Work Text:
Cate found the jar empty.
She lifted it like it was evidence at a crime scene, peered at the pink label—CATE CANDY STASH in Sydney’s messy sharpie—and shook it. It made the saddest sound imaginable: nothing.
From the mattress, Sydney didn’t look up from her laptop. “You ate twelve last night.”
“They were tiny,” Cate said, aghast, like Sydney had accused her of a felony instead of an adorable personal failing. She set the jar down with a huff and slunk back across the bed on her knees. “And I was being good for you. A reward system only works if there are rewards.”
Sydney typed a few more lines, jaw soft with a private smile that said she’d already lost this argument and would pretend otherwise for sport. She wore a hoodie that had been laundered past the point of sin and black boxers that rode low on her hips, her short hair a carefully curated mess, headphones crooked around her neck. Punk rock husband, telecommuting menace.
Cate, aggrieved, folded herself against Sydney’s side, cheek to her bicep like she was a pillow. “I wanted a lollipop.”
“Order more,” Sydney said, tone gentle, eyes still on the screen.
“I wanted one now.” Cate dragged the now across her tongue and then sighed miserably. She fidgeted. She was too wired to nap, too restless to read. Every thought angled toward her mouth—how hollow it felt, how empty her tongue was without something sweet, without something to worry between molars, without the low, mindless comfort of sucking until the rest of the world dimmed. She wanted to be occupied. She wanted to be filled.
“Baby,” she tried, rubbing her cheek along Sydney’s arm. “Can I suck on your fingers?”
“Mm.” Sydney scrolled. “I’m working.”
“I’ll be quiet,” Cate whispered, already bringing Sydney’s hand into her lap, the silver rings cool against her thigh. She popped Sydney’s index into her mouth before permission arrived, closing her lips in a perfect seal and sighing around it like a prayer. The taste was hand soap and salt and the ghost of guitar strings, familiar as a key sliding home. She sucked gently, stroking her tongue under the pad, feeling the tendon in Sydney’s wrist shift. Sydney’s breath stuttered but she kept reading.
“Behave,” Sydney warned, soft.
“I am,” Cate said around her finger, voice muffled, innocent. The vowel curled obscenely anyway.
She worked that single finger like a guilty pleasure: cheeks hollowing, tongue laving, swallowing reflexively because having it that deep made her whole body loosen. Sydney typed one-handed, which was both impressive and intolerable because Cate wanted her attention like she wanted sugar. She slid her free hand under the hem of Sydney’s hoodie and traced lazy circles into the slight dip above the waistband of her boxers, the patch of skin that always stayed warm, grinning when goosebumps chased her touch.
“Catherine,” Sydney said, a low warning full of fondness.
Cate blinked up at her through her eyelashes, eyes big and baby-blue and wronged. She switched to two fingers, greedy, sucking them down until her lips kissed the calluses at their base. Sydney’s mouth parted. The laptop screen reflected in her eyes for another heartbeat before she tore her gaze away and looked at Cate properly: at the hungry set of her mouth, the pink glow to her cheeks, the little tremor in her throat as she swallowed around the push of knuckles.
“Jesus,” Sydney said, voice rough. “I said I’m—”
“Working, I know.” Cate slid lower, a cat puddling toward the warmest part of the bed. She draped herself across Sydney’s thighs like an expensive blanket, fingers still stuffed in her mouth. Then—faux-absentminded, deadly precise—she let her nose nuzzle the soft curve of Sydney through her boxers. Just the suggestion of pressure. Just a kiss through cotton.
Sydney’s hand spasmed in her hair, not quite a grip. “Behave.”
Cate’s eyes went wide, the picture of purity. Her mouth slipped off Sydney’s fingers with a wet pop. “I’m only cuddling,” she whispered, then nosed again, slower, the arc of a tease. Heat sparked in her belly, an anticipatory ache she knew by name. The glittering little thrill of getting what she wanted by pretending she didn’t.
