Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

You make the profile on a Tuesday. It is raining lightly, like the sky can’t commit.

Your apartment is warm in the cheap, electric way. Too quiet, too clean. The kind of stillness that begs to be disrupted, not violently, but with intention. With bad decisions dressed up in silk and charm. So you pour yourself a glass of wine, slide into your comfiest, most low-effort lingerie, and open the app your roommate once whispered about like it was a sin.

Seeking Arrangement. That’s all it’s called. As if that alone weren’t the whole truth.

You do not use your name. You do not use your face. What you give is a suggestion, parted lips, clavicle glow, a delicate flash of skin like the promise of something private. Your bio is short. Half a joke. Half a dare.

Broke, bratty, and bored. Take me shopping or take me to bed. Bonus points if you can do both.

Then you close the app, and you tell yourself you will delete it in the morning.

But the first message comes twelve minutes later.

You scroll past the usual suspects, yacht-bound CEOs and crypto messiahs, their offers written like contracts, their attention like debt. One man calls you princess. One sends an unsolicited photo of a Rolex, followed by his dick. Another asks for your Venmo before your name.

And then, almost invisible between them all, there it is:

L.K.38

A single photo. Not a selfie. Not staged. A broad-shouldered man in a suit, face turned in profile, backlit by the grainy glow of some airport lounge. Sunglasses tucked into the collar of his shirt, with a drink near his hand. It’s impossible to place, but there’s something about the posture. The quiet stillness of it, like he doesn’t need to be looked at to be noticed.

The bio is empty. No name. No pitch. Just a message.

L.K.38: You look like trouble. I like trouble.

You pause. Thumb hovering. The message lands sharp, clean. Not clever, not coy, just confident. You hate men who try too hard. You hate them more when they try at all, but this doesn’t feel like effort. It feels like gravity. Like you’re already sliding.

It isn’t clever. It isn’t performative. But there is something clean in the way it lands, like a coin dropped straight into the center of a fountain.

You click, the profile is empty. Just a zip code. Local. Logged in five minutes ago. You picture someone older. Maybe not old, but worn-in. Broad shoulders. Quiet hands. A man who doesn’t need to peacock to make you look twice.

You shouldn’t reply, but your wine is half gone, and the silence has started to press in again.

So you do.

DouxChaton: Maybe I am trouble. You think you can handle that?

He answers immediately.

L.K.38: Trouble’s never scared me, but it’s made me spend money before.

You smirk. Tilt your head. Not a denial. Not a warning. It’s just fact, and that’s worse because it means he means it. You reread it once, then again. He types like a man who doesn’t bluff.

DouxChaton: So you’re used to buying your way out of bad decisions?

L.K.38: Sometimes I double down on them instead.

Your wine is forgotten. Your legs pull up beneath you like muscle memory.

You’ve spoken to men who want to own you, and in contrast, spoken to men who wish to be owned. He feels like neither. Like someone who just wants to see what happens when you’re given too much rope.

DouxChaton: You sound like the kind of guy who tips well and lies about being divorced.

L.K.38: Not divorced.

L.K.38: Just old enough to know better.

L.K.38: And young enough to still want to misbehave.

Your mouth parts, just slightly. You exhale slowly, because that one lands, and hits low, behind the ribs. You picture the airport photo again, the drink, the shoulders, the calm.

God, he’s good.

You picture his hands, wide palms, ringless fingers, the kind of knuckles you only get from punching something you didn’t mean to.

DouxChaton: Misbehave how?

L.K.38: Let’s meet and I’ll show you.

You blink. He doesn’t even pretend. There are no winks, no emojis. Just the invitation, left bare like a live wire, and God, you want to touch it, but you should be afraid. Instead, you’re warm beneath your skin in a way that feels like sensual.

DouxChaton: You always this direct?

L.K.38: Only when I’m interested.

L.K.38: Are you free Friday night, sweetheart?

Sweetheart. You fucking hate that word, but from him, it doesn’t feel sticky. It feels practiced. Heavy with implication, like it’s somehow in these few chat lines you have earned it. 

Sweetheart twists something in your stomach. You hate it. You hate how much you like it.

You hesitate for the first time, but not out of fear, but out of something stranger. Anticipation. Excitement, in the kind of slow-burn way that comes with knowing a decision is probably stupid and doing it anyway.

DouxChaton: Depends where we’re meeting.

L.K.38: Upscale lounge. Something quiet. Discreet.

L.K.38: You pick the dress. I’ll cover the tab.

DouxChaton: You gonna bring the envelope full of cash too, or is that tacky?

L.K.38: I’ll keep it in the car. In case you impress me.

You smile now, really smile. Not because he’s funny, but because he’s playing the same game you are, and not pretending otherwise. You let the silence stretch just long enough to feel like power.

DouxChaton: Text me the details.

DouxChaton: And wear something that makes me behave.

His final message of the night:

L.K.38: That’s not really my thing, sweetheart.

Of course it isn’t, men like him don’t behave. They wait. They watch. They wager on you misbehaving first. You stare at that last line longer than you mean to, and you realize something, he didn’t ask for your number.

He expects you to give it, oh, and you do.

Your fingers hover over the keyboard. You could ghost. You could block. You could delete the whole account, blame it on the wine, and laugh about it in the morning.

You don’t.

Instead, you type out the number you only give to hair salons and strangers. The one you made in your sophomore year on Google Voice when the world started to feel too big for just one version of you.

DouxChaton: 617-555-0327

DouxChaton: Be careful with it. I’m not this easy in person.

You hesitate, and then hit send. The read receipt pops up within seconds.

Then:

L.K.38: Noted.

L.K.38: I’ll text you Friday morning. Wear something you’ll make me regret.

Your breath catches, not from fear. From knowing this is the last quiet moment you’re going to have for a while.

You toss your phone onto the pillow beside you and stare up at the ceiling. The room is dim, warm in a way that feels indulgent, somewhere between comfort and consequence.

You’ve done worse. You’ve let worse men buy you drinks, touch your waist, whisper their bankrupt promises into the crook of your neck. At least this one is honest about the exchange, not in words, but in posture. The photo alone says it: I don’t need to chase you. I’m already choosing whether you’re worth the time.

And you should hate that. You usually do.

But there’s something about him, not just the boldness, but the restraint underneath it like he could say more. Could offer more. But he won’t. Not yet. He’s waiting to see what you’ll give him first.

It makes your stomach twist.

You rise to refill your wine, bare feet cold on the laminate floor, glass half-forgotten in your hand. There’s a hum in your ears, the kind that comes after a decision has already been made, and it has, hasn’t it?

You’re going. You’ll meet him.

Not because you need the money. Not really. Not because you’re lonely. Even if you are.

But because it feels like something is about to happen. Something slow and irreversible. A turning point, wrapped in black dress fabric and whispered pet names and envelopes full of cash.

You don’t believe in fate, but you believe in instincts, and yours are screaming.

--

You wake with it already in your chest, that slow, low thrum nestled just beneath your sternum. It is not quite dread, not quite excitement. More like the memory of a sound you haven’t heard yet. A vibration, subtle and persistent, like a warning system built into your ribs.

You lie still for a while, and pretending the silence is enough.

You told yourself last night that you wouldn’t overthink it. That you’d treat it like a game, nothing more. Like slipping into someone else’s dress, someone else’s name. Just show up, be pretty, get drinks. Accept the envelope, if there is one, and then laugh if he turns out to be awful. Walk away if he isn’t.

But of course, you’re overthinking it.

You overthink the shower, how long to stand beneath the water, how hot to let it get. You turn the dial too far, scald yourself, and stay anyway. You scrub too hard. Shave your legs like it matters. Exfoliate like you’re shedding something old, soft, and useless. Moisturize like your life depends on it.

It becomes a ritual. Not about cleanliness. Not about attraction. It’s about readiness, some semblance of control. But you know that you can’t control him, but you can control this. Your preparation. Your presentation. The version of yourself you decide to bring.

Your closet waits like an open mouth. Half the hangers you own are holding clothes you bought to be brave in. You slide your fingers past them absently, leather, velvet, silk. And then you find it, the dress.

Black. Soft. Cut on the bias in a way that suggests indecency, without ever quite proving it. The hem hovers mid-thigh, flirts with danger. The neckline doesn’t ask permission. You bought it two years ago on a whim, imagining some smoky rooftop bar you never actually went to. It’s clung to a padded hanger ever since. It’s too much for dinner, too bold for birthdays, too much for the version of you that never left the apartment.

Well. Until now.

You lay it out on the bed like a question.

Next comes the perfume. Not your everyday one, not the airy citrus or the barely-there vanilla. The other one, the one you keep in the back of your drawer in its little black box, the glass bottle heavy, as if it knows something about how to make a memory. You dab it on your neck, your wrists, the curve of your thigh just beneath the hem. A place he might not find. A place you hope, for some reason, he does.

Then the lipstick. Not cherry. Not pink. Something darker. Meaner. The kind of red that looks best smudged. You paint your mouth slowly, watching yourself in the mirror like a stranger you’re trying to impress, and maybe you are.

Your phone buzzes once on the nightstand. You don’t check it right away. You just breathe. Shallow. Quiet. The hum in your chest hasn’t left.

It’s louder now.

L.K.38 : 8:00. Luxe Lounge, Downtown Crossing. Tell the host you’re meeting someone under Kennedy.

You stare at it for longer than you need to.

Kennedy.

It hits you like the aftertaste of something bitter and familiar. Kennedy. It’s common enough. There are Kennedys everywhere. Streets are named after them. Schools. Presidents. Maybe you had a professor once. Perhaps it’s just the way the word sits, clipped, official. A name with posture.

You know that name. Of course you do. It’s not exactly uncommon, but still, it unseats something. Some small, slumbering part of your memory turns its head. Not awake. Not yet.

Still, something curls at the base of your neck. Not fear. Not recognition. Something smaller. Duller. Like a radio tuning in but not quite landing.

You toss the phone on the bed and turn back toward your vanity. Your mascara’s dried, your liner still sharp. You don’t look like someone who’s second-guessing anything. You look like someone with a plan. And if your heart is beating a little faster than it should, then, well. That’s just part of the costume.

You order the Lyft like you’re confirming something. Confirming a decision. A dare, maybe. If it’s a secret. You don’t double-check the address, just click Confirm Pickup and watch the little car icon inch closer on the screen.

Five minutes away.

You pace the apartment once, slowly. Then again, faster. You know you shouldn’t recheck your reflection. You do anyway. Your lipstick is still perfect. Your hem is still high. The dress rides a little when you walk, a detail you pretend not to notice.

Outside, the headlights flicker through the window. You grab your coat and your clutch and lock the door behind you like it matters, like it’s possible to leave yourself behind when you go.

The car is quiet. The driver doesn’t ask questions. You’re grateful for that, because you don’t think your voice would work right now anyway.

The city hums around you in neon and movement, people on sidewalks, signs flashing OPEN in red script. You don’t look at your phone. You don’t look at the time. The inside of the car smells faintly like spearmint and pine-scented cleaning spray. The heater clicks softly, and some lo-fi hip hop plays on the radio.

Your legs are crossed too tightly in the backseat, but you don’t uncross them. The tension feels earned, like the price of entry.

You catch your reflection in the window. Not directly,  just enough to recognize the shape of your face, the line of your throat, the flash of red at your mouth.

You don’t look nervous. You look like a problem.

And maybe you are.

The car slows as it turns the corner onto Tremont. You spot the building before the driver does, all black marble and gold signage, the kind of place where every light is dim on purpose. The awning reads Luxe Lounge in narrow serif letters, like something out of a spy movie.

You swallow hard, and your heart clicks once behind your ribs, like a lock turning.

The car stops. The driver meets your eyes in the rearview but doesn’t say a word.

You slide out into the night.

You step inside and feel it immediately: the shift in temperature, tone, and expectation. The lounge is bathed in low gold light, with all velvet booths and backlit liquor displays, soft jazz murmuring beneath the clink of glasses. 

Everyone here looks expensive in that effortless way that isn’t actually effortless, blazers that sit just right on shoulders, heels that whisper instead of click. You don’t belong here, well, not really. But you tilt your chin like you do, like you’ve done this before, like you come here often and always leave with someone richer than you arrived with. You shrug out of your coat slowly, deliberately, fingers grazing the skin of your arms as you fold it over one forearm. You’re aware of every eye that doesn’t look at you, aware of the absence of attention. That’s how these places work, nobody stares, but everybody sees.  

You hold your posture like a weapon. You are here on purpose. You are dressed for danger. You are not the girl who almost canceled. You move like you’re being watched, even if no one is, especially because no one is. There’s a part of you that loves that, the quiet power of suggestion. 

The way you can own a room without touching it. You think about pausing by the bar, just to be difficult. Just to see how long he’d wait for you if he’s already here. You don’t know what he looks like exactly, not fully, but you bet you’d recognize the way he sits. The weight of him.

You kind of want to make him work for it, just a little. Let him think you’re running late, or second-guessing. Let him watch you laugh with a stranger first. You’re not here to be easy. You’re here to be wanted. And men like him, the older ones, the dangerous ones, they always want the girl who doesn’t say yes too quickly.

But you don’t even know what he looks like. So, you resort to asking the host, like a good girl. 

The host looks up as you approach, dressed in black-on-black with a tablet in one hand and the kind of polite expression that’s been trained into place.

“Reservation name?” he asks, glancing at you, then the screen.

You hesitate for half a second. Just long enough to feel it.

Then you say it.

“Kennedy. I’m meeting someone under Kennedy.”

The word tastes strange in your mouth. He nods like it’s nothing, taps the tablet once, and gestures toward the back of the lounge, a long hallway of private booths lit like secrets.

But the name lingers.

Kennedy.

It shouldn’t mean anything. You tell yourself that again. It’s just a name. A placeholder. Something you’ve probably heard a dozen times in passing. It’s probably not even his real last name! So, why does your stomach twist like you’ve just stepped onto the edge of something tall?

You follow the host down the hall. Your heels whisper across the carpet. You keep your back straight, your face blank, your mouth curled just enough at the edges to look amused, the kind of amused that says you’re only here because you want to be. Because you chose this.

But your pulse is in your throat now, and the name repeats in your head like an echo in an empty stairwell. Not a warning. A memory, half-formed. Just waiting to land.

The host gestures toward a booth tucked into the farthest corner, half-shadowed, half-glowing, the kind of place meant for conversations no one else should hear. Someone’s already there.

You see him before he sees you.

At first, it’s only the shape of him, tall, broad, tailored. One arm draped over the back of the booth like he owns it, like he’s done this before. His other hand cradles a lowball glass, fingers curled loose around the rim. No fidgeting. No nerves. Just stillness. Controlled. Dangerous. Calm.

He doesn’t look up right away. He’s watching the room.

You slow your pace.

Something tightens behind your ribs.

There’s something familiar in the way he holds himself, that casual tension, the kind you only learn from carrying weight for too long. You can’t see his face yet, but it doesn’t matter. You already know.

You know before he turns. You know before the host says his name again. You know before his eyes land on yours.

And when they do, it’s not surprise that flashes across his face.

It’s recognition. Slow. Deliberate. Like he’s letting it show on purpose.

And then, he smiles.

Not kindly. Not gently.

But with the sort of self-assured, wicked amusement that belongs to men who always get what they want, and who know exactly when they’ve just won something they shouldn’t have.

Your mouth goes dry.

Because it’s him.

Leon.

Your father’s friend .

From the backyard cookouts. From the Fourth of July. From those long, hazy weekends when your father grilled too much and poured drinks too strong. You hadn’t seen him in years and hadn’t spoken more than a handful of words to him, ever. Just enough to remind him that he was older. Serious. Quiet. 

Dangerous in that way government men sometimes are, not loud, not showy, but built like a weapon someone else decided not to holster. The kind of man who stood at the edges of every room and made you nervous without doing anything at all.

He stands now.

Not quickly, not with shock. Just… like he’d been waiting for you to catch up.

“Well,” he says, voice low and amused, “I’ll be damned.”

Your body reacts before your mind does. A sudden flash of heat. The tight, embarrassing clench of your thighs. The way your heart knocks against your ribs like it’s trying to outrun the look on his face.

Because it’s him.

Leon fucking Kennedy.

And all at once, the timeline folds back in on itself. The summers you spent half-watching him from behind sunglasses and solo cups. The cookouts, the lawn chairs, the way he never stayed long but somehow still lingered.

He was your low-key sexual awakening, not the first man you ever thought about, but the first one you thought about wrong.

Not in your bed.

Not in schoolgirl daydreams.

But in half-lit hallways. Barely dressed. Dangerous. Quiet.

You were eighteen when you first pictured him saying your name like a secret. You’re mid-twenties now, and he’s looking at you like maybe he’s thought about it too.

Your breath hitches, but you smooth it out before it escapes. You don’t let yourself blink too long. Don’t let the panic show.

