sweet Spencer realizing he has feelings for cold!Reader? I'm obsessed
OH NO. [ONESHOT]
/oʊ noʊ/
Spencer makes a (rather terrifying) revelation in relation to his ice-hearted coworker, who might not actually be all that ice-hearted.
WARNINGS: fem!reader
spencer reid x cold!reader || fluff?? || 2.3k || series masterlist!
a/n: based on the fact that it was 1°C when i left my house yesterday and i was freezing
main masterlist!!
Sometimes, Spencer Reid hated living in Virginia.
The temperature always felt colder than it did back in Vegas, no matter whether it was in the dead of winter or in the middle of summer, and for someone who didn’t have the best temperature regulation already, that just spelled extra issues for Spencer to deal with on top of everything else.
It was March for god’s sake, why was it only 40 degrees?
He walks into the office bundled up like a newborn baby, with a shirt, a vest, and a coat on, with a scarf wrapped tightly around his neck and knitted gloves on his hands.
He sits down in his desk chair with all the grace of an elephant trying to do ballet, the chair squeaking under his weight as he basically throws himself into it.
Morgan starts laughing almost immediately. “You look like you’ve just stepped out of Antarctica-”
“It’s cold,”
“It’s not that cold,”
“Those who have issues with temperature regulation are more susceptible to extreme temperature fluctuations when the weather changes,” Spencer rubs his hands together through his gloves in the hope that the kinetic energy will spread through his hands and warm the rest of his body.
“And let me guess, you’re one of those people?” Morgan raises his eyebrow with a smirk.
“Yes Morgan, I’m one of those people,” Spencer’s exasperated response is enough to send Morgan over the edge into laughter.
“Will you quiet down, it’s 8 in the morning for god’s sake,” Your arrival is announced with your usual snark, tiredness still lacing your tone as you walk around the two to reach your own desk opposite Spencer’s and pull a white beanie from your head to stuff it in the pocket of your coat.
“Sorry-”
“Not you Reid,” Despite the fact that you’re dismissing him as the recipient of your annoyance, it still sounds like you’re angry at him.
“Someone’s chipper this morning,” Morgan nudges Spencer like he’s speaking to him privately, but is raised enough that he knows you’ve heard it too. “You would’ve thought she’d be elated, she’s in her element now the temperature’s dropping,”
“I can hear you.” you scoff out your words as you unpack your bag on your desk.
“Oh I know, it’s more fun when you can hear me,” Morgan takes a sip from the mug in his hands with a smirk, leaning back in his chair once he’s decided you’d endured enough of his teasing for now.
You spend the next ten or so minutes in silence as everyone sets themselves up for the day. Everyone except Spencer evidently, who is still sat with all of his outerwear on despite the office being internally heated.
“Will you stop shaking?” Spencer turns his eyes away from his frozen hands at your question, although phrased more like an instruction under your usual tone. “I can see it in my peripheral vision and it’s distracting,”
“Oh um- I’m sorry,” Spencer clutched both of his hands tight together in an attempt to forcibly stop them from shaking.
“Don’t apologise, go make yourself a cup of coffee or something, those gloves aren’t doing anything to help you,”
“Right- Yeah,” Spencer takes your advice with a nod, standing up from his desk to practically run over to the kitchenette like your word was law.
“I know what you’re doing Ice Queen,” Morgan tilts his head knowingly at you as you watch Spencer scamper around the corner and out of sight, and you don’t turn your gaze towards him even after Spencer leaves your field of vision.
“I’m not doing anything,”
“You care about Reid’s well being,” He throws a balled up post-it note in your direction, hitting you in the side of your head and acting as an incentive to look in his direction, shooting daggers at the bridge of his nose. “You can’t hide it from me sweetheart, your icy façade is melting as we speak,”
“Whatever,” You roll your eyes as you stand up from your chair, exiting the conversation with a scoff as you walk around the bullpen and disappear into the unisex bathroom.
You still haven’t returned by the time Spencer walks back to his desk with a steaming mug of coffee cradled in both hands, and his eyebrows furrowed slightly at your empty desk chair as he took his seat.
“She just went to the bathroom genius she hasn’t disappeared off the face of the earth,” Morgan laughs in amusement at Spencer’s expression, staring at your chair like his gaze will magically will you into existence.
Then his vision goes dark, and he can hear Morgan’s laughter escalate. He’s not sure exactly what’s happening at first, but as his wind-chilled ears begin to warm and his eyelashes catch on something as he tries to open his eyes he realises that his vision has been physically obstructed by something.
He pulls up on the material covering his eyes, and like a magic trick, where your chair was empty before you are now sitting in it, head lowered to hide behind the screen of your computer monitor as Morgan continues to chortle at the two of you.
It’s a quick realisation that what was previously covering his eyes was a hat, specifically the white beanie that you’d walked into the office wearing this morning.
“What did I say?” Morgan gestures outwards with his hands like he’d proved some point to you that Spencer was clearly ignorant to.
“Shut your mouth or I’ll pull out all your teeth and do it for you,”
“Ooh I’m so scared, Reid protect me from this absolute monster,” Morgan presses his hand to his chest dramatically, leaning back in his chair with a smirk etched onto his face.
Spencer doesn’t so much as spare Morgan a glance at his comment, blankly staring in your direction as his brain computes what exactly had just happened. He was wearing your hat now? You’d put your hat on his head? You’d walked over, taken your hat, and physically put it on his head?
Under normal circumstances he’s sure he’d die of embarrassment at so much as the thought of having something that personally belonged to you in his possession, let alone be actually wearing something the belonged to you and invaded his olfactory neurons with your scent.
Yet here he was, so absolutely dumbfounded by your actions that he didn’t even have the mental capacity to be embarrassed.
“Reid,” Morgan nudges his shoulder, and Spencer turns to him with wide eyes and a half-absent expression.
“Huh?”
“Wow, look what you did to him, he’s completely shut down,” Morgan throws another balled up post-it in your direction, hitting you in the shoulder this time, and you bite your tongue as you turn your head up to look at the two boys across from you once more.
Your eyes are narrowed as you glare in Morgan’s direction, but he takes no notice of it whatsoever as he gestures towards Spencer with his head, smirking all the while.
