Chapter Text
"You're late."
Jesper sighed at that poor excuse for a greeting. He stomped the mud off his boots and shook the raindrops from his coat. Whichever Saint blessed the weather in Ketterdam clearly had an issue with dereliction of duty.
The back entrance of the Dregs Club came into the kitchen, a cluttered space with dirty dishes on the sink and a grumpy crime boss at one of the unmatched wooden chairs. The table was uneven. Kaz sat at the lower edge, coffee in his mug tilting toward him like the only thing that would risk getting close to Kaz Brekker.
"Didn't realize I was on your curfew, Da," Jesper sniped back, cutting Kaz a look.
Kaz still dressed like a businessman. That was a poor excuse to start running his gang like a factory. Or worse, like a merch ran his family. Jesper had seen those merch kids all in their dark suits and slicked hair and shined shoes.
A cold realization hit Jesper.
"Did we have a job?"
Kaz regarded the crow's head of his cane. A Fabrikator, a different Fabrikator, made it. Jesper had fixed it, though. In Ravka, Jesper had fixed this little piece of the scarring they all took from the Darkling and his reign.
"No," Kaz said, finally, turning those flat wicked eyes of his on Jesper.
"Then what's the problem?"
"Nothing," Kaz said.
Saints, Jesper wanted to deck him sometimes. Just one good smack across the jaw.
The only person Kaz had really talked to was Inej. With her gone, rather than risk trusting someone else, he just looked at them all with paragraphs in the set of his jaw. He didn't-say monologues at Jesper.
"Your boyfriend's asleep."
"Shit."
Not a job. He promised to take Wylan out for waffles.
We're big players now,
Jesper had said.
Wylan had just shaken his head with a little chuckle and said,
Maybe
you
are.
So, let me take you out like the big bosses do.
Jesper was supposed to be here at 6:30. 6:30 sharp, he had promised, and when he saw the look in Wylan's eyes he had been stung, but rather than say so, he kissed him and promised it again. 6:30. Don't be late, he'd told Wylan.
Like a podge.
"What time is it?"
Kaz looked at his pocket watch. Jesper heard the seconds tick.
"Did you at least win something this time?" Kaz wasn't asking that. He was informing Jesper that he knew the sharpshooter had been at the tables. And he knew he had lost.
Jesper was in no mood for Kaz's un-speaking.
"What time is it, Kaz?"
"How broke are you, Jesper?"
"Kaz–"
"It's 4:30." Kaz pushed himself to his feet, and rather than explain what he was doing awake at the ass end of dawn, he handed Jesper a twenty-kruge note. "I need my team strong, that won't happen if my sharpshooter and chemist can't get along. Buy him breakfast. Apologize."
Jesper opened his mouth to deny that he owed an apology, but Kaz glared him into silence.
"We have something coming up. I'm going to need both of you. Make nice."
Jesper sighed. He took the money.
"Yes, Boss."
And there it was. He messed up, yeah, he knew that. Maybe his boyfriend would be angry and Jesper would need to amplify his charm like a Grisha with one of those bones they wore. Except now, instead of facing Wylan like their affection needed stitching up, Jesper had to face him as Kaz's lackey.
As he climbed the stairs toward his–their–room, he wondered just how upset Wylan was. Would this be several days of "I'm sorry you can't read" avoidance? Or an entirely too familiar "it's okay, Jesper" of resignation? Saints, he wasn't crying, was he? It was just a date, it was one date, honestly! One mistake!
Maybe it was better Wylan was asleep. Maybe Jesper could get some rest before facing this, too. Or maybe he was getting wound up again about Wylan being upset. Maybe…
The door creaked when Jesper pushed it open. He paused, wincing, but heard nothing further. Once, Wylan suggested fixing that. He offered to oil it, but Jesper pointed out those squeaky hinges gave a useful warning just in case, and he could think of far more entertaining uses for oil.
Jesper stepped into the room. He hung his coat, then loosened his bootlaces. His eyes adjusted. There was light through the parted curtains, moonlight and streetlights, enough to make out Wylan under the blankets, his body curled toward the place Jesper's ought to lie. Jesper tossed his shirt and trousers at the foot of the bed.
When he lifted the covers, he glanced once more at Wylan.
"Saints!" Jesper gasped, instinctively reaching for his revolvers. Luckily he'd hung the guns already.
"What?" Wylan asked.
"You're meant to be asleep!"
Wylan raised his eyebrows, trying to make his sweet mouse face look serious.
"I don't think you're one to talk about who's mea–" He interrupted himself with a yawn. "Meant to," he tried again. Another yawn.
Jesper laughed and crawled under the covers.
"You're too cute to be so serious."
Wylan kissed him.
"Mmm. Are you horribly cross with me?" Jesper asked. "You can be. It's okay."
"Not horribly," Wylan replied, settling against him. "Besides, you'll make it up to me. Start with cuddles, please."
Please.
Honestly, how had someone like Wylan wound up on the streets of the Barrel? How had he survived? And how was he this tender and adorable while still being an explosionist?
Jesper had answers to none of those questions. What he had, instead, was a not-horribly-cross little chemist to cuddle.