Author's Note:
The lack of endnotes with the last chapter was not to warn you about the non-graphic violence at the start of this one. We're gonna move pretty quickly into fluff, smut, and a whole lotta appreciation for the birthday present MJ bought Peter back in chapter 13.
XXVI
MJ didn't want to scare her mom. Instead of allowing Peter to call her while she was in the bath, she dictated a message to him―head resting back against the tiled wall, bruised cheek feeling hot and swollen―and had him text June on her behalf. The text let her mom know that the Black Widow would be waiting to accompany her back to their apartment after her shift. MJ and Peter had no way to contact Romanoff, but the spy had said she'd be in touch shortly, so MJ would ask her then to go to the hospital and make sure her mom got home safely, just in case this was an attack on her family specifically.
She wasn't sure yet that that was the case. Nobody knew her, not really, and it had been two and a half months now since J. Jonah Jameson had revealed Peter's identity. Also, she'd been attacked in the Parkers' apartment, not her own. All of that was kind of a blur of instinct and adrenaline and though Peter insisted that she didn't have to talk about it right now, MJ felt like she couldn't really relax until she'd divulged her experience. So she told him how she'd gone over to his place and, even without a Peter-Tingle, had gotten a feeling. Could've been that the air was less stuffy than she'd been expecting (thanks, she'd since learned, to the attackers entering through a window and leaving it open), or that, as she'd ventured cautiously through the dark kitchen, she'd heard a faint sound other than her own footsteps. Those moments seemed as immeasurably long now as an afternoon lying in the sun at the beach; everything right after had happened so quickly in comparison. Peter sat on the edge of the bathtub and trailed his fingers in the water next to her raised knee, but MJ could see how hard he was clenching his other hand into a furious, guilty fist.
A something that had swiftly materialized into a someone had pushed her hard into the kitchen counter and she'd fallen after the impact, having not been anticipating the hit. She'd scurried beneath the Parkers' kitchen table, dumping the contents of her backpack purse and latching on to the handle of the mace. She'd spared a few seconds to begin texting Peter for help. When the someone had gripped her around the ankle to drag her into the open, MJ'd hit send on her unfinished text and dropped her phone to wrap both hands around her weapon. (She noticed the understanding dawn on her boyfriend's face―this was why he'd followed her directions to retrieve her phone from under the kitchen table.) She'd cracked her attacker across the knuckles with the light-but-unforgivingly-solid length of the mace shaft. Their grip had loosened without releasing her so she'd swung her next hit upward between the person's thighs, earning a deep grunt and a freed leg.
MJ had made for the apartment's front door. Neither a hero nor an idiot, she'd had no interest in standing her ground and extending this fight. But there'd been a second attacker then, blocking her path. (Above her, her boyfriend drew in an anxious breath through his nose.) She'd fled to the living room instead, hand working the controls of the mace to extend the spiked head―the way she'd practiced all afternoon. In spite of being untrained, lightweight, and outnumbered, she'd sure as hell given the two men (as she'd confirm with the pained groans that followed) a surprise when she'd fought them off with a Wakandan mace. Not that they'd paused to admire the craftsmanship while she was striking them in their stomachs, then their shins when she'd had to dive to the ground to avoid being part of the wreckage of the Parkers' coffee table, then their arms as she'd scrambled backwards behind the couch as they'd hauled it aside to reach for her. She'd gained her feet and retracted the spikes to give one of the men a blow to the ear when Romanoff had suddenly been there, bringing the other attacker to the ground before subduing to unconsciousness the man MJ'd assumed she'd just concussed.
Of course, after that, she'd gone to pieces a little bit and had allowed Romanoff to lead her giddy ass to Peter's room, away from the blood and destruction. She didn't bother recapping that part; Peter had seen enough to get the picture.
"I've never been so scared for you and scared of you at the same time," he said when she finished.
"Now you know how it feels to date you," MJ informed him, and he leaned over to kiss her on the forehead, almost setting her off with sobs of relief that they were both here and alive.
