Stuck With Me: A Cad Bane Novel

Chapter 33

Warnings: mushy but in a cheesy way im so sorry, cad is horny (why am i not surprised),

Word count: 1.2k

Stirring, you blink awake, your cheek pressed against the hard plane of Cad's chest. His arm is slung over you, his fingers wrapped loosely around your shoulder, his face pressed against the top of your head. For once, his eyes are shut when you wake; he hasn't been roused by your sleepy movements, and you ease yourself out of his arms, only grasping how exhausted he must have been now. Cad's always on alert, even when he's asleep, and it's that absence of vigilance that makes you realise that he must really trust you to let himself be this way, his lips half parted, snoring quietly, relaxed, his eyes flickering slightly under his eyelids as his chest rises and falls steadily. Tucking the blanket around him, you pull it up to his chin and slip one of the extra pillows in his arms so he won't sense the lack of your body and wake up too soon. He grumbles in his sleep, frowning but not waking, instead cuddling the pillow to his chest, his fingers twitching over the material before stilling again.

Strolling over to the cockpit, you slouch into the cockpit chair, and, just on a whim, you pull up the holoscreen and quickly type on the keyboard, hitting search before you lose the confidence to. A frown furrows your brow as you force your still sleepy eyes to focus on the blue tinged Durese dictionary in front of you. Apprehensive, your chest tightens, and for a moment you consider leaving it, shutting down the holoscreen and going back to bed, but curiosity tugs at you all the same. Carefully, you scroll to the section headed 'f', scanning the words until you find fullua. Tracing your finger across the hovering screen, you read the translation in Basic.

'Beloved,' you whisper to yourself. How long has he been calling you that? How long was he professing his love for you, and you were completely oblivious to the meaning of his words? Since the Garkata Fighting Arena? Since you found out you were a Shi'ido? Something swells in your chest, and it feels as if you can fly, as if you can spread your arms and soar up into the sky with the sheer amount of joy inside you.

'I knew ya'd find out eventually.'

You glance up. His voice is still raspy with sleep, he rubs at his right eye with the back of his scarred knuckles, and his shirt collar is lower on one shoulder than the other, the fabric rumpled. It gives him a dishevelled air, just woken, but the smile on his face is fully awake. You go all melty inside, your heart softening for the man leaning in the doorway, the remnants of sleep still swaddling him like a blanket as he smiles sheepishly at you, fidgeting with his fingers before he holds out a hand to you.

'Come back to bed?'
You ignore his request for the moment. 'You know, I really like being called your beloved.' You wink, smiling up at him. 'And I think you'll find that you're stuck with me if you carry on calling me that.'
He grins. 'Then that will be as long as there's breath in my lungs, my fullua.'
Reaching out, you grab his hand, letting him pull you into his embrace. 'I guess I'll come back to bed, then, my beloved.'

─────•~❉᯽❉~•─────

You wake in Cad's arms again, but this time he's awake, his body wrapped around you, his arms laced around you, his legs tangled in yours. His soft breathing ruffles your hair, and you nuzzle your face into his shoulder, feeling his long fingers clasp the back of your neck, keeping you tucked up right beside him. Eyes drooping closed again, you begin to drift off when your stomach rumbles, and you lift your head, grinning at Cad when he chuckles, fingertips drawing soft patterns down your back. He stays quiet, and you can tell he's pondering something, turning a thought over and over in his head, so you leave him to it and slip out of his grasp, leaning down to kiss his cheek before you head to the 'fresher.

You've just splashed your face with water, rubbing the crystalised sleep out of the corners of your eyes, when he comes in, thoughts still roiling in his gaze. Watching him in the mirror, you wipe your face and begin to open your mouth, meaning to ask him what's on his mind, but he clasps your hips in his long fingers, pressing his bare chest to you back before grinding his hips lightly against your ass. Slowly, he dips his head, brushing your hair away from your neck, his fingers leaving cool trails on your skin as he softly bites down on your skin, his tongue flicking out to taste you.

You glance up into the mirror to see his face. His eyes are cast down, his teeth grazing over the muscle connecting your shoulder and neck, his hips fitted snugly to yours. Your reflections seem lustful, his lips on your skin near salacious if it were not for the something else in his eyes, as if he's contemplating your taste on his tongue, as if he's trying to decipher it as if it's a code he needs to crack, a puzzle he needs to fit together to find answers. Watching as your face clouds with confusion, he lifts his head, knowing that you're wondering what he's doing. If he wants you, he'll make sure you know, and he can tell that you're not sure exactly what he desires right now with his hips pressing yours into the sink and with his eyes hungry - not hungry in a way that implies he wants to be sheathed inside you, but hungry in a way that suggests he wants to drink up every last drop of your soul so it mixes with the very matter of his own.

His lips still pressed to your bare shoulder, he meets your gaze, his voice rough with sleep. 'Would ya marry me?'

Your heart ceases pounding for a moment before it leaps into action again, double the rate it had been a moment ago. Grabbing the sink to steady yourself, you open your mouth, trying to speak words that haven't assembled themselves yet. You feel as if your legs will buckle under his fiery gaze, and your chest swells with something so deep and ardent and burning that the only thing you can do is grab his hand which still lies against your hips and press it to your heart. Something inside you hopes he can feel the emotions flying through you, hopes he can hear the yes yes yes yes careening right through your bloodstream. A life with him? Yes. A family with him? Yes. Everything with him? Yes. Yes. Always yes.

'Y - yes,' you gasp. 'Yes, Cad, yes. I would, and I will.'
He smiles, and your heart stutters a little bit at the softness in his gaze. 'Now yer really stuck with me, fullua.'
You grin, spinning around to face him and pressing a kiss to his lips. 'I wouldn't change a thing.'