Your gaze is substantially softer once your eyes flicker over to the boy sitting opposite you. The hat really seems to complete the whole ‘just stepped out of a blizzard’ look that Spencer’s outfit seemed to radiate, and the bright red of his cheeks seemed to amplify that look tenfold.
“Are you still cold?” You ask the question like you’re annoyed at him, and he takes it as your irritation from Morgan’s constant teasing bleeding into your speech rather than you genuinely being irked by him. After all, you had gone out of your way to help him warm up right? Then again that could’ve been because you just didn’t want to watch him shiver anymore. You did say it was distracting-
“Reid.” He turns his eyes up towards you as you speak his name with all the conviction of an aggrieved high school teacher.
“Yes? I mean- Not ‘yes’ I’m cold- ‘yes’ like I’m paying attention- You know- Uh-” You hold up a hand to stop Spencer from spinning into a spiral as he tries to elaborate on what his response meant.
“You’re not cold anymore?” You keep your eyes trained on him as you ask the question, emphasising it a way that indicated you wanted a straight answer from him and not some half baked explanation of why he was/wasn’t.
“No… Well, my hands are-” Spencer stops himself prematurely with a shake of his head. “No- No I’m not cold anymore, I’m okay now,”
“Your hands are still cold?”
Spencer nods, looking down at his hands sheepishly as if they've betrayed him.
You watch Spencer's hands for a moment before making a decision. With a resigned sigh, you reach into your coat pocket and pull out a small red hand warmer, holding it out over the divide between your desks to offer it to him without a word.
Spencer's eyes widen in surprise as he takes the hand warmer from you, a sinking feeling shooting through his chest as your fingers brush his. But it wasn’t the kind he’d grown accustomed to when speaking to you.
There wasn’t a shred of intimidation or lingering insecurity, it didn’t send a chill down his spine or make him feel the need to curl into himself, it instead left a strangely comfortable warmth in it’s wake, one that was quickly proving to be more useful at warming him up than the gel packet held between his fingertips.
It was a sensation he wasn’t sure he’d ever actually felt before, and his mind couldn’t make up whether it’s origin was the temperature difference in your hands as they brushed each other and the inherent warmth of your hand graced his, or whether it was an internal situation where your silent act of consideration was literally tricking his body into believing it was warmer just as a result of your actions.
Either way, he suddenly felt very warm.
He fumbles with the warmer for a second before tugging off his gloves and snapping the small disk to start the chemical reaction. "Thanks," he murmurs, his cheeks flushing slightly.
"Don't mention it," you reply, turning back to your computer screen with complete nonchalance in your tone.
Spencer nods softly at your response, rolling the packet between the palms of his hands as his eyes linger on your face even after you look away.
Spencer’s beginning to be increasingly distracted from his files by thoughts of you. Your hidden kindness, your wit, the way your eyes crinkle when you smile, the way you chew on the end of your pen when you're concentrating, the way your nose scrunches up when you're deep in thought-
He realises, with a jolt, that he's falling for you.
It hits him like a ton of bricks, and for a moment, he's paralysed with a mix of astonishment and fear. How had he not noticed it before? He's never been good at relationships, maybe that’s why. He didn’t exactly know what constituted as real feelings for someone.
Morgan watches the exchange with a smirk, but there's something softer in his expression as he looks between the two of you, specifically towards the puddle of Spencer’s emotions showing all over his face. He clears his throat, breaking the momentary silence.
"Well, now that everyone's warm and cozy, shall we get to work?" he says, trying to inject some levity into the situation.
Spencer nods, already diving into the case file on his desk as a means of desperately trying to get the image of your face and the feeling of your fingers brushing against his hand out of his head. You follow suit, the warmth spreading through the bullpen as you all settle into your routine.
He tries to focus on the case at hand, but his mind keeps wandering back to you. He remembers the feeling of your hand brushing against his, the way his heart had fluttered in his chest at the contact. It's a feeling he can't quite shake, and he's not sure he wants to. That was the worst part.
Oh no.
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Black Metal and Bourbon (I)
AU MASTERLIST || PART II
PAIRING: Biker/Mechanic!Simon 'Ghost' Riley x F!Bartender!Reader
WORDCOUNT: 8.1k
WARNINGS: Alcohol consumption, drug usage, mentions of sex & intimacy, dark jokes/dirty jokes, rumors, gossip, past toxic relationship, a shitty Ex, protective!Simon, etc. (18+ mini-series)
*I do not give others permission to translate and/or re-publish my works on this or any other platform*
You slapped the damp rag back into the bar top, the fabric heavy with spilled alcohol and other fluids that you didn’t even want to try and think about.
“Jesus.” Your muscles ache, neck stiff from having to try and slap a dart from the ceiling where some jackass had been too drunk to attempt and hit the target. The thing was still up there, as you weren’t about to spend your entire night fruitlessly attempting to fix someone else's blurry mistakes.
You glare over your shoulder, seeing the unconscious form of the man in question being dragged out by his friends presently, his slurring chuckles making him sound like a drowning elephant. Intoxicated yells of goodbye attached to your name make you roll your eyes slowly as they begin being said; you push through the waist-height door to allow you behind the front counter. Your middle finger flips the patrons off before boisterous flirting hits the air.
“C’mon baby, don’t be like that—!” Is cut off by the slam of the front doors and you couldn’t be more happy that your boss hadn’t gotten the bolts tightened.
“Don’t get paid enough…” You grumble, eyes slithering over to the tip jar and seeing the overflow of bills and coins as your fingers wrap the neck of a bottle of Vodka.
The profit would be split with your coworker even if she’d been gone for more than half a night getting railed by her new boy toy. You can still remember the look she’d given you as she’d walked out during rush hour, her sharp smirk and smug sheen of ‘you won’t say anything, will you?’
Grumbling under your breath, you slip the Vodka back into its slot on the wall racks, while telling yourself you can’t drink on the job; trying to forget the face of the man that had been attached to hers before they’d stumbled to the back alley.
“Graham Whitaker, you’re such a five-cent sell-out,” you shake your head, sighing heavily into the air that smells like booze and sweat.
Graham Whitaker—your Ex in every sense.
