Bruce Wainright has (onerule) wrote in doorslogs, @ 2013-01-06 21:25:00 |
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Entry tags: | batman, catwoman |
Who: Luke and Wren
What: Post-Christmas party things. (2/2)
Where: Their house.
When: After group plot.
Warnings/Rating: None.
“Oh, no,” he groaned. “I went and gave you ideas.” He tipped his head to the side, like he was considering what it might be like, doing what she wanted, and a slow, teasing grin spread over his features. “Maybe one weekend wouldn’t be so bad. I can do breakfast in bed, and massages, and all that romantic stuff, and it wouldn’t kill me to wear an apron and slippers for a while. Especially if you’re wearing the same, and nothing else,” he added, tugging ever so slightly on the fabric of her nightgown. Then his expression sobered, and his gaze turned impossibly fond. “I’d do anything for you,” he told her, and there was no teasing in his voice, not just then. He meant every word.
He was relieved, at least, that she agreed with him, because the man they’d met at Thomas Inc. was nothing he ever wanted to become. Sometimes his temper worried him, the amount of anger he had inside, but in comparison to his other self he had it mostly under control, and it was added incentive to keep trying. “I don’t want to change anything,” he said, with the shadow of a puzzled frown. “I wouldn’t go back and not meet you even if I could. There’s no point in seeing what ifs, or wondering about them, and all the hotel proved tonight was that we’re better together than we would ever be apart.” And he sounded so sure of that. He shook his head when she admitted she’d thought that not having gone shopping would have changed things, because the kidnapping was his fault, and he had always known that. It was about him, not her, and the guilt he felt over what she’d suffered would never really go away. “I brought that on you,” he told her. “I think it was always going to happen. She wanted to torment Thomas, remember? But other me, he didn’t... he didn’t deal very well.” Which was an understatement, but he didn’t want to think about that, just like he didn’t want to think about the other paths her life might have followed without him. He didn’t say anything while she spoke, her fingers against his lips silencing him, at least until she was done. “If all that’s true, then you could be happier too. But I’m as happy as I need to be, and you’re all I want in the world too,” he said. “I love you more than anything, and I’ll never stop.”
Her helpless look didn’t go unnoticed, but he chose not to comment on it, because all the words in the world weren’t going to get them to the point where he could propose without her doubting his motivations. No, actions spoke louder, and he could be patient. “I know I don’t need to,” he admitted, “but I want to. I bet Will felt the same. Pajamas in front of the tree is pretty adorable, though.” As for not crying, he shook his head, not even trying to hide his grin. “I would,” he countered. “It would be completely embarrassing for the rest of my life, which is why you should let me propose instead, even if I do blush my way through it.” And then everything else was lost as he kissed her, his other hand sliding down, fingers trailing along her side, to rest on her opposite thigh. “We can stay here,” he whispered, brushing his lips along her cheek as she spoke. “Just like this,” and he mouthed the underside of her jaw. “Without anything ever going wrong,” he finished, trailing kisses down the side of her neck before pausing to look back up at her.
She grinned when he groaned, a happy youthful thing of a grin. She lifted a hand and curled a short strand of his brown hair around her finger when he tipped his head to the side, and his teasing smile made her own grin go even warmer and brighter. "Wait, wait," she said, mischief in her smile. "Maybe I don't want the aprons or the slippers," she added with great mock thoughtfulness, before her expression turned to something warmer and more promising when he tugged on the fabric of her nightgown slightly. She would have kept teasing him about it, and she'd already parted her lips to do just that, but his expression went sober and she stayed quiet. She just stared at him for a second, then two, then three. "I would too. Do anything for you, I mean- But-" she worried her lip, and she winced just the tiniest bit before she continued, worried that he'd get angry with her. "Do you mean it?"
