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thewillofdeez · 10 months

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50/50: A Shanks/OC (and Beckman/OC) Romance - Chapter 2: Conditions and Compromise

Summary: A twenty year journey of friendship, love, and heartache between Shanks and the woman he loves.

Chapter 2 word count: 4758

TW: Discussion of disease, death, and suicide.

Riley readied herself for the day and made her way down the stairs, stopping at the washroom to gather Shanks and Beckman’s clean clothes and mend the bullet holes in Shanks’s shirt and pants. She then dropped them outside their doors and headed into the kitchen to begin working on breakfast, trusting that the smell of bacon, eggs, and coffee would wake them in no time. She’d yet to meet a man who couldn’t be easily roused from the deepest sleep by the smell of breakfast.

It wasn’t long before a groggy voice greeted her. “Mornin’,” said Beckman, as he rubbed the sleep from his eyes.

“Morning,” she responded. “Sleep well?”

“Possibly too well. Can’t remember the last time I slept in a proper bed and not a hammock or on a deck. Shanks is up too, he’ll be in soon.”

“Goooooood morning!” A cheery voice followed almost immediately. Shanks bounded into the kitchen, his crooked smile beaming. He always was a morning person; Beckman hated that.

Riley giggled. “Looks like someone’s healing up nicely.”

“What can I say, I have a great doctor,” Shanks responded with a wink.

“How are your wounds feeling?” she said, turning back to the stove to hide her grin.

“Sore, but I’m okay.” He pulled out a chair at the table and was sure to sit down in it with care.

“Glad to hear. I put some medicine out for you to take. Just something for pain and antibiotics to fight off any possible infections. I’ll also want to take a look at your wounds after breakfast.”

“Riley,” Shanks drawled, “If you wanna keep seeing my ass you can just say so.”

Riley couldn’t help but laugh. She turned to Beckman. “Is he always like this?”

Beckman took a sip of his coffee. “When there’s pretty women around, yes, constantly.”

Riley chuckled and plated food for herself and the two pirates, setting the full plates down in front of them and grabbing a seat.

“So…I thought about what you guys said last night.” Beckman and Shanks shared an expectant look. “I do want to come with you.”

“YES! GAHHHH” Shanks yelled, reflexively throwing both arms in the air in victory, only to immediately regret his decision when a sharp pain from his bullet wound shot down his right side. Beckman shook his head and sipped on his coffee.

“But,” Riley followed up as Shanks winced in pain, “I do have some conditions.”

“Conditions?” Beckman asked.

“Look, you guys are broke right now. No money, no ship, no supplies, basically just the clothes on your backs. The community on this island is tight, and I’m willing to use my connections to help you get everything you need to get back out to sea, including a new ship. The catch is, you need to do it my way.”

“And what’s your way?” Shanks asked, his left elbow resting on the table, and his hand cradling his head.

“You need to work for it like normal people, not steal it like pirates. There’s a small shipbuilding company in the next village. They mostly do merchant vessels, but they’ve been known to work on pirate ships as well. I’m friends with the family who runs it. If you’re willing to, we can go over there after breakfast and I’ll propose a deal to them: you two work for them in the shipyard, and they help you design and build your own ship. It’ll certainly take some time before you get back out to sea, but what they can help you make will be loads better than that little dinghy you guys were on before. Meanwhile, I’ll work on gathering supplies for the ship, and you guys can continue to stay here with me for as long as it takes.”

Silence settled over the table as Shanks and Beckman looked at each other. To Riley, it almost looked like they were communicating telepathically.

“How do you know we won’t just get there and steal a ship?” Beckman asked. “We are pirates, after all.”

“I don’t,” she replied. “I’m just going against my better judgment and trusting you.”

“You said conditions earlier,” Shanks added. “Plural. What else do you need in order to join our crew?”

Riley smirked as she swallowed a sip of coffee. “Just focus on this one for now. If you hold up your end of the bargain, you’ll hear about the other two. And if you’re not willing to comply with my terms, you’ll still get your ship and we just go our separate ways. No harm done. So, do we have a deal?”

One more glance passed between Shanks and Beckman, smiles forming on their faces. “We’re in.”

Riley beamed. “Great!” Their plates empty and bellies full, Riley cleared the plates from the table. Beckman stopped her as she began cleaning the dishes and insisted on taking over, which she allowed. In the meantime, she summoned Shanks back to his room to examine his wounds.

Closing the door behind her for privacy, Riley went into doctor mode. “Pants down,” she ordered, pulling on a pair of gloves.

“Ya know, most women at least offer to buy me a drink first.” Shanks couldn’t help but wink at her. Riley rolled her eyes - this guy was a real flirt, but she couldn’t deny she found him amusing.

Riley sunk down to examine the wound on Shanks’s rear. It was a little inflamed, which was to be expected given its location, but it didn’t look terrible. The course of antibiotics would do its job. She then rose and instructed him to pull up his pants, to which Shanks dramatically sighed. “Fine, I guess.”

