Author's Note:

if you read VT, you'll know from those notes why the wait was so long. i'm sooo sorry, and will reiterate here that i never intend to keep readers waiting this long. it's been literally half a year but just life, y'know?

i feel writing the next chap will come quite quickly and easily but begrudgingly admit that i put this chapter off for aaages due to being intimidated by its content.

and on that note, please consider the new rating! you know what that means.

if you want to skip the *lemon emoji*, just don't read past this line: They'd spent the past three months learning how to unwrap each other.

CHAPTER SIX

Rita Farr took pride in the title gifted to her as a mother. After her accident, a part of her had been convinced she would never get to experience such an honour. But then came Garfield, and something shifted in her soul.

She had to protect this boy. This lost, broken boy, who had endured in eight years what no person should in their lifetime. This boy who today was no longer a boy, but a man.

Her son. She would protect him to her end, for in her heart, he was still that scared, shattered child who had come to them terrified and alone.

Five days before Beast Boy arrived in Michigan, Cliff had been passing through the West Wing of the manor and overheard mention of the room arrangements. He'd let out a full, metallic sigh.

Lord knows he didn't want to - he really didn't want to - but someone had to have the little guy's back. So he decided to do his nephew a solid, breaching Rita's discussion with her husband to pull her aside.

"Excuse me?" The heroine fumed up at him.

"Look Reetz, I know you don't wanna hear it. I don't think any of us do. But your 'little boy' gets some."

He watched her whole face pinch in what he knew to be disdain. "How would you know if—"

"Because he's a young, good-lookin' guy, and I know, alright?" he said in that thick, Bronx accent.

Cliff didn't just have an inkling. Gar had to go to someone when he turned thirteen and suddenly had questions. (It was actually just the one question, and not all that uncomfortable. But it was enough for Cliff to think 'Fuck it' and tell him everything he needed to know, like tearing off a band aid. The shifter was not at all thrilled, but just thanked his lucky stars the whole thing had occurred with Robotman and no one else on the team.)

"Just save us all the sneakin' 'round and let the kids share a room, I beg ya'."

Rita gaped at him, face red with frustration. Her head whipped to Steve, who she determined was close enough to have picked up the exchange. He glanced from his chair to see round eyes demanding backup, but quietly went back to his Sudoku, cementing that he desired no part in it.

It was really no business of his what Gar did to satiate his needs, and he didn't want it to be. If he was a young, healthy male doing what young, healthy males did, there was no call to interfere.

Rita was begrudgingly swayed. Very begrudgingly.

Her way of dealing with it was to send him a very long, very overdue text detailing the importance of safe sex, with perhaps a comment thrown in there about being too young to be a grandma.

Okay, Mom, she received back. An acknowledgement and nothing more.

It took those remaining four days for her to sit with the idea, to vaguely accept the reality that her little Garfield was actually growing up. She still didn't have to like it, though.

This might've been why Larry found himself guiding them to their room instead of their hostess.

"Guess I'm playing bellboy too," he'd mumbled when asked to acquiesce. Beast Boy and Raven tailed behind him with their suitcases.

The panelled walls stretched to oak ceiling beams. The floor beneath them creaked, with one particular board releasing a low whine when Raven's foot moved across it. Larry led them a few more steps up the hall then stopped.

"Alright, this is you," he announced, more for Raven's sake. "Bathroom's in there. Computer room's two doors down, if you need it. And, uh." Had he missed anything? "Whatever, Gar'll show you 'round. He knows this wing."

"That I do," he smiled.

"So if it's all the same with you two, I'll be getting back to my Bollywood Drama." Well, Raven certainly hadn't pegged him as the type for that. "Good to have ya' back, kid," he said before turning to leave down the corridor.

"Night, Lar."

"Oh." Larry looked over his shoulder. "Cliff says you owe him."

"Uh. Okay?" Beast Boy raised a brow, not understanding in the moment what that meant.

Raven heard the floorboards creak again beneath his weight and only realised by the time he'd vanished down the stairs that Gar was already through the door, both cases taken with him. She entered too and soaked up the space.

"Is this a guest room?" Raven asked, walking further inside.

"It's my old room," Gar told her. He lifted both cases onto the window seat and began unzipping his own.

It was the opposite of his room at home. There was one large rug instead of carpet. Grand furniture in fitting with the house.

No pictures. No clutter.

"No bunk bed?"

He looked up from his case to see her teasing expression.

"No bunk bed." Though not for a lack of want. Garfield had wanted a bunk bed more than anything in the world, but never been allowed one.