She knew he had a temper. She'd made him angry plenty of times. When they were teenagers, after Seattle, it happened a lot. It was, admittedly, one of the reasons she'd never believed he could forgive her if he learned about Gus, and it was one of the reasons she still had trouble grasping that. Part of her expected him to remember it whenever they fought, and to get angry about it all over again. She was still waiting for the proverbial other shoe to drop, but it hadn't yet, and with every day that went by she believed a little more that it might not ever drop. "I would change a lot of things," she admitted, because she would. She had so many regrets that she couldn't even begin to list them all. "I would change so many things, but I wouldn't change meeting you," she said truthfully. She considered leaving it at that, letting the conversation fade into something positive, but the fact that he'd been so broken in the future life that they'd seen, it stopped her from doing that just that. "I was always really guilty, you know, about what happened in the freezer. I thought I corrupted you, and that I made you do something you didn't understand." She shrugged her shoulders a tiny, tiny bit. "I still do a little. You were so sweet, and so innocent," she said remembering, her expression going far-off and a little wistful. That had been terrible, that place, but she couldn't regret being with him then, even if it made her feel like a terrible person sometimes.
When he said he'd never stop loving her, she pressed her fingers to his lips with a little more pressure. "No, don't. You'll jinx it," she said, a little of her maman's superstitious nature sneaking through. The thought of Will proposing in pajamas made her smile though, brought that smile back. "It is adorable," she said. "I haven't talked to Evie yet. I bet she'll have a really sweet story tell. I wonder if he's panicking about the baby yet." She could get lost in that subject, and she could get lost in her own guilt seconds later. She didn't want to start that, though. It had taken up too much time in the past month, and she really wanted to stop before it just made him reconsider everything. She ducked her head when he explained why she should let him propose, and then she peeked up at him through her lashes and gave him a look that was all crinkled nose and abashedness. "I would never propose. I'd worry you accepted because you felt like you couldn't say no," she admitted honestly, a whisper as his lips pressed along her neck. "You wouldn't get bored? Staying here forever with me?" she asked, her fingers sliding up beneath his shirt and trailing across his belly. Just that, nothing more, just her nails moving lightly back and forth, her fingertips pressing against the warmth of his skin. She looked up at him then. "Sometimes I can't believe you let me touch you," she said, an awed little whisper that came with a curious tip of her head, almost a question.
He let out a mock gasp, as though scandalized by her suggestion, despite the wicked gleam in his eyes giving him away. "Are you saying you'd want forty eight hours of no clothes at all? Because I think I like the sound of that. We can break this place in, one hard surface at a time," he teased. "You know, along with all that other stuff.” A slow, slow smile began to spread over his face, but it stilled when she went quiet and just stared. Oh, there was a time when he would have gotten angry, a time not so long ago, but he knew better know. He knew what he was like when he was angry, and he’d seen what he could have been like had there been no one there to keep him in check, to make him want to control it; so instead, he forced himself to stay calm. Wren questioning whether he meant what he said or not wasn’t her fault, and it wasn’t his either, and he just had to remember that. “Of course I mean it,” he told her, and the assertion was followed up by a quick kiss.
Guilt was something he hadn’t figured out to get rid of, not completely, and he’d probably spend the rest of his life trying to make up for the way he’d treated her in New York. Most of his anger had been directed towards Thomas, but he’d still admired (and loved, though he wouldn’t admit that to anyone) him too much to actually take it out on him, to voice his feelings, and Wren had suffered as a result. “I wouldn’t change that either, not for anything,” he said, because he’d take all the bad ten times over if it meant still having her in his life. He pulled her closer, onto his lap, when she admitted to still feeling guilty about what had happened between them all those years ago, in the dark and the cold, when he’d expected to die. “You didn’t corrupt me, and you didn’t make me do anything. I was naive, yeah, and I didn’t know what I was doing, but I still wanted it. I could have told you to stop,” he admitted. “But I didn’t want you to.”