His arm wound was faring a little better, and was also in an easier position to keep from pressure and strain - well, for normal people, anyway. Apparently not this guy, she thought, recalling his enthusiastic response at breakfast. Riley advised him to take it easy still - even if her proposition goes according to plan, he’d have to wait at least a few more days before getting to work. She then released him back to the kitchen, where Beckman was finishing up the dishes.

“You guys ready to go?” she asked.

“Lead the way,” said Shanks.

Riley led them through the village and onto a path that connected this one with the next. It was a gorgeous sunny day, and the three laughed and talked the whole way until they reached the shipyard, where they met with a man named Bill who wasn’t a Giant in species, but certainly was by human standards; he towered over Beckman, the tallest of the trio, by a good three feet. Riley greeted her old friend and introduced her new pirate companions. Together, the group came to an arrangement: Shanks and Beckman would work in the shipyard four days a week, and in turn Bill would help them design and build their own ship the next two days. The last day they would have free.

“I’d estimate it’ll take at least six to eight months to get you boys a full-sized pirate ship,” Bill said in his gruff voice.

“You guys okay with that?” Riley asked, turning to Shanks and Beckman.

“Fine with us,” Beckman said. “We’re in for as long as it takes.”

The pirates shook hands with Bill, and agreed to get started once Shanks was well enough.

The next month passed quickly, and Riley couldn’t say she didn’t enjoy the company of her new roommates and soon-to-be crewmates. The three of them got along exceedingly well, and she felt a real connection to both of them. She knew she was making the right choice in joining their crew.

Shanks was of course the more fun-loving and lighthearted of the two pirates. He could easily make Riley laugh until her sides hurt, something he seemed to take immense pride in doing. He was also quick to flirt with her, and while Riley enjoyed it, she’d also seen him do this with every pretty woman he came across in town, and didn’t really pay it much mind.

Beckman was the quieter and more mature of the two, and when they weren’t at the shipyard he enjoyed working with Riley on the logistics of stocking their ship and accompanying her to the stores and markets around town. Like his captain, Beckman did have a wild side, though, and Riley had learned quickly that letting the two of them loose in the local bars was both deeply amusing and entirely anxiety-inducing.

Given the amount of time Shanks and Beckman spent at the shipyard, the trio’s time together was usually limited to breakfasts, dinners, and their day off, but they were good at making the most of that time, even if just consisted of them talking after dinner until they passed out in a pile, with Beckman snoring softly as he leaned against the back of the sofa, Riley against his chest, and Shanks with his head in Riley’s lap, her fingers tangled in his red hair. These were the times she really valued.

One sunny morning, Riley finished with her last patient for the day early and decided to bring them all lunch. When she sat down with Bill while Shanks and Beckman finished what they were doing, he couldn’t stop gushing to her about what hard workers they were, and how highly they spoke of her. It warmed Riley’s heart to know that the pirates could easily just steal a ship and be on their way, but they wanted her on their crew badly enough that they didn’t - they did exactly what she asked of them, and they chose to stay behind for at least half a year so they could earn their ship and her presence on it. It was a level of friendship Riley had never really known before.

Shanks and Beckman walked into Bill’s kitchen, sweaty and dirty but both smiling. “Riley!” Shanks greeted, engulfing her in a hug.

“Oh gross, Shanks, you’re all sweaty, get off!” Riley cried, pushing him away. Shanks relinquished but only after nuzzling her neck with his sweaty forehead for good measure, laughing the whole time.

The two pirates washed up and joined Riley and Bill at the table, grabbing the sandwiches she had prepared for them.

“So, Bill,” Shanks asked his temporary boss, “Can we show her?”

“Show me what?” Riley asked, swallowing a mouthful of sandwich.

“That’s up to you lads,” Bill said, ignoring Riley’s question. “I think it’s at a good point, and we can include her input in the final draft.”

Shanks beamed and bolted from the table. “Be right back!” He returned shortly after holding a massive scroll of paper. “You ready for this?” he asked her.

Riley smiled widely - now she knew exactly what it was. “I am so ready.” Beckman and Bill removed the remaining plates and cups from the table, allowing Shanks to spread open the diagram with a flourish. “Ta-da!”

The ship’s exterior schematics were stunning. Whatever she had expected Bill to help them build, it wasn’t this. It was a good mid-sized ship with five sails, an impressive dragon-shaped figurehead, and could probably house sixty sailors with ease. The design was simple with few frills, but it was effective.

“Oh my God, guys. And you’re okay to help them build this?” she directed to Bill - it seemed like too much.

Bill let out a deep, rumbly laugh. “Of course! It’s been a long time since I had a creative project like this. Merchant vessels and repairs get boring after a while. It’ll be a blast!” Bill had known Riley her whole life, and had initially been friends with her parents. He saw Riley as an extension of his own family, and to help out her friends like this was just what he considered part of being a good friend to her, and her deceased family in turn.

“There’s more,” Beckman said, pulling back the top sheet and revealing the interior layout on the next two pages. This ship had everything they could need - ample storage, several communal sleeping quarters with room for actual beds (something Beckman was apparently very insistent upon), a large and well-equipped galley, and a shared bathroom with multiple showers and hot water heaters. It was more space than she could have possibly imagined they would have, and she realized she would need to up her stocking plan significantly and call on every favor she was ever owed in town just to get the place furnished. That’s not even factoring in the space allotted to the ship’s twelve cannons, with five on each side and two in the back. Where the hell was she going to get cannons?