They encourage a mindset not fit for the job, Mento had preached, even after his son had begged on his knees. That was why, when they moved into the tower, a tall, traditional bunk had been at the top of Beast Boy's list of requests.

It served him well for the time it remained there. Now, a standard Queen stood in its place. Single mattresses weren't ideal for... things.

It all really added up when you looked around his room at Dayton. It was Spartan. Sad. Raven was quickly learning why her boyfriend always clung to childhood things - he never got to have them when he was meant to.

He was like her. Forced to grow up too fast.

"Shame," she went on, not encroaching on the topic. "I was gonna claim the top." She'd only been playing into the juvenile role, but he had another role in mind.

"Oh, you can still be on top," Gar offered without missing a beat, sending a classic wink her way.

Raven flushed. He'd only started doing this recently, only started being so brazen about it. She still hadn't fully figured out how to respond; all she had in her arsenal was her deadpan retorts.

"Does Rita know she raised a deviant?" she said, finally joining him at the window seat.

"That was mean. Do it again," Beast Boy grinned.

"Exactly."

Raven's hands went to her own case and unsealed the zip. She raised the lid and looked inside, then fumbled around for her bell-sleeve jumper, the whole time assessing what had happened downstairs.

They'd exchanged words without being in a crisis situation. She supposed that was good, though beneath the calm, there remained a restlessness she couldn't seem to shake.

Just as she began refolding her jumper for the dresser, Gar moved from her side and wound his arms around her middle from behind. Her chest dipped as his chin found her shoulder, perching there whilst his front pressed to her back.

"You were great down there," he murmured. "I think it went well."

Despite herself, Raven sighed. "Ya' think?"

"Hey." Gar turned her by the shoulders to face him. "Dad'll warm up. He likes knowing things."

He wanted to explain further. To say: 'He's just sizing you up because he's a douche'. He thought better of it.

Beast Boy sensed that sort of behaviour in a lot of authority figures, the same way it worked in the wild. Some people just didn't like their territory stepped upon. They typically had the courtesy to be more subtle about it, though.

Raven lightly nodded. "Yeah..." Well I like people not knowing things.

He easily marked the disquiet in her tone - not that she made as much effort to hide it these days. They were more open that way.

"C'mon." He pushed a smile out of his frown and took her by the hand. Raven let herself be pulled along. When they reached the edge of the bed, Gar released her, then proceeded to crawl into the middle of the sheet, curl up on his side, and spread his arms wide open.

A warm, tickled smile broke through his girlfriend. Pale palms found the duvet as she too crawled onto the bed, some unseen force pulling her right into those arms. She shuffled in with her head dipped to his collarbone, and those same arms coiled around her waist, clasped at her back to bring her right into his chest.

It felt so strange, her being there. His Raven, in Dayton Manor. In his bedroom. In his bed.

Strange in the best possible way.

A green hand stroked lazily up and down her spine.

"The hard part's over now," he said into her hair. "We can put a big check next to Day One."

Raven tucked her hands under her chin. "Sorry. I guess I'm getting used to it all."

"I know," he smiled sympathetically. "They're a pretty hard bunch to get used to."

She smiled too. Somehow, he'd mastered the art of thawing her nerves. Her shoulders felt lighter, her heart beat steadier.

"They like you though," he went on. Raven's nose crinkled.

"Really?"

"Yeah." She felt a kiss land on her chakra stone, something he often did. "But not as much as I do." Another to her cheek. Then another again, this time feathering the slope of her neck.

A gentle giggle escaped her. Beast Boy smirked.

"What was that?" His hands held tight to her waist. "Thought you told Cliff I'm not funny."

"You're not," she said into his chest, wrestling down a smile.

"Oh yeah?" His smirk turned devilish. Those hands at her waist became hooked fingers that skittered like spiders up and down her stomach. A shriek tore from deep inside her.

"Gar!" Raven squirmed through a peal of giggles. It merely spurred him on.

He'd found out how to make her laugh without fail. So what if it was cheating?

"If I'm not funny, how come you're laughing?"

Her hands clasped around his forearms in a desperate bid to stop him. It did literally nothing, and she mentally cursed him for his physical strength.

That wasn't to say she couldn't cheat as well.

He smiled down at her quaking frame, just to feel his hands go still and cold. Both were now encased in a shadowy sphere, holding them in place like a prisoner in chains.

Well, he kinda deserved that.

His face hovered near hers. They strove to calm the rise and fall of their chests as their laughter waned, and he let out one last, breathy chuckle against her lips. It was entirely sexy of him.