You decided to tell your coworker, if she ever showed back up, that the only reason she was getting dicked-down was because it was that man’s plan to try and make you jealous. As if you’d be caught with your pants down over a prick that had cheated on you more times than you could count before you threw his ass out.
“Not my problem anymore,” your hands move to display themselves in a motion of a settled disagreement before wiping them on your black pants.
It was late now, of course, with the dart-drunk and his friends being the last patrons that you had to serve. But you’d been in this town a long, long time.
Sorrel the construction worker came in an hour, Miss Anna-Lee accompanying for her nightly Gin and Tonic before she talked about her late love from the seventies. From there it was three more regulars before closing activities and fighting to get up tomorrow by noon only to do it all over again.
Over and over and over.
You lean back on the counter and look across the brown wood and warm overhead lights, behind you, the illumination from the drink rack gives off a dead glow.
This was your workplace since you'd been of age, and over the years that seemed to drag, here is where you’d stayed. Nothing ever changed in this town—the biggest shock was when you’d broken up with Graham; people hadn’t stopped talking about it for months.
This place was like a prison of slow death and abandoned dreams. Safe to say this was not what you had envisioned for yourself.
You scoff, pushing off the back counter and snatching your rag back up before you can spiral once more.
The stains weren’t going to buff themselves out.
Maybe it was chance that the mechanics shop across the street had shut down, too few employees and too many drug busts. Chance, or fate, whichever it was you chose to believe in that still-air Sunday, it was still a shock to you when you looked out the front window as Sorrel called goodnight through his heavy accent.
‘SOLD’
“Sold?” Sorrel pauses with one foot out of the door, and he chuckles when he sees where you’re looking in shock, your hand holding a dirty glass.
“Haven’t heard, then? Few newcomers snuck in under our noses—they’ll be running the place; mechanics!”
“New?” You laugh. “Who in their right mind would come here of all places?”
Sorrel shakes his head, grumbling as he pulls a cigarette from his pocket. “You’ll just have to meet ‘em, Doll. Sure you’ll leave a glowing impression.”
“Take that shit outside, you ass. You know I hate the smell.” A smirk graces your dead eyes.
“Like I said. Glowing.” You glare, but the man slips out of the door quickly and his form passes by the window outside to climb into his truck parked in the street. Two honks from the horn and the older man is off, grizzly-like beard gone just like your boredness.
New arrivals?
You blink at the blackened shadows of the street, illuminated by the lights and their tall tree-like bases—the sway of the planted bushes in the boxes outside. Your head tilts at the abyssal building that was once in working order.
It was a shitshow now, years of abandonment not giving it any helping hand regarding upkeep. The concrete was cracked, the garage door was hanging off of one side, and the front windows had been broken by your Ex’s buddies when they had gotten into a fight like the three-year-olds they were.
You hum lowly. A hard-chucked set of keys, you recalled. You’d seen it from here easily enough. Hadn't lied to Sheriff Russel when he’d come knocking, and, you suppose, that was why even now the immature posse still tried to scare you by following you home at night to this day.
As if everyone didn’t know where everyone else lived already.
But back to the current interest for the night.
“Let’s have a little look-see, then,” you breathe, knowing Miss Anna-Lee would be a good while away like always. You could chance five minutes—it was just across the street after all.
Shuffling outside, making sure to hold the door until it closes slowly, you step down the single step and stick your hands into your pockets. The night wasn’t hot or cold, simply there like a metaphorical cut on your palm; it wasn’t surprising the more you lived with it, but it still made your skin itch.
Feet padding, you cross the dead street and take in the long stretch of unkempt grass, stepping onto the broken curb as your shoes crunch broken glass. Long-gone cigarette butts are scattered here and there, the occasional stray bit of metal or trash. Your eyes shift slowly from one brick that makes up the frame to another, the peeling blue color that could use touching up.
The mural you had painted in middle school had faded a long time ago, just like the great expectations of going into an art career. The eyes of a great gray wolf are only a dark outline that you can’t help but stare at as if a cancer was growing in your brain, hidden behind the reach of green ivy.
Ripping your eyes away, you ignore the cry of tires from across the town and the pop of an exhaust pipe—the roar of either a car chase by the repeat offender Irene Chaney, or by some stupid kid related to Irene Chaney.
“She’s gonna wreck one of these days,” you breathe, looking down at your object of intention—the sold sign in all of its red and white glory.
Your hand snakes out and grabs the cheap plastic, stopping its swaying with a creak and a tilt of your head.
You just couldn’t understand it—who in their right mind would buy this place? The only thing it would be good as is rubble, at least then some rabbit could make its very dusty home here.
Sorrel had mentioned multiple people too.
“Must be up at the B&B then,” your voice carries over the space, the stars twinkling above you as a shadow stands at the end of the cracked driveway. Its hands are in its pockets, tall form bulky with the dark brown leather jacket around its intimidating form. You’re none the wiser, letting the sign drop as you put your hands to your hips. “They better not be fuckin’ dickheads—”
“Mind explainin’ to me why I came to get a drink and now I’m talkin’ to some Bird on my property?”
You startle, gasp peeling out of your lips as your head swivels as if attached to a string which, in turn, tracks back to the source of a heavy Manchester accent. Grass breaks under your feet, as the gravel of the tone makes you cringe. Your eyes lock on the man who looks like he just came back from a warzone.
The first thing you noticed was the balaclava and the skeleton detailing, of course, how could you not—the lower half was an inch below those October eyes of the deepest shade of brown you’d ever witnessed.
Your spine straightens in cautious surprise, hiding the way your hands had clenched as if ready to swing on your Ex if he so happened to be there instead of…this person.
“Excuse me?” You say, quickly, as if it was forced out instead of a scream. Your face pushes that stern expression back to your face as your throat clears out the hoarseness.
A covered head tilts with its small sliver of pale flesh visible to you—the strong bones of his nose bridge and hidden jawline. The bulk of large muscles and thighs spoke to hard labor, and his booted feet shifted below loose black cargo pants.
The mask alone caused you a hint of worry in those few seconds of fast study of this phantom’s anatomy.
He blinks at you slowly, raising the small corner of a dark brow from a respectable distance away.
“Said you’re trespassing, yeah?” Your face gains a sheen of heat, and you glance at your bar behind the stranger, at the bright burn of the lights.