You’ve walked into the fire. You’re not about to flinch.

So you give him a look, the kind of look that says this is fine, even if your pulse disagrees. You let your mouth curl, just barely, and tilt your head like he’s an old friend you almost recognize.

Then you slide into the booth across from him, slow and deliberate. You cross your legs like it’s the only proper thing to do in a moment like this. 

 And you say:

“Didn’t think Kennedy was a first name.”

Leon doesn’t answer right away.

He leans back, fingers still curled around his glass, and lets his eyes drag over you, not slowly, not salaciously, but with a kind of deliberate calm that makes your skin feel too tight like he’s cataloging you. Like he’s already known.

His smile doesn’t change, but his voice dips just enough to touch something beneath your skin.

“Didn’t think you’d still be answering to a fake name,” he says. “But here we are.”

His gaze settles on your mouth. Lingers.

“Red suits you.”

You hate the way your stomach flips. You hate the way he says it, like it’s not the first time he’s thought it. Like maybe he saw it coming, or worse, he hoped for it.

He takes a sip from his drink. The ice clinks softly.

“You gonna pretend you didn’t recognize me either?” he asks, tilting his head, and there’s no malice in it. No judgment.

Just the smug, steady amusement of a man who plays poker for a living and already has your tells memorized.

You laugh, soft. Just loud enough to cut through the space between you.

It’s not a real laugh. Not fully. More like a performance. A cue line. Something to buy time while your pulse calms down and your face remembers how to stay still.

You lean back, letting the booth cradle your spine. Let him think you’re relaxed, but let him wonder if you really are.

“I mean,” you say, reaching for the water glass beside your napkin, “your picture wasn’t exactly clear. Could’ve been any square-jawed fed with a decent tailor and abandonment issues.”

You take a sip. Hold his gaze over the rim.

He doesn’t flinch. He’s still watching you, like you’re more interesting now than you were when you walked in. Like you’ve confirmed something he was already half-certain of.

You set the glass down.

“But sure,” you add, lips curling just enough to tease, “maybe I recognized the scowl.”

Leon’s mouth twitches, the ghost of a real smile, sharp and unreadable.

“You always this mouthy on a first date?”

You shrug. “Depends on the tip.”

He lets that hang in the air for a beat. Then he laughs, low, from the chest, like he’s genuinely enjoying himself.

God, he’s dangerous when he’s warm.

He leans in just slightly. Not enough for anyone else to notice, but you feel it. The weight of him, suddenly closer. Like gravity shifted in your direction.

He leans in.

Not dramatically. Not with intent to touch. Just enough that the air changes between you, warmer now, more specific. You can smell the faintest edge of his cologne beneath the smoke and top-shelf bourbon, and it’s not helping.

“I’m guessing you’re not here for dinner,” he says.

His voice is quieter now. Not conspiratorial, just sure.

You meet his gaze. Let your lips part like you might argue. But you don’t.  Instead, you tilt your head just slightly.

“Depends what’s on the menu.”

His eyes drop, not far, not rude, but enough. And when they lift again, you can tell he’s already piecing you apart. Not like prey. Like opportunity.

He exhales through his nose. Just once.

“Brat.”

Not cruel. Not teasing. More like a diagnosis.

Like he’s seen girls like you before, but more importantly, like he’s seen you.

And it’s not the first time you’ve heard it. Not even the first time from a man who thought he could tame it out of you.

But coming from him?

From Leon?

It lands different, it hits lower. Sharper.

You feel it like heat beneath your skin, blooming out from your chest and settling just behind your knees. You shift slightly in the booth, but it’s too late, your body’s already betrayed you. You’re flushed. You’re clenching. You’re caught.

You hate how much you want him to repeat it. To make it worse. To make it personal.

It’s ridiculous, the way your brain short-circuits for that one syllable in his voice. But you’ve thought about this before, this exact moment, or one close to it.

Not on purpose. Not out loud. But late at night, when the world was quiet and your phone was down, and you were scrolling with one hand under the covers. You’ve imagined him saying it. Not yelling. Not angry.

Just like this.

Familiar. Possessive, almost.

He could have called you beautiful; he could have started with sweet. That’s what most men do when they’re trying to get something.

But not Leon.

He already knows he has it. He doesn’t ask. He confirms.

You smile, but it doesn’t reach your eyes.

“Careful,” you murmur. “Might start thinking you like that.”

Leon doesn’t laugh. Not really. But something in his mouth shifts, a twitch at the corner, a shadow of what might be satisfaction.

And now, sitting across from him in lipstick you picked to feel like someone else, you can’t stop your mind from folding backward. Peeling through old summers like pages that stuck together too long.

You think of the pool parties, the late July heatwaves, the half-flat sodas and paper plates, your father talking shop with Leon by the grill. You’d be fifteen, sixteen, seventeen, laid out on a lounge chair with your sunglasses too big and your bikini bottoms pulled higher than necessary. You remember the sting of sunburn and the sharper sting of being ignored.

You remember watching him. Not obviously, not head-on. But from the corners. The way he stood, like he didn’t belong in the world around him. Like the house, the yard, the whole damn barbecue were just things he passed through because someone asked him to.

You’d try to catch his eye. Subtle things. Dropping your towel. Stretching like you were sore. Laughing too loudly at things that weren’t funny.

He never looked.

Or if he did, if he ever noticed, he didn’t let it show, and maybe that was the hottest part.

By the time you were twenty-one, you’d worked up enough nerve, or maybe just enough tequila, to try something bolder. He was at your dad’s house again, jacket off, tie loosened, drink in hand. You don’t remember what you said. Something clumsy. Something that sounded like a joke.

He didn’t take the bait. Just looked at you for a long second and said something polite.

“You’re drunk. Go to bed.”

You hated him for it, and you wanted him more after.

Now, years later, he’s sitting across from you in a booth meant for secrets. No one around to watch. No father standing beside him. No barrier but your own restraint, and that’s wearing thin.

And he’s calling you brat like maybe he saw it then. Like maybe he wanted to see it. Like he’s finally done pretending.

He takes another sip of his drink, slow and deliberate, eyes never leaving yours. The ice clinks softly, the only sound between you for a moment too long, and then he sets the glass down. Leans in further, this time just enough that your knees nearly brush beneath the table.

“Let’s not pretend we don’t know why we’re here.”

His voice is low. Certain. Not cruel, but cutting through the static like a blade slipped beneath fabric. You don’t answer right away. You could play dumb. Bat your lashes. Ask what he means, but that would be a lie. And the moment’s already too sharp for pretending.

This isn’t a meet-cute. It’s not a transaction either. It’s something stranger. Hotter.

An understanding, half-formed in sunlit backyards and drunken glances, now fully awake under dim lighting and layered intentions.

You let your eyes narrow. Not cold, just curious. Controlled.

He watches you the way men like him always do when they’ve already decided how they want the night to end.

“I don’t do this often,” he says. The words come measured, like he’s laying out a fact. Like he knows how it sounds, but says it anyway. “Not like this.”

Your voice is lighter, deliberately casual, but not soft.

“And how do you usually do it?”

He shrugs. It’s a movement without urgency. A man with all the time in the world.

“Discretion. Boundaries. Paperwork, sometimes.”

You laugh once, dry and low.

“Wow,” you murmur. “So romantic.”

He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t blink. If anything, his gaze sharpens, the warmth stripped clean. There’s nothing flirty about the look he gives you now.

“This isn’t romantic.”

And you should flinch at that. You should let it sting, let it settle in your chest like rejection.

But you don’t.

Because he’s right, and more than that, you want him to be.

You didn’t come here for flowers. You didn’t come here for fairy tales. Knowing who it is, you stay, under the guise of you came to see if he would finally look at you the way you always hoped he would. To see what would happen if he did.

You lean in slightly, matching his stillness, measure for measure.

“Fine,” you say, voice quiet but sure.

“So what is it, then?”

You don’t look away when you say it.

“Let me guess,” you murmur, twirling the straw in your untouched water. “You’ve been fantasizing about this since I was what, eighteen? Nineteen? Bikini at the pool, red popsicle, little sundress you pretended not to notice?”

You let the corner of your mouth curl. A smile, not a question.

His jaw shifts, barely.

“That was you playing innocent,” he says.

You laugh. “That was me playing available. ”

There’s a beat of silence that follows, not awkward, not cold. Just… heavy.

You watch his fingers flex once on the table, like he might reach for something and doesn’t. His eyes stay on yours, and the air between you folds in on itself, thicker, tighter.

You lean in just enough to feel it.

“Did you ever want me back then?” you ask, like it doesn’t matter, like you’re joking. Like your stomach isn’t already in knots.

“Probably not,” you add with a shrug, before he can speak. “I was a mess. College dropout. Bad dye job. Whole ‘please love me’ thing bleeding off my skin.”

You pause. Let your eyes scan him lazily.

“But I bet you looked. Just once. Maybe twice.”

You sip your water like punctuation.

“I would’ve let you.”

Leon doesn’t smile this time.

Not fully.

But there’s a shift in his posture, that subtle change in men who’ve decided the game is theirs now. His hand leaves his glass and rests flat on the table, fingers splayed, casual. Anchored. His eyes stay on yours, steady as a trigger pull.

“Cute story,” he says, voice smooth and low. “But you don’t get to rewrite history just because you’ve got lipstick on now.”

The air between you tightens. You feel it in your throat. In your thighs. In the low ache that had been building since the moment he said 'brat'.

He tilts his head slightly.

“I looked,” he says. “Once. Maybe twice.”

A pause.

“I also knew better.”

You open your mouth, to argue, to laugh, you’re not sure, but he doesn’t give you the chance.

“And let’s be honest, sweetheart,” he continues, the endearment deliberate now, weighted, almost cruel in its softness. “You weren’t playing available back then. You were playing reckless. ”

He leans in, elbows on the table now, close enough for you to see the flecks of gold in his stubble and the way his hair catches the warm light overhead.

“You think that sundress made me want you?” he asks, quiet. “It didn’t. The way you looked at me did.”

Your breath catches.

“You didn’t want to be loved,” he says. “You wanted to be seen.”

His voice drops just a little lower.

“And now you’re here. Sitting across from me, dressed to be owned, asking if I ever wanted you.”

He doesn’t blink.

“So tell me, are you still pretending this is a coincidence?”

You should shrink from it.

You should pull back. Apologize. Laugh it off, like any normal girl would.

But you’re not normal. Not tonight.

You’ve wanted this for years, even when you didn’t have the language for it. Even when the wanting was just a tight pull low in your stomach, watching him from the deep end of your father’s pool, wondering what it would take for a man like that to look at you like a problem he wanted to solve.

So when he says your name like that, like he’s tasting it, like he’s testing how it feels in his mouth before he says it again, you don’t back down.

You lean in.

“You tell me,” you murmur. “Am I pretending?”

Your voice is smooth, but your chest is tight. Your thighs clench beneath the table. Your hands rest in your lap like they don’t trust themselves.

And then, softer, but sharper, meant to cut:

“Because you’re the one who messaged me.”

That lands. You see it, it’s not a win, not exactly, but a crack.

His jaw twitches. Just slightly, but he doesn’t look away.

“I wore this for you,” you add, and your voice almost breaks on the last word, almost, but you keep it steady. “Picked the lipstick for you. Got in the car for you. ”

Your tongue wets your bottom lip, slow.

“So if anyone’s pretending?” You tilt your head, lashes low. “It’s not me.”

He doesn’t speak for a long moment.

Doesn’t blink, doesn’t shift, just watches you, gaze level, unreadable, like something in him has settled. As if there was a part of him that was playing along has gone quiet to make room for something colder. Older.

Control.

Then he moves.

It’s small, precise. A slow lean back into the booth, his arm stretching out to rest across the top of the leather. His fingers tap once against the cushion. A simple gesture, effortless, like he’s not commanding anything at all.

And then he crooks two fingers toward the seat beside him. Once.

No smile. No explanation.

Just:

“Come here.”

He doesn’t raise his voice. Doesn’t need to. The words settle in your stomach like heat. Like gravity.

Your pulse stumbles.

You hesitate, not because you’re unwilling, but because it’s too easy. Too natural. Like something that’s already happened once before in a dream, and now it’s just happening again, the way it always was going to.

You glance at the space between you. The edge of the table. The long, polished stretch of booth that separates where you are from where he is.

It might as well be a mile.

You could say no.

You should say no.

But instead, you shift. You slide from your seat, slow and fluid, heels clicking softly as you round the curve of the booth. Each step feels louder than it is, like your own body is betraying how badly you want this, have wanted this, for longer than you’ll admit.

And when you sit beside him, not pressed close, but near enough to feel the warmth radiating off his body,  it’s like something inside you exhales.

He doesn’t look at you right away.

Just lets his fingers rest against the back of the booth, behind your shoulders. Not touching. Not yet.

The proximity alone is enough.

Your thigh is brushing his now. Bare skin against tailored pants. You’re aware of every inch of yourself. Every heartbeat. Every breath.

He turns his head. Just slightly. Eyes still half-lidded. Cool. Calculated.

Like he’s making sure you’re exactly where he wants you.

“Better,” he murmurs.

And fuck, it is.

Not because he’s closer. But because you moved, and because he asked.

And you said yes without saying a word.

He doesn’t touch you.

That’s the worst part. The best part. The thing that makes your mouth dry and your thighs press tighter together beneath the table.

His arm stays behind you, knuckles grazing the top of the booth. He’s so close now that you can feel the shift in the air when he breathes. When he turns his head.

You’re looking forward. You’re trying to act like this is normal, like your heart isn’t pounding, like your body isn’t screaming to close the gap.

And then he speaks, his voice is low. Private, and closer than it should be.

“You’ve wanted this for a long time,” he says. Not a question. A truth.

The words land low, behind your navel. A slow, curling heat. They don’t shock you. They don’t even make you mad. They just make you feel seen.

You blink. Swallow. Say nothing.

His mouth is near your ear now, not close enough to touch, but close enough to feel the shape of his breath.

“Don’t bother lying.”

You don’t.

Because you have wanted this, in fragments, in flashes, in half-formed thoughts you buried in the softest parts of yourself and tried not to name. You liked it when you were too young to know better, and even more when you were old enough to realize that he did.

You wonder if he knows what those summers did to you.

How many nights did you touch yourself with your headphones in and his name on your tongue. How many men you chased for the wrong reasons because they carried something of him, the voice, the hands, the presence. How many drinks it took before you tried to flirt with him at your father’s house, how humiliating it was when he didn’t bite, and how much worse it was that it only made you want him more.

And now here you are. Black dress. Red lips. Sitting beside him like you’ve always belonged there.

He still hasn’t laid a finger on you, and somehow, that’s the part that makes you ache the most.

He doesn’t move right away.

Doesn’t look at you, even now. Just keeps speaking like he’s narrating a story you wrote in secret and thought no one would ever find.

His voice is steady. Low. Dangerous in its calm.

“And now you’re wondering,” he says, “how far I’ll let you take it.”

It’s not a question. It’s not even curious. It’s something else, something deeper, like he already knows. He’s been letting you inch closer since the day you turned eighteen and started looking at him like you knew what you were doing.

You say nothing, because you can’t. Your throat’s too tight, breath shallow and burning, heart beating like it’s trying to outrun itself.

His fingers shift behind you.

Just a small movement, casual, unhurried, but it changes everything. The knuckles of his hand brush your shoulder, then trail lightly down the top of your spine. A slow, deliberate drag, soft at first, then firmer.

Goosebumps rise like they’ve been waiting. You feel your body respond before your mind does. The way your back straightens. The way your thighs press together. The way your lips part just enough to catch a breath you don’t want him to hear.

Leon finally turns his head.

He’s close now, closer than before. His eyes meet yours like they’ve been waiting all night. Like maybe they’ve been waiting for years.

And then, his hand finds the side of your neck.

Not choking. Not gripping.

Just… holding.

Warm. Firm. Steady.

Like he’s testing how much you’ll let him take.

“You want me to spell it out for you?” he murmurs. “What this is?”

You should answer, but your voice doesn’t work.

So you nod.

Barely.

And his thumb brushes once, gently, along the edge of your jaw.

“Good girl.”

You swallow.

It’s instinct, not intention. The kind of movement your body makes when it forgets you’re trying to hold something in.

His hand is warm against your throat, not squeezing, not forcing, just there. Steady and claiming and completely impossible to ignore. His thumb grazes just beneath your jaw, and it’s maddening how little it takes.

Your skin prickles. Your chest is tight. There’s a pulse in your throat now that didn’t used to be there, one he can feel beneath his palm, and you hate that.

You hate that he can feel what he’s doing to you. Hate it almost as much as you want him to keep going.

Your jaw tightens. Your lips part, then press shut again.

You can’t flinch. You won’t. Not now.

So you breathe, shallow, but even, and meet his gaze with everything you have left.

