Archive of Our Own

The nightmare was the same as always. The explosion, the fire. Closer than it had been in reality, so close that she could feel the heat. Hear the screams. His screams.

No, no, no. 

Even in her panic, part of her knew it was a dream. She needed to wake up, needed to stop the sounds, the images assaulting her subconscious.

Wake up, wake up.

"Courtney? Courtney, wake up."

Robert's voice. Robert's arms, tight around her. Finally, her eyes snapped open. His face was the first thing she managed to focus on. He was there. He was safe. They were in her bed, tangled up together in her sheets. 

She opened her mouth to speak, but all that came out was a choked sob. He understood anyway, pulling her closer and stroking her hair soothingly.

"You're okay, it was just a dream," he whispered. "Was it the same one? The bomb?"

"Yeah," her voice was muffled where she had buried her face against his shoulder.

"I'm sorry."

"Why are you sorry? It's not your fault I put a bomb on your suit and almost killed you."

He tensed at that. "I'm sorry that you can't forgive yourself." His thumb brushed over her cheek, wiping away the tears he found there. "You have more than made up for something that you didn't actually want to do."

Even in the dark, she knew he was looking at the scar on her left shoulder. "I know you think so."

"You will, too. I won't give up until you do, and you know I'm stubborn," he tilted her chin up towards his and kissed her lightly. "I still have dreams about that night on the roof sometimes, about the bullet hitting you in the heart. I know it's not exactly the same. But I think it comes from the same place. The idea that I could have lost you before I really had you scares the hell out of me."

"You could have lost me because I chose to save you," Courtney argued. "That's not the same as me blowing up your mech because I was trying to save myself."

"If it hadn't been you, Shroud would have found someone else to do it. You're not to blame for him manipulating you and using you, and you weren't the only one he used. I won't give up until you accept that, too."

She could almost let herself take his words to heart. But through her thin tank top, there was still that faint red glow between them. She moved to cover it without even thinking. "I hate it so much."

Robert placed his hand over hers. "I know you do. Royd really thinks he's getting somewhere on figuring out how to reprogram it, though."

"Because he feels guilty about calling me a traitor, even though he had every reason to."

"He didn't. And that's not the only reason. He cares about you. And he's excited about the possibility of being able to replicate the tech, and I don't blame him. Your augment could help change people's lives for the better."

"I don't even know if I want him to reprogram it, he could still study it if it was removed," she sniffled. 

His lips pressed against her cheek lightly. "If that's really what you want, we can make it happen. You can take your time and think about it, you don't have to decide yet."

"It's so ugly."

"Don't say that. Nothing about you is ugly," his hand carefully slipped under her tank top, brushing against the metal. "This is just one more thing you survived, one more thing that made you who you are now. And who you are now is someone I can't live without." Another kiss, deeper this time. "I know I can't take that dream away, but maybe I can help you forget about it for a while."

Before she could answer, he was sliding her top up over her head. His mouth attached to her throat, licking and kissing a trail down to her chest. "Robert?"

"Don't," he whispered, barely lifting his lips from her skin. "Unless you want me to stop, don't talk right now. Just let me show you how beautiful you are to me."

Her hands moved to his hair, tugging lightly, the way she knew he liked. "Don't stop."

"Never," he said hoarsely. He closed his mouth over her nipple, his fingers pinching the other with just enough pressure to send a rush of arousal through her body. Her nightmare forgotten for the moment, she writhed under him, growing wetter by the second.

"Oh fuck, Robert..."

"Tell me what you need, sweetheart," he murmured. "Whatever you want."

"I want your mouth," she gasped out, well past the point of playing games with him. "Go down on me, please."

He raised his head and grinned at her. "Thought you'd never ask." Sliding down, he dragged her shorts off, then settled between her thighs and spread her open, groaning out loud at the sight of her dripping for him. Breathing in her scent, he gripped her hips and held her in place before burying his face in her, mouthing at her clit without any hesitation or teasing.

She couldn't hold back the cry that ripped out of her. His tongue worked her perfectly, keeping steady pressure as he licked between her folds, down to kiss her entrance and then back up to suck her clit into his mouth. He was so good at this, too good. 

She didn't even need to guide him with her hands in his hair, he knew exactly where she needed him most. How he was able to do that, she would never understand. Not that she even cared to try when he was fucking his tongue into her cunt, greedily licking up as much of her as he could get, moaning as though he had never tasted anything better.

"I need-" her words broke off into a helpless gasp when he sealed his mouth over her core. "Fuck, I need your fingers."

He groaned in assent and immediately obliged, plunging two fingers into her, pushing them as deep as he could go. His mouth moved to her clit, sucking it between his lips hard enough to make her buck against him. 

"Come for me," he rasped, adding a third finger and moving faster. "I know you're close, let me feel it."

Then his mouth was back on her clit, his fingers were stretching her perfectly, and she was screaming as she fell apart on his tongue, grinding against his face while he kept working her through her orgasm.

Courtney finally pushed him away when the sting of overstimulation began to build. He let up, moving to kiss and stroke her thighs while she recovered, then trailed kisses up her body until he reached her lips. Wrapping her arms around him, she pulled him down fully on top of her, eager to taste herself in his mouth.

When the need to breathe became impossible to ignore, she pulled back and looked up at him. He was so beautiful it made her ache, with his hair disheveled and his lips swollen. 

"I want you," she whispered against his ear, feeling him nod before he sat back, kneeling between her legs.

Her eyes followed his every move as he practically ripped his t-shirt in his hurry to get it off. She reached up to touch him, admiring the increasingly obvious results of the time he'd been putting in at the gym. It wasn't that she had any complaints about his body before, but she loved feeling the extra muscle he'd put on when he held her close, or when she ran her hands over him and clutched at his arms and his back while he fucked her.