They spent a couple of minutes in silence after that, until she couldn't stand the expression on Peter's face that said he was internally beating himself up for not being there to protect her. It was a stupid fucking thought―she'd made it through alright and he'd come as fast as he could―so she didn't address it. The best way to convince him to move on was to prove she wasn't a victim. He stood immediately to assist her when she opened the drain and started to rise from the bathtub.
"Do you need something? I can get you something. What do you need?"
Peter practically swaddled her in a thick towel and once she'd liberated her arms, she wrapped it around herself and tucked in the end so it would stay up.
"I'm going to ice my face. My mom's going to freak out enough as it is. Maybe you should get dressed," MJ suggested, eyeing her fully-nude boyfriend.
She hadn't been thinking about him like that before, during her frantic doctoring of his wounds and the tender way he'd run her a bath and stroked his fingers through her hair while her tense muscles went slack, but now, even with the already-yellowing bruises that striped his torso and the bright-pink new skin of his healing palms, she felt an intense yearning for him. As tempting as yay, we're alive! sex was, MJ had enough self-awareness to know that it would probably deplete the last of her energy. So she patted his chest, swallowed, and walked past him out of the bathroom. Her black dahlia necklace stuck to her damp skin above the line of the towel.
"Oh hey," MJ remembered. "You can wear the underwear I got you for your birthday!"
That thought cheered her up, though her smile still contracted to a wince when she folded a bunch of ice cubes from the Parkers' freezer into a tea towel and held it to her cheek. Fuck, that was cold. She listened to Peter going to his bedroom to see what clothes he'd left behind when he and May had moved out in June and made her way back to the bathroom. Setting her makeshift icepack on the counter for a minute, she redressed. Unlike Peter's shredded t-shirt, her clothes were in pretty good shape―if she chose to ignore the faint blood spatter across the front of her shorts. The elastic of her underwear dug into the tender part of her battered hip, but she buttoned her shorts over them and brought the ice back to her face.
She met Peter in the kitchen.
"Black briefs?" he questioned, raising his eyebrows at her. Slowly, MJ grinned.
"Don't remind me. The mental image alone is enough to make me want to do bad things to your broken body."
"Nothing's broken," Peter protested.
"I know, but I'm trying to trick myself into believing you're more injured than you are so... so that..."
He'd stepped close to her, making it hard to keep track of her train of thought.
"Then you can at least pretend nothing important's broken," he suggested quietly. He shifted both his mouth and his hips towards her.
MJ snorted a laugh and let Peter kiss her. When he skimmed his hands gently down her back to grip her ass, she pressed her mouth against his. A couple of nudges from each of them turned it into a desperate, demanding kiss. Then, her phone rang in her pocket and they broken apart. For the best, she tried to convince herself, answering the call from the unknown number.
"Streets are clear," Romanoff said before MJ'd had a chance to greet her. "You two can leave the apartment. I'll get it fixed up."
"You want me to tell you where the cleaning stuff is?"
"I was thinking I'd just throw out the most severely damaged stuff. Unless your boyfriend wants to hang on to half a table and a rug soaked in blood."
She was being funny, but MJ felt the colour drain from her face and quickly handed the phone off to Peter.
"It's ok to leave?" he asked the spy, keeping an arm around her waist as he spoke. "Ok, I'll take her home. No, I'll stay with her, don't send anyone else."
The protective note in his voice made the hair on the back of her neck stand up.
"Ok," Peter said again, "putting you on speaker."
MJ frowned at him in confusion as he held the phone up between them.
"Can you bring my mom home after her shift?" she blurted.
"Already at the hospital waiting for her," Romanoff confirmed. "I hadn't planned on interrupting, but she came to me. Said maternal instinct had tipped her off."
MJ let out a worried gasp.
"You told her I'm ok, right?"
"Yep, I think she's going to be distracted for the rest of her shift, but I persuaded her not to rush out or do anything to attract unnecessary attention. She will be leaving early though. I couldn't fight her on that. Told her she'd see you at home and that you were in good hands until then."
She lifted her eyes to Peter's and smiled at him.