“Bit presumptuous,” you murmur, voice thin but intact. “You always this confident with girls who sit when they’re told?”

Your words are sharp. Clean. Almost convincing.

But your pulse gives you away. So does the way your knees are still pressed together, tight, like you can contain all of it. Like the heat between your legs hasn’t been blooming quietly since the moment he looked at you like a problem worth solving.

He smiles. Slow. Like he knows what you’re doin, because he does.

You don’t break eye contact. You won’t give him that, but your voice is softer when you add, “I didn’t say yes yet.”

It’s a lie.

And he knows it.

His fingers flex ever so slightly, not tighter, just firmer. Just enough for you to remember he’s still touching you. That he hasn’t moved his hand since the moment he laid it there. Like he doesn’t have to.

“Didn’t have to,” he says.

And you hate him for that. But mostly, you hate that he’s right.

The waitress comes and goes like a ghost, soft-spoken, practiced, careful not to linger. She sets down their drinks, asks if they’ll be ordering dinner, and Leon says no without looking at the menu. His hand leaves your neck when she arrives, but the weight of it doesn’t.

You let your own fingers curl around the stem of your glass, wine red and heavy in the dim light. You drink slower than you need to, not because you're nervous, but because you're trying to hold onto the shape of the moment. Every heartbeat, every breath. Every impossible inch of distance between your thigh and his.

You talk. Not about anything that matters. The weather. The bar. He makes an offhand comment about city traffic, which he turns into a dry story about missing a flight in Berlin. You laugh at the right parts. He watches your mouth when you do.

His voice is low. Even when he's telling a story, it never loses that edge. It stays just beneath the surface, that quiet authority, like everything he says could become a command if he wanted it to.

You sip your drink. You cross your legs again. His gaze flickers, just briefly, and that’s the only confirmation you need.

He’s letting you pretend you still have control.

You don’t know who stands first. It doesn’t matter. The check is already paid for when you reach for your purse. He touches your wrist, just two fingers, a slight pressure, and says, “I’ve got it.”

You don’t argue.

Outside, the night is cooler than you expected. You feel it against your skin, the brush of wind across your thighs, but not enough to break the heat lingering in your chest.

He doesn’t ask. Doesn’t say, want to come up? Doesn’t offer a ride or mention his hotel by name.

He just looks at you, waiting, and you nod.

Because there’s nothing left to pretend.

Chapter Text

The hallway is quiet in the way expensive things are.

Padded carpet, soft lighting, the low hush of distance and good insulation. You don’t speak. Neither does he. Not because there’s nothing to say, but because anything you say now would feel too small for the moment.

The elevator ride is short. Of course, he booked a hotel. 

You stand close, you aren’t touching, not breathing, and listen to the hum of the floor numbers ticking by. You watch your own reflection in the brass paneling. He watches you.

When the doors open, you follow.

His room is at the end of the hall, of course. Corner suite. The kind that’s far from the elevator and closer to consequence. He swipes the keycard, the light turns green, and then the door swings open to dim lighting and city windows and something too expensive to name.

He steps aside to let you in first.

You walk in slowly, heels quiet on the carpet. There’s a couch. A king bed turned down. A low tray of room service glasses that haven’t been touched. You take in the space the way you’d take in a gallery, not admiring, just witnessing because none of it matters. Not really.

He closes the door behind you. The click of the latch feels final.

You don’t turn around.

Not yet.

You hear the rustle of his jacket as he shrugs it off. The soft clink of something, keys, wallet, badge, maybe, landing on the console near the entry.

You stand in the center of the room like you’re on display. You were always meant to be seen in this light. This dress. This silence.

And then, you feel him behind you.

Not close, not touching, but present. A shift in pressure. A change in the air. Like gravity decided to rearrange itself around him.

He speaks, finally. Low. Close.

“Take your shoes off.”

His voice is low. Steady. Not unkind, but shaped like a command.

You don’t move right away.

Not because you’re scared, because you’re calculating. Because you’ve let him lead all night, and now, at the threshold of something irreversible, you want to see what happens if you push back. Just a little.

You shift your weight to one hip, still facing the room, your hands falling loose at your sides. You let the silence stretch.

Then, so softly it almost doesn’t sound like defiance:

“You do it.”

It hangs in the air, it’s not confrontational. Not coy. Just deliberate. Like an offering wrapped in challenge. Like a girl who knows exactly how far she can go without pulling her hand from the flame.

Behind you, nothing moves.

And then, you hear it.

The soft inhale. The almost-silent laugh, dark and low and buried in the back of his throat, like he didn’t expect you to say that and loves that you did. You feel it in your spine before you hear the shift of his steps.

He comes to you slowly.

You don’t look. You don’t turn. You just feel him behind you, taller, broader, warmer , somehow, than you remembered. The heat of his body at your back, not touching, but enough to raise goosebumps along your arms. You stand still. You let him look.

And then he kneels.

You feel the air change again, lower now. More intimate. More dangerous.

His fingers slide down your calf first, deliberate and smooth. Just the tips, just enough to make your breath catch in your throat. He takes your ankle gently in his hand, lifting it just enough to unbuckle the strap. The metal clicks softly.

He doesn’t speak. Doesn’t rush.

One shoe, then the other.

Each one removed like it’s some kind of sensual clockwork.

When your feet meet the carpet again, bare and cooled by the air conditioning, you feel as though you’ve shed something heavier than your heels. You feel smaller. Not in a way that frightens you, in a way that strips you down to something essential.

He doesn’t rise immediately.

You feel him there, still crouched behind you. Still looking.

And then, finally, his voice, closer this time, just behind your knee:

“Ask me again,” he says.

And you don’t know if he means please or more or make me yours.

You just know you will.

You feel his hands before you see them.

One at your ankle, still lingering where the strap had been. The other sliding up, slow, careful, reverent in a way that only makes it worse. His palm glides along the curve of your calf, then higher, up the back of your knee, the slope of your thigh. Not groping. Not greedy.

When he finally stands behind you, the heat of his chest at your back, your breath stutters. You don’t move. You let him take his time.

He leans in, close enough that you feel the shape of his mouth near your ear, the ghost of his breath painting a line across your neck.

“I bet you used to think about this kind of night,” he says.

His voice is low. Thick. Mean in that way that feels it’s just for you.

Your stomach tightens. Your lips part, but no sound comes out.

“Bet you used to lie awake,” he continues, fingers skimming up your sides now, over the dip of your waist. “In that little room, in that little house… door locked, headphones in…”

His hands are warm. Big. Too steady for how hard your heart is racing.

“…thinking about me. ”

You inhale sharply. He hears it. Of course he does.

His thumbs press just slightly into your hips, anchoring you.

“Wondering what my hands would feel like,” he says, “if I ever touched you like this.”

His palms slide around the front of your waist now, fingers splayed, dragging slow and flat across the silk of your dress.

“Wondering if I ever thought about you too.”

You close your eyes. Your knees want to give. You don’t let them.

“You did, didn’t you?”

The question is a whisper.

He doesn’t answer with words.

He brings one hand higher up the center of your torso, between your breasts, until his fingers reach the delicate zipper at the back of your dress.

He finds it easily. Of course he does.

And then, with the same careful patience he’s had all night, he begins to pull it down.

Inches at a time.

Each tooth of the zipper slipping open like the quietest yes you’ve ever heard.

Your skin chills in the wake of it. Or maybe it’s just your nerves, lit like match heads all over your body.

You don’t move. You don’t breathe.

You just stand there, dress parted at your spine, baring the very parts of you you always wanted him to see.

And when his mouth finds your neck, warm, steady, unforgiving.

You don’t even pretend to be surprised.

The dress gives under his hand. Slowly, surely. Each inch of skin revealed makes the room feel smaller, warmer, and more dangerous. You feel the weight of the fabric pulling down your arms, pooling at your waist.

His mouth is at your neck now, open but not biting, tongue barely brushing your pulse. You stay perfectly still, not out of fear, but strategy. Letting him think he’s won.

And then you turn, not quickly. Not with resistance. Just… deliberately.

You face him with the zipper halfway undone, your shoulder bare, one strap already slipping down your arm. You watch his gaze drag over you lazily, darkly. Not surprised. Not triumphant.

Satisfied.

His hands stay at your sides, like he’s giving you the illusion of space. But his thumbs are pressing gently into your ribs, right where it’d hurt if you tried to bolt.

You tilt your head.

“Still think I’m the girl who used to chase you around in a sundress?” you murmur, voice like smoke.

Leon exhales through his nose, slow. Measured. His mouth quirks, not quite a smile.

“No,” he says. “You’re worse now.”

You smirk.

And that’s when he lowers his voice.

“Bet your daddy’d love to know where you are tonight.”

Your breath catches. Not because he’s wrong. But because it’s exactly the line you didn’t know you needed him to cross.

Leon leans in, not kissing, not touching, just close enough that his next words land directly against your mouth.

“All those years he tried to keep you out of trouble…” he murmurs. “And you came looking for it anyway.”

You raise your chin, just a little.

“Maybe I was trying to give it a face.”

He laughs, low and dangerous.

“You gave it a name, sweetheart.”

His hand lifts, brushes a stray strand of hair behind your ear. The touch is soft, almost sweet, until his fingers tighten just slightly along your jaw.

“Now say it.”

Your pulse pounds.

You hold his gaze. The brat in you wants to bite. The girl in you wants to beg.

Instead, you settle somewhere in the middle.

“Leon.”

He closes the distance, but he doesn’t kiss you. He doesn’t move.

What the fuck?

He just lets it hang in the space between your mouths, that half-inch of charged air where something sacred ought to go. You feel his breath, steady and unhurried, and it’s worse than contact. Worse than hands or mouths or heat.

Because he knows what you want now, and he’s not giving it to you yet.

His hand stays at your jaw, thumb stroking once over the corner of your mouth. Like he’s testing the softness of it. Like he’s debating whether you’ve earned what comes next.

“You used to say it different,” he murmurs, low and deliberate. “With your daddy standing right next to me.”

Your stomach twists. Not from shame, from the sheer velocity of how badly you want him to say more.

“You’d sit there all polite, all sweet. Barely look at me.”

His other hand lifts, finds your bare hip, fingers dragging slow across skin as the dress slips lower, your whole body tensing in anticipation.

“You remember that?”

You nod. You shouldn’t. But, God, you do.

“I do,” you breathe.

He hums like he already knew, like it was just a formality.

His grip tightens at your waist, not rough, just anchored. Enough to remind you that you’re not walking away from this. Not now. Not like this.

And then his mouth dips to your throat again.

Not a kiss. Not yet.

Just a slow, open-mouthed drag along the column of your neck. Breath warm. Tongue barely brushing skin. His stubble scraping where it shouldn’t feel good, but it does. God, it does.

“You could’ve walked out,” he says, voice low against your pulse. “Could’ve turned around the second you saw who I was.”

His hand spreads across your waist, fingers splayed, firm like something he means to keep.

“But you didn’t.”

You exhale, shaky, shallow. Heat blooms low in your belly.

“You stayed.”

His other hand lifts again, thumb tracing the curve of your lip. The edge of your teeth. The heat of your breath.

“And now you’re standing here,” he murmurs, “in a dress I know you didn’t put on for just anyone, trying to remember how to breathe.”

You don’t answer.

You can’t .

He pulls back just enough to look at you. Really look. His eyes are dark and gleaming, heavy with knowledge.

“But once you did …”

His thumb presses just a little firmer against your bottom lip.

“…you stayed because you wanted to know if I’d ever touch you like you used to imagine.”

“But here’s the thing,” he says, thumb returning to your bottom lip, slow and firm. “You don’t get kissed until you ask me nice.”

You blink, as you feel the heat crawl up your throat, into your cheeks. You want to snap something. You want to smile. You want to tell him to fuck off, but your knees are already shaking.

You try to look at him like you’re still in control.

Like the flush in your cheeks is from the wine. Like the trembling in your thighs is something you chose.

But his thumb is still resting at your mouth, and it’s hard to be clever when you can’t remember how to swallow.

You close your eyes.

Not to escape, just to breathe. Just to gather whatever’s left of the girl who walked in with her chin up and her heels too high.

You feel the words form in the back of your throat. They don’t come easily.

Not because you’re ashamed, but because it matters.

You could make a joke. Roll your eyes. Call him dramatic.

But he’d see through it. So instead, quiet, nearly breathless, you whisper:

“Please.”

It’s not much, but it’s everything.

His thumb moves slowly, brushing the corner of your mouth like punctuation. His hand at your waist tightens just slightly, grounding you, anchoring you to the moment you just gave him.

He waits. Makes sure you meant it.

And then, 

“Say it right. ”

The words land low, behind your ribs. Warm and sharp and expected.

You open your eyes to meet his gaze.

It takes a second. Just one. But when you speak again, there’s no bite in your voice. No flinch.

Only truth.

“Please kiss me, Leon.”

He doesn’t smile, but the shift in him is unmistakable. The way he breathes, the way his hand moves, up your back now, guiding, certain.

And then his mouth is on yours.

Not soft.

Certain.

His lips part yours like a question he already knows the answer to like he’s not asking, like he’s confirming.

You gasp, just barely, and he takes it, takes you , in the way only someone who’s waited can. It’s not rushed, not hungry. It's indulgent. Like the night is his to spend and you're already paid for in full.

His hand doesn't grope. It guides. One at your lower back, the other still at your neck, cradling you like he already knows you’re not going anywhere. His tongue brushes yours once, slow, deep, possessive.

You forget where you are.

For a moment, the hotel disappears. The hallway. The quiet elevator ride. Even the years before this, the birthdays, the barbecues, the too-tight dresses you wore to pool parties just to watch him not look at you.

It all collapses into this.

This.

The feel of his mouth. The weight of his hands. The slow press of his chest against yours, like a question you’re answering with your whole body.

You curl your fingers into the cloth of his shirt without thinking. Just to keep yourself upright. Just to feel the fabric between your hands and know it’s real.

He breaks the kiss first, but only just.

His breath is warm against your cheek. His voice even warmer.

“You taste like something sweet,” he murmurs. “Something expensive.”

You smile before you can help it. Half-drunk on the kiss. Half-drunk on him.

“You taste like something sweet,” he murmurs. “Something a little dangerous.”

Your lips twitch into the start of a smile. A little breathless. A little wild.

“I was hoping you’d notice.”

He exhales, quiet, almost a laugh, but not quite. His thumb drifts along the curve of your jaw, and when he speaks again, it's softer. More certain.

“I’ve been noticing for a long time.”

That’s what does it, not the kiss. Not the hands.

That.

The admission. The proof that you weren’t imagining it, weren’t just a kid with a crush and a fantasy. That he saw you , even then. That he remembers.

You don’t say anything. You don’t have to.

Your silence is permission.

And Leon, God help you, knows how to read it.

He kisses you again before you can think, with no hesitation this time. No restraint.

Just heat, and want , and years of tension snapping like a wire pulled too tight. His mouth finds yours with a force that steals breath. It's not careful. It’s not polite. It’s a claiming, and you let it happen because, God, you want to be claimed. To be chosen , not because you're the youngest or prettiest or newest, but because you’ve been in his head too, all these years, and now he’s finally admitting it.

His hand slides up, tangles in your hair, and pulls just enough to make you gasp. Your mouth falls open against his, and he takes advantage of it, tongue deep, confident, like he’s memorizing you from the inside out. It should be overwhelming. It should feel too fast.

But it doesn't.

It feels inevitable.

Your nails bite into his shoulders, anchoring yourself to him like he's the only steady thing in a room that won’t stop spinning. The taste of him is heat and hunger and something older, like whiskey soaked into leather, like secrets whispered at midnight. He kisses like he means to leave a mark. Not just on your skin. Everywhere.

And maybe that’s what wrecks you most of all, that it’s not just lust.

It’s recognition.

You’d thought about this moment so many times, usually alone in your room, the memory of his voice tucked behind your teeth, the shape of his hands imagined over your body. But the real thing is worse . The real thing is better. He’s rougher than you dreamed. Slower, too. He knows what he’s doing.

And what’s worse, he probably knows exactly what you want.

The kiss breaks only because you need air. You don’t pull away, though. You breathe against his mouth like you’re still trying to steal something from him. Your lips are swollen. Your thoughts scattered. Your body thrums with adrenaline.

He doesn’t say anything.

He doesn’t have to.

Because when he looks at you, it’s with a gaze that says, This isn’t over.

This is just the first layer.

Your chest rises and falls against his. Shallow. Unsteady. Like the kiss shook something loose in your ribcage and you’re trying to keep it from spilling out. His eyes are still on you, dark, steady, unhurried. His mouth glistens. His thumb is still at your jaw, gentle now, but not soft. Never soft.

You know what he wants, and you know where this is going.

But you tilt your head, just slightly. A flick of the lashes. The ghost of a smirk.

“So,” you breathe, voice sugarcoated and thin, “that how you kiss all your sugar babies?”