The pressure of her fingers against his lips, combined with her worries of him jinxing something, made him roll his eyes, but it was a fond gesture, rather than anything cynical. “There’s nothing to jinx, but okay,” he teased. As for Will and Evie, he’d be lying if thinking about them didn’t make him a little sad; they were probably engaged by now, with a baby on the way, and their lives were more normal than anyone else he knew in Vegas. He was happy for them, of course, but at the same time he couldn’t help thinking that they had what he and Wren should have had. But he shook those thoughts off and smiled up at her instead. “He probably is, but maybe he’s bypassed panic and gone to excitement already.” He paused when she admitted she would never propose, and then he laughed, a throaty sound against her skin, and he pressed another kiss to her neck before pulling back. “Then I guess I get to be the one who proposes,” he said smugly. “And I’d never, ever get bored with you.” He sighed in pleasure at the feel of her fingers beneath in skin, but it turned to surprise at the awe in her voice. “What?” Why he wouldn’t have let her touch him, he had no idea. “If anything, I don’t know why you let me touch you. Knowing the things I’ve done...” He trailed off with a shrug.
"Luke Henry! I'm shocked," she gasped, but she was terrible at the shocked innocent act, and there was entirely too much interest in her grey eyes for her modesty to be even partly genuine. She knew it, too, because she almost broke into a laugh before the sentence was even done. "We're parents now. I don't think we're allowed to have sex anymore, and we really, really can't have sex all over the house," she teased, letting her smile win over any attempts to remain serious then. She smile still lingered as she stared, and it took a second longer than it normally would have for her to realize that he was trying to stay something - quiet, calm, not angry? She wasn't sure, but something, and she would have called him on it, had he not followed everything up with that quick kiss. But even that, small as it was, was enough to derail her and make her think everything was okay, and by the time the kiss broke, she was already listening to what he was saying about changing things.
She didn't protest when he pulled her onto his lap. Instead, she just settled more comfortably, one thigh on either side of his and the skirt of her nightdress bunched up between them. "You didn't want to die a virgin," she said, a quiet little thing, testing the waters to see if teasing about that was okay. There was worry there, in her voice, that kept the teasing from being teasing at all, and she bit her lip too hard afterward to make it any way believable as anything but an attempt to be lighthearted. "You were too sweet to tell me to stop then," she said a second later, soft smile and honesty in the place of teasing. It was true; he had been so very sweet when he was young, and so very naive, and so certain that the world could be a better place. She ran the back of her hand along his jaw, and then she curled her fingers around the nape of his neck. "And now you're all grown up," she said, obviously just thinking aloud, the statement a disjointed, fond thing. "Still sweet, though."
Her fond smile turned to something slightly exasperated when he rolled his eyes at her, and she tugged on the ends of his hair lightly as payback. "There's everything to jinx," she insisted, because in her world things like this didn't last, things like what they had just didn't exist. Her maman had brought her up to believe this wasn't real, that it was all make-believe, a deck of cards that could come crashing down at any moment. She tried, a moment later, to figure out what he was thinking, what he was trying so hard to shake off after she mentioned Evie and Will. In her mind, she imagined a thousand thing before he spoke, and none of them were good. But he sounded okay when he finally did talk and she sighed a relieved sigh. "I think panic lasts a little longer," she said sagely as he kissed her neck, though she had no real idea at all, and she laughed a little at how smug he sounded when he said he got to be the one that proposed. She wanted to ask if he was really thinking about it, if this was really a thing. Because joking about it and teasing, that was just like joking and teasing about treehouses when they were kids, right? She always believed that he wasn't being really serious, even then. "You could have a midlife crisis in fifteen years, like all other men do," she said of him becoming bored with her, but it was his surprised tone that stilled the fingers beneath his shirt entirely. Stillness, stillness, and then she was dragging her fingertips against his skin again and tugging on the hem of his shirt up in a gesture he should have recognized without even thinking by now. "You haven't done anything," she said, her tone challenging him to disagree with her.
