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It’s past midnight when her door creaks open. Familiar footsteps let her know it’s Lockwood.
“Luce…” it’s barely a whisper, but she thinks she likes the way he calls out her name. “Are you still up?”
She hesitates for a moment, before shifting around to face him. Half of his face is illuminated by her dim nightlight, and the other half is shrouded by the dark sky.
“I am. You alright?”
A pause. She can feel him thinking restlessly.
“I don’t want to be by myself tonight,” he admits. It might merely be a statement, but Lucy knows it’s a question, a plea.
Her skin goes cold when she pushes the blanket off of herself. A silent invitation. She can hear him sigh, in relief or exhaustion — she doesn’t know. Her bed dips as he slips under the covers with her. They keep a slight distance from each other as they always do, and Lucy quietly wonders why the air always feels so heavy between them.
They lie for a while in companionable silence, their breathing the only indication of some sort of presence in the room.
There’s so much she wants to say to him. An insatiable itch to tell him all of it, to show him all of it — the scars, the hurt, and her heart most of all. She wants to see all of him too — to crawl under his skin and soak up his thoughts. There’s someone there, behind the cracks of the cocksure facade he puts on when facing the world, someone she wants to know.
It terrifies her. It eats at her every day, a recurring pinch at her insides every time she even looks his way. She chews at the thought, knowing he’s made it infinitely clear that his walls are up for a reason.
Nothing good comes from letting people in.
If only he would let her tear them down, brick by brick. In some ways, she is already halfway there. His eyes gave it away, when she told him about Kipp’s offer. He couldn’t afford to lose her now, asset or not.
“Hey,” he breaks the silence, but he speaks so softly she almost misses it, drowning in thought.
“Did you mean it?” he asks. “Did you mean what you said about me — us — being your home?”
She hums in response. “Of course.”
“You’re my family, to be honest,” she says. She tries to sound somewhat nonchalant, or else she might just cry. “My actual family wouldn’t care to give even half a shit if I was dead.”
She can feel him turn to gaze at her, and meets his eyes briefly. Her hands are shaking, so she picks at the skin next to her nails as a distraction.
“My mum didn’t even bother to check up on me when I ended up in the hospital after our first encounter with Annabel Ward,” she admits. “They never wanted me; all I was to them was a bint who made them some bloody pocket money.”
He exhales slowly, and tentatively offers an outstretched palm. She takes his hand, and it reminds her of that time when he was patching her wound up, when they were too close for comfort.
“I had no one too,” he tells her, hand warm in hers. “I’ve been all by myself since I was nine, and I think being alone turned me into a bit of a bastard.”
There it is again, the self-deprecation from Lockwood that seeps in every now and then. As much as he was sometimes a hard-headed idiot, making bets and acting on impulse, he had given her a home and a chance. Lucy wants to tell him how much she’d care if he ended up at the bottom of the Thames.
“Y’know… for all the dumb shit I talk, I do think you are way too good for me,” he almost laughs. “A dumbarse like me clearly doesn’t deserve having you here.”
“Lockwood…”
She wants to pull him closer. And so she does.
He stills for a second when she wraps her arms around his waist, weight shifting to drape across his lanky frame. But slowly and surely, he melts in her embrace and pulls her impossibly closer. She buries her head into the crook of his neck, and can’t help but notice that he smells like cedarwood and vanilla.
He holds her like she’s a lifeline, as if she were only a figment of his dreams that might disintegrate if he lets go. His touch makes her feel so sure of herself, and she wonders if it’s the same for him.
“You’re more than enough for me,” she lets the words spill from her mouth like a reverent vow. “And I want you to learn how to believe me.”
He says nothing, but leans in until his head rests atop of her own. She can feel the steady beat of his heart reverberating across his chest.
“But…” she starts, fiddling with the hem of his nightshirt. “I need you to let me in first.”
She pulls away to read his face, and he offers her a steady nod. His hand moves up to brush the hair away from her face, and only then is she struck by how intimate their position seems to be. Their eyes lock and she is utterly transfixed by his devoted gaze.
As his fingers swipe across her forehead, she gasps at the contact, but it’s quickly swallowed by his lips on hers. And just like that, she can’t get enough, grasping at the ends of his nightshirt, while he captures her in a searing kiss. He’s everywhere all at once, and she feels this delicious ache seep into every crevice of her being — under her ribs, to the very tips of her fingers, and between her thighs.
He caresses her face, while his other hand travels across the wide expanse of her skin. Eager, she repositions herself on top of him without needing to pull away. His fingers card through her hair, and she almost wants to laugh because it’s clear they’ve both wanted this for far longer than either of them would admit.
Lucy thinks she’s gone greedy, and she doesn’t think she’ll ever be able to have enough of this. In the heat of the moment, she bites down on his lip, and he responds with a low whimper.
She pulls away from him, and he gazes back at her, eyes luminescent with rapture and yearning. He looks at her like she’s a goddess to be worshipped. But here they are, out of breath and panting like the unpracticed teenagers that they are.
Lucy can’t stop the giggles from escaping her, and Lockwood begins to grin as well.
“I like you,” he confesses. “I like you so much that it scares the living shit out of me.”
“Well, I would have to hope so, if we’re doing this again,” she jests. He offers her a small laugh, before pulling her back down in an embrace.
“Let me amend that, actually,” he says as she entangles their legs together. “I think I might love you.”
She bites back a face-splitting grin.
“Same here.”