Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

“You will love again the stranger who was your self.

Give wine. Give bread. Give back your heart

to itself, to the stranger who has loved you

all your life.” – Love after Love by Derek Walcot 

Six months since Prater’s blood stained Dexter’s hands, since the garbage bags sank into the harbor’s black depths - and yet the world feels both fractured and frozen.

Debra Morgan stands at the kitchen counter, drumming her fingers against a chipped ceramic mug. Steam curls upward, dissolving into the gray dawn. The mug’s rough handle bites her thumb, grounding her in this space that smells of him - soap, coffee, and a faint trace of her own shampoo woven into the air.

Her apartment sits empty across town, a relic she rarely visits. She’s here. Always here. With Dexter.

Outside, the New York neighborhood glitters through a cracked window, neon edges cutting through the haze. A taxi horn blares, a curse echoes from the street. The city hums - indifferent, alive.

Deb sips her coffee. Bitterness burns her throat, a fleeting comfort. The counter’s edge digs into her hip, pain anchoring her racing thoughts. She’s wearing one of Dexter’s old T-shirts, the fabric soft and thin, smelling of him - sweat, soap, home. Her hair, loose and tangled from sleep, clings damply to her neck, still carrying the faint scent of last night’s shower - their shared steam, their bodies pressed too close.

Six months since I stopped being Charley. Debra Morgan again.

But it feels like a lie.

The name’s mine - but am I?

Prater’s death flashes in her mind - Dexter’s knife, the glint of glee in his eyes, the sick satisfaction in his laugh. Blood pooling on plastic. Bags sinking into the harbor’s dark throat. Her stomach twists. Angel’s face follows - eyes wide, accusing. You knew.

Then LaGuerta - her body limp in Deb’s arms, a ghost whispering: Always Dexter. All because of him.

Footsteps break her spiral - soft, deliberate. Dexter pads into the kitchen, barefoot, fresh from a shower. Damp curls cling to his neck, his faded T-shirt and sweatpants making him look achingly human - too human for the monster she saw six months ago.

He moves close, his arm brushing hers as he reaches for the coffee pot. The touch is casual, habitual, dangerous. His breath, warm with mint, grazes her cheek. Steam hisses, mingling with the city’s damp air. His calloused fingers brush her wrist - electric, unsettling.

“Morning,” he murmurs, voice low, still rough with sleep - intimate in a way that makes her chest ache.

She snorts, masking the tremor in her heart. “You’re too fucking close, Dex.”

He flashes that half-grin, hazel eyes glinting with something dangerous and warm. “You love it.”

She doesn’t deny it. Can’t. Because it’s true - damn him, it’s true. Every touch, every glance pulls her deeper, like he’s wired into her pulse.

He’s everywhere - his hands, his breath, his fucking eyes. We kiss in hallways, fuck in every room, don’t even hide it anymore.

They’re inseparable, and it’s suffocating. Am I just his shadow now? Losing myself in him?

Her gaze drifts to the kitchen table, where Harrison’s hoodie lies crumpled from his last visit. He’s in college now, studying criminology - chasing ghosts like hers, like their father’s. The thought warms her, but it aches too. She’s missed so many years, and now he’s slipping away.

She picks up her phone. No messages.

A photo from last week glows on the screen: a diner booth, her and Dexter too close, his hand on her knee, Harrison’s smile tight and tired.

The chair creaks as she sits. Dexter follows, thigh pressed against hers - always close. Their fingers find each other on the table, the coffee steaming between them.

He’s trying to be normal. But they’re not.

Harrison sees us - touching, kissing, too much.

He’s pulling away, and it’s our fucking fault.

She remembers his words from months ago: You’re all I’ve got left.

The weight of it presses against her ribs. Are we drowning him in this?

Dexter sets his mug down, turning toward her, eyes searching. His hands slide to her hips, pulling her into his lap. She gasps but doesn’t resist, arms looping around his neck, fingers threading through his damp hair. His touch is possessive, intoxicating.

“Be better.” he whispers, echoing her words from six months ago, his breath warm against her ear.

She stiffens. The phrase cuts like a knife. His forehead presses to hers. She breathes him in - soap, coffee, Dexter - addictive, consuming.

She melts anyway. He’s my everything, but is that all I fucking am?

“So,” he murmurs, soft but deliberate, “I was thinking… one of Prater’s files. A child abuser. A killer.”

She meets his gaze. The spark is there - the thrill of the hunt. It chills her.

“Remember, Dex,” she says, voice firm. “Redemption. No trophies. No fucking joyrides.”

He nods, fingers tightening on her hips, closing the small space left between them. “For you.” he says, heavy with promise.

She snorts. “Don’t make it sound like a goddamn sacrifice.”

But she sees it - the edge, the hunger. Can he really stop? Can I keep him in check?

Her love feels like a noose, tightening with every heartbeat. Be better - for him. For Harrison. For me.

She slides off his lap, needing air, and steps to the window. The road glints, indifferent to their chaos - cars passing, horns blaring, a dog barking two streets over.

Dexter follows, wrapping his arms around her from behind. His chest is warm against her back. He kisses her temple, soft but unyielding, his lips a contrast to the city’s hard edges. The glass under her fingertips is cold, streaked with last night’s rain. His arm is heavy, grounding - but it doesn’t quiet the question burning in her chest.

The city doesn’t care if we’re killers, lovers, or both.

We’re alive. But what survives next?

She thinks of Harrison. Of the monster in Dexter that never really sleeps.

Is this love or a noose?

Maybe both.

Her hand finds his, squeezes tight –

a fragile resolve to try.

For now.

Chapter Text

“I love you

because the Earth turns round the sun

because the North wind blows north

sometimes because…

I love you

because it is the natural order of things" -  Resignation by Nikki Giovanni

 Debra Morgan decides to run that afternoon, and Dexter follows - as he always does.

The city pulses around them: horns, exhaust, the tang of hot pretzels from a cart on the corner. Their sneakers strike cracked pavement in sync, her ponytail swinging, his breath steady beside her.

She’s never out of my reach, he thinks - comfort and compulsion in equal measure.

Six months since Prater’s blood, since the vow to be better, and still the monster hums under his skin, patient and hungry. Being near her keeps it quiet - or so he tells himself. Their enmeshment steadies him, even as it strangles.

Back in the apartment, the air smells of sweat and coffee. A cracked window leaks in the city’s restlessness - yelling, a subway’s low moan.

Deb heads for the shower. He follows without question.

Steam fogs the mirror as they strip down, shirts hitting the tile. Dexter adjusts the spray until it’s warm, not scalding, and steps in behind her.

He presses his body to hers, chest to her back, the hot water pounding down, stinging his skin. His lips graze the damp curve of her neck, tasting salt and her citrus shampoo, his fingers digging into her hips with possessive need. His arousal is evident, unhidden, and he wants her to feel it - needs her to.

She grabs the soap, suds sliding down her lithe frame, catching the light on her small breasts. His hand drifts to her arm, tracing the jagged scar from a kill she did as Charley, a ghost of her past life.

“Can’t even shower fucking alone anymore.” she murmurs, her voice half-teasing, half tired.

“Would you rather be alone?” he teases back, pressing himself harder against her, the soapy friction of their bodies igniting a familiar heat. He grinds slowly, savoring the slippery slide.

“Christ, Dex, don’t you ever get enough?” Her laugh is sharp, playful, but her eyes flicker with something deeper - doubt, maybe fear, a shadow of Prater’s death.

“Never enough of you,” he says, voice low, raw with truth, his lips brushing her ear. Never enough, Deb. You’re my everything.

They step out, toweling off, his eyes lingering on her - small breasts, lean muscles, every curve a map he’s memorized, mind, body, soul.

She pulls on his old T-shirt and jeans, the fabric clinging to her damp skin, smelling of him. He dresses in a plain button down and pants, their movements quiet, synchronized, intimate.

In the kitchen, he starts lunch - grilled sandwiches, because Deb still avoids cooking.

The counter is cluttered with mismatched mugs, one chipped from her careless toss. The air smells of sizzling butter, grounding him as he slices tomatoes with a precision that mirrors his kills.

His mind drifts to Prater, the garbage bags sinking into the harbor, Deb’s horrified eyes as he laughed, the glee he couldn’t hide. 

Six months since I promised to be better. The knife in his hand feels too familiar, the urge buzzing beneath his control. Is she enough to keep it quiet? 

Deb sits at the kitchen table, worrying her lip as she scrolls her phone, her silence heavy. What’s she feeling? Sometimes he can’t separate her thoughts from his - they’re fused, one entity born of trauma, love, blood.

She’s Debra Morgan again, risen from the dead like him, records updated to declare her alive. No more Charley, that mask of survival. It feels right, real, but fragile. She hasn’t worked since Prater, hasn’t found her place after eight years of his orders. Dexter doesn’t mind - he still drives for Urcar at night, when she’s asleep, to keep them afloat. She’s free, but is she whole?

“So, tonight…” she says, eyes lifting to meet his, voice steady but sharp. “Anonymous tips. Justice. No trophies.”

“You said that earlier,” he teases, but her words sting - a reminder she doesn’t fully trust him with the kill. He doesn’t blame her, not after Prater’s glee. 

“Just making sure you heard me, asshole.” The smirk softens the words, but not the warning.

He finishes the sandwiches, sliding a plate to her and sitting across, their knees brushing under the table. Her foot presses against his, a constant touch, anchoring. Just as he takes a bite, his phone buzzes - Harrison. He puts it on speaker, heart lifting at his son’s voice.

“Hey, buddy,” Dexter says, forcing warmth. “How’s school?”

“Great. Just started a criminology class.” Harrison’s voice crackles, hesitant. “Got a lecture on profiling today. Sounds like something Grandpa Harry would’ve taught.”

Dexter’s chest tightens. Harry’s code, my curse. “You’re making him proud, kid.”

Deb chimes in, her voice warm but her leg pressing harder into his: “Kick ass, Harrison.”

He’s chasing Harry’s path, Dexter thinks, but it’s tainted by me.

He remembers Prater’s gun against his son’s skull, the terror in Harrison’s eyes.

Too much blood. Too much truth.

After lunch, Deb wanders to the bedroom, returning with one of Prater’s files - the child abuser. She drops it into his lap, settling beside him on the couch, her thigh pressed against his.

“We tip the cops off after,” she says. “This isn’t for fun. We keep those kids safe.”

“Deb.” He covers her hand. “You can trust me.”

“I do,” she says softly. “It’s the other part of you I’m not sure about.”

The words sting. He opens the file anyway. Ink, dust, sin.

Her hair brushes his cheek, her scent wrapping around him. Her hand rests on his thigh, sending a pulse of desire and dread through him. 

She says redemption, but her eyes still fear the monster.

That night, they head out under cover of darkness, her hand laced tightly in his.

She looks beautiful, mysterious - intoxicating in the dim streetlight. He steals a kiss in the doorway. Doesn’t care who sees.

The city’s chaos surrounds them - hot dog carts, coffee vendors, exhaust fumes mingling with the crisp fall air. Horns blare, crowds push past, but her fingers in his are a lifeline.

He drives them toward their destination, her presence a pulse keeping him steady. They step onto the busy New York street, anonymous in the throng, just another couple.

 But they’re more - accomplices, lovers, a duo bound by blood and promises. 

The city doesn’t care if we’re murderers or in love. With her, I’m alive.

Harrison sits alone in his dorm room, the blue glow of his laptop casting stark shadows across the space. Textbooks litter the desk, a criminology syllabus open to notes on profiling, but his eyes are fixed on a photo from last week’s diner visit - Dexter and Deb, hands tangled, lips too close for comfort, his own smile forced. The dorm smells of stale pizza and laundry detergent.

His mind drifts to Claudette Wallace’s guest lecture this week, her sharp eyes lingering on him during her talk on the New York Ripper. She’d been invited back, just like during his campus tour earlier this year, and he’d felt her gaze like a spotlight - uncomfortable, probing.

She’d questioned him about Ryan Foster’s murder back then. He has a sinking feeling she still thinks he knows something, guilt twisting in his gut.

He flips to his textbook, but the photo pulls him back, the screen’s light making their closeness look even more intimate. 

They’re not normal family - kissing, touching, like lovers, not siblings. 

He remembers catching them months ago, tangled in bed, looking guilty. Since then, it’s gotten worse - open kisses, constant touches, like he’s invisible in his father’s home.

His father’s anger scares him now - the flash behind his eyes, the tight control that feels ready to break.

Guilt gnaws deeper. Ryan Foster. Lady Vengeance framed. Secrets under his fingernails that won’t wash away.

Claudette’s card sits on his desk, a temptation glowing in the laptop’s light. If I reach out, do I save them? Or destroy us all?

Chapter Text

“I think I made you up inside my head.

I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead;

(I think I made you up inside my head.)"

– Mad Girl’s Love Song by Sylvia Plath

The city hums beneath a bruised sky.

Under the cover of night, Deb walks arm-in-arm with Dexter through New York’s crowded streets, the air crisp with early fall. The pulse of the city thrums around them - horns, voices, the hiss of steam from a grate. She pulls her leather coat tighter, the zipper’s cold bite grounding her. A drunk curses in an alley; a cab splashes through a puddle, headlights cutting through the dark.

Dexter notices her shiver, his voice low, teasing. “Cold?”

Before she can answer, his arm slips around her shoulders, pulling her close, his body radiating warmth through her coat.

Always so fucking close.

A shiver of delight wars with the dull ache in her chest. Six months since Prater’s bloodied end, since she shed Charley for her real name - and she’s still here, tethered to him like gravity.

They move toward the target’s building, a crumbling structure under flickering streetlights. The sidewalk reeks of damp concrete and piss. Junkies mutter to ghosts in the doorway.

Deb slips free of Dexter’s arm.

“I can do this alone, Dex.” she says, voice sharp, boots scuffing grit. She needs to prove she’s more than his shadow.

“The fuck you are.”

His tone cuts the air, and when she glances at him, he’s already smirking - infuriating and intoxicating in equal measure. She wants to slap that smirk away - and maybe kiss him after.

His protectiveness strangles her, but it sends a tremor through her too, warmth blooming low in her belly. He’s a chain.

And I fucking crave it.

He catches her wrist, fingers lacing through hers - firm, deliberate.

“We’re doing this together. It’s dangerous.”

“I did a hell of a lot of dangerous shit without you hovering, asshole.”

The bite in her voice fades as the heat from his grip sinks into her skin. Her pulse betrays her.

“Yeah,” he murmurs, eyes locking on hers, “but that was before you had me back.”

Smug bastard - he knows she can’t resist him.

At the entrance, she shoves her hand out for the lock-pick kit. The metal tools clink softly. She works fast - the sharp click of the tumblers loud in the quiet hall - and tries not to notice the flicker of pride in his eyes. It thrills her. Sickens her. Makes her ache.

I’m not just his partner. Damn it.

The hallway stinks of mildew and stale smoke. She’s half a step ahead when movement bursts from the side - a blur, then impact.

The man slams her into the wall, pain exploding through her ribs, breath torn from her lungs. She hits the floor hard, grit biting her palms. Footsteps thunder down the stairwell, fading fast.

Dexter’s on her in seconds - kneeling, hands on her face, her shoulders, scanning her for damage instead of chasing him.

“I’m okay.” she gasps, wincing as fire shoots through her side. So much for doing this alone.

“You’re not,” he says, voice raw with fear. His eyes - dark, wild - terrify her with their tenderness.

“Jesus, Dex,” she mutters, “let go.”

He doesn’t. Of course he doesn’t. He scoops her up like she weighs nothing. His arms are unshakable, his jaw set. She hates how safe it feels. Hates it - and needs it.

Look at me. Down in seconds. Needing him again.

Back at the apartment, the air feels thick, metallic with adrenaline. Dexter sits her gently on the couch, grabbing the first-aid kit.

The leather of her coat creaks as he helps her out of it. When he lifts her shirt, the bruise stares back: purple, swollen, angry, blood smeared where her skin scraped the wall. His hands, warm but trembling, clean the wound with antiseptic. The sting burns, but the heat of his touch burns hotter. His focus, the tension in his shoulders, the way his breath hitches - each detail ignites her despite herself.

He’s treating me like I’m fragile. I fucking hate it - but I want him.

She leans in and kisses him hard, cutting through his care with hunger. Her lips crash into his, desperate. His hands freeze mid-motion. Her fingers tangle in his hair, pulling him closer. When she pushes him toward the floor, he resists.

“Deb - you’re hurt.”

“Shut the fuck up,” she breathes, peeling off her jeans despite the pain. He helps, slow, careful, but the moment she’s free, she straddles him, undoing his pants and freeing him before pressing down until he fills her - slick, solid, familiar. The pain mixes with pleasure, a sharp edge of control.

“Fuck, Deb,” he hisses, hands steadying her waist. “Be careful.”

She pins his wrists above his head, grinding down, every movement a rebellion.

“You can’t keep fucking doing this,” she whispers, breath hitching between words.

“Neither can you.” His voice breaks against her ear. He thrusts to match her, letting her think she’s in control.

She grinds harder, chasing release, and comes screaming his name, the sound raw, echoing in the small apartment. His groan follows, deep and guttural, his release pulsing inside her.

When it’s over, she collapses against his chest, sweat cooling on their skin. Her bruise throbs in time with her pulse.

“Your love’s a cage, Dex,” she whispers, voice hoarse. “And I’m trapped in it.”

He wraps his arms around her, pulling her closer, his breath hot against her hair. 

He’s my everything, but his protectiveness suffocates me. I fuck him to feel in control, but I’m lost in him. Doubt crashes over her like a wave, their intimacy vital yet venomous, a noose tightening around her heart.

The next day, sunlight slants through the blinds, sharp as guilt.

Dexter has her pinned against the fridge, tongue in her mouth, when the sound freezes them both.

A throat clears.

They pull apart - her shirt half-buttoned, his hand still on her hip. Harrison stands in the doorway, jaw clenched, eyes wide.

“What the hell is this?” he snaps, voice cracking. “You two aren’t normal family - you’re always like this!”

“Harrison,” Deb starts, voice trembling, “it’s complicated - ”

“Complicated?” His laugh is jagged. “You’re kissing like it’s not weird!”

“Harrison,” Dexter says evenly, but the boy cuts him off, red-faced, shaking.

“We need help,” he blurts. “All of us. Therapy or something - before this breaks us.”

Deb’s stomach twists. She thinks of her last therapist, of Dr. Michelle Ross peeling open her love for Dexter, raw and forbidden. So much has changed - and yet, not at all.

Dexter exhales, calm but distant. “If that’s what you need, we’ll try.”

Deb forces a small, brittle smile. “Okay, Harrison. We’ll go.”

When the door shuts, silence floods the apartment. Deb rubs her temples, her pulse still racing. Dexter steps forward, but she backs away, needing air.

Harrison’s pulling away. And it’s our fault.

They’re tangled too tight - kissing, touching, stuck to each other until there’s no space left.

But Harrison needs them both.

And Deb doesn’t know how to be his aunt and Dexter’s anchor at the same time.

The city hums outside, its pulse steady while theirs falter. She presses a hand to her chest and thinks how thin the line really is between love and dependency, between needing someone - and being consumed by them.

Chapter Text

There are names for what binds us:

strong forces, weak forces.

Look around, you can see them:

the skin that forms in a half-empty cup,

nails rusting into the places they join,

joints dovetailed on their own weight. – For What Binds Us by Jane Hirschfield

Dr. Ellis’s Manhattan office feels clinical yet deceptively cozy; a calm that puts Dexter on edge. The worn leather couch creaks beneath him and Deb as they settle in, knees brushing, her hand tight in his. Next to them, Harrison slumps in an armchair, sneakers tapping a restless rhythm on the faded carpet, jaw tight. A box of tissues sits beside mugs that read Trust the Process and One Cup Away from a Breakthrough, their cheer mocking the tension in the room. Through a cracked window, gray light filters in with the city’s noise - horns, chatter, a distant siren. Lavender air freshener clings to the damp, exhaust-tinged breeze.

They’d rushed in late, the chaos of Manhattan traffic - and their own hesitancy about therapy - keeping them tangled in bed until the last minute. The chill from outside still clings to their coats. Deb’s hand is warm in his, pulse quick beneath his fingers, a lifeline he can’t release. Her knee digs into his leg, her nerves vibrating through him. Harrison’s idea, this therapy - after catching them kissing again. He thinks about Deb’s bruise, her reckless push to go solo shortly before Harrison had seen them kissing.

Dexter’s chest tightens, memories flashing: Kurt Caldwell’s blood in Iron Lake, Harrison’s trembling hand firing the shot that nearly killed him, Prater’s gun pressed to his son’s head. He thinks of Angel dead just six months ago, how he’d been circling Dexter before that, trying to convince other New York cops he’s the Bay Harbor Butcher. So much in his head, and so much he can’t say in this office.

Across from them, Dr. Ellis sits poised - a blonde in her fifties, tortoiseshell glasses, hair pulled tight, posture sharp. Her degrees line the wall like quiet credentials. “Just on time,” she says, voice smooth. “You must be Dexter and Debra.” Her handshake is warm but clinical. 

The therapist’s face in Iron Lake flashes, brief yet unsuccessful. He knows Deb’s haunted too, her own sessions with Dr. Ross peeling back her love for him, raw and forbidden.

“Harrison and I were just getting to know each other.” Dr. Ellis says, glancing at the boy. His tapping grows louder.

The questions begin gently but slice deep.

“Tell me about your family dynamic.” she says.

Dexter’s tone is even, practiced. “We’re close. Always have been.”

Deb’s comes sharp, defensive. “We’ve been through some shit, okay?” Her knee bounces faster.

Harrison breaks first, his voice erupting like a dam bursting, open and shaking. “They’re always touching - touching ! Like this!” He gestures wildly at their clasped hands, Dexter’s fingers still laced with Deb’s, unyielding. “It’s not normal brother and sister stuff!” His face flushes, eyes flashing with frustration, hurt, and something deeper - fear.

Dexter flinches. “She’s my anchor after everything we’ve been through,” he says, voice calm but strained. He doesn’t release her hand. Deb stiffens beside him, her knee pressing harder into his leg - a plea, or protest, he can’t tell.

“Harrison-” Deb tries, her voice soft but unsteady, her hand growing clammy in his.

“No!” Harrison cuts her off, leaning forward, his sneakers scuffing louder. “You’re always touching. Hands, hugs, kisses. It’s fucking weird!” His voice cracks, echoing in the small room.

Dexter feels it like a wound reopening - his son’s trauma, all the things a boy shouldn’t have seen, Rita, bleeding out in the tub.  And beneath that, his own: his mother’s blood. Two sons born in blood.

“We’ve been through hell, Harrison,” Dexter says, his tone low, controlled, but his chest aches. “It binds us.”

“It’s how we fucking survive, kid,” Deb adds, her voice tight, shifting under Dr. Ellis’s stare, her glasses glinting like a predator’s eyes.

The therapist’s pen scratches, the sound grating against the city’s loudness outside.

Dr. Ellis leans forward, her gaze piercing, as if she can peel back their lies. “Why do you two feel you can’t be apart?” she asks, voice calm but relentless. “Your closeness - it’s intense, almost codependent. Do you do separate activities? Hobbies, time alone? That’s healthy in any relationship.” She pauses, her eyes flicking to their hands, still clasped. “It’s great to have a close relationship, but every relationship needs boundaries.”

Dexter’s jaw clenches, his grip tightening on Deb’s hand, her pulse racing under his fingers. “We’re stronger together,” he says, voice firm, almost defiant. Separate? After eleven years without her? After she could’ve died working for Prater? The thought of her scouting alone, bruised and bleeding, flashes - her push for independence, his failure to protect her. I can’t let her out of my sight.

“He’s all I’ve fucking got.” Deb says, her knee bouncing faster now, a sign of discomfort. Her voice is raw, vulnerable, and Dexter wants to pull her into him, kiss her, shield her from this probing. But he can’t - not here, not with Harrison’s eyes burning into them.

“Mmm,” Dr. Ellis hums, jotting another note, her pen’s scratch like a warning. “But is it healthy for Harrison?” Her gaze shifts to the boy, who glares, his fists clenched, knuckles white.

Harrison’s voice rises, trembling with anger and fear. “Dad’s anger scares me - how do I trust you?” The words hit hard, coded but heavy with truth. He doesn’t say “kill,” but his eyes betray the memories, wide and haunted.

Dexter freezes, his heart pounding, Deb’s nails digging into his palm, a sharp sting grounding him. “I’m trying, Harrison,” he says, voice low, almost pleading. “I’m trying to be better.”

“It’s not enough!” Harrison snaps, his voice breaking. “You scare me, Dad. Both of you - you’re like one person, and I’m just… left out.” He slumps back, glaring, as Dr. Ellis leans forward, her pen poised.

“Can you tell me more about this ‘anger,’ Harrison?” she asks, her tone gentle but probing. “What makes it scary?”

Harrison shuts down, his jaw tight, eyes dropping to the carpet. “Forget it.” he mutters, but the silence is deafening, heavy with unspoken truths.

Dexter’s chest aches, guilt and fear knotting together. The lavender scent turns cloying,  and he feels the monster stir, quiet but waiting.

Back in Dexter’s apartment, Dexter and Deb collapse onto the creaky bed, the weight of the therapy session pressing down like a stone. Deb mumbles about needing a nap, voice thick with exhaustion. Dexter joins her - not because he’ll sleep, but because he can’t stand the space between them. He needs her close to keep the world from cracking open.

They’re still dressed, jeans and T-shirts rumpled, shoes kicked off haphazardly on the floor. A light blanket covers them, its worn fabric soft against their skin. The room carries their life in small, familiar clutter: her jacket slung over a chair, a coffee mug on the dresser, the faint scent of her shampoo lingering in the air. Through the cracked window, New York’s noise seeps in - chaos bleeding against the fragile quiet of their bed.

He pulls her close. Her head finds his chest, breath warm and uneven against his skin. His fingers drift through her hair, tangling in the soft strands. Beneath his palm, her heartbeat steadies him. She’s the only thing that feels real, he thinks - but the thought cuts deep.

