Note:

Hi !

This is a translation of my fic "Dans sa peau", originally in french. It takes place after the events of my fic "Breathless". If you haven't read it yet and plan to do so, I strongly suggest you go read it first :) .

I translated it myself but English is not my first language, so feel free to tell me if you see any mistake. I'll fix it as soon as possible ! :D

Lying flat back on Marinette's mattress, Adrien lets out a sigh of satisfaction.

"Marinette...", he murmurs with infinite tenderness to the woman lying on him, while laying sweet kisses on her neck. "My Marinette. My princess. My Lady. "

Adrien relishes without restraint the affectionate nicknames he reserves for the one who rules over his heart, making them roll with delight on his tongue. Moreover, he is obviously not the only one to appreciate these little words full of love. Lips a few inches from his cheek, Marinette lets out a muffled laugh that caresses his skin and immediately sends delicious chills down his spine.

One of Adrien's hands moves to get lost in Marinette's dark hair, while the other rests lazily on her hip. His fingers sink between her locks, exert a light pressure on the back of her head to silently invite her to raise her head toward him and kiss her. Marinette willingly complies, delicately trapping Adrien's lips with hers.

Adrien closes his eyes with pleasure and tightens his grip around Marinette's waist, squeezing her a little harder against him. Over and over and over again, until it felt like their heartbeats were merging.

Time seems suspended, trapped somewhere under Marinette's mouth and fingers.

Lost in the middle of an ocean of intoxicating sensations, Adrien savoured the gentle caress of the young woman's tongue on his, the way her hand runs along his jaw, the burning sighs that escape from her lips to linger on his skin.

He still struggles to believe that this moment of wonderful happiness is real, and if it isn't, he would never want to wake up.

Until some time ago, Adrien thought he had lost Ladybug forever. Several years earlier, his life was turned upside down when he and his Lady finally succeeded in putting an end to the Papillon's actions. This day should have been their moment of glory, the culmination of their career. But this memorable moment had instead ended in the cruellest of ways.

That day, Adrien discovered that behind the mask of his worst enemy was hiding none other than his own father.

In shock, he fled to the United States, abandoning in the process his miraculous, his kwami, his role of hero.

Abandoning Ladybug.

Without a word, without an explanation.

For a long time, he thought he had lost her. Full of remorse, he has blamed himself for his attitude, bitterly regretting having been so impulsive. The absence of his Lady had gnawed at him for years, mercilessly attacking his wounded heart.

But now this long torture has ended.

Now he has found her.

Ladybug.

Marinette.

The woman who has never stopped haunting his heart since day one.

She is there, in his arms, so close to him that he can feel her heartbeat echoing in his own chest.

Since they finally reunited after these painful years of separation, the two former heroes never leave each other. They keep calling each other, looking for opportunities to see each other, and today is no exception.

Taking advantage of her parents' absence for the week, Marinette invited her partner to spend the day with her. Being alone, they are hardly likely to be interrupted by curious glances or probing questions, and she much prefers the warm atmosphere of her apartment to that of the hotel in which Adrien still lives.

The morning passed at full speed between long conversations, video games and jokes worthy of the greatest days of Chat Noir and Ladybug. Then, after a meal that almost to burn while they were hugging and a film that Marinette has no memory because of having spent more time kissing Adrien than watching the screen, they found refuge in the room of the former heroine.

Tenderly embraced on her bed, they now savour this moment of intimacy they would not have dared to dream of until a short time ago.

Adrien pulls away slightly from Marinette's mouth, ignoring the exclamation of protest that immediately escapes her. But the young man's lips quickly find their way back to her face, brush against her skin again, and this brief manifestation of annoyance is quickly replaced by languid sighs of pleasure.

Purring enamoured "Marinette", Adrien places a line of kisses along his partner's jaw, tracing a burning path from the tip of her chin to the crook of her neck. With every inch covered, he can distinctly feel Marinette's breathing quicken, her fingers dig deeper into his shoulders, her body pressing harder against his.

With his heart beating wildly, Adrien relentlessly pursues his work.

He often thought that Marinette was the center of his universe, if not his entire universe, but never has it been truer.

She is everywhere at once, intoxicating all his senses.

The softness of her hands instinctively caressing the back of his neck. The scent of her skin, mixed with a subtle scent of flowers and vanilla. The sound of her heartbeat, which resonates in his ears like the most beautiful of music. All these sensations intertwine, sublimate, to plunge Adrien into an ocean of happiness from which he would never like to emerge.

He feels Marinette's pulse beating under his lips, strong, powerful, heady. As fiery as his own heartbeat, which is now pulsing at an infernal rate.

