DISCOVERY ➴ Chrollo x Reader

L. Socks

Chrollo was still there when I returned to the kitchen. My hair was still damp, but I felt overwhelmed with comfort, the warm shower and my F/C fleece pyjamas did wonders... I suppose not being alone and the fact that I was insanely relieved also helped...

I kept my eyes on his lean, muscular figure. During my shower I couldn't shake the feeling that I had imagined his presence, I wasn't beyond believing I could hallucinate at this point. He was still there though, setting the table with a soft smile on his lips, wearing his home clothes—dark grey sweatpants and a white t-shirt. 

He was back to looking like he belonged to this quirky cottage, like he belonged to an idyllic perfect life in which I got home and had him cooking dinner for me. A life in which I'd be teased for everything I did or didn't do... A life in which I didn't feel alone... I didn't feel anxious about my situation... A life in which I enjoyed taking one day at a time... with him. 

 I pressed my lips together to hold back what could only be a foolish and goofy smile as I silently stepped into the kitchen. The coolness of the tile floor seeped into my thick woollen socks, a treat I managed to find in one of the many coffers that aunt Bertie had lying about the house. 

Sensing my entrance, he turned and looked at me from top to bottom, eyes following the gaudy looking socks as I made my way to the table. His dark eyebrow rose, and he clicked his tongue, "Are those new?"

I shuddered and slid onto my seat, "They're a new...find?"

"Where did you find Aunt Bertie's winter socks?" His eyes narrowed, and so did mine, as the interrogation continued. What did he want to know? I had found those socks during my lowest point last week, they were mine. He didn't deserve them!

"Hmmm... That's classified information." I gave him a tight-lipped smile and stole the ladle he carried to pour some soup onto my bowl, a garish orange thing with a drawing attempt at photorealistic chickens all round.

He waited to yank the ladle off my hands until I had finished serving myself. "Were there more socks?"

It was as if he couldn't be only nice, he had to make his niceness sting... While it hurt that there was always an aggressive or rude action following his attentive and soft moments, wasn't the existence of his contradictory motions one of his kind actions? I hated to be pulled from my dreamy view, but at least it kept my delusion in check. Hmmm... to think that his mean actions were kind... wasn't that also delusion?

I took a spoonful of soup into my mouth and drew the silence out even more, before replying, "Why? Are your feet cold?"

"No," he scoffed.

"Then it'll remain a secret. My secret. My socks," I muttered under my breath, before deciding a change of subject was the best course. "Did you even consider adding salt to this soup?"

"I did, but then I wouldn't be able to hear you complain, would I?" He had no right to smile at me so freely. He didn't, yet he kept doing it, that broad smile of his, showcasing his straight teeth and crinkling his eyes. A real smile.

I frowned once I felt my lips twitch upwards, but it was hard to maintain it for longer, specially when he started eating and took a few peeks at me, still sporting a soft smile. It was unfair. Really unfair.

The conversation during dinner was nothing but banter, back and forth snappy remarks and short-lived victories over one another. By the end of it, I was too tired to fake displeasure or distaste, and my cheeks hurt from smiling.

I took to washing the dishes as Chrollo stored the leftovers, and it felt right, the silence felt right when he was with me, doing his thing. I was too far gone. I had to be... It hadn't even been a month since life as I knew it had changed dramatically...

Was my attraction based on his... looks? Would I be this fucked if he wasn't as handsome as he was? Did it even matter that his looks got to me? There was no going back, I was feeling things for him and there was nothing I could do about it. I would never tell him... I was a distraction while he planned greater things... while he followed his stupid poem. I knew it, and it stung. My heart felt heavier every time I thought about it.

I shook my head to rid myself of the thoughts that kept repeating whenever I considered my feelings for my ... captor? He never kept me on a leash... but he did force me to come along with him... at first... now... who was he to me? Who were we? Where did we stand? 

"Y/N?" His voice was soft, barely a whisper, but far too close, so close in fact that I felt his breath fanning over my neck. I felt like my entire body tried to jump off my skin, yet forced it to remain in place by some unknown god.

"Hm?" I said, far too high-pitched to sound unfazed. I didn't know what came over me, but I found myself taking a step back, feeling my back colliding with his chest.

Chrollo's arms wrapped around me leisurely, hands running over my clothes from each side to the other. His voice was still a mere whisper when he posed the most unexpected question. "What are we doing now that dinner's out of the way?"

We? WHat were WE doing? What? I took a shaky breath, trying to steel my nerves. "Well... It's never too early to go to bed..."

"Mhm... so are we going to bed?" His hold on me tightened, and all the air I held in my lungs decided to escape. I wet my lips, brain racking itself for something to say, anything really. But nothing came to me, no... My brain seemed more interested in noting the speed at which my heart kept beating, far too fast for someone who was standing completely immobile. "Do you have to work tomorrow?"

"I-" I was about to say yes when it hit me... "No... it's my break day."

"Hmmm..." I felt his chest vibrating against my back, sweet lord how could he hum so... sexily... I had no words to describe what the fuck he was doing to me. "So what are we doing in bed so early if none of us has to wake up early?"

"WEll... HUm... we could go for a walk?" I was out of my mind for good. He couldn't be starting this up. He couldn't be trying to seduce me... no... he was playing with me... teasing me.... like he usually did! I would not fall for his tricks!

"Hmmm~ Do you like it outside?" Oh my lord... How could he be doing this to me? How was I meant to resist the most provocative priest in the world? The sins he whispered in my ears, disguised with clever wording, a mere innuendo, were meant to make me cave, to make me fall further and further...

I closed my eyes, trying to hold back the whimper that was ready to leave my body if he whispered anything more with such a sensual tone... I could play dumb... I could...

Did I want to?

...

I stared at the window just above the kitchen sink, to the forest that started just past the piled stones that were meant to be a wall surrounding the house. It was dark out. I could barely see anything past the first line of trees.

Did I want to play dumb?

"I had an interesting experience once... outside" My heart was about to jump out of my ribcage, that was the only explanation as to the way it was beating.

The silence nearly killed me. I couldn't tell how long it lasted, maybe it lasted nothing at all. "Are you looking for a repeat?"

"Hmm... Not exactly, I'd rather it happened differently now..."

Author's Note: ~~ Here we are again~ (where would you like it to happen, my dears? inside or outside, but differently?) - first one to answer gets it