He managed to muffle his laughter just in time, finding her feigned innocent shock nothing short of endearing. It felt good to have something to laugh about, especially after what the hotel had put them through, and he wrinkled his nose when she said they weren’t allowed to have sex anymore just because they were parents. “That’s a lie. We can have as much sex as we want, wherever we want, and us being parents doesn’t change that,” he protested. “I mean, I think you’d look really good on the kitchen table, for starters.” He hadn’t realized the effort it took to stay calm was so visible, and he was relieved when the kiss seemed to distract her, because he didn’t mind trying, and he didn’t want her thinking that she frustrated him any more than she already thought.
Her attempt at teasing left him uncertain, because he couldn’t discern whether it was meant to be taken seriously or not; whether he should laugh, or protest, because it hadn’t really had anything to do with that at all. And, even if she meant well, he didn’t think he’d ever be able to joke about the kidnapping. But she felt good in his lap, all warmth and solid weight, and that soothed his uncertainty, just a little. “No teenage boy does,” he said, a mirror of her attempt, before he slipped back into seriousness. “You could agree with me, just once.” It was a fond thing, because he knew her, and he knew she was never going to believe--not fully--that he’d wanted what had happened between them. “I’m not nearly as sweet as you, though, and half the time I don’t feel all that grown up,” he admitted, and his gaze turned warm as he splayed his fingers out over her hips. “Well, in some ways. I like to think I’ve grown up a little from the kid who couldn’t even look at you naked without turning red and stammering.”
The light tug on his hair drew out a mock pout, and in the face of her exasperation he merely flashed a boyish grin. “If you say so,” he said, of there being something to jinx, and as for panic lasting a little longer, she was probably right. If he were in Will’s shoes, he probably would have panicked for a while too, before it became excitement, anticipation, because more kids was something he wanted one day. Just like marriage was too, and maybe she thought he was teasing, maybe she thought he wasn’t serious, but he was. And, when the time was right, she would see that, and he hoped she would say yes without any doubts when it happened. “Not all men have midlife crises,” he protested, teasing, but then her fingers stilled, and he wondered if he’d said the wrong thing. Maybe he’d reminded her of things she didn’t want to think about, and he regretted saying anything at all, at least until her fingers started moving again. He gave her a long, long look when she said he hadn’t done anything, and after a moment he pulled his shirt over his head, not as quick as he could have been, almost hesitant to reveal what she’d seen time and time again. “Yeah, I have,” he said quietly, because the scars spoke for themselves, didn’t they?
"I thought parents had to appear chaste, Luke," she teased, pressing a kiss to his nose when he crinkled it. "If we have sex on the kitchen table, what's going to keep me from giving you heated looks from across it afterward?" she asked, feigning as much innocence as she could muster, which wasn't very much, really. "And why do you get to decide who gets to be where? I thought this was my 48 hours," she protested with fake indignation, but she was sobering a moment later, because she could tell that her attempt at teasing had fallen short. And she guessed he was right; no teenage boy wanted to die a virgin, and why had she said that? Her cheeks reddened, and it was the seriousness in his voice a moment later that kept her from slipping into full embarrassment. "I agree with you about some things," she finally said, a quiet protest. "You don't like it when I pretend to agree. You can always tell. You always hated that," she said truthfully, because she'd done that a lot toward the end in Seattle, and she'd done it a lot toward the end in New York, and he'd always really disliked it. She rocked forward a little when he splayed his hands on her hip, and instinctual thing, a desire to get closer. "We're not really that old," she whispered, as if it was a big secret, the fact that they were still young enough to be really, really stupid sometimes. But then she smiled, a bright fond remembering thing of a smile. "You were scared to touch me. It was adorable."