His eyes narrow.

Not angry. Not amused. Just interested , like you’re a puzzle he hasn’t decided whether to solve or ruin.

He steps forward again, crowding you back a pace without even touching you, and your spine kisses the wall with a soft thud. The heat of him rolls off in waves. His fingers trail down, just barely, brushing the curve of your hip like he’s reminding you who started this game.

“I only kiss the ones who can take it,” he murmurs, voice low enough to hum in your chest.

You raise an eyebrow, still pretending your legs aren’t jelly, still pretending you’re not aching.

“And if I want more than just a kiss?”

He leans in, close enough for his breath to catch the edge of your ear.

“Then you better earn it, sweetheart.”

Your breath catches, not because he’s intimidating, but because you want to .

Because there is something so dangerously thrilling about playing with a man who won’t hand you what you want just because you batted your lashes.

You like being put in your place.

Even more, you like trying to claw your way out of it.

Your heart skips.

Just once.

Not out of fea, but because you feel the pivot before it happens. The air thickens. His eyes darken. That subtle, razor-thin shift from flirtation to intent.

You started this with a smirk, but the look he gives you now makes it catch in your throat.

“You want more,” he says.

Not a question. A conclusion.

Your lips part, but you do not speak. Not yet.

Because his hand is already moving, sliding slow and firm down your waist, anchoring you in place as his body crowds closer. Not crushing. Not aggressive. But definite . Like he has no intention of letting you go anywhere until he’s done with you.

He doesn’t kiss you this time.

He studies you.

Like he’s taking inventory. Your breath. Your hesitation. The stubborn little tilt of your chin that hasn’t quite flattened into obedience yet.

Then, without ceremony, without hurry, he reaches behind you and takes your wrist.

Guides it gently, purposefully, to rest on the edge of his belt.

“You wanted to know what this was,” he murmurs. “So go on.”

Your mouth goes dry. The weight of him, the heat, the authority , it pulses through you like a second heartbeat.

But still, you hesitate, because this is not the fantasy anymore. This is not the brat in the black dress playing pretend in the mirror.

This is him , letting you touch what you asked for. What you dreamed about. What you teased and poked and prodded your way toward.

And he’s not making you beg.

Yet.

But he’s watching. Like he’ll only let this go so far before reminding you again: your power here only stretches as far as he allows.

“You look like you’re thinking,” he says, tone deceptively light. “That’s cute. But it’s not what I asked for.”

Your breath stutters.

And your fingers move, because you do want to earn it. You want him to take every part of you and prove that you never really had the upper hand, not tonight, not at those pool parties years ago, not when you first saw his message and felt your stomach twist.

You start to undo his belt. Quietly. Slowly. Your fingers tremble just a little, and you pray he doesn’t notice.

But he does, he always does.

And just before you finish, he leans down, lips brushing your temple as a praise.

“That’s my girl,” he whispers. “Now be good for me.”

You finish unfastening the belt. The buckle gives with a soft, metallic clink, too loud in the hush between you. His zipper follows, slower, more deliberate, the motion of your hand grazing firm muscle beneath tailored fabric.

He does not move to help you. Does not hurry the process along.

Instead, he watches.

That same quiet control. Like he’s memorizing the shape of you on your knees, or the angle of your wrists, or the blush creeping down your throat. Like he could carve it into memory without lifting a single finger.

And maybe he will.

“Keep going,” he says. Low. Measured. The cadence of a man who knows he does not have to raise his voice to be obeyed.

You slide his slacks down, careful, reverent, like you’re handling something sacred. You are. Or at least, it feels like it. The heat of him, the scent, the weight, already pressing against the fabric beneath.

He’s half-hard.

No, more than that.

Thick, heavy, and barely restrained, like he’s been holding back just to see what you’ll do with it.

You glance up at him.

His jaw is tight. Hands loose at his sides. He hasn’t touched you since guiding your wrist, but everything in his stance says he’s ready,  ready to correct you if you falter, ready to reward you if you don't.

You lean forward. Not innocent. Not bashful.

Hungry.

Because this is what you wanted, isn’t it? Not just the transaction. Not the envelope, the tab, the arrangement.

This .

The part where he watches you kneel in front of him, lashes lowered, mouth parted, and knows you're not doing it for the money.

You kiss along the edge of the fabric first, one slow, lingering press after another. A tease, a test, and then your fingers curl around him, through the thin cotton, and you nuzzle against the swell beneath.

You feel him twitch, and you smile.

“Is this what you wanted?” you murmur, voice low, lips brushing the seam of his briefs.

His hand finally moves, just one, settling in your hair with something close to reverence.

“No,” he says.

You blink, glancing up.

His grip tightens slightly, just enough to hold your attention.

“I want all of you,” he murmurs. “But I want to see how far you’ll go to deserve it first.”

And you feel it then, the shift.

Not just tension. Not just heat.

The contract .

Unwritten, but binding all the same.

You nod once. A slow, obedient tilt of your head.

Then you pull the waistband down, because it’s real now. Not the fantasy, not the poolside glances or the drunken dreams or the faceless sugaring profile. Not the idea of him, but the man himself. Standing before you. Hard because of you. Waiting.

“I was right,” you murmur, almost to yourself. “You’re perfect.”

His hand tightens gently in your hair.

“No,” he says. “ You’re perfect. Like this.”

You lean forward. You kiss the head of him first, soft, a slow press of your lips that lingers. You feel the twitch beneath your mouth, the way his breath hitches, controlled but not immune.

Then your tongue traces him. Deliberate. Devout.

You hear him exhale. Low. Through his teeth.

It feels like praise.

You take him in slowly, inch by inch, your lips parting wider, your breath steady. You don’t rush. You perform . Because you want him to remember this. The first time he really had you, on your knees, in his hotel room, eyes glassy with want, doing this like it mattered.

Because it does .

His hand never forces. Never shoves. Just guides. A constant pressure in your hair, a reminder that he’s there, that he’s watching, that he’s pleased.

“Just like that,” he breathes. “Christ, sweetheart, you really are something.”

And the sound of it, low and cracked, makes you ache.

You hollow your cheeks. You moan softly, not exaggerated, not performative. Just real. The heat of him, the weight, the thrill of his approval, it coils deep in your stomach like pride, like hunger, like yes, this is what you were meant to do.

You let him slide deeper.

His hips don’t move, not at first, but his breath does. Shaky. Strained. His composure is breaking at the edges, even if he’s trying to keep it intact.

He murmurs something. You don’t catch it, your name, maybe. Or just a curse.

Then he pulls you back gently, not all the way, just enough to look down at you.

Your lips are wet. Your eyes are wide. You’re panting.

And he smiles.

Not cruel. Not soft either.

Pleased.

Like he’s known all along this is how it would look, you, wrecked and willing and beautifully eager at his feet.

“Open wider,” he murmurs. “Be a good girl for me.”

You obey.

You obey, jaw aching already, lips parted wide with need.

It is not obedience born from submission. It is devotion. From the girl who used to press her thighs together at the sight of him, dripping pool water in a bikini two sizes too small. From the woman who showed up tonight with no name and a dress built to ruin.

You give this to him. And he takes it.

Not greedily. But like a man starved all the same.

“Fuck, look at you,” he mutters, voice rough with heat. “Prettiest mouth I’ve ever seen.”

His hips roll forward, just a little. A test.

You don’t flinch.

You welcome it.

You hum around him, lashes fluttering. The sound earns a quiet, fractured moan from deep in his chest, one he tries to bury, but fails.

“Dreamed about this,” he says, almost like a confession. His hand tightens in your hair, not enough to hurt, just to anchor . “You. On your knees. Mouth open. Begging for it.”

You blink up at him. Let him see what you are now, flushed, aching, slick with want.

And you’re not begging. Not yet.

You would if he asked.

He guides you again, deeper now, a slow push that tests your throat’s resistance. Your breath stalls, but your body doesn’t. You take him, eyes stinging, jaw slack.

You’ve thought of this moment too many times to count, under covers, in showers, in that one shame-flushed night after your 21st birthday when you’d had too many gin and tonics and ended up on your bedroom floor with his name bitten into your wrist.

And now?

Now you’re living it. Breathing it. Tasting it.

Leon curses, his other hand finds your cheek, brushes your hair behind your ear like he needs to see your face. Needs to watch the want there, the hunger.

“That’s it,” he groans.

Your thighs clench.

You press your nails into your own knees to stay steady, drool already slicking the corners of your lips. But you love it. You want the mess. Want him to see how far you’ll go, how good you’ll be if he just keeps looking at you like that.

You let him thrust a little now, shallow, controlled, precise. Each movement threaded with restraint, but that restraint is fraying. His jaw is clenched, his breath uneven. You feel him twitch against your tongue, and it makes your whole body burn.

“Bet you used to think about this,” he pants. “Tried to act innocent. Little poolside tease. Did you think I didn’t notice?”

He pushes in again, deep, slow.

You gag once, and his hand slides back, cradling the back of your head.

“Easy, sweetheart,” he murmurs. “I’ve got you.”

And you believe him, because you’ve never been this full, never this seen.

You pull back just enough to breathe, lips wet and swollen, chest heaving. And when you look up at him again, he looks ruined.

A man at the edge.

A man you put there.

He pulls you off with care, not urgency, one hand still cradling the back of your head like he’s afraid he’ll break you. You’re breathless, lips slick, eyes glassy. He watches you swallow hard, tongue peeking out to chase the taste he left behind.

“Christ,” he mutters, thumb brushing your jaw. “Look at you.”

You blink up, throat raw, chin wet, and something like pride curls low in your belly. You did that. You made him unravel like that.

But then, the shift as the temperature changes.

Leon crouches, hands firm on your hips, and you realize too late what’s happening.

He lifts you, effortlessly, and carries you.

Across the room and onto the bed like he’s done it a hundred times in his head. Like your body already belongs there, sprawled across the sheets.

You start to speak, some tease, something bratty, but he covers your mouth with a kiss that isn’t rough, but isn’t soft either. It's anchored. A kiss that tells you to hush now, baby, I’ve got it from here.

When he pulls back, he’s already pushing your thighs open with both hands. Wide. Possessive. Slow.

You feel cool air kiss the slick between your legs. Your breath hitches.

He smirks.

“You’ve been dreaming of this,” he murmurs, voice rasped at the edges. “Haven’t you, sweetheart?”

You don’t answer. Not with words.

Your hips lift instead, offering. Inviting.

He takes the hint, and lowers his mouth like a man returning to something just for him.

The first lick is slow. Deliberate.

Flat tongue, bottom to top. No teasing. No warmup. Just one long, hungry pass over everything he owns now.

You cry out, sharp and sudden. Your hand flies to the back of his head.

He chuckles against you.

“There she is.”

Then another lick. And another. And then his mouth closes over your clit like he’s sealing a promise. Your back arches, a strangled sound punched from your lungs. He’s not gentle. But he’s good. Too good, because this isn’t him proving anything.

Then another lick. Slower this time, firmer. A deliberate drag of tongue from slick entrance to the aching swell of your clit, again, like he’s drawing a map he already knows by heart. You gasp, body flinching, and he hums low in his throat at the sound, like it pleases him.

Again.

And again.

Until his mouth closes over you with sudden, possessive heat, lips sealing around the softest part of you again like he’s claiming it, tongue circling once, then pressing just right .

It steals the air from your lungs.

Your spine bows off the bed, hands scrambling for purchase in the sheets, but you find none. Just the rhythm of him, steady, assured, devastating.

He’s not gentle.

But he’s good. Unreasonably good. The kind of good that only comes from patience, from precision, from a man who’s learned how to ruin someone properly, and enjoys doing it slow.

Because this isn’t Leon trying to impress you.

This is Leon Kennedy. A man who doesn’t bluff. Who does nothing he doesn’t mean.

And tonight?

He means to wreck you.

His tongue moves with purpose, not teasing, not tentative, but measured. Exact. He flicks once, presses again, then returns to that maddening circle that makes your whole body tighten beneath his grip.

“Stay still,” he growls, voice hot and hoarse. “Take it.”

You whimper, and God, you take it.

His mouth is everywhere now. Messy. Devouring. Like he’s trying to memorize you from the inside out, not just the taste, but the way you sound when he sucks just right, the way your thighs twitch when he tongues you slow, the way you fall apart without a single word from his lips.

It’s obscene. Intimate. Like being prayed to and punished at the same time.

Your legs shake. Your hands fist the sheets. You’re close, so close , and he knows it.

Because this man? This mouth?

You were never going to survive it.

He looks up, his mouth is slick. His smile is feral.

“Good girl,” he says, voice like gravel and honey. “Knew you’d taste sweet.”

You’re so close you can taste it, not like something ahead of you, but something already breaking, already here.

Your thighs tremble under his grip. Your breath staggers, catches, and collapses. The tension coils tighter and tighter in your gut, and your mouth falls open with a wordless cry, the kind that rises from somewhere you can’t name.

He feels it, senses the shift in your body, the way everything locks up, begging for release.

And that’s when he pulls back.

Just enough.

Just barely.

You make a sound like a sob, a sharp, stunned little gasp punched from your lungs, all build and no relief. Your hips jerk instinctively, chasing his mouth, but his hands are already there, holding you down.

“Leon,” you breathe, more plea than name.

He doesn’t answer right away.

Just exhales slow and hot against your slick skin, and you feel the smirk in it. The restraint. The choice .

Then his voice, low and dangerous and so goddamn calm.

“You were going to come,” he says. Not a question. A statement. A verdict.

You nod. Desperate. Shaking.

He hums, thoughtful. Almost cruel.

“Not yet.”

You whimper again, the sound dissolving at the back of your throat. You’ve never been so close, not like this. Not undone and still denied.

His fingers stroke once down your thigh, slow, like an apology he doesn’t mean.

“You want it too easy,” he murmurs. “But good girls earn it.”

You blink up at the ceiling, chest rising and falling too fast, your whole body humming with need and shame and something darker that thrills you more than it should.

You’re wet. Wanting. Helpless.

And he’s watching you come apart without lifting a finger.

He leans in again, lips brushing your inner thigh.

“Be patient,” he says, voice all velvet threat. “I’m not done with you yet.”

Your whole body is ringing. Not pain. Not even want. Something worse, that near-electric ache of being kept.

Your thighs are trembling where he holds them open. Your breath stutters like a stalled engine, all hiccuping tension and no traction. You can still feel him on you, the heat, the absence, the promise.

But he doesn’t touch you again. Not yet.

Instead, he shifts upward, slow, deliberate, and his mouth brushes your ear when he speaks.

“You’re going to ask me,” he says, like he’s explaining something simple. “Not just to keep going. Not just to let you come.”

His hand smooths up the side of your ribcage. Pauses beneath the curve of your breast. No pressure, not yet.

“You’re going to ask me to earn it.”

Your mouth opens. Closes. The words won’t come.

He hums again,  a little disappointed, a little amused.

“I know you’ve been dreaming of this,” he murmurs, into your thigh, looking up at you, his blue eyes burning holes into you.

You go still. Mortified. Exposed. Your thighs clench under his grip, and his hands squeeze back, firm, grounding.

“I noticed,” he says. “I noticed every fucking time.”

And still, he doesn’t move to touch you.

“You want it?” he says. “Use your manners.”

You blink hard. Swallow.

Your voice is thin when it comes, scraped raw from want.

“Please.”

“You’re soaked,” he murmurs, teasing. “All that attitude, and you’re this fucking wet for me.”

You want to mouth off. You want to twist that into a game, say something sharp, bratty. But you can’t. Not when he’s dragging two fingers through the mess of you, spreading it, slow and deliberate. Not when he pushes them in, deep, curling them just right on the first try.

Your hips jolt. His free hand presses them down.

“Still,” he says again. “Take it.”

And you do.

God, you do.

Because he’s not gentle, he’s good. His fingers move with purpose, the rhythm cruel in its precision, dragging pleasure just far enough out of reach to make you ache for it.

Then his mouth is back on you, and your vision flares.

You taste metal on your tongue from the force of your own gasp.

You reach for his hair, desperate for something to anchor to, but he growls against you, “ No. ” and the sound makes you clench around his fingers.

“Keep your hands where they are,” he says, voice wrecked, mouth slick. “I want to see you try to behave.”

Try.

You whimper.

He sucks your clit between his lips, fingers curling again, and the world narrows to that,  heat and stretch and sound, the slick echo of him devouring you like a man possessed. Every time you get close, he slows. Backs off. Drags you down just enough to keep you wanting.

Your thighs shake. Your breath breaks.

“Please,” you whisper. “Leon, please.”

“Not yet.”

You make a sound, something helpless, frustrated, filthy, and he only groans against you, like your desperation feeds him.

Then, finally, one hand rises to your chest, not to grope, but to hold. Right over your heart. Like he wants to feel how hard it’s working. Like he wants to know he did this.

And you swear, you’d let him do anything now.