The other night’s failure replays in fragments: the child abuser’s escape, the bruise spreading purple on her ribs - his inability to keep her safe. He should go alone next time. But he sees her face, defiant: I can do this alone, Dex. She never will, and he couldn’t bear it if she did.

Harrison’s voice echoes next, raw and trembling from therapy: They’re always touching - not normal. The boy’s fear slices deeply.

Dexter closes his eyes. I love her too much. Her absence would feel like losing a limb - like forgetting how to breathe. He wonders what Harry would think of the mess his children have become: so entangled they can’t exist apart. Was it ever normal?

He remembers her as a kid, chasing him through the backyard, her hand always finding his. She’d needed him, and he’d needed her light to balance his dark. The boundaries blurred long before either of them noticed - shared beds during storms, whispered confessions in the dark, touches that lingered too long. Then the church - the kill - the look on her face when she found him. The way she chose him anyway. She killed for him. Faked her death for him. Came back for him.

And now, after eleven years apart, they’ve crossed every line: kissing openly, fucking without shame, their love a prison neither can break. Therapy calls it unhealthy; Harrison calls it terrifying. They call it survival.

He feels the darkness under his skin, patient and hungry. She’s the only thing keeping me from crossing the line. Her warmth, her breath, her heartbeat - all that holds the monster quiet. But for how long? Be better. Her words echo like prayer.

“Harrison’s right,” Deb murmurs suddenly, voice low, startling him - he thought she was asleep. “We’re too much, Dex.”

He tightens his hold, lips brushing her temple. “You’re my gravity, Deb.” he whispers, voice vulnerable. No secrets left, no lines uncrossed.

She lets out a sharp laugh that trembles at the edges. “That’s the fucking problem, asshole.” Her fingers trace the scar over his chest through his shirt, the one Harrison gave him. “You make me feel safe and scared at the same time.”

He catches her hand, presses it flat to his heart. “We’ll figure it out,” he murmurs. “I can’t lose you again.”

She shifts, looking up at him - eyes wet, fierce. “You’re not losing me, Dex. But this - always together - it’s drowning Harrison. Maybe it’s drowning me too.”

His heart clenches. “You want space?” he asks, barely a whisper. The idea feels like oxygen deprivation.

“Not space.” Her hand tightens on his shirt. “Just balance. I’m trying to be Debra Morgan again, not just… yours.” She exhales. “But I love you, you idiot.”

He kisses her forehead - slow, gentle. “I love you too,” he says, voice trembling. “We’ll be better.”

She smirks faintly. “Don’t make promises you can’t keep, Dex.”

“I’m trying.” he says, and the truth in it nearly breaks him.

They lie tangled beneath the thin blanket, her breath syncing with his, the city beyond the glass – noisy against their quiet. His hand moves through her hair, slow and rhythmic. Their closeness comforts him, cages him, defines him.

She’s my tether to the light, he thinks. But we’re losing him. And if she ever lets go, the dark will win.

Chapter Text

“That moment she was mine, mine, fair.” – Porphyria’s Lover by Robert Browning.

Sunlight streams through the blinds of Dexter’s apartment, casting slatted shadows across the tangled sheets where Deb lies, entwined in Dexter’s arms. His legs weave through hers, his arms wrapped tightly around her, holding her close even in sleep, as if she might vanish. She’s awake before him, a rare moment, and watches the soft rise and fall of his chest, his face smoothed by sleep, almost innocent. Human. So different from the monster that haunts her thoughts. Her heart aches, love and fear colliding like a storm. 

Her chest tightens. He’s my everything, she thinks. But what the hell is that making me?

“Dex.” she whispers, voice barely a breath, not wanting to break the fragile quiet.

“Mmm,” he murmurs, pulling her closer, his grip possessive even in half-sleep, his breath warm against her neck.

“Dexter.” she tries again, sharper now, squirming in his hold. “Wake up. I’ve gotta fucking pee.”

He groans, loosening his hold. She slips free, grabbing one of his T-shirts off the floor - soft, stretched thin, smelling faintly of him - and pads into the bathroom.

When she returns, he’s standing by the window in just a pair of jeans, buttoning them up. Morning light catches the faint sheen of muscle across his back, the pale scar from Harrison’s bullet tracing a crooked line near his ribs. She pauses, watching him. That scar means alive.

He turns and catches her staring. A slow, smug grin curls at his lips. “Like what you see?”

“Fuck off.” she says, but her laugh ruins it.

He steps closer, tugging on a clean shirt, the fabric stretching across his shoulders. The room feels smaller when he’s near, the air thick with unspoken desire.

“Maybe I should get rid of my apartment.” she says, rummaging through the closet. Her clothes are crammed between his - an accidental confession of permanence.

“I’ve been telling you that for months.” he says. There’s something possessive under the softness of his tone, something that makes her pulse quicken even as her stomach knots.

She shoots him a glare, but her eyes betray her, tracing the shape of him through the shirt. We’re too fucking close. The thought burns, a warning and a craving all at once.

He moves behind her, hands finding her waist as she zips her jeans. His fingers press into her hips, grounding, claiming. His lips brush the side of her head in a kiss that’s barely a breath, and for a second, the whole world narrows to the sound of their heartbeats.

“Dex.” she murmurs, a protest that sounds too much like a plea.

He steps back, the spell breaking, and crouches to pull a folder from the corner of the closet - the hidden stash of Prater’s old files. “Come here.” His voice is low, serious now.

The bed creaks as they sit side by side. Their thighs touch, heat bleeding between them.

“The one from last time?” she asks, still rubbing her ribs where the bruise from that night lingers; fading, but not forgotten.

He shakes his head. “I don’t want you going back there. Not after what happened.” His voice is steady, but the way his jaw tightens gives him away.

“I’m not fucking fragile, Dex.” she snaps, pushing at his shoulder. “It was one hit. I’m fine.”

“Still,” he says quietly, “I’d rather wait. Handle it myself.”

Her glare sharpens. “Handle it yourself? You mean control it yourself.”

He doesn’t argue. Just looks at her, eyes dark, calculating, something dangerous flickering behind restraint.

“Fuck you.” she mutters, shoving him harder. He lets her.

He grabs her wrist before she can stand, grip gentle but unyielding. “We’ll talk about it later,” he says, slipping the folder into her lap instead. “Here. Look at this.”

She sighs, opening it with a snap of frustration. “Joseph Smith?” she snorts, flipping it open. “What a boring-ass name.”

Dexter leans in, the side of his arm brushing hers. “He preys on undocumented immigrants,” he says, tone clinical but low. “Promises them shelter. Work. Then they disappear.”

Deb flips to the photos - an abandoned building, rotting walls, graffiti scarred. The kind of place where no one would look twice. “Jesus Christ.” she whispers.

“Prater’s file had enough,” he says. “We can move now. No extra proof needed.”

She glances at him, studying the sharpness in his expression - the quiet thrill under the surface. “Remember what we said. No trophies. No creative dismemberment. We tip off the cops. No goddamn pleasure in it.”

He leans back, exhaling, his gaze shifting to the ceiling like it might hold the answers. “I hear you.” His voice cracks slightly. “It’s just…”

“Just what?” she presses, voice edged.

He turns his head toward her, eyes searching. “There’s a higher chance of getting caught this way. And if anything happened to you…” He trails off, swallows hard. “I couldn’t live with it.”

Her breath catches. He says it like a confession, like a promise. It makes her want to scream and kiss him in the same breath. “Don’t make this about me,” she says, forcing steel into her voice. “This is about keeping you human, Dex. About doing something that means something.”

He nods, eyes softening, guilt and want tangled behind his calm mask. “I’m trying,” he whispers. “I swear I’m trying to be better.”

He leans in, presses his forehead to hers. Their breaths tangle, uneven, too close.

She wants to believe him. She does. But belief feels like walking a tightrope over fire.

“Be better,” she murmurs, voice breaking around the words. Then, because she can’t stand the weight of it - “Also, your breath fucking smells like death.”

He lets out a low laugh, kisses her anyway - soft, but certain. “Guess I’ll go brush my teeth.”

“Yeah, you fucking do that.”

But she doesn’t move. They sit there, foreheads still touching, the folder forgotten, the morning sunlight shifting across their skin. Her bruise throbs, and for a fleeting second, it almost feels like peace - until it doesn’t.

. 

That night, Deb sits beside Dexter as he drives toward Joseph Smith’s hideout, the New York streets a blur of neon and noise beyond the cracked car windows. The city feels alive in a way that gnaws at her nerves - sirens loud, horns blaring, exhaust fumes seeping through the vents.

Her real name - Debra Morgan - feels like a raw nerve: exposed, fragile. No longer Charley obeying Prater’s orders, no mask between her and the world. I’m doing this because I love him - my brother, my lover - and it chokes me. Her heart twists. Love and guilt knot tight around her ribs. How fucked up am I?

Traffic crawls. Cabs honk. Pedestrians dart into the street like they’re immune to death. A driver leans out his window, screaming curses into the cold air. Deb stares out at the chaos, missing Miami’s slower burn - its lazy heat, its salt-slick air. New York is all sharp edges and concrete noise.

Beside her, Dexter grips the wheel, jaw tight, the muscle ticking as the car halts again. He looks carved from shadow in his dark shirt and pants - controlled, but brimming with tension.

“He should be there.” he murmurs, eyes fixed ahead. His voice is steady, but she knows better. He’s been out already - said he was doing Urcar runs, but she knows that tone. He’s scouted the place alone. Always fucking one step ahead. Always protecting her, caging her.

“You went there without me, didn’t you?” she says, her hand finding his thigh, fingers pressing into the muscle beneath the fabric.

His jaw tightens. A pause. “Yes.” he admits finally, eyes flicking toward her before returning to the road.

“Dex.” Her voice is sharp enough to cut. Her hand tightens, nails biting slightly through the fabric.

“I wanted to be prepared,” he says, low and calm. “I don’t want you hurt, Deb. And yeah, I gave some rides. We need the money.” His tone softens. “I’m following the rules. You’re here now. That’s what matters.”

“Sometimes I wanna fucking smack you,” she says, her hand sliding higher on his thigh, fingers brushing the growing bulge there. He glances down, then up again, a flicker of heat darkening his gaze. “And sometimes,” she adds, voice low, “I just wanna fuck you.”

His breath catches - sharp, audible. The sound sends heat rushing through her, low and hot. His protectiveness strangles her, and she still wants him more for it. What’s wrong with me?

Traffic shifts, a break in the jam. Without a word, Dexter swerves into a side alley, the tires crunching over gravel. The shadows swallow them.

“Back seat.” he says, voice rough, stripped bare of pretense.

Her pulse spikes. She climbs over the console, his hand steadying her, and he follows. The air in the car turns thick, humid with need. She tugs down her jeans, denim scraping her skin, and unbuttons his. He’s already hard, already waiting. There’s no prelude, no hesitation - she pulls her panties aside and sinks down onto him with a soft, strangled sound.

He grips her hips, guiding her movements, head tipping back with a low groan. “Fuck, Deb,” he hisses. “You always feel so good.”

She braces her hands on his chest, watching his face, his eyes gone dark with hunger. He pulls her down for a kiss, deep and consuming, his tongue sliding against hers, the car rocking beneath them as he thrusts from beneath. Outside, a siren wails. Somewhere, a bottle shatters. The city doesn’t care who they are or what they’re doing.

“Fuck,” he groans into her mouth, breathless. “This is the kind of luck I need before every hunt.”

She lets out a shaky laugh. “Horny bastard.” Her voice breaks on a moan as she moves faster, the bruise on her ribs flaring with pain that sharpens the pleasure.

“Only with you.” he murmurs, kissing her jaw, his words half-groan, half-confession.

“This is where you get your pleasure,” she whispers, her tone fierce even as she trembles. “Me. Not the kill. Not like Prater.”

He answers with a growl, one hand sliding between them, his fingers finding her clit. Of course he knows exactly how to touch her. The pressure builds fast, unbearable, pleasure crashing over her in waves. “Fuck, Dex!” she gasps, clutching his shoulders as she comes, body shaking, her bruise throbbing in sync with her pulse.

His hands return to her hips, guiding her, fucking her harder from beneath, sweat beading on his forehead as he chases his own release. His eyes roll back, a guttural groan spilling out as he stills, pulsing deep inside her, their breaths mingling in the cramped space.

For a moment, they stay like that, her heart pounding, his chest heaving beneath her. The car smells of sweat and sex, the alley’s damp air seeping in, cooling their skin.

He pulls her close, kissing her gently, a soft contrast to their frenzy, his lips lingering on hers, brushing sweaty hair from her forehead.

“We should probably go now.” he murmurs, voice hoarse, thumb brushing her cheek.

“Yeah.” she whispers back, but doesn’t move. The world beyond the alley feels miles away. For just this second, she wants to stay right here - no kills, no ghosts, no watchers. Just them, in their small, broken bubble.

When they arrive at Joseph Smith’s hideout - a crumbling, forgotten building tucked in a dead corner of New York - Deb feels the shift in Dexter before they even step out of the car. The change is sharp, chilling. He’s no longer her brother, lover, or Harrison’s father - he’s something colder. A predator.

His eyes narrow, his movements sharpen, every muscle wired with purpose. The building looms ahead, its graffiti-scarred walls glowing faintly under the flicker of a dying streetlight. Boarded windows gape. The air reeks of mold, piss, and something disgusting that sticks to the back of her throat.

Her heart pounds. Her real name - Debra Morgan - feels like an open wound. No more Charley, no more pretending.

Dexter leads, of course - guiding her to a filthy side window, steps silent and sure. He’s been here before. Scouted it. Prepared without her. She feels the irritation flare under her ribs, mixing with the leftover heat from their backseat chaos. He keeps her slightly behind him, body angled like a shield, and she bristles at it but follows, boots crunching over gravel.

Through the jagged glass, they see Joseph Smith moving in the dim room beyond. He’s alone, arranging tools. Two cages line the wall, each holding filthy mattresses and a rusted bucket. Across from them, ropes and knives gleam under a weak bulb. The sight curdles her stomach. Immigrants - people promised food, shelter, a chance - and he caged them instead.

Fucking monster.

She glances at Dexter. His jaw tightens, his breath steadies, and she sees it: the spark, the quiet thrill. He loves this part - the hunt. I hate that it draws him in.

“Stay behind me.” he murmurs, voice low and calm, hand slipping into his pocket where the M99 syringe waits, its weight heavier than the word mercy.

She nods, though every nerve in her body screams rebellion. She’s not fragile. Not Charley. But her bruise still throbs from the last hunt, a dull reminder of her limits - and of his fear.

They slip inside. The door creaks, the air thick with dust and filth. Joseph is bent over his tools, humming softly, oblivious. Dexter moves like a shadow, precise, silent. The syringe flashes once, a quick strike to the neck, and Joseph collapses to the concrete in a heap of dead weight.

Deb exhales. Quick. Clean. No resistance.

They move in practiced rhythm - retrieving plastic from the car, covering the floor. The sound of the plastic crackles under their shoes, sharp and sterile. The room reeks of sweat, iron, and fear. When she glances at Dexter, she catches it again - that flicker of disappointment in his eyes. No struggle. No terror. No release.

Before Joseph wakes up, he slides the knife in steady, controlled, a single, perfect motion. Blood pools on the plastic, dark and muted under the light. No laughter, no glee. Just purpose.

Deb feels her breath catch, relief tangled with unease. This feels better - justice, not carnage - but she still sees it in his eyes, the hunger simmering just below the surface. Waiting.

Her heart tightens. Can he keep this up, or will he break?

“Ready?” Dexter asks quietly, wiping the blade clean. His voice is calm again, but his eyes are heavy with something she can’t quite name.

She swallows. “Yeah. Let’s finish this.”

They share a look - raw, wordless - and Deb knows what comes next. The part she can’t watch. No matter what she’s done, she can’t watch him cut a body into pieces.

She turns and steps out into the night. The cold hits her like a slap, sharp and grounding. The city in the distance - sirens, laughter, the metallic crash of a garbage truck somewhere down the block. Her breath ghosts in the air as she digs a burner from her pocket. Angel’s voice echoes in her mind - Bay Harbor Butcher.

Her hands tremble as she types: Abandoned building, 23rd and 9th. Trafficking operation. Check the cages. The words blur slightly, her pulse still hammering. The evidence is in there - blood stains, restraints, the cages. Enough to make sure someone sees the victims this time.

By the time Dexter joins her, the air smells faintly of bleach. He’s hauling garbage bags toward the trunk, movements controlled, efficient - but his expression is distant, unsatisfied. The car’s taillights glow red against the alley walls as he loads the last bag.

They drive in silence. The purr of the engine fills the space between them, the weight of what’s in the trunk pressing against the quiet.

Deb glances at him. His jaw is locked, eyes fixed ahead, the streetlights sliding over his face in flashes of gold and shadow. He’s trying - she can see it - but it’s not enough. Not for him. Maybe not for either of them.

“Hey,” she says softly, reaching across to rest her hand on his. “You okay?”

He glances at her, his expression softening, but his voice stays low. “Yeah,” he murmurs, giving her fingers a gentle squeeze. “Just… keeping it clean. For you.”

Her throat tightens. “For us.” she says, correcting him quietly.

He nods, eyes on the road again, but she sees it - the tension that never fully leaves him, the shadow that never really sleeps.

Be better, Dex, she thinks. But the thought that follows is colder, heavier: What if he can’t?

Back at the apartment, Deb and Dexter unwind in uneasy silence - the night’s “clean” kill lingering like a stain neither of them can wash off.

They shower together, steam clouding the small bathroom, the air thick with soap and heat. The water hisses down, tracing the bruise on her ribs - a dull, stinging reminder of her own limits. Dexter’s touch is gentle but distant. His hands move with purpose, never lingering, never exploring. The steam wafts around him, blurring his face in the mirror, but his tension bleeds through - jaw tight, eyes distant, unsatisfied.

He’s here, but not here. The monster’s awake behind those calm hazel eyes, pacing under his skin.

Is it the kill? The code? Me? Her pulse catches, fear and love weaving together until she can’t tell the difference. His shadow’s swallowing me.

They towel off in silence, feet cold against the tile. Dexter pulls on sweatpants and a faded T-shirt, movements restless. Deb slips into pajama bottoms and one of his old shirts, the cotton damp against her skin, smelling faintly of him. They skipped dinner, but now he moves to the kitchen anyway, knives flashing under yellow light.

The air fills with the sizzle of garlic and oil. The smell should be comforting, grounding, but instead it’s heavy, clinging to the air like tension. Dexter’s energy beside her is sharp, restless. He’s holding something in, but for how long?

“Dex…” she starts, leaning against the counter, her voice soft but steady - ready to confront him about what she already knows: the kill wasn’t enough.

Then her phone buzzes. A sharp sound in the quiet.

She glances at it, half-ready to ignore the late call - until she sees the name.

Joseph Quinn.

Her heart slams against her ribs. What the fuck...? He shouldn’t know she’s alive.

Her hand trembles as she answers, putting it on speaker without thinking. She needs Dexter to hear.

He freezes mid-motion, the knife hovering over a carrot. The smell of garlic fills the space between them, sweet and bitter.

“Hello?” Deb says, voice barely above a whisper.

“Deb,” comes the voice. Quinn. His tone is low, disbelieving; haunted. “You’re alive.”

Her throat tightens. “Joey… how...?” The question sticks, unfinished.

“I’ve been talking to a New York detective since Angel died,” Quinn says, voice strained. “Claudette Wallace. She sent a photo - you and Dexter. Kissing.” A pause, heavy with accusation. “What the fuck, Deb? You’re both supposed to be dead, but you’re alive, acting… not like siblings. That photo - it’s not how siblings look.”

Shit shit shit. Panic claws at her chest, her breath short, ragged - a fucking panic attack. Her eyes meet Dexter’s, his gaze cold, unreadable, but she knows hers scream fear. Angel’s accusations - Bay Harbor Butcher. What did he tell Claudette? She paces, the floor creaking under her bare feet, her heart pounding so hard it hurts.

“It’s complicated.” she chokes out, voice breaking, her hands shaking as she grips the counter.

“Complicated?” Quinn cuts in, tone rising. “He’s the Bay Harbor Butcher, isn’t he?” His voice is sharp, cutting through the static. “Claudette said Angel was on a mission to nail him. Then Angel dies. You both disappear - dead, we thought. Now you’re alive, kissing, acting like… lovers. Angel was right, wasn’t he? And you knew all along.”

Her vision blurs, tears she hadn’t noticed spilling down her cheeks. She’s pacing harder, the apartment closing in, the garlic’s warmth now suffocating. Dexter steps around the counter, his hand settling on her shoulder, steady, grounding, his warmth a lifeline against her spiraling panic.

“Stay out of this, Quinn,” he says, voice low, controlled - danger wrapped in calm.

There’s a beat of silence. Then a quiet, weary sigh from the phone. “I can’t,” Quinn says finally. “Not after Angel.”

The line clicks dead.

The silence afterward is deafening.

Deb’s trembling before she realizes it, tears spilling fast, her chest hitching. Dexter catches her mid-step, pulling her in, arms tightening around her. His shirt is soft against her cheek; his heartbeat steady, steady, steady. He’s the cause of her panic - and the only thing that calms it. The contradiction splits her open.

“It’s gonna be okay,” he murmurs into her hair. His voice is too calm, too sure. “We’ll handle it.”

“How can you say that?” she chokes out. “He knows, Dex. Quinn fucking knows.”

He doesn’t answer right away, just smooths his hand down her back, grounding her. Then he turns off the stove, guiding her toward the bedroom. The garlic still hangs in the air, a ghost of normal life they’ll never have.

They collapse onto the bed, tangled in each other. The sheets are rough, still smelling faintly of sex and detergent. Dexter’s arm drapes over her waist, heavy and protective. He presses a kiss to her temple, her cheek, her lips - soft, steady, anchoring.

“He fucking knows, Dex.” she whispers again, fingers fisting in his shirt. Her voice cracks on the last word. Fear tastes like blood in her mouth.

“We’ll handle it.” he says again, his lips brushing her hairline. “I won’t let anything happen to you.”

She pulls back just enough to look at him, eyes shining. “What if I don’t want anything to happen to you either?” Her voice is quiet, breaking. I love you too much to lose you.

He cups her face, thumb brushing the tear on her cheek. “You won’t,” he says softly. “We’re in this together.”

Then he kisses her, slow and deep, silencing her trembling for just a heartbeat.

Always.

But even as she melts into him, the words echo hollow in her head.

Because she knows what “handle it” means when Dexter says it.

Detective Claudette Wallace sits at her meticulously ordered desk in the New York precinct, every pen, file, and notepad aligned with precision - a fortress of control against the chaos surrounding her investigation.

Rain patters softly against the window, a steady rhythm she barely registers, drowned beneath the pulse of “Stayin’ Alive”blasting through her headphones. The irony isn’t lost on her, but it helps her think - the tempo syncing with her heartbeat as she studies the grainy surveillance photo in her hand.

Debra Morgan and Dexter Morgan.

Lips locked.

A kiss far too intimate for siblings.

Her fingers trace the photo’s worn edge. Their closeness radiates from the image, bodies tilted together, hands intertwined, oblivious to the world. A shiver crawls up her spine. Whatever this is - it’s not grief. It’s not family.

The precinct buzzes around her in flickering fluorescent light, the air stale with burnt coffee and damp coats. Claudette flips through the files spread before her - Prater’s, collected from his mansion after his “disappearance.” Pages rustle, brittle and yellowed, their contents a collage of cruelty and obsession. She cross-references names, her pen tapping a restless rhythm on the desk.

At the center lies Dexter Morgan’s file.

Evidence she’d pieced together from Angel Batista’s hotel room after his death:

Notes on Miami. Blood slides. Bay Harbor Butcher.

Angel’s scrawl fills the margins - He’s the one.

The words burn through her thoughts, heavy as the rain smearing the city lights beyond the glass.

She flips to another folder - Harrison Morgan.

Ryan Foster’s murder.

Mia LaPierre took the fall, but Claudette remembers the boy’s eyes when she questioned him: darting, hollow, frightened. And again, just weeks ago, when she gave her guest lecture at his campus - he wouldn’t look at her. Wouldn’t even blink her way.

She exhales, slow, the air thick. The photo of the Morgans lies at the center of her desk now, haloed in lamplight. The edges curl slightly from her touch.

Angel was right.

He’d been so sure - convinced that Dexter Morgan was the Bay Harbor Butcher. And now, years later, both Morgans have resurfaced - alive, entangled, faked deaths forgotten, their trail leading straight here to New York.

Not siblings. Not really.

Her pulse quickens. She glances again at Harrison’s file photo, the young man’s haunted eyes staring up from the page. Three of them. A web of blood and secrets spun tight. Ryan Foster’s death. Angel’s. Prater’s disappearance. All threads in the same tangled weave.

The rain thickens, drumming harder against the window, the sound merging with the distant sirens and city noise below. Claudette leans back, her chair creaking, the motion slow, deliberate. The files smell musty, ink fading, pages fragile beneath her fingers - but their meaning is alive, pulsing, undeniable.

She takes a sip of her coffee. It’s gone cold, bitter as truth, grounding her focus. The fluorescent light above her flickers once, briefly plunging the room into shadow before buzzing back to life.

Her pen stills.

She closes the folder with a soft snap - the sound sharp and final in the empty office.

Angel’s accusations were never madness. They were prophecy.

Dexter Morgan. Debra Morgan. Harrison Morgan.

They’re hiding in plain sight.

And Claudette Wallace is closer than they know.

Chapter Text

“No one has imagined us.

We want to live like trees,

sycamores blazing through the sulfuric air,

dappled with scars, still exuberantly alive.” - Twenty-One Love Poems by Adrienne Rich

“We should really talk-”

It’s early afternoon, and Dexter and Deb are in the living room, the city’s restlessness filtering in through the cracked window. The air smells of the damp fall breeze seeping in, carrying the grit of New York.

Deb’s looking gorgeous, as always, standing near the couch in a pair of shorts despite the chill outside, barefoot with chipped toenail polish, and one of his long T-shirts that hangs loose on her frame. She has no bra on, and Dexter can see her nipples poking through the thin fabric, a sight that stirs the heat in his gut, pulling him toward her like gravity. The monster stirs beneath his skin, unsatisfied since the kill the other night, a quiet hunger gnawing at him.