Taking a stiff breath, your lips pull into a frown as you try to hide your embarrassment.
“Well…a holler would have been just fine.” A fake glare is put on. “What’s with sneaking up on a woman in the middle of the night? Are you some creep or something?”
Those dark eyes stay locked on yours, and for a moment you don’t know if you’ve encountered a statue or not because he doesn’t speak for a moment.
A puff of breath from his nose.
“You the bartender, then?” You motion to your nametag above your left breast and grunt. His gaze homes in before he simply says, “Good.”
Without another word, the man turns stiffly before he steadily begins making his way back to the bar; crossing the street with a swift check of the road. You watch him saunter off, jaw slackened and your cheeks hot. The span of his shoulder blades levels out as he rolls his shoulders.
Where did this guy even come from? The answer was simple, the bed and breakfast was only four buildings down and to the left. Guy must have come in for a late-night serenade with a bottle.
A quick glance is thrown back to the rundown property behind you before you growl and hurry after this individual who currently pushes open the faulty doors of your work. Jogging across the asphalt, you catch the thing right before it closes and slip inside with a puff of air and a shoved-down snap of a sarcastic ‘thanks’.
Yet, the man is already pulling back one of the bar stools and easing into it when you make it behind the counter. You study him yet again.
“You’re one of the new mechanics?” Brown-Eyes blinks at you.
Without missing a beat, he goes, “Bourbon—Kentucky.”
“I asked a question,” you cross your arms, not even for a moment looking away as the silence of the bar sneaks in around you and this strange creature. “Least you can do for a lady is answer it when you act like a damn cat and sneak up on her.”
“You were on my property.” This is leveled out through a grunt, and after a moment of staring, you scoff.
“I was curious about who had bought such a piece of junk. Guess I have my answer.” Your hand grabs the bottle of Kentucky Bourbon, the amber liquid inside sloshing as you turn back and put it into the wood. There’s a fraction of a dead tease that makes the man seem more human than he looks.
“Well, aren't you a ray of sunshine?”
“I prefer a solar flair.” You comment dryly and set an engraved glass next to the bottle. Something flickers past the mechanic’s eyes, a quirk to the fabric of his balaclava.
“On The Rocks or Neat?” Your brow raises and you tilt your head.
“That even a bloody question? Neat.” You snort, splaying your hands before you grab the bottle as he watches you blankly.
“Sorry, it's kind of my job to ask.” Your hand shifts and you pour a reasonable amount into the glass, knowing exactly when to stop. As you shift the bottle away, you leave it on the bar top and gently push the beverage to him as his gloved fingers take it up. You repress a small smile at the matching bone gloves to go with the detailing on his balaclava.
“Bartenders always have this much attitude?” The glass is kept in front of his person, carefully held in his large grip.
Moving back, you go to lean on the back counter. This night was quickly taking an interesting turn. “Only if they’re me.” You sigh. “You have a name, then, Brown-Eyes?”
The individual snorts at the title, but his eyes narrow on you at the same time as if he was held hesitant at the ability for you to make him. He had an air of casual tension around him, like a dog on a thin leash that can only just manage to meet others and stay his fangs.
Danger, you pinpoint. The man felt like danger. A riptide; surface tension.
Then why was it that you felt more and more intrigued by the second?
“Simon Riley,” he eases, staring with those numb eyes of his before he tips the glass slightly your way. With the thumb on the same hand that holds the bourbon, he hooks it under his face covering and pulls it up until he can connect the glass to his lips and take down a sip as his Adam’s apple bobs in a swallow.
On the way back, his thumb drags the fabric back to its previous position as if nothing had happened. The image of pale skin and stubble sticks with you, and your eyes shift away quickly without you realizing it as the glass is returned to the counter.
“Well, Simon Riley,” you mutter, “welcome to nowhere.”
The man hums, eyes looking you over in a single glance before the gaze shifts to the wall behind your head. He says nothing, and the door opens to the next three familiar customers as you move to take their order. As you slip out from behind the barrier, you grumble under your breath before you slip past Simon to the corner booth.
“For the record, Riley, I do enjoy seein’ that old place getting taken on. Don’t run it into the ground, would you? And if you need a fresh coat of paint, for the love of all things holy, don’t go down to the Schafersons’ place, you come right to me.”
Walking casually, you greet the three ladies from the downtown library with a smirk and an easy comment about if their husbands knew they were out so late, to which you promptly got cursed out on good faith. Sharing a few chuckles, you get them started on what they need, all the while feeling those brown orbs now following subtly from the side of their sockets, intrigued.
Simon wasn’t sure what to make of you, and the same could be said about this town as a whole. A woman with such a future trapped behind her eyes, adventure in her blood, why were you here in a place with nothing promised for it except dying businesses and old faces? This was a place where people came to hang up the coat, not try and rip it off of its peg.
The children born here with ambitions leave, that was the common denominator. Even Simon could see that. But you? Here you were.
The man peels his eyes away, taking up his glass again and re-hooking his thumb to his mask. Amber liquid seeps into his mouth, pulling the scars on his lips and cheeks as he swallows it down as easily as water. The bourbon pools in his stomach, sending its honied effects to the back of his mind; it would take much more to get drunk, but that wasn’t what Simon was looking for.
Perhaps he was just out tonight wondering why he’d left the military for a mechanic’s job and come out here—asking anything for a sign that this was the right decision even as his head echoed with the screams and the gunfire.
And then he’d seen you standing in front of the fuckin’ worst mechanics shop he’d ever seen that he’d signed the property deed for not three hours ago. Hell, he hadn’t even looked at the place before buying it—Price was responsible for the official financial actions, and the man had made him swear that it was worth it.
But fuck, he’d just needed a way out of the city. Too loud, too unpredictable in that previous shop of theirs right by the busy street. MacTavish and Garrick had been easy to convince; they’d all served together before and had no family over here either.
A new start thousands upon thousands of miles away.
Your head pulls up from where you chat with the librarians, hearing the slam of the door as the draft wafts in from outside—a small breeze has picked up.
Inside walks in your very ruffled, and very well-pleased, coworker, Celina Bell.