What caught her attention the most, though, was her own medical office. It wasn’t huge, but the layout boasted two recovery bays, a desk, a small refrigerator, a lab workspace, storage cabinets, and a bookcase that she couldn’t wait to stock with her collection of medical texts. It was more than she could have asked for, and she was impressed that Shanks and Beckman had anticipated her needs so accurately.

“Well?” Shanks asked expectantly. “What do you think?”

Riley couldn’t speak. “I’m….it’s amazing. You guys truly thought of everything. I can’t wait to see it come together!” She allowed her eyes to continue wandering over the diagrams, taking in every detail.

“It’s your ship too, Riley,” said Beckman. “Anything else you think it needs?”

It’s my ship too, she mused, letting it sink in for the first time. “There is one thing I want. Another condition of my joining your crew.”

“Oh?” Shanks said. “What’s that?”

“I want my own room. I’m a girl, and I imagine most of the future crew will be guys. I have no interest in sharing a room with a bunch of smelly, sweaty boys,” she finished, staring pointedly at Shanks.

The men at the table had to laugh. “I think we can work that in,” said Bill.

“Honestly,” added Beckman, “Now that you mention it, the three of us should have our own rooms. Shanks, a captain should have his own quarters. Vice captain too. And Riley’s right, she is a girl and we shouldn’t expect her to cohabitate with us.”

“We’ll work it into the final draft, then!” Shanks replied before turning to Riley. “So, Riley, by my count that’s two conditions out of three. You gonna tell us what the final one is?”

“Nope, not yet,” she said with a smirk. She caught Bill’s eye who gave her a knowing look. She knew he could guess what that third condition might be about, but she wasn’t ready to bring it up with Shanks and Beckman yet. It’s not that she didn’t trust them, it was just that if any condition she presented would break their friendship and cause them to rescind the offer to join their crew, it would be this one. She wanted them to have a completed ship and be able to break away from her freely if they so chose before she dropped it on them. When the ship was finished, she’d tell them, and they could make their choice.

Seven months later, the time for that final condition came. Shanks and Beckman had enjoyed their time in the shipyard, and they all upheld their end of the bargain - Shanks and Beckman worked their asses off four days a week for Bill, spent another two with him helping them build their own ship, and spent their free day with Riley, who continued to house and feed them. Over the course of time Riley had even taken to coming by the shipyard to help with construction, as her doctor duties allowed. She wasn’t nearly as strong as the pirates or Bill and his team, but she enjoyed that they let her help in small ways, hauling lumber here, nailing planks there, and painting the gold trim along the edge of the ship. She couldn’t stop thinking about what Beckman had said: It’s your ship too, Riley. She took pride in her work, even if it wasn’t as heavy duty as that of her companions.

When the ship was complete, furnished, and stocked with supplies, Riley, Shanks, Beckman, Bill, and the rest of Bill’s team gathered on deck. Looking around as the furled sails moved gently in the wind and the smell of lumber surrounded her, Riley couldn’t keep the excitement from bubbling in her chest. Or maybe it was anxiety. Or a little bit of both. Tonight, she’d have to tell Shanks and Beckman, and let them make their choice.

Shanks popped a bottle of champagne that was almost half his size with a laugh. “As captain of this ship, I hereby christen it the Gold Dragon!” Shanks poured some onto the deck before taking a swig and passing it around as everyone cheered and celebrated the fruits of their labor. The trio hung around at Bill’s to celebrate well into the night, before they said their goodbyes and headed back to the village for the last time. They’d be back the next day to set sail.

The three walked back to town, laughing over nothing in particular, arms looped around each other keeping themselves steady. They’d all had a bit to drink, Riley less so than the others, but she could still feel a buzz.

Entering her home and office, it looked strangely empty. Most of her medical supplies and some of her furniture had made its way onto the ship. She knew she was taking a risk in doing this - if they decided not to take her, she’d have nothing. But it was a chance she had to take, and it was powered entirely by hope. The new doctor who would be coming from another village would have a pretty blank slate to work with when he arrived in a few days.

Riley grabbed a bottle of sake from the kitchen and some of her few remaining cups. She’d need a drink to get through this, regardless of the outcome. She returned to the living room where Shanks and Beckman were laughing raucously over something.

“Hey guys?” Riley said softly, getting their attention. “I need to talk to you about something.” She sat down on the floor with them and poured them each some sake.

“Is this the final condition?” Shanks asked, all notes of mirth gone from his voice. He’d been waiting for this for some time.

“It is. But first, you need to know some backstory about me.” In their eight months together, Riley had always skillfully avoided providing the pirates with anything other than the vaguest, most general responses when they asked about her childhood or family. After a while they’d stopped pushing it, figuring she’d tell them when she was ready.

Shanks and Beckman exchanged a look, then turned their attention to Riley, who was looking into the liquid in her sake cup.

“Have either of you ever heard of a disease called Mors Cerebralis?”

Shanks shook his head. “Nope.”