Barely holding a smile, Adrien spreads a wandering strand with his fingertips and uncovers a portion of skin at the junction of Marinette's jaw and neck. He takes a deep breath then places a kiss on the very spot he just exposed. A deep, languid, deliberately slow kiss that he intensifies with every fraction of a second. His lips move lazily against Marinette's skin, his teeth mischievously teasing her earlobe.

Marinette lets out a moan of pleasure which immediately gives Adrien a delicious feeling in the pit of his stomach. This new sound slips deep into his chest, spreads throughout his body in gentle waves of heat, awakens in him sensations whose intensity makes him dizzy.

Before he could repeat his gesture, Adrien felt Marinette's fingers run feverishly along his face, pressing against his cheeks to force him to raise his head. He barely has time to obey her silent plea that Marinette crushes her lips against his to kiss him fervently.

"Kitty...," she sighs, moving away slightly, an loving smile illuminating her face.

Without adding another word, she leans towards Adrien and kisses him again.

One of Marinette's hands is pressed firmly against the back of Adrien's head, further intensifying their kiss, while the other rests on one of his hips. She kisses him slowly, tenderly, as if she were savouring every second of this wonderful moment of intimacy.

Suddenly, Adrien notices that Marinette's hand that was resting against his waist has moved slightly, and that she is now playing with the hem of his T-shirt. Then, slowly, timidly, she slips under the fabric to brush his skin.

The contact is brief, almost non-existent. But it's clearly enough to send adrenaline rushes through Adrien's veins. To give him the feeling that his skin is catching fire, to give in his pulse such a brutal acceleration that his head is spinning.

Marinette's fingers go up an inch on Adrien's chest and ignite each of his nerves.

Never has he been so aware of his body and of this surface of skin on which the fingers of the one he loves dance.

A part of Adrien feels on the verge of explosion, while another fervently wishes that Marinette will continue her explorations, no matter what. But Marinette's hand stops, obviously hampered by the recalcitrant fabric of his T-shirt.

Adrien suppresses a moan of frustration.

"If you ... If you want, you can take it off", he gasps in a breath, indicating the garment with a brief gesture of the chin.

Marinette raises her head as sharply as if he had slapped her. Without saying anything, she stars straight at him. Her pupils are now so large that her eyes look strangely dark and the almost unbearable red that marbles her cheeks now descends along her neck.

Adrien swallows hard, waiting for a sign from her. A word, a gesture, anything, before his own nervousness takes over and consumes him forever. He and his Lady may be closer than they've ever been before, but their relationship has never reached such a stage.

Lost somewhere between fear and excitement, they dance around this invisible border which still stands between them, without daring to go further.

At least, without daring for the moment.

"O-Okay...", Marinette finally whispers, in a barely audible voice above their heartbeats.

She sits up, leaving Adrien enough space to do so. Cheeks burning, the young man leans on his elbow, on his hands, sits awkwardly in front his teammate.

His heart is now beating so hard that he has the sensation of feeling it pulsing in every corner of his being.

He shouldn't be so jittery, he lectures himself. Dressing and undressing has long been a component of his former life as a model, there should be nothing extraordinary about that. But today, he is facing Marinette. His Lady, his Princess, the one owns his heart without the slightest chance of ever losing it.

He has never been in such a situation and nervousness almost paralyzes him.

Closing his eyes to escape Marinette's mesmerizing gaze for a moment, he lifts his arms with an almost mechanical gesture and hastily gets rid of his T-shirt. The cool air of the room immediately caresses his skin and Adrien shivers.

The logical part of his brain whispers to him that now that he is shirtless, the young man should now be invaded by a sensation of sweet freshness. But Adrien has on the contrary the impression that his body temperature is reaching insane heights, that his skin is consumed, that his veins are carrying torrents of lava.

Slowly, he opens his eyelids. His gaze falls first on Marinette's hands, follows the delicate curve of her arms, lingers on her mouth, and after what seems to be an eternity, finally meets the eyes of the young woman. Marinette smiles shyly at him first, then more frankly afterwards.

Blushing, she stretches her fingers towards him, stops barely an inch from his chest.

Adrien can feel the warmth of the palm of her hand radiating through this tiny space of air that still separates them and whose existence he ardently curses. Then, in a fraction of a second, Marinette erases this unbearable distance and puts her hand flat against his chest.

Suddenly, Adrien can no longer breathe.

With a simple gesture, Marinette seems to have sucked all the air out of his lungs, to have annihilated any coherent thought in his brain.