“I don’t want to talk.” he murmurs, his hands sliding to her waist, then lower to her ass, squeezing firmly, the soft give of her flesh under his fingers grounding him, chasing away the lingering dissatisfaction. Her body yields, warm and familiar, and he feels the ache in his chest ease just a fraction.

“Jesus Christ.” she says, voice breathy, her eyes meeting his with that mix of exasperation and desire that always unravels him.

He raises an eyebrow, pressing himself against her, letting her feel his arousal through the thin layers of clothing. The friction sends a spark through him, his pulse quickening. “No, just Dexter.” he responds, his tone teasing, but there’s an edge to it, a need he can’t mask.

She rolls her eyes, but he catches the way her breath hitches. His gaze pins her - unblinking, possessive. She squirms, cheeks flushed, teeth catching her lip. The sight ignites him: love and need twining like wire, hot enough to burn. She’s my gravity. My addiction. My undoing.

And then he starts walking her backward, his hands moving to her hips again, guiding her until the backs of her legs hit the couch. The soft thump of the impact echoes in the quiet room, and he spins her pulls her down onto his lap, her weight settling against him, warm and perfect. The monster quiets. Only her.

“You’re such a fucking smug asshole.” she says, her voice low, breathless, but her hands are already sliding up his chest, fingers curling into his shirt.

“You love it.” he murmurs, leaning forward and catching her bottom lip between his teeth, nipping gently, the taste of her flooding his senses. His hands move to her thighs, pushing her down against him as he grinds up, chasing friction, the heat building fast, urgent.

“We need to fucking talk, Dexter.” she says, her voice muffled against his mouth. “About Quinn - about what he might fucking know - ”

“I don’t care about that right now.” he says, cutting her off with a kiss, deep, tongue sliding into her mouth, claiming her. His hands roam, sliding under her shirt, grasping her breasts, fingers moving over her peaked nipples. She lets out a gasp, arching into his touch, and he grinds against her harder, the friction sending sparks through him. 

They’ll figure it out later - Quinn, the Bay Harbor Butcher case, Angel’s accusations. Right now, she’s the only thing that matters, the only person who can satisfy his needs in all ways - his anchor, his love, his everything. The monster is unsatisfied from the clean kill, but she quiets it, fills the void.

“What the fuck do-” He derails her statement with another kiss, deep, tongue in her mouth, his hands moving to settle at her waist.

“I want to fuck you.” he whispers into her mouth, voice hoarse, and he feels her melt against him, sighing but relenting. Her hands wrap around his neck, pulling him closer, her body pressing into his with that familiar need.

“You’re fucking lucky I love you.” she mutters, fingers tangling in his hair, tugging just enough to make him groan.

He laughs, low and dark, kissing her harder, his hands sliding up and down her back before finding the hem of her shirt. From there, he moves them to her front, slipping under the fabric, grasping her breasts again, his fingers teasing her hardened nipples. She gasps, the sound vibrating against his mouth, and he grinds up harder, driving for pressure, the heat building between them like a fire he can’t control.

He’s halfway to pulling her shirt over her head when the sharp click of a lock cuts through the air.

Fuck.

They scramble. Too late.

They’re both flushed, breathing heavy, Deb halfway in his lap, straightening her shirt as Harrison comes in, his backpack slung over one shoulder.

He looks between them suspiciously, his eyes narrowing, the air thick with the scent of their arousal and the city’s fall breeze seeping through the window.

“Uh, Harrison-” Dexter tries, his voice still rough, addressing his son to cover the awkwardness, his heart pounding in his ears like a drum.

“Jesus.” He drops the bag with a thud. “You’re obsessed with each other. This-” he gestures between them, voice cracking, “-isn’t fucking normal! Were you about to fuck? You know brothers and sisters don’t do that, right?”

Dexter opens his mouth. “We’re not - technically… ” The words falter. He sounds pathetic even to himself.

He sees Deb next to him, red-faced, and she turns to glare at him, her eyes flashing with a mix of embarrassment and anger. But what was he supposed to say? Harrison knows what they’re doing. He can’t deny it.

Harrison’s face twists. “You were raised together. You are family. You’re so wrapped up in each other I don’t even exist.” His voice breaks, the anger giving way to something rawer - betrayal.

“Harrison,” Deb says softly, tears stinging her eyes. “I know it’s fucked up, okay? We both know. But we love you, too. You matter. What Dexter and I have-”

“Yeah?” He cuts her off. “Well, maybe you should think about that the next time you’re about to fuck my father - excuse me - your brother -” Harrison spits, his voice laced with disgust and hurt, “ - on the fucking couch.”

The words hit like a slap.

Dexter’s heart pounds, drowning out the city’s noise. He wants to say something, anything - but there’s nothing left to defend. They stopped hiding long ago. It’s killing Harrison, but going back isn’t possible.

He watches his son’s face harden before he storms out, the door slamming behind him with the finality of a verdict.

Silence floods the apartment.

Deb sits frozen, shirt half-twisted, chest heaving. Dexter stares at the closed door, his pulse thudding in his ears.

He’s losing his son. He can’t lose her.

And he doesn’t know if he can keep both.

Dexter watches Deb pace the living room, her bare feet whispering over the worn carpet in restless loops. The afternoon light filters through the cracked window, catching on her chipped toenail polish, her loose T-shirt and shorts swaying with each step. Her face is flushed, eyes bright with unshed tears, and the sight of her unraveling twists something deep in his chest - guilt, love, fear, all tangled like the sheets they woke in.

Harrison’s breaking, and it’s our fault.

“Deb. Sit.” he says, voice low, steady, but she ignores him, her pacing relentless.

“Thank fucking God we have therapy later, huh?” she says, half to him, half to herself, her voice sharp with anxiety, the words cutting through the apartment’s quiet.

“Debra.” His heart pounds, panic rising with the sound of her name.

She stops and turns, eyes wet, wide. “We - fuck, Dexter. We’re pushing Harrison away.” Her voice cracks, a sob trembling in her throat. “Should we…” She falters, tears spilling. He already knows what she’s about to say - the thought that could destroy him.

He’s up before he can think, hands gripping her arms, voice raw. “Don’t even say it.”

Stop this. Go back to pretending they’re only siblings. The thought is a blade twisting in his gut. I can’t lose her.

She nods faintly, tears streaking her cheeks. He brushes them away with his thumb; her skin is warm and soft, grounding him. “We’ll figure it out.” he says, gentler now but urgent. “Harrison doesn’t understand, but he still wants us in his life. We’ll find a way - but I can’t lose you, Deb.”

“I wasn’t saying you should.” she whispers, eyes searching his - love and fear warring in them.

“Yeah,” he says, leaning forward, pressing a kiss to her lips - deep, hungry, but quick, a desperate claim. Their foreheads meet, breaths mingling, her warmth flooding him. “But you were about to suggest I give this up. And I can’t.” He pulls his head back, and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear, fingers lingering. “I need you. There’s no going back. Not after everything.”

Her shoulders soften. “Me neither,” she admits, barely audible. “I’ve wanted you for so damn long.” She shakes her head, tears glinting in the light “But we need more space.  Not distance – space. We’re always on top of each other, and Harrison feels it. Maybe we stop putting on a show every time he’s around. Shut a door, at least.”

He sighs, a short nod, the concession cutting deeper than he wants to admit. “You’re right,” he says, voice low, the words heavy. He pauses, a faint smirk tugging at his lips despite the ache. “Though sometimes I wish he’d knock instead of using his key.”

“Not helping,” she says, shaking her head, shooting him a glare that softens into a reluctant smile. She heads to the bedroom, and he follows, watching as she peels off her shorts and T-shirt, revealing the bruise from the failed hunt, fading now but still there. She dresses quickly - jeans, bra, sweater - movements sharp and purposeful. “You can fuck me in the shower, on the bed, wherever the hell you want,” she says, half-teasing, “as long as we can shut a damn door. At least for now.”

He catches her arm, turning her toward him, pulse quickening at the memory of what they’d started before Harrison interrupted. “You know, now that you mention it…” He leans close, his breath brushing her lips.

She places her hands on his chest, pushing him away gently, her touch firm but not unkind. “Not right now.” she says, her voice soft but resolute, eyes meeting his with a flicker of regret.

It stings. She’s never turned him down. He steps back, runs a hand through his hair, forcing his voice level. “Okay.”

“Dexter,” she says, catching his arm. “Don’t look at me like I just kicked your fucking puppy.”

“You just… never say no.” he admits, careful, though the hurt lingers.

Her eyes soften. “And I still fucking want you,” she says fiercely. “But Harrison just walked out after catching us on the couch. Maybe we both need to breathe.”

She pulls on her boots, then her coat. “I’m going for a walk. I’ll meet you at therapy.”

He wants to stop her - Don’t leave, not even for an hour - but he doesn’t. Her words echo: We need space. She’s right; he knows it. But as the door closes, the quiet expands until it hurts. The room smells like her and city air, and without her, it all feels wrong.

He tells himself it’s better - for her, for Harrison, for them - but the lie feels hollow.

Dexter sits stiffly on the couch, the leather cool against his palms. Harrison and Deb haven’t arrived yet. His eyes flick to the clock, then to the window, where muted daylight filters through the glass. The city murmurs faintly beyond it. The air smells of lavender and something faintly metallic - clean, but not clean enough.

Dr. Ellis sits across from him, jotting notes, or pretending to. The silence stretches, elastic, almost taunting. Why did he have to be the first one here?

He clears his throat. “Therapists’ offices always smell like lavender and shame,” he says finally, tone mild, conversational. “No offense.”

Dr. Ellis blinks, caught between a smile and a frown. “None taken.”

Dexter nods, eyes darting back to the clock. Maybe honesty isn’t the best icebreaker after all.

Thankfully, the door opens. Harrison arrives first, shoulders hunched under his jacket, his expression already sour. Deb follows close behind, cheeks flushed from the cold. Harrison sinks into the armchair again, curling in on himself, one foot tapping an uneven rhythm on the carpet. Deb takes the seat beside Dexter, close enough that their legs brush.

Despite her talk of needing more space, she inches toward him, picking up on Harrison’s restless energy. When her thigh presses against his, he lays a hand on her knee - steadying her, grounding himself.

Dr. Ellis notices. He feels her eyes flick to the gesture, then back to her pad. He pulls his hand away. Freud’s dream - or nightmare, he thinks.

“So,” Dr. Ellis says after a beat, adjusting her glasses. “Who wants to start today?”

“I caught them about to fuck on the couch.” Harrison blurts. His voice shakes - anger and hurt threaded tight.

“Jesus, Harrison.” Deb mutters, dragging a hand through her hair, cheeks coloring pink.

Dexter stays still, expression blank. There’s nothing to defend - it’s true.

Dr. Ellis pauses, pen hovering midair. “Can I ask,” she says carefully, “aren’t you two siblings?”

“Adopted.” Dexter supplies flatly. The last thing he needs is to be accused of incest on top of everything else. Not Bay Harbor Butcher - sister fucker. The irony almost makes him laugh. Almost.

Dr. Ellis’s eyes sharpen behind her glasses. “Adopted or not, that’s still… complicated.”

Deb exhales, sharp. “Yeah, no shit.” She crosses her arms, shifting away from Dexter, though her thigh remains pressed against his. “You don’t need to tell us it’s fucked up. We already know.”

Harrison lets out a bitter laugh. “You sure about that? Because every time I walk in, you’re on top of each other like the world’s ending.” His voice softens at the edges, fraying. “Maybe it already is. Maybe it’s just you two who can’t see it.”

Dexter feels the words hit like a clean incision - small, but deep. Maybe it is ending. He wants to reach for Deb again, to quiet the static in his chest, but Dr. Ellis’s eyes catch the movement, and he stops himself. Control. Normalcy. Pretend.

“Harrison,” Dr. Ellis says gently, “last session you mentioned being afraid of your father’s anger. Can you tell me more about that?”

The boy’s jaw tightens. “He doesn’t yell or hit. It’s just… the way he looks sometimes. Like he’s not here. Like something else is.”

The words cut clean through Dexter, leaving no blood but plenty of ache. He can almost hear Harry’s voice whispering: You can’t hide what you are forever.

Deb’s voice rises, quick and defensive. “He’s been through hell. We all have.”

Dr. Ellis nods, writing something down. “It sounds like you’ve survived a lot together. That kind of trauma can bond people - sometimes too tightly. What helps us survive can also keep us trapped.”

Deb bristles. “So, we’re a fucking case study now?”

“No,” Dr. Ellis says softly. “Just human.”

Harrison scoffs, but his voice wavers. “Yeah, well, whatever it is - it’s killing me. Every time I go to my Dad’s, it’s like there’s no air left. You two suck up all the oxygen.”

The silence after that is sharp, painful.

Deb swallows, trying for humor but failing. “Guess we’re real fun to analyze, huh, Doc?”

Dexter doesn’t speak. The city noise outside feels louder now - the drone of engines, the bark of a horn, life moving on without them. Beneath his skin, the monster stirs, restless but contained.

Dr. Ellis turns to him. “Dexter? What are you feeling right now?”

He thinks for a moment. “Contained,” he says finally. “Barely.”

Deb glances at him, startled by the honesty in his tone. Harrison looks away. The room holds its breath.

Dr. Ellis leans forward. “When that containment slips… what happens?”

He meets her gaze, almost too calm. “I don’t let it.”

Her pen stills. “And if you did?”

He hesitates - a flicker of something raw. “People get hurt.”

The words drop like stones into water, rippling outward. Deb’s breath catches. Harrison’s leg starts to bounce again.

Dr. Ellis breaks the silence gently. “Debra, you’ve said before that Dexter’s all you have. That sounds like love, but it also sounds like fear. What are you afraid of losing if you step back?”

Deb looks at the floor. “You ever lose someone so completely it felt like your fucking lungs stopped working?” Her voice wavers, but she doesn’t stop. “He was gone for eleven years. I thought he was dead. Then I got him back, and now every time I’m not near him, I’m waiting for it to happen again. Waiting to lose him.”

Harrison’s voice cuts in, trembling. “And what about me? You ever think you lost me in the process?”

The room goes silent.

Deb blinks fast, tears gathering. “Jesus, Harrison, no-”

He shakes his head, bitter. “It’s not funny, Aunt Deb.” The title catches in his throat, strange and small.

Dr. Ellis lifts a hand gently. “Let’s take a breath.” she says, but Harrison keeps going.

“You talk like you’re the only two people who matter. You don’t even look at me unless I’m yelling or walking in on you. You want to be a family? Then fucking act like it.”

Dexter’s hands tighten on his knees. He’s right. But how do I stop needing her?

Dr. Ellis lets the silence hang, then turns to Harrison. “What would it look like if they tried to make space for you?”

Harrison stares at the floor. “Maybe just… stop acting like it’s the end of the world if you’re not touching for five minutes.”

Deb’s voice is small. “I can do that.”

Dexter nods. “We can.”

Dr. Ellis studies them both. “You depend on each other for stability,” she says softly. “But that kind of closeness can blur into something else. The most loving thing you can do is give each other enough room to stand alone.”

Deb lets out a shaky breath, trying for sarcasm. “Space. Sure. Sounds easy.”

Dexter glances at her, the ghost of a smile tugging at his mouth. “I don’t think either of us does ‘easy.’”

“Then start small,” Dr. Ellis says. “An afternoon apart. No calls, no texts. Just… breathing room.”

Harrison slumps in his chair. “I’d settle for that.”

Deb looks down. “Yeah. Me too.”

Dexter nods, though his chest feels tight. “We’ll try.” he says, and even he doesn’t believe it.

Dr. Ellis scribbles something on her pad and closes it softly. “Good. Trying is enough for today.”

The room quiets. Outside, the city thrums. Inside, the air is too still, like they’re all waiting for someone to breathe first.

Deb finally mutters, “Guess we’ll see who breaks first.”

Dexter’s voice is low. “If I make it to dinner, it’ll be a miracle.”

Dr. Ellis doesn’t smile. “Sometimes miracles start small.”

Harrison grabs his jacket. “Yeah,” he says, voice flat, “and sometimes they don’t come at all.”

He’s gone before either of them can answer.

Deb leans back, rubbing her temples. “Well,” she sighs, voice cracking, “that went fucking great.”

Dexter watches the door long after it closes. His pulse stays steady, but something inside strains against the stillness. “She wants space,” he murmurs, half to himself. “But every time she pulls back, I just want to follow.”

Dr. Ellis studies him, quiet for a long beat, then says gently, “Then maybe space isn’t the problem. Maybe it’s what you’re afraid you’ll lose inside it.”

Outside, New York carries on - sirens, shouting, the endless churn of life. Inside, everything stills, the quiet settling over them like dust.

Alone in his dorm, Harrison slumps over his desk, elbows braced against a pile of books he hasn’t touched in hours. The cheap lamp bright beside him, casting a sickly yellow light that makes the room feel smaller, like the walls are leaning in. Outside, the city is alive - the thud of bass from a party down the hall, laughter spilling into the corridor, the faint hiss of rain against the window. He feels none of it.

His laptop glows in front of him, cursor blinking in an empty email draft addressed to Detective Claudette Wallace. She’d visited his class recently - sharp eyes, soft voice, the kind of person who notices too much. He tells himself this email is about his “project,” just a few follow-up questions about the New York Ripper case she mentioned. But he knows better.

He’s testing her. Testing himself.

The words on the screen blur as he types: Thank you for your lecture last week. I had some questions about how you determine when a suspect’s anger turns into action… His fingers pause, heavy on the keys. Anger. The word sits there like a bruise.

He remembers his father’s face sometimes - blank, distant, that look that makes the air in a room go still. The same look before Kurt Caldwell’s body took its last breath, blood pooling. Dad’s anger scares me, he’d said earlier in therapy, and it hadn’t felt like enough. Because it’s not just anger, is it? It’s something darker, something that screams behind his father’s eyes like a secret engine.

And then there’s Deb. His aunt. His father’s… whatever she is now. He rubs at his temple, trying to erase the memory of them on the couch, flushed, tangled. He feels sick, angry, protective, confused - all at once.

If they don’t change, maybe I tell her about Dad’s anger. Maybe that’s how this ends.

He hovers over the “send” button, pulse hammering. Claudette’s business card sits beside his laptop, creased from how many times he’s folded and unfolded it. Her number, her title, the neat font - NYPD Detective Division. Someone who might actually listen.

But he doesn’t press send. Instead, he closes the laptop slowly, the click echoing louder than it should. The rain outside thickens against the glass, a steady patter that sounds too much like blood dripping.

He leans back in his chair, staring at the ceiling, guilt twisting deep in his chest. He wants to tell the truth. He wants to stop protecting monsters - but they’re his monsters. His family.

And family is the hardest thing in the world to betray.

“So… an afternoon apart? No texts? No calls?”

It’s late. The apartment is quiet except for sound of running water in the sink. Dexter stands shirtless in sweatpants, brushing his teeth beside Deb, who’s in one of his old tanks and threadbare sweats, her hair loose around her shoulders.

He spits, rinses, and glances at her reflection in the mirror. “That’s what the therapist suggested.”

For a beat, the only sound is the scrape of toothbrushes and the soft rush of the faucet. Then Deb starts laughing - sudden, bright, a little hysterical.

Dexter watches her, face calm at first, then a reluctant smile tugs at his mouth. “What?”

She sets her toothbrush down, still laughing. “It’s just us… We’re fucking pathetic.” She wipes her mouth with the back of her hand. “How did we get this way? Normal people don’t fall in love with their siblings and then-” she gestures vaguely between them, “-never fucking leave each other’s side.”

He turns his head to look at her, heart twisting. Her cheeks are flushed, her hair wild, eyes still shining with laughter - and he loves her so much it physically aches. “I think we always have been,” he says softly. “Attached, I mean. Even before all of this.”

Deb tilts her head, studying him through the mirror. “Didn’t always feel like that. You were always distant, and I was always running after you. Needing you.”

“It was the mask,” he admits. “If I let you see how much I needed you too, you’d know who I was… what I am.”

Her throat works as she swallows, their eyes meeting in the mirror - hazel, dark, both tired and raw. “And now I know.” she says quietly.

He turns to her, reaching up to cup her cheek. “And you’re still here. With me. I don’t have any reason to push you away anymore.”

She presses her lips together, worrying at the edge of them, then slips out of the bathroom. He shuts off the light and follows her to the bedroom, the soft pad of her bare feet like a heartbeat he can’t stop following.

They slide beneath the sheets, the air between them heavy with warmth and unspoken things. Deb curls against him, her arm draped over his chest. His hand finds her forearm, tracing small, soothing circles against her skin.

“We do have one reason for space, though.” she murmurs. “Harrison.”

He exhales. “Yeah.” Then, quieter: “It’s just… hard to let you out of my sight.”

“Dex,” she says, propping her chin on his chest to look at him. “What do you think is gonna happen if we spend more time apart? The only time you ever let me out of your sight is when you’re driving for Urcar.”

He meets her gaze, lips twitching in something that isn’t quite a smile. “Do you really want me to answer that? Last time you walked a few feet ahead of me, you got slammed into a wall. You were gone for eleven years. And now Quinn and Wallace are sniffing around both of us…” He pauses, his voice low, rough. “I just can’t let anything happen to you.”

Her brow creases, softening the edge of her voice. “Yeah, but you can’t control everything, Dex. No matter how much you think you can.”

He sighs, the weight of it sinking into his chest. “I don’t want Harrison to hate us,” he admits. “But I don’t know how to let you go. Not even a little.”

“Then maybe we start small,” she says. “An afternoon. Like Dr. Ellis said. You can even stalk my location if it makes you feel better.”

He chuckles, a low sound against her hair. “How long is an afternoon?”

She groans, rolling her eyes. “Jesus fuckballs, Dex. You are so fucking clingy.”

He laughs, the sound warm and quiet. “And here I always thought you were the clingy one.”

“I was.” She nudges him playfully. “Guess you’re my karma.”

He smiles, brushing her hair back from her face. “You’re my weak spot.”

Her expression shifts, tender but serious. “Harrison is too, though. For both of us. If we push him away… we’ll regret it. You don’t just have to protect me, Dex. We both have to protect him. Wallace, Quinn - they come for you, for me, they come for him too.”

The thought freezes him, the realization sharp and immediate. He nods slowly, his breath catching. “You’re right.” A beat passes, his voice softening. “An afternoon alone doesn’t mean no sex, though… right?”

Deb snorts, laughing, the tension finally breaking. He flashes her that half grin - the one that always drives her crazy.

“You’re fucking insufferable.” she says, shaking her head.

“And you love it.”

“Unfortunately.” she mutters, but she’s smiling.

For the first time in a long time, the air between them feels light. Not fixed, not perfect - just breathable. The city buzzes faintly outside, the rhythm of it matching their slow, even breaths as they drift closer under the sheets.

And for tonight, that’s enough.

Chapter Text

“Tell me how all this, and love too, will ruin us.”- Scheherazade by Richard Siken

The folder lies open on the dining room table, another one of Prater’s relics - one more killer, one more excuse to feed the monster she’s trying to keep caged. The paper smells faintly of mildew and ink, old fingerprints smudged into the edges. Deb paces beside it, arms crossed tight, while Dexter sits with eerie stillness, eyes scanning the file like scripture.

The name printed at the top makes her stomach twist: Milton Crane, a.k.a. The Sculptor. His nickname earned from the way he “arranges” bodies - carving them, positioning them like grotesque art installations. Even reading it makes her skin crawl.

“Shouldn’t we wait a little longer?” she says, breaking the heavy quiet. The city buzzes faintly through the cracked window - sirens, honking, the hiss of tires on wet asphalt. The smell of cold coffee lingers between them.

Dexter doesn’t look up. “We’ll be fine,” he says flatly, then adds, “I can do this alone, you know.”

That stops her cold. Her boots scuff against the floor as she plants both hands on the table, leaning in. “Fuck you,” she snaps, eyes blazing. “So, what you’re basically telling me is if I don’t agree, you’re going to do it anyway?”

He leans back in his chair, crossing his arms. Silence answers her.

“What the fuck happened to be better, huh?”

His eyes flick to hers, steady, unreadable. “I’m trying, but-”

“You didn’t get what you needed from the last kill.” Her voice cuts through his.

He doesn’t deny it. The lack of protest hurts more than any admission could.

She exhales sharply, pacing again, one hand dragging through her hair. “Jesus Christ, Dex. You’re backing me into a fucking corner.” She spins, pacing harder, the floor creaking under her boots. “Fine,” she says finally, defeated. “But we do it my way. If you want to be fucking better, then we do it the way we’ve been doing it.”

He nods, but his jaw tightens.

“Maybe I scout him alone. Maybe-”

“No.” His voice is instant, hard. “We’re not doing this again, Deb. We do it together.”

She freezes, then laughs once, bitter. “It’s just - the hunt. The whole process. It thrills you.” Her tone softens. “And I’ve done similar things as Charley. You don’t need to protect me.”

He looks at her for a long moment, the mask slipping just enough for her to see what lives underneath - the twitch in his jaw, the flicker in his eyes, the ache of something he can’t name. “Yeah?” he says quietly. “And you think I’m just going to stop enjoying it overnight? That our new code magically fixes me?” He stands, running a hand through his hair, looking up like the ceiling might offer answers. “You don’t get it, Deb. It’s the only thing that quiets the-”

“Yeah,” she interrupts, voice sharp, trembling. “It’s like fucking crack to you. I know.”

He shakes his head, steps closer. His voice drops to a whisper, almost gentle. “But you don’t. Not really.”

Her pulse quickens.

“I said I’d be better,” he continues, placing a fist against his chest. “And I’m trying. But this-” He presses harder. “This thing inside me, my Dark Passenger… it doesn’t go away. It’s always there. Waiting.”

She looks at him, jaw tight, tears burning behind her eyes. “You make it sound like it’s something outside of you,” she says. “But it’s not, Dex. It’s you. Whatever part of you carries all that anger.” She hesitates, voice shaking. “Have you ever thought maybe Dad fucked up? Maybe instead of training you to kill, he should’ve just… gotten you help?”

He lets out a hollow laugh. “A little late for therapy to fix this, Deb.”