“Me neither,” said Beckman.

“I wouldn’t expect you to, honestly,” said Riley. “It’s pretty uncommon.” She took a sip of her sake, then continued. “Mors Cerebralis is a neurodegenerative disease. It attacks the brain. Symptoms can start appearing any time between the ages of 25 and 45, but outliers have been known to happen. For reference, I’m 21, same as you, Shanks. It’s caused by a genetic deformity that causes your brain to basically eat away at itself. Symptoms usually start small with forgetfulness, tremors, mood swings, and things like that. But over time your brain will shut down. You become a shell of who you were, you don’t remember the people in your life, you can’t take care of yourself, and eventually the brain can no longer sustain basic bodily functions like making your kidneys work or even breathing. Then you die. Average time from first symptoms appearing to death is about two years.”

Riley had to stop for a second. She couldn’t bring herself to raise her head to see Shanks and Beckman’s reactions, not yet. They didn’t say a word.

“I watched my whole family die from this disease, and there’s a fifty-fifty chance I’ll develop it too.” Riley meant to stop to allow them time to react, but now she’d started she found she had to get out all of the things she’d been holding in about her past.

“My dad died when I was a baby, from unrelated reasons. Bill was actually his and my mom’s best friend, and he and his family have watched out for me for all these years. The disease is passed down genetically, and my mom’s family carried it. My grandfather died of it before I was born. Mom was diagnosed when I was only about 6 or so. That’s when I started reading medical books. I was just a kid but I was terrified and wanted to learn about what was happening to my mom since everyone thought I was too young to understand. She died when I was 8. By then I probably understood it better than anyone else in the family from a science perspective.

“Then my older brother and I moved in with my uncle - my mom’s brother - and his daughter, my cousin. He cared for us for a few years before he got diagnosed when I was 10. He was dead by the time I was 12.

“Next my brother started exhibiting symptoms. It was a shock not because we didn’t expect him to get it, but because he was only 18 at the time, much younger than usual. In less than two years, he was gone too.

“That just left me and my cousin. I was about 14 by then and she and I started living with Bill, and I began studying medicine with the woman who was the town’s doctor before me. After everything we’d seen, I’m sure you can imagine that we were both kind of a mess. My cousin - Elise, handled it a lot worse than I did. She was a year older than me. She became obsessed with knowing if she would get the disease or not. The way she put it, if she was able to find out and it turned out she wouldn’t get it, then she’d never have to worry again. If it turned out she would get it, then it just meant she would make the most of her life while she could.

“The issue is that just like there’s no known cure at the moment, just treatments to temporarily alleviate symptoms, there’s also no known way to see if someone will get it or not, you just have to wait and see. Or at least, that was true at the time. She’d read an article in the paper about Dr. Vegapunk, supposedly the smartest man in the world, and she decided to seek him out, figuring that if anyone was able to help her it would be him.

“Despite me begging her not to, Elise managed to gain passage on a merchant ship and set out in search of Vegapunk. She was gone for a year and a half. But she came back.”

Riley took a break to drain her sake cup. Still, not a word from Shanks and Beckman. She still couldn’t look at them.

“Turns out she did find Vegapunk, and after telling him her story he agreed to help her. Elise wasn’t a scientist like me, but apparently she and Vegapunk worked together to develop a new method of gene sequencing, allowing him to look at her chromosomes to find the exact faulty piece that caused the illness and thus being able to tell if it would occur in someone. The thing about Mors Cerebralis is that if you aren’t passed the gene from your parents with that fifty-fifty chance, your genetic makeup will look normal. It’s either there or it’s not, and if it’s there, it means you will exhibit symptoms eventually. Incidentally, this is why she and I both decided we’d never have kids of our own. For Elise, it turned out to be there.

“When she came back, she told me everything. About working with Vegapunk, about how wild it was being able to look at her own chromosomes, and about when she found out she did, in fact, have the disease. She tried to go back to normal for a while, but knowing didn’t help her the way she had thought it would. She got depressed, isolated herself. A few months after she got back I found her dead. She’d killed herself.”

She finally brought herself to meet Shanks and Beckman’s eyes. It was obviously a lot for them to take in, but mostly they looked at her with concern and empathy.

“Before I set sail with you tomorrow, you need to know that this is possibly what my future holds. All the literature says it’s a fifty-fifty shot of any one person in a genetic line getting it, but if you’ve been keeping score, I’m looking at a 100% failure rate. I need to know that you’re okay with this possibly, if not likely, being something I’ll have to deal with in the future.”

The room was silent as she let everything she just dropped sink in for her friends. Eventually, Shanks spoke.

“Holy shit, Riley. I mean, yes. Yes, if it happens we’ll be there for you the whole time, no matter what.”

“See, that’s the thing,” Riley replied. “And this is my final condition for joining your crew. And if you’re not willing to do this, I don’t blame you at all, and we can go our separate ways. You can still have the ship and everything on it. Guys, I don’t want to die like that, like my mom and uncle and brother did. It’s a fucking awful way to go out, but to have to sit there and watch it happen to people you love…I wouldn’t wish it on my worst enemy.