“Cate.” Sydney breathed it like a limit, like a plea.
“Please,” Cate said, small and boundless at once, palms curved over Sydney’s thighs. She kissed the outline of her through the black cotton and looked up, mouth pink, lip gloss already smudged from the finger sucking. “Can I put it in my mouth?”
Sydney exhaled hard. The laptop closed half an inch and then stopped, the hinge protesting like a held breath. “You’re ridiculous.”
“Hungry,” Cate corrected, and mouthed her again, through fabric: not biting, just heat and want. “I like being quiet for you. I like having something to do while you work. I’m good with my mouth, daddy, I’ll be so good—”
The laptop shut with a decisive clap.
Cate’s smile bloomed and turned secret in an instant. She sat up onto her knees, hands obediently tucked behind her back, eyes alight. Sydney watched her for a long beat, deciding what to do with such a pretty problem, then hooked her fingers in her waistband and dragged the boxers down. Heat, weight, and the soft, half-heavy length of her cock sprang free, flushed at the tip from the cage of fabric.
Cate went soft around the spine. Her pupils blew, the world narrowing to the gravity between her lips and that aching line of skin. “Hi,” she whispered, breathless, and then laughed at herself. “Sorry. Rude.”
Sydney cupped her jaw, thumb stroking the hinge. “You like this that much?”
Cate nodded, too honest and too far gone to be coy. “I like having you,” she said. “In my mouth. Where you belong.” And then she leaned forward and took her in, slow, like returning a pacifier to a fussy baby, sighing deep as the head slipped past her lips.
Her shoulders dropped. The rest of her followed.
Sydney’s breath hitched. “Fuck.”
Cate hummed, delighted, because the first slide down was always holy. She suckled, gentle, cheeks hollowing, letting the weight rest on her tongue while she found the rhythm that soothed her. The motion made something low in her brain unspool, a ribbon coming loose. She closed her eyes and settled, a warm, contented animal, mouth wrapped around Sydney and nothing else.
Sydney’s hand fell to Cate’s hair and stayed there, a weight more than a command. She tried valiantly to reopen the laptop with the other hand and got as far as the passcode screen before Cate’s tongue curled just right and she forgot numbers existed. “You’re so—shit—this is how you want to be quiet?”
Cate nodded, lips stretched, eyes smiling. She moved with patience, taking her deeper by careful increments, breathing through her nose, unbothered by the soft pressure at the back of her throat. She liked the drag of it, the push. She liked how it made her eyes water a little. She liked the mess. Spit slicked her lips and gathered in a little string when she eased off to kiss the tip, then sank down again, tighter, her tongue flattening, her sweet moans vibrating along the underside.
Sydney swore again, voice fraying. “You’re going to kill me.”
Cate shook her head and hollowed her cheeks. Not kill. Feed. Fill. Fix.
Sydney stopped pretending she wasn’t watching. She pushed the laptop to the nightstand, thumbed the headphone cord away. Both hands found Cate’s hair now, tugging it back from her face so she could see, so she could guide if she wanted to. “Open,” she said, and Cate opened wider, angelic. “Good girl.”
Cate made a little noise like a thank you around her, her fingers curling around Sydney’s thighs for balance, nails sinking lightly into muscle. She swallowed on the next push, a practiced, greedy gulp that earned her a rough, involuntary sound and a twitch against her tongue. She smiled, smug and pleased, and then went willfully, joyfully stupid for it, letting the world narrow to the wet slip and the ache in her jaw and the taste of salt she was going to chase to the end.
“Oh—fuck—Cate—” Sydney’s voice broke. She pulled Cate off with a slick pop, breathing hard, wet shine connecting them for a second before snapping. Cate blinked up, dazed and flushed, saliva webbed between her lips. “You’re going to make me—” Sydney swallowed. Her eyes were dark, intent. “Sit up. Hands behind you.”