She brushes down her top and black skirt, blinking around with blown pupils until her eyes lock on you. A poisonous smile meets your eyes as you raise a brow slowly—Lord, if this girl didn’t realize that fucking your Ex over some workplace squabble wasn’t something to be proud of, she was really a lost cause.
Simon only glances over his shoulder before turning back around and tapping his fingers against his glass absentmindedly.
“You alright?” You ask out of due diligence, sparing the ladies an apology look for them being interrupted.
“Better than alright,” Celina chuckles, walking over with a limp in her step. “Just scored Graham Whitaker.” She fake pauses, blinking as if in realization that a child would know was taking the piss. Your face is stuck in the expression of boredom. “Wait…you two were involved for a few years, right? Oh, I’m really sorry—I had no clue.”
“Yeah,” you look her up and down and blink at the disheveledness. “Sure. Quite the score.” A pause, her lips pulling back into that smug smirk that reminds you of a weasel. Yet your next words leave her face devoid of blood. “You know he got Chlamydia from Stacy Green a week ago, right?”
A pin could be heard dropping. Brown eyes are firmly stuck to the scene, unsure what to make of it. The ladies stifle their laughter.
“...W-what?”
“Y’know,” you motion a hand to her lower body, walking past her back to the bar. “STD. Chlamydia. Results in—”
“I know what the fuck an STD is, you bitch.”
“Woah,” you whistle, “language.” Your body returns to the counter as loud stuttering is left behind you, the frantic patting of a pocket to look for a phone before enraged feet rush to the exit. “Need a refill, Riley?”
“It can wait,” Simon utters slowly. The door slams shut.
You chuckle, shrugging. “Alright, suit yourself.”
The man takes the names you drop and files them away, slotting them into his mental database for when he needs to work with these people. Yet, there’s already a sour impression just off of comments alone. Who better to get your news from than a bartender?
You know everyone's dirty little secrets.
You diligently serve the drinks to the librarians, placing them down carefully before Simon once more has a re-filled glass of his drink. He moves it slightly up in a cheer and gives you a stare as you wipe your hands with a clean rag.
“Seems you know everything ‘round ‘ere.” His accent is what draws you in, and you find yourself eager to hear more from him.
“I’m easy to talk to,” you respond, shrugging and leaning on the counter a foot or two away as you both watch the other. A smirk overtakes your features. “And I am the one that gives people the drinks.”
“So, what I’m hearing,” Simon raises a brow. “Is that you get ‘em dunker than a man on his execution date.”
You click your tongue, tilting your head in a teasing manner while maintaining a serious face.
“Afraid you’ll spill your secrets, Riley?”
His eyes flash at you, and his lips flicker into a smirk you can hear in his voice.
“It’ll take more than two glasses of Bourbon to get me talking, Sunshine.”
Your face shifts away, but the sudden fight with a smile leaves you nearly breathless.
Who is this man?
“Why are you here,” your question meets his ears as he takes back the last of his drink, stomach filled for the night and his searching, for the moment, abated.
The glass meets the bar top.
He grunts. “Needed a drink.”
Your lips pull in annoyance. “You know what I mean. You’re terrible at answering questions.”
“Hm, maybe.”
“Fuck off,” you grumble, shaking your head as a low chuckle makes your insides swirl.
A stack of bills is placed on the counter, and the man stands, grabbing the hood of his black sweatshirt and pulling it up. His gloved hands go to the pockets of his leather jacket with a roll of his wide shoulders. From under the hood, the white of the painted mask glares out from under the shadows that now shroud him.
You both sneak a glance at the mechanic's shop—a clear view from the front window.
“See you around, then?” Your head is tilted at him, blinking. You hum under your breath. “I’m going to keep asking you why you showed up in this town, Riley, and I won’t stop until I get an answer.”
Simon quirks a brow, eyes glinting with interest. When was the last time someone had spoken to him like this outside of his boys?
“Look forward to it,” he utters slowly. With a blink and one more dead look, he’s already out the front door and walking back down the street—disappearing like a ghost the same way he had appeared.
Picking up his cash and counting through it, the librarians across the way snicker, and one calls out, “So, the new mechanic, huh?”
“One more peep and I’m doubling your tab.”
But…you did have to admit, he had been charming…hadn’t he? At least someone here could juggle your attitude.
—
Three days pass with no sighting of Simon Riley, but just because you didn’t see him doesn’t mean you weren’t witness to his aftermath.
The shop across the street was practically fixed up while you were asleep.
Where there had been overgrown grass, there was now a cut lawn getting watered by the reach of an angry sprinkler. The fast movement of the spray reaches the sidewalk that was, somehow, still there under all that trash hiding away like a criminal. Stray bricks are gone and stacked into a pile as you pause outside the bar, staring wide-eyed with your breath caught in your throat in the late morning air.
The ivy over your mural was peeled back—that faded wolf’s gaze locking with yours, unyielding to the calls of time as its canid body stool as a silent sentinel.
But, on the third day, as you’re going on break before the night sets in, you manage to not only see Simon again but meet two of the other men who’d moved here.
You pick up your feet and jog across the street, hopping the curb as you blink, impressed at the open garage with its fixed and oiled bay door. Inside it was still dusty—remnants of what was left behind in the corners and scattered. But it was getting there. Quickly.
“Didn’t know Simon was goin’ to sign on such a piece of rusted shite—where’s the fuckin’ outlets?” Gritted Scottish. You stick your hands into your pockets and enter the large opening.
“If I remember,” you speak, finding the two men standing slightly off to the side as the bulkier one with a mohawk carries a series of extension cords. Cobalt and brown eyes dart to you in shock—the second man of darker complexion sharing a glance with the other in swift confusion. “When you manage to find them, they’ll all be burst.”
Blank stares are sent your way.
“Kids would come by and watch ‘em spark when they were bored. No one really cared enough to stop them.” A clearing of a throat meets your ears as you study the room more.
It was small, with only one main garage for all the repairs, but that wasn’t new to you. The motorcycles were, though.
Five in total all parked and resting next to one another near the back wall, all in varying shades of black and gray. Your lips twitch at the sight, imagining your late-night acquaintance riding one of them—you dare say that it fit him quite well, and you weren’t that surprised at all by this.