The words are heavy. She stares at him, heart pounding, realizing - maybe he really can’t change. Maybe all her love won’t be enough to keep the darkness at bay.

“Fine,” she says finally, her voice breaking into resignation. “We’ll go together.” She lets out a breath that sounds like defeat. “But I’m taking that fucking afternoon away from you today. Dr. Ellis’s bullshit - remember? A few hours. No calls, no texts.”

He goes still. “Today?”

“Yeah. I’ll be fine. You can give some rides or whatever. Just - don’t follow me.”

He tilts his head, studying her the way he studies victims - intense, unblinking. It’s love and danger all in one look. “Fine,” he says slowly. “But be careful. And if you’re not back by five, I’m coming to find you.”

She huffs, a breath that’s half laugh, half frustration. “Clingy dickhead.”

His mouth quirks. “You weren’t complaining about my dick last night.”

She snorts, shaking her head as the tension fractures. “You’re fucking impossible.”

She rounds the table and shoves his shoulder, but he catches her hands before she can pull away, tugging her in. His kiss is brief, soft, and somehow still desperate.

“Have fun.” he murmurs against her lips.

She smirks, her voice low. “Try not to murder anyone while I’m gone.”

For a while, she just walks. No plan. No destination. Just motion.

The city swells around her - horns blaring, heels clicking, the scent of roasted peanuts and car exhaust hanging in the late afternoon chill. When she finally ducks into a subway station, the rush of air from an approaching train hits her face, metallic and damp. She boards without looking where it’s going. Just away.

Breathing room. That’s what she wanted, right?

The train rocks and vibrates, fluorescent lights flickering above rows of strangers. A man in a business suit scrolls through his phone beside a woman asleep on his shoulder. Two teens argue about a playlist. A homeless man hums tunelessly at the far end of the car. Deb watches them all and feels… dislocated. Like she’s watching life through glass.

Freedom, she realizes, doesn’t feel like freedom. It feels like standing too far from the edge of something that used to keep her balanced.

When she steps off again - somewhere uptown - the air bites sharper. The sidewalks are crowded with the usual chaos: kids chasing pigeons, parents barking half-hearted warnings, tourists gawking and snapping photos of things the locals stopped noticing years ago. A woman laughs too loud into her phone. A man mutters to himself, pushing a shopping cart full of cans. The city doesn’t care who you are or what you’ve done. It just keeps moving.

Deb tightens her jacket around her chest, trying to hold in warmth, or maybe the ache that keeps rising in her throat. She reaches for her phone once. Twice. Her thumb hovers over Dexter’s name, that familiar pull tightening her stomach. She imagines his voice - steady, calm, that strange mix of affection and control.

Be careful, Deb.

She shoves the phone back into her pocket, jaw set. “I’m fine,” she mutters to no one. “I don’t need a goddamn babysitter.”

But the lie doesn’t quite land.

Her mind drifts back to the folder on the table. The Sculptor. The photos, the precision. The look in Dexter’s eyes as he studied them - not horror, not even fascination, but recognition. Like he saw himself reflected in the killer’s work.

And that’s when the thought starts. Dangerous. Stupid. Irresistible.

If she can get there first, scout the place, find something – anything - before Dexter does, maybe it’ll prove something. That she can handle it. That she’s not just his shadow. That she can protect him instead of the other way around.

“Fuck it.” she breathes, decision solidifying like ice in her gut. Dr. Ellis can shove her afternoon of self-care.

She knows from the file where the Sculptor does his work - an abandoned warehouse in Brooklyn, near the river. Bodies posed like art projects before being moved and found in various locations, their faces rearranged into silent screams. The memory sends a shiver down her spine, but she keeps walking toward the nearest subway station anyway.

By the time she reaches Brooklyn, the sun’s slipping low, painting the streets in copper and gray. The air smells of wet concrete and old oil. She walks past shuttered storefronts and graffiti-tagged walls, the neighborhood quieter here, less forgiving.

Her heart picks up as she nears the address. The building looms in the distance - windows smashed, bricks crumbling, a faded sign barely clinging to the wall. A chain-link fence surrounds it, half-collapsed, like it’s given up trying to keep anyone out.

Deb crouches, scanning the perimeter. Her breath fogs the air. Somewhere, a siren wails and fades.

Her fingers slip down to her boot, finding the hilt of the knife Dexter made her carry. The weight of it is reassuring, familiar. His way of loving her, she thinks grimly - arming her for the world instead of trusting it won’t attack.

She spots a gap in the fence, just wide enough. The metal scrapes her jacket as she squeezes through, fabric catching on the cold wire. Her pulse hammers. The building ahead, silent and waiting.

“Okay,” she mutters under her breath, steadying herself. “You wanted to prove something. Fucking prove it.”

And with that, she moves forward - alone, determined, the knife a cold comfort against her palm.

The warehouse is silent. Too silent.

Deb steps inside, the echo of her boots swallowed by the vast emptiness. Dust swirls in thin shafts of light filtering through cracked skylights, each beam catching the ghost of movement - tiny motes floating like ash. The air smells of rust, damp wood, and something older - something that once lived and rotted here.

Her fingers tighten around the knife as she moves deeper, her breath loud in her ears. The silence isn’t peaceful; it’s listening.

Room by room, she passes what could almost be mistaken for art. Figures. Shapes. At first she thinks they’re mannequins, half-finished sculptures maybe, but as her eyes adjust, the details crawl into focus - the waxy sheen of flesh-colored resin, the seams where real hair’s been glued in, mouths stitched into grim parodies of expression.

Sculptures, yeah. But twisted.

One figure kneels with hands clasped in mock prayer, ribs carved open into delicate petals. Another stands headless, words etched into its chest: BEAUTY IS THE BODY REVEALED.

Her stomach flips. “Jesus Christ.” she whispers, backing away.

The air is heavy, unmoving. Somewhere in the distance, water drips - a single rhythmic plink that echoes like a metronome for the dead. She swallows hard and pushes forward.

In the second room, the smell shifts - less decay, more chemical. There’s a long metal table against the far wall, cluttered with tools: scalpels, pliers, brushes stiff with dried paint. Above it, a corkboard covered in yellowed clippings and Polaroids, each one tagged with neat, handwritten notes.

Her gaze catches on a shelf stacked with dusty folders. Files. She hesitates, then pulls one free.

Inside: lists of names. Sketches. Notes in cramped handwriting. And then - something that makes her freeze. A copy of a printed email chain. At the top: To: Prater. Subject: Re: Meeting Invitation.

Her pulse quickens. She flips the page. It’s an old invitation, dated nine years ago, before she became Charley. Prater’s “gatherings.” His serial killer social club. And this guy - the Sculptor - had been there. Had sat in those meetings.

Her throat goes dry. “Shit,” she breathes. “He’s connected.”

She crouches beside the table, sifting faster, scanning for anything else - names she recognizes, dates, anything tying it back to Prater’s other protégés. The paper crackles in her shaking hands. She’s so focused she doesn’t notice the subtle shift in the air behind her - the faint scuff of a shoe, the soft intake of breath that doesn’t belong to her.

A shadow glides across the wall.

Deb’s body reacts before her brain does - muscles tensing, knife halfway lifted - but it’s too late. A rough hand clamps around her from behind, forcing her upright, and something damp and heavy presses over her mouth.

The smell hits instantly - sweet, chemical, wrong.

Chloroform.

Her first instinct is to fight - she thrashes, elbows back hard, heels slamming into shins - but the grip only tightens. The edges of the room begin to blur, light smearing into color. Her pulse thunders, frantic and fading all at once.

Dexter. She thinks of him with sudden, fierce clarity. His face. His voice. The way he always finds her, no matter where she runs. Please, Dex. Please be close. Please come.

The last thing she feels is the sting of panic giving way to numbness. The folder slips from her hand, papers scattering across the floor.

Her final thought, before the world goes dark, isn’t fear. It’s regret.

How fucking stupid I’ve been.

When she wakes, the first thing that hits her is the cold.

It slices through her, sharp and clean, biting into bare skin. Her shirt is gone, her bra exposed, jeans half-unbuttoned. The table beneath her is metal - slick, freezing, vibrating faintly against her back as if alive. Her head throbs with a deep, pulsing ache, the echo of chloroform still clinging to her lungs.

The air smells of iron and disinfectant. And something else - paint thinner, maybe. Art supplies.

Her eyes flutter open to the dark. The ceiling is above, flickering light spilling from a single overhead bulb that hums like a dying fly. The edges of the room swim in and out of focus - shapes draped in cloth, the glint of steel.

And then - pain. A sharp, slicing pressure along her left arm. Not deep enough to kill, but deliberate. Intimate.

She gasps, jerks, but her wrists won’t move - thick leather straps bite into her skin, pinning her to the table. Her pulse slams in her throat.

“Ah,” a voice murmurs beside her ear - low, smooth, almost tender. “Don’t move. You’ll ruin the lines.”

She turns her head toward the sound. The Sculptor. She doesn’t need to see his face to know - it’s in the rhythm of his voice, that worshipful calm only monsters use when they think they’re creating something sacred.

“Art.” he whispers, the word curling against her ear like breath.

“Art?” she spits, her throat raw, voice shaking. “You think this is fucking art?”

Her vision clears just enough to see him - a man in his fourties, pale, eyes too bright, too empty. His apron is smeared with streaks of dried crimson and clay dust. He tilts his head, studying her like she’s an unfinished sculpture.

“You’re beautiful,” he says, almost reverent. “Just what I was looking for. My next project.”

She jerks against the restraints again, wrists burning, leather cutting into skin. “You’re a fucking amateur,” she snarls, each word trembling but defiant. “Real artists don’t need to chain up their critics.”

He laughs softly, delighted. “Scream, then. It’s music.”

The knife traces another shallow line down her arm, this one slower, deliberate. Her breath catches. The world narrows to the point of contact - the blade dragging through skin, the wet sting that forms behind it, the metallic tang of her own blood rising in the air.

Her mind screams stay calm, but panic crawls up her spine, cold and slick.

“Dex…” she breathes, almost a prayer. Her lips barely move.

The Sculptor doesn’t notice - or doesn’t care. “You’ll look perfect when I’m done.” he murmurs, stepping back to admire his work.

She twists, testing the restraints again. No give. The straps bite deeper. “My brother’s coming,” she says suddenly, voice hoarse but sharp. “He’ll fucking kill you.”

He chuckles, the sound light, almost affectionate. “Then let him come. Maybe I’ll make art out of him too.”

Her blood runs colder than the table.

She glances to the side - there’s a window, cracked open just enough to show a slice of night sky. Darkness. Neon glows faintly in the distance. It’s past five.

He knows where I am. He tracks my location.

Come on, asshole.

The thought loops in her head like a heartbeat. Every second stretches. The light flickers overhead, her pulse syncing to its uneven rhythm.

The Sculptor leans over her again, knife glinting, his breath hot and sour. “You shouldn’t waste your last moments on someone else.”

Her jaw tightens. She meets his eyes, forces a smirk. “You have no idea who the fuck you’re dealing with.”

The blade bites deeper this time. Pain sears up her arm, bright and electric. She gasps, biting down hard on her lip until she tastes blood. Her body shakes, sweat mixing with cold air, every nerve screaming - but her mind clings to one image: Dexter’s face, calm and merciless.

The thing she’s spent months begging him to suppress - the darkness, the hunger - she needs it now. Needs him.

Her breath shudders out, broken but steadying.

He’ll come.

He has to come.

The minutes stretch, slow and merciless.

Each one drips through her veins like poison, marked by the rhythm of her heartbeat hammering against the leather straps. Thud. Thud. Thud. Too fast. Too weak. The sound feels detached from her body, like it’s coming from somewhere far away.

The pain burns through her arm - white-hot, steady, deliberate. She can feel the blade trace the edges of muscle, the way it jerks slightly when it meets resistance. It’s too real, too slow. She bites her lip harder, trying to focus on the sting instead of the tearing.

Don’t cry. Don’t fucking cry.

But she does. Hot tears spill sideways into her hair, catching on her temples, mixing with the sweat beading on her face. She hears him above her - humming. Soft, content. Like this is just another day in the studio.

“Perfect.” he murmurs, his voice a caress that curdles her stomach.

She wants to scream, to curse him, to tear his throat out with her teeth. But her strength is slipping. Every movement feels slower, heavier.

The air stinks of copper and paint. The overhead light flickers again, and for a split second, she thinks she sees Dexter’s shadow at the edge of her vision. Her chest tightens, stupid hope flaring like a match. But when the light steadies, it’s just the Sculptor, smiling as he presses his thumb against the wound he’s carved.

“Stay still,” he croons. “Beauty takes patience.”

Her voice cracks. “You think carving up women makes you an artist? You’re a fucking coward.”

He laughs softly, pleased. “Even your anger is beautiful.”

Her mind flashes with images - Dexter at the table this morning, hands steady as he sorted through Prater’s files. The way he looked at her when she said she needed space. That tight, pained smile he gave her when he let her go.

And now he’s somewhere out there, probably pacing, checking the clock, waiting for her to come home. If she ever comes home.

She can picture his face when he finds her. The stillness. The quiet. The transformation.

There will be nothing good left in him after this.

She’s so fucking stupid.

The blade grazes her throat, light but cold enough to make her breath seize. “There,” the Sculptor whispers, admiring his work. Her bra clings to her, soaked through with blood, each breath wet and shallow. The smell of it fills the room - metallic and sharp.

Her vision blurs at the edges, the world shrinking to the sound of her own breathing. She can feel the darkness creeping in, soft and inevitable.

“You’ll burn for this.” she rasps, voice trembling, breaking.

He leans close, his smile sharp as the knife. “You first.”

The room sways, light bending. Her head lolls against the table, her pulse faltering.

She thinks of Harrison. His eyes. His anger. The way she and Dexter have already broken him.

And then, Dexter - his voice, his hands, the way he looks at her like she’s the last good thing holding him together. She realizes, dimly, that he’s the only person she’s ever trusted to save her. Even if it means unleashing everything she’s tried to chain inside him.

Her lips move, cracked and trembling. “He’ll come.” she whispers, more to herself than to the man poised over her. Her tears streak down, blurring her vision until everything’s a haze of light and shadow.

He laughs softly, not understanding that he’s already doomed.

“He’ll come.” she repeats, weaker this time, a prayer more than a promise.

And as the darkness presses closer, she clings to that last truth like breath itself:

If there’s one thing Dexter Morgan knows how to do -

it’s find blood.

Chapter Text

"At five in the afternoon.

It was exactly five in the afternoon.

A boy brought the white sheet

at five in the afternoon.

A basket of lime ready prepared

at five in the afternoon.

The rest was death, and death alone

at five in the afternoon" - Lament for Ignacio Sánchez Mejías by Federico García Lorca

At first, Dexter paces the apartment - slow, controlled, counting steps to keep his mind quiet. The air feels wrong without her in it. Too still. Too cold.

He makes coffee he doesn’t drink. Checks the clock. Then checks it again.

He tells himself to be patient. She needed space - her words. Breathe, Dexter. It’s fine.

So, he distracts himself. Gives a few Urcar rides. Smiles when people thank him, pretends to care about their lives, their complaints, their small, safe worlds. It’s mechanical, hollow. Every passenger is a reminder that Deb isn’t here.

Finally, he calls Harrison over. Just father and son. No tension, no competing gravity. Maybe this is good - normal.

For a while, it almost is. They order food, half-watch a movie. Harrison even laughs once, that short, surprised kind that slips out before you can stop it. It feels… real.

Until it doesn’t.

Dexter’s eyes flick to his watch again. 5:03. Then 5:10. Then 5:26.

By 5:30, his stomach twists hard enough to make him nauseous.

He tells himself it’s fine. Traffic. A longer walk. Maybe she stopped for coffee. But the words don’t stick - they crumble as fast as he builds them.

Harrison notices. “Everything okay?”

Dexter forces a small smile. “Deb said she’d be home by five. I just…” He hesitates, the calm breaking around the edges. “I’m just going to give her a quick call.”

He dials.

Voicemail.

Dials again.

Voicemail.

By the fourth try, he’s on his feet, pacing the small space like a caged animal. His pulse hammers against his ribs.

“Dad?” Harrison stands, uneasy. “What’s going on?”

“Something’s wrong.” Dexter says, voice low, clipped. His hand shakes slightly as he opens the Find My app. The blue dot appears - Brooklyn.

His stomach drops.

Brooklyn.

He knows that address.

He sprints to the bedroom, Prater’s files already open before he knows he’s moved. Papers scatter to the floor as he tears through them. Then - there.

The Sculptor.

The address matches perfectly.

For a heartbeat, Dexter’s body goes cold. Then hot. Then nothing but static and pulse.

He closes his eyes. Please, no. The prayer feels foreign on his tongue - he doesn’t believe in God, but he believes in Deb. And he believes in blood.

The panic sharpens, crystallizing into something dangerous. Familiar. The thing she’s been trying to save him from stirs, stretching its limbs.

He moves automatically - gathering his tools, gloves, plastic, the knife he swore he’d only use for justice. He works fast, efficient, his breathing measured only because if he lets it break, everything inside him will.

He hears movement behind him. Harrison stands in the doorway, pale and confused.

“Dad,” he says. “What’s going on?”

Dexter doesn’t look up. “It’s Deb,” he says tightly, stuffing supplies into his bag. “She’s in trouble.”

“What kind of trouble?”

He finally turns, eyes wild, mask gone. “The kind I should have stopped.”

Harrison takes a step closer. “I’m coming.”

“No.” Dexter’s voice cracks like a whip, too sharp. Harrison flinches, and Dexter forces himself to breathe. “It’s dangerous,” he says again, quieter now, the words trembling. “You stay close to me, but you do exactly what I say. Understand?”

Harrison nods, throat bobbing as he swallows.

Dexter slings the bag over his shoulder. The movement is practiced, ritualistic. Something ancient reawakening in his muscles.

As they head for the door, the air in the apartment shifts - like the calm before a storm that’s already chosen its first strike.

Inside, Dexter’s thoughts fracture - love, fear, guilt, fury. But beneath it all, one truth cuts through the noise:

If the Sculptor has hurt her, there won’t be a code.

There will only be blood.

The drive is thick with silence.

Dexter’s hands are welded to the steering wheel, knuckles pale, veins standing out against the skin. Every stoplight feels like a personal attack, every brake light ahead an enemy. His pulse hammers in his ears, steady and brutal, like something counting down.

The city outside blurs - all just noise. He barely sees it. Every sound feels too slow. Every second, too long. He wants to scream. To kill.

If anything’s happened to her…

He cuts the thought off before it can form teeth. He can’t picture it. He won’t.

His jaw aches from clenching. Why the fuck did she go alone? He knows why - her stubbornness, her constant push to prove she isn’t breakable. To prove she doesn’t need him. You do, Deb. You always fucking do.

And now - maybe too late - she might finally realize it.

Beside him, Harrison is quiet, rigid. The boy’s eyes flick toward him occasionally, uncertain, reading the danger in every twitch of his father’s body. Dexter doesn’t speak. If he opens his mouth, the scream will tear him apart. Harrison must sense it. He doesn’t push.

When the warehouse finally appears in the distance, hulking against the skyline, something breaks loose inside him.

He floors the gas.

The tires shriek as he slams to a stop beside the chain-link fence. Gravel sprays, dust clouds rising like smoke. He’s out of the car before it even stops moving, slamming the door so hard the metal groans.

The night air hits him - cold, sharp, tasting like rain and rust.

He yanks the trunk open, grabs his bag. The weight of it in his hand is familiar, grounding, dangerous.

“Are you sure you want to come?” His voice is low, flat, barely human. He doesn’t stop moving, loading tools into his belt, checking for the knife, the cord. He doesn’t have time to argue, but he has to ask.

Harrison’s voice trembles, but the words are steady. “She’s my family too.”

Dexter nods once. That’s all it takes.

“Stay behind me. Don’t move until I say.”

They slip through a tear in the fence, the metal biting at their clothes. The world narrows to sound - the scrape of gravel under their shoes, the wind through the broken windows, the far-off hum of the city that doesn’t know what’s happening here.

He spots the faint glow through a shattered pane - light. Movement.

“Through there.” he whispers, though the word sounds more like a growl.

He climbs through the window first, glass crunching under his palms. The air inside is thick - chemical, old blood, mold. It smells like death pretending to be art. He reaches back, hauls Harrison through, then stalks forward.

Sculptures line the walls - bodies pieced together from mannequin parts and something worse. A jaw that isn’t plastic. A hand that still has skin. The scent of rot clings to the air like oil.

His stomach knots, his vision narrowing.

Please. Please be okay.

He moves fast, his footsteps silent. Each turn of a corner feels like a heartbeat he can’t afford. The air burns with fluorescent flicker.

Then he hears it - her voice. Small. Strained. Alive.

“Dex…”

He rounds the corner, and the world tilts.

She’s strapped to a table - half-naked, slick with blood, her skin a canvas of carved lines. Her head lolls toward him, eyes dazed but open. The sight hits like a physical blow, a spike straight through his ribs.

And standing over her, scalpel glinting under the light, is a man. Mid-forties. Calm. Smiling.

The Sculptor.

“Deb!” The word rips out of him, raw and unfiltered. He doesn’t remember crossing the room, but he’s already moving.

“Dad - he’s got a knife!” Harrison’s voice cracks behind him, somewhere distant.

The Sculptor looks up, grinning wide. “Here for the show?” he says. His tone is delighted, taunting, his hand still resting on the blade.

That smile seals it.

Deb’s voice breaks through the roar in Dexter’s ears. “Dex…” Weak, but there.

He sees the blood on her throat. The cuts on her arms. The way her chest shudders just to breathe.

His mind fractures. Everything inside him - the guilt, the fear, the helplessness - collapses into one sharp, burning point.

He sees red.

All the careful rules, the rehearsed calm, the thin membrane of humanity - gone. The monster stretches awake in his chest, fully, beautifully alive for the first time in months.

He takes a step forward, voice low, shaking. “You touched her.”

The Sculptor tilts his head. “She’s exquisite. Don’t you see? I made her-”

Dexter’s voice cuts through, dark and final. “You made your last mistake.”

And as his fingers curl around the handle of the knife, the world finally makes sense again.

The sound that comes out of him isn’t human.

It’s a guttural snarl, a noise dragged from somewhere ancient and buried.

Dexter moves before thought exists - before Harrison’s warning even finishes leaving his mouth. His knife flashes, the Sculptor swings his own, but Dexter’s faster. The blades collide once, metal clanging, and then Dexter slams into him, driving him backward into a shelf. Jars crash to the floor - formaldehyde and bone shards exploding like sick fireworks.

“Dex – stop - !” Deb’s voice, weak, hoarse. But he’s too far gone to hear.

He grabs the man’s wrist, twists until bone pops. The knife clatters away. The Sculptor screams, but Dexter’s hand clamps over his mouth, cutting the sound short. His grip tightens until teeth grind against palm.

“You carved her,” Dexter growls, the words low, shaking. “You cut into her.”

The man thrashes, gasping under the weight of Dexter’s fury. His other hand claws at Dexter’s arm, nails tearing skin, but Dexter doesn’t even feel it. The smell of blood - Deb’s blood - clings to the air, sweet and metallic. His vision tunnels.

He doesn’t see a man anymore.

He sees every victim that ever deserved to die.

He sees Deb on that table, carved open because he wasn’t there.

Something inside him - whatever thin thread tethered him to restraint - snaps.

Dexter drives his fist into the Sculptor’s face. Once. Twice. The third time, the nose caves in with a wet crunch. The man howls, choking on his own blood. Dexter hits again, again, until his knuckles split, slick with red.

“You touched her!” he roars, the sound echoing through the concrete room. He grabs the Sculptor by the hair, slams his head into the wall - once, twice, a third time. Bone cracks. The man’s body twitches.

Still breathing.

Good.

Dexter grabs the fallen knife, the Sculptor’s own, and without ceremony, without the ritual of plastic or words or rules - he plunges it into the man’s throat.

The body convulses, blood spilling out in hot spurts, coating Dexter’s hands, his chest, the floor. It’s not enough. He twists the blade, and the gurgling sound that follows is wet, pathetic.

“Dad!” Harrison’s voice cuts through the haze, terrified.

Dexter looks up, chest heaving, the knife still buried in the man’s neck. His son is frozen near the doorway - eyes wide, face pale. Deb is still strapped to the table, tears streaking through blood on her cheeks.

For a long, terrible moment, no one moves. The only sound is the wet rasp of the Sculptor’s dying breath.

Dexter leans down, whispering in the man’s ear. “You don’t get to make art from her.” Then he jerks the blade free, the final spurt of blood painting the wall. The Sculptor collapses, lifeless.

Silence.

The monster breathes through him, slow and satisfied. The air is thick, hot, reeking of blood and fear. His pulse begins to slow, and with it comes the realization - Harrison saw everything.

He turns. Deb’s still on the table, trembling, barely conscious. Harrison’s pressed against the wall, shaking, trying to process what his father just did.

Dexter’s voice is rough, unsteady. “Untie her.”

Harrison doesn’t move.

Dexter drops the knife, its clang echoing through the room, and crosses to Deb, undoing the restraints with trembling hands. Her skin is cold and slick, her breath shallow.

“Hey,” he whispers, cupping her face, his voice cracking under the weight of it. “I’m here. You’re okay now.”

Her eyes flutter open, dazed but knowing. She studies his face, the blood, the madness still burning behind his eyes. “Dex…” Her voice is a rasp. “You found me.”

“Always.” His voice breaks.

She reaches up, weakly touches his cheek. “What’d you do?”

He glances down at the body, then back at her. There’s no code, no mask. Just truth. “What I had to.”

For a heartbeat, she just stares - then nods faintly, eyes closing again. “Good.”

Dexter’s chest tightens, something twisting and unspooling all at once.

He looks down at the ruin of the Sculptor’s face, blood pooling beneath him, and for the first time in years, he doesn’t feel the need to justify it.

The monster doesn’t whisper this time. It breathes. Calm. Sated.

Outside, sirens wail faintly in the distance - someone must’ve heard the screams.

Inside, Dexter presses his forehead to Deb’s, the world narrowing to the sound of her breathing.