Raven merely blinked before his mouth was dropping down to hers. Another shameless cheat.

She faded into his kiss and felt her magic release. As her idle hands moved to each side of his neck, he let his newly-freed ones trace the shape of her waist. They flexed there, holding on when their lips drew apart for a second kiss.

Her small body curled. His tongue slipped past his fang into the window of her mouth, until it brushed against hers in one dark, heavy slide.

"Mmh."

The vibration from her throat was immediate rapture. He felt his head tilt to one side, moving hers with it so the height of her cheek sank deep into the pillow.

Slowly, Garfield's palms at her waist became slinking arms pulling her flush against him. Raven's own arms glided over his shoulders, then cinched where green hair fanned into green skin.

She felt the exhale from his nose just as her leg moved to curl lightly around his calf. Not a moment later, his right hand was leaving her middle to urge her along, landing first at the dip behind her knee then sliding higher to hike her thigh up his hip.

Her heel touched the base of his back and centre settled snug against his. They fell into another lewd kiss, then another again. Raven felt fingers grip into her, felt the rumble in Beast Boy's chest. He moved that hand keenly over her leggings until it curled around the swell of her ass - then he squeezed with one hard, deliberate grind.

All the day's lethargy fizzled away. Raven's blood zapped her fully awake.

"Gar..."

A distant hum from her boyfriend reached the back of her throat.

"The others," she said into his mouth.

"Are all downstairs." He languidly captured her top lip. "And will be for a while." Her bottom lip.

With another promising squeeze, she felt her will erode beneath his touch. Raven didn't mean to crumble, but...

"You're sure?"

Gar smiled. "It's a big house, Rae." A heady kiss pressed into her temple, then those lips fluttered down to her jaw. "Relax..."

Raven sighed out as his hand now slid devotedly to the small of her back beneath her sweater. Her spine arched where it moved along every dainty notch, creeping to the narrow between her shoulder blades.

They'd spent the past three months learning how to unwrap each other. Her eyes had already fallen shut, the gentle command blanketing her brain and dampening her doubts. It was borderline embarrassing, how easily she would succumb to him after the endless years of restraint. How she would bend to the yearning. The need.

She'd been patient, she reasoned, brushing the blunt of her nails into his scalp. They hadn't had much time before leaving the tower.

First, there was decorating for the holiday. Then, buying and wrapping presents. Then, a meal together before Robin and Star left. Then scattered crime calls. Then packing for Michigan. Then catching up with Titans North before she and Gar left.

God, she needed this; to tread upon this forbidden thrill, to do things they probably weren't supposed to do. She needed his distraction, and if she knew Gar, he was reeling to love her anxiety away.

He sensed she'd buckled when the last dregs of tension fell out of her shoulders, when she took his face in her hands to drag his mouth from her throat back up to her kiss. And maybe that's when he buckled too.

Her boyfriend was big on kissing, Raven knew. So she felt pretty damn lucky that he was wonderful at it. Expressing affection was in his genes; it came so naturally to him. She considered herself as someone still learning, but had come along stirringly. He made it fun to learn.

Behind closed lids, Gar's eyes clouded with the colour of greed. Raven rocked dully into him, and a wave of heat pricked along his skin.

He rolled them over with shocking ease, until he had her back flat to the mattress and his front pressing down on top of her. She went to lock her elbows, to latch around the breadth of his shoulders, but just as quick, he was wrenching himself away. She felt cold and empty for all of three seconds as he leaned back just long enough to throw off his shirt.

Raven's eyes blackened as she gazed on at the fabric coming away. There was a thud as it landed to the rug, and she trailed her gaze over the length of his torso. His want for her was pressing at the front of his jeans. Her tongue felt suddenly heavy in her mouth.

Slender hands reached out to him, transfixed, and she grazed her fingers down the channel of his abs. Gar allowed for this, though couldn't help the lift of his lip. He didn't have magic, but he had power.

In one swift move, he swept up her wrist, then the other as well, and pinned them both to the pillow above her head. The way he looked down at her... It was as if he was telling her: 'We're going to go slow, and it's your turn first.'

She felt her wrists twitch where they crossed over each other inside his fist. A flash passed through her eyes. It sent his heart pounding.

He'd only recently discovered Raven liked to be pushed around. In truth, she'd discovered this about herself around the same time.

Emeralds brushed over her; how her raised arms thrust her ribcage out; the messy way her jumper had ridden up, now teasing along the base of her bra. Insatiable, he dipped down and took hold of her warm mouth again.

