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Will Graham has had his fair share of, well, let’s call them unusual experiences. He had seen a totem pole made of dead people, had stood in a corpse fed mushroom garden and had adopted a serial killer’s daughter, co-parenting her with his psychiatrist. What he hadn’t experienced yet was losing the same everyday item every other day. Well, losing might not be the right term. It’s not that he puts them anywhere and then forgets about it. A pillow isn’t exactly an object one might misplace every now and then anyway. However, that’s what keeps happening. So far, eight pillows have gone missing. First, he thought that he was simply confused, that he might have lost them during sleepwalking. But thanks to his therapy and the treatment for the encephalitis, nightmares bother him rarely anymore and he never wakes up anywhere but in his own bed. He didn’t give it much thought and bought a new one. And another, after that one was missing, too. And then another, and so on. At first, he suspected his dogs. He scolded them, but soon had to realize that they would have left evidence all over the place. His dogs wouldn’t just bury a pillow; they would play with it until it was torn to shreds. He apologized with lots of cuddles and treats. The pillows kept going missing and Will continued to buy new ones. All he could come up with was a rather unlikely explanation: A thief. But who would break into a house in the middle of nowhere and steal a pillow of all things, let alone do it over and over again? Will doesn’t keep much of monetary value in his house, but there are certainly things worth more than a simple pillow with a plain white pillow case. What does one do with so many pillows? Neither his dogs nor the camera he had set up after another pillow was gone are much of a help. The former must get distracted somehow, though certainly not drugged. They seem happy and content whenever he returns home, not dizzy and confused. The camera simply gets turned off for a few minutes, without catching as much as a shadow before or after. Although it is annoying, Will stops his attempts in catching the culprit and resigns himself to buy new pillows.
Then, something happens.
And Will suddenly knows.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
“Did you just smell me?”
Hannibal pulls back, not fast enough though. He prattles something about Will’s aftershave and how it probably has a ship on the bottle. That’s the moment when Will knows the answer. That’s also the moment when Will has enough. Secretly being the Chesapeake Ripper is one thing. Being a pillow thief is on a totally different level.
Will breaks into Hannibal’s house while the man is at the opera. He finds the pillows exactly where he thought he would – and where he should have suspected them in the first place. The nest in Hannibal’s bedroom is made out of expansive, probably custom made blankets and pillows. They seem soft while providing the needed stability for nest-building.
Inside, though, the nest is lined with several cheap, white pillows. Pillows stolen from Will, saturated with his scent, put in the very core of the place most sacred to an omega. Will’s heart misses a beat. It’s almost unheard of that an omega marks their nest with anything other than their bonded mate’s scent. And yet, this is exactly what Hannibal did. Will growls proudly.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
When Hannibal comes home, he recognizes the scent immediately. The scent of the alpha he wants so desperately since the very first time he met him. The scent he needs nowadays to be able to fall asleep. The scent that soothes him when he fears that nobody will ever be able to truly see him and accept him for what he his.
Will’s scent.
He enters his bedroom where the scent seems the strongest. The stolen pillows loose Will’s scent far too fast, so this surely must be wishful thinking?
“Isn’t it a little bit beneath the Chesapeake Ripper to act like a common thief?”
He flinches and turns around. And there stands Will, tall and confident, his blue eyes saturated with alphan red, his grin smug and his voice teasing. Hannibal stares at the alpha, for once in his life stunned into silence. With all his knowledge and intuition, he could never entirely predict Will Graham. The alpha closes the space between them, and it is more than pure instinct that makes Hannibal arch his neck, allowing Will to nuzzle at his throat. Soft, reverent kisses are placed there, until Will pulls away. He cups Hannibal’s face in his hands, his thumbs stroking flushed cheeks. Hannibal holds his breath as Will makes eye contact, searching for something in the omega’s wet, golden eyes. He must be content with what he sees there. He grins, deliberately letting Hannibal see his teeth. The omega can’t help but picture how these teeth could rip prey apart. More than that, however, he pictures how these teeth could sink deep into a bonding gland. Into his bonding gland. The first drops of slick wet Hannibal’s thighs and make Will’s nostrils flare. He whines and Will growls. They crash into each other, and when Will lifts Hannibal up, the omega wraps his legs around his waist and lets himself be carried to his – to their – nest.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
A few days later, they have to throw away most of the pillows and sheets. They are ruined beyond salvation after Hannibal had fallen head first into a spontaneous heat, triggering Will’s rut. It doesn’t matter to Hannibal, though. He won’t have to steal pillows to replace them. From now on, he has the alpha right beside him, and they both make good use of it. Will is happy that he doesn’t have to buy new pillows every other day. However, this is nothing compared to the joy he feels of having Hannibal as his bonded mate. Sharing a home, hunting together and having a ridiculous amount of sex (even in Hannibal’s pristine kitchen, because after all, every thief must be punished) fills him with a happiness he wouldn’t have thought possible. And it’s really only a coincidence that, whenever Will has an especially tiresome day at the BAU ahead of him, one of Hannibal’s scarfs, saturated with the omega’s soothing scent, happens to disappear.