She waited until Beckman lifted his head and met her eyes.

“You’re the best friends I’ve ever had. I hope I never have to ask you to do this. Really, I do. But if it comes down to it, if I start exhibiting symptoms and my brain starts to really go…I need you to promise me that one of you will kill me. Or get someone else to do it, I don’t care, I just…”

Shanks and Beckman met each other’s eyes briefly before turning back to Riley.

“I can’t blame my cousin for what she did. I wish she hadn’t done it, I wish I still had her here every day…” Riley’s voice began to crack. Shanks wanted so badly to move to her side and comfort her, but he couldn’t bring himself to, not yet. “But I don’t blame her for the choice, having seen what she and I have seen. I don't want the disease to take me, but I also don’t know if I’d ever be able to do what she did if it came down to it. So I need assurance that if it ever happens, I will have a way out before I lose my mind and my dignity entirely.”

Silence overtook the room. Shanks and Beckman were looking at each other, communicating in that wordless way she often saw them do. Riley fidgeted with her nails, then busied herself pouring the rest of the sake into their cups.

“Riley…” Beckman began. “I can’t promise you I’ll ever personally take your life. Shanks can’t either. We could never do that.”

Tears began falling silently from Riley’s eyes in earnest now.

“What we can promise,” Shanks took over, “Is that if it ever comes to that we’ll find a way to help you…end things. We respect your right to die in whatever way you feel is right for you. But…Goddammit, I hope it doesn’t happen.”

Riley nodded. “I can work with that.” She let out a sob, and Shanks and Beckman moved to her spot, each of them wrapping their arms around her as she cried into them. Shanks planted a kiss on top of her head. “We love you, Rye. Whatever happens, we’ll deal with it. Okay?”

“Okay.”

The trio spent the night together in much the same way, allowing Riley to cry while mostly masking their own feelings in stupid jokes to make her laugh. Eventually, they fell asleep piled together, the way Riley always loved.

Previous - Chapter 1: Meetings and Propositions

Next - Chapter 3: Old Friends and New

#akagami no shanks x reader #akagami no shanks #red haired shanks #red haired shanks x reader #red hair pirates #benn beckman #benn beckman x reader

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blog-sliverofjade · 4 years

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7: Tête Dure Minous

Pairing: Remi Denier x OFC

Summary: Lorel Maddox just wants to live as a human, run her bakery in peace, and forget. Unfortunately, the alpha of the local leopard pack has very different ideas.

Remi Denier doesn’t know what to make of the female Changeling who wants nothing to do with him or the RainFire pack. He does know that he has a driving need to protect her. Even if it’s from herself.

While they’re embroiled in a battle of wills, there’s a war brewing on the horizon. The outside threat could not only destroy everything they hold dear, but tear apart the fragile new bonds of the Trinity Accord, plunging the world into bloodshed to rival the Territorial Wars of centuries past.

Word count: 2018

Content warning: Racist cop

Hearth Fires Masterlist

Beta read by the wonderful pandabearer

Lorel bared her teeth at him when a wave of power washed into the shop; it tasted wild, male, and lethal. She tore her attention away from the cop in time to see Remi stalking through the open door. Her cat went from snarling and ready to pounce to wary watchfulness in the presence of a bigger predator. She hated that some of her anxiety eased the moment she caught his scent, but at least her cat’s homicidal urges went from screaming to a dull roar.

And damned if she wasn’t relieved to see Denier, like he was some sort of knight in shining armour. Or, rather, a knight in jeans and a t-shirt. Said jeans hung low on his hips, emphasizing his narrow waist in contrast to the breadth of his chest. The black t-shirt clung to the ridges and hollows of his densely muscled chest and wide shoulders.

“Mr. Denier, she here one of your’n?” Shank turned square to him and jerked his head in Lorelei’s direction.

“All changelings in Swain County are mine.”

She opened her mouth to protest the hard, possessive statement, but Remi cut her off with a look, the cat rising in his eyes. Although they never changed colour, her own cat recognized his and urged her to back down. The animal usually urged the opposite; the sudden shift in temperament had her scrabbling to regain her equilibrium after she’d prepared to fight for control.

Even though the sheriff was human, some latent instincts must have sensed something because he dropped his folded arms to hook his thumbs behind his belt. Remi’s gaze didn’t stray from Shaw’s, but she had no doubt that he was keeping careful track of the cop’s hands in relation to his weapons.

“Ya need to get your girl in line. Had a call she was intimidatin’ folk.” Shank levelled him with a hard look below thick, dark brows.

The thought that either of them believed she was under his protection soothed something within that she hadn’t even known had been stretched taut. The relief was like setting down a burden she’d been carrying for so long she only recognized the strain once it was gone. And that set her teeth on edge.

“The CCTV footage doesn’t corroborate the allegation.” There was a drawl to his voice, but it lacked the thickness of the bayou it’d had when they first met.

“Yer a big guy, what a young girl’d find intimidatin’ you’d hardly sneeze at,” he shrugged.

“Are charges being pressed?” Remi merely tilted his head and, somehow, she knew that his leopard was close to the surface even though his eyes continued to remain completely human.