Just the heat of his tongue and the low, satisfied sound he makes when your whole body shudders like it’s trying to remember how to survive it.

Leon returns to you like a man reclaiming what is his, tongue deliberate, lips parted just enough to let the heat of his breath fan over your skin. And when he resumes, it is not for your relief.

It is for his pleasure.

Your thighs jump when he licks again, slow and firm, but he just presses them wider, palms like iron on your hips. A warning. A promise.

You are still shaking when you feel the first press of his fingers, slow, confident, sinking in like they belong there. He crooks one, just slightly, and the tension ripples through you so fast it feels chemical.

“Still with me?” he murmurs, voice too low, too close.

You nod. It’s all you can do. Your mouth is open, but nothing is coming out,  no wit, no breath, no resistance.

“Good,” he says. “Then you can take a little more.”

He adds another finger and the stretch punches the air from your lungs. You feel full , already too full, but not in the way that breaks. In the way that builds.

It’s obscene, the way he moves inside you, practiced, focused, intentional , as if he knows exactly how close you are and exactly how to keep you there. His mouth never leaves your clit, but it changes, now working in sync with his fingers, a cruel harmony of rhythm and restraint.

And when you start to buck,  just once, hips twitching, instinctive, his teeth barely scrape, and he growls into you.

“No,” he says. Not loud. Not angry. Just final. “You don’t come yet.”

You whimper.

It escapes before you can bite it back. A tiny, strangled sound like surrender.

He chuckles against you, tongue flicking with maddening lightness now, and pumps his fingers again, slow, too slow, until your body’s climbing so high it feels like a betrayal.

You are shaking. You are wet in a way that makes everything slick, filthy, undeniable. Your knees try to close again, and again he forces them wide, almost gently.

“You’re doing so well,” he says, and fuck, he means it.

That praise shouldn’t break you, but it does. It fractures you, lets the pleasure bleed through every pore until you are gasping into the dark.

But he stops just before the edge. Fingers still. Mouth lifts.

You cry out, not in pain. In protest. In disbelief.

Leon presses his lips to your inner thigh, a kiss too soft for what he just did.

“You want to come?” he asks, voice velvet and venom.

You nod, frantically.

He smiles against your skin.

“Then ask me again.”

You blink against the blur in your vision. Your breath catches. Your legs are still spread, trembling, your slick thighs shining in the low light, want written across your whole body. But he does not move.

His fingers stay buried inside you, unmoving now, a taunt more than a touch. His mouth hovers just above your skin, close enough to feel the heat of him, not close enough to give you anything real.

You shudder. Your hands clench in the sheets. The ache is unbearable, white-hot and endless, like your body’s caught in a current you cannot escape unless he lets you go under.

“Leon,” you whisper.

Nothing.

He raises an eyebrow, almost amused.

You lick your lips. You’re not used to asking for things, not like this. But your pride is a distant thing now, tucked somewhere behind the throb between your legs.

You try again.

“Please.”

Still nothing. Just that maddening stillness.

You bite your lip, throat thick, and the words come before you can second-guess them.

“Please, Leon. I want to come. I need to. Please…”

A beat.

Then another, and then he moves, just enough to bring his mouth closer to your center again, exhaling warm over you.

“Is that the best you can do?” he murmurs. “You can beg prettier than that.”

You gasp, not from shock, but from need. You are unraveling. Open. Raw. Nothing between your mouth and the truth anymore.

“Please,” you breathe again, more desperate now. “Please,  I’ll be good. I’ll stay still. I’ll take whatever you give me, just please , let me come.”

That’s the one.

You feel the shift in him before he speaks, the dark satisfaction in his breath, the hum of approval that vibrates in his chest as he smiles against your thigh.

“Good girl.”

You barely register the moment his mouth leaves you. Just the rush of air, the ache of absence. The wet heat between your legs thrums, too swollen, too sensitive, and you make a soft, broken sound, the kind of sound that gives everything away.

He rises slowly, deliberately, trailing his palm up your thigh as he does. There’s nothing hurried in him. Not the way he kneels between your legs, not the way he looks at you now, like you are something rare, and just shy of holy.

"Lie back," he murmurs.

You do, without thinking. The way he says it leaves no room for games. Just obedience. Just heat curling low in your belly.

He drags his hand up your stomach, slow, splayed, deliberate, until his palm rests just beneath the curve of your breast. He watches you breathe. Watches your skin rise to meet his hand.

“You want more?” he asks, low and dark.

You nod, breathless. “Yes. Please.”

“Then you’ll take it how I give it.”

The promise in those words knots tight behind your ribs. You spread your legs wider, eager and trembling, and you see the approval flicker across his face. Like he’s waited for this. Like some part of him is always waiting for you to fold.

He shifts again, pushing his slacks down just enough, and your gaze catches on the line of his stomach, the way the muscles there tighten with restraint. He’s not untouched by this, not by your begging, not by the way your body opens for him without a word.

When he leans over you, one hand braced beside your head, the other gripping your thigh, he’s not smiling anymore.

He’s watching you like a man who finally gets to ruin the thing he’s been imagining for years.

And you?

You welcome it.

His body hovers above yours, heat radiating off him in waves, not just warmth, but something deeper. Something like want, held tight beneath his skin. You feel it in the weight of his gaze, in the tremble he reins in through sheer control.

You reach up, touch his wrist. “Please.”

He doesn’t answer with words. Just lowers his mouth to your navel and breathes you in like he’s memorizing you from the inside out. Then higher, lips grazing ribs, tongue flicking at the underside of your breast, teeth just grazing the curve before he catches your nipple between his lips and sucks, slow and deliberate.

Your back arches. You cry out, a strangled little sound that makes him hum against your skin, pleased.

“You’re so damn soft,” he mutters, more to himself than you. “Like a secret someone should’ve told me about years ago.”

He presses his hips into yours now, barely, enough for you to feel how hard he is through the fabric of his slacks, how little room he has left for pretending.

“You have no idea,” you whisper, breath hitching, “how long I’ve wanted this.”

“I think I do,” he says, voice low and tight.

And then his fingers return, dipping low, between your thighs. Testing. Teasing. Finding how slick you are with just the lightest touch.

“You’re soaked.”

You nod, helpless. “Leon…”

“I know.” His voice gentles, but only slightly. “I’ve got you.”

He brings his fingers to your mouth and presses them against your bottom lip. “Taste what you do to yourself,” he says, and the command in it makes your thighs clench again.

You part your lips. Take them in.

His eyes darken. And then he moves.

One hand lifts your leg over his hip, the other bracing beside your head again. You feel the press of him, heavy and ready, dragging through your folds, not yet breaching, just letting you know he’s there.

You gasp, legs tightening around his hips instinctively.

And still, he waits.

“Say it,” he murmurs. “Tell me you’re mine to touch like this. That you want it.”

Your whole body feels like a live wire, strung up on tension and need. You look up at him, lips wet, chest heaving, the world narrowed down to this man, this moment, this impossibly thick pressure at your entrance.

“I’m yours,” you whisper.

He smiles. Not sweetly. Not kindly, but like he’s about to take what’s his.

He moves above you with that same quiet control. No rush. No apology. Just inevitability wrapped in the warmth of his body, the weight of his stare. His shirt is gone, you think you remember unbuttoning it, fingers shaking but stubborn, and now there’s nothing between you but skin and nerve endings and the heavy silence of a moment about to tip into something irreversible.

His hand cups your jaw, thumb brushing the edge of your lip like he’s still trying to decide if you’re real. Like maybe he’s dreamed this too. Then he lowers, slow, deliberate, and kisses you again, deep, molten, consuming.

You taste heat. Salt. The ghost of his breath. But more than that, you taste intention , the promise tucked behind every press of his mouth: I will undo you. If you let me.

You arch up into him. Just slightly. Just enough.

"Easy," he murmurs. A rasp dragged over velvet. “Let me.”

He says it like a warning. Like he is doing you a favor. Like a gift you’re too bratty to ask for but too smart to deny. And when he lowers again, not to kiss your mouth but your throat, your collarbone, the center of your chest, your breath stutters, because he’s worshiping now. Or maybe laying claim.

His fingers trace down your side. Not hurried, the slope of your ribs, the soft tension of your stomach, the twitch of muscle beneath anticipation.

You reach for him, greedy, aching, but he catches your wrist, pins it gently to the mattress.

“No,” he says, and it is not harsh. It is not cruel. It is rule.

“You want more,” he says, mouth brushing your sternum, “you earn it.”

You nod, and you say, “Please.” You feel like you’re falling into something ancient and primal and right , something that doesn’t feel like giving up control, but like finally handing it to someone who won’t drop it.

And when he looks up at you again, mouth wet, eyes dark and steady, he smiles, not kind, not cruel, just pleased.

“Good girl.”

He moves like a man with a plan. Slow, sure, deliberate. You watch as he stands, unhurried, and unfastens his belt. The sound of leather sliding through loops snaps through the air, sharp and final. Your breath stutters.

He doesn’t rush. Doesn’t ask again. Just steps closer, palms bracketing your hips as he nudges your legs further apart, coaxing you open with the same ease he’s used on your every defense.

“This,” he murmurs, leaning down to press his mouth to your jaw, “is what you’ve been wanting, isn’t it?”

You don’t answer, you can’t , not when he lines up, not when you feel the blunt press of him against you, hot and heavy and real. But you meet his eyes, and maybe that’s enough.

Because then he sinks in.

The stretch is maddening, slow and overwhelming, and perfect in the worst way. You gasp, fingers twisting in the sheets, thighs tensing as your back arches. He holds your hips still, steadying you, grounding you.

“Easy,” he breathes, his own voice rough now. “I’ve got you.”

You do your best to believe him.

He doesn’t move at first, just stays there, buried deep, like he’s trying to memorize the way you feel around him. His head drops to your shoulder, jaw clenched, breath shaky.

“Fuck,” he whispers. “You’re unreal.”

You shiver.

When he pulls back and thrusts again, it’s deeper. Harder. Every movement presses into something devastating, something blinding. It’s too much, not enough, everything you’ve ever wanted all at once.

You feel yourself unraveling already, not just from the rhythm, but from the way he looks at you. Like you’re his reward. Like he’s waited for years to touch you like this, and maybe he has.

Maybe you both have.

His grip tightens.

“You’re gonna take it all,” he says, voice dark with reverence. “Every inch. Like a good girl.”

Your body obeys before your mouth can argue.

And when you moan, broken and real,  he groans like it’s the sound he’s been chasing since he saw you on that goddamn app. Since before that. Since the second he realized you weren’t just his old friend’s daughter anymore.

He thrusts again, slower this time, grinding deep, and you feel him everywhere. You’re melting, shaking, gone. And he knows.

“Thought about this every time you wore that tiny bikini,” he mutters, lips dragging over your collarbone. “You knew what you were doing.”

You bite your lip, gasping when his hips roll again, sinful and sharp.

“You liked it,” you whisper. “Knowing I wanted you.”

His laugh is hoarse, breath hot at your throat.

“Still do.”

Then he takes your wrists in one hand, pins them above your head, and owns you.

He pins your wrists to the headboard like it is nothing. Like you weigh less than a thought.

His palm spreads over the back of your hands, strong and steady, grounding you. His other hand wraps beneath your thigh, anchoring you open as his hips move again, slower now, deliberate, obscene in the way he draws it out.

Every movement is deep. Controlled. Like he is sculpting the rhythm from memory, not improvisation.

“You take it so well,” he murmurs, right into the shell of your ear. “Bet you used to imagine this. Laying there, biting your knuckles, thinking about what it’d feel like to get touched like this by me finally.”

Your whole body tightens beneath him, with embarrassment, with arousal, with the helplessness of being seen.

Because he is right. God, he is so right it burns.

You never told a soul. But he was the fantasy. The untouchable. The older man in the corner of your father’s barbecues, arms crossed over broad shoulders, sunglasses hiding what he was looking at. You never caught him watching. Not once.

But that made it worse. Made you want it more.

“You were always such a good girl in front of everyone,” he says, tone half-mocking, half-worship. “But I knew better. I saw through it.”

His hand slips between you, just a press of his fingers where you need them most, and you break. A ragged, involuntary moan tears out of you, high and ruined.

“That’s it,” he growls, satisfaction thick in his throat. “Sound so fuckin’ pretty like this.”

You twist beneath him, head tipping back into the pillow. His grip on your wrists doesn’t falter. It’s unyielding, not cruel, never cruel, but claiming. He’s keeping you here. Keeping you in this moment. Making sure you feel every inch of what you asked for.

“I want…” You start, but your voice fails you.

“What, sweetheart?” he asks, still moving slow, measured, devastating. “Use your words.”

“I want to come.”

“Yeah?” His thumb circles, his hips grind. “Then earn it.”

You whimper, no, plead , your whole body surging toward the edge he keeps just out of reach.

“You’ve got one job right now,” he whispers, and you can feel the smile in his voice, dark and knowing. “Take it. All of it. And ask nice.”

You do. You do because your pride is gone, your composure is dust. You’d beg for it. You’d crawl for it. You would have years ago, if you thought he’d take you like this.

“Please,” you whisper. “Leon. Please.”

There is a pause, a fraction of silence where you can feel him watching you, calculating just how far to push.

Then he lets go.

Not of your hands. Not of control.

Of the restraint.

His rhythm snaps into something harder, rougher, relentless. The bed creaks beneath you. The world narrows. Your thoughts vanish beneath the roar of sensation and the warm weight of his voice at your throat.

“That’s it,” he breathes. “That’s my girl.”

Your breath shatters first. Then your body follows.

The pleasure doesn’t hit you like lightning, it’s slower, meaner. A full-body unraveling that begins at your core and ripples outward in waves, each one rougher than the last. You cry out without meaning to, throat raw, hips stuttering beneath the rhythm he holds.

Leon doesn’t stop. Not right away. He pushes you through it, through the tremors, through the way your legs try to pull closed around him. His grip only tightens, coaxing more, giving no quarter. You feel it all, every last second.

Only when you go slack beneath him does he ease up. Slowly. Deliberately. His hands soften, release, and drift. One to your waist. One to your face.

He studies you like you’ve just been sculpted into something new.

“That’s my girl,” he murmurs, voice low and warm and unbearably fond. “Took it so well.”

You try to speak, to say something sharp or clever or cocky, but nothing comes. You are breathless. Boneless. Undone, and he sees that too.

Leon shifts, slipping out of you, and the absence is sudden but not cruel. He follows the movement by lying down beside you, reaching with steady hands to guide your thigh over his so you’re close, tucked in against the solid heat of him.

You blink up at the ceiling, trying to find words and trying to feel like a person again. But it’s so quiet now. Just your breathing. His. The whisper of fingers tracing lazy circles into your hip.

You don’t expect tenderness, but you get it anyway.

His nose brushes your temple. His mouth grazes your hairline. It’s not a kiss. Not quite. Just contact—just presence.

“You alright?” he asks after a minute.

You nod. Or maybe you just breathe in a way that feels like a nod.

“Good,” he says. His arm tightens around you, bringing you fully into his side. “Wasn’t done with you. Just needed to remind you who’s in charge.”

You huff a laugh, or try to. You shove his shoulder, groaning, burying your face against his chest. And he laughs, this time fully, the sound rumbling against your cheek.

Your cheek is pressed to his chest now, heartbeat slow beneath your ear, one arm looped around his ribs like you’ve forgotten how to sleep alone. The air in the room is heavier than before, steeped in salt and sweat and something softer neither of you wants to name.

His palm moves in idle circles on your back. Thoughtless, almost, except you know he’s thinking. You can feel it in the way his fingers hesitate every so often, like they’re catching on something unspoken.

Then, with no warning, his voice cuts through the stillness:

“We can keep doing this,” he murmurs, low and amused, “but how exactly are you planning on telling your daddy?”

Your breath catches, not in horror, not in shame, but in that sick little thrill that always comes from being caught in something deliciously wrong.

You tip your head back enough to see his face, eyes narrowed, mouth curved.

“You think I’m telling him?” you say, half a scoff, half a dare.

Leon smirks. “Nah. You’ll keep it quiet. Let him keep thinking his little girl’s still sweet and untouched.” His thumb brushes your lower spine. “Meanwhile, you’re in hotel beds with men who used to brief him on weapons trafficking.”

You flush, but your gaze doesn’t drop. If anything, it sharpens. “Maybe I like it better this way.”

His smile deepens, not mocking, just knowing. “Yeah,” he says. “You do.”

And then he kisses you. Slow. Deep.

Like a secret.

“You staying?” he asks eventually, low like he already knows the answer.

You want to be bratty. Want to make a joke about paid hourly rates or fairy-tale endings. But your body betrays you, as it has been doing all night, warm, pliant, already molding to the shape of him.

So you hum something noncommittal and settle into the mattress. You don’t fall asleep, not really. Just listen to the quiet of the room and wonder what the hell happens next.