The mock pout made her want to kiss him, but the boyish grin just made her want to stare forever. And she thought she could, really. That she could just watch him for as long as he let her, which was never very long, really. He always got impatient, and she loved that about him too, the fact that he wasn't very good at just sitting around, not without eventually squirming or needing to do something. She didn't realize that he was still thinking about Will and Evie, that he was still thinking about babies and marriage. Really, she thought he only talked about those things because she brought them up, not because he thought about them himself. "You don't think so?" she asked seriously about the midlife crisis, because she was still that girl that didn't believe in happily ever after, even though she wanted to believe more than anything. "You don't think you'll want someone younger and prettier when Gus is grown and off in college somewhere?" But his long look silenced her a moment later, and she almost told him that he didn't have to pull the shirt off if he didn't want to. She didn't understand the hesitation, didn't realize that it had something to do with what they were talking about. Instead, she twisted his hesitation and tangled it with her own fears. "I won't- I'm not going to push for anything," she promised, letting her fingers rest in her own lap, where she twisted the bunched fabric there between her fingertips to keep from touching him. But none of that was enough to keep her from disagreeing with him, not on this particular subject. "No, you haven't. If I don't get to blame myself forever for things, you don't either," she said, carefully keeping her gaze on his face.
“Appearing chaste and being chaste are two different things,” he objected playfully. “We can be parents and still have sex on the kitchen table. Your heated looks would probably go right over Gus’ head anyway.” Which wasn’t exactly true, but it was all teasing just then, all warm smiles and not-so-accidental brushes of contact and touches, considering their close proximity. “Hey, you’re free to suggest who should be where,” he said, laughter audible in his tone. “I’m not stopping you.” But then she was sobering, and her cheeks were slowly turning warm, and he wanted to kick himself for being such an idiot. It had been a really, really poor attempt at humor. In an effort to ease her embarrassment, he kissed one warm cheek, just one, before leaning back a little to look at her, hands still on her hips. “You’re right,” he agreed, because she was. He’d always hated her feigned agreement, and better they end up disagreeing through honesty instead of building an impossible truth upon lies. Whatever her opinion, however much he might not agree, he’d always prefer honestly as opposed to a lie to placate him. “I don’t want you to pretend, not with me.” His breath caught in his throat as she rocked against him, and his fingers tightened their hold, and he exhaled in a quiet huff of laughter when she said he'd been afraid to touch her. "Was not," he protested quietly, and then grinned sheepishly. "Okay. Maybe I was, a little. I just didn't want to do anything wrong." He hadn't wanted to hurt her either, which was why he'd always been so careful; leaving behind bruises would have horrified him back then.
Her question about his potential midlife crisis was so serious that he wished, somehow, he could make her have the faith in them and their relationship that he had. But he couldn't force it, and trying only ever made things worse. "No, I don't think so," he said honestly. "I won't want anyone else but you, even when Gus is grown and off in college, and you'll always be the prettiest woman in the world to me." He hadn't realized that she would misunderstand his hesitation, though he probably should have, and he tipped his head to the side in confusion when she said she wouldn't push him for anything. "I-- what?" He frowned when she pulled her fingers back into her lap, really not understanding, and shook his head at her continued disagreement. "Don't stop," he said, lacing his fingers with hers and trying to tug them back. "I like it when you touch me, even though I don't know why you'd want to sometimes. Just look at me, Wren. How can you say I haven't done anything? I'm only blaming myself for things I've done. It's okay," he added, and tugged again on her fingers, this time more insistently. "You make me feel like I'm not a monster," he admitted, a hushed whisper.
She gave him her best confused look when he objected that appearing chaste and being chaste were two different things, and she almost laughed a few seconds into the mock confusion. "I don't know. Maybe there's someone one can ask if it's okay to have sex on the kitchen table," she suggested with an attempt at wide-eyed earnestness. She made a tutting sound when he said she was free to suggest who who should be where. "If I get to decide, then we go back to you being naked all weekend and me getting to look at you all the time," she said truthfully, "without you being allowed to get touchy." Her favorite game, and one that drove him absolutely crazy. "All weekend," she added for emphasis, as he kissed her cheek. She pulled back and smiled at him when he actually agreed that he disliked her pretending to agree with him. Normally he argued with her about things like that or, lately, he employed what she decided was 'Evie's tactic' of not answering. It was a genuine smile, because she really did love it when he was honest with her, even about her own faults, and he got a little whimper for his troubles when his fingers tightened on her hips as she rocked. "You were terrified if I even came close to taking my clothes off," she teased, loving that sheepish grin as much as she loved the way his breath had caught in his throat seconds earlier.
