,’ Yoongi agrees.

Your expression is difficult to read. ‘He’s in a retreat a couple hours drive from here. He took time off after we closed the case.’

Yoongi gulps his coffee. ‘There isn’t anything else we can do here anyway, we’re waiting on leads.’

He reaches out his hand for the car keys. ‘I can drive.’

***

The retreat Kiho is staying in is set amongst the foothills of a mountain, rolling grounds all around, a view of the cliffs overlooking the sea.

It seems to Yoongi like a place only the very rich or the very damaged would live.

Unless you get better pay packets in Seoul he’s apprehensive about meeting Kiho.

You sign in at the front desk, the receptionist greets you warmly, like she’s met you a few times before.

You lead Yoongi through a huge lounge, through open patio doors and into a green. Yoongi’s looking around at the residents, scanning the area the way he does automatically whenever he’s in an unfamiliar place.

You’re waving a hand, and then you’re embracing a tall man tightly. Neither of you say anything but Yoongi can see the way your shoulders slump, like the tension’s draining out of you.

It’s only when the tall man looks up at Yoongi inquiringly that Yoongi notices the long scar running along his neck. Tracing the path of his jugular, vertical rather than horizontal.

Kiho extends a hand.

‘So you’re going to get our guy,’ he says.

Yoongi doesn’t know what to say to that.

‘We’re going to get him,’ he says, finally.

Kiho turns to you. ‘You haven’t told him,’ he says to you.

You’re looking at Yoongi.

‘We can tell him now.’

***

‘I started getting notes after Jang Daeseong was convicted,’ you say. You’re sitting in a gazebo with Yoongi and Kiho, mugs of coffee in front of you.

Yoongi raises an eyebrow.

You flick your eyes to his, then look away, unlock your phone.

Yoongi takes your phone, scrolls through a gallery of pictures.

Lined paper, handwriting he’s seen before.

Yoongi reads through the content, then returns your phone to you.

‘The originals are with forensics,’ you tell him. ‘The paper and ink are generic, impossible to trace. There’s no trace of DNA, not so much as a partial print.’

‘The notes stopped coming last month,’ you say. ‘Right around the time I moved.’

Kiho’s scratching his neck absently, Yoongi catches how your gaze drops to his scar.

The length of it’s longer than a stab wound, he thinks the surgeons might have had to extend the scar to repair the vessels beneath.

You turn to Yoongi.

‘We have to stop him,’ you say. ‘Use me to lure him out.’

‘He nearly killed me,’ Kiho says. His expression is sober, his tone flat.

He stops there, but Yoongi can hear his next words, loud and clear.

What’s he going to do to you?

‘We can’t let him keep going like this,’ you say, very gently.

Kiho meets Yoongi’s gaze.

Yoongi doesn’t falter.

‘He has to be stopped,’ he agrees.

***

The drive back to the police station goes quicker - there’s something about seeing your old partner that’s given you a bump of energy.

Yoongi can practically feel the adrenaline fizzing in your blood, coming off you in waves.

He’s worried about the crash when the adrenaline ebbs.

He sure as fuck hopes you can cope with the lows better than he can.

He’d put in a call before you left the retreat, Namjoon’s fast tracking a last known address on the neighbour of Jeon Bogyeol who’d moved away.

You’re typing an address into the satnav yourself, face drawn, eyes serious.

Yoongi doesn’t have to ask whose address it is.

‘Are you sure you’re up to this?’ he asks.

His voice is as neutral as he can make it but he already knows that you’ve made your decision.

It’s written all over you, in the way your shoulders are squared, in the tilt of your chin, in the way your hands are tensed into fists in your lap.

‘I need to see this through, Yoongi,’ you say.

Yoongi takes a moment.

‘What happened to Kiho?’ he asks.

‘He didn’t see who it was,’ you answer. Your eyes are fixed in front of you, jaw tensed.

‘He was heading home in between shifts and he got jumped in the car park under his apartment. If he hadn’t been found by the car park attendant —‘ you voice trails off, and you shiver.

‘He was lucky the car park attendant called for help right away. That his next door neighbour, fresh off a shift in the trauma department, arrived home when she did and was there to take over. That he lives five minutes on blue lights away from the best trauma centre in Seoul.’

You look at Yoongi. ‘Kiho’s damned lucky to be alive.’

‘It’s a different injury from the reaper’s usual MO,’ Yoongi says slowly.

You nod. ‘He was toying with us.’

‘You said you received notes from the Reaper,’ Yoongi says. He’s watching you carefully in the rearview. ‘What did they say?’

Your lips press together in a line, but your voice is steady when you answer.

‘He said he’d been watching me, and that he was coming for me. That I’d be his final kill.’