The sultry touch of his free palm crawled up from her stomach to that exposed line of mesh, and he pushed up her sweater the rest of the way to fully enclose her breast within his touch. Raven's teeth skimmed his lower lip, and when his thumb ran over her stiff, rosy bud, her eyebrows creased.

Gar adored these mesh bras. They were so perfectly seductive. A frail stretch of netting, showing just a little, but not all of what hid underneath. Like mist on a mirror.

He ground his bulge between her legs to give them both that shot of friction, and at the base of his back, another leg wrapped around till two ankles were hooked. The mesh at her chest was pulled slowly down, and the changeling rolled her nipple between his thumb and forefinger.

Raven whimpered. He inhaled her, drunk on the scent of her pleasure. A little hum dripped from her tongue onto his, and her hips pitched up to meet with his again. The pressure caused his head to drop aside, releasing a deep, shaky moan into her ear that merely made her burn hotter.

Gar moved lower, mouth seeking out the lush line of her throat. Raven sighed out and let her head rock back as he bit into her pulse point. The lure of him, it was always like this. This fierce lust mingled so flawlessly with the soft, tender love.

Here, he at last surrendered her wrists, but Raven knew to keep them there. She wanted to be good for him. She wanted it so badly.

Gar lifted his stomach from hers. His left hand kneaded at the pale mound of flesh whilst his right now snaked down between her legs. They loosened their grip on his waist without question, leaving enough give to spread apart at the crux.

All of her blood rushed down to her core, her eyes fluttered closed as he watched the bliss float over her face. Two fingers came together and played at the delicate space left open for him, and he braced for the long, low sigh that lingered in his wake. The heel of his hand cusped around her, tilted into that pulse-pulse-pulsing heat.

Raven's pleasure was his. He could get off on just the sounds she made, the pheromones she let off. He was usually so dedicated to warming her up with painful slowness, like warming clay between his hands, but her impatience had scented her. Her hips began an insistent roll into his palm. For a millisecond, their hazy eyes met, and some white teeth appeared to bite down onto her lip.

That was it.

He hurriedly shifted off of her only to grasp at the waistline of her leggings, shimmying them down her thighs with her panties. The fact her jumper was still bunched at her collarbones, the fact his jeans still clung to his hips, made it oddly more enticing.

In a few excitable moments, the annoying barrier was ripped from her legs, and before Gar could do anything, she was sitting up a little and guiding his right hand towards her.

He stared on. She led that hand to her mouth, and without breaking the lock of their eyes, Raven let the spit gather on her tongue and leisurely slipped two fingers past her lips.

He gaped, needle-like teeth glinting in the dim light.

Open that pretty mouth for me, baby.

He thought maybe one day he'd have the guts to say such things to her out loud. Those petal lips closed around the base of his fingers, and she sucked. Hard.

He loved her like this. Literally no one but him knew how nasty she could get.

There had been a shift with them recently - a steady incline straight out of shyness. Gar had always had quite the libido in him - he'd known that for a while - but lately he'd pulled things out of Raven that she did not know she had.

It often irritated her how he was underestimated in everything. Anyone who caught a glimpse of what rose to the surface when he was turned on would never think to doubt him in bed. He was fucking incredible. Effortless. Confident. And she was certain it had everything to do with his animals.

Their sixth sense. Their instincts. Their drive.

There was a want that brimmed beneath the changeling's skin when they got like this. Something like hunger. Addiction.

When his fingers came away, a saliva string lingered before it snapped. He didn't just pull them out; he dragged them out. They glistened, soaked, and she guided him again, this time down to the apex of her thighs.

He saw her navel twitch in anticipation, and moved his fingers torturously over the lips of her pussy. When they reached the bed of her slit, his two digits became an upside-down V, dragging upwards and splitting her open on their path.

That V came together, the pads of his fingers kissed the hood of her clit; a soft, gentle graze, before pressing down against that pink, tumescent bead. Green eyes flicked up to witness the plume of breath that fled out of her. He swallowed it with his lips closing over hers again, fingers bending at the middle so their ends could tease her nub.

Beast Boy shuddered above her. Her arousal felt impossibly wet and good beneath the spiral his fingers made.

Another gasp shot into Raven, like she was stealing the air straight from his lungs. She nudged her hips a fragment higher, and he took the hint, descending his touch with a slick drag down. That delirious warmth now circled her fluttering core. It gave some pressure, like it was going to breach, but then didn't. A set of dark brows dipped, irritated.

"Please..." she breathed.

That's what he'd wanted to hear. He rested his forehead against hers.

"Say I'm funny."

Raven frowned.

"Fuck you."

Gar chuckled.