"I owe you so many favours," MJ realized, adding escorting her mom home to the multitude of things the spy had done for her.
"Protecting you and your family is not a favour any more than it's a favour to have Bruce's back in a fight, or to stop that genius you're dating from gallivanting around in his Spider-Man suit when he's supposed to be in hiding."
Peter let out an affronted noise.
"Before you leave the apartment," Romanoff continued, "there's one thing I need to know."
"What?" he asked.
"Not from you, from Jones." MJ heard her take a heavy breath before lowering her voice. "Did anyone besides Peter know you would be at his apartment tonight?"
"Well," MJ said, thinking hard, "he said he told Ned he was meeting me here, but Ned didn't even have time to tell anyone before Peter left his place, not that he would."
"Alright, we rule him out and widen the net. Did anyone know you were going to Peter's apartment at any time?"
"No..." she started to say, but she remembered something. "Cindy knew."
"Are we concerned about Cindy?" Romanoff questioned. Though they'd just met and gotten along that afternoon, MJ understood that the spy was prioritizing her safety over preconceptions about her friendships.
"No," she repeated. She sounded uncertain though, but it had nothing to do with Cindy. There was something else that she couldn't quite recall... Suddenly, MJ had it. "Brad. Brad knew."
"That's Brad Davis," Peter clarified into the phone, eyes firmly and questioningly on her face. "He's in our grade at Midtown, interning at the Daily Bugle."
"Cindy told him by accident," MJ said, eyes sightlessly scanning the Parkers' kitchen as she thought back to the day she, Cindy, and Brad had gone for burgers. "A Bugle photographer took pictures of me going into the apartment building and Brad said they were keeping an eye out for, I don't know, Spider-Man co-conspirators or something. Cindy corrected him and said I was just apartment-sitting. He's the only person I can think of who knew."
"But those guys were here because of me, weren't they?" her boyfriend asked in a pleading tone. "They came looking for me?"
"You've been gone from the apartment for months," Romanoff reminded him, "and it was too slick to be a random burglary. We can't rule out other motives yet, but I'd say it isn't impossible that Jones was the target and that they were either waiting for her to come by sometime or followed her to the building."
"If this was Brad―" Peter grit out.
"If this was Brad," the spy interrupted, "I'll trace it back to him."
Although it felt weird as hell to defend that asshole, MJ had to speak up.
"I don't think he'd do this," she said, ignoring her boyfriend's doubtful expression. "Brad's kind of... into me. Even if he somehow had the authority to hire two goons to come attack me―which, there's no way―he wouldn't."
"Guys get jealous," Romanoff countered. "There's the old 'if I can't have her, no one can.'"
"Brad's a persistent asshole, but he's not psychotic."
Peter sighed without arguing, though the spy had paused, presumably to allow him room to throw out any additional information.
"I could be wrong," MJ allowed.
"We'll get to the bottom of it," the spy promised. "You two focus on staying safe. You've both been through a lot tonight."
"We will," Peter said on behalf of both of them. The tension in his jaw didn't escape MJ's observation.
Neither of them had access to a car and with her boyfriend visibly injured and her holding fast-melting ice to her face in a sopping tea towel (the night was still very warm), they agreed that they'd set off warning bells in the head of a taxi or ride-share driver. Her apartment wasn't far; they decided to walk.
By the time they arrived, the shoulder of MJ's t-shirt was soaked from the water running down her face and neck and Peter had started griping about his birthday present. It was kind of almost normal? She was glad the strange sensation of a different style of underwear was bothering him more than the aches and pains of throwing himself across rooftops.
"They fit, don't they?" she asked, shooting her boyfriend a look when he wiggled his hips oddly as she unlocked her apartment door.
"Yeah. I'm just not used to having something, you know, cradling my web-shooter."
She laughed and it made her face ache. Pushing the door wide, she raised what was now just a cold, wet cloth to her face. She'd have to swap it for new ice inside. Oh, or maybe a freezie. Before she could head towards the kitchen, or even step into the apartment, Peter was tucking her behind him and entering first. Any other night, that would've really pissed her off. Not tonight.