Some long-buried instinct in Shaw must have recognized it, too, because the hand closest to his stunner twitched. Claws burst from Lorel’s fingertips. For once, she didn’t try to force them back in. Remi, however, kept his hands in his pockets. Only a fool would miss the lethal threat hidden beneath the lazy demeanour. How on earth he managed to hold the alpha’s stare, full of barely restrained savagery, she had no idea.

“Naw, I think we’ll let this’un go with a warnin’.” Shaw shrugged and resettled his hat. “But you best show your girl how things are ‘round here.”

Shocked speechless by the blatant paternalism, she could only gape at him.

“Oh? And just how are ‘things ‘round here’?” Remi’s tone was deceptively calm, but whatever the other man saw on his face had drained the blood from his own.

“Well, that… you see…” His Adam’s apple bobbed as he gulped. “You can’t just go ‘round intimidating people you don’t like!”

“I think you should take your own advice, officer.” The predator was present in his voice. “Cher, why don’t you make a copy of that video for Sheriff Shaw here?” He never looked away from the cop so the silent snarl she threw his way went unnoticed.

“Testosterone’s getting thick in here anyway,” she muttered in a volume pitched for his ears alone.

Once Lorelei was out of the room, the red haze fogging his mind cleared a little and he could think clearly again. Shaw, on the other hand, realized he was alone in a room with a leopard in human skin, which meant he was less likely to do something stupid to prove his masculinity in front of a third, feminine party. Men could usually be counted on to pull supremely senseless stunts when it came to pretty women. Such as issuing premature ultimatums instead of merely taking the measure of a prospective packmate.

“Now look here…” the sheriff licked his lips.

“I assume the human will be charged with filing a false report?” He leaned against the cash counter, bracing his hands against the edge, palms down. The relaxed stance fooled Shaw into downgrading his threat level and puffed up accordingly, crowding the alpha’s space. Remi barely avoided rolling his eyes. His leopard didn’t take it as a challenge, merely huffed and sat down to scratch behind an ear.

“We have to dispatch a car ‘cause if something happens, we could be held liable if we don’t. We don’t want people to avoid callin’ if they see something suspicious.” Remi wondered if the sheriff realized just how much of a stereotype of the rural hick cop he was, despite his law degree. When he’d decided to found RainFire, he’d compiled dossiers on the local Enforcement brass and he knew that Shaw was well-educated. Was it a deliberate good ole’ boy ruse to put the humans at ease?

Lorelei returned with the data chip and his leopard snapped to attention, snarling a warning at the male in the room. Neither half of him wanted the cop anywhere near the curvy redhead. Remi caught the eye of Sugiyama through the door, which was still propped open, and waved him over. The lieutenant accepted the chip and promised it would be entered into the incident report, ignoring his superior who clearly smelled displeased. Scenting no lie from the officer, his leopard settled somewhat.

“Now I assume that Ms. Maddox is free to resume business unless ya’ll have any further questions.” It wasn’t so much a question as it was a threat.

Though Shaw was pissed at the brusque dismissal, he strode out of the bakery. Sugiyama lingered to thank Lorelei for her hospitality and cooperation. Remi crushed the urge to throw the officer bodily out of the shop. He could probably hit Shaw like a bowling pin with the lieutenant as the ball.

“Thank you for your concern, Mr. Denier,” she said stiffly and smoothed her apron. Today, it was patterned with autumn leaves and edged in yellow worn over a russet dress. He wondered what he would find if he tugged on the satin tie and parted that modest Peter Pan collar to lick at the freckles that peppered her neck. Were there more scattered across her creamy breasts? Did they trail across her soft stomach to…

“Mr. Denier, was there something I can help you with?” By the sharp arch of her brow, she was repeating the question. Unlike Shaw, she wasn’t afraid of being alone with him although she was at the other end of the hierarchy. Even with all the training in the world, a submissive could never hope to win against an alpha leopard in a physical battle. And yet still she defied him while maintaining all outward propriety that could never be mistaken for an actual challenge.

“There’s no need to be so formal, please, call me Remi.” It was an obvious ploy to keep him at arm’s length. If she thought that would work, well, she had another thing coming. He intended to solve the mystery of this woman who played at being human, needed to figure out why his cat wanted to hunt her in the most sensual way.

“Was there anything you require?” Icy haughtiness that would have done those few who still clung to Silence proud. Coaxing her out of her shell was going to be fun.

“A ‘thank you’ would be nice.” A slow, feline smile curved his lips.

“For what? Barging in here and claiming responsibility for me like I’m a child?” That was interesting. Most submissives liked feeling safe and protected, that she found it upsetting was another facet to the puzzle of Lorelei Caine/Maddox.

“Keeping you from assaulting a law Enforcement officer.” It had been obvious that she wanted to go for Shaw’s throat the second he walked in.

“Thank you, Mr. Denier, for sweeping in here uninvited and undermining my authority in my own business. I am ever so grateful you patted me on the head and shooed me away while you menfolk postured at each other.” Her tone was sweet enough to drizzle over one of her confections and the drama was so over the top it would have done Scarlett O’Hara proud. Any minute now he expected her to start soliloquizing about root vegetables. “Since you’re marking your territory and all, I think the sheriff peed on that tree over there in case you feel the need to over-mark.”