"Like what you see?" Robert asked, as if he didn't know.

"Love it," she raked her nails down his chest to the waistband of his sweatpants. "But I need to see more."

He pulled the pants down to his knees and managed to kick them off the rest of the way, never taking his eyes off of her, looking extremely pleased by her obvious excitement. His hand wrapped around his cock and stroked. "You want me inside you?"

She knew what he wanted to hear, and she suddenly wasn't in a mood to be difficult. Not when her body was screaming for him and he was so close. "Please." She spread her legs wider, reaching up to grip the bars of the headboard.

Instead of lowering his body onto hers and entering her, he stood up. His fingers brushed her lips, silencing the sound of protest she let out. Confused, she watched as he walked to the opposite wall of her bedroom, picking up the full-length mirror leaning there and bringing it over to prop it up against her dresser.

Her eyes widened as she realized what he had planned, the thought of it sending her pulse racing. As he stood over her, she saw the questioning look on his face and nodded eagerly.

He sat back down on the edge of the bed and pulled her into his lap, maneuvering her so she was straddling him with her back to his chest, both of them facing the mirror that he had positioned perfectly.

"I want you to keep your eyes open as much as you can," he whispered roughly, kissing the back of her neck. "I want you to see yourself the way I do when we make love."

The gentle language he used was a sharp, incredibly arousing contrast to what he was asking of her. Watching their reflections, she could both see and feel his hands on her hips, lifting her up and then lowering her onto his cock. 

They shared a groan as he filled her. He gave her a moment to adjust as he always did, scattering kisses over her back, her neck, her shoulders. When she clenched around him, he took the hint and began sliding her up and down his length with a deep moan that she felt where he was pressed against her back. His hips rocked up into her, setting a steady pace.

"Oh fuck," Courtney panted, unable to look away from the mirror for even a second. She could see his cock glistening with her slick when he pulled out and stretching her cunt with every thrust in.

"See how good you look?" he groaned into her skin, his eyes finding hers in the mirror. "You're so fucking beautiful, I swear sometimes I can't believe that you're real. That you're mine."

She cried out, squeezing around him so hard she could feel him twitch inside her. "Say that again."

"You're mine," Robert murmured. "You're mine, Courtney."

"Yes," she moaned, leaning back against his chest, the slight shift letting him slide in even deeper. "Fuck, yes, I'm yours." Feeling the pressure inside her starting to build, she reached down to rub her clit. 

"That's it, baby," he suddenly slowed his pace, digging his fingers into her hips and pulling her down so she could feel every inch of him. Her eyes fluttered closed as the back of her head hit his shoulder. "Open your eyes, and keep them open when you come."

"I can't," she whimpered, rolling her hips, urging him to move faster.

He pulled out almost completely and then slammed back in, stilling inside her. "You're being so good, I know you can do this for me."

She forced her eyes open, gasping when she saw his face in the mirror, focused completely on her. "I can be good," she clenched around him, hard enough to make him moan. "I'll be good for you."

As soon as she said those words, his control seemed to snap. He began fucking her at a dizzying pace, dragging her down to meet his thrusts. All she could do was hold on, placing her hands over his on her hips. There was almost nothing she loved more than undoing him like this, getting him to let go and use her.

"Fuck, I needed this," he grunted, in between kisses down her spine. "I need you."

He kept talking as he pushed her closer to the edge, his words getting lost in their combined moans and the sinful sounds of their bodies meeting. Her eyes were fixed on the mirror, barely recognizing herself. Her skin was shimmering with sweat, a flush of red covering her cheeks and spreading down to her chest. She looked beautiful, just as he'd said, completely lost in pleasure.

Then she was coming, crying out incoherently, struggling to keep her eyes open and do as he'd told her through the blur of tears that filled her eyes. Her reflection arched and writhed in the throes of her orgasm, so powerful that it bordered on pain. Robert stayed with her through it, thrusting deep even as her cunt clenched tightly around him, whispering praise in her ear. 

"There you go, I've got you," his breath was coming in rapid, heavy gasps as he rocked up into her. 

Courtney reached one hand up to tangle in his hair, grounding herself while the last tremors of her release faded. She focused on his reflection, on the way his hands dug into her hips, supporting her when she slumped back against him. 

He was close, she could see it in the way his pace began to falter, the way his mouth dropped open. His eyes were half-closed but still watching her in the mirror. "Come for me," she whispered, wanting more than anything to watch him fall apart.

With that, she sucked in a deep breath and vanished, keeping her eyes on him in the mirror as he thrust up into her once more. She held it in as he moaned her name, as she watched his cock pulse inside her and coat her invisible core with his release. Seeing it made the sensation of him filling her more intense than ever, and she clamped a hand over her mouth to keep from gasping. 

Only when he fell back against the mattress and pulled her down with him did she finally allow herself to take in air, flashing back into view. Robert pressed his hand to the back of her head and pulled her into a kiss, still inside her, their legs still tangled together.

"Wow," he laughed, breathless and wrecked. "That was a first."

She grinned, still feeling fairly winded herself. "Pretty hot, right?"

"Extremely hot," he agreed. "But still not as hot as you look when you come." He carefully turned her onto her back, his cock slipping out of her with the movement. Looking down at the mess they'd made, he reached over to grab the box of tissues next to the bed, cleaning them both up before laying back down.

Courtney immediately curled into him, resting her head on his chest. "I love you," she whispered.

"I love you, too. And I'm yours," his arms encircled her, one hand sliding through her hair. Just as her eyes were starting to feel heavy, he spoke again. "You are so strong."