MJ stayed close behind him, mace lowered at her side, as he flipped on lights and made 100% sure the apartment was clear of would-be attackers and signs of forced entry. Finally, he sighed with relief and she took her weapon to the bathroom, rinsing its head in the sink. The traces of blood where the spikes had penetrated through her attackers' padded clothing made her a little dizzy as they washed down the sink, but she got through it. Done, she took the mace to her bedroom, set it on her dresser, and gave it a fond pat of thanks. Then, she went out to the living room to find her boyfriend sitting on the couch, nursing a glass of water.
"You wanna text Ned?" she offered, holding out her phone.
They traded―Peter took the phone while she had a sip of his water. As soon as he'd sent the text to let his best friend know they were both fine, Ned started sending a whole string of messages in response. MJ watched her boyfriend text him once more, saying they were recuperating and would talk to him soon. He passed the phone back and she tossed it onto the table, set the remainder of his water beside it, and laid her head on his chest as he settled deep into the cushions. Peter couldn't have breathed in and out more than a dozen times before she was totally asleep, his arm wrapped around her front to cup her opposite shoulder.
He shook her gently awake to let her know he could hear her mom in the hall outside. In their final seconds of silence, she held his face and kissed him.
Then her mom was in the room, panicking and―alarmingly―crying. It was something she rarely did.
"You should see the other guys," MJ bragged lamely, which did make June hiccup a laugh through her tears.
Once she'd taken a look at her and MJ had, reluctantly, revealed the bruise on her hip, June allowed her daughter to step aside and hauled Peter into a hug.
"I really didn't do anything," he said, laying a hand on her back as MJ watched with a wry smile.
"Peter, you've looked better," June told him bluntly as she drew back. "I know that whatever happened to you happened because you were protecting Michelle. Even if," she went on with a warning finger when Peter attempted to cut in, "you think what you did didn't count or wasn't enough. Don't beat yourself up. You got her home safe."
He nodded in acceptance.
"You ok with the couch?" June asked.
"What?"
MJ was thrown as well―delighted, but thrown.
"He can stay?" she asked her mom.
"Michelle, we are not kicking this boy out of our home tonight. Peter, honey, I'm going to get changed and then will you let me take a look at those hands?"
He nodded again, but MJ wasn't as easily dodged, leaving her boyfriend and following her mom to her bedroom.
"Don't tell me you want me to send him back to his apartment," June said.
"No. I just wasn't expecting..."
"Look," her mom said, sitting on the end of her bed as she peeled off her perpetually foul-smelling socks, "it hurts me to see him injured. Most of the time I've known him, it's been as your sweet, nerdy boyfriend."
MJ smiled at the knowledge that Peter could hear what they were saying from the living room. Nerd.
"Thinking of Peter like that," June continued, "it's difficult to give him part of the responsibility of taking care of you. Don't roll your eyes at me. It's not old-fashioned to accept his help in keeping you safe. But that sweet, nerdy boy is also an Avenger. As an Avenger, he's going to do his job and as your boyfriend, he's going to feel the need to protect you in particular."
"You should've been a doctor of psychology instead," she said sarcastically.
"You be nice to your mother, Grapefruit Face."
MJ cupped her swollen cheek defensively.
"It's not that bad."
"You look like I did when I took a softball to the face in college."
"Amazing how you pursed medicine instead of a career as a professional athlete."
Her mom gave her a hard look.
"Anyway, as your boyfriend, I do not want him sleeping under our roof, but as your personal bodyguard, I feel better knowing he's nearby."
"Can he sleep in my room then?"
June laughed hard and shooed her daughter out, still laughing as she shut the door on her to finish getting changed. Well, it had been worth a try.
"I'm staying overnight?" Peter asked, twisting to look at MJ when she walked into the room.
"Is that ok?"
"Actually," he said as she sat next to him and put her hand in his upturned one, "I was thinking about staying longer."
"How much longer?"
He turned to her, first staring down at their hands, then into her eyes.
"I think I should move back to Queens."
"What? Really?"