Chapter Text

You wake slowly.

Not because the bed is unfamiliar, but because it is too comfortable. Sheets soft and expensive. Pillow cool against your cheek. The kind of quiet that only comes from triple-paned windows and blackout curtains. Dim light filters in anyway, a thin gold seam where the curtain does not quite meet the wall. It catches on the curve of your shoulder, the column of your neck, the sharp place behind your knee where his thigh had pressed all night.

He is not beside you.

But his absence does not feel like abandonment. The mattress still dips toward where he was. His heat lingers in the linen, and across the room, draped neatly over the back of a chair, is his jacket. Black. Structured. Familiar.

You sit up slowly, the sheet falling from your chest.

Your body aches in ways that are not quite soreness, not quite regret. Something between pride and proof. You roll your shoulders, stretch your legs beneath the covers, and wonder if he meant to let you sleep. If this is part of the dynamic now, reward, not dismissal.

Your eyes find it then.

On the dresser. Clean white envelope. No logo, no hotel branding. Just your name in black ink, slanted with control. Not Chaton. Not sweetheart.

You hesitate. Not because you do not know what is inside. But because you do.

You pick it up anyway.

The paper is thick. Weighted. Tucked inside, crisp bills and something harder,a folded note. You draw it out with careful fingers, breath caught somewhere between outrage and arousal.

The note is short. One line.

“For last night. And because I know you liked it.”

Want to crumple it, throw it, storm into the bathroom and tell him you’re not some cliché. That you’re not that kind of girl, whatever that means anymore. That just because he left an envelope with your name on it doesn’t mean you’re bought, doesn’t mean this was just a transaction.

But your fingers are still holding it gently, and your thighs are pressed a little closer together now.

You press the envelope flat against your lap and look up toward the bathroom door, just cracked, faint steam curling at the threshold. You hear him in there, moving. Brushing his teeth maybe. Showering the night off his skin.

You stare down at the envelope again. White. Crisp. Unbranded. It’s not tacky. Not clumsy. It’s intentional. That’s the part that gets you.

Because you did this, didn’t you?

You made the profile. You flirted with a stranger on an app where envelopes are the whole point. You picked the dress. You asked for the wine. You let him unzip you like you were a present, like something he had already paid for in advance, and you didn’t stop him. You didn’t want to.

So maybe this isn’t about being a cliché. Perhaps it’s about getting what you asked for, and realizing you liked it even more than you thought you would.

Because Leon didn’t just give you the envelope. He earned the right to leave it.

And you accepted everything else with your knees parted and your mouth open.

So no, you’re not just a girl with a sugar daddy, if that’s even what this is becoming. You’re a girl who showed up half-sure she could play a game, only to find out she loved the rules. 

And you?

You are still in his bed, clutching evidence of what last night really was. It’s not payment. It’s proof of last night. The way he touched you like he already knew all the places no one else had gotten quite right. Honestly, it was something you feel you should be paying for like he did you a favor.

You close your fingers around it again. Let the edges press into your palm.

From the bathroom, the sound of running water stops. Steam curls out under the door, thick and low.

You tuck the envelope under the pillow, not to hide it, but to keep it. Like something you might want to look at later. Like something earned.

Then you lean back against the pillows, smooth the sheet over your lap, and wait for him.

The bathroom door opens with a quiet click.

You don’t look. You just stretch your legs out under the sheet like you’ve been waiting a lifetime and not twenty minutes, like you’re not still warm between the thighs and pink behind the knees. Like you’re the kind of girl who gets mornings like this all the time, someone who never flinches when the man from last night reappears with wet hair and a towel slung low around his hips.

Leon steps into the room with that same unbothered quiet he wears like a second skin. Freshly shaved. Shirtless. All broad shoulders and damp breathless heat. He tosses a shirt over the back of a chair and glances at you like he’s already decided he’s keeping you, just hasn’t said it out loud yet.

“So,” he says, voice low and still drying from sleep, “how do you want to do this?”

You blink, tilt your head. “Do what?”

He gives you a look. That patient, steady look that says he knows exactly how clever you’re pretending not to be.

“The arrangement,” he says simply.

You shift back against the pillows. “Mm. Straight to business.”

His mouth quirks. “I thought you liked that.”

You shrug, lazy. “Depends on the business.”

He crosses the room. Not fast. Not looming. Just present, in that way he always has been, the kind of man who fills space without crowding it. His laugh is quiet, almost soft. He walks to the chair in the corner, picks up his watch, and rolls it onto his wrist with the same precision he uses to check a sidearm. You wonder if he handles all his weapons the same way, smooth, silent, practiced.

“Figure we keep it clean,” he says, nodding toward the envelope still barely tucked beneath the pillow. “Set expectations. Terms. Rules, if we need them.”

You raise an eyebrow. “Is this where you pull out a contract?”

“No paperwork,” he says, but there’s a glint in his eye that suggests he’s thought about it. “Just clarity.”

You sit up a little straighter, wrapping the sheet across your chest, not out of modesty, but to mark the shift. “Alright. Clarity.”

He leans on the edge of the dresser. Arms crossed. Barefoot. You think of the envelope under your pillow. You think of the way he made you feel last night, spoiled, punished, seen.

“You’re not seeing anyone else while this is happening,” he says first, even. “No side arrangements.”

You pause. “Fair.”

“I’m not gonna play games about it.” He looks at you, eyes steady. “We can do this the right way. I’ll cover expenses. Gifting, cash or otherwise. I’ll check in before I make appearances.”

There’s a hum in your chest. A heat that creeps up even as you nod. “And?”

“And I want you,” he says, quiet but final. “When I want you.”

You don’t flinch.

You should. You should say something sarcastic. You should pretend that sounded too possessive or too blunt. But instead, your thighs press a little closer again.

“Understood,” you murmur.

Then his tone shifts. Just slightly. More thoughtful now.

“There’s one other thing.”

You glance up. “Yeah?”

“Your father.”

The words sit in the room for a moment, heavy but not cruel. Just real.

You exhale, long and thin.

“My father,” you repeat.

Leon nods. “He’s not a stupid man.”

“No,” you agree. “Just willfully blind where I’m concerned.”

Leon watches you for a beat. “I’ve known him for ten years. I’ve been at every Fourth of July, every damn Christmas Eve. You think he won’t notice?”

“I think,” you say slowly, “he notices what he wants to notice.”

Leon’s jaw tightens a fraction, then relaxes. “He’ll notice if I stop showing up to poker night.”

“Then don’t,” you say immediately.

Leon raises an eyebrow.

You roll your eyes, but it’s fond. “If you stop showing up, he’ll think it’s weird. He’ll poke. He’s got that dumb little theory that you’re secretly the best player in the group.”

“I am the best player in the group.”

You laugh. “Yeah, and if you vanish, he’ll assume I scared you off.”

Leon moves a little closer. “You did scare me off.”

“Liar.”

His grin is quiet, close-lipped. “You were always the one girl I swore I wouldn’t touch.”

You swallow. Something stirs low in your belly.

He leans down, hands braced on either side of the bed now. Close enough that you can smell the soap on his skin. See the memory flicker in his eyes.

“Now look at you,” he says softly. “In my bed, already trying to pretend we can pull this off without someone getting caught.”

You wet your lips. “Can we?”

Leon’s eyes darken just a little.

You should be nervous. You should be thinking about logistics, about poker night, about the way your dad still calls Leon brother over beers in the garage. But instead, all you can think about is how steady he looks right now. How warm. How easy it is to want this when he’s already halfway between a secret and a sin.

“Guess we’ll find out.”

You’re still in his bed when he finally reaches for his phone.

It’s not a dramatic gesture. There’s no pretense. Just a casual glance at the clock and then a quiet, deliberate unlock of the screen. You watch him scroll for a second, thumb steady, then hold the phone out toward you.

“Give me your real number,” he says without looking up. “The one that doesn’t forward to a burner app.”

You narrow your eyes, but not because you plan to lie, because it annoys you how quickly he figured that out. It makes you feel small and seen at once. Like he’s been peeling back layers you didn’t even know were showing.

“I thought mystery was part of the charm.”

He glances at you then, just for a second. The look says don’t push me, but the smirk says I hope you do.

“You want charm?” he says dryly. “I’ll get you roses next time. But give me the number.”

You sigh, long and dramatic, the kind of sigh that belongs to a girl who gets what she wants even when she pretends she doesn’t. “Fine.”

You rattle it off, your real number, the one tied to your medical records, your dad’s insurance plan, the voter registration you never updated. He types it in and calls it on the spot. Your phone buzzes where it’s half-buried in the sheets, and something about the sound feels... final. Like a contract clicking into place.

You stare at the screen for a moment longer than you should. Then you look up, you’re already toeing the edge of brat again.

“I get rules too, y’know.”

He raises an eyebrow. 

“Do you?”

“Mmhm.” You sit up straighter. Still bare, still warm from sleep and shower, but suddenly full of opinions. “No surprise drop-ins. No acting jealous. And no pretending this means more than it does.”

It comes out sharper than you mean it to. You’re not trying to convince him. you’re trying to convince yourself. Because last night was supposed to be a game. A risk. A one-time indulgence wrapped in expensive sheets and heat.

But now it’s morning, and he’s here, all quiet dominance and damp-blonde-hair, and suddenly you’re not so sure what parts of you were acting.

Leon doesn’t laugh. He steps forward, slow, watching you like something he intends to study. Like something that’s already his.

“First one’s fair,” he says. “I’ll always text first.”

You nod, satisfied. “Good.”

He tilts his head. “Second one’s bullshit.”

You blink.

“I get to be jealous if you’re mine. That’s how this works. You agreed to exclusivity, sweetheart. You don’t like it, you walk.”

Mine. That word lands lower than your stomach, a quiet, deliberate plunge. You want to scoff. You want to roll your eyes. But the truth is, you’ve been waiting for someone to claim you without flinching.

And God help you, it feels good.

You don’t push back. Not this time.

“And the third?” he asks, voice like poured velvet. “The part about not pretending?”

“That one stays,” you say, but it’s softer now. “We’re just having fun.”

Leon leans forward, palms braced on either side of your bare thighs, and it’s not just the proximity that makes you hold your breath, it’s the way he makes silence feel heavy. Like he could tip the whole world over with just one sentence.

“Then you’d better make sure I keep enjoying myself.”

You grin, sharp as sugar. “Or what?”

His mouth brushes your cheek, slow and hot. You feel his voice at your jaw before you hear it.

“Or I start making the rules.”

You shiver, and neither of you says what you’re both thinking:

He already is.

--

The envelope is still tucked under your arm when he walks you to the lobby.

You’d forgotten it was even there, the weight of it, the quiet reminder. Now it feels almost vulgar. Like a punchline to a joke that stopped being funny sometime around 3 a.m., when he kissed your shoulder and murmured good girl against your spine.

You don’t say much on the elevator ride down. Neither does he.

You both wear silence like a second skin. His smells like soap and sweat and sleep. Yours still tastes like his tongue.

Outside, the morning is too bright. That sharp kind of city daylight that shows everything, cracked sidewalks, bad decisions, blurred lipstick. You blink against it.

He holds the hotel door open, but doesn’t follow. Just rests one hand above the frame and watches you like something he’s cataloging.

“I called you a car,” he says.

You glance up. “What kind?”

“The kind that waits,” he says. “It’s black. License ends in 7-2-8.”

You almost make a joke, something sharp. But there’s a steadiness in his tone that holds you still. It’s not sweetness. It’s something quieter. Like possession, but worn gently.

He steps closer, tucks a strand of hair behind your ear with a knuckle. “Text me when you get in. Text me when you’re home.”

You scoff, because you’re still clinging to that version of yourself, the one who doesn’t get flustered by federal agents with morning stubble and rules in their mouths.

But your voice is softer than you mean it to be when you say, “You gonna miss me that bad?”

Leon’s smile is quick. Dangerous. “Not bad. Just enough.”

And then, because he is who he is, he adds, “Thursday night. Poker. Your dad’s place.”

You freeze. Just for a second. Not because you forgot, but because you’d pretended you could.

“Right,” you say. “Thursday.”

He leans down, lips near your ear. The heat of him, too close to ignore.

“Wear something you can sit across from me in,” he murmurs. “Without making me lose the hand.”

You swallow. You don’t respond. Your mouth is too dry for it.

And then he pulls back, looks at you one last time. “Go.”

The car is waiting. You slide in. You do not look back. Not until you’re at the end of the block and you check the rearview mirror, and there he still is, just a dark silhouette in the glass, unmoved.

Like he’s already planning Thursday.

--

Your apartment is exactly as you left it, clean, quiet, and two degrees too cold.

You drop your keys into the dish by the door, peel off your jacket, and stand in the center of the living room like you forgot what comes next. Everything feels slightly off, like the air rearranged itself in your absence.

Maybe it did.

You should shower. You should brush your teeth. You should sleep for three hours and then pretend this was just another questionable decision in a long line of them.

But you don’t.

Instead, you move through the space on autopilot, past the couch, past the mirror,  until you reach your bedroom. You sit on the edge of the bed, still in last night’s dress, and stare at the envelope on your nightstand. You’d pulled it from your purse without thinking. 

You pick it up.

Your fingers hesitate just a second before peeling back the flap. The paper is heavier than it should be, the way things are when they carry weight you are not ready to name. You count without meaning to, without breathing. Fifties. Hundreds. Crisp, new bills in a tidy, folded stack, too much for one night, and somehow still not enough to account for what he did to you. For how you let him. 

You blink once. Twice. And then you laugh, dry and short, because this isn’t pretend anymore. This is the part where the fantasy gets itemized. Where the heat of his mouth and the pressure of his voice and the ache between your thighs becomes a number. 

And it’s a big one.

You lie back, let your eyes fall shut. And he’s there again, not in a romantic way, not like some dream you can fold into a memory. He’s there like he never left. The weight of his body. The scrape of his voice. The slow, ruinous way he said open wider and ask me nice like he’d been waiting years to speak in that register.

You do not count the bills again.

Instead, you press the envelope flat against your thigh like that might anchor you. Like you can push the memory down with it. But it doesn’t work, because what rises instead is older, messier. Four years old now, but still sharp around the edges.

Your 21st birthday.

It was late, later than your dad usually let the parties stretch. One of those rare backyard nights in June when the air stays warm past midnight, and the whiskey your cousin brought burns sweeter than it should. Most of the guests had gone. Your father had long since passed out on the couch inside, television still humming, one shoe off. Only a few people remained, nursing their final drinks like a kind of grief. You had found Leon by the pool, alone, nursing a beer with one hand, scrolling his phone with the other.

He’d been laughing earlier, louder than usual. Relaxed in that loose, charming way he only ever seemed to be when your dad was too distracted to notice. Thirty-four then, still tan from a job that had kept him overseas, with his shirt sleeves rolled up just enough to see the edge of a faded scar across his forearm. His hair was longer back then, swept carelessly back from his forehead, still damp from when your cousins had shoved him into the shallow end.

You came out in a dress too short for the occasion, strappy, red, a little desperate. You’d thrown it on in the dark while half-drunk, heart racing in that way it did around him. You had spent the entire summer before watching him from the safety of your sunglasses, at barbecues, poker nights, those stupid Saturday trips to the gun range your father swore counted as “bonding.”

He looked up when you approached. Said your name like a question.

“Birthday girl,” he added, a little smile tugging at his mouth.

You sat beside him, too close. Let your thigh brush his and say something you thought was clever. You laughed too loudly at your own joke. Your knee touched his. You remember leaning in, just slightly, and whispering, “You know, I used to think about you.”

His breath caught. You heard it, not a gasp, not a choke, but the kind of quiet inhale that only comes when something short-circuits behind the eyes. The shift was slight, but it was real. The tilt of his jaw. The stillness in his hands. Like a man caught between instinct and principle.

“Don’t,” he said, low. Not cruel. Not even firm. Just heavy. Thick with something that sounded suspiciously like want.

But you were drunk on your own boldness. Drunk on him, and you’d spent too many years wondering what it would take to rattle Leon Kennedy. This wasn’t just curiosity anymore. It was a dare infused with alcohol.

You leaned in closer, enough to let your knee graze his again, this time on purpose.

“Why not?” you whispered, sugarcoating the venom. “Too young for you?”

Still, he didn’t look at you. His jaw was locked tight. Like if he turned his head even a fraction, the whole thing would snap.

You let your lips part, soft and smug. “Or maybe you just like your girls a little less…” your voice dipped “difficult.”

That did it.

His head turned. Just enough for you to see it in profile, the flinch in his brow, the heat in his stare. His mouth opened, then shut. A muscle in his cheek twitched like he was biting something back. Your name formed behind his teeth, rough and unfinished.

And then he stood. Not fast. Not flustered. But like someone leaving before the fire caught.

He set his beer on the edge of the pool. Said nothing.

You watched his back retreat into the glow of the kitchen lights, wide and tense, and didn’t move for a full minute.

