Work Text:
Strike poured himself a glass of whiskey. Was he seriously so thick, so arrogant? Marry me. He had meant it. He put the peas back in the freezer, sat at the table in what now seemed a sad little flat, and brought the glass to his lips. Then he thought better of it. He poured the glass down the drain, then the bottle.
He wasn’t going to drink himself to death, not least because the smoke taste of the whiskey reminded him of passing out from blood loss in a murderer’s apartment, but because there was hope buried in the despair he felt. Her anger had proved something to him. That if he acted sooner, he would have had a chance with her. Perhaps when they held each other at her wedding, he could have asked her to run away with him. Invited her upstairs after their whiskey fueled intimacies in the office. Told her how he was feeling at the Ritz, instead of making some drunken, sleazy move that had scared her.
Strike knew he didn’t deserve Robin Ellacott. He had been a source of stress for her, and surly on top of it, and, doubtlessly, she could do better. She was currently doing better for herself right now, at the Ritz, about to receive her second marriage proposal of the night. One she should accept, shouldn’t she? She should, Strike thought bitterly.
He knew what he wanted, and it was her. He lamented every stupid dalliance that had made him unworthy of the seriousness he so desperately desired. He deserved his loneliness. He deserved his clean, solitary attic flat, the pain in his leg from climbing the narrow stairs, the smarting of his wounded ear. He deserved this. He didn’t deserve Robin Ellacott.
But he felt a strange sort of compassion toward himself, in the adrenalinic aftermath of telling her he really loved her, asking her to marry him (?), and feeling her push him away. He went to the bathroom and turned on the shower, which took a bit to get hot. He disrobed, careful not to displace the bandage on his ear. He put on a shower cap, like the kind you find on the bathroom counter at a hotel, which the nurse practitioner had given him when schooling him on wound care. With similar care and gentleness, he removed his prosthesis, and got into the warming shower. He sat on his little shower stool and let the warm water wash away some of the fear and shame he felt. He may not deserve Robin Ellacott, but he deserved a nice shower. He deserved to fill his nostrils with the smell of lavender and sage. He deserved the cleanliness of his towel, the velvet feel of the unscented moisturizer he slather on his dry body.
He had a scented candle which Ilsa had given him for Christmas, because the scent was called Cornish Forest. He sniffed it, and lit it with a match from a box he used to use to light a Benson and Hedges. God, a cigarette would be amazing right now. But, surprisingly, his instinct toward himself was for care, not punishment. He put the lit candle on the table, then hopped over to his bedroom to dress himself, but only got as far as boxers. He turned out the lights and laid down on his couch, the room cast in flickering shadows, which somewhat calmed him.
He was going to change, he decided. Yes, Robin would likely marry someone else... but what if she didn’t? What if she broke things off with Murphy, and gave him a chance?
He was going to become, oh God, this sounds so stupid, but he was going to become the best version of himself. He would give up alcohol, and nicotine, and swim laps, and fucking lift weights inasmuch as he could. He would give his leg a proper rest so he wasn’t in constant pain as he traversed the country on complicated investigations. He would use gentle tones, less swear words, take up fucking meditation...
He would do anything to be with Robin. Anything. Marry her instantly or wait years until she was ready. She didn’t want kids, not now, and he didn’t either... but if she changed her mind at 39 and wanted to get one in under the wire, he would change his mind, too. He would change his most fundamental instincts and desires for this woman he loved so desperately, he knew he would.
He decided- again, that crazy and surprising instinct towards self compassion rearing its head- that he had to make these changes even if Robin came back to the office with a diamond ring on her finger, or even if she never came back at all.
He had just taken down a murderer, dismantled a sex trafficking ring, pieced together the most complicated puzzle of his career. What good was he to anyone drunk or fat or dead?
He took out his notebook and wrote down a little plan.
He felt a little more at peace in his life and in the world. At least Robin knew now, didn’t she? Knew how he had felt all this time? He felt too strangely proud of himself to feel totally humiliated.
He heard a noise from downstairs. In the dim flickering light he could hardly see his clock, but he guessed that two or three hours had passed since his impulsive marriage proposal. The front door opening, the racket of heels on the stairs, his heart started pounding against his sternum. Any sense of inner peace withered instantly at the thought that- could she be coming back? To have another go at him, tell him what a stupid, arrogant, callous bastard he had been? The footsteps grew closer. Then, there was an unmistakable slamming on the door.
“Strike!” Robin’s voice called. “You better be in there.”
Her tone was as angry as ever, but Strike’s heart stood up straight.
“Yes!” Strike called, his voice sounding choked. “Hold on a moment, I’m legless!”
Artlessly, he hopped to the door, and undid the double lock. When he opened the door, he realized he had never been more happy to see Robin’s angry face, glaring at him.