Then, timidly, the young woman moves her hand, and Adrien has the sudden certainty that his whole body is about to consume itself on the spot. Marinette's fingers are like a flame on paper. They burn, burn, burn again, drawing a hot path across his skin as they slowly trace the contour of his muscles.

Adrien inhales, exhales, desperately trying to calm the frantic beating of his heart.

He in turn stretches out a trembling hand towards Marinette, before sliding his arms around her waist to pull her against him. He kisses her with infinite gentleness, fearing that a sudden movement would deprive him of all reason.

His nerves are so tense, his heart so close to exploding, that he dreads the slightest gesture.

Marinette willingly kisses him back, then pulls slightly away from him.

"And I... We can remove mine too," she whispers against his lips.

Adrien's heart leaps as violently as if he wanted to burst out of his chest.

"A-Are you sure?" Stammered the young man, dumbfounded.

"Certain," replies immediately Marinette.

A playful gleam in her eyes, she pushes Adrien lightly with her fingertips, forcing him to lie down again on the mattress. Breathlessly, the young man does so without saying a word. Marinette's cerulean gaze paralyzes him and his emotions reach an intensity that terrifies him.

Marinette gives him a smile that she would certainly have liked to be full of confidence, but which suddenly appears strangely tense. Obviously, she is desperately trying to tap into the strength and confidence that are Ladybug's prerogative, but her strained expression and trembling hands betray her nervousness.

Then she takes a deep breath and, with a fluid gesture, pulls her T-shirt over her head.

Adrien can't breathe again.

His gaze lingers on Marinette's waist, on her belly, hypnotized by this pale skin that is now revealed to him. It follows Marinette's curves, goes slowly upwards, still hesitating to continue on this road that the young woman tacitly allows him. Then, when Adrien finally dares to lay his eyes on the perfectly shaped curve of her chest, he feels himself blushing to the roots of his hair.

Adrien is happier than ever to be lying down because he is certain that at this precise moment, his knees would be unable to support him. Between the shorts she still wears and her opaque underwear, Marinette is more dressed than if she were in a swimsuit, but the intimacy of the situation makes him dizzy.

A shy smile on her lips, Marinette grabs their two T-shirts with a trembling hand and turns slightly to place them on the side of the bed.

And there, at this very moment, Adrien notices something.

A dark spot, which he now sees down Marinette's back.

A drawing.

No.

"A tattoo?" He hears himself say in a strangely hoarse voice.

Marinette flinches and on her face, nervousness gives way to a sudden embarrassment. The red that covered her cheekbones and her neck stretches like a tide, delicately tinting her collarbones, spreading to her shoulders. Stifling an annoyed growl, she buries her face in her hands. For a moment, she seems to want to sink into her mattress and disappear into it.

Now dumb with amazement, Adrien stares at the tattoo that adorns his partner's back. His eyes with pupils still dilated with pleasure widen, his mouth opens, giving his face an expression of astonishment almost comical.

It's not so much the fact that Marinette is tattooed that puts him in a state of stupor bordering on paralysis. No. What moves him, what upsets him to the depths of his soul is the precise subject of the drawing she has chosen to adorn her skin.

A cat.

A black cat.

For anyone, this drawing of infinite delicacy would have been nothing more than a work inked by a talented artist. But on his Lady's back, what might have been an innocent feline tattoo takes on a heavy meaning.

It's not just a charming picture.

It's a memory.

A tribute.

A cry of love.

Adrien is suddenly overwhelmed by waves of violent emotions. They hit him, stun him, compress his chest to the point of taking his breath away. The young man is moved beyond words, oscillating between incredulity, hope, euphoria and other feelings that he cannot describe but whose intensity is such that he is dizzy.

For far too long, the love of others has been like a fantasy for Adrien, an unreachable dream. Between his lonely childhood, his missing mother and his father as severe as he was distant, the young man grew up with a boundless thirst for affection and a deep wound in his heart. For him, love had become an unattainable wonder. Something he could give without counting, without ever receiving it in return.

Today, of course, things are different. Adrien has friends who never cease to surround him with their affection, to prove to him every day how much he means to them. And he has Marinette. His Princess, his Lady. The one who lights up his days, who haunts his nights, the one he loves more than anything and whom he knows without a doubt that she also loves him in return.

Things are different.

But Adrien would never have believed that his existence could one day be dear enough to someone's heart for that person to feel the need to engrave proof of it in their own skin.

This discovery shakes him to the depths of his being.

Cheeks burning, he slowly detaches his gaze from Marinette's tattoo to look straight into her eyes.

"You have a black cat tattooed on your back," he continues voice where emotion now mingles with incredulous joy.

Although it seems humanly impossible, Marinette flushes even more. She defensively crosses her arms over her chest, defiantly raises her chin.