“Il y a pas de quoi. Next time Shaw wants to cause a fuss, he’ll have to notify RainFire.” She blinked, considering the ramifications of having a pack of predatory changelings on her side when it came to dealing with the bigoted sheriff. “One of the benefits of pack is protection.” It was not just a case of safety in numbers. Dominants lived to defend their pack, the need to protect ingrained into the core of who they were.

“It was one person. Besides, you can’t be there 24/7,” she said dismissively.

The cat didn’t like the insinuation that he couldn’t protect this stubborn woman who regarded him with eyes of cool slate ringed with Prussian blue.

“No one messes with RainFire.” Any and all challenges were met with swift and brutal force. Yet the challenge of Lorelei was one that couldn’t be resolved with violence. Not as the initial offensive, anyway.

“You make it sound like you’re running a protection racket. Should I pay protection money in cookies? Are you going to shake down the grocery store for milk, too?” Cocking a hip, she braced a fist on it and gestured in the direction of the grocer with her other hand.

“What if next time it’s someone with a gun?” The blood drained away from her face and he bristled at the spike of doubt in her luscious sugar and spice scent. At their first meeting, he’d thought that the smell was from her array of goods; now he knew that it was part of her. When he’d walked in, the sweetness had been tainted with a hint of something foul that nearly left an aftertaste. That note quickly faded while he dealt with Shaw and he wasn’t yet certain whence it came.

“Then it’s a good thing I keep a hot pot of tea going.” She glanced at the faintly steaming kettle within arm’s reach. As a makeshift defensive strategy, he had to admit it wasn’t half bad. A faceful of scalding liquid would give even him pause.

“A clever answer,” he mused. “Do you have one for me?”

A faint vertical line formed on her brow. Normally she took care to avoid meeting his gaze in case his leopard took it as a provocation, she did so now with remote appraisal.

“Are you going to kill me if I decline your offer?”

“Only if it’s necessary. Why? Do you plan on hurting my people, t-minou? You’ll find we’re not easy prey.” He knew his eyes flashed cat bright as he stalked closer to her. Wide-eyed, she mirrored his movements until she bumped up against the counter. Bones pushed up against her skin from the grip she had on the white ashwood. The pulse of her heart was a fluttering butterfly under the thin skin of her throat, the sound of it like the hoofbeats of a racehorse.

“If you’re calling my bluff, cher, this is a game you won’t win.”

Tête Dure - Hardheaded

Minou(s) - Cat(s)

T - Small, shortened form of petite

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lokilickedme · 5 years

Text

Part One of Read By Loki Laufeyson - The Night Manager Chapter 9

By request

Posted originally in 2016 at the Archive of Our Own (no longer available there)

Warning: No Archive Warnings Apply (rated mature for crude language and lewd sex talk and brief reference to necrophilia. Damn Loki.)

Category: F/M and some indigenous aquatic predators/Pine’s bunghole

Fandom: Loki - Fandom, The Night Manager - Fandom

Relationship: Jonathan Pine/Yvonne

Character: Loki (narrator), Jonathan Pine, Yvonne

Additional Tags: Explicit Language, Non-Explicit Sex, Loki Does What He Wants, stick to the damn book Loki

Series: Part 1 of Read by Loki Laufeyson

Stats: Originally Published 2016-01-29 Words: 1017 (original version)

Updated with additional text 2019-01-02

Chapter 9 of The Night Manager, Read By Loki Laufeyson

by lokilickedme

Summary: If Loki narrated audiobooks.

Notes:

The Night Manager, chapter nine, randomly abridged and read by Loki Laufeyson. Sorry about the additional narrative, I couldn't stop him.

See the end of the work for more notes.

"You're a lie," she said, distractedly kissing him. "You're some kind of lie. You're all truth, but you're a lie. I don't understand you."

Oh yes, this is a good start, lies lies and more lies - I can get behind this fellow and the compulsive fibbing, but the damn woman talks too much. You're not meant to understand him sweetheart, he's a fucking secret agent spy assassin and he'd just as soon shank your ass as bang it. But the lies part I like.

"I'm on the run," he said. "I had a problem in England."

Doesn't everyone? I had problems recently in Jotunheim and Midgard, trust me I know how being on the run can jack your mojo but good god man, get busy - the female's already implied she's ready to climb you like a cherry tree just to suck your dangly fruit, stop talking and get after it. I was on the run when I knocked up the queen of the giants and begat my triplets so I know it’s possible to mix business with pleasure when you’re hotfooting it on the lam from an angry pantheon of Norse gods or whoever it was you doublecrossed this time. I may be projecting a bit, but you get my drift. We've got six hours of this nonsense to plow through so let’s get to the good stuff, shall we?

She clambered up his body and put her head beside his.

Now we're talking!

"Want to talk about it?"

Oh god I didn't mean literally. Stop talking.

Blah blah blah, boring yammer about a passport, blah blah blah, poking about in graveyards, "What's your real name, who are you who are you"...

Who writes this tripe? It isn’t fanfiction, that shit’s good.