He doesn’t know what Harrison saw.

He doesn’t care what happens next.

He only knows one thing:

If anyone else ever touches her, ever hurts her again - he won’t stop at one.

He works fast. There’s no time for precision, only survival.

The cleanup is sloppy - blood smeared instead of scrubbed, the body wrapped in half-folded plastic – hidden until he can come back and do the job properly, footprints in the dust - but he doesn’t care. None of it matters. All that matters is Deb.

He scoops her into his arms, her weight limp but still warm, the faint sound of her breath ghosting against his neck. Her skin is cold, slick with blood, the metallic scent thick enough to choke him.

“Stay with me,” he mutters as he carries her out. “Please, Deb. Stay with me.”

Outside, the night feels colder. The air tastes bitter. Harrison holds the door open, face white, eyes huge and empty.

Dexter places her in the back seat, as gently as his shaking hands will allow. “Sit with her.” he orders, voice low but trembling. He yanks off his jacket, then his shirt, pressing the fabric into his son’s hands. “Keep pressure on the wounds. Hard.”

Harrison nods wordlessly, pressing the shirt against Deb’s chest. The fabric darkens instantly, scarlet spreading like wildfire.

Dexter climbs into the driver’s seat and peels out, tires shrieking against the asphalt. His heart slams in rhythm with the engine.

“Hold it there.” he barks, eyes flicking between the road and the mirror. Deb’s head rolls against the seat; Harrison braces her, his jaw clenched, breath shallow.

The drive home blurs into one long siren inside his skull.

When he finally pulls up to his place, he’s out of the car before the engine dies, sprinting to the door. He lifts Deb again - she feels weightless now, terrifyingly light - and carries her inside.

“Couch.” he says, more to himself than to Harrison. He lays her down gently, brushing hair and blood from her face. The sight of her - the pallor, the bruises, the carved lines on her arm - makes something in his chest seize.

“First aid kit. Bathroom cabinet.” His voice cracks mid-sentence.

Harrison hesitates, just long enough for Dexter to snap, “Now!”

The boy flinches and runs. Dexter presses the blood-soaked shirt tighter against Deb’s side, feeling the heat of her life still there, pulsing faintly. His hands shake.

“Stay with me, Deb.” he whispers again, thumb tracing her jaw. “Don’t you dare fucking leave me.”

Her eyelids flutter, a faint sound escaping her throat - half a groan, half a word.

Harrison returns, thrusting the kit toward him. Dexter snatches it, opens it, and starts working - gauze, antiseptic, tape, makeshift stiches. His movements are practiced, automatic, but every time he touches her skin, something fractures.

Her blood stains his fingers. It won’t wash off, he knows that. Not this kind.

“If I could kill him again,” he mutters, voice low and shaking, “I would.”

Harrison stands nearby, frozen, watching the methodical horror of it - his father covered in blood, hands steady, eyes glassy.

“That was too much, Dad,” he says finally, voice small, breaking the silence. “You didn’t just stop him… you destroyed him.”

Dexter’s breath catches. He doesn’t look up. “I did what I had to do.” His tone is quiet, empty. “I’m just sorry you had to see it.”

He doesn’t mean for it to sound so cold. But everything warm in him is directed at the woman bleeding under his hands.

Deb shifts, wincing, her eyes barely open. “No hospital, Dex.” she murmurs, voice faint but clear. “You can’t risk it.”

He meets her gaze, and for a heartbeat, the world stops. Her hand rises weakly, finding his cheek, her thumb smearing blood across his skin.

“I’ve stopped the bleeding,” he says softly, almost to himself. “You’ll be okay. I’ll take care of you.”

He presses his forehead against her hand, closing his eyes. For a moment, the monster inside him quiets - not satisfied this time, but spent, hollow.

When he finally looks up, Harrison is standing at the doorway, pale and shaking. The distance between them feels impossible.

“Harrison-” Dexter starts, but the boy cuts him off, voice trembling.

“You said you were trying to be better.”

Dexter opens his mouth, but no sound comes out.

Harrison’s eyes flick to Deb, then back to him. “I don’t think you can.”

The words hit harder than any blow.

He watches as Harrison turns away, heading for the door, his footsteps fading. The sound of it - the quiet retreat - hurts worse than anything in the warehouse.

Dexter stays kneeling beside Deb, his hands still covered in her blood, staring after his son until he’s gone.

Only then does he let out the breath he’s been holding - one that sounds too close to a sob.

He bends down, pressing a kiss to Deb’s forehead, whispering into her hair. “I saved you,” he says, voice cracking. “I saved you.”

But the words feel wrong.

Because somewhere deep down, he knows what Harrison saw.

And maybe this time, what he saved can’t be saved at all.

The adrenaline has burned out, leaving only silence and the steady pulse of what almost wasn’t.

Harrison’s gone - his footsteps, his voice, his judgment all vanished - and Dexter can’t bring himself to move. He lays on the bed, still in his jeans from earlier, shirtless, hands stained faintly pink from scrubbing her blood off too late. His shoes are somewhere on the floor, but he doesn’t remember kicking them off. He doesn’t care.

Deb is curled against him, her head resting over his heart. She’s breathing. Weak, uneven - but breathing.

He holds her like she might dissolve if he lets go. His fingers trace the edge of her shoulder, avoiding the bandages, memorizing the warmth that means she’s still here. The air smells like antiseptic and iron, sharp and clean over the lingering copper of blood.

And then, without warning, the tears come.

Hot. Silent. Relentless.

He presses his face against her hair, the strands damp against his cheek. He hasn’t cried since she re-appeared in his life - not really - but the sob builds in his chest before he can stop it, clawing its way out in a low, broken sound.

He came so close to losing her. Too close.

He thinks about her on that table - her body, carved and trembling, her voice whispering his name - and the fury rises again, strangled by grief. He can’t imagine this bed without her. The apartment without her. The silence that would follow.

He feels her shift slightly, somewhere between consciousness and sleep. Her voice is faint, raw. “I’m okay.”

He looks down at her then, really looks - her face pale against him, the bruises along her throat, the faint lines of stitches on her arm. And somehow, even like this, she’s the most alive thing he’s ever seen.

He leans forward and kisses her - soft, careful, the taste of salt between them. Love and fear fused together.

You almost weren’t, he thinks, but she doesn’t need to hear that. She just needs to rest.

“Sleep.” he whispers instead.

Her lashes flutter. “You won’t leave me?”

His throat tightens. “Never,” he says, the word breaking on its way out. “I’m right here. You’re safe.”

She nods weakly, her breath brushing his chest as she drifts. He stays completely still, holding her tighter as if pressure alone could keep her tethered to this world.

In the dark, he listens to her breathing even out, counting every inhale like a prayer. His own heart refuses to settle.

He thinks of Harrison - his son’s wide, horrified eyes watching him kill, watching him become the thing he swore he wasn’t anymore. He thinks of the blood on his hands, still ghosting his skin even after washing. He thinks of Quinn, of Wallace, of what’s coming.

But none of it matters. Not tonight.

All he can care about is her.

Because without her heartbeat beneath his hand, he is nothing.

He presses one last kiss to her hair and whispers into the dark, voice breaking into something between confession and curse:

“I can’t lose you again, Deb.”

And for the first time in years, Dexter Morgan feels something he can’t compartmentalize - grief, love, fear, and the terrible, human ache of needing someone so much it hurts to breathe.

Chapter Text

“I am the rest between two notes,

which are somehow always in discord

because Death’s note wants to climb over -

but in the dark interval, reconciled,

they stay there trembling.

And the song goes on, beautiful." - My Life is Not this Steeply Sloping Hour by Rainer Maria Rilke 

She wakes to the sensation of touch - gentle, precise, and familiar. Hands ghosting over her arm, her neck, the bandages that hold her together. The world comes back in fragments: the dull ache in her head, the raw sting in her throat, the steady pulse of pain that throbs through her body like a second heartbeat.

Her eyes crack open, lids heavy and dry. The first thing she sees is Dexter hovering above her, the morning light cutting across his face in sharp lines. He looks like hell - skin pale and streaked with blood that didn’t wash off, dark smudges under his eyes, hair flattened and wild at once. He’s wearing only jeans, his chest bare, the faint sheen of exhaustion clinging to him.

“Ow, that fucking hurts.” The words come out rough - half mumble, half gasp - as his fingers brush too close to a tender spot on her arm.

He pauses, a flicker of guilt passing over his face. Then his mouth curves slightly. “You must be feeling better.” His voice is quiet, gravelly from lack of sleep.

“If you count feeling like I got hit by a fucking truck as better, then sure.” she rasps.

He lets out a low laugh, something hoarse but real, and reaches out to brush a strand of hair from her face. His fingers linger near her temple, gentle in a way that makes her chest ache. “So,” he says softly, “is now when I get to tell you how fucking stupid you were? And that if you ever do something like that again, I’ll kill you myself?”

The teasing doesn’t land the way it usually does. There’s a tremor beneath it - something sharp and terrified that she hears even through the dryness in his tone.

She swallows. “I know,” she says. And she does. The guilt sits heavy in her chest. “I just…”

“Wanted to prove something to me?” he finishes, his eyes searching hers.

She nods faintly. “I know. I’m a fucking idiot. Always have been.”

He leans in and presses his lips to her forehead - brief, warm, trembling. “Yeah,” he murmurs, “but you’re my idiot.”

She snorts, then winces. “Ow. Fuck.”

He almost smiles again, but the quiet that follows between them isn’t peace. It’s fragile, full of the things neither of them are ready to say. The way he looks at her makes her insides twist - intensity, devotion, something darker under the surface. Love, but the kind that could drown them both.

“I’m going to draw you a bath,” he says after a moment, voice steadier. “You need to wash up. We both do.”

He disappears down the hall. She listens to the sound of running water, the pipes groaning, the faint metallic clink of bottles against porcelain. When he returns, he slides an arm around her, helping her sit up. Her legs feel weak, rubbery, but she manages to stand, leaning into him. The floor feels cold against her bare feet. He supports her carefully, his arm firm around her waist, his touch careful in all the places she hurts.

In the bathroom, steam drifts up from the tub, fogging the mirror. The scent of soap and antiseptic mixes with the faint, copper tang of old blood. He kneels beside the tub, checking the temperature with his hand, then moves back to her.

He unwraps her bandages slowly, methodically - cleaning, redressing, wrapping again with quiet precision. The sting of the disinfectant makes her hiss, and he murmurs an apology, voice low and sincere. Then he covers the fresh dressings with plastic, practical, efficient. Always the medic, the forensics tech, the caretaker.

When he starts helping her out of her clothes, she doesn’t stop him. There’s no shame left between them. His eyes stay on her face, not her body, every movement deliberate. He strips out of his jeans and underwear, then slips into the water behind her, easing her down until she’s settled between his legs, her back against his chest. The heat seeps into her sore muscles, her skin prickling with the sudden rush of warmth. She exhales a sound that’s almost a sigh.

His hands move slowly, washing the blood from her skin, tracing soap over her shoulders, her hair, her arms - all gentleness, no hunger. Just love. The kind that scares her more than his darkness ever could.

She lets herself lean back against him, the steady rhythm of his breathing grounding her. The silence stretches, filled only by the sound of water lapping against porcelain.

She thinks of last night - flashes more than memories: the smell of blood, the cold bite of the knife, the sound of his voice when he found her. The look in his eyes after.

He killed for her. No plastic, no code, no ritual. Just rage. Just love.

And for the first time, she isn’t afraid of that part of him. She’s grateful for it. The part of her that used to beg him to “be better” feels distant now - like an echo from another life. All she feels is the pulse of safety in his arms.

“We should probably cancel therapy today.” he murmurs behind her, breaking the quiet.

She shakes her head weakly, water rippling around her shoulders. “No.” Her voice comes out raw. “We can’t.”

“Deb, you can barely walk.” His thumb traces her collarbone, careful not to touch any fresh wounds.

“Harrison was there,” she says, eyes fixed on the water. “I remember… his face. The way he looked at you. At me. If we cancel, it’s like we’re giving up on him. Like we don’t fucking care.”

His breath catches behind her - a sigh, or maybe a quiet groan of protest. “You’re hurt,” he says again, but softer this time. “You need to rest.”

“I will,” she insists. “After. But we’re going. I mean it.”

There’s a pause. Then she feels his lips press against the crown of her head, the kiss lingering there - heavy, tired, tender. “Okay,” he whispers. “We’ll go.”

She closes her eyes, letting the warmth of the bath and the weight of him behind her blur the edges of the world. For now, there’s no therapy, no blood, no fear - just water, skin, and the fragile illusion that they can still save something.

By the time they get to Dr. Ellis’s office, Dexter’s nerves feel skinned raw. He parks close, helps Deb from the car, his hand firm around her waist.

She’s bundled in an oversized sweater and jeans, the sleeves pushed up just enough to reveal gauze peeking beneath - neat, white bandages that look worse under the fluorescent hallway light. Her skin is pale but not ghostly, her body steady but fragile. He keeps a hand at her back anyway.

When they step inside, Dr. Ellis looks up from her notes, surprise flickering across her face. “You both made it.”

“Yeah,” Deb mutters, her voice still rough. “Wouldn’t miss it.”

Harrison’s already there, slouched in the corner on a chair, eyes fixed on his sneakers. His shoulders are hunched, his jaw set. Dexter feels the boy’s silence like a wall between them.

They all settle. Deb beside him, close - too close for therapy, maybe - but he doesn’t care. Her leg presses against his, and that simple pressure keeps his hands from shaking.

Dr. Ellis studies them for a moment before speaking. “Debra, you look like you’ve been through something.”

Deb gives a short, humorless laugh. “You could say that. I, uh… got jumped.”

The therapist blinks, frowning slightly. “Jumped?”

Dexter keeps his voice even. “Someone followed her from the subway. It was dark. She fought back.” He glances at Deb, the briefest flicker of eye contact - we’re sticking to the story.

Dr. Ellis’s gaze moves between them. “You fought back.”

Deb nods once, rubbing her bandaged arm like she can still feel the weight of the straps. “Yeah. Didn’t really have a choice.” Her tone is casual, but Dexter can hear the quiver under it - the truth vibrating beneath the lie.

“And you saved her?” Dr. Ellis asks quietly.

He nods. “Got there just in time.”

A silence settles. Harrison shifts in his seat, restless, picking at the hem of his sleeve. Finally, he says, voice tight: “I saw it.”

Dexter glances at him, careful. “You saw what?”

“The anger.” Harrison’s voice cracks on the word. “When you found her. The way you looked. You scared the fuck out of me.”

Deb’s hand finds Dexter’s instantly, her fingers curling through his. Her pulse trembles against his palm. “He was in shock, Harrison,” she says softly. “You would’ve done the same thing.”

Harrison’s eyes lift, watery but defiant. “No, I wouldn’t. You didn’t see him. You didn’t see what he -” He cuts himself off, the words dying in his throat.

Dr. Ellis leans forward slightly. “What did you see, Harrison?”

Dexter feels the room contract, air thickening. Every muscle in his body tenses, but his face stays calm. He forces the smallest, measured breath through his nose.

Harrison looks at her, then at them. “I just saw my dad… lose it. I’ve never seen him like that.”

Dr. Ellis’s gaze shifts to Dexter. “Lose control?”

Deb’s grip tightens. He can feel the warning in her fingers - be careful.

“I wouldn’t say that,” Dexter answers finally, voice low, deliberate. “I’d say… I let something out. Something I’ve spent a long time trying to contain.”

Dr. Ellis’s pen stops mid-stroke. “What do you mean?”

He exhales slowly, eyes fixed on the carpet. “Anger,” he says simply. “When I saw what had been done to her, it… I didn’t recognize myself. I wanted to protect her. That’s all.”

“That’s all?” she presses, gentle but probing.

He looks up then, meeting her gaze. “Sometimes ‘protecting’ and ‘destroying’ start to look the same.”

The words suspend there, too honest, too sharp. Harrison’s throat bobs; Deb’s thumb strokes the back of his hand like she’s soothing a wild animal.

Dr. Ellis studies him for a long moment. “That sounds like something that frightened you as well.”

He swallows hard. “It did.”

“And you, Debra?”

Deb looks up, eyes glassy but strong. “I was scared. But not of him. Of losing him. Again.” Her voice cracks slightly on the last word.

Harrison lets out a short, bitter sound. “You’re both insane, you know that? Normal people don’t talk like this.”

Dr. Ellis holds up a hand, calm. “Harrison, I know this is hard to sit through. But your -” she pauses, catching herself.  “- your family has been through something traumatic. Everyone reacts differently to fear.”

“Yeah, well, some people react by murdering the guy,” he mutters under his breath.

Dexter’s heart stumbles in his chest, but he forces his tone to stay mild. “You mean metaphorically.”

Harrison’s eyes flash. “Do I?”

Deb shifts closer to Dexter, practically pressing into him now, like she can shield him from his son’s accusation - or him from himself. “We all lost it a little,” she says quietly. “Last night. It wasn’t pretty, but we’re still here.”

Dr. Ellis looks at her, then at the bandages again. “Debra, you said you fought back. That takes strength, but it also takes a toll. Are you allowing yourself to rest?”

Deb huffs out a breath that might be a laugh. “I’ve got him hovering like a damn nursemaid. I couldn’t not rest if I tried.”

That earns a faint smile from the therapist, but it fades fast. “And you, Dexter? How are you coping after all that adrenaline? That kind of intensity doesn’t just go away.”

He thinks about blood on his hands, about the sound the Sculptor made when the knife went in. The relief that followed. The way Deb’s breath hitched when she woke in his arms.

“I’m… managing,” he says at last. “Mostly by reminding myself she’s alive.”

“That’s not nothing,” Dr. Ellis replies softly. “But it’s also not healing. You both need time, and space.”

The word lands hard between them. Space. The one thing they can’t seem to give each other.

Harrison stands abruptly. “I can’t do this right now,” he says, voice trembling. “Every time I look at you two, it’s like I’m watching the same disaster in slow motion.”

“Harrison-” Deb starts, but he’s already at the door.

Dr. Ellis calls after him, “Wait, Harrison - what did you mean earlier? About murder?”

He freezes, hand on the handle. His voice is low, shaking. “Ask them.”

The door shuts.

A long, heavy silence.

Dr. Ellis turns slowly back to Dexter and Deb, her expression unreadable. “Should I be worried about what he’s implying?”

Dexter meets her gaze evenly, the calm back in place, his mask sliding on like muscle memory. “He’s angry,” he says simply. “He saw me lose control protecting her. That’s all he meant.”

Deb nods quickly. “He exaggerates. Always has.”

Dr. Ellis doesn’t look convinced, but she lets it go - for now. “You both have a lot of healing to do. Separately and together.”

Deb’s voice is quiet. “We know.”

The therapist closes her notebook. “Be careful that love doesn’t become a weapon.”

Dexter’s lips twitch - almost a smile, almost a warning. “It already has.”

She looks at him sharply, but he’s already standing, helping Deb to her feet.

Dr. Ellis hears warning. Deb hears love.

And Dexter means vengeance.

The night air smells like rain and old cigarettes.

Harrison paces outside his dorm, sneakers sloshing through shallow puddles that reflect the flicker of a streetlight overhead. Claudette Wallace’s business card is pinched between his fingers, edges bent, the paper softening in the damp. He’s been holding it so long his knuckles ache.

He can still see it - the warehouse. The smell of blood, thick and metallic. The sound of his father’s voice, low and unrecognizable. The way Dexter’s face changed when he saw Deb on that table: all human expression stripped away, something else wearing his father’s skin.

A monster. Or maybe just the truth, finally unmasked.

Harrison exhales, breath fogging in the cold. His pulse hasn’t really slowed since last night. Every time he blinks, he sees Dexter’s hands - steady, sure, merciless. The Sculptor’s gurgling breaths still echo in his ears, wet and awful.

He tells himself what happened before was worse - Kurt Caldwell, Logan, even Prater. But this was different. This wasn’t control. This wasn’t a code. It was chaos.

He stops pacing, stares down at the card in his hand. Claudette Wallace. NYPD. Her name looks smaller now, smudged by rain. She’s the one who’s been circling his family like a shark. The one who might actually believe the truth about his dad. About all of them.

All he’d have to do is call. Tell her what he saw. Tell her what Dexter really is.

His throat tightens.

But then he thinks of Debra - bandaged, pale, barely breathing when Dexter carried her out. The sound of her voice, hoarse but steady, whispering his father’s name, saved by his father.

He remembers the way Dexter looked at her, not like prey, not even like redemption - just like love.

And Harrison doesn’t know what to do with that.

He knows what he saw was wrong.

He also knows that if Dexter hadn’t done it, she’d be dead.

The card bends under his fingers, paper giving way with a soft crack. He stares at it for another moment - his father’s life in one thin rectangle of cardstock. All he has to do is hand it over, and it’s over.

But he doesn’t.

He crouches down, hand shaking, and drops it into a puddle. The water ripples, swallowing the name. The ink starts to bleed, black threads dissolving into dirty gray. He watches until it’s gone.

Rain begins to fall again, light at first, then steadier. It soaks into his hoodie, runs down his neck, chills him to the bone.

He may not understand what Dexter and Deb are to each other - he doesn’t think he ever will. He still sees flashes of it in his head, confusing and wrong. But they’re his family. The only family he’s ever had.

And no one else will ever understand him either - the darkness, the anger, the part of him that feels too close to his father’s.

He remembers Ryan Foster’s blood on his hands. The sickening crack. The heat in his chest. It wasn’t for fun. It wasn’t the same. But it wasn’t innocent either.

No one else would accept that. No one else could.

Except them.

He tilts his head back, rain hitting his face, and whispers to the night, “Guess we’re all fucked up together.”

Then he turns, shoves his hands into his pockets, and starts walking home. The city thrums around him - alive, uncaring, endless - and for the first time since last night, his footsteps feel steady.

The apartment feels softer tonight - like even the walls are trying to let them rest.

Deb’s curled on the couch, propped up by too many pillows, a blanket tossed over her lap. The TV drones softly in the background - some sitcom laugh track that doesn’t match the rhythm of their real lives. Her body aches, her bandages tug when she shifts, but the warmth of the blanket and the smell from the kitchen make her chest ache in a different way.

Dexter moves quietly at the stove. Jeans and a sweater, sleeves rolled up. He ladles soup into two bowls, steam curling up and catching the kitchen light.

Chicken noodle.

Just like Mom used to make.

He knows her too damn well.

When he carries the bowls over, he sets one in her hands carefully, like he’s afraid she’ll break. Then he sits beside her, close but cautious, their legs just brushing under the blanket.

“Thanks.” she says. Her voice is rough, throat still raw.

He gives her a small smile but doesn’t answer. The quiet between them feels fragile - but not empty. Just full of things neither knows how to say yet.

The smell of soup mixes with the faint scent of antiseptic still clinging to her skin. The TV laughs again, wrong and hollow. Deb stares at the bowl, spoon untouched, and the images come back - the warehouse, the table, his face when he saw her.

That rage. That love. That terrifying, beautiful thing she’s been trying to cage for months.

She thought she wanted to make him better. Now she’s not so sure “better” even exists for people like them.

“Dex,” she says finally.

He glances over, the smallest flicker of worry in his eyes. “Yeah?”

“Last night…” She exhales. “Thank you. For what you did. For… saving me.”

He flinches like the word cuts. “I know I-”

She stops him with a look. “Let me finish.”

He nods, silent.

“I saw you,” she says softly. “The real you. And I know I’ve been pushing you to be better, to get rid of that… thing inside you.” Her fingers fidget with the blanket’s edge. “But that thing - your monster, your Dark Passenger, whatever the fuck you call it - it saved me. You saved me. And I don’t know how to separate those two anymore.”

Her voice cracks, but she keeps going. “So, I’m done pretending I can. I accept it. I accept you. All of it.” She swallows hard. “And I guess that means I love all of it too.”

For a long moment, he doesn’t move. Just stares at her, his eyes wet and unreadable. Then he whispers, almost disbelieving, “You mean that?”

She tilts her head, gives him a half-smile that trembles at the edges. “Yeah. I fucking mean it.”

Something breaks loose in him - a sound that’s half a laugh, half a gasp. He leans in and kisses her. It’s soft, not hungry, just human.

When they pull back, she grins faintly. “You know you’re a fucking sap, right?”

He smirks. “Only for you.”

Before she can answer, the sound of a key turning in the lock cuts through the air. They both look toward the door.

Harrison stands there, dripping from the rain, his hoodie plastered to his shoulders. He looks at them - at the couch, the bowls, the soft light - like he’s not sure if he belongs here anymore.

“Hey.” he says finally. His voice is quiet, but it carries.

“Hey.” Deb echoes, her chest tightening. She shifts, wincing a little.

“What are you guys eating?” he asks after a pause. It’s tentative, a truce disguised as small talk.

“Soup,” Dexter says. His voice is gentle, careful. “You want some?”

Harrison hesitates. Then nods. “Yeah. I do.”

Dexter stands, heads to the kitchen, and when he returns, he hands him a bowl. Harrison takes it, the steam fogging the space between them.

“Dad…” he starts, voice low.

Dexter looks at him, waiting. Deb’s eyes flick between them, holding her breath.

“I don’t get it,” Harrison admits, the words tumbling out. “Whatever’s between you and Aunt Deb, I don’t understand it. And what I saw last night…” He trails off, eyes dropping to the soup. “It scared the hell out of me. You scared me.”

Dexter opens his mouth, but Harrison keeps talking. “But you saved her. And I know she loves you, and you love her, and…” He shakes his head, frustrated. “I don’t know if it’s right. I just know you’re my family. Both of you. And family… sticks together, right?”

Deb’s throat burns. She nods before she can speak. “You’re fucking right it does.”

That makes Harrison laugh - a real one this time, short and surprised.

Dexter’s smile trembles, then he steps forward, setting his bowl aside, and pulls his son into a hug. It’s awkward, wet, and perfect.

Deb watches them, her eyes stinging. The room smells like soup and rain and something new - maybe hope, maybe home.

When they finally pull apart, she grins weakly and says, “Well, if this turns into a group hug, I’m fucking suing. I’m still bruised as hell.”

Harrison snorts. “Got it.”