Her nature was to keep disagreeing with him about his potential midlife crisis, to carry on until it was a serious conversation about twenty years down the line, one that wouldn't resolve anything, really. But she didn't want to just then, and she made the effort to change her response before it reached her lips. "You can remind me you said that in, say, twenty years, when you're really tired of my cooking," she said instead, a little hopeful, a little teasing. But then he was frowning, and she didn't understand why. She scooted back a little bit on his lap, in case he needed more space. But then he told her not to stop, and he tugged at her fingers, and she was left giving him a confused look. "I thought you didn't want me to-" she began, but then she was shaking her head, denying what he was saying without interrupting him immediately. She pulled her fingers free from his after his final tug, and her hands raised with a lingering hint of uncertainty. Her fingers cupped his jaw a second later, and she inched a little closer, closing something of the distance she'd put between them. "You're not a monster, Luke. You never have been. You don't have it in you to be that. Even some strange, older not-you version of you wasn't a monster. I know you don't believe me," she said, thumbs brushing his cheeks, "but you're too good inside to ever be someone who hurts people intentionally. That's a monster." And maybe there was a time when she wouldn't have seen a distinction between killing anyone and what he'd done, but that was months ago, a blip, because she knew him too well to ever hold onto that impression. "You calling yourself a monster, it's like me calling myself a whore. You wouldn't let me get away with saying that about myself. You don't get to say things like that about yourself either, because it's not true," she finished, fingers sliding down over the side of his neck, to his shoulders, and then down over his chest.
He tipped his head back and laughed before leaning forward, brushing the knuckles of his hand over her jaw before dropping it back down to resume his hold on her waist. “Or we could make our own rules, do what we want. Be wild,” he teased. As for her terms, he pretended to consider them, feigning thoughtfulness, before giving her a mock suspicious look. “That sounds more enjoyable for you than for me, if you get to look and I can’t touch. All weekend is a long time. What if I can’t control myself, and I get touchy anyway?” His voice was all innocence, as though it might be a genuine slip, rather than a deliberate effort to wear her down and have what he wanted in the end. He liked the way she smiled, though it was surprising, because he could never quite tell when honesty was going to work or when it was going to backfire on him horribly. That whimper made him shift against her, just a little, wanting the feel of friction between them, and he pulled a face when she kept teasing him about the awkward teenage virgin he’d been all those years ago. “I’d never seen a girl naked before you, okay? And you were-- I mean, you still are. Gorgeous, I mean. Just the thought of you without clothes made it hard to breathe,” he told her, and even now he remembered what it had felt like. Just thinking about it made some small, near-forgotten part of him want to blush all over again.
The fact that she didn’t argue with him, like she usually would have, made him beam, and he was happy enough to agree with anything she said just then. “Alright, I will,” he promised. “Just in case you’ve forgotten by then.” When she scooted back on his lap, he realized, belatedly, he’d missed something, but then her fingers were on his jaw, and he forgot about his sudden, rising desperation to fix whatever had gone wrong. He wanted to believe he wasn’t a monster, he did, but that fear would always live within him, as evidenced by the form Thomas had taken on his hallucinations while he was under the influence of Crane’s toxin. “I want to believe you,” he admitted. “But I’m still trying to see what you see when I look in the mirror. I tricked myself into believing it was right, what I was doing, and I know it’s not, but I-- I was always scared of becoming like them, you know? Simon, he told me something once, before he left. Something about those who hunt monsters becoming one themselves, and I guess--” He broke off with a shrug. But what she said, about him calling himself a monster being like her calling herself a whore, rang true, and he hadn’t ever thought of it like that before. “You’re right,” he said, after a moment. “I would never let you call yourself that. I’ll try,” he promised, watching the path of her hands as they slid down to his chest, and it was entirely on impulse that his arms tightened around her, pulling her against him, and rather than saying anything else, he just kissed her instead.