"No offense to your mom, but I want to be here to protect you. You need me. Don't argue."
"I wasn't going to," she said with a smile. "I needed you this whole time. I never wanted you to go. But you had to. How can you be here and stay out of the public eye?"
Peter took a deep breath.
"Pepper's putting out a press release soon. I was going to tell you before... all of that happened. It's all the data we accumulated to prove that I didn't kill Beck. Spider-Man's in the clear."
"What about Peter Parker?" MJ wanted to know, squeezing her boyfriend's hand. "What happens to him?"
"Peter Parker is Spider-Man," he answered.
Her eyebrows rose in understanding.
"You're going to tell everyone. Are you sure?"
"I think so. No, yeah, I know so. This feels right. I'm glad Pepper held off for a few more days though because I wonder if the attack tonight is connected to Jameson outing me. We still don't know who slipped him Beck's footage. It'd be nice to be able to bring that to light too when we clear my name. Both of my names."
Peter shook his head, then smiled. MJ could feel herself relaxing into the warm look in his eyes as much as she was relaxing into the couch.
"I'll get you some sheets," she volunteered.
They made up the bed where, June confirmed when she came out to get a mug of tea, he was welcome to stay until his situation was figured out and he could move home permanently, once again occupying his old apartment with May. June looked over his hands, applying more disinfectant, and gave him and MJ mild painkillers to soothe their aches for the evening. Then, she said goodnight. The two of them looked at each other in the calm stillness of the living room and Peter speculated that it wouldn't be long until he was home again. All of a sudden, school was starting next week and he wanted to be able to go back to class with his friends, like normal. Maybe not exactly normal, since he'd be a fairly big celebrity for a while, even around his peers, but normal-esque, normal-ish, as normal as they could get for right now.
"Flash calling you 'Penis' again every day will probably balance out all the freshmen asking for your autograph," MJ joked as they sat on his crisp, cool sheets.
"Actually, I don't think he will," Peter said thoughtfully. "I had this weird conversation with him where he got really supportive and just... nice. Didn't hit on me once."
"No shit?"
She tried to sound surprised, but a smile spread across her face. She'd been regretting how she'd blown up at Flash thanks to envy, brought on by stress, brought on by a long-distance relationship, brought on by a false accusation of murder. These were the sorts of things that happened in her life. And that life would be easier without having constant animosity with Flash Thompson to worry about when they returned to Midtown. MJ wasn't quite ready to be friends with him the way Peter was, but when she thought about him as the guy who'd praised Spider-Man in Venice and been left behind while his parents went on a cruise and, by the sound of it, had actually been receptive of her criticism of how he'd treated Peter... Yeah, she thought they had a chance of being friends in the future.
"It's scary," he said.
"What is?"
"The feeling that everything's going to be ok. Is that nuts?"
MJ nodded and pulled him against her, careful of the sore spots on both of their healing bodies. Peter's head landed on her shoulder; she pressed her cheek to his hair. Faintly, she heard the laugh track of whatever her mom was watching on her laptop in her room. June never wore the headphones MJ had gotten her last Christmas and it usually bothered her. Tonight, she was comforted by the reassurance of her mother nearby and her boyfriend's warm solidity nestled against her. For a long time, she watched the wall as light slanted up and in from buildings across the street and traffic passing below. She watched until her eyelids grew so heavy that even rubbing at them wouldn't relieve the weight. She watched until the light dimmed and Peter's breathing slipped into the steadiness of rest after exhaustion. She watched until she wasn't watching anymore, eyes closed before she could even realize.
"Sweetheart. MJ. You're gonna get a crick in your neck."
She groaned, monumentally grouchy that Peter was trying to wake her prematurely for the second time tonight. It couldn't have been that long since she'd fallen asleep. She turned her head away from him and groaned again, feeling the stiffness already creeping up her neck. Moron was right. That just made her grumpier.
"I know you can hear me," he laughed softly.
MJ turned her head again and opened her eyes just enough that he'd be able to tell she was glaring at him.
"Still dark," she observed and complained, then snapped her eyes shut again.