***

The address you’ve put in for Jeon Bogyeol is a house in a run down suburban neighbourhood, the type of place Yoongi grew up.

The houses are haphazardly arranged, like a careless scatter on a Monopoly board, connected by a warren of roads too narrow for more than one car to pass.

Yoongi can see you tensing up the closer you get to your destination, and after he parks and switches off the engine, he places his hand on your arm.

Your eyes are expressive, more so than your voice.

‘We haven’t got grounds yet for an arrest warrant,’ you say, flat.

‘We’re working the case,’ Yoongi replies. ‘And if it’s right, we’ll work it until it’s airtight.’

Your response is to stare at him a moment, then to push open the car door.

Yoongi notices that you’ve unzipped your jacket, making your holstered gun more visible.

His own gun presses against his hip, the weight of it reminding him that although he’s only drawn it a handful of times, each time has been with intent.

He sure as fuck hopes neither of you will have reason to draw your gun today.

***

The address is little more than a shack, a rickety door that looks like it’ll give under a strong kick, a boarded up window that’s visibly cracked.

Yoongi knocks, identifies you both.

Follows procedure because he’s determined to get it all right this time.

Get the monster locked up where he belongs.

You don’t have grounds to break down the door, at least not until you go round to the back and see the pink tricycle upended in the dirt, streamers splayed tendrils of pink and white.

There isn’t much that sends Yoongi into the grey as much as the suggestion that a child might be involved.

He doesn’t really recall looking at you to confirm, just knows that one minute he’s outside in the chill and the next he’s inside the shack, gun drawn, the metallic tang of blood in the back of his throat.

There’s nowhere to hide in the empty shack, Jeon Bogyeol is gone.

You do a cursory search but both of you know you aren’t going to find your answers here.

Then Yoongi must blank out, because the next thing he hears is your voice, firm, saying his name.

He’s panting, covered in sweat, back against a wall, your hands grabbing fistfuls of his jacket to keep him upright.

He blinks, and you snap into focus. There’s ringing in his ears.

Your mouth opens, and the ringing stops. He hears your voice.

‘Let’s go, Yoongi.’

He lets you lead him out, folds himself into the passenger seat of your car, notes distantly how you put your hand on the top of the doorframe like you’re worried he’s going to bang his head.

You start the engine and then you drive, and Yoongi’s grateful that you don’t say anything at all, don’t ask for an explanation of why a fucking tricycle sent him into a tailspin.

Yoongi looks down in his lap because he’s not ready to see if you’re looking at him differently now that you’ve seen him wig out.

You put the radio on after a few minutes, stop at a drive thru after an hour.

It’s only when you hand him a coffee, silently, that he’s moved to speak.

He clears his throat, and you’re the one who speaks, still looking straight ahead, out the windscreen.

‘You don’t have to tell me. I mean, I’ll listen if you do, but you don’t have to.’

Yoongi chews on that a moment.

‘Three years ago I worked what we thought was a murder in Busan. It turned out to be an abduction.’

Yoongi laughs. There’s no humour in it.

‘We found her. She was still warm. If we’d been ten minutes quicker at figuring it out, if her fucking dad had told us about the business deal he had that had gone sour sooner, if I’d even just tried harder…’

His voice trails off.

He risks a glance at you.

You’re still not looking at him.

‘I can’t speak to whether you could have prevented it, Yoongi. All I know is that none of us come to work to do a bad job.’

Your hand lands on his forearm briefly.

‘Some days are just bad days at the office.’

It’s not the first time Yoongi’s heard it, but it’s the first time it’s been said to him with no judgement that he can hear.

***

When you get back to the precinct, Namjoon’s waiting.

He hands Yoongi another case file.

‘I got Jimin to follow up on those leads we talked about,’ Namjoon says, no preamble.

‘We visited Jeon Bogyeol’s last known address,’ you say. ‘There’s no one there now, but it hasn’t been long since he moved out.’

Namjoon says, ‘Keep me informed.’

He nods to the case file. ‘There’s some interesting information in there.’

As Namjoon walks off, you turn to Yoongi.

‘I’m going down to visit someone I know in forensics, see if they can check the house.’

Yoongi heads for your joint office.

There’s a cleaning cart parked just outside the door, which opens just as Yoongi reaches for the doorknob.

The cleaner apologises and bows politely.

Yoongi steps aside to let her pass.

‘You forgot this,’ he says, spotting the dusting cloth left on your desk.

He hands it to her and places the file on his desk.

Outside, it’s raining again.

***

Yoongi wakes with a jolt.

You’re perched on the edge of his desk.

‘You should go home, get some sleep.’

‘In the middle of an active murder investigation?’ Yoongi mumbles.

‘I’m one of the potential targets, remember?’ you say, grimacing. ‘He might come to us.’