"I don't know if I could be wild," she said, turning her cheek and pressing a quick kiss to his palm before his hand dropped and ruining the effect of her feigned, wide-eyed innocence with the warmth of that simple brush of lips against his skin. She didn't even try to hold onto the innocence when he gave her that mock, suspicious look. "It is," she said candidly. "I always want to make you do that for me, and you always manage to wiggle your way out of it somehow," she teased, because she knew precisely how he wiggled out of it, and so did he. "I can keep a crop around if you get touchy." She lowered her voice, as if she was sharing a very, very deep secret, "I have a bunch of them for work." When he shifted against her, she dragged in a slow breath, because she really did love the feel of having him against her. Even like this, when it was just touching, just friction and contact. Sometimes, she thought that just having this could make her the happiest person in the world. But the way he pulled a face made her laugh, a warm laugh, all youth and warmth. "I like thinking about you not being able to breathe around me," she admitted, and she gave him a playful smile a second later. "But you have to breathe every once in awhile." she cautioned, even as she reached down and tugged the bunched fabric of her nightdress up and over her head. "No touching," she warned him once the dress was over her head and discarded alongside his shirt. "We have Christmas presents to do soon." And there was a very, very obvious and tormenting little grin on her lips.
She all but forgot her near nudity in light of the more serious turn of the conversation, though. "I know you believed it was the right thing," she said of his killing people. She knew that was the only way he would have been able to do it, to convince himself. He wasn't Jack; he wasn't a killer, not really. He was guilty about absolutely everything, always, even things that weren't his fault. There was no way he would have been able to do the things he'd done without the belief that he was doing right. He was endlessly better than her when it came to things like that. "You're nothing like them, and you never have been. And even if you tried really, really hard, you wouldn't be able to manage it. You'd end up like that older you in Thomas Inc., all broken up and shattered. You're just not that person, Luke," she said with absolute conviction. "You don't even have it in you to be that person." Because a person who really was a monster, they would never have cut themselves or hurt themselves in other ways because of their guilt, regardless of what Simon had said. Hunting monsters just made Luke hurt; it didn't make him a monster at all. "No guessing. What Simon said, it might be right about some people, but not about you." Never, she thought, as her hands skimmed down lower, over his stomach and to his side, where those scars that still terrified her lived. She looked down at her fingers against them, and she was just lifting her gaze when he kissed her. She pressed against him, all soft warmth and curves, and she kept her fingers where they were as she kissed him back.
“Oh, I think you could be pretty wild if you put your mind to it,” he told her with a mischievous grin, having completely abandoned his pretense by this point, and not attempting to hide his intentions in the slightest. But when she told him he always managed to wriggle his way out of being stared at, he couldn’t help adopting a look of mock innocence. “It’s not my fault you can’t keep your hands off me, or that I can’t keep my hands off you.” He raised his eyebrows at the mention of a crop, but there was interest there, a stirring of something he barely understood himself, and he swallowed heavily without realizing it. “So if I get touchy, you’ll use one on me?” There was little better than the feel of her against him, whether it was just like this or something more intimate, skin on skin, and he laughed when she warned him to breathe once in a while. “I won’t suffocate, don’t worry. At the worst I’d just get a little lightheaded,” he teased, but then she was pulling off her nightdress, which he hadn’t expected at all. He stared, blatantly, and being told not to touch just made it that much harder to restrain himself. “That’s just cruel, Wren,” he whined, with an exaggerated pout. “It’s like sending a kid into a candy store and telling him he can look, but he can’t actually have any of it.” But as hard as it might have been for him to just look without doing anything about her, he kept his hands at his sides.