Dexter looks between them, that small, uneven smile still on his face. “Next time, we’re ordering pizza.”

“Yeah,” Deb says, leaning back against the couch, warmth flooding her chest. “Let’s not make trauma soup a tradition.”

They all laugh - small, tired, real.

And for the first time in a long time, the laughter doesn’t sound out of place.

It just sounds like family.

Chapter Text

“The streets that follow like a tedious argument

Of insidious intent

To lead you to an overwhelming question…” The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot.

The city moves like a living organism - pulsing, breathing, swallowing them whole.

They walk hand in hand through the crush of Manhattan’s evening crowd, fingers interlaced, shoulders brushing. The air smells of roasted chestnuts from a street cart, the metallic bite of the subway venting up through the grate. Bodies press too close, the noise constant - horns, laughter, the occasional shout slicing through the din.

Deb keeps close beside him. She’s steadier now, healing, but still flinches at sudden sounds. He sees it in her posture - the way her shoulders tighten when someone brushes past, the faint tremor in her hand when she adjusts her hair. She hasn’t said she’s afraid, but he knows.

It’s the same look she had after Brian. The same brittle edge of hypervigilance. Months spent sleeping in his apartment, jumping at every creak in the floorboards. Back then, she clung to him like he was the last solid thing left in her world.

And maybe he still is.

He feels her fingers tighten around his, grounding herself in him. And though he should be comforted by it, guilt lingers beneath his ribs - sharp and cold.

He couldn’t have stopped her from going after the Sculptor alone. He knows that. But part of him still wonders - what if he’d tried harder? What if he hadn’t let her out of his sight?

And then another, darker part whispers that he’s grateful. Grateful she finally sees him. All of him. Grateful that she’s stopped asking him to be “better.”

They haven’t talked about how that changes the code - but it does. He feels it every time the Dark Passenger stirs, pacing the edges of his mind. Sated for now, but never silent.

A man shoulders past them, hard enough to knock Deb off balance. She stumbles, her arm jerking in his.

“Jesus fucking Christ, watch where the hell you’re going!” she snaps, voice echoing off the glass storefronts.

“Deb,” he says quietly, pulling her out of the flow of foot traffic, into a pocket of shadow near the curb. “You okay?”

“I’m fine.” she bites back, cheeks flushed, breath uneven.

He studies her. The tremor in her voice says otherwise. “We can go back.”

She shakes her head, sharp, defiant. “I said I’m fucking fine.”

And that’s when he sees it - a black sedan idling across the street, its engine purring softly under the noise of the crowd.

It’s the same car he noticed two blocks ago. Same dark tint on the windows, same slight angle toward them. Watching.

He doesn’t move, just murmurs, “That car.”

Deb follows his gaze. “You think it’s following us?”

“I know it is.”

She swallows hard, eyes darting back to the street. “Shit.”

He squeezes her hand and starts moving again, faster this time, weaving them through a group of tourists, ducking into a narrow side street. The city noise fades to a dull thrum, replaced by the hiss of tires and the occasional splash of water from a passing cab.

Then his phone buzzes in his pocket. A single vibration, sharp and insistent.

He pulls it out, the screen glowing faintly in the dim alley light. One message.

You killed Prater. You took everything. I’ll take your son.

-Nelson

Dexter’s pulse spikes. The words sink into him. His stomach turns to ice. Images flash in sequence - Harrison’s face, pale and afraid with Prater’s gun pressed to his head. The Sculptor’s blade. Deb bleeding on that table.

The monster stirs. Violent. Ready.

“Fuck,” he mutters, holding the phone out to her. “It’s Nelson.”

Deb’s expression hardens as she reads it. “That slimy, psychotic piece of shit. It has to be him in that car.” Her voice cracks around the edges despite the anger. She chews her bottom lip, eyes wide, flicking toward the street. “He’s rebuilding Prater’s network. He’s coming after us.”

“No,” Dexter says. His tone is flat, but his mind is already moving, mapping the patterns, running scenarios. “After me.”

Every killer I’ve stopped leaves a trail. But some ghosts crawl back through the cracks. Nelson isn’t after revenge - he wants to see if I’ll break again.

He takes her hand, grip firm, and leads her back toward the lights of the main street. The city swallows them once more - two figures moving fast through the crowd, haunted and hunting.

The diner hums with low music and the clatter of cutlery, the kind of place where nobody looks too long at anyone else. Grease stains the walls, sunlight filters through cracked blinds, and everything smells faintly of oil that’s been burning for hours.

They sit tucked away in a back booth, half-shadowed. Dexter’s burger sits untouched, fries cooling beside it. Across from him, Deb chews her chicken salad sandwich like she’s trying to convince herself she has an appetite.

“Tell me what you know about Nelson,” Dexter says quietly, watching her over the rim of his shake. “Anything that didn’t make it into the files.”

Deb exhales through her nose. “Not much more than you already know. He was secretive as hell. I learned more about him when we broke into his place than in the years I worked beside him. Prater’s circle wasn’t exactly about friendship, Dex. It was survival.”

He nods slowly. “He’s got his mother hidden somewhere. He wouldn’t risk coming after me otherwise.”

Her jaw tightens. “Then we find him before he finds Harrison.”

“I know-”

Her phone buzzes, slicing through the air. She picks it up without thinking. “Hello?”

A pause. Then a voice that makes her blood run cold. “Deb.”

She freezes. Quinn.

Dexter sees her hand tremble slightly as she sets the phone down on the table, presses speaker, and leans closer. His stomach tightens.

“Joey.” she says, carefully.

“Listen,” Quinn’s voice is raw, low. “I shouldn’t be calling, but I’m telling you this because I still give a damn. Wallace isn’t backing off. She’s got Angel’s notes, the photos… even your death certificate. She’s convinced you faked it. And Dexter - she’s looking at him.”

Deb’s face drains of color.

“She’s building something big,” Quinn continues. “So, I’m telling you - turn on him. Save yourself before she takes you down with him.”

Dexter’s fingers curl into fists under the table. The world narrows to a single pulse. One kill. That’s all it would take. One clean cut, one body in the dark, and the problem disappears. The monster inside him shifts, whispering: She’d understand.

“Don’t call again, Joey.” Deb says, her voice trembling but hard. She ends the call. The quiet after feels heavier than before.

For a long moment, neither of them moves. The music hums, a waitress laughs somewhere near the counter.

“They’re never going to fucking stop, Dex.” Deb says softly, still staring at the phone.

His jaw tightens. “Then we make them.”

Her eyes lift to his, dark and sad but steady. “We can’t kill our way out of every threat.”

He meets her gaze, voice low, calm, terrifyingly certain. “It’s the only language people like them understand.”

She shakes her head, pushing away from the table. “No. We protect Harrison. We stop Nelson. But no more war. Not like before.”

He watches her slide into his side of the booth, the smell of grease and her shampoo colliding as she leans in close. Her forehead rests against his temple, her breath warm against his ear.

“Promise me,” she whispers. “We handle this smart. Not just bloody.”

For a second, Dexter says nothing. The Dark Passenger beneath his ribs is pacing, eager, hungry. He can almost taste Nelson’s blood already. But he feels her hand slide into his, fingers lacing with his own - the only thing that’s ever been strong enough to tether him.

He exhales, a slow release that doesn’t feel like surrender but something close. “We’ll be smart,” he says finally. “But if he touches Harrison…” His voice cracks, low and certain. “I won’t stop.”

Deb closes her eyes, nodding against him. “I know,” she murmurs. “And I wouldn’t ask you to.”

Outside, a black car idles across the street. Its tinted windows catch the light for a heartbeat before disappearing into traffic.

Neither of them notices.

The apartment feels smaller tonight - too still, too clean. Dexter moves through it methodically, packing what they’ll need: gloves, cash, extra clothes, his kit. The sound of zippers fills the silence between them.

Deb limps slightly as she crosses to the dresser, pulling out jeans and a sweater, wincing when the fabric brushes her healing arm. “Jesus, we’ve turned into fucking fugitives again.” she mutters.

Dexter gives a faint smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. “Temporary. Just until we know what Nelson’s planning.”

The words sound calm, rational. But underneath, something buzzes - low and constant, like a radio frequency just out of tune. His Dark Passenger stirs in that static, not from hunger, but from alertness. The same restless hum that always comes before blood.

They fill two duffel bags. When Deb glances toward the door, he checks the locks one last time, then kills the lights. The city buzzes faintly outside the windows - sirens, traffic, laughter somewhere too far away to reach.

They’re halfway to the door when his phone vibrates in his pocket. The sound is sharp in the quiet.

He glances at the screen. Harrison.

You guys doing okay?

A simple text. Normal. But it tightens something in his chest.

Since the night Harrison came home - wet, shaking, soup in his hands - the boy’s anger has softened into something close to love. There’s peace now. Fragile, tentative, something Dexter doesn’t want to shatter.

But the text feels like a thread pulling at that peace.

He types back, We’re good. Where are you?

A moment passes. Then his phone buzzes again - a photo of a pile of books beside a half-finished essay on a glowing laptop.

Currently drowning.

Dexter’s mouth twitches into a small smile. I’m proud of you, he types back, hitting send before he can think about why the words feel like a prayer.

Deb notices the faint glow of his phone. “Who’s that?”

“Harrison,” he says. “Just checking in.” He hesitates, thumb hovering over the screen. “Should we tell him? About Nelson?”

She straightens slowly, her face pale in the dim light. “Where is he?”

He shows her the photo. “His dorm. He’s studying.”

Deb nods, decisive. “Then he’s safe. We don’t need to scare him, not yet. He finally trusts us again, Dex. Let’s not drag him into this mess.”

Her words make sense. They always do. He watches her tuck a strand of hair behind her ear, watches the way her fingers tremble slightly when she thinks she’s hiding it.

He nods. “Right.”

But something in him - something deeper than thought - doesn’t settle. It’s that faint static again, the dark burn in his chest, whispering that calm never lasts. That every time he’s convinced himself someone is safe, it’s already too late.

He tightens his grip on the duffel, the canvas rough against his palm.

Deb zips up her bag, shoulders it, and looks toward the door. “Let’s go before my fucking arm decides to fall off.”

He forces a smile. “Right behind you.”

As they step into the cool night air, Dexter takes one last glance at the phone in his hand. The photo of Harrison’s desk still glows on the screen - ordinary, alive.

It should make him feel better.

Instead, it feels like the calm heartbeat before the knife falls.

He slides the phone into his pocket and locks the door behind them, telling himself that’s enough. That Harrison’s fine. That his instincts are just nerves.

But the burn under his ribs doesn’t fade.

It never does.

The motel smells like damp carpet and bleach - someone’s half-hearted attempt at cleaning decay. The wallpaper peels at the corners, water stains spreading like veins across the ceiling. The buzz of a flickering fluorescent light fills the silence.

“Fuck me,” Deb mutters as she steps inside, surveying the cracked plaster and the sagging mattress. “You really know how to pick the high-class places.”

Dexter tosses their duffel bags onto the single bed and glances back at her. “I didn’t pick it for the view.”

“Still. Couldn’t you at least have found one that doesn’t smell like an ashtray full of regret?”

He lets out a faint laugh, the sound dry. “We’re hiding, Deb. Not vacationing.”

She snorts. “You know what this reminds me of?”

He waits, stripping off his jacket, hanging it on the crooked chair in the corner.

“That shitty motel in Miami,” she says, crossing her arms. “When we were hiding from Isaak Sirko. Before I told you I loved you. Before Hannah McPoison tried to kill me.”

He smiles despite himself. “Feels like a different life.”

“It was,” she says softly. “Before everything got this fucked.”

He sits on the edge of the bed. “We were both stupid back then.”

She steps closer, her shadow falling over him. “You still are.”

He huffs a small, surprised laugh. “Thanks.”

She doesn’t respond, just slides between his knees. He tilts his head up to her, and for a second they just look at each other - years of blood and guilt and love compressed into a single breath. Then he kisses her.

It’s slow at first, unsteady, like remembering a language they used to speak fluently. Her lips taste faintly of mint and fear. She presses closer, careful but hungry. His hands find her waist, pulling her in - gently, mindful of the bruises, of everything still healing beneath the skin.

When they part, she’s breathing hard. He brushes a strand of hair from her face. “Is this okay?” he asks, voice low.

She tilts her head, a half-smile tugging at her lips. “You asking if you can fuck me?”

“In this room?” he murmurs, smirking. “I’d fuck you anywhere.”

“Romantic.” she mutters, rolling her eyes. Then she pulls her shirt over her head and winces at the motion.

“Careful.”

“I’m fine, Dex.” Her voice wavers only slightly.

He hesitates, but she’s already unbuttoning her jeans, moving slower than usual but determined.

“Lay back.” she says, her tone brooking no argument.

He quirks a brow. “You’re not getting me to say ‘yes ma’am.’”

“Then shut up and do it.”

He kicks off his shoes, his jeans, his boxers, pulls off his shirt, the mattress creaking beneath him. The air between them thickens - musty, electric, real. She strips down too, pale skin glowing faintly under the jaundiced light.

She climbs over him, straddling his hips, her hair falling around them like a curtain. “You always need to be in control.” she says.

He traces his fingers up her arm, avoiding the heavy bandages, then cups her face. “I thought you liked it when I was.”

She smirks, leaning down just enough for her breath to brush his lips. “You like to think you’re always better.”

The words dig deeper than she means them to. He opens his mouth, but before he can answer, she kisses down his chest, slow and deliberate, until speech becomes impossible.

When she takes him into her mouth, his head falls back against the pillow, a low groan slipping out before he can stop it. Her rhythm is unhurried, knowing, a dance they’ve done a hundred times but never like this - fragile, fierce, and alive.

“Fuck,” he gasps, his hand finding her hair, not to guide her, just to anchor himself. “You’re incredible.”

She hums in response, the vibration making him shudder. When it becomes too much, he tugs lightly at her hair. “Stop or this’ll be over fast.”

She pulls back, smirking, lips slick and red. “Who’s in control now?”

“Jesus, Deb, are you trying to prove something?”

“Maybe.”

She climbs up his body, grabbing his leaking cock, and sliding down onto him in one slow, deliberate motion. His breath catches, hands flying to her hips.

“Better?” she asks, her voice barely above a whisper.

He can’t even answer.

Her body moves over his, steady, unbroken, her palms pressed against his chest. Every thrust burns through the last few days - the fear, the blood, the guilt. The monster inside him stirs, but not with hunger. With recognition. With something close to peace.

When she leans forward and kisses him, it’s fierce and trembling. “You’re not always better,” she breathes against his mouth, “but you’re mine.”

He groans, his hands sliding up her back, pulling her closer, meeting her rhythm from underneath. “Then I’ll stop trying to be.” he whispers, the words more vow than surrender.

Her laugh breaks into a moan, grinding against him, as her body tightens around him, tumbling into ecstasy. He follows, pulsing inside her as the world collapses to the sound of their breathing, the creak of the old mattress.

When it’s over, she stays pressed against him, her forehead on his shoulder. The room smells of sweat and dust. It feels almost like safety.

He strokes her back, slow circles, his own pulse still uneven. “We really know how to pick our hiding spots.”

She lets out a tired laugh. “Guess we’re not good at better after all.”

He smiles into her hair, quiet, content for now. “No,” he murmurs. “But we’re good at surviving.”

Deb falls asleep not long after, curled in his arms, her skin still warm against his. They’re both naked and spent, tangled in sheets that smell faintly of sweat. Her breath ghosts softly over his chest - steady and fragile. Human. 

Dexter lies awake, holding her. His fingers trace the small curve of her shoulder, the faint band of gauze peeking from beneath the blanket. Her face, so fierce awake, looks impossibly young in sleep. The tiny lines around her eyes smooth out, her mouth slackens, her brow unknots.

He loves her so much it hurts. Not the way he used to think of love - abstract, chemical, something he could fake - but something real, messy, suffocating. It pulses through him like another heart.

And yet beneath it, another rhythm stirs.

His thoughts drift to Angel. The old notebooks. The accusations.

Bay Harbor Butcher.

The words never really die. They just wait for new mouths to speak them.

He imagines Claudette hunched over a desk, poring through Angel’s old notes, Wallace connecting dots in blood he thought had long been scrubbed away.

The Dark Passenger sings beneath his ribs, low and eager, the way it always does when the walls start closing in. One kill would solve it all, it whispers. One clean cut. One body to silence the noise.

But then Deb shifts in her sleep. Her hand slides against his chest, searching unconsciously for him, and her fingers curl there, loose and warm. She murmurs something half-formed - his name, maybe - and the sound tethers him like a heartbeat.

The song quiets.

He exhales, presses his lips to her hair, tastes salt and shampoo and the faint metallic trace of blood that never seems to leave their lives.

“You keep me human, Deb.” he whispers into the dark. “Even when there’s nothing left worth saving.”

The words suspend there, fragile and true, swallowed by the slow sound of her breathing.

He thinks of Harrison next. His son’s face flashes through his mind - tired eyes, guarded smile, that text from earlier. He reaches for his phone on the nightstand, thumb brushing the cracked case. No new messages.

A small pulse of unease flickers in his gut. It’s nothing concrete - just instinct, a faint tightening under the skin.

He tells himself the boy’s fine. He’s studying, probably asleep by now. He’s safe.

Still, he can’t stop the glance toward the window. The city beyond it, low and endless.

He slips the phone back down, pulls Deb closer until her head rests under his chin. The steady rise and fall of her chest lulls him, her warmth dulling the static in his mind.

If something were wrong, he’d know.

He always knows.

At least, that’s what he tells himself as his eyes grow heavy, the song of the monster fading into the softness of her breathing - quiet, for now.

And in that fragile, borrowed peace, Dexter Morgan lets himself drift toward sleep.

Chapter Text

“In the desert,

I saw a creature, naked, bestial,

Who, squatting upon the ground,

Held his heart in his hands,

And ate of it.

I said: “Is it good, friend?”

“It is bitter - bitter,” he answered;

“But I like it

Because it is bitter,

And because it is my heart.” – In the Desert by Stephen Crane

Morning comes slow and gray, leaking through the warped blinds like diluted smoke. The motel still reeks of old cigarettes and bleach - an attempt at cleanliness that never sticks. Deb lies still for a moment, half-awake, her body heavy and sore, the ache in her arm pulsing with every heartbeat.

For a few seconds, it’s almost quiet. Then everything from yesterday slams back - Nelson’s message, the black car, Quinn’s warning, the motel’s sagging mattress under her back.

Her eyes snap open.

Dexter’s pacing the room in his boxers, phone clutched in his hand, shoulders tight. His hair’s a mess, his jaw clenched. He hasn’t shaved. There’s a hollowness around him that she’s learned to fear - the space he goes to when logic starts turning into obsession.

Something’s wrong.

She sits up fast. The sheet slips off her chest, cold air prickling her skin, but she doesn’t care. “Dex,” she says, voice rough. “What is it?”

He doesn’t answer right away, just stares at his phone like he’s waiting for it to explain something he already knows. Finally, he says, “I can’t reach Harrison. I’ve called him five times.”

Her stomach knots. She’s the one who told him don’t tell Harrison anything. That he’d be safe at his dorm. That they didn’t need to drag him into this.

Dexter’s phone buzzes again, sharp in the quiet. He freezes mid-step. His thumb hovers over the screen.

The silence stretches until it feels unbearable. Her pulse pounds in her ears, in the healing wounds on her arm, everywhere. “Dex,” she says, barely breathing, “what the fuck is it?”

He turns the phone toward her.

A photo fills the screen - Harrison, gagged, wrists bound to a metal chair. His face is bruised, terrified, half-lit by the kind of warehouse lighting she’s seen a thousand times before.

Underneath, a message:

You killed Prater. You took my future. I’ll take your legacy.  - Nelson

The world narrows to a single beat of guilt. “This is on me.” Her voice breaks. “I said don’t tell him. Jesus Christ, Dex, I’m so fucking sorry.”

He crosses the room in two strides, cups her chin hard enough to make her meet his eyes. “Don’t,” he says quietly. “He’s after me. He’ll use anyone to get to me. This isn’t your fault.” He swallows, voice dropping. “It’s mine. I should’ve known he’d go for him.”

He lets go before she can respond and goes to his duffel bag, pulling out the files he’d kept from Prater’s network. Papers spill onto the motel’s stained carpet. He flips through fast, methodical, eyes darting like a machine scanning for weakness.

“What are you doing?” she asks, dragging on his shirt from the floor, the cotton cold against her bare skin as she comes up behind him.

“Nelson’s file,” he mutters, already scrolling through his phone. “Harrison’s somewhere industrial - concrete walls, cracked paint. Look.”

He hands her the phone again. She studies the picture. Behind Harrison, the wall’s gray and water-damaged, a window half-shattered, a sign just barely visible - red letters faded to rust.

It tugs at something buried deep.

She chews her thumbnail, mind flicking back years - to long nights and Prater’s calm voice telling her who deserved to die and why. The smell of gasoline. The pop of a silencer. A warehouse where rules were broken and punishment was delivered.

“I know this place,” she whispers. “One of Prater’s cleanup sites. He used it when his pet killers got sloppy. There’s a sign like that in the Bronx.”

Dexter’s already pulling on jeans. “Then that’s where he is.”

She moves too, ignoring the stiffness in her body as she gets dressed. She finds her duffel, loads a few clips into the gun she hasn’t touched in months, the sound of the metal clicking into place like muscle memory. She tucks it into the back of her waistband.

Dexter glances at her but says nothing, checking his own kit, sliding knives into the inner pockets of his jacket.

“It’s not a kill,” she reminds him, voice steady but shaking underneath. “It’s a rescue.”

He doesn’t look up. “He kind of deserves it, though.”

“Yeah,” she mutters, zipping the bag, “but Wallace, Quinn  - all of it - we don’t spill blood unless we have to.”

He nods once. “Then let’s make sure we don’t have to.”

They leave fast.

The drive is silent, tension humming between them like static. Rain hits the windshield in slow, heavy drops, each one a drip of dread. Streetlights smear across the wet glass.

All she can think about is Harrison - his laugh, his anger, the fragile peace they’d just found. Her fault. Her goddamn fault.

When they turn off the main road, she directs him down a half-abandoned industrial strip. “Left here.” she says. Her throat feels raw.

Dexter kills the headlights two blocks out. The building rises from the dark like something half-remembered - corrugated metal, rust bleeding down the walls, a faded sign overhead that once said BRONX SUPPLY CO.

The same place. She feels it in her bones.

They get out. The air carries the smell of rain and decay.

Dexter grabs his tools; she draws her gun. They move side by side, instincts in sync, ghosts of old habits falling into step. The side door’s hanging off one hinge - no lock, no alarm.

Inside, the darkness feels alive. Damp air clings to her skin, the scent of mildew and something sharper - old oil, dried blood, rust. Every footstep echoes too loud.

Each room they clear is worse than the last. Empty chairs. Hooks in the ceiling. Piles of dust-covered mannequins, some broken, some painted in flesh tones, their faces twisted mid-expression.

Prater’s trophies.

The memories hit like static - her voice shouting orders, the thud of a body hitting the floor, her shaking hands washing blood from her wrists. For years she told herself she was saving lives. Now all she sees is how much of herself she lost.

“Deb,” Dexter whispers from behind her, but then-

A sound.

A groan, low and human.

She runs toward it before he can stop her. Gun raised.

Harrison sits slumped in a chair in the center of the room, duct tape over his mouth, wrists bound, head drooping forward. Sweat glistens on his forehead, but he’s breathing. Alive.

“Harrison!” Dexter’s voice breaks behind her, half shout, half prayer.

She takes one step forward-

-and Nelson lunges from the shadows.

Gun raised.

“Stay where you are!” he snarls. His face is slick with sweat, his arm bandaged with a dirty rag. “You cost me everything, Bay Harbor Butcher.” He spits the name like a curse. “My mother’s dying, my network’s dead, and the only name that still scares people is yours.”

His gaze shifts to her, eyes burning. “And you - his conscience. Cute act.”

She doesn’t think. She acts.

One squeeze of the trigger.

The shot cracks through the room, the recoil familiar and sickening. The bullet grazes his arm; the gun in his hand clatters to the floor. He stumbles back, clutching his shoulder, blood dark against his shirt.

“I won’t let you take him,” she says, breath ragged, hands trembling but steady on the gun. “But I’m not you, Dex.”

Nelson groans, retreating a step. Harrison stirs, eyes fluttering open, a muffled sound escaping his gag.

And Deb feels it then - the old adrenaline, the old power - rushing through her veins like fire and guilt all at once.

For one heartbeat, she’s back in the life she thought she’d buried.

For a moment, there’s only sound - his own pulse roaring in his ears, a low, thunderous rush that drowns out everything else.

Then he moves.

He’s on Nelson before thought can catch up. The Dark Passenger is already awake - stretching, smiling, savoring. Dexter grabs Nelson by the collar and slams him into the wall hard enough to shake dust from the rafters.

The knife is in his hand before he even remembers drawing it.

Blood smears under his grip, slick and hot where Nelson’s shoulder wound leaks down his arm. The smell of it - metallic, familiar, right - floods his senses.

“You wanted the Bay Harbor Butcher?” Dexter growls, his voice rough with something feral. “Here I am.”

He presses the blade to Nelson’s throat, just enough to make skin dimple, to feel the tremor of the man’s pulse under the steel. One small push, one clean slice, and it would all be over.

Nelson’s eyes flash, defiant even through the fear. “You think killing Prater made you clean?” he spits, the blood from his mouth spraying Dexter’s cheek. “You’re still the product. Just another freak in a suit.”

Dexter’s jaw tightens. The Passenger burns low, pleased, whispering the familiar song of release.

One cut, one silence. End it. Make it stop.

The world narrows to Nelson’s throat, the vein pulsing there like a target painted by fate itself.

He hears Deb shout something - but her voice sounds far away, muffled by the pulse in his ears.

Then her hand touches his shoulder. Light, trembling, real.

“Dex,” she says again, closer this time, raw and human. “Don’t.”

He blinks. The fog wavers.

Her hand slides higher, over the tense muscle of his arm. She’s shaking, but her touch steadies him. “Look at me.”

He does.