Biker mechanics. It fits the script.
“Who’s this then?” The Scot asks you, raising a brow as a friendly smirk pulls his mouth up. “Can’t remember bookin’ any repairs today, Ma’am, might have to wait a few more days before we get it all up and runnin’.”
“I can see. No, I work just across the street,” you spare a friendly smile.
“So you’re the bartender? The bartender.” The second man speaks, grinning kindly as he searches through a toolbox on a small table. He hums, looking playful. “So that’s why Ghost was gone so long.”
Ghost…? Did they mean Simon?
The skeletal accents suddenly make far more sense.
“Johnny MacTavish,” A hand is leveled out ahead of you, and you take it casually with a muttering of your own name. “Soap’s just fine as well.”
Your brow quirks, but you only share an amused nod.
The other individual stands and makes his way over, tall and leaner as to where Soap’s more blatant strength is.
“Kyle Garrick—Gaz. Pleasure.”
“Just came over to introduce myself,” your hand shifts back into your pockets as you motion with your head back to the bar. “I’m on my break.”
“Ah,” Soap’s hands move the cables he holds as he loops them into a more storable shape vertically around his elbow and palm. “Last one to meet then is Price—man’s in town gettin’ lunch for us,” he grunts under his breath. “Hopefully a damn set of zip-ties, too.”
“Zip-ties, Mate?” Gaz breathes a chuckle with a fix of the backward ball cap on his head. “C-4 would bloody help more. At least then we can have a clean starting point.”
“I think we’re fresh out of C-4, unfortunately,” you huff a laugh, motioning around as the men smirk at you, Johnny snorting a chuckle. “You guys have done a pretty good job so far. I can’t remember when it looked this nice in here.”
“Well, we’re honored, Bonnie,” Soap tilts his head as he ties off the cord with one of the ends. “Makin’ me blush.”
“If Simon had just looked at the place before buying it, we might have been able to open sooner.” Gaz huffs, thinning his lips as he glances over the broken window and the peeling paint—the door to the main lobby that has a punched dent in it. “Couldn’t be worse.”
“Well then it can only get better,” you breathe, shrugging.
Gaz huffs affectionately. “Not wrong there, then.”
You lean forward, tilting your head. “You’ll find I rarely am.”
“Second time you’ve snuck on,” a Manchester accent scares you once more, head snapping to the side as the light spills in from the garage opening. “This a pattern, Sunshine?”
Simon’s brows are raised as those October eyes lock with yours. Gaz and Soap share a look, smirking before the Scot peels off to find a place to store his belongings.
“Where have you been?” Gaz asks as you glare at the masked man for once again coming up behind you.
A bag is presented, leaning off three fingers as a glance gets thrown past you.
“Down the street. Needed these made.” The bag is tossed and Kyle catches it easily.
You watch as the crinkly plastic is opened and the dark fabric of four black pairs of overalls is produced, each embroidered with their respective names.
“What’s wrong with the old ones?” Johnny pipes up, brows furrowed.
“Looks like you got fuckin’ mugged in ‘em.” Simon slides his attention back to you as Johnny curses with a glint of amusement in his blues.
“Aren’t open yet.” Your face peels back to a stiff annoyance.
“I can see that, Riley.” You motion to the other men. “I was being polite.”
He grunts while walking past, muttering through a brief smirk, “Doubt that.”
Your jaw slackens, but you only growl and hold your tongue as you glance the mechanic over. He still had his leather jacket, but a loose shirt took the place of a hoodie.
“You ready to answer my question?” Simon locks those eyes with yours from over his shoulder before sliding up to the black form of one of the motorcycles.
Visible to the naked eye, you take in the lack of fairings around the frame—eyeing the pure black metal of the entire engine from any angle that you might move to you’d still be able to see. It was nice. Perfect, even; damn expensive too. While the thought was enticing, you can’t imagine Simon riding it—he seemed more rugged, more…classy.
“Negative.” You roll your eyes, but Soap speaks before you can retort.
“Finally takin’ out the CB1000R, Ghost? ‘Bout time.” The brute throws a blank look at the Scot as Gaz utters to you a few feet away before a casual ‘no’ is leveled out through the space.
“He got it months ago,” Kyle’s eyes crinkle. “Can’t seem to take it out for a ride yet. No one knows what he’s waiting on.”
“Can’t say I blame him,” your words confide. “It’s beautiful.”
“It was a fucking fortune—no use collecting dust is what I say.” You hum, shifting back to Simon who taps the seat of the CB1000R before moving past it to an older cruiser with dents and dirt along the sides. This was more him you thought. Rugged and more dated than the first; something you use on long rides to nowhere.
“Maybe he’s just waiting for a special occasion,” you guess.
“Better get on with it.” Gaz moves away with a shrug and a huff.
Your lips pull in a small smile, and you watch Simon pull keys from his jacket and insert them as he moves to straddle the larger body of the cruiser, easing into it slowly. Staring, you think about how far that bike could take you—what you could see with it on the open road of possibilities and whipping air. Where would you go? Anywhere. Anywhere and everywhere.
Eyes shifting away from the motorcycle, they widen as they softly meet Simon’s own—locked for a moment in a staring contest. His lids barely pull down, studying something. You clear your throat and exhale.
Sensing your company was most likely a hindrance at this point, you turn to leave as the engine flares—you wave easily behind your back with a call of well-wishes.
“Come have a drink one time, boys, yeah? I need stories that come from strangers for once.” A ruckus of ‘affirmatives’ and ‘will do, Ma’ams’ sparks up from Johnny and Kyle as you exit to the roar of the motorcycle behind you, your feet kicking a stray rock into the grass before you make it to the curb.
Before you can cross, a steel body blocks your path.
“I’ll be needing a drink later tonight, then.” Simon watches from atop his seat, one booted foot to the ground to steady himself as he comes to a slow halt. His fingers curl the handles, twitching.
“Let me guess,” you tilt your head, smirking, “Bourbon?”
“A woman after my own heart,” he draws numbly, October browns as dead as mulch. As dead as dirt.
“And do you have a heart, Simon Riley?” You question, blinking at him as your mind tells you to walk away. Your brain doesn’t need a repeat of Graham—you already had enough problems on your plate right now besides some attraction to this stranger. This push and pull made your heart jerk, even when you know it shouldn’t.