“Please, come in,” Strike found himself saying coolly.
Robin stood where she was. “You’re a fucking dickhead, you know that right?”
“Well aware,” Strike said sincerely, gesturing for her to come inside.
Robin strode into the flat, then looked around sort of confused. “Why does it smell like a forest?”
“I lit a candle. Look, Robin, I’m sorry.”
“Sorry for what, Strike? Say exactly what you’re fucking sorry for. No, you know what, no, I don’t want to hear you speak. I’ve just ended my relationship. The second years-long fucking relationship that bloody ended because of you. Because the whole time I was with him, I couldn’t stop fucking thinking about you.”
Robin normally didn’t swear so much. She spit her words at him. He was holding onto a chair to stay upright, and she was moving closer to him with every sentence.
“And you go and propose marriage? Without so much as bloody kissing me first? All that time I was single, pining for you, you shagging all the women that fucking throw themselves at you while I sat there and watched? You know what they called me, Charlotte and her friends? They said I was your little pit pony. I won’t be anyone’s fucking pony, Cormoran Strike, and I’m not going to be your fucking wife.”
He took in her words, the surge of hope and disappointment and desire they caused, and he opened his mouth without thinking, having no idea what he was going to say. He looked down into her glimmering eyes and said,
“Robin, I didn’t mean to—”
“Shut the fuck up,” Robin said angrily.
Strike never found out how exactly he was going to finish that sentence, because Robin threw her arms around his neck and pulled him into a furious kiss. Instinct and desire overtook his shock and he fell into the embrace, wrapping his arms around Robin and pulling her into him while still leaning his hip against the chair.
Seven years of pent-up desire, anguish, and lust, were poured into that kiss. He tried to tell her everything he couldn’t say with the pressure and moisture and friction of their lips colliding, tried to tell her how truly and deeply he had meant it when he said I’m in love with you and even marry me. She had of course just said she wouldn’t marry him, but as he knitted his fingers into her strawberry blonde locks, deepening the kiss, he felt his body trying to convince her. He ran a hand up her back, pulling her body closer into his, and as he lost himself in it, he nearly lost his balance.
“Sorry, I’m, my leg was acting up,” Strike said.
“Don’t apologize,” Robin said. Her hostility seemed to have been washed away by the moisture of his tongue. “Take me to your bed.”
“I’ll follow you there,” Strike said.
Robin strode over to the bed, sat on the edge, and began taking her shoes off. Strike was very conscious of the fact that he was only wearing boxers, and his arousal was probably plainly evident. Robin looked up at him with lust in her eyes as he followed the short path of furniture to his bed.
Strike sat down on the bed next to her. It was a millisecond before they were kissing again, and Robin ran her hands all over Strike’s bare, warm skin, and he felt hot blood rushing to pleasant places. Robin pulled him into the bed. She inched up the mattress as he climbed on top of her. She wrapped her legs around him, pulling him in closer, grinding his erection into her center. He felt like he could die of happiness, and then she started fumbling for her zipper, and he moved to help her, and with a bit of teamwork, they removed the dress.
“You’re so fucking beautiful,” Strike whispered. “I’ve dreamt about this for years.”
“Fucking liar,” Robin said. “You’ll say anything to get laid, won’t you?”
Strike laughed. He pressed a kiss into her neck, then her collarbone, the curve of her breast above her bra. “I’ve wondered what it would be like to do this for seven years.”
“If you want me to believe you,” Robin said, “Then you’ll have to do all the things you’ve been dreaming about doing to me all these years.”
“Oh?”
Robin grabbed Strike’s hand from where it laid genteelly on her shoulder and guided it to cup her breast.
“And don’t hold back,” Robin said.
The erotic promise of these words sent his heart pounding and his blood rushing and his face went back to hers, pressing her into the bed with affectionate force. A sumptuous “Mmmm,” escaped Robin’s mouth which spurred him on, and he caressed every bare inch of her body. He slid one of her breasts from the flimsy fabric of her bra and massaged it before taking her nipple into his mouth, licking and sucking and biting just enough to tease her and elicit a moan.
The idea that there were clothes between them, as few as there were, seemed oppressive, and he expertly- but not too expertly, he hoped- unhooked her bra and let it fall to the floor. Robins hands roamed his body, her nails sliding pleasantly down his chest, and then she took his erection in her palm, and he returned the favor, sliding his hands over her underwear, pleased to find how warm and wet she felt even over the fabric.
“Tell me... tell me what you like,” Strike said.
“I like this,” Robin said. “Don’t stop.”
“I want to please you,” Strike said.
“Say it again,” Robin breathed.
“I want to please you?”
“No,” Robin said through a moan as she pressed herself into his hand. “Tell me you love me.”
“I love you, Robin,” Strike said.