Cate obeyed instantly. At the shift from gentle to direct, heat pulsed low in her belly. She intertwined her fingers at the small of her back and raised her chin, mouth open in quiet invitation, throat that vulnerable, a perfect column. She panted once, shaky, as if the posture alone hit some circuit in her brain that said: yes. Yes, this.
Sydney’s thumb pressed into her chin, guiding her wider. “You want me to fuck your throat, baby?”
Cate’s lashes fluttered. Her voice came out wrecked and bright. “Uh-huh.”
“Use your words.”
“Yes,” Cate whispered, thighs rubbing together. “Please, daddy. I wanted it the whole time. I wanted you to make me take it.”
“Of course you did.” Sydney’s mouth tipped wicked. “You don’t want candy. You want this.”
Cate nodded helplessly. “Want your cock.”
“Good girl.” Sydney shifted, spreading her knees wider, and wrapped a hand around the base of her cock, guiding Cate down toward it. “Breathe for me.”
The first push was slow, deliberate, all the way to the point where resistance gathered—a tender, quivering promise at the back of Cate’s mouth. Sydney paused there, letting Cate whine and work, letting her throat flutter open. Tears threatened the corners of Cate’s eyes and made everything glitter. She made a small sound that was more gratitude than pain. Sydney pulled back to give Cate a breath, and then pushed again, deeper.
Cate’s world turned to heat and pressure and praise. She relaxed around it, the gag reflex a thing to breathe through, to meet with unclenching, to welcome like a wave returning to shore. Sydney’s fingers tightened in her hair and her voice arrived from far away, slow and so goddamn fond: “There you go. Just like that. Take it, sweetheart.”
Cate moaned around her, hands still clasped behind her back like she’d been tied. Spit slicked her chin, dripping to Sydney’s skin in a bright thread. She let her eyes unfocus and floated on the rhythm as Sydney began to fuck her mouth in earnest—careful at first, then faster, then the kind of sure that came from knowing this wasn’t punishment, wasn’t cruelty, but the exact medicine Cate craved. The bed complained. The headboard thumped. Cate’s throat worked greedily around the push and withdraw, swallowing because it made Sydney swear and because the pressure rolling through her, the fullness pressing into her sinuses, the surrender of it—God—it all lit her up like a storm.
Sydney’s breath began to stutter. “Look at me,” she said, strained, and Cate dragged her gaze up. Tears streaked black through her mascara, her mouth stretched glossy and obscene around the length pumping into it. She looked devoted. She looked blissful. She looked like Sydney had given her exactly what she needed and Cate had turned it into worship.
“Fuck,” Sydney groaned, hips twitching. “You’re so—fuck, Cate, you’re perfect.” She eased off just enough to thumb Cate’s spit-slicked cheek, her bottom lip, the hollow where drool pooled. “You wanted a pacifier and now look at you.”
Cate’s answering sound was a shameless whine. Please don’t stop.
Sydney didn’t. She set a pace that made a wet, obscene music, one hand splayed at the back of Cate’s head, the other guiding the angle of her mouth. “Breathe,” she reminded, every few thrusts. “There you go. Open. Good girl. My good, greedy girl.”
Cate could feel the words like a hand between her legs, like friction where there was none. She rocked minutely, thighs pressed tight, vision blurred with tears and lust. Each time Sydney bottomed out, heat flared in her chest. Each time she eased back, Cate chased, mouth frantic. She wanted to be used. She wanted to be praised for how well she took it. She wanted Sydney to lose the plot because she’d made herself a solution and delivered it kneeling.
Sydney’s composure frayed. Her hips snapped harder. “Fuck. I’m close,” she warned, voice hoarse. “Where—?”
Cate wrenched her hands free and grabbed for Sydney’s thighs, urging, nails biting. She swallowed as deep as she could and held there, eyes pleading up: here. Please. Please.