You’d only just met him.
The man hums, thighs shifting on the black metal frame. He says the easiest answer he can.
“A cold one.”
Pushing on the ground, he takes off down the road back into the main town for whatever errand he was on this time. Your eyes follow until the figure is no more than a memory of the smell of oil and the metallic tinge of caution.
—
You hated the smell of cigarette smoke.
Like a pregnant woman’s aversion to the scent of meat, you grew nauseous at the very hint of cheap tobacco and paper on the air—loathed the burn of it. It had to do with your Ex, of course. The man had been a habitual chain smoker, lighting up one after the other until you had to leave his house entirely to puke on the front lawn. If you thought about it hard enough, you could still taste the ash on your tongue from when he kissed you after lighting up.
But that was only one of the reasons you’d never moved in with him despite being together for years—the cheating was the other problem.
Girl after girl, broken promise after broken promise, you’d still held onto him as if he deserved it. Hell, all that Graham Whitaker deserved were the copious amounts of STDs he probably had after sleeping with as many women as he could to try and get back at you. You didn’t have ample reason to ban him from the bar—him or his loud-mouth friends, you should say—so the problem, like a bad rash, persisted. Cars following you after work and all.
But, the here, the now.
Simon had, in fact, come in for that drink that night—just as he had for the last week up until the grand opening of the boys’ shop. You’d both spoken throughout these encounters and formed some sarcastic and sly-looked bond that the other locals couldn’t understand. You had even learned about his military service.
The both of you were just…different, people said. No one else really argued with it.
You finally met John Price before the party that you’d heard from Simon that Soap and Gaz had been eager to host for the town—‘come meet the bastards that bought that old shitty building and see how they fixed it up all by themselves. You should come and give us your money.’
It was there that a proposal was offered.
“Simon says you told him to come to you about paint.” John was late thirties, keeping a well-trimmed beard with a mustache that was the same shade of brunette as his head of hair. Tall, as well as built, he had found you as you were closing up the bar early for the town-wide party, Celina having already slipped out.
You were dressed in a long skirt and a nice shirt for the occasion.
“John Price, I’d imagine,” you comment, stuffing your keys into your pocket as your purse hangs from your shoulder. A throaty grunt tells you all you need to know as you move down the step. “Yeah, I did say that. Do you need some?” You look over his shoulder to the still peeling color on the outside of the bricks as the men are dragging out folding chairs and long tables. There was the clatter of laughter and loud calls.
John’s blue eyes shift behind him, and he raises a brow slowly.
“Thinkin’ we’d just hire you,” a side-eye. “If you’d be interested.”
That was a surprise.
You begin walking across the street, the man beside you and awaiting your answer.
“Hire me?” Your voice asks, but you aren’t against the idea. “How do you know I’ll be any good at it,” you chuckle in question.
“Simon says he found your initials next to the mural—the wolf.” Your feet pause, stuttering for a second before you catch yourself. The blood on your face stops its circulation in shock. “Not a bad piece, then.” John grunts. “...Think you can do a skull and wings?”
So, you sat with your sketchbook in front of the wall, a portable camping chair below your bare feet as your legs folded under you. Your slip-on sneakers rest in the green grass, kicked off with a sigh. Blinking, the chatter and mumble from the party surround you in a sheen of community and calmness. You can pinpoint every voice, every story being re-told as if new news when it goes in one ear and out the other like a breeze on the wind.
Humming under your breath as the sun is low in the sky, you hear the silent feet still from over your shoulder. A smirk flickers your lips.
“Snooping, Riley?”
“My building.” He grumbles, “Seein’ what you plan to do to it.”
You snort, looking over your shoulder and smiling. “If I recall, you’re the one who took up my offer and told Price about it.”
Simon was dressed in cargos and a compression shirt pushed up to his elbows, the swell of his forearms on full display along with the scars and…tattoos. You blink at them, the swirl of black skulls and guns; barbed wire and dog tags—the dark images that fit him as his motorcycles did on his left limb. Brown eyes flicker from yours to the painted wolf.
“Good at that,” the man says, balaclava shifting.
Your expression slowly shifts to something far softer than you can remember it ever being; inside of your chest, your heart tightens.
“Thank you.”
He levels you, the corners of his eyes easing out of the numb nothingness to show something akin to shielded affection. Molten sunlight on the side of his face, making the color of his irises glow amber. Simon nods to your sketchbook, clearing his throat.
“I able to see it, then, or is it some secret?” You huff.
“Come here,” your hand motions, palm brushing away eraser shavings as your fingers get stained with graphite. The shadow comes closer, leaning over you as the scent of oil pools in your gut. You blink at the side visage, swiftly looking back down to your sketchbook as a slight wind ruffles your skirt.
“Price was talking about a skull with wings beside it—later on he made mention of a sword through the top.” While you explain the concept, you inadvertently study the tattoos on the flesh beside you, one scarred hand coming out to lightly grab the armrest of your chair as Simon leans even closer.
As your face begins burning, breath caught in your throat, he blinks down at the image as he looms, head tilting.
Simon breathes, chest rising and falling as his eyes go far off. You know the symbol means something, though you also have a good guess that it’s related to this group’s time in the service.
He hums, and you see his lips open, the rough grate of his vocal cords as he begins to form words for you.
“It’s—”
Your name is loudly called from across the way, both Simon’s and your heads snapping back as you both realize exactly how close you two have become. The stealing of the other’s warmth like wraiths of hidden longing ceases when you wrench your attention to the man you wished would leave you alone.
Graham raises the dark bottle of a cheap beer from the dollar store in your direction, walking over. Now, your Ex wasn’t anything spectacular, but even you had to admit it was the best you could do around here if you didn’t want to date men only five years from the grave. Graham was tall, strong, and heavy-willed like a bear. In the day hours, he worked as a farmhand down the way.
Your body tenses, eyes going tight. Simon sees.
“Who’s this,” he asks slowly, fingers twitching.
“Ex,” you mutter, grimacing. “He’s going to make a scene.”
Already gazes had started drifting over, conversations lapsing into mute silence as orbs shifted to three different individuals all stuck in the same storm.