"Technically, it's just a monochrome tattoo," she replies with a pout. "Which, by pure coincidence, represents a cat. "

Heart pounding, Adrien stretches out a trembling hand towards Marinette, silently inviting her to turn a little more so that he can contemplate the work engraved in her flesh. He runs his fingers over her skin, delicately tracing the outlines of the drawing. As if to make sure he wasn't dreaming, as if he needed to prove to himself that it wasn't just a fragile illusion capable of dissipating at the slightest touch.

Under his hesitant caress, Marinette shivers. Adrien can feel the slight tremors that run through her body, just as he can easily guess her gaze weighing on him. But his own eyes are fixed on her tattoo again, trying to engrave the tiniest details in his memory.

It's not just a work inked on the skin of the one he loves.

It is a cry from the heart, a confession that moves him more than a thousand declarations of love.

"You have a tattooed cat on your back," he repeats softly, slowly absorbing this extraordinary discovery. "A black cat. "

Marinette lets out a falsely annoyed sigh, belied by the shy smile that now dances on her lips. She in turn stretches her hand towards Adrien, gently stroking his cheek with her fingertips.

"I missed you", she replies simply.

Adrien remains paralyzed with emotion.

Marinette's words run straight through his heart, imprint themselves there like a red-iron mark.

She missed him.

Adrien's chest tightens, desperately trying to contain a new wave of emotion that threatens to surge at any moment. The young man would like to say something. Anything. But in vain. His throat suddenly feels as dry as if it had been sandpapered and his words get stuck, then disappear into the void.

Marinette's response was clear and concise.

She missed him.

Nothing simpler, apparently.

But the reality is more complex and Adrien instinctively guesses the words hidden behind the silences of Marinette. He knows only too well this feeling of emptiness that gnaws at life, the sleepless nights spent in vainly remembering the past. The absence of the other who gives the impression of having been amputated of a part of oneself, of being nothing more than a shadow in search of the person who once illuminated one's life.

She missed him, to the point that she felt the need to ink a memory of him into her skin.

At a loss for words, Adrien sits up slightly, puts his arms around Marinette and lets himself fall back against the mattress, dragging her along with him in his fall.

Surprised, the young woman tightens her fingers on Adrien's shoulders, involuntarily digging her nails into his skin. But Adrien doesn't care. He delicately cups Marinette's face in his hands and traps her lips with his. For what seems like an eternity, he kisses her tenderly, trying to convey to her all the love he feels for her, all the shame he still feels for having made her suffer so much. Each kiss is an open-hearted confession, a declaration of love, a promise never to leave her again.

Marinette answers him fervently, following every movement of his lips and letting her tongue dance around his. Gradually, the tension that Adrien felt fades, dissolves in Marinette's tender hugs. His muscles relax, his vocal cords loosen, and Adrien plunges with delight into this ocean of happiness that he would like never to leave.

"I love you, Marinette," he whispers between two kisses. "I love you, I love you, I love you. "

Her name escapes his lips, mingles with the words of love he whispers to her continuously.

Marinette slips her arms around the back of his neck to hold him closer, again and again and again.

"I love you, kitty," she replies, smiling affectionately.

The deep red of her cheeks is reminiscent of her old mask, her eyes with the colours of the summer sky sparkle with joy, the little laugh that dances on her lips sends delicious shivers down Adrien's spine. Never has Marinette been so beautiful and never has the young man felt so loved.

After years of pain and wandering, he has finally found his place in the world. It is here, in Marinette's arms, showering her with kisses while promising her an eternal love.

The emotion Adrien feels suddenly turns into a wave of euphoria. It grows, swells in his chest, before surging to his whole being, illuminating everything in its path. Encouraged by this powerful wave of bliss, Adrien's heart sings its delight with all its might, giving the young man the impression that fireworks of joy are exploding inside his chest. Adrien is ecstatic, almost dizzy in front of this sudden discharge of pure happiness.

He does not remember ever having been so happy.

Adrien looks up and places a light kiss on the tip of Marinette's nose before pressing his forehead against hers. His fingers move along her waist, rest tenderly on the tattoo on her lower back. And, slowly, a mischievous smile worthy of Chat Noir appears on his lips.

"I love you too", breaths Adrien. "And anyway, one thing's for sure, my Lady," he then purred with a chuckle, ignoring Marinette's suspicious raised eyebrow. "You got me under your skin. "

*** THE END ***

Note :
Well, it's over for this little fic. This is one of the three side stories of my fic Breathless, I hope you liked it ! I'll try to translate the 2 other side stories as soon as possible ^^