And maybe you should have felt embarrassed. But all you felt was power.

Because he didn’t say no.

He fled.

You groan, fling your arm over your face, as you remember all this.

God, what the fuck are you doing.

You slept with your dad’s best friend. His coworker. A man with a classified history and a name that makes government offices clench.

And worse?

You liked it, and you asked for it, breathless and stupid and grinding against his mouth like a spoiled debutante in a noir flick.

You told yourself you weren’t a cliché, that you had the upper hand. That it was your game, your rules.

But he called you sweetheart like it was the only name you’d ever had.

Your phone buzzes.

You don’t want to look. You already know it’s him.

But of course you do.

Leon : Home safe?

You stare at the text. Not the words, just the fact of it. Like the man who spent the night between your thighs now wants to play the part of chaperone.

Your thumbs hover. You could ignore him. You could leave it on read. You could pretend this morning is a clean break, a full reset.

But you don’t.

You type:

You : Inside. No stalkers. No regrets.

The dots appear immediately.

Leon : I’ll see you Thursday.

Leon : Try not to think about me until then.

You toss the phone onto the pillow beside you. Curl onto your side. Try to ignore the low, familiar ache between your legs and the heavier ache just behind your ribs.

You are so fucked.

And not in the fun way this time.

Chapter Text

Your father’s house smells like grilled meat and domestic beer. The kind of scent that sinks into the wallpaper after years of Friday night rituals and backyard bravado. You’ve always hated how familiar it is, how easy it is to fall back into the rhythm of pretending.

The game’s already in full swing by the time you arrive. Laughter drifts in from the garage-turned-man-cave, punctuated by the clack of poker chips and your dad’s telltale bark of a laugh. You pause in the hallway, keys still in hand, and school your expression into something breezy.

You’re not here for him.

Except, of course, you are.

Leon’s car was already parked in the driveway when you pulled up. Black. Polished. Immaculate, just like him. It made your heartbeat doubling before you even stepped inside.

You adjust your top, just a little. Low neckline. Subtle gloss. Nothing overt. Just enough to see if he looks.

You move toward the kitchen first. Make a show of grabbing a drink. Chatting with your dad. Light banter. Easy charm. You’re good at playing the daughter. It’s the other role that’s harder to hide.

When you finally step into the garage, it’s Leon who notices first. You feel it before you see it, that shift in the air, the momentary silence where a man forgets to breathe. And when your eyes meet across the table, it’s not playful.

It’s possession.

He looks devastating. Button-down sleeves rolled to the forearms. Hair just a little messy, like he got here in a hurry. Like maybe he thought about you all day and showed up with that tension still in his jaw. He doesn’t smile. Doesn’t nod.

But his eyes drag over you like a hand on bare skin.

You smile, bright, bratty. Like you don’t feel the weight of it. Like you didn’t wake up still tasting him in your mouth.

“Seat open?” you ask, voice sugary-sweet.

Leon doesn’t speak. Just nudges a chair out with his boot.

Your father laughs. “Careful, baby girl, Leon’s on a hot streak tonight.”

You glance back at Leon as you sit, crossing your legs slow, deliberate.

“Good,” you say. “I like a challenge.”

And beneath the table, just as your knee brushes his, you swear you hear the quiet catch of his breath.

Leon doesn’t look at you.

Not directly.

But he doesn’t have to. There’s something taut in his posture now, like a bow half-drawn. The stack of chips in front of him is arranged with obsessive precision. Cards held just loose enough to flick, but steady like everything else about him. Under the table, your leg rests a hair’s breadth from his, not touching, but daring to. You can feel the heat of him, the tension like a live wire strung between your knees.

Your dad is already dealing. Conversation rolls over you like water, loose and familiar. Someone jokes about last week’s game. Someone else cracks a beer.

You can’t move.

You’re caught in that split-second decision, the one you’ve always been too impulsive to make carefully. Do you play it cool? Do you let this be a test of patience, slow-burn and smart, or do you lean into it, bratty and bold, and see how fast you can make him flinch?

You could flirt with Ed, the guy to your right. Just enough to be annoying. You could lean into Leon’s side with faux-innocence, “accidentally” brush his thigh under the table, stretch like you don’t know what you’re doing. You’ve done it before. Years ago. You were drunker then, younger, but the instincts are the same.

But tonight?

There’s something heavier in the air. Something real.

Because now you know what he tastes like. You know how he sounds when he curses under his breath with your name on his tongue. And maybe most dangerous of all, you know how he looks at you when no one else is watching.

And right now, with your father three feet away, Leon is trying very hard not to look at you like that.

It makes your pulse skitter. Makes your breath catch.

You glance his way, slow, deliberate, letting your eyes drag across the sharp lines of his jaw, the soft mess of his hair, the throat you kissed last night and bit just once, just to see how he’d take it.

He doesn’t meet your gaze. But his thumb taps twice against the edge of his cards. Once. Twice. Still again.

A tic. A tell.

And suddenly, your choice is clear.

You lean back, cross your arms beneath your chest, and smile to yourself.

Fine.

Let’s see who breaks first.

The first hand is bullshit.

You fold early, just to watch. To see how he plays when he’s trying not to play. Leon doesn’t speak unless spoken to, and even then, it’s brief, a glance, a nod, a low murmur of “check” or “raise” in that voice that sounds like gravel dragged across silk. His poker face is immaculate. Has been since you were seventeen and trying to figure out why your dad’s friend made you nervous just by being in the room.

But you know better now.

You know what he looks like when he’s falling apart. When his mouth is on your thighs and his control is unraveling one flick of his tongue at a time. And no matter how calm he looks now, you know what’s underneath.

So you play your next hand.

You hold a decent pair, eights, but you don’t care. Not really. It’s not about the cards.

It’s about what you can get away with.

You lean forward when you bet. Let your fingers linger on the edge of the chips just a little too long. Not overt. Not desperate. Just...suggestive. Like your body hasn’t quite remembered it’s supposed to be respectable. You tap your lip once with a fingertip before calling a raise. Not even looking at him when you do it. You don’t have to.

He calls your raise.

Of course he does.

The next hand, you cross your legs beneath the table. Slowly. Deliberately. Let your heel brush his ankle and pretend it was an accident.

His knee shifts away.

But not far.

He doesn’t look at you. Doesn’t touch you.

But he folds without another word.

The message is clear.

You smile to yourself. Shuffle your cards. Pretend you’re focused.

Another hand.

This time, you’re bold. You raise early, eyes half-lidded, sipping your beer like it’s wine, like you belong here in a room full of older men who all still see you as somebody’s daughter.

All but one.

Leon eyes your stack, then leans back slightly in his chair. His thigh presses lightly against yours under the table. Barely enough to be felt. But it’s there. It’s deliberate. A punishment. Or maybe a warning.

You nearly drop your cards.

You recover, barely, and shoot him a glance. Sharp. Coy. Daring.

His mouth curves, not a smile, not really. Just a suggestion of amusement. His tell again: thumb tapping the side of his beer bottle. Once. Twice. Then he raises.

You lose the hand.

Doesn’t matter.

Because the game’s not poker anymore.

It’s proximity. It’s breath. It’s glances. It’s what you can do in full view of your father and his friends without getting caught. It’s how long he’ll let you tease before he decides to teach.

He leans forward to rake in his winnings, forearms resting on the edge of the table. No smirk. No wink. Just the calm confidence of a man who knows he already has the upper hand.

“You still working at that gallery downtown?” he asks, eyes fixed on his chips, voice mild.

Your pulse jumps. The others keep chatting, the game shuffling on around you. But you feel the shift, subtle as a hand to the throat.

You clear your throat. “Not since March.”

He nods, like that matters to him. Like he made a note of it.

“Hm. Thought so. You never posted about it again.”

You nearly miss your turn. Fingers slipping just slightly as you toss in your next bet.

He deals the next hand like nothing’s happened.

“You still driving the Outback?” he asks. Louder this time, so your dad can hear. So it sounds innocent. Like small talk.

But his knee brushes yours under the table, steady and deliberate.

“Only when you’re not picking me up,” you say sweetly.

Your father chuckles, already distracted by his cards.

But Leon’s eyes flash. Just once.

And then he looks away.

Just in time to raise the bet.

Break comes naturally, like it always does. Your dad stretches back in his chair and sighs like the night’s been harder on him than it has. Cards scatter, laughter echoes, someone turns up the Red Sox game in the background.

“Shit,” your dad mutters, checking the cooler. “We’re dry.”

He turns toward the far end of the table. “Leon, mind doing a beer run?”

Leon shrugs, pushes back his chair without complaint.

Your dad’s attention swings to you. “You still got that card I gave you last month? Run it with him?”

You blink, surprised. “Uh, yeah. Yeah, I’ve got it.”

“Good,” he says, already turning away. “Grab a 30-rack and whatever snacks aren’t total garbage. You know what your uncle likes.”

You catch Leon’s eye as you stand, slipping your purse over your shoulder. He says nothing. Just holds the door open, polite and unreadable, like the night in his hotel room never happened.

It’s not until the two of you are in the quiet dark of his car that it shifts.

You settle into the passenger seat, still a little too aware of the dress you picked just for tonight, the one that hugs tight in all the right places. The door clicks shut.

Then,

“Seatbelt.”

The command is low, quiet.

You reach for it, and as you buckle in, his hand brushes the fabric of your skirt,light, casual, like he’s just checking the hem. But it lingers. Just enough to remind you who you’re sitting next to.

He pulls out onto the street, the engine a soft hum between you.

“Cute dress,” he says, eyes forward. “Did you pick it just for me?”

You cross your legs slowly. “Maybe I did.”

His knuckles tighten on the wheel.

“Then don’t act surprised when I treat you like it.”

The air in the car thickens.

He doesn’t raise his voice. Doesn’t even look at you. Just keeps driving, one hand steady at ten o’clock, the other resting near the gearshift like it belongs there, like it’s waiting to move if you give him reason.

“You gonna behave,” he says finally, “or do I have to remind you how we handle brats?”

Your breath catches.

But you don’t smile. Not this time.

Because this isn’t the hotel anymore.

This is home turf.

And he still makes you feel like you’re out of your depth.

You exhale, slow and sharp, a breath shaped like defiance.

“Funny,” you say, eyes on the windshield, “I don’t remember signing over my personality the second we fucked.”

Leon’s fingers drum once against the wheel. Not fast. Not impatient. Just thoughtful, like he’s measuring how far you’re going to push this.

You glance sideways, find his profile in the wash of passing streetlights, cut from shadow and bone, jaw tight, gaze ahead.

“You think you can talk to me like that?” he asks, low.

“I think,” you murmur, “that the moment you handed me that envelope, you gave me permission to act however I want.”

That does it.

No raised voice. No sudden move.

Just the soft click of the turn signal. A measured pull into an empty side lot next to a quiet corner store. The engine stays running. He shifts into park.

Silence folds between you, thick as velvet.

Then he turns.

Not all the way. Just enough that you feel it, his attention, coiled and pointed.

“You’re not wrong,” he says calmly. “You want to play brat, play brat. I’ll let you. Hell, I’ll even enjoy it.”

He leans closer, elbow on the center console now. His voice drops, dark honey poured slow.

“But don’t confuse permission with power.”

Your stomach flips. A little from nerves. A little from something lower.

“I don’t care how clever your mouth is. When I say behave, you do it. Not because I’m paying you. But because you want to be good for me.”

You blink, lips parted. He watches your expression shift. Watches the flicker behind your eyes, pride, resistance, heat.

“Don’t worry, sweetheart,” he adds, a quiet promise curling behind the words. “I’ll make it worth it when you are.”

He doesn’t touch you.

Doesn’t have to.

His voice does more than hands ever could.

You don’t move, you just sit there, breath shallow, heart thudding stupid in your chest like it’s got something to prove. You can feel the air change, heat crawling up your spine, but also settling low in your belly. You hate how much he gets to you. Hate more how much he knows it.

Leon’s still watching you. Not smiling. Not teasing. Just… waiting. Like the space between you is a fuse and he’s letting you decide if you want to light it.

So you do.

You shift your legs slightly apart. Barely. Just enough for the message to land.

And he moves.

Slowly. Deliberately. One broad hand slides across the console and curls around the back of your neck, warm, rough, grounding. His thumb brushes just below your ear, soft but firm. Like he’s reminding you who you belong to.

You suck in a breath. Your pulse stutters.

“Good girl,” he murmurs, and fuck, the words land harder than they should.

He leans in, lips grazing the shell of your ear, not a kiss, not really, just heat and breath and intent. “You like mouthing off?” he says, voice low and steady. “Then you better learn what happens when I don’t feel like being patient.”

You tilt your chin, defiant.

But your thighs press together again.

He laughs, quiet, dangerous. His other hand moves too fast for you to brace, sliding up your inner thigh, under your dress, fingers slipping beneath the edge of your underwear. Just a brush. A single drag of knuckle and fingertip over heat-slick skin.

You flinch. Then gasp.

“Already wet,” he says, half to himself, like he’s proud. Like he knew.

Then he pulls back. Instantly. Clean break. Hand gone, warmth gone, that stillness returning like a door slamming quietly shut.

“Get your shit,” he says smoothly, sliding the car into park. “We’re not late for beer.”

You just sit there.

Drenched.

Burning.

And absolutely, infuriatingly, obedient.

You walk into the store on shaky legs.

Not visibly. Not enough for the bored teenage cashier to clock. But you feel it. In the flex of your calves, in the swing of your hips. A heat curled deep between your thighs like some slow-burning ember he struck to life just to leave you with.

The list your dad texted you is short. IPAs and some kind of hard seltzer your cousin likes. You add something cheap and citrusy, a little out of spite, a little because you want to see how Leon reacts, if he even does.

You swipe your card without flinching. Load the clinking plastic bags into your arms. Keep your chin high as you walk back into the evening air.

He is still in the car. Still in the driver’s seat. One hand on the wheel, the other resting lazy on the console like nothing happened. Like he didn’t just touch you and take your breath and leave you dripping in the front seat of your father’s car.

You yank open the door.

“I hate you,” you mutter.

He raises an eyebrow, unbothered. “You’re welcome.”

You shove the bags behind the seat, slide back into place, and slam the door shut harder than necessary.

He doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t even glance your way.

“You do that to all your sugar babies?” you ask, arms crossed now, refusing to look at him. “Or just the ones whose dads would literally kill you?”

Leon shifts the car into drive with a slow, measured click.

“Just the brats who like being reminded who they belong to.”

Your breath catches. You hate how much that line hits.

You roll your eyes. But it’s weak. It’s shaky. It’s cover.

He smirks, quiet and victorious, and pulls back into traffic like he didn’t just win something.

The night winds down slowly.

Laughter curls through the screen door. Empty beer bottles crowd the edge of the poker table, and your dad is deep into another bad hand he swears is a winner. You hover somewhere between bored and wired, the kind of restless only one man in the room could do anything about, and he’s currently pretending you are not his problem.

Leon hasn’t looked at you in over twenty minutes. Not really.

Which would be fine. Expected, even. Except every time someone else cracks a joke and your laugh lingers a little too long, you feel it. That quiet awareness. That sliver of attention sliding across your skin like heat off the stove. He’s still watching. Just not openly.

You get up first.

No announcement. No showy exit. Just a quiet slide of the chair, your empty glass in hand, and a mumbled goodbye to your dad. He doesn’t ask questions. He’s half-drunk, anyway, and still trying to figure out how he lost forty bucks to Leon in two hands.

You cross the driveway to your car. Slip into the driver’s seat. Dig for the keys in your bag with a flicker of smug satisfaction. At least you get to leave first. At least you’re in control again.

Except… the car doesn’t start.

Not once. Not twice.

Not even a sputter. Just the low mechanical whine of a battery that is, without a doubt, already dead.

You exhale sharply. Hit the wheel with your palm. Whisper a string of quiet, increasingly profane curses.

A knock comes at the window, and you jump.

Leon.

You open the car door, slow and composed, like you didn’t just flinch.

“Car trouble?” he asks, dry.

You blink up at him. “No, I just enjoy sitting in dead silence in my dad’s driveway with the engine off at ten o’clock on a Thursday.”

His mouth twitches. “Pop the hood.”

You do. You wait while he checks something under the hood and rattles the cables like it’s an old habit. A few minutes later, he leans into the open driver’s side again, arms braced against the roof.

“It’s dead.”

You look up at him. “And?”

He shrugs. “You need a ride.”

You narrow your eyes. “And you’re just gonna offer?”

He tilts his head, considering. “Call it an act of service.”

You’re still not sure if you want to punch him or kiss him.

Probably both.

You gather your bag, step out, and lock the useless car behind you.

“Fine,” you say. “But if you try anything…”

Leon smirks. “You’ll beg me to keep going?”

You shove him lightly in the shoulder.

But you get in the car.

And you don’t say no.

