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It’s nothing serious, Jacobi isn’t stupid enough to believe it could actually mean anything. There’s too much power imbalance, too much professionalism and too much adrenaline. You need to put your feelings into something and if that’s sex with your boss, well, happens right? To everybody. To some people.
He doesn’t put too much thought into it. Not the first time it happens, anyway, because they’ve just finished a mission and there is too much rush, too much teeth and nails and god, that definitely should be forbidden.
When he comes back to the flat covered in bite marks Maxwell doesn’t even comment. She raises her eyebrows and pointedly goes back to her xbox. It’s better this way, obviously. He doesn’t need to talk about this and she doesn’t need to know anything more than she can figure out herself.
It happens from time to time, outlet after a mission, almost a routine now. But the quiet times are what makes him wonder, the times when they don’t need that to let go, when it just kinda happens. When he wakes up next to Kepler, the moonlight coming through the drapes, shadows dancing on the wall. It could mean something, he thinks, at the very same moment realising how stupid the thought even is. And yet he cannot help but wonder, even if only for a second. An impossible situation, obviously, to wake up next to Warren Kepler every morning, to watch him sleep almost peacefully. Jacobi could almost fall for it, for the illusion of safety and calmness, if he wasn’t so painfully aware of how dangerous the man sleeping next to him actually is.
It could never work, he thinks, staring at the ceiling. It’s nothing you could call love, after all. It’s a dance, mix of loyalty and Kepler knowing, Kepler teasing him all the time. He could ask Jacobi to jump into a fire just for fun, for the sake of mission, some ridiculous excuse. And Jacobi wouldn’t protest, not at all.
Maybe it’s easier this way. He was always the man to follow orders, to follow whoever was smarter, stronger or more powerful. Life was easier this way; if it’s someone else’s decision he doesn’t have to be responsible. Kepler knows this, obviously, he does. That’s why they chose him in the first place; someone to be saved from a sad life in a sad bar, someone to give themselves completely, to be just loyal.
Or maybe more than that.
“Can’t sleep?” says voice next to him, hoarse from sleep. Kepler’s look is as piercing as always and Jacobi wonders - if he ever dared to lie, how long would it take the man to figure it out?
“The moon keeps getting in my eyes” he answers, not even remotely true. Kepler laughs and doesn’t believe him even a bit.
“If you need to think, do it quietly, Daniel.” Kepler turns to the other side.
Jacobi wonders.