man_without_fear | You're the worst, you know that, right?

You're the worst, you know that, right?

Matt had things to do tonight. Leads to track down, situations he could be handling, people he should be helping.

Instead, he's wasted a bunch of energy in Milliways and now he's wasting time by returning to his place after, on this side of the door, just a short spell away.

Arriving on the landing, Matt clomps down the stairs, a perforated box tucked under his arm. He has the mask on, but along the exposed parts of his face there are a few lightly bleeding scratches, and he has more beneath the dark fabric of his shirt on his shoulder and back.

Clearly annoyed, he heads straight for the kitchen; depositing the box on a chair at the table and walking to the fridge to pull out a bottle of water.

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With that gentle tug, Matt neatly closes what little negative space remains between them. Claire's spine and shoulder blades relax fully against the solid wall of his torso, and she shifts her hips slightly to better align their lower bodies.

"Nice change of pace," she murmurs fondly, her voice catching as his fingertips glide over her sensitized skin.

His head bends lower and he breathes against her neck, his lips pressing lightly against her jaw just below her ear.

"It does feel nice," he notes, fingertips gliding lightly along each rib, still trailing higher.

"Not that I'll make a habit of it," he adds, for the record.

She's a furnace against him, burning hotter as her pulse pounds beneath the brush of his mouth.

"Never," she agrees, while his butterfly touch draws another back-arching shudder from her. "You've got cred to maintain."

"Mm. Maybe I just don't know what I'd do with myself if I did stop."

He hears the uptick of her heartbeat, and feels the blood rushing faster through her veins. His own pulse goes from a steady drum to a canter as he counts each of her ribs with the pads of his fingers. .

One, two, three...

Four, and his trailing touch grazes the side of her breast, fingertips leading the way for his palm so slowly caress while his lips meet her cheek.

His tenderness stokes the sweetest of aches beneath her flushed skin, pebbling her nipples and pulling a pleased murmur from her parted lips.

She shivers into him, and covers the back of his hand with her palm.

"And if you did?" A gentle squeeze, and she guides his hand higher, until she can press a kiss to the sensitive pads of his fingers. "Could you make peace with it?"

He let's her have his hand, taking her action of redirect as a signal. He nuzzles her cheek and then draws back, keeping the closeness, but holding now to take his cues from her.

His focus shifts on her question; banter and quip replies fading as he's caught by what she's asking.

He's quiet for a moment, thinking about it, then finally replies, "I'm not at a place to walk away. I started this because I couldn't make peace with the way things were, and I haven't changed enough to find it yet."

As she absorbs his answer, the pad of her thumb sweeps along the swollen ridges of his knuckles in a light, contemplative back-and-forth.

"You don't strike me as a quitter, anyway," she says, turning her head, letting her lips graze his jaw as she speaks. "Peace, though — that's something I wish for you."

She leads his palm and fingers past her chin, down the warm column of her throat, to splay on her chest, resting over her heart's strong, steadfast beat.

"Want for you."

First time for everything.

He doesn't give voice to the thought, instead he focuses on the steady cadence of her heartbeat; feeling it beneath his palm and hearing it drum in his ears.

The truth is, since he started this he's never thought about a stopping point. And while peace hasn't come with it, he feels more himself wearing the mask than he ever did behind glasses and a cane.

Breathing deep, letting it out slow, he says, "I'm not sure what peace for me would even be like, but I know what I'm doing now is more important than that."

A slight shift and a careful twist put her on her back beside him — all the better to study his shadowed profile, and to stroke his cheek with the backs of her fingers.

"That ... "

She tips her head, nose nudging his as her mouth ghosts over his lower lip.

"Is the loneliest thing I've ever heard."

He lifts his hand to allow her movement, resettling with his arm across her chest and his hand resting on her shoulder.

Her fingers rasp against the stubble on his cheek and he feels her quiet scrutiny.

Working his throat when he hears her assessment he replies, "It's not so bad as that."

Certainly nothing he's never lived with before.

A low hum of dissent vibrates against the side of his neck.

Her mouth hovers over his Adam's apple before she presses a kiss there.

"So tell me something."

She drags her lips lower, to the hollow at the base of his throat.

"When's the last time," she murmurs, the tip of her tongue flickering over his collarbone, "you felt content?"

The ghost of her breath against his skin chased by the press of her lips prickles his flesh and sends heat through his veins.

His throat works lightly when her tongue dances along his collar, the sensation almost a distraction as he searches for her answer.

"Define 'content'," he replies, a flashing smirk trying to pass off the counter as a smart reply rather than the attempt to dodge or buy time that it is."

Her lips curve into a tiny, knowing smile against his skin.

"Still," she clarifies, nuzzling up his throat, until she reaches the underside of his jaw. "Relaxed."

His chin tilts, and he breathes a soft laugh.

"I'm relaxed now."

Her smile widens, baring her teeth at his jugular.

"That might work on a different girl."

He gives a small flinch, hand tightening on her shoulder a moment.