At Yoongi’s expression, you say, ‘We’ve been doing nothing but following up leads since the last murder. The last investigation took months, almost a year. What are you going to do, not sleep until he’s caught?’

‘I don’t sleep much anyway,’ Yoongi says, but he knows you’re right.

‘I know you don’t,’ you reply. There’s an empathy in your tone that reminds him you’re a homicide detective too.

You exchange a look, and then you both speak at the same time.

‘I should go —‘

‘Do you like wontons?’ Yoongi blurts out.

You raise an eyebrow. ‘Is this like inviting me in for ramen?’

‘What?’ Yoongi splutters. ‘No, not like that. There’s this place I go. They have—-‘

‘Wontons, I get it,’ you say. You get up. ‘Yeah. Let’s go.’

***

It’s been a while since Yoongi shared a meal with someone else, the last person was Hoseok, who could go straight from a crime scene to a steakhouse without turning a hair.

You’re chasing a wonton around your plate, fatigue lining the corners of your mouth.

Yoongi asks, ‘Where do you live?’

‘The other side of town,’ you tell him. ‘Near the financial district.’

‘Fancy,’ Yoongi muses.

‘More than I can afford,’ you say darkly. ‘If this case goes on for a while I’m going to need to move.’

You look up at him. ‘Where do you live?’

‘Close to here,’ Yoongi says.

‘Yeah?’

You put your chopsticks down. ‘I should —-‘

This time, Yoongi interrupts.

‘Do you want to come round for ramen?’

Your eyes meet, and there’s a beat of silence. Then a pulse of connection that sends heat through Yoongi’s veins.

Your knee brushes his under the table.

‘Yeah,’ you answer, deliberate. ‘Fuck, yeah.’

***

Yoongi’s always hated the preamble to a hookup, in his line of work uncertainty is a thing to be avoided.

You work the case until you get an explanation no reasonable person would doubt.

He finds himself waiting, though, now that you’re standing in his apartment.

You’re looking around, and he wonders if his existence seems as lonely on the outside as it feels on the inside.

He’s wondering if you’ve changed your mind, if you really did think he meant ramen, when you reach out and grasp the front of his shirt.

Slip the tips of your fingers just under, hold the placket as you use your other hand to unbutton. Start at his throat, work your way down, slowly.

His skin prickles under the warmth of your fingers.

You lean forward and press a kiss to the base of his neck.

Yoongi reaches up, slides a hand around the nape of your neck, and you tilt your face to his.

Close up, you’re soft.

Yoongi traces your bottom lip with his thumb, and your lips part.

You don’t say anything, though, and that’s ok, because Yoongi thinks you’re as talked out as he is.

It’s been a hell of a fucking day.

You’re kissing his neck again, instead of his mouth, and that’s ok, because this isn’t love, it’s comfort.

A human connection in a day filled with monsters.

Yoongi sighs as your hands slip over his bare chest, round to his back.

He helps you lift your top over your head, admires your breasts, nipples pressing against the fabric of your bra.

He cups the weight of them in his hands, and you moan.

Yoongi’s cock is filling out, and you’re undoing his belt like you want to see for yourself.

You drop to your knees in front of him, press your mouth onto the length of him over his boxer briefs, sigh with pleasure.

‘Not too much,’ Yoongi warns, ‘not if you want me to fuck you.’

You look up at him, hair mussed, a smile curving your lips.

You tug his boxer briefs down, and Yoongi curls a hand around himself so as not to hit you in the face.

‘Just let me —‘

You open your mouth to take him in, and Yoongi groans at the feel of your warmth.

When did he last —

His crown nudges the back of your throat, and you swallow, and he loses his train of thought.

He grabs your shoulder, tugs you up, kisses the smear of his own stickiness at the corner of your mouth.

The light slanting in through the window is hues of gold and orange, filling in the hollows of your face, outlining the curves of your body.

Yoongi has to stop looking at you because he doesn’t want to cry at how much he’s missed being close to someone like this.

‘Where do you want me?’ he asks, voice taut.

‘Anywhere,’ you say. ‘Just turn these fucking lights out.’

***

In the dark, Yoongi’s most enraptured by the warmth of you.

Your skin is smooth, so soft under his hands as he wraps his fingers around the curve of your hips.

His cock glides in and out of the heat between your legs, and your moans are beautiful but what really gets him are the hitches in your breathing as he moves.

He turns you over, onto your back, and you pull him to you. Your mouth opens on his shoulder in what would be a kiss if you weren’t biting down. Your tongue flicks over his bruised skin, an apology.

You haven’t spoken to each other in words in a while but Yoongi doesn’t think either of you need words right now.

At least he doesn’t.