Sydney swore like a benediction. “Fuck, Cate—” Her hips jerked. The first pulse hit the back of Cate’s throat and she swallowed on instinct, on training, on hunger, eyes fluttering shut as warmth spread. Sydney groaned, her whole body bowing, fingers tightening in Cate’s hair as she spilled into her. Cate took it all, swallowing it all down, a shaky smile breaking helplessly over her face around the stretch of her lips. When Sydney finally pulled back, panting, Cate chased for one last kiss to the head, an affectionate, addictive suck that had Sydney’s thighs trembling.
“Fuck,” Sydney said, voice gone. She gathered Cate up immediately, tugging her by the shoulders into her lap. Cate went boneless there, turning her cheek into Sydney’s chest, mouth wet and tender, breath coming fast through her nose. Sydney brushed hair back from her damp face with reverent fingers and thumbed away a smeared mascara line. “You okay?”
Cate nodded, dizzy and delighted. “Fixed,” she said, small and ragged, and laughed at herself again. “I needed that so bad.”
“I know.” Sydney kissed her forehead, then her damp lashes, then the soft, swollen corner of her mouth. “Mouth feel better, sugar monster?”
Cate hummed. “Mouth feels full.” She tilted her head back, eyes sparkling wicked. “I still want a lollipop later.”
Sydney snorted, wrecked and fond. “I’ll buy you a metric ton.”
Cate nuzzled into her throat, licking a slick stripe to taste Sydney’s skin, shameless. “You were so good,” she whispered. “So mean. I love when you’re mean.”
Sydney rubbed her palm down Cate’s spine, grounding. “You love when I tell you what to do.”
Cate’s smile turned sleepy, sated. “Mm. That, too.”
They sat like that while Cate’s breathing evened out, while her jaw settled from the throb to a dull, satisfying ache, while the mess on her chin cooled. Sydney reached for a tissue with one hand and dabbed at her, tender as anything. Cate let her, eyes closed, basking. When Sydney tried to shift to stand, maybe to get water, Cate clung dramatically.
“Nooo,” Cate whined into her hoodie. “Stay. I’m clingy.”
“You don’t say.” Sydney settled again and wrapped her up. “Water in a second. Then teeth. Then actual candy.”
Cate tipped her face up, blinking in that baby-deer way that got her out of everything and into trouble. “Then more?”
Sydney’s laugh was husky. “You just had your throat use quota for the hour.”
“For the hour,” Cate repeated, thrilled. She sighed, content, and nosed at the hollow of Sydney’s collarbone like she could crawl inside. “You can work now,” she added magnanimously.
“Can I?” Sydney stroked a thumb along Cate’s bottom lip, still shiny. “You going to stay quiet?”
Cate nodded primly and then—unable to resist—parted her lips and sucked the thumb in, just the tip, just a tiny little sip. Sydney’s eyes darkened on reflex. Cate’s laugh was a wicked kind of sunshine around the pad of her finger.
“Gremlin,” Sydney said, affectionate and doomed.
“Oral fixation,” Cate corrected, unlatching with a kiss. “And a very specific solution.” She tucked herself closer. “I like being your solution.”
Sydney pressed her mouth to the crown of Cate’s head and breathed her in, laptop forgotten on the nightstand. “Yeah,” she said, quiet and full. “You’re mine.” She paused, fingers tracing circles at the nape of Cate’s neck the way Cate had done to her earlier. “And you’re getting a new stash. No more empty jar emergencies.”
Cate made a pleased little sound, blissed and bratty both. “Maybe we should keep one empty,” she mused, tipping her head back to grin. “You know. For insurance.”
Sydney’s mouth curled. “You don’t need insurance, baby.”
Cate’s lashes dipped. “I know,” she said, soft. “I have you.”
Sydney kissed her again—messy, unhurried, tasting like relief and something sweeter than candy—and when Cate sighed into it, their mouths fit like they were designed for exactly this kind of problem-solving. After, Cate curled back down, thumb stroking idle shapes into the seam of Sydney’s hoodie and boxers, but gentle now, pacified.
Quiet fell, warm and humming. In the corner, the empty jar caught a stray shaft of afternoon light and glowed like a promise to be filled.