She felt Peter's breath on her face right before he bumped his nose into hers. Alright, if he was going to persist in keeping her awake, she'd stay awake on her own terms. MJ quickly angled her head and pressed her mouth to his, lips lazy and loose from sleep. When Peter pushed back insistently, gripping her hair low against the back of her head, she gasped in a quick breath, feeling his kiss fall all the way through her until it found purchase in a low, needy place and tugged. She rolled on top of him. Leaving it to his hands to arrange her knees on either side of his hips, MJ just let herself drop into Peter's lap, twining her arms around the back of his neck. His eager hands bunched the loose material at her hips as her baggy shorts rode up, then hooked through her belt loops and held her hips against his. It put far less pressure on the bruise than just taking her by the hips would've. She could feel him swelling in the front of his sweats. Fuck. Trying to grind against his length, she found she couldn't; Peter wasn't giving her enough leeway. It dawned on her like a blinding red sun that he wasn't using his regular strength, the kind that allowed for push and pull, give and take, when things became heated between them. A flush shot through her that this was something more, that he was crossing over into his enhanced strength.
"Are you being Spider-Man with me?" MJ wetly broke the kiss to enquire.
"Depends if you can handle it," he breathed back, nipping her lip.
"How will you know?"
"You ever take a man down with a mace?"
Peter grinned against her lips and she felt his dick throb impatiently against her groin.
"Mhmm," MJ murmured, moving to kiss along his throat. "You wanna know what the trick is?"
She slid her hands down his chest.
"Fuck," Peter muttered, rocking his hips into hers. "Tell me."
Trailing her mouth upward, she stopped next to his ear.
"You've gotta know how to grip the shaft."
She tilted her hips back from his and slipped her hand in between, flexing her fingers around the obvious bulge. Peter moaned, yanking her hips to his so swiftly that she barely got her hand out of the way in time.
"We can't do this out here," MJ reminded him while she could still remember how to speak.
"What? Why... Oh, right."
"I'm going to go to bed." She kissed him and climbed backwards out of his lap. "Don't want a crick in my neck."
She'd barely left the living room when she heard Peter's feet brushing against the carpet as he followed her. MJ bit her lip, grinning to herself without looking back. The apartment was silent.
Once he'd snuck into her room behind her, MJ switched on her bedside lamp and he softly shut the door. The painkiller had quashed the prickling hurt in her face and the warm light made the yellow bruising across Peter's ribs blend into his skin when he removed his t-shirt. She stopped him before he could go any further on his own. They kissed in light teases, MJ smiling against him when he tried to catch her lip between his, and undressed each other for the second time that night. Where last time it had been fearful and perfunctory―proceeding in order to know how to care for each other amidst worries of what wounds might be revealed―this time their pace was dictated by reverence, and much slower.
MJ ran her palms up Peter's back and down his arms like she'd never felt his skin before. Her heart raced; touching him was like breaking some rule. Of course, they'd managed pretty damn well since he'd been 'exiled,' including that very surprising encounter at the stadium that afternoon (or was it yesterday afternoon? It hadn't occurred to her to check the time after Peter woke her), but now he said he was coming back, really coming back. Though they still didn't have all the time in the world, or all the privacy in the world, tonight was something they didn't have to snatch and rush through. She kissed his mouth, then bent her head to kiss his chest, taking her time. Peter pulled at her belt loops again before letting them go and hiking the hem of her t-shirt up to slip his hands beneath her shorts at her hips. Being careful around her bruise, he caressed her skin, then worked his fingers under the band of her underwear and rubbed his fingertips there while he panted above her, MJ's teeth catching his nipple.
Turning, she meant to guide him onto the bed, but he pressed himself up against her from behind instead. His hands repositioned to unbutton and unzip her shorts. The process was only slightly hindered by MJ grinding her ass into Peter's rigid erection. When her shorts fell to the ground, his fingers stole into the front of her underwear, curving with her body to cup her until his middle finger rested along her wetness, dragging lightly back and forth. MJ let her head fall back onto Peter's shoulder and his words hummed against her neck as he kissed her there.