The passenger seat smells like him.

Leather, cologne, faint hints of whatever soap clung to him the last time you saw him bare-chested and unbothered. You shift your thighs a little closer together and pretend it is not because of him. That it’s just the night air. The silence. The way your skin remembers what his hands felt like and wants it again.

He drives one-handed, wrist draped over the top of the wheel like it’s second nature. His other hand stays on the console. Close. Casual.

Dangerous.

You glance over at him once. Just once.

He doesn’t look at you.

But he says, “You could come back to mine.”

You blink. Swallow once.

He says it like an offer. Not a command. Not quite.

But it feels like one.

You lean your head back against the seat. Try to act like you’re thinking it over. Like you’re not already soaking through your underwear just from the sound of his voice.

“Why?” you ask, playing it slow. “Want to count your winnings again with company?”

His mouth twitches. “I thought maybe you’d like to thank me for the ride.”

You scoff, soft. “Pretty sure the Uber would’ve cost less.”

He hums once, and it sounds too pleased. “Maybe. But it wouldn’t have made you squirm in your seat the whole way home.”

Your breath catches.

He still hasn’t looked at you.

He doesn’t need to.

You shift again. Cross your legs, then uncross them.

“Is that what this is?” you murmur, letting your voice go light. “Some kind of lesson?”

“Maybe.”

You risk a glance at him. His jaw is set. His eyes still on the road. But there’s a heat rising off him now. The kind that spreads slow and low and doesn’t ask permission.

You wet your lips. “What happens if I say yes?”

Leon doesn’t answer right away. Just flicks the turn signal on, merging onto the road that leads to his place, not yours.

Then, finally, he says, “We'll see."

Your stomach flips. Heat floods your face. You squeeze your thighs together so tightly it almost hurts.

“And that’s it?” you ask, voice unsteady. “I don't even get to know?”

Leon’s hand finally moves, and slides from the console to your knee. Just a touch. Just a brush of heat through the fabric.

“For tonight,” he says, tone low and cruelly gentle. “That’s all brats who fooled around get.”

You make a noise that’s half indignation, half arousal.

And he laughs, soft and dark, as he turns up the street toward his apartment.

The apartment is cleaner than you expected.

Not sterile, not cold, just lived-in the way a man like him would live: efficiently. Leather couch. Hardwood floors. A few framed prints on the wall, cityscapes and blues and grays. No clutter. No throw pillows. No sign of a woman.

The door shuts behind you with a soft click .

You stand there for a second, blinking against the dim light. His space smells like him. Like cedar and soap and late-night danger. You should walk further in. You should do something with your hands. But all you can manage is to shift your weight and try not to look too impressed.

Leon steps past you without a word and sets his keys in a small bowl near the door. His jacket comes off next. He hangs it up, then looks over his shoulder like he can feel your eyes on him.

“You gonna stand there all night?”

You lift your chin. “Just taking it in.”

His mouth curves, but it is not quite a smile. “And?”

You glance around, playing it casual. “Feels like you.”

That earns you something, a flicker in his eyes, almost like approval.

“Sit if you want.” He nods toward the couch as he heads into the kitchen. “Want anything?”

“Water.”

He returns a moment later, a chilled glass in one hand. You take it from him, fingers brushing, and he lingers just long enough to make it mean something.

You sit. Cross your legs. Sip slow.

Leon remains standing.

Watching you.

“I’m not gonna fuck you tonight,” he says, tone even. Not cruel. Not apologetic. Just… declarative.

You raise an eyebrow, even as your stomach flips.

“Oh?”

He moves to lean against the edge of the kitchen counter, arms crossed. The muscles in his forearms flex slightly. His eyes are dark. Hungry. Patient.

“Too easy,” he says. “You want this to work, you need to learn to wait.”

You exhale. Try not to show how much that lands. How tight your thighs are pressed. How wet you still are from the car ride over.

You tilt your head. “I’m not great at waiting.”

“I noticed.”

You set your glass down slowly. Stretch just enough for the hem of your dress to ride up an inch too far. His eyes follow it. Of course they do.

“Doesn’t seem fair,” you murmur.

Leon pushes off the counter and crosses the room in three unhurried steps. He stops in front of you, tall and quiet and devastating.

“You think this is supposed to be fair?” His voice drops low, something like heat curling beneath the surface. “You let me take control. That’s the deal.”

You stare up at him, heart kicking at your ribs.

“Then tell me what to do.”

The words slip out before you can stop them.

Leon smiles, slow, knowing, dangerous.

“Start by keeping your hands to yourself.”

And then he turns and walks down the hall, toward the bedroom.

Without another word.

Leaving you there on the couch.

Throbbing.

Waiting.

You stay seated, not because you want to. Not really. But because that line, start by keeping your hands to yourself , didn’t sound like a suggestion.

And God help you, it turns you on more than it should.

The soft thud of his footsteps fades down the hallway. A door opens, then closes. Not slammed. Not locked. Just... closed. Like an invitation.

You stare at the spot where he disappeared, breath shallow. Everything in your body screams to follow. To lean into the part of yourself that’s used to calling the shots, flirting for control, pushing until someone breaks.

But now?

You’re not sure who’s breaking.

You sip your water, just to keep your hands busy. The cold helps, but only a little. The dress you wore for effect feels too tight now, like it’s trapping the heat low in your belly. You uncross your legs. Cross them again. And when that doesn’t help, you finally stand.

You move through the apartment with slow, quiet steps, not because you’re sneaking, but because it feels like crossing a threshold. Like if you move too fast, the illusion might crack and reveal how badly you want to be seen exactly like this.

You pause outside the bedroom door.

Your fingers curl at your sides.

Then you knock once. Lightly.

“Leon.”

No response.

You swallow, lean your head lightly against the frame. “This is a little fucked up, you know.”

Still no answer.

You inhale. “You said you wanted control. Fine. You’ve got it. But you can’t just-”

The door swings open.

Leon stands there barefoot, in a black t-shirt and sleep pants. Hair damp, shoulders relaxed. But the look in his eyes, the way it pins you, makes your pulse stumble.

“I can just,” he says calmly. “And you like it.”

Your throat goes dry.

He watches you for a beat. Then steps aside.

“Come in.”

You hesitate, just long enough for him to raise a brow.

“You came this far,” he says. “You gonna flinch now?”

You step in.

The room is warm, dimly lit, sheets still rumpled from sleep. You make it halfway to the bed before you stop and turn.

“I don’t know what you want from me tonight.”

Leon shuts the door behind you.

“I want you to learn,” he says. “That not everything happens when you want it.”

You bite your lip. Shift your weight.

“I’m not good at that.”

He steps closer. You don’t move away.

“That’s why I’m here.”

He stops inches from you. His hand lifts, thumb brushing lightly beneath your jaw, not firm, not soft. Just enough to steady your head and keep your eyes on his.

“This doesn’t work,” he murmurs, “if you don’t let it get under your skin.”

You’re already trembling.

He sees it, and still doesn’t kiss you.

Instead, he walks past and settles onto the bed, pulling the covers back on one side.

“Get in.”

It’s not a question.

You hesitate. Just long enough for the ache between your thighs to start throbbing again. Then you cross the room and climb in beside him, careful not to brush his skin too obviously.

He lies down on his back, one arm behind his head, watching the ceiling.

You stare at him for a long moment.

“This is insane,” you whisper.

Leon doesn’t look at you.

“It will be.”

You lie beside him, still dressed.

Every nerve feels exposed.

The silence stretches, not awkward, not heavy. Just weighted. Like the space between lightning and thunder.

Leon hasn’t looked at you since you got into bed. Not directly. He breathes slow, even. Like he has all the time in the world. Like this doesn’t rattle him in the slightest.

You hate how hot that is.

So you speak. Soft, but clear.

“How do I earn touch tonight?”

His head turns. Just slightly. Enough that the corner of his mouth lifts, not in amusement. In recognition . Like he was waiting.

“You’re asking?”

You nod once. “I want rules. So I know which ones I’m breaking.”

Leon shifts to his side. Finally faces you. His eyes sweep over your body like they’re charting a blueprint. Not hurried. Not indulgent. Just… aware . In that dangerous way that always made your stomach twist.

“You think this is a game,” he says. “And you want to win it.”

You swallow. “Am I wrong?”

“No.” His voice is velvet, rough at the edges. “But winning doesn’t mean what you think it does.”

You watch him, throat tight.

He leans closer, breath ghosting the line of your jaw and not touching. Just near enough to make you ache.

“If you want to earn touch,” he murmurs, “start by keeping quiet for five minutes.”

Your brows lift. “That’s it?”

He doesn’t blink. “You’re already failing.”

Your mouth opens. Then closes again.

Leon watches your lips like they’re a loaded weapon.

“Try again,” he says.

You breathe through your nose. Settle against the pillow. Close your eyes, as if that will help.
Because five minutes shouldn’t be hard. Except his presence is heat and weight and absence , all at once. Except you know what his mouth can do, what his fingers feel like, how he tastes like want and danger and every bad decision you’d happily make again.

And now you’re here, in his bed, in your dress, burning for it.

You count your breaths. You keep still. You keep quiet.

One minute in, his knuckle brushes the top of your thigh.

Not high enough to satisfy. Not low enough to be innocent.

Just enough to test.

Your pulse stutters.

His voice is quiet. “Better.”

Another minute passes.

Then his palm comes to rest at the top of your knee. Warm. Steady. Possessive without pressing.

You exhale slow, almost shaking.

Three minutes.

He lets a single finger drag beneath the hem of your dress. Just an inch. Just enough to remind you who owns the rhythm now.

“You’re learning,” he murmurs.

Four minutes.

The ache between your thighs is unbearable. You shift once, barely, and his hand tightens.

“Still,” he says, low.

You obey.

Five minutes.

Then his hand slips under the dress, slow and confident, knuckles grazing your inner thigh like he’s rewarding restraint. Like he’s rewarding you .

He leans in, breath brushing your ear.

“Ask again.”

You turn your head, trembling now.

“Please,” you whisper. “I want you to touch me.”

Leon smiles, dark and full of promise.

“Then let’s begin.”

He doesn’t move fast. He doesn’t need to.

His hand coasts higher under your dress, deliberate, fingers grazing the lace at the tops of your thighs. He takes his time like he’s unwrapping something expensive, something earned. Not bought.

“You wore this for me,” he murmurs, thumb teasing the band of your underwear. “Didn’t you?”

You nod, just once.

“Words.”

“Yes.”

Leon hums like the answer pleases him. Like it was obvious, but he wanted to hear you say it anyway.

The sheet rustles as he moves closer, hips shifting, body half-over yours now. His hand slides under the lace and presses flat against the heat between your thighs, palm cupping, unmoving.

You exhale like it’s the first breath you’ve taken in hours.

“You were soaked last time I touched you,” he says, voice low and rough. “How are we doing tonight?”

“Worse,” you whisper.

He chuckles, a warm, quiet thing. The kind that makes you feel ridiculous and precious all at once.

“Good.”

Two fingers dip between your folds, slow and firm, sliding through wetness you were too proud to acknowledge. He doesn’t tease this time. He slides them in deep, just once, then pulls them out again.

A whimper escapes your throat.

Leon lifts the fingers to his mouth. Licks them clean with slow, deliberate precision. Watching you the entire time.

“Still my favorite taste,” he says.

You squirm. The dress rides higher.

Favorite? your mind echoes, sharp with disbelief. He’s had it once. Once.

And still, your thighs press together. Like the heat of the lie, or the arrogance of it, turned you on more than the compliment ever could. Of course, it’s a line. You know that. But God, the way he said it. Like he meant it. Like it belonged to him already. 

He says it like he’s been thinking about it ever since the other night, you realize. Like he tasted it once and it ruined every other woman after.

That should make you roll your eyes. It should make you push his hand away and tell him to keep dreaming.

Leon doesn’t touch you again, not yet. He lets you burn.

Then, without warning, he lifts the hem of the dress and pulls your underwear down, sliding them off like they’re a gift to himself.

“You’ve earned more,” he says softly. “Stay still.”

You do. You feel the whisper of your underwear sliding down your thighs, the air kissing bare skin as he peels them away, painstakingly slow, deliberate, like he’s unwrapping something precious he already paid for in full.

You try .

Not a word leaves your mouth. You don’t trust your voice. Not with the way your chest tightens. Not with the way your hands curl uselessly in the sheets, needing something to hold, something to anchor you while everything else is unraveling.

He disappears beneath the covers. His shoulders shift, settle between your legs. And then, heat.

His mouth finds you again, patient and sure. No games now. No control.

You’ve earned more, he said.

Like obedience had weight, as if being still, when every nerve in your body wanted to buck and writhe and take, was the greatest gift you could offer him.

Tongue broad, steady, dragging over you in long, slow sweeps that leave you gasping. Then tighter. Deeper. His lips seal around your clit and he hums low, like he means to let the vibration undo you.

Your hands clutch the sheets. Your hips lift once, instinctive.

He grips your thighs in warning.

You force yourself still.

Tongue and lips and breath, all moving like he’s studying you again from the inside out. You feel the slow drag of his tongue along your seam, the way he lingers, presses, traces. Like he’s trying to memorize pressure points. Like he wants you to come undone slow and messy, unraveling just for him.

You bite your lip.

Try to hold still.

You try.

But your hips twitch and your legs tense and your breath keeps catching, because it’s too much. Because it’s not enough. Because it’s everything you dreamed of in the dark, whispered into a pillow, imagined with your fingers between your thighs and no name on your lips.

And when he finally presses two fingers back inside, curling with a rhythm that builds and builds, you realize what he’s really doing.

He’s not just touching you.

He’s training you.

Pushing you to the edge and pulling you back and holding you there like it’s a lesson. Like if you can take this, you can take anything.

You don’t know what you’re saying anymore. Just a string of soft, broken pleas. Because the part of you that wants to take more, to rock your hips, to tell him faster , that part is still loud. Still bratty. Still wired to test limits. But you hold back. You stay still.

You obey.

Because he told you to.

And because part of you, deep down where the heat meets the hunger, wants to please him more than you want to finish.

And then, he lifts his mouth just enough to speak.

“Good girl.”

He lingers just beneath what your body begs for, just above what your pride can handle. It is a lesson and a reward and a dare all at once. And you realize, breath caught in your throat, that you would do anything right now to earn more.

Not because you are weak, but because you want to give it to him.

One of his hands leaves your hip, glides up the inside of your thigh, slow and unhurried. His fingers graze where you’re already shaking for him, teasing, not entering, not yet. Just touching, coaxing, circling. Like he wants to draw this out until it breaks you.

And it’s working.

You can’t hide the way your body arches for him now. The way you strain toward every inch of him, the way the heat of him has overtaken all your cleverness, all your bratty armor. It’s gone. Melted into the mattress.

His fingers dip lower, and your breath stutters.

You want to beg. The words coil at the back of your throat, bitten off by pride, by longing, by something deeper.

But he knows. He always knows.

And so he pauses, just enough to pull back, look up, voice warm and wrecked with power.

“You gonna ask nice for it, sweetheart?”

And this time?

You just might.

You almost say no. Just to keep a scrap of control, just to hold onto the last thread of your dignity.

But it’s slipping, has been for minutes now. His voice slides under your skin like heat, like breath against a bruise. You could lie, but your thighs are trembling, your spine arched, your hands twisted in the sheets like they might anchor you to yourself.

You part your lips, and for a moment nothing comes out.

Then, 

“Please.”

It’s quiet. Not broken, but close.

You feel him smile against you, the shift of his lips against sensitive skin, pleased, but not smug. He doesn’t gloat. He doesn’t tease. He only answers with action.

His mouth returns, no longer tentative, no longer holding back. The patience is gone, replaced by certainty. Intention.

He gives you what you asked for, what he believes you earned.

His fingers join his mouth, slipping inside with a precision that makes your vision stutter. He moves like he knows the shape of you already. Like he’s memorized the way your breath catches, the place you twitch, the sound you make when you’re close.

And you are close.

Too close.

It swells inside you like a tide, like something too big for your body. Your hips jerk, but he holds you steady. You can’t move. You can’t think. You are open and trembling and ruined.

And through it all, his voice, low, wrecked, soft against your skin.

“That’s it,” he murmurs. “Good girl.”

You come undone with those two words.

Silently. Violently. Back arched. Fists clenched in the sheets. His fingers still moving inside you while his mouth returns to finish what it started. The world goes soft around the edges, and he does not stop until you fall back into yourself, breathless, boneless, still shaking.

His mouth softens, his fingers withdraw, his hands soothe the tremble from your thighs. Like nothing in the world exists now but you.

And you realize, you were never out of control.

You just wanted him to take it.

Then he rises, and pulls you against his chest. Lets you catch your breath with your face buried in the curve of his shoulder.

“That’s how you earn touch,” he murmurs.

You don’t respond.

You don’t need to.

Your body already did.