Work Text:
The sky shattered in a flash of violent white, followed moments later by a low rumble that vibrated through the floorboards of the small attic room.
Penelope froze, her fingers hovering above the illuminated keyboard. Her eyes quickly moved to the upper right corner of her screen. 1.20 am. The rain lashed against the dormer window in a relentless rhythm. Rain had never been the issue; rain was safe. But under her breath, she cursed the lightning. As soon as the sky had lit up, she knew the sequence had begun.
She held her breath, ears straining against the dark silence of the house below.
There.
A faint, sharp creak of old timber settling on the floor below. That was how it always started.
She had known this for years, though she had naively hoped the recent move would change things. Instead, in this old townhouse, it only seemed to increase. She knew deep down she could never truly escape it, so all she could do was scramble frantically to finish as much of her chapter as possible.
Panic surged through her chest. She only had a couple of minutes left—maybe less. Her hands flew over the keys in a desperate burst of speed, trying to squeeze out one last paragraph before the inevitable caught up to her.
Screeech.
The agony of a door hinge echoing up the stairwell.
She gasped, her eyes darting toward the darkness beyond her office doorway. The lock on that door had been broken for months—a defect of the early 1800s townhouse that she now desperately regretted not fixing. For a frantic second, she looked at the heavy velvet armchair in the corner. She could push it. She could barricade the entrance.
No. It wouldn't hold. It would only waste precious seconds she could use for writing, and what was about to come had never been stopped by closed doors anyway.
Thump... sighhh.
The first step of the ancient staircase yielded. Heavy, slow, relentless.
Thump... sighhh.
Another step. A cold sweat broke out on her arms. She kept typing frantically, her heart hammering against her ribs like a trapped bird. The dark shapes beyond her desk seemed to lean in, as if watching her fail to escape.
Thump... sighhh.
The sounds were coming faster now. A sequence born of storm and shadow, ascending straight toward her home office. The air in the room suddenly felt thick, oppressive, and heavy.
She reached the end of a sentence, slammed the spacebar, and opened her mouth to draw a breath—
The door behind her opened with a final creak. Shadows spilled across her desk. One approached swiftly, looming just behind her. Hot air brushed the back of her neck.
Before she could even hit Save, two massive, heavy limbs wrapped rigidly around her waist. In one swift, unstoppable motion, she was snatched completely out of her swivel chair.
She let out a soft sigh, resting her forehead against a very familiar, very solid, and slightly hairy chest.
"Colin," she murmured, her voice laced with affectionate exasperation. "I am right in the middle of the scene."
"Thunder," a deep, muffled voice grumbled into her hair.
Colin didn't wait for her permission. He hoisted her over his shoulder in a classic caveman carry—the only practical way to navigate the cramped, narrow staircase of their old London home without smashing her head against the plaster walls.
The terrifying monster of the thunderstorm was currently wearing faded flannel pajama pants and smelled faintly of body wash and interrupted sleep.
As they maneuvered down the tight, creaking stairs, Colin’s right hand secured the back of her knees, while his left hand cupped gently over her legging-clad butt, steadying her, taking meticulous care to duck low so her head didn't bump the low-slung doorframes. For all his dramatic, caveman-style kidnappings, he carried her as if she were made of delicate glass.
"You know," she murmured, her hands lightly tracing the muscles on his back to the waistband of his pajama pants as she hung upside down, "I could have written another five hundred words tonight."
"Not happening," Colin muttered softly, his breath warm against her thigh. "Storm's right over the house."
He stepped off the final creaky stair, swept into the dark sanctuary of their bedroom, and unceremoniously—yet thoroughly gently—deposited her onto the soft mattress.
Before she could complain, Colin immediately moved to help her undress, determined to get her comfortable for bed.
"Butt up, arms up," he commanded gently, coaxing her knit sweater dress over her hips and then her head and setting it aside.
While he grabbed her sleep shirt from the bench at the foot of the bed, she swiftly removed her bra. When he turned back to her and only stared dreamily at her boobs instead of handing her the shirt, she took it out of his hands and quickly pulled it over her head.
With a sigh, he kneeled down in front of her and slid her leggings off her legs, then slid off her plush socks, leaning down to press a sweet, lingering kiss onto each of her bare ankles, before lifting her legs onto the mattress.
With her properly put to bed, he hurled himself beside her, pulled the heavy duvet over both of them, and wrapped his arms and legs around her like a giant, terrified octopus. He buried his face into the crook of her neck, clinging tightly to her, his large hands reaching up under her top to softly cup her bare breasts.
She chuckled softly as his hands settled warmly over her. "Are you sure you actually need me to fall asleep, or do you just need my boobs?"
Colin let out a low, muffled huff against her skin. "I need you," he grumbled softly. "You just happen to come with a spectacular pair of boobs, so really, it's a two-for-one deal."
Outside, another bolt of lightning flashed, turning the world outside the windows almost white, followed instantly by a deafening roar of thunder that shook the glass.
Colin flinched hard, burying his face deeper into her skin, his grip tightening until he was practically squeezing the air out of her lungs.
She couldn't help the soft smile that spread across her face in the dark. Wasting a night of peak writing inspiration was annoying, sure, but listening to her six-foot-whatever husband turn into a helpless puddle the second a dark cloud rolled over London made her heart melt every single time.
She untangled one of her arms, managing to turn towards him, wrapping it up and around his shoulders, running her fingers through his messy sleep-tangled hair.
"I've got you," she whispered softly, pressing a kiss to his forehead. "You're safe."
Colin let out a long, ragged exhale, his tense muscles slowly beginning to unknot against her warmth. "Don't go back upstairs, Pen,“ he mumbled sleepily into her collarbone.
"I'm right here," she promised, smiling into the dark as another peal of thunder rolled across the sky. "I'm not going anywhere."