All day they lived naked, and when the rain cleared they took the boat out to an island in the center of the lake and swam naked from the shingle beach.

There are no pictures in this book and at this point I’m thinking the narrative would benefit greatly from pictures. Why are there no pictures? And while swimming naked in natural bodies of water is a nice idea in theory, let me tell you that in many areas of this shithole planet there are things living under the water’s surface that you don't want having unrestricted access to your assorted entrances and exits. This book is not a safe or accurate portrayal of how a romantic escapade should be conducted because I'm here to say there is nothing romantic about having your paramour remove a spiky candiru from your bunghole.

Every day or night they made love. In the small hours of morning when he came up from the disco...

Wait, what? He's hanging out in a disco all night? I hope he's showering before he comes to bed because this is what, 1974? I’ve got six words for you: nylon polyester and leisure suits, people. Fabrics that hold every smell that wafts within a dozen yards of the wearer. Sweat and pot and unwashed crevices and who knows what else - he's going to be coming in smelling like New Jersey. Do women find the odor of stale beer, industrial waste and farts arousing?

Yvonne would lie awake waiting for his brushing signal against the door. He would tiptoe to her and she would draw him down on her, her last long drink before the desert.

Well I'll be buggered, apparently they do.

I've just been informed by a studio tech in an In-N-Out tee shirt that this story is taking place in the 1990's, not the 1970's. I was confusing it with that other one with the same guy in it, the one about the apartment building full of idiots who don’t realize doors open both ways. So fortunately there are no polyester leisure suits smelling like sulfur and B.O. to hamper the romantic encounters, which is good because I was starting to wonder about this woman Yvonne's sanity and olfactory kinks. But I still don't understand what the fellow is doing hanging out in a disco all night while his woman is laying in bed waiting to be scrogged. This author has obviously never had sex.

Their lovemaking was almost motionless.

What?? Why in the name of fucking Yggdrasil - ? People it requires movement, there's rubbing and friction and thrusting and stuff that happens to the thing inside the thing and...motionless? Like I said, this author's obviously never had sex, what the hell is he doing writing about it? This is disturbing. Only the dead have motionless sex and that’s exclusively during the rigor stage when your dick can literally snap off if you move. Is this foreshadowing? Are they going to die the next time they go skinnydipping with the spiky candirus?

The attic was a drum, and every movement clattered through the house. When she started to call out in pleasure, he laid his hand over her mouth and she bit it, leaving teeth marks in the flesh around his thumb.

Yes, biting is nice, but I'm still worried about the foreshadowing and the whole motionless sex thing. It's the spiky candirus, isn't it?

And now there’s more boring tripe about the passport, which this fellow really seems obsessed with. His life at this point consists of sex with a woman who apparently likes to pretend she’s dead, doing Travolta impersonations in the disco downstairs when he’s not practicing flexing his penis muscles for the motionless copulation with the freaky Miss Yvonne, and swimming in dangerous waters with a Visitors Welcome sign stapled to his asshole. And there’s some spouting about in French, and finally more sex. Oh joy. Did I mention this book could really benefit from pictures? Because it could really benefit from pictures.

They made love in an empty guest room while her mother was at the supermarket, and in the walk-in airing cupboard.

Well that doesn't sound at all uncomfortable. The guest room is a good option so long as mummy’s got a long shopping list and you’re quick about changing the sheets, but I Googled that shit while I was looking up areas that are indigenous to the spiky candiru - aside from being small and cramped as fuck, there's elements from the heating system in these airing cupboard things. Which I would take to mean that if you go to splashing bodily fluids around in them someone's going to end up with an electrified dick lit up like a christmas tree. Maybe this is what the foreshadowing was about.

She had acquired the recklessness of sexual obsession. The risk was a drug for her. Her whole day was spent contriving moments for them to be alone together. "When will you go to the priest?" he asked.

Yes darling, by all means make an appointment with a holy man to get forgiveness for what we did in the cupboard. I hear heaven frowns upon the whole legs-over-the-head thing. Be sure to get absolution for my electrocuted wiener while you're there. Oh, and isn't there that little issue of you being engaged to someone else?

Skipping a bit...skipping...oh god, really? More whining about the passport? This man is more obsessed with getting a passport than he is with getting pussy. I'm starting to wonder if he even likes sex and now the whole candiru up the bunghole thing is making sense.

The only crime she had omitted to mention was the theft of her own heart.

Seriously? It gets romantic now, in the final sentence? They've been fucking in dangerous predator-infested lakes and electrical closets with exposed wiring and dusty cramped attics and doing the whole motionless sex thing which, admittedly, might come in handy around that electrical equipment - and now, at the very end of the chapter, there's a line that indicates some depth of emotion that could possibly have redeemed that cringey bit about the disco? He could have come in smelling like the subway and she'd say "You've stolen my heart" and he'd say "Oh good because someone stole my wallet in that crowded disco so your heart is pretty much all I have now." A lost opportunity, author. You're still a virgin, aren't you?

End Notes

#Loki Reads #a lost oldie from 2016 #updated #The Night Manager #Loki fic #by request #part 1 of 3

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