And for a second, the warehouse flickers - the smell of rust and blood is replaced by antiseptic, by the memory of her in the bath, her head against his chest. Her breath, her warmth. Her love.

Then another voice - Harrison’s, weak but alive, cutting through the fog. “Dad… please. If you kill him, that’s all you’ll ever be.”

The words strike deeper than the blade could ever go.

Dexter freezes.

The knife trembles in his hand, his reflection staring back at him in the polished steel. He sees himself - eyes wild, face slick with sweat, looking more like prey than predator.

Slowly, he exhales.

He flips the knife in his grip - hilt-first - and smashes it across Nelson’s jaw. The man crumples to the ground with a strangled groan, blood running from his lip.

Non-lethal. Barely.

“You don’t get to die easy,” Dexter says, voice flat, empty. “You don’t get to make me that again.”

He rips duct tape from a crate, the sound loud and tearing in the silence, and binds Nelson’s wrists tight. The man curses under his breath, weak and furious, but Dexter ignores him.

The Dark Passenger snarls inside, wounded and restless, denied its offering.

One kill. Just one. You’d sleep tonight.

He pushes it down.

No.

Deb exhales beside him - a sound halfway between relief and exhaustion. For one fragile heartbeat, there’s quiet.

Then - sirens.

Faint at first, then rising. Echoing off the metal walls.

“Shit.” Dexter mutters.

He turns, dropping to Harrison’s side. Deb’s already there, ripping the tape from her nephew’s wrists, her hands trembling as she pulls the gag away.

“Harrison, hey, look at me,” she says, voice breaking. “You’re okay, we’ve got you.”

The boy blinks, dazed, eyes darting between them. “Dad?”

Dexter’s chest tightens at the word. He grabs the ropes around Harrison’s ankles, slicing them clean with the same knife that nearly spilled another man’s life seconds ago.

“Can you stand?” he asks, quieter now, the danger replaced by something heavier - guilt, love, the aftertaste of blood he didn’t spill.

Harrison nods shakily. “Yeah. I think so.”

Dexter helps him up, one arm steadying his son’s weight, the other still clutching the knife. His pulse won’t slow. His skin feels too tight.

Behind them, Nelson groans again, shifting against the tape.

Deb looks at him, then at Dexter. “Leave him. Cops’ll find him soon enough.”

Dexter nods once. His voice is low, almost tender. “Let them.”

They half-carry Harrison toward the exit. The sirens are closer now, lights flashing faintly through the grime-streaked windows.

As they move through the room, toward a side door exit, Dexter catches his reflection in a broken mirror - blood on his cheek, shadows under his eyes, the knife glinting in his hand.

For a heartbeat, he sees the Dark Passenger staring back.

He doesn’t look away.

Because this time, the monster didn’t win. Not tonight.

Claudette hears the sirens before she sees the light - three distinct tones layered over each other, like notes in a chord. Her brain catalogs them automatically: two patrol cars, one ambulance. She turns down her music - not off, never off - and slips her headphones around her neck. The faint hum of Staying Alive remains, a filter between her and the chaos.

The warehouse smells of rust, mildew, and copper - blood that’s already drying. She steps through the side door just as three figures appear in the corridor ahead: Dexter Morgan, Debra Morgan, and Harrison Morgan.

All three stop.

The lights flicker overhead. Claudette’s eyes move fast, scanning details in fragments - the gun in Debra’s right hand, safety off. The knife in Dexter’s left. Blood spatter on his sleeve, but not on his palms. The bound man groaning behind them.

She speaks before greeting them. “You’re leaving a scene.”

Deb freezes. Dexter doesn’t. His posture shifts, protective, almost imperceptibly. Claudette notes the micro-movement - the step forward, half an inch. Defensive behavior.

“Detective Wallace,” Dexter says evenly. “We were getting my son out.”

Claudette doesn’t answer. She’s already assembling it, the visual equations forming behind her eyes.

Blood on the floor - drops, not spray. Indicates low-velocity bleeding. Single graze wound. Distance: two to three meters. Entry angle - high right. Shooter shorter than target. Debra. Not a kill shot. Intentional.

She walks past them toward the restrained man. “Nelson Blacksmith,” she says aloud, confirming the mental file. “Alive. Good.”

Nelson groans something incoherent - maybe a curse. She doesn’t respond. She crouches, studying the tape binding his wrists. “You used duct tape. Brand matches the crate behind you. You tore it unevenly.”

“Yeah,” Deb mutters. “Wasn’t exactly time for craft hour.”

Claudette doesn’t react to tone. “Tape pattern is angled. Right-handed binder. Dexter.”

She stands, turns back to him. “This isn’t self-defense,” she says flatly. “This is choreography.”

Deb bristles. “Congratulations, Sherlock.”

“I don’t need congratulations.” Claudette’s eyes flick back and forth between them, cataloging the way their breathing syncs - slow, measured. “I need truth. Your truth never matches the evidence.”

Dexter’s expression doesn’t shift. “He kidnapped my son. We found him like this.”

Her head tilts, sharp. “Kidnapping fits. Scene control doesn’t. You cleaned something before I arrived.”

“I wiped blood off my nephew,” Deb snaps. “That’s what you’re smelling.”

Claudette ignores the sarcasm. She studies the younger one – Harrison - tape residue across his mouth, rope burns circling his wrists. His pupils are dilated but tracking. Pulse rapid. Shock.

“Pulse one-twenty,” she murmurs without meaning to. “Fear, not guilt.”

Deb frowns. “What?”

Claudette blinks once. “Nothing.”

Her gaze shifts upward. Ceiling beams, rust patterns. Water drips near the north wall - three drops every two seconds. She follows them with her eyes, grounding herself in rhythm before looking back.

“You two breathe like people who kill,” she says quietly. “Slow. Measured. Relieved after impact.”

Neither denies it.

For a few seconds, the only sound is the sirens fading outside.

Then Claudette exhales through her nose, slow. She knows she’s close - too close - but not close enough to prove it. “I can’t prove it,” she says finally, voice matter-of-fact. “Yet.”

She keys her radio, tone flattening further. “Suspect in custody. Two witnesses on scene. Possible self-defense. Scene secure.”

Her eyes linger on Dexter a beat longer than necessary. “I’ll see you both again,” she says. “Soon.”

It isn’t a threat. It’s data.

She turns away, slipping her headphones back over her ears. Music swells - a quiet fugue, precise and mathematical - and she walks past the uniforms flooding in, their boots clattering on wet concrete.

Behind her, she can hear Nelson being loaded onto a gurney, cursing Dexter’s name. She files the sound away, a timestamp in her mind.

Out in the cold air, Claudette closes her eyes and replays the scene - the distance between blood droplets, the angle of Dexter’s stance, the faint tremor in Debra’s hands when she lied.

The pattern is incomplete. But patterns always finish themselves, eventually.

She opens her eyes to the blur of blue lights and rain, whispering almost to herself, “The Bay Harbor Butcher breathes.”

Then she walks toward her car, the music growing louder, drowning out everything else.

When they step outside, the rain hits like punishment.

Cold, hard drops slam against the warehouse roof, spilling down in sheets as they step out into the downpour. The air smells like metal and filth and something cleaner now - ozone, bleach from the EMTs, the sterile scent of aftermath.

Claudette’s already walking away, headphones on, head tilted slightly as if listening to music only she can hear. The flashing blue lights paint her in strobes - clinical, alien - and then she disappears into the chaos outside.

Deb stands there, soaked in seconds, the chill cutting through her sweatshirt, through her skin. Harrison’s wedged between her and Dexter, shivering, pale. His face looks smaller under the ambulance lights - too young, too scared, too much like she used to feel after every raid with Prater.

She knows they’ll be taken in. Questioned. Photographed. Another round of lies to stack on top of all the others.

Dexter looks over at her, hair plastered to his forehead, eyes distant and dark.

“She knows.” he says quietly.

“Yeah,” Deb murmurs, her voice almost lost in the rain. “She always fucking knows. She just can’t prove it.”

They hold each other’s gaze for a long second across Harrison’s shoulder. The boy’s weight between them is both grounding and unbearable.

An EMT waves them forward. Nelson is being wheeled toward an ambulance, his arm strapped and blood soaking through a makeshift bandage. His muffled curses carry over the sirens, words she can’t make out but knows are about them. About Dexter.

She swallows hard. The fatigue hits in waves now - heavy and deep, crawling through her bones. “They’re gonna separate us,” she says under her breath. “Ask questions. We need to get our stories straight.”

Dexter nods once, curt, precise. “He came after Harrison. You fired. Non-lethal. Self-defense.”

“And you?” she asks quietly.

He hesitates. “I restrained him until backup arrived.”

She looks up at him, water dripping from her lashes. “That’s not the truth.”

He meets her eyes. “It’s close enough.”

She huffs out a small, broken laugh, the kind that sounds more like disbelief than amusement. “Close enough for you is a fucking miracle.”

For a moment, neither of them says anything. The sirens wail, paramedics shout, flashlights cut through the rain. She can feel her pulse in her healing arm, every beat throbbing under wet bandages.

She leans in, her lips close to his ear, voice barely more than breath. “You almost killed him.”

Dexter turns toward her slightly, water dripping from his jaw, his expression unreadable. “I wanted to.” he says simply. No defense. No remorse. Just truth.

She nods slowly, rainwater tracing cold lines down her neck. “But you didn’t,” she whispers. Her tone softens, a fragile thing in the storm. “Maybe that’s enough.”

He doesn’t respond right away, and she doesn’t press.

Harrison shifts between them, glancing up through wet lashes. “So, what are we now?” he asks hoarsely. “Heroes?”

Dexter almost smiles, a weary curve that never reaches his eyes. “No,” he says. “Survivors.”

Deb looks at him, then at Harrison. The boy’s trembling. She reaches up, brushing wet hair from his face, her hand gentle despite the tremor in her own fingers.

The rain keeps falling, relentless, washing blood from the concrete until it runs down the gutter in thin red threads.

She tilts her head back, eyes closing, letting it hit her face. She can almost pretend it’s cleansing. Almost.

When she opens them again, Claudette’s car lights are disappearing down the street.

“She’s not done.” Deb says quietly.

“Neither are we.” Dexter replies.

And with that, they follow the EMTs toward the ambulance lights - three soaked silhouettes moving through the storm, bound by love, by blood, and by something far darker that still refuses to let them go.

Chapter Text

“One need not be a chamber to be haunted,

One need not be a house;

The brain has corridors surpassing

Material place.” – One need not be a Chamber to be Haunted by Emily Dickinson

The first sound Deb hears is the low thrum of dryers from the laundromat below, a steady mechanical heartbeat under the city noise.

She wakes to it, bone-tired, her body stiff and sore, curled into the corner of the narrow cot she and Dexter have been sharing. The thin blanket is scratchy against her skin. Her muscles ache; her arm throbs under the fresh bandages. Even breathing hurts a little.

She blinks at the cracked ceiling. The light leaking through the window blinds is the dull gray of early morning, that hour when night hasn’t quite let go. Her head feels stuffed with cotton, heavy from too little sleep and too many questions.

The precinct feels like a fever dream now - too bright, too long. She’d sat under that buzzing fluorescent light for hours, answering Claudette Wallace’s quiet, relentless questions. Dexter in another room. Harrison somewhere down the hall. Too many words. Too many cracks. There’s no way all three of them told the same story. There hadn’t been time to plan, to sync.

And now, time is exactly what they don’t have.

She rolls onto her side and peers over the edge of the cot. Harrison lies on the floor in a sleeping bag, half-asleep, half-tortured by the things replaying in his head. His face twitches, his body turning, the kid restless even in dreams. He’s trying to be strong, trying to be normal, but she knows the kind of silence that comes after interrogation - it sticks to your bones.

Dexter isn’t beside her. She turns her head and finds him across the small room, hunched over a metal table. The glow of his laptop cuts across his face, throwing deep shadows under his eyes. Prater’s files are spread out around him - stained pages, manila folders, scrawled notes. His stubble is dark, uneven; he looks like he hasn’t eaten or slept in days.

The air smells faintly of metal and rain drifting in through the cracked window. Somewhere outside, a siren wails and fades.

They were released from the precinct late last night - no charges, no proof. Just questions that sliced too close. Claudette’s eyes haunt her most. The way she’d studied Dexter - not just looking at him, but reading him, like she could see every kill stitched under his skin.

Deb pulls the thin blanket tighter around herself. The interrogation had gone beyond Nelson’s kidnapping and the warehouse. Claudette’s questions had turned personal, invasive - why she’d faked her death, where she’d been for eleven years, why she and Dexter acted like more than siblings. She’d dodged what she could, asked for a lawyer halfway through, but she’d seen the flicker of recognition in Claudette’s eyes: You’re lying. And I can prove it. Not yet - but soon.

The memory makes her stomach twist.

She sits up slowly, her joints protesting, and whispers, “Are you ever gonna sleep?”

Dexter doesn’t look up. “Can’t.” His fingers keep moving over the keyboard, steady, methodical.

She knows what he’s doing - running searches, tracing old contacts, scanning patterns of movement, maybe planning the next safehouse. Always one step ahead. Always pretending control.

Her voice is soft, rasped by exhaustion. “She’s circling, Dex. She’s not gonna fucking stop this time.”

He finally glances up, eyes sharp even in the half-light. “Then we move before she does.”

The words hang in the air, practical and cold.

From the floor, Harrison’s voice breaks through the quiet - rough, still caught between sleep and fear. “You think she knows? Like… really knows?”

Dexter exhales slowly. “She doesn’t know.” He pauses, the faintest tremor in his tone. “She feels it. That’s worse.”

Silence.

The city presses in around them. The pipes clank. Rain begins again outside, a slow patter against the windowpane.

Deb watches them both - the man she can’t stop loving and the boy she’d die to protect - and feels the walls of the tiny room closing in. Claudette’s face won’t leave her mind. Neither will Quinn’s voice, his warning echoing like an old wound.

They’re running out of space. Out of chances.

And as she sits there in the dim, gray morning, watching Dexter’s shoulders tense over the keyboard, she realizes the thing she’s been avoiding since last night at the warehouse:

They’re not just running from Claudette anymore.

They’re running from the ending that’s been waiting for them since Miami.

They spend the day locked inside the safehouse, curtains drawn, lights dimmed. The air feels thick, wrong. Every hour seems to crawl slower than the last.

Dexter works at the small metal table by the wall, his laptop screen casting his face in a pale blue glow. The light sharpens the edges of his exhaustion - the faint tremor in his hands, the tight set of his jaw. His focus is relentless. Prater’s files are still spread before him like like a map of madness.

Deb can’t sit still. The walls feel too close, the ceiling too low. She paces between the bed and the window, her socks sliding on the warped wooden floor. The sound of the city outside filters through in fragments - honking, muffled music, sirens that rise and fade like waves.

They’d ordered Chinese food hours ago, but it sits forgotten, half-empty cartons leaking soy sauce onto the table.

Harrison’s in the bathroom, the steady sound of the shower filling the silence - a rhythmic hiss that almost drowns out the rest of the world. Almost.

Then her phone buzzes.

It’s a soft sound, almost nothing, but it cuts through the air like a knife.

Dexter’s eyes flick toward it, his expression unreadable. Before he can reach for it, Deb snatches it up.

One glance at the screen makes her stomach twist. Joey.

For a second, she just stares at the name, thumb hovering. She should let it go to voicemail. She knows that. But something inside her - the part that still remembers laughter, sunlight, normal life - makes her answer.

“Deb.”

His voice is lower than she remembers. Rough, tired. Maybe drunk. Maybe just done.

“You didn’t take my advice,” he says. “You never fucking do.”

Her chest tightens. “Joey, please don’t-”

“No, just listen.” His breath is uneven, like he’s pacing too. “Wallace has people pulling old Miami files. She’s cross-checking blood reports, missing persons, everything. It’s gonna stick this time, Deb.”

She sinks onto the edge of the bed, phone pressed to her ear. The sheet beneath her is rough, smelling of dust and cheap detergent.

He pauses. When he speaks again, his voice cracks, quieter. “And I know you. You’re gonna go down with him, aren’t you?”

The silence stretches.

“Jesus, Deb. You’re throwing your whole life away for that guy.”

Her throat tightens. She closes her eyes, voice trembling but steady when it comes out. “My life is him.”

There’s a beat - no words, just breathing.

Then softly: “Then I hope he’s worth dying for.”

She can’t tell if it’s anger or heartbreak in his voice. Maybe both.

“Don’t call again, Joey.” It’s the lie she tells herself as much as him - that she can hang up and walk away from everything that still hurts.

“I won’t,” he says, voice distant now. “But when they come for him… don’t say I didn’t try to save you.”

The line goes dead.

She sets the phone down, staring at it. Her hands shake.

Over eleven years, and he still loves her. Through everything - the lies, the faked death, the impossible truth of who she really is. He’d still take her back, even now.

She feels the ache of it settle deep in her ribs. In another life, she could’ve loved him right. They could’ve had a house, a kid, Sunday mornings that smelled like coffee and normalcy. He would’ve been good for her. Safe.

But this isn’t that life.

She looks up and sees Dexter - still at the table, the faint light from the laptop haloing his face. The man who’s broken her life apart and somehow made it the only one she can live. The one she keeps choosing, even knowing he’ll destroy her in the end.

He looks up, sensing her eyes on him. “Quinn?” he asks, voice flat, calm.

She nods, slipping the phone into her pocket. “Yeah.”

“What did he say?”

She exhales, the air shuddering out of her lungs. “That he still gives a damn. And that I’m a fucking idiot.”

Dexter studies her for a moment, his gaze soft but unflinching. “He’s half right.”

Her laugh comes out cracked, like it doesn’t remember how to sound. “Yeah. I know.”

The rain outside thickens, a hard, rhythmic hiss against the glass. Harrison’s still in the shower - the water a steady curtain of sound that makes this small pocket of time feel suspended.

Deb stands, moves toward Dexter. The floorboards creak under her bare feet.

He turns slightly in his chair, watching her come closer, something wary and tender behind his eyes.

She stops beside him, looking down at his hands - steady, cold, the hands of someone who’s killed for her more times than she can count.

“You shouldn’t have to keep choosing me.” he says quietly.

“I already did.” Her voice is soft, final.

For a long moment neither of them moves.

Then she leans down, presses her mouth to his.

It isn’t a hungry kiss; it’s tired, certain, the kind that says I know what I’m giving up.

His hand rises, hesitates, then finds the back of her neck.

The laptop light flickers across their faces - blue, gray, and achingly human.

When she pulls back, she whispers against his lips, “You’re not the better choice, Dex… you’re just the only one I can live with.”

He breathes out her name, almost a prayer.

The rain keeps falling.

And in the cramped heat of the safehouse, Debra Morgan finally stops pretending she wants to be saved.

Morning comes pale and washed out, the color of cigarette ash. The air in the safehouse feels stale, recycled through too many nights without sleep.

Deb stands by the bed, stuffing clothes into a duffel bag. Her bandaged arm throbs with every movement, but she doesn’t stop. They’ve learned not to linger anywhere too long.

Dexter moves quietly around her - efficient, calm, terrifyingly methodical. He folds his few clothes with surgical precision, checks the burner phones he’d acquired – they’d decided to get rid of their phones the night before, after Quinn’s call – due to the risk. He checks the cash, the fake IDs. Harrison’s voice drifts from the bathroom, humming off-key as he brushes his teeth. The sound should be comforting. Instead, it makes her chest tighten.

She glances at Dexter. “You think he’s holding up?”

Dexter doesn’t answer at first. He’s at the window, hand frozen on the curtain. The color drains from his face.

“Dex?”

He doesn’t move. Just whispers, “Don’t look obvious. Just… move slow.”

Something in his voice makes her blood go cold. She crosses to him anyway and peers out through the narrow gap in the curtain.

Below, two unmarked cars idle along the curb. Headlights off. No movement, no sirens - just the stillness of predators waiting for the right breath to strike.

Claudette.

“Fuck.” Deb mutters, heartbeat thudding in her ears.

Dexter’s voice is barely audible. “We’ve got to move. Now.”

She kills the lights without thinking. The room plunges into dim morning gray. Shadows stretch across the walls.

“Grab what matters.” she says.

He glances at his knife roll - the one constant in every escape. His hand hovers above it, then curls into a fist. He leaves it behind. Too risky. Too much blood already tied to them.

From the bathroom, Harrison’s muffled voice: “What’s going on?”

Deb moves fast, whisper-shouting, “We’re leaving. Shoes on, no questions.”

He steps out, toothbrush still in his mouth, eyes wide when he catches their faces. “Is it-”

“Go.” Dexter’s tone leaves no room for argument.

They slip into the stairwell, the door closing behind them with a soft click. The concrete steps echo under their feet. The building feels claustrophobic. Somewhere above, a pipe groans.

Then a voice crackles faintly through the stairwell radio:

“Units, move. East entrance first.”

Claudette’s voice. Calm. Even. Curious. Not angry.

The sound makes Deb’s stomach twist. She’s heard cops bark orders before - panicked, loud, messy. But Claudette sounds like she’s conducting an autopsy.

Dexter stops halfway down the stairs, scanning the shadows. “Basement. This way.”

They move fast but careful, slipping through a rusted door into a boiler room that reeks of old water and burned dust. Pipes line the ceiling like arteries; condensation drips steadily into puddles that catch the flicker of the emergency light.

They crouch behind the boiler, breathing shallow.

Above them, footsteps. Muffled voices. Claudette’s monotone carries through the vents.

“Blood near the drain. Coffee mugs - three. Two adults, one male adolescent. They left less than an hour ago.”

Dexter’s eyes flick toward Deb’s - wide, alert. Every syllable Claudette speaks is like a fingerprint pressed into their lives.

“Jesus Christ,” Deb whispers. “She’s like you.”

He shakes his head slowly. “No. She’s better.”

They stay like that - crouched, silent - as more voices join hers. The scrape of boots, the thump of drawers opening. Claudette narrates every detail like a machine parsing data.

“Shower used recently. Towels still damp. Trash empty. Intentional. They clean as they flee.”

Deb feels the air grow hotter, her pulse loud in her ears. Sweat beads down her neck. The tang of steam fills her mouth.

Above them, Claudette’s voice lowers.

“Check the back exit. They’re watching the windows.”

Dexter presses a finger to his lips. They wait. One minute. Two. The footsteps fade. The stairwell door slams somewhere distant.

Only then does he exhale.

They slip out the side maintenance door, into the narrow alley behind the laundromat. The light outside is sharp and colorless. The city bustles - buses, car horns, the rhythm of a day that doesn’t know what almost happened.

Harrison’s breathing is ragged as they move down the alley, Deb’s hand firm on his back. Dexter glances once over his shoulder at the building.

They’ve made it. Again. But barely.

Deb looks at him, her voice raw. “She’s closing in, Dex. Faster than anyone ever has.”

He doesn’t respond, just takes her hand and keeps walking.

The sun climbs higher, lighting the street like nothing happened at all.

But for Deb, it feels like the world just lost another layer of air - thinner, tighter, harder to breathe.

Hours later, they find another hiding place - an abandoned storage unit at the edge of the city. The roar of traffic from the nearby freeway fills the silence.

Harrison’s already asleep, wrapped in a thin blanket in the corner. His breathing is uneven but deep - the kind that comes only after days of running, fear, and too many close calls.

Deb watches him for a moment, her chest aching. He looks younger when he sleeps, softer. Like the kid he was in Miami, before everything.

Dexter sits against the opposite wall, knees bent, hands resting loosely on them. His face is shadowed, pale in the dim light spilling through the metal slats of the door. He’s staring at his hands - the same hands that have killed, that have saved, that have touched her like she’s something worth protecting.

She crosses the concrete floor quietly and sinks down beside him. The floor is cold beneath her, but his shoulder is warm when she leans against it.

For a long time, neither of them speaks. The city is loud beyond the walls – a shout, a horn, a dog barking once and falling silent again.

Finally, Deb breaks the silence. Her voice is hoarse, low.

“Every time I think we’re done,” she murmurs, “it just fucking starts over.”

Dexter exhales, slow, tired. “That’s what survival is.”

She lets out a broken laugh. “Survival. Right. You ever think maybe we’re just delaying the inevitable? Just running from a bullet that’s already got our fucking names on it?”

He doesn’t answer. Just shifts slightly so their arms brush. The contact feels electric, grounding.

She stares down at their hands. His fingers twitch, restless - like he’s fighting the urge to reach for something, or someone, or maybe just the knife he left behind.

Quietly, she says, “I keep thinking about Angel. What he saw in you… in us.”

Dexter’s voice is soft. “He wasn’t wrong.”

“No,” she whispers. “But he wasn’t right either.”

They sit there in the quiet that follows, the kind that feels heavier than words.

She turns her head to look at him - at the dark circles under his eyes, the faint stubble along his jaw, the exhaustion carved into every line of his face. He looks like hell. But he’s here. Alive. So is she. So is Harrison.

And for now, that has to be enough.

“Dex,” she says, her voice trembling now, “if this is all we ever are - running, hiding, cleaning up blood and pretending it’s normal - then I guess that’s fine. I just…”

She stops, biting her lip, trying to find the words.

He turns to her, watching, waiting.

“I’m done pretending I want redemption,” she says finally. “I don’t. I just want you. Even if it fucking kills me.”

Something flickers behind his eyes - pain, love, maybe both. He reaches out and takes her hand, his fingers wrapping around hers with a kind of desperate gentleness.

“I don’t deserve you.” he says.

“Yeah,” she mutters, eyes glistening. “But you’ve got me anyway.”

The silence stretches again, but it’s different now - thicker, intimate. She shifts closer, until her knees brush his. His breath ghosts across her cheek.

He hesitates, then cups her face with one calloused hand. His thumb traces the edge of her jaw, slow, reverent, as if memorizing her.

When he kisses her, it’s soft - not hungry, not rushed, but the kind of kiss that feels like an ending disguised as comfort. The kind that says everything they can’t put into words.

Her fingers curl into his shirt, pulling him closer. His other hand slides to her waist, holding her like he’s afraid she’ll vanish if he lets go.

When they pull apart, their foreheads rest together, breaths mingling.

“This won’t end well.” she whispers.