"What? I am," he replies with a short laugh.

She wants an answer outside of the present, and he's hard pressed to find one.

Thumb taking up a slow back and forth on her arm, he finds himself sifting further and further back, searching for a moment to give her.

Ever since they met his life has been about courtrooms and street brawls.

He thinks about saying when he and Foggy won their first case, but after the brief celebration with Karen, Matt was back in the mask and that night kicked off things with the Russians.

Leaving Landman and Zak, but that's when he first put on the mask.

Before that he was in a miserable internship that was destroying him inside.

Before that was law school, his focus and effort on trying to make his dad proud.

Going further than that there's no point in giving an answer.

The Cassanova in him wants to name one of the moments with her, but their meetings have always involved blood, and secrets, and the shadow of violence.

His expression shifts, failure to find an answer drawing clouds around him.

Finally he gives up, forcing a laugh and a full smile. "I'm pretty sure it was a Tuesday."

Feeling him tense, she presses a light open-mouthed kiss to his pulse-point — gentle, almost chaste, lingering there while he struggles to give her an answer.

When he laughs, her lips skim his chin, his jaw, the corner of his mouth, catching the edge of his smile.

"Okay." Her free hand slides up his forearm, past the back of his wrist, until her fingers tangle with his at her shoulder. "Now's good."

He finds himself listening for disappointment in her response, while his smile tries to hold.

Attention shifting to the trail of her hand along his arm, and their fingers lacing together, he squeezes her hand before admitting softly, "It's better. With you here."

He knows the circumstances aren't great, and the situation isn't usual, but having her here still means something. And even as he works to get her free of the threat out there, it still helps knowing she'll be around after.

Returning the squeeze, she rests her forehead against his, and closes her eyes, imagining the moment as Matt might experience it.

"Here?" she asks, her rasp low and honeyed against his lips. "Or ... "

She eases onto her side to face him, fitting her body flush against his.

"Here?"

His arm wraps around her, his palm resting between her shoulder blades as for a moment he breathes her in.

His chest rises and falls against hers and he hears their hearts beat in his ears.

Brushing his nose against hers, he centers on her closeness.

"Here," he answers, holding her against him.

Encouraging even more contact, she drapes her thigh over his hip. As she settles, the small shift coaxes another shudder from her, causing her breath to catch.

His fingertips splay wide on her back, and while her eyes remain closed, she can tell he's double-checking her ribs, monitoring her comfort level.

"Oh," she whispers, knowing he can feel her half-smile of assurance against his mouth, "here."

On that snag in her breathing he doesn't tense, but he does still for a moment, careful to make sure that she isn't hurting. The easy way her breathing seems to be coming, and the continued lack of bone grinding reassures him that everything is as okay as it can be.

He fits closer to her, shifting in reaction to her leg sliding over his.

Kissing her smile first on the corner, and then on her lips, he says, "Right here."

Another kiss, his forehead touches hers and whispers back, "Here is good."

She breathes a contented sigh of wordless agreement, relaxing fully against him.

Wrapped in warmth, with the allergy meds still percolating in her system, she begins to drift, only an occasional shiver playing at the edges of her consciousness.

Drowsily: "Matt."

She blindly tucks her head beneath his chin, nuzzling into the hollow of his neck and shoulder.

"What do you see?"

He holds her close, tucking her in against his chest.

A small smile rucks up the corner of his mouth when he hears the drowsy notes in her voice, and he takes a moment to breath in deep, clearing out his senses before he focuses to answer her.

"Your ribs sound good, better," he says, voice low. "And I hear your heart, it has a good strong beat."

It's a steady, comforting cadence that he's come to surround and ground himself with since she's been here. A reminder and reassurance when he comes in at night and wakes up in the morning that she's here, safe. Alive.

"It's going to rain here again before morning. Not another heavy storm, the light kind of rain. A fall drizzle. I can feel the temperature drop, and smell the moisture collecting in the air."

He tilts his head slightly, gathering more information from around them, bringing some of the rest of Hell's Kitchen into the room they're sharing.

"The guy downstairs left his TV on again, old Twilight Zone episodes. And the lady across the way is talking to her son on the phone. He's stationed in Germany."

Coming back to her, he bows his head against hers smile still in place.

"I like the shampoo Bar gave you. And you were eating raspberries tonight."

Lulled by the rumble of his voice, she's liquid-limbed against him, slowly slipping closer to the edge of sleep.

In the black behind her eyelids, she can practically see the clouds gathering overhead — thickening, darkening, growing heavy with promise.

(If this were a normal day, Claire would probably find herself caught in a morning shower after the end of her shift at the hospital.)

She imagines Matt's downstairs neighbor dozing in a favorite recliner while Rod Serling narrates onscreen.

The mother across the street, features warm and animated as she speaks with —

Matt's lips graze Claire's crown, anchoring her, and she half-smiles.

"Mm-hmm," she murmurs into his chest. "Finished 'em off so you wouldn't have to."

You're the worst, you know that, right?

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