"There's nobody as beautiful as you," he said.
And, "M, I touch you like this in my dreams."
"I love you... I wanna make love to you." He said that too.
She shed her t-shirt, hair flopping against her back until he held it aside to kiss across her shoulders and down the top of her spine, fingers still taunting her as they swept lightly over her clit without focusing there. Because Peter knew―because sometimes, when they did this, he seemed to know everything―he made a few, sudden, quick passes at her clit and MJ had to brace her fists on the mattress for balance. He removed his hand from her underwear and she chased it with a disappointed sigh. She was glad she hadn't intervened though, because now he was drawing her underwear down her legs and helping her step out of them and her shorts. He pressed the soft material of his sweatpants, plus the firm length within, against her bare ass like he couldn't stop himself. As she closed her eyes in the pleasure of anticipation, he unhooked her bra and she let it drop. His hands smoothed down the full span of her back, around to knead her breasts and set the dahlia swaying from her neck, then one hand darted down between her legs and cupped her with that same unambiguous unyieldingness he'd shown on the couch when he held her hips against his. Peter wanted this, MJ knew, so badly.
When he stepped away, she watched him get a condom from her drawer, then shove his pants to the ground.
"Hold on a minute," she said with a smirk and Peter froze, huffing with maybe self-consciousness or impatience or exasperation, as her gaze lingered on his birthday present. "They look good. How's the fit now?"
It was a really fucking bad joke with his cock so evidently straining the front of the briefs, and therefore probably fair when he responded the way he did.
"You tell me," he suggested. He stripped them off, rolled the condom on, and was still grinning to himself at his even worse innuendo as he came back to MJ, holding her at the waist rather than her hips.
"This reminds me of the mirror," she said as he lined himself up, the head of his dick almost making her jump as it nudged her slick entrance.
"You wanna do this over there instead?"
"I actually don't really want to wait another second."
MJ said it quietly, abruptly, and shot a quick glance back at him. He leaned over her and kissed her shoulder, skimming his mouth back and forth as he began to push inside from below.
"Me neither."
She bent her knees a little to accommodate their slight height difference―and to sink down on him, serious about not wanting to wait. Peter filled her steadily in return, clutching her waist as his breathing hitched.
"Does it feel good for you like this?" he checked.
"Move and let's find out."
Untucking her fists, MJ planted her hands flat on the mattress. He began a steady rocking and she swayed her hips with his. It was good, so good, this gentle buildup, that made everything inside her frothy, like they were fashioning the base layer of whatever this would be out of frosting. His hands, probably a little itchy and tight as his body wove shut the tiny abrasions on his palms, shifted and grasped at her waist.
"You want it harder?" she panted.
"Y-you?" he asked back. She could hear the restraint in his voice.
MJ tensed her arms and slammed her hips back against Peter's as he plunged ahead. He swore forcefully and reached up to grope her breasts, weathered palms a blissful hell on her nipples. As he thrust forward, she raised one leg to put her knee on the bed.
"Fuck. Yes," Peter breathed, dropping a hand to grip the front of her thigh for leverage as he bucked deeper into her clenching channel, making MJ quietly cry out and seize the bed sheet in both hands.
Body taut and legs open wide for him, she would've been totally, thoroughly satisfied to remain in that position while he drilled into her, stimulating her g-spot. But on his next thrust, Peter surged forward, then kept leaning his weight into her instead of withdrawing. MJ scrambled onto the bed, tossing the sheet back, and he slipped out of her. Though they both made miserable sounds at the loss of contact, she quickly turned back to him, finding him kneeling on the bed. Her insides clenched―all heat and arousal and no Peter. She kissed him deeply, their tongues stroking each other and his semi-sticky cock bobbing against her stomach.
"How would it be best for you?" he asked, breaking the kiss. His hands smoothed needily up and down her arms.
"My knees feel ok," she said as she belatedly realized it hadn't hurt to prop one on the bed. Though maybe the distraction of him driving into her from behind had helped. "I think I'm ok with whatever, as long as you don't grab my hip. That's the sorest. What about you?"