“I know,” he murmurs. “But for now, it’s us.”

Her eyes close. “Always has been.”

They lie down together on the cold concrete floor, her head against his chest, his arm around her. The faint sound of traffic seeps through the walls - the constant pulse of the city that keeps moving no matter who bleeds in its shadows.

Deb listens to his heartbeat - slow, steady, human - and feels something in her unclench.

The world outside keeps turning.

For tonight, they don’t have to.

Chapter Text

“The woods are lovely dark and deep,

But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep,

And miles to go before I sleep.” – Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening by Robert Frost

Morning creeps slow through the cracks in the storage unit’s metal door - thin blades of light cutting through dust. The city drones faintly in the distance, a low vibration beneath the silence.

For the first time in days, it’s quiet.

Harrison stirs in his blanket pile, groggy, running a hand through his hair. He mumbles something about air, about being suffocated, and before either of them can answer, he’s already slipping out the side door. Just a minute, he says. Just to breathe.

Deb’s half-asleep beside Dexter, her head on his chest, her hand still curled in his shirt. The faint rise and fall of her breathing syncs with his heartbeat. It feels almost like peace.

Then-

A sound.

Metal scraping metal. Soft. Deliberate.

Dexter’s eyes snap open. The hair on his arms lifts. There’s a low rattle from the main door, the kind you only hear from the outside - someone testing the latch.

He freezes, breath shallow, pulse already counting outcomes.

Boots. Muffled, measured. The quiet rhythm of training.

He sits up fast. “Deb.” he whispers.

She blinks awake, confusion giving way to awareness. Her gaze locks on his face, then on the door. The color drains from hers.

Outside, the faintest murmur of a radio. Then silence.

The smell shifts - cold air and oil, then the sharp sting of metal and gasoline.

They move without words. Dexter’s already on his feet, scanning for any other exits. There aren’t any.

Deb grabs her jeans, half-pulls them on. “How the fuck-”

“They found us.” His voice is calm but his pulse hammers against his throat. “The burners.”

“Shit.”

He glances toward the side door - the one Harrison slipped out of earlier. It’s still ajar, rain-slick light spilling in from outside.

Empty. Open. Exposed.

They can’t run that way - not without walking straight into a crossfire. The risk is too high.

A flicker of relief cuts through the panic, sharp and fleeting. At least Harrison’s not in here. Not trapped with them.

And then, from outside the door:

“Two adults. One adolescent. No windows. No other exits.”

Claudette’s voice. Calm. Precise. Like a scientist confirming data.

Deb’s breath catches. “Fuck.”

Dexter moves to the wall, presses his back to the cool metal. His mind races through maps - the distance between units, the weight of the door, the angle of entry. Tactical team means at least six. Probably more. Claudette’s learned from the warehouse.

He hears the shuffle of boots repositioning - one pair to the right, one to the left, one staying dead center. Claudette’s pacing pattern. He can feel it through the floor.

“Dex…” Deb’s whisper cracks. “You have to take Harrison and run.”

“I’m not leaving you.”

“You can’t fight them all. She’s not gonna stop until-”

“Until what?” he snaps, too low to carry. “Until she proves what she already knows?”

They lock eyes - two fugitives who stopped believing in redemption long ago.

Outside, Claudette’s voice carries again, steady as ever.

“Morgan. I know you’re in there. Both of you. There’s nowhere left to go.”

No threat. No emotion. Just truth.

Deb exhales, trembling. “She doesn’t even sound human.”

Dexter listens to the faint whine of the latch being loosened, the shuffle of movement outside. His voice drops to a whisper. “She’s not angry, Deb. She’s certain.”

The first clack of the bolt echoes through the small metal room, loud, echoing.

Deb’s hand finds his instinctively. Cold. Tight.

And as the door starts to rise - slow, deliberate, light slicing across the floor - Dexter knows this is the end of running.

Not yet the end of them.

But close.

The sound of the latch feels like a countdown.

It clicks once. Twice.

And then the door groans open.

Light cuts through the dim storage unit in a thin, merciless strip. Dust swirls in the air like ghosts stirred awake. Deb’s heart hammers so hard she can taste blood in her mouth.

Dexter’s hand is tight around hers, cold and steady, but she can feel what he’s trying to hide - the pulse in his wrist, thudding out a rhythm that matches her own panic.

The door rises higher, metal scraping metal, the noise dragging like teeth across her nerves.

Then boots.

Measured. Purposeful. Not the panic of a raid, but the inevitability of someone who’s already won.

And then Claudette Wallace steps through the light.

No helmet. No vest.

Just her badge, her calm, her gun lowered but ready. Headphones hang around her neck, the faint hum of Stayin’ Alive still leaking through - the eerie calm that always makes Deb’s skin crawl.

Her eyes move fast. Not human-fast - machine-fast.

Three blankets. One duffel bag. A small pillow still indented from a head.

Then to them: Dexter standing just in front of Deb, her hand still in his; the damp hair on her neck sticking to her skin; the faint bruise along Dexter’s jaw; the fear in their stillness.

“Two adults,” Claudette says softly. “One adolescent. No windows. No other exits.”

Her tone isn’t cruel. It’s factual. Like she’s confirming a lab result.

Deb’s throat tightens, her voice a rasp. “You’re not supposed to be here alone.”

“I don’t like noise,” Claudette says simply. “It gets in the way.”

She steps forward. The faint scent of rain and gun oil follows her.

And then, behind them -

A sound.

“Dad-”

Harrison bursts back through the side door, breathing hard, sweat and fear all over his face. “They’re outside. Cops are everywhere. There’s no way out.”

Deb spins on him. “Jesus Christ, Harrison, what the fuck are you doing?!”

Tears sting her eyes before she even realizes she’s crying. “You were supposed to run!”

“I’m not leaving you!” he yells back, voice cracking. “I’m not leaving either of you again!”

Claudette’s gaze flicks toward him, then back to Dexter. “He came back,” she murmurs, half to herself, like she’s making a note in her head. “Pattern of attachment. Predictable.”

“Don’t,” Deb snaps. “Don’t talk about him like that.”

Claudette looks at her - really looks. “Then how should I talk about you?”

Deb’s voice catches in her throat. “Like a person who’s had enough.”

Claudette studies her face for a long, unblinking second. “You’re bleeding through your bandage,” she says softly. “That means adrenaline’s peaking. Fear response. Fight or flight.” Her eyes shift to Dexter. “You’ve trained yourself for neither. You freeze. You calculate.”

Dexter’s voice is quiet. Controlled. “You’ve been busy.”

“I read patterns,” Claudette says, her voice steady. “And I’ve been reading yours for a long time.”

She tilts her head slightly. “You killed Prater. You dismantled his network. Nelson went rogue because of you. Your sister-” she glances at Deb.  “died and didn’t. The Bay Harbor Butcher died in Miami and reappeared in Manhattan. You didn’t even bother changing your rituals.”

Deb can’t breathe. It’s not anger in Claudette’s tone. It’s clarity. Truth delivered like data.

Dexter doesn’t flinch. He’s still, but something in his eyes shifts - like a man already writing the outcome in his head.

“You’re wrong,” Deb says. “You don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Claudette doesn’t look away. “You want me to say you kill bad people? That it balances out?” Her voice sharpens, just a little. “It doesn’t. Blood doesn’t cancel blood.”

Deb’s chest feels like it’s caving in. “He’s not what you think.”

“I know exactly what he is.”

And then Deb breaks. She doesn’t even feel it happen - just the tears spilling fast, hot down her face. “He saved me,” she says, choking on the words. “He fucking saved me when no one else could. He’s done things I’ll never understand, but I’m still here because of him.”

Claudette’s expression doesn’t change, but her eyes flick toward the faint scar on Deb’s arm, the way she’s trembling.

“He’s not your savior,” she says quietly. “He’s your mirror.”

Deb shakes her head hard, swallowing the sob clawing at her throat. “You don’t get it. You can’t.”

Claudette’s gaze softens just slightly. “Then explain it.”

Deb stares at Dexter - his face pale, eyes fixed on the floor, emotion buried deep beneath that calm. He looks like someone who’s already accepted the ending. It breaks her.

“Yeah,” she whispers. “He’s done terrible shit. But he’s the reason I’m still breathing. The reason Harrison’s breathing. He’s saved more lives than you ever will, and yeah, maybe that makes him a monster. But he’s the one I choose.”

The words rip through her, raw and honest.

Claudette takes a step closer, gun still down, her face unreadable. “You’re protecting him.”

“I’m loving him,” Deb snaps. Her voice trembles, but her eyes stay locked on Claudette’s. “And there’s a difference.”

The silence that follows feels endless.

Claudette studies her - really studies her - like she’s seeing something she can’t categorize, something that doesn’t fit the math.

“You kill monsters,” she says finally. “But you are one.”

Deb wipes at her face, her voice low and shaking. “Maybe. But I’m done pretending I’m not.”

She expects Claudette to raise the gun then. To finish what the system never could. But instead, the woman exhales - slow, deliberate. Her hand loosens on the weapon.

“Hold perimeter,” Claudette murmurs into her radio. “Suspects contained.”

A pause. Then, quieter, so only they can hear: “No entry until I give word.”

She turns back to them. “There’s a maintenance hatch behind the crates. South wall.”

Deb blinks. “You’re letting us go?”

Claudette’s tone doesn’t change. “You have three minutes.”

Dexter stares at her. “Why?”

Her gaze drifts - just for a second - to Harrison, standing there with wide, terrified eyes. Then back to Dexter. “Because he still has a chance not to become you.”

For the first time, Claudette’s voice wavers. Not much - but enough.

Deb doesn’t wait. She grabs Harrison by the arm, pushing him toward the back of the unit. “Go,” she whispers.

He hesitates. “Aunt Deb-”

“Go.”

Dexter follows last, his hand brushing Claudette’s shoulder as he passes. “You’ll never stop seeing it, will you?” he murmurs.

Claudette doesn’t look at him. “No,” she says. “That’s the curse.”

Deb looks back one last time before slipping through the hatch. Claudette stands in the light from the open door, motionless, the hum of her music barely audible. For a heartbeat, Deb almost sees something in her - pity, maybe. Understanding.

Then Claudette lifts her radio again.

“Units - move in.”

The door slams behind them.

They run.

The echo of Claudette’s voice fades behind them, clinical and calm, already reconstructing their absence.

And Deb knows, as the three of them spill into the tunnels behind the crates, that mercy like that doesn’t come twice.

The tunnel feels alive  - pulsing with the sound of the city above them, the vibration of pipes, the ghosts of a thousand footsteps that came before. The air is damp, the floor slick beneath their shoes. Every breath tastes like rust.

They move fast. Too fast. Harrison’s hand keeps brushing hers, shaking. Dexter’s flashlight slices through the dark, its beam bouncing across concrete and old graffiti. Somewhere behind them, the echo of boots - dozens of them - drawing closer.

“Left.” Dexter says quietly. His voice is steady, but it’s not calm. It’s something deeper - resolved.

They turn down another corridor. Deb’s lungs burn, her side stitches, her arm throbs beneath the half-healed bandage.

“Dex, where the fuck are we going?”

He doesn’t answer. Doesn’t even look back. Just keeps moving. The tunnel gets narrower, colder. The walls close in, dripping with condensation.

When he finally stops, it’s at a three-way junction - one tunnel leading deeper into shadow, one curving toward a distant puddle of water, one ending in collapsed concrete. He turns to them, breath ragged, flashlight trembling slightly in his hand.

“Here,” he says softly. “You’ll go this way.”

Deb stares at him. “What the fuck are you talking about?”

“Deb-”

“No.” Her voice cracks like a whip. “Don’t you fucking start with me. We’re not splitting up.”

Harrison steps forward, breath coming in shallow bursts. “Dad?”

Dexter looks at him, eyes soft, haunted. “If they take me, it’s over. For both of you. You’ll spend your whole life being my story - the Bay Harbor Butcher’s son. Deb will go down trying to protect me. And I can’t…” His voice breaks, barely audible. “I can’t do that to you. Either of you.”

“Stop.” Deb’s crying now, and it’s ugly - raw and shaking. “Don’t you dare say goodbye like this.”

He moves closer, takes her face in his hands. His palms are cold and rough. “You once told me you wanted me to be better.”

“I lied,” she chokes out. “You think I want this? You think I can fucking breathe without you?”

“You can,” he whispers. “You have to.”

“Dex, please…”

He leans his forehead against hers, their breaths tangling in the dark. His voice trembles when he speaks again. “Everything I touch breaks, Deb. You’re the only thing that didn’t.”

And then he kisses her.

It’s not fast. It’s not clean. It’s desperate, deep and shaking, and she’s sobbing against his mouth. It’s full of years of silence, of everything they buried and everything they couldn’t. And it feels too much like goodbye.

Her hands fist in his shirt, pulling him closer like she can hold him here, like sheer will could anchor him to this world.

She tastes salt and tears and fear. She doesn’t know if they’re hers or his.

When he pulls away, his voice is a whisper against her skin. “I love you.”

“Then stay.” she begs.

He steps back. Just one step. But it feels like miles.

Then he turns to Harrison.

The boy’s shaking, crying, trying to stand tall like his father. “We can still run,” he says, voice cracking. “We always run.”

Dexter stands in front of him. “Not this time.” His hands frame his son’s face, gentle, soft. “You’re not me, Harrison. Don’t ever be.”

“You don’t get to decide that!” Harrison’s voice breaks, loud in the tunnel.

Dexter’s eyes flick up, meet Deb’s again - a look that says you do.

Then he’s standing, shoving the flashlight into Deb’s hand. “When you hear them, you run.”

She grabs his wrist. “Don’t. Please, don’t.”

He looks at her one last time, the faintest smile flickering - sad, soft, human. “For once, just do what I say.”

And before she can say another word, he’s gone.

He turns down the right-hand tunnel, footsteps fading fast, swallowed by the dark.

“Dexter!” she screams, the sound tearing through her throat. “DEXTER!”

Her voice bounces off the walls, comes back smaller, emptier.

Harrison grabs her, arms around her waist, trying to pull her back. “Aunt Deb, stop - he wants us to go! He’s saving us!”

She thrashes against him, sobbing. “No! He doesn’t get to do this again!”

But he’s gone.

The air trembles with distant shouts.

“Suspect spotted!”

“Hands where I can see them!”

And then - gunfire.

Three sharp cracks that split the world apart.

Deb freezes. The sound echoes through the tunnels, vibrating in her ribs, in her teeth, in her skull.

Then silence.

No echo.

No shout.

Just silence.

Harrison’s still clutching her. Both of them shaking. The flashlight slips from her hand and clatters to the ground, beam spinning, throwing wild light across the wet walls.

“Dad…” Harrison whispers, voice breaking completely. “Dad, please.”

Deb’s chest caves. The sound he makes - that single word - rips through her worse than any bullet could.

She wants to run to him. She wants to go down that tunnel, drag him back from whatever’s waiting. But Harrison’s arms are locked around her. He’s shaking, whispering, “He told us to go. He told us to go.”

And she knows he’s right.

Her throat burns. The tears come faster now, unstoppable. “He promised me he wouldn’t leave.”

“He didn’t,” Harrison says, voice trembling. “He saved us.”

The words slice her open, because they’re true. And they hurt like hell.

She looks down the tunnel where he vanished. The flashlight beam catches on something - a smear of red on the wall, water dripping over it, thinning it out until it disappears.

She stares at it for a long time, her breath shaking, until finally, she nods. “Then we fucking live.” she says, voice raw and breaking.

They run.

When they emerge, the sun has risen high in the sky - light stretching across the city. The air outside feels wrong. Too quiet.

They stop in the alley behind an old building. Deb turns, just once, to look at the tunnel’s mouth. A line of steam drifts from it, fading into the air.

Nothing else.

No footsteps.

No silhouette.

No Dexter.

She wipes at her face, smearing dirt and tears. “He’s gone.” she whispers.

Harrison nods, eyes red, staring at the ground. “I know.”

But as she stands there - heartbeat still pounding, lungs burning - she feels something strange.

The wind shifts, faint and cold, brushing against her neck like breath.

And for a moment, just a second, she swears she hears it - a whisper, low and familiar.

Run.

She turns fast.

Nothing there.

Just the city waking up.

Just morning.

Just the absence of him.

She takes Harrison’s hand, their fingers cold and shaking. “Come on.” she says.

They start walking, their shadows stretching long in the early light.

Behind them, the tunnel gapes open - black, quiet, and waiting.

The puddle near its mouth ripples once.

Then stills.

Chapter Text

“For one human being to love another;

that is perhaps the most difficult of all our tasks,

the ultimate, the last test and proof,

the work for which all other work is but preparation.”  By Rainer Maria Rilke

The town they end up in doesn’t even have a skyline.

Just fog, pine trees, and the smell of salt in everything.

It’s the kind of place where people mind their own business, where the sea keeps its secrets and the seagulls scream over them. Nothing like New York. Nothing like Miami. Just quiet, heavy and constant, like a held breath.

Deb walks the beach most mornings before work. Gray sand, gray sky, gray heart. She tells herself she’s not looking for him, but her eyes still search the shoreline. Sometimes she swears she sees a shadow on the pier. Sometimes there are footprints that end where the tide begins.

She dreams of him often.

Hands on hers, voice a whisper against her ear: I’m still watching.

When she wakes, the sound of the waves replaces the sound of gunfire, but the echo never fades completely.

At first, it’s unbearable. Every time she closes her eyes, she sees him turning away. Every dream ends with the sound of those three shots. Her grief is a storm she wears on her sleeve, a bruise the world can see.

Harrison’s grief is quieter - tight and private, like his father’s used to be.

But sometimes it breaks through.

They live under new names now.

She doubts she’ll ever be Debra Morgan again. Harrison can’t be who he was either. They rent a weather-beaten apartment that smells of misty rain and salt. The window faces the ocean, but she keeps the curtains drawn most nights.

When the news finally breaks - the real Bay Harbor Butcher confirmed, the headlines calling him “presumed dead” - it’s like the air’s been punched from her lungs. His face is everywhere. His name in every mouth.

Presumed.

The word haunts her more than dead.

She’d heard the shots. She’d heard the silence that followed. But the word presumed lingers, whispering possibilities she can’t let herself believe.

She cuts her hair off one night - shoulder-length first, then shorter. Dyes it black. The new her looks strange in the mirror, the color swallowing her face. Harrison buzzes his hair close to his scalp. They don’t talk about why.

She finds a job at a used bookstore. It’s quiet and it smells like dust and paper.

She likes closing shifts the most - the hum of the lights, the creak of the floorboards, the way no one expects her to smile.

Harrison takes online classes under his new name. He doesn’t want to be a cop anymore. “I’ve seen enough justice to last a lifetime.” he’d said once, his tone flat, not bitter. Just tired. He picks up shifts at a local café. Comes home late, carrying with him the smell of espresso and rain.

They keep moving through days like ghosts trying to remember how to be human.

One night, months into the new life, she comes home to find Harrison on the kitchen floor. The bottle that’s held in his hand is half-empty, his eyes red, his breath heavy with whiskey.

She doesn’t tell him to stop. She doesn’t take it away.

She just sits beside him on the cold linoleum and reaches for the bottle. Takes a long pull. Lets it burn.

“I miss him too.” she whispers. Her voice cracks in the middle of it.

Harrison nods, staring at nothing. “It fucking sucks.” he mutters. “Our lives are fucked because of him… but he’s still…” He stops, swallows, corrects himself. “Was. My dad.”

She feels her throat close up. Passes the bottle back. “Yeah,” she says quietly. “Our lives might be fucked because of him. But if he were still alive-” her voice breaks. “-I’d run to him in a fucking minute.”

The sob comes out raw, unguarded. Harrison drops the bottle and pulls her close. She clings to him, to what she has left.

“I love you, Harrison.” she says through tears. “You hear me? I’ll do whatever it takes to make your life better. You’re all I’ve got.”

He nods, crying too. “I know.”

Nine months later, the grief isn’t gone. It’s just quieter.

Like a scar - deep under skin, still tender when she presses.

She still closes the bookstore most nights. She likes the sound of rain against the roof, the smell of old paper from the books.

Someone dropped off a used copy of a new book a few weeks ago - The Bay Harbor Butcher: The Real Story.

She told herself she wouldn’t look.

Now she does. Every night. The cover’s worn, his face staring back in grainy grayscale - the half-smile she knows better than her own. The only photo she has left of him. She hides it from customers, but never from herself.

It’s late again - ten fifty-five, just before closing. The rain’s turned to mist, tapping soft against the window. She’s standing behind the counter, staring at his picture when the bell above the door rings.

She doesn’t look up. “We’re closing soon.” she calls out, distracted.

There’s a pause. Footsteps. Slow. Familiar.

Then a voice - low, rough, soft around the edges:

“You know, staring at a book isn’t the same as looking at the real thing.”

Her heart stops.

Actually stops.

For a second she thinks she’s dreaming - that she’s fallen asleep behind the counter again, her brain tricking her with a mirage.

Her hands start shaking.

She turns.

And there he is.

Dexter.

Alive.

Standing just inside the door, hair longer, beard rough and uneven, eyes tired - the same tired she’s been carrying for months.

She can’t breathe. Can’t speak. The world tilts, blurs.

He crosses the room in two steps and she’s in his arms before she can decide if it’s real. His hands are warm, his chest solid. He smells like rain and salt and something faintly metallic - blood maybe, or memory.

She’s crying so hard she can’t see. His arms tighten around her, steady, like they always have. His breath hitches, and she realizes - he’s crying too.

When she finally pulls back, her face wet, her voice barely works. “You’re supposed to be dead.”

“I was,” he says, the corner of his mouth twitching. “Didn’t stay that way.”

She hits his chest once, weakly - half rage, half relief - then collapses against him again, sobbing into his shirt.

“How many times have you fucking died now?” she mumbles against him.

He huffs out a laugh, the sound catching in his throat. “Three.”

It’s ridiculous. It’s perfect. She laughs too, watery and broken.

“I have to close the store.” she whispers finally.

He nods. Lets her go - but only just. She keeps glancing at him while she locks up, afraid he’ll vanish again.

When the lights click off, the store goes dim except for the streetlamps outside. For the first time, she puts the book back on the shelf where it belongs.

They walk to the beach, hand in hand. The wind off the water is sharp, cold. Her hair whips across her face, and he brushes it back with the same care he used to use cleaning a blade.

The tide’s low, the sky streaked with silver.

“We’ve been here awhile,” she says quietly. “It’s okay. Harrison’s okay. He’s in school. Doesn’t want to be a cop anymore.” Her voice falters. “But we both… we both miss you.”

He nods. “I know.”

She looks at him, eyes glistening. “How did you find us? How the fuck did you survive?”

“Didn’t you hear?” he says softly. “They never found my body. Presumed dead.” A smile ghosts across his face. “There was a drop in the tunnels - water, rebar, chaos. They hit me, clipped my shoulder. My blood was enough. It looked convincing. Claudette closed the file.”

He pauses, looking out at the dark water. “You used the fake name from the ID in your pocket. I searched for every Taylor Hill until I found you. Took months. Watched from a distance first. Wanted to make sure it was safe.”

“It’s never gonna be fucking safe, Dex.” she says, her voice trembling.

He nods, stepping closer. “Then we make do. We always have.”

She stares at him for a long moment - this impossible, broken, beautiful man standing on the edge of the world. Then her voice drops, quiet and shaking.

“If you don’t kiss me right now, I’m gonna fucking scream.”

He laughs, a real laugh this time, soft and human. He reaches out, his fingers sliding under her chin, his thumb brushing her lip. “You still love me?” he whispers.

“Of course I fucking love you,” she breathes. “Don’t be an idiot.”

And he kisses her.

It’s desperate and deep, everything they’ve both been starving for - grief and relief and love and anger all tangled together. Her arms wrap around him, his around her. The world narrows to warmth and salt and the sound of the waves breaking behind them.

When they finally pull apart, their foreheads rest together, breaths mixing. She closes her eyes.

“You came back.” she whispers.

“I never left.” he says.

She stays there, her forehead still pressed to his, the ocean wind tangling their hair, carrying salt between their lips. The world feels suspended - just the sound of waves, the distant cry of a seagull, their hearts beating out of sync but still together.

Her voice is a whisper against his mouth. “You remember what I used to say to you?”

He nods faintly, a breath against her skin. “Be better.”

The words hang between them - soft, familiar, heavier than the tide.

She exhales, shaky. “I spent years wanting that for you. Begged you for it for months.” She traces his jaw with trembling fingers, feeling the warmth of his skin, the roughness of his beard. “But standing here now, I get it. You were better, Dex. You already were. You saved us.”

He studies her face - the wind in her hair, the tears glinting in her lashes - and the smallest smile flashes across his lips. “Did I?” he asks quietly.

“You did,” she says. “You saved us. Even if it meant losing yourself.”

He takes her hand, presses it to his chest. His heart beats steady beneath her palm - proof, impossible and alive.

“I’m here,” he murmurs. “I made it back.”

Her breath catches; her eyes squeeze shut like she’s afraid to open them and find him gone again. “You’re not real.” she whispers.

He leans in, his forehead resting against hers. “Then hold on,” he says, voice low and certain. “And see if I disappear.”

She does. And he doesn’t.

When she kisses him again, it’s salt and rain and the promise of something they both stopped believing in. The ocean crashes around them, cold and endless, but she feels warm - so warm - pressed against him.

When they finally part, she’s crying, but it’s different this time - softer, lighter.

“Maybe this is better.” she whispers.

He brushes a tear from her cheek, his thumb steady. “It is,” he says. “Because it’s real.”

She looks up at him, breath trembling in her chest. “You remember what you said down there? You said everything you touch breaks.”

He nods faintly.

Her voice wavers. “You were wrong. You didn’t break us. You made us better.”

He smiles - small, tired, human - and pulls her into his arms again. “Then maybe that’s what ‘be better’ meant all along.”

They stand there as the water creeps higher, folding around their ankles. The fog shifts and the stars turn silver, and for once, there’s no need to run.

There’s only the ocean now - its slow breathing, his heartbeat under her hand, and the quiet truth that somehow, impossibly, he kept his promise. The waves take it from there, folding their words into the dark, where even monsters can finally rest.