He was struck by how easy and beautiful it was to say those words, and mingled within his overpowering arousal there was relief, a release of tension seven years in the building.
“Touch me... put a finger inside me,” Robin begged, and Strike didn’t have to be asked twice. He pulled her underwear down and gently slid his fingers over the most sensitive part of her body. She gasped and moaned and twitched as he slid a finger inside her. He was gratified by how wet she was already, but it wasn’t enough, he felt ravenous, greedy and hungry.
“Can I... can I taste you?” Strike said, not knowing how to phrase it.
“I said don’t hold back, didn’t I?”
“So that’s a yes?”
“Yes, Strike, yes,” Robin said, almost laughing.
He placed kisses on her breasts, her sternum, her stomach, his finger never leaving the inside of her, but then his tongue was on her clitoris as he fingered her, and she asked for another finger, and he obliged. He licked and sucked, adjusting his rhythm to her movements and moans, adjusting the pressure and friction to her cries.
“Oh fuck!” she cried. “Don’t stop, please don’t stop.”
He didn’t stop until he heard her cry out in ecstasy, and felt her walls squeezing his fingers, and she politely tapped him on the head to let him know she had well and truly finished. The way she kissed him after he climbed slowly back to her face was so tender and erotic that Strike felt precum leaking from his cock, the prickle of a tear of happiness behind his eyes. It didn’t matter to him that she had rejected his marriage proposal if there were moments like this in his present and future.
“I need the loo... While I’m gone you should find a condom.”
“On it, boss,” Strike said, and she laughed.
He missed her every second she was gone. He had condoms waiting optimistically in his bedside table, and he got one out. As he contemplated whether he should unwrap it now or wait for her to come back, she reentered the room. The flickering light of the candle cast her beautiful body in shadows. He started to kneel on the bed and open his arms to her but she said,
“No, lay down.”
Robin kissed him and straddled his lap.
“You’re so beautiful,” Strike said again. “I’m really just in awe.”
“You’re sweet, but... I need to say something.”
His heart, already pounding, sped up as he looked up at her and caressed her thighs. “Yeah?”
“I want to do this, but you, we have to go slow. I need to be on top so I can just go really, really slow.”
The terms sounded more than agreeable to Strike. “Of course.”
“But before we... well, I’d like to return the favor,” Robin said which a cheeky glimmer in her eye.
“Only if you want to,” Strike said.
Robin pressed a careful kiss to his bruised jaw. Then, she whispered in his ear, “I’ve wanted to for years.”
Robin crawled down his hulking Torso and took his hard cock into her mouth, and it only grew harder at the feeling of her tongue on him. Strike momentarily wondered whether it was skill or tenderness that made it feel so good, but in seconds he simply didn’t care, there was nothing in the world but sensation, and happiness, and mounting pleasure and mounting desire. Her hair fell into her face and he ran his fingers through it and held her hair back so that he could watch her ministrations.
“Wait, stop,” Strike said when it became too much.
“Condom,” Robin commanded.
Strike did the work of putting it on in record time, and then Robin hovered over him. She took his cock and pressed it into her clitoris, grinding up and down on him. He loved the way she teased him. But soon, the time for teasing ceased and she was sinking down on his cock and both were crying out in pleasure. Robin moved slowly, breathing in sharply through her teeth.
“Go as slow as you need,” Strike reassured her.
“I have to, you’re so big,” Robin said, sinking down another centimeter.
He hoped to God she would keep moving achingly slowly, so that it wasn’t over in seconds. He couldn’t believe how lucky he felt in this moment. He touched her face, pressing his thumb into her lower lip. She took the tip of his thumb into his mouth and sucked which much the same care she had done elsewhere. He took his wet thumb and gently, ever so gently, brushed her clit as she advanced and retreated on his throbbing cock.
“Oh fuck, don’t stop, I love it... I love you,” Robin said.
In that moment, all of it was worth it. Every fight, every night of lost sleep, every grueling case worked, every mystery slowly and painfully unraveled. To be here with her, now, to hear her say those words. He only lasted a few minutes more, and he asked her to say it again as he was about to come, and his pleasure spilled out with unrealized force.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for it to be over so soon,” Strike said.
“Don’t worry, my love,” Robin said, resting her head on his chest. “You’ll make it up to me in the morning.”
In the morning, he did. The libidinous vigor he displayed was not just out of a desire to please and perform and impress, but to truly impress upon her how much he meant what he said in the stairwell, as gruffly and impulsively as he said it, he meant it. Even marry me.
“I need something from you, partner,” Robin said over toast and eggs.
“What is it, love?” Strike said with a smile.
“A weekend away. Just the two of us, no work.”
“Where?”
“Anywhere. Preferably not Sark.”
“How about Cornwall? Bank holiday weekend?”
Robin smiled. “Alright, then.”