Simon grunts, standing up to his full height and crossing his arms over his chest, legs shifting below him and thighs trading weight. His moving leaves half of you kept firmly behind him and your eyes study his stance as you notice that fact. You blink, and feel something stir in your ribcage, blooming like a flower.
“Hey, Bartender!” Graham takes a cigarette out of his pocket and lights it as his fingers fumble over the neck of the bottle. “Though I’d seen you over here missing all the action. Nothing’s changed I see.”
Your face pulls in with disgust.
“Graham, you’re drunk. Go home.” It was true—his words were slurring, his limbs loose with drink. He smirks at you, taking a drag of his cancer stick and puffing it directly at you. Your hand snaps to your nose to try and cover the horrendous smell.
“Nah,” he breathes. “I’m here with Celina, see’s a pretty nice lookin’ broad don’t you think? Not as good of a fuck as you, but, hey, I take what I get.” His expression shifts to hidden anger and Simon takes a heavy step forward before he can finish the rest of his sentence, hands shifting to grasp his biceps harder. Those browns simmer with low ferality—a warning.
The air gets heavy.
“Pretty good little lie you spread about me gettin’ that shit from Stacy.”
“That was a lie?” You drawl lazily and watch your Ex’s eyes flash with rage. But he should know you don’t take shit from him anymore. “Oh,” your fingers tighten over your flesh and make you sound stuffy. “Maybe I heard wrong, you’re right. You don’t have Chlamydia.” You glare. “It was Gonorrhea, wasn’t it?”
“Bitch!” Graham barks, moving forward, but before anyone can realize it, Simon already has him shoved back with a stone-like push to your Ex’s chest.
“Not smart, Mate.” The former soldier utters, arms falling back to his sides. The party by this point had entirely halted in sharp gasps and bated breath.
Graham’s beer bottle shatters as it hits the ground, the grass not able to absorb the way it slams down to dirt. Your wide eyes stay stuck on Simon’s figure, who’s now entirely hiding your view of your Ex—the wide expansive back that shows the writhe of his shoulder blades and how his spine shifts under the tight shirt.
Your hand lowers from your face.
“What the fuck?!” Graham spits. “You made me drop my fucking drunk, man!”
“Be thankful that was all, yeah?” Simon’s dead voice is a cold chill on a winter evening. Any sane person would turn and leave immediately. “Cut your losses.”
No one breaths for a long minute, and you can see the other new mechanics inching closer from the sides. All of the locals are deep into the scene, fingers to their lips in surprise. There’s going to be talk tomorrow—the bar will be busy.
“Graham,” you try to sway the pig-headed man once more from behind Simon. “Go home.”
“So this is what I get,” your Ex spits, head trying to peek over the larger man’s frame to look at you. Simon’s hands clench into tight fists. “I’m with you for years and this is how you treat me? I gave you everything!”
“Those are years that I never want to think about again,” you say with a stiff finality. “And it’ll be a cold day in hell before you ever see me worrying about where you are or who you fuck.”
Knowing that the situation is over and done with, Simon takes a single step forward and leans into the man.
“You heard ‘er,” he levels, unblinking. “Scatter.” Simon’s accent made it sound more like a threat, but maybe it was.
Graham growls and takes a long drag from his cigarette, staring Simon down.
“Fuck you, you piece of shit.” But all he does is turn sharply on his heel and stomp away, crossing the street to his truck before he opens and closes the door with a violent slam. From across the way, Celina gasps and calls his name, but the engine has already started and Graham is down the road with a roar from the exhaust.
Everyone is watching you and Simon, and the staring peels back your skin until Simon grumbles and grabs your arm.
Blinking in shock, he only gives you a moment to steady yourself and slip on your shoes before he drags you inside the garage. You huff and look up at him as you close your sketchbook–trying to not look at those tattoos again. Your finger wanted to trace them—to study the ink down to the layer of skin where it ended and became red flesh and weeping veins. How far up his left arm did they go? Did they only stay at his forearm, or up to his shoulder?
Inside he lets you go, head slightly tilted to the outside as the sounds of hushed whispering pick back up; hurried and filled with electricity. Simon grunts, blinking.
A heated silence encompasses the two of you, and as your eyes lock, neither can speak for a moment.
“Sorry about that,” you glance at your feet. “Should have guessed he’d show up and do something.”
“Don’t apologize,” Simon crosses his arms again, boots righting themselves. “That’s not your fault that some bastard can’t act right, yeah? Forget about it, it’s all nothing.”
“You shouldn’t have to be involved—”
“Bloody cut it out, would you?” Simon glares, brows pulling in. “I said it’s nothing.”
He was very passionate about this, it seemed.
You sigh, shaking your head before a tiny chuckle makes the mechanic blink in confusion. “Suppose I can call you my guard dog now, huh?”
“Piss off,” you laugh, covering your mouth with your hand while your eyes narrow down. Simon's own crinkle along the edges, lowering his hands to push them into his pockets.
A second leads into another, but neither of you has any particular interest in re-joining the others, even if Soap is smugly passing looks and Price smirks into his drink. Gaz fixes his hat while he tips back a beer bottle, hiding a glint of amusement.
Simon’s voice lowers, seeming to hover closer.
“You alright, then?” You nod, face heating up as you stare at his shadow-tainted visage and how the face-covering obscured him from your eager eyes.
“I’m used to his drama. I have no problem giving it back.” Simon hums, October browns glinting like Halloween lights.
“Seems so.” He pauses, and pushes out a joking, “Not surprised, Sunshine.”
“Good, Brown-Eyes,” you lean back on your heels and smirk. “I’d be offended if you were, with all we’ve been talking to one another.”
“Getting familiar, Bartender?”
“Of course, Mechanic. Haven’t you heard?” He tilts his head, prodding you on as his eyes soften that candle-like smidge. “I keep everyone’s secrets—and you still have to tell me yours.”
Simon chuffs a low chuckle, and the fabric of his mask pulls as he shakes his skull. “Maybe one day, yeah? Need to stick ‘round to know ‘em.”
Then perhaps this town was worth wasting away in.
—
“Bastard won’t cause any problems, will he?”
“No, no, he’s too much of a coward to try and get back at anyone. He won’t do anything.”
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