You’re tightening around his cock now, your cries quickening until you gasp his name in a tone that makes him grunt and his hips jerk, taking him deep as he can go.

Even in his pleasure he makes sure not to crush you as he collapses next to you.

Then you’re up, walking over to the window, pulling up the sash, lighting a cigarette without asking if he’s ok with it.

Yoongi admires the outline of your profile against the glass.

‘I needed that,’ you say, taking a drag, hunching a little to blow smoke out of his window.

‘Me too,’ Yoongi says, honestly.

He ties off the condom, gets up to toss it in the trash on top of yesterday’s takeout.

Pours you a glass of water on his way back to bed.

He half expects you to be dressed, and you are, but in his clothes, not your own, an old t-shirt he’d tossed on the chair by the bed yesterday morning before he left for work.

He can’t see your face clearly in the dark. It makes it easy to find his voice.

‘You should stay,’ he says. ‘We can get coffee in the morning.’

You’re quiet. ‘I want to.’

Yoongi climbs into bed, and after a moment you slide in next to him.

Your bodies aren’t touching at all, but somehow having you there with him is enough.

Yoongi means to check on you, but he’s asleep so quickly he doesn’t get a chance to.

***

There’s a basketball hoop set into the wall in the back end of the station, a concrete square with a chain-link fence.

The building opposite is a block of offices, as is the building next to it.

Yoongi makes the shot, and you grab the ball on its first bounce.

You say, ‘Forensics got nothing from Jeon Bogyeol’s shack. He bleached the shit out of the place before he left.’

Yoongi grunts, watches you point and shoot.

He’d read through the file Namjoon gave him on the neighbour - it’s incomplete but she was last seen alive twelve weeks ago in a coastal town.

There’s something niggling at the back of his brain, he’d suggested shooting hoops in the hopes that the activity might shake the thought loose so his conscious mind can make the connection.

His phone vibrates in his pocket.

Namjoon.

‘I’m going up to see Namjoon,’ he says. ‘You coming?’

‘I’ll stay here for a bit,’ you say. ‘I’ll be up in a sec.’

Yoongi shrugs, lets himself back in.

Takes the stairs up to Namjoon’s office on the third floor.

There’s a cleaning cart parked next to the staff kitchen as he rounds the corner.

Yoongi’s about to knock on Namjoon’s door when his scattered thoughts crystallise.

The case file Namjoon had given him had a grainy photo of Jeon Bogyeol’s neighbour, the one who’d reported him and then disappeared.

He’s seen her face before, and recently.

Coming out of your office.

‘Fuck,’ he swears.

He grabs his phone out of his pocket, dials your number.

Your phone rings, and rings.

Yoongi takes off, down the stairs, back the way he came.

By the time he bursts out of the back door of the station, gun drawn, his heart’s thumping triple speed, but his hand is steady as he aims it at the man with a knife standing over you.

His finger goes from trigger guard to trigger.

‘Fucking drop it,’ Yoongi warns.

He doesn’t, so Yoongi shoots.

***

Jeon Bogyeol’s neighbour who had reported him was called Seo Hyerin.

She was in her early forties, an ex-teacher who he’d coerced into helping him by turning up at her new place even after she’d moved to get away from him.

She’d been too scared to disobey him, but in forcing her to help him, Jeon Bogyeol had given her access to enough information to clinch the case against him.

Once she’d found out he’d been shot and was likely to go straight from hospital to prison, she’d shared all that information with Yoongi and you.

The pieces fell into place so easily there was no need to make any of it fit.

And now Yoongi’s sitting in the kitchen of your apartment, watching as you pack things up.

He’d been right. Your place was fancy.

You were being transferred back to Seoul to finish up, see things through with the case.

He realises you’re looking at him.

‘My new place is a couple hours drive from here,’ you say.

‘Yeah?’ Yoongi says, like he hadn’t already looked it up.

He’d also looked up timed automated cat food dispensers, just because it was one thing to have a neighbour drop in and feed Kenzo if he’s stuck with a case occasionally, but it’s another thing if he’s regularly going to be driving down to see you.

If he’s regularly going to be spending the night away.

It’s uncharacteristic, for him, but he’s hopeful.

‘I slept pretty well that time,’ you say, looking down into your box.

You look up at him, and the curve of your lips makes Yoongi think to himself that he’d like to kiss you, sometime.

‘In your apartment,’ you clarify, like he wouldn’t already know.

‘I make good ramen,’ Yoongi says. ‘I can make it again for you, you know.’

You laugh, and the sound makes Yoongi feel warm.

He realises that he’s smiling.

Fuck, it’s been a while.

#bts fanfiction #bts smut #yoongi x reader #bts fanfic #yoongi fic #yoongi smut

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