MJ held him by the hips, then moved her hands to his dick, one encircling him at the base while the other stroked up to the head over the condom. Peter shuddered and kissed her hard before responding. It made her heart feel like it was sailing way out over a canyon on a tire swing.
"It, it hurts a little to curve forward, so maybe if you were on top...?"
"Ok."
Except, apparently, he immediately changed his mind. The second she agreed, Peter tugged her thighs forward, knocking her onto her back. Breathing rapidly because, whatever this was, it could only be good, she watched him shuffle in front of her on his knees and ease hers apart. MJ reached up and ran a hand through his hair as he stared at the wetness between her legs. She tightened her hand in the strands, just a little, because they had grown longer and curled in the summer heat and felt luscious between her fingers.
"I thought you just said you wanted me on top," she reminded him, gaze diving to his erect cock. She knew what he wanted most and that he was making himself wait. Masochist.
"M," he groaned, "I want you every way."
He lowered himself between her spread thighs―she tried to give him as much space as possible as the idiot got as comfortable as he could with a spray of autumn-hued bruises across his front―and basically sealed his fucking mouth to her. MJ whimpered behind her clamped-shut lips. Her hand moved with his head, fingers still tangled in his hair, as he licked at her aggressively, tilting his head this way and that to trace every bit of her with his tongue, blending her arousal and his saliva. He pinched her clit carefully between his teeth and gave short little tugs that had her hips writhing and jumping. Because he was aware enough not to grab them on instinct, he wrapped his arms around her thighs instead, holding them tighter and tighter until there was no way she'd be able to get her legs free without him releasing them. The solid muscles of his arms pushed back against her tensing thighs as he devoured her.
"God, god, god," MJ muttered. "Spider-Man."
Peter outlined her entrance, then plugged it with his tongue. She almost screamed at the sensation of it prodding and flexing and swiping at her g-spot.
"Now," she hissed insistently.
Instantly, he pulled his mouth off her, backhanding the wetness.
"Now?"
"Now," MJ repeated, and they hastily traded places.
He looked up at her straddling his hips and blew out a long breath.
"You're my hero," she blurted as she gripped his cock and took it inside her again. "Did you know that?"
Pink flared up his face in the soft light, but although he opened his mouth to respond, he ended up meeting her declaration with a breathless grunt. MJ rode him fast and as rough as it seemed like they could stand in the condition they were in. She wouldn't let him guide her into something slower, not with his need or hers, especially after he'd just had her so close to climax, fooling around with his tongue. When he was obviously getting close―hips thumping her mattress as he bucked up into her―she entwined a hand with his and fingered her clit with the other. Peter's eyelids fluttered as his eyes rolled back from watching her touch herself, then flew open, coming so hard inside her that his jaw clicked with a silent moan. Her orgasm struck while he was still thrusting shallowly into her, working through his bliss. MJ rocked back and forth on him as he pawed lethargically at her breasts and felt like she could've maybe kept up that pace forever. That was until she felt the flicker of her hips and thighs starting to cramp and had to sway to a stop. She tumbled off him and was jostled like doll when he briefly got out of bed to tie off and chuck the condom.
They both knew he couldn't stay in her room for the rest of the night, but she shifted over further so they could at least lie comfortably until they found the strength and motivation to get cleaned up and redressed.
"I love you," MJ told him as he kissed her forehead, breathing hard from his nose into her hair.
"You're incredible," he said. "You did amazing today. You're just... the most unbelievable person I've ever met. And I love you too."
"Wow, way to show up what I said."
Peter snorted a laugh and MJ propped herself up on her elbow to look at his smiling brown eyes. She traced his jaw, his chin with her fingertips and remembered what he'd said to her that one time she'd texted him to joke that his home missed him. How he'd twisted her words in the kindest, sweetest way. At the time, it had made her ache. MJ felt very differently now that they were together. She thought about the two of them and how it didn't really matter if they were at the compound, at his apartment or hers.
MJ smiled back and said, "Welcome home."
Author's Note:
We're getting so close to the end!
To be continued...