"Close enough."

Those two thick fingers pushed steadily inside her, and she instantly forgave his cockiness.

Raven wasn't aware of how her thighs spread wider. Of how the thin arms draped above her head now sagged at either side of her flushed face.

Gar had to watch her reaction. Every time was always better than the last. He felt himself sink inside; the first crook of his fingers, then the second. Her eyes were as low as they could be without falling shut.

Before he could be submersed, he pulled the digits out again, and her lip trembled, just before he plunged in fully to the hilt.

His girlfriend stiffened and her mouth fell open. Gar bit back a curse as he studied the way her head craned back, jaw tipped to the ceiling. When he pumped out then in again, he let his eyes flick down, just to watch his fingers disappear into her.

His wrist could pivot to reach all those sweet, sensitive spots. The heel of his hand angled over her clit as before, maintaining a firm pressure there, letting her grind to prolong that stimulation.

"Unn..."

He glanced up, and that exposed neck was much too inviting, so he swooped down to claim it. At the same time, his fingers curled into a small, rough patch. When Raven jolted, he decided he would ruin her with it.

The girl was already pretty far gone. The fingers of his right hand inside her, his face buried in her nape, his left hand again rolling her nipple back and forth. She could feel him everywhere.

A deep growl reverberated through the room. Raven almost protested when his left hand abandoned her breast, but he used that arm to balance himself on his elbow and crouch lower down the bed. Supple lips laved across her midriff, tongue lightly skimming the toned, pale flesh.

Next he robbed her of her cushion, lifting the heel of his hand away from her centre and exposing the nerves to the air. She could bear it though, when she sensed balmy breath dancing across it instead.

Beast Boy's tongue dripped with the urgency to taste her.

His fingers hooked again inside her, thumb skilfully pushed her right lip aside. His tongue was scorching hot, and as soon as it flicked out over her sore, throbbing pearl, her hands drove like claws into his hair.

He grabbed what he could of the thigh around his neck, elbow still rooted deep into the quilt. The flat of his tongue made one long stripe from the bottom of her pussy to the top, licking her wide open as his fingers thrust a little deeper, a little faster.

The shifter peered at his work and saw his spit dribble its way from her clit down to his knuckle.

"Shit, Rae."

He dove back in with a shattered groan, and Raven echoed it as the inside of her thighs sealed over his ears. Her boyfriend drew pointed circles around the swollen knot, and she arched into him like a bow.

Blunt heels dug into his shoulder blades. Butterfly breaths hitched her chest up and down. Her brain was tepid, foggy, hips raised to meet every delectable stroke. Then he suckled around her clit, and a loud noise left her that was all breath and lungs.

"Ahhhn—"

Nails tightened at the crown of his head, her other hand clutching the pillow above her. Her chest shot up then collapsed, pouring sound from somewhere deep and desperate.

He'd become familiar with her knack for getting vocal... Not so much in screams, but in gasps, in mewls, in moans. Raven was always embarrassed after, but in the moment it was like she couldn't help it. It was extremely hot and fantastic for his ego, not to mention a colossal turn-on.

There were times he did something very right, and her voice would rise three octaves higher. He loved that too. Fuck, he loved her. Loved when she got like this, and loved that it was because of him.

He could already see himself pounding her deep into the bed sheets once this delicious tryst was done. Could already imagine how her toes would curl.

Reverting back to the rapid flicking of his tongue, Gar noted the frantic tremble of her hips, and gripped her there with his free hand to try and steady the movements.

Above her broken whines, above the moist frenzy of his mouth, the creak of a floorboard lurched down the hallway. Garfield and Raven froze on the bed. Ten seconds later, a knock rapped from the other side of the door, and somewhere behind a curtain, a glass pane shattered.

Author's Note:

bar 'that chapter' in violet tide, this is my first time writing something spicy, so please be kind. i'm not gonna lie, i'm saving my best smut writing for part ii of VT. i still hope this was good though? ;w;

(p.s. for those who don't believe they'd get it on under the same roof as the DP, i respect it, but have to disagree. they're madly in love and early into their relationship. it's a massive house. bb has his own entire wing. neither of them are saints, and risk-taking is a huge part of their lives already. idk, maybe i just don't see it as a huge deal? ¯\_(ツ)_/¯)

(p.s.s. blew my mind when i found out americans say 'check' instead of 'tick' like the rest of the world! :') i also found out recently that americans don't use a 24hr clock? so had to adjust things in my other fic bc of that lol. if i ever make errors on americanisms, please just call me out and i'll correct them. i want their dialogue to be accurate!)