Whether he’d believed it was right or not, that didn’t change what he’d done. All the self-justification he could muster could make him forget that Thomas had condemned him either way, and while he had no idea if the man was aware of the depths he’d sunk to during the past five years, he had no hope of forgiveness. How could he, when he couldn’t even forgive himself? There were some who accepted him regardless of his sins; her, Max, Jack. And he was grateful for it, but he would never, ever feel deserving. “I love you for believing that,” he told her. “I love you for seeing good when you look at me, no matter what I’ve done, and I love you for always trying to make me see the same.” He couldn’t agree with her, not now, but maybe someday he might be able to. Maybe. “I love you for never giving up on me,” he whispered, just before his words were lost in their kiss, and his efforts to keep from touching her were lost as his fingers pressed into her skin. “We could start presents now,” he said, muffled against her lips, as he tried to speak without breaking the kiss entirely. “You’re pretty much unwrapped anyway. Otherwise, I’m going to need a really cold shower.”
"Me? Wild? Never, ever," she insisted, and she laughed outright when he said they couldn't keep their hands off each other, the laugh warm and happy, the shadows of that horrible wood and the terrible things they'd seen far away for the moment. "I think it's kind of great that we can't keep our hands off each other," she told him, and she meant it. She never thought she'd have that with anyone and, at the beginning, she'd never believed he'd ever want her in the same way. She tipped her head a little when he swallowed heavily, and there was something in his voice when he asked about the crop that thrilled her. "Make us reservations somewhere for Valentine's day, and we'll see. It can be a full day's challenge," she offered, and there was something heated in her grey gaze that she had to shake her head to chase away. And, for once, she actually thought they might be together a month and a half into the future, which she didn't even realize. His whine made her smile an adoring smile. "I always let you have something in the end, eventually."
But she could see him get lost in his own self-hate a moment later, in his own inability to forgive himself for the things he'd done. "I'm never going to give up on you, no matter what happens. Not on convincing you that you're a good person, and not on convincing you that there's no one else I want in the world, and not on convincing you that you're a wonderful father. So, you better get used to it, Luke Henry," she insisted, kissing him with enough desire and heat to put all her passion and feelings for him behind the claim. "I love you," she whispered insistently against his lips when she pulled back from the kiss. A second later, she noticed his fingers on her skin, and she gave him a wicked little smile as she scurried off his lap. "Real presents first," she teased, because keeping him waiting was always the best distraction. She didn't get very far, though, before she came back and slid her fingers into his hair. She was taller than him, standing in front of him like she was, and she leaned down and pressed a slow, lingering kiss to his lips. "Merry Christmas, Luke," she said, earnestly, the words tripping a little with emotion, before she skittered out of his grasp again and backed toward the bathroom. "I need to get dressed, and you need to go wake your son," she explained, that playful glint in her eye, and the use of your son very intentional just then. She stopped just before rounding into the bathroom, her fingers on the doorframe. "I'm happy," she said, simple and plain. "Are you?"
There were probably people who’d tell him it would fade someday, how crazy they were about each other, but those weren’t people Luke cared to listen to. “I think it’s great too,” he informed her. They didn’t work like anyone else, and their relationship was something that he didn’t think could be defined, or labelled, even though he didn’t doubt some tried. The mention of Valentine’s Day made him grin, and he had a brief, fleeting thought-- maybe, just maybe, they could make enough progress by then-- but he set it aside, deciding he had time. “Reservations for Valentine’s Day. Done. And I know you do,” he added with a grin. “Eventually.”
The emotion in her words, the heat and desire in her kiss, it all made him believe her, made him trust that she meant what she said, and he thought he could stay there forever, with her in his arms, and her mouth under his. “I’m never going to give up on you either,” he promised, breathless, “and I love you too. More than anything.” He thought his fingers on her skin would keep her there, but the opposite was true, and he groaned when she scooted off his lap and put distance between them. “But you could be a real present,” he protested, sliding to the edge of the bed and looking up at her when she approached again. He strained up to meet her kiss, fingers brushing over the backs of her thighs, but he didn’t try to pull her closer, and he simply sighed when she pulled out of his grasp again. “Merry Christmas, Wren,” he said, watching her, taking the time to calm himself and soothe some of the heat that had begun to rise in his belly. He pushed himself to his feet when she paused, and he smiled. “Yeah, baby. I’m happy. Now you go get dressed,” he teased, reaching for his shirt, “and I’ll wake our son.”