Work Text:
Charlotte wakes up disoriented. She's in a bed, that much is clear, but at first she has no idea where. The sheets feel clean, but there's the smell of a man on them…the musky smell of sex nearly overpowering the baking soda that the laundry used, and then there's the faintest note of citrus and bergamot. It's that little trace that makes her roll over, because she knows that cologne, has smelled it on him time and again.
It's his bed, then. And he's still fast asleep. Her mouth curls up looking at him, still with the healing wound on his cheek. She remembers asking him last night if it hurt to kiss her, and he'd kissed her again, fiercely, and said if it hurts I won't notice, not when I'm with you. She's had men try to romance her before, say sweet nothings to her, but not a one of them had his peculiar blend of passion and almost awkward adoration.
She props herself up on one elbow, so she can get a better look at him. It would be nice if she could say to herself that he looks so much younger and more carefree in sleep. In reality he still looks exhausted, even when he's resting. She thinks the lines on his face have become more starkly graven even in the year or so she's known him. It makes her want to take care of him, protect him, which is a dangerous thought that she immediately stuffs down into the place where she keeps thoughts that will get her into very serious trouble.
In an effort to distract herself, she gets up, slowly, quietly, checking over her shoulder to make sure he won't wake up, and steals a sweater that's hanging over the armchair in the corner of his bedroom. It's too big on her, of course, but she likes it. It's warm, and it smells like him, and fuck her , she's turning into one of those gooey-eyed girls swooning over their lover's clothes. Next thing she knows she'll be knitting things and doing his laundry or something equally heinous.
She pads out into the kitchen, looking for her coat, which has her cigarettes in its pocket, when her eyes land on the tin of coffee sitting on the shelf over the counter. Yes, yes, coffee would be excellent. She fills the kettle, still a bit amazed at a life where one never has to haul water, and turns on the burner, watching the gas spring up with a whoosh of blue fire and then settle to a steady flame. She knows he doesn't think about these luxuries—why would he have to, really—that he has no idea how incredible this is, not having to ration coal bit by bit. She assumes he's paid up the meter (or possibly doesn't even have a meter) because the apartment's not freezing, a luxury in and of itself. She's heard of the nicer sorts of flats simply giving tenants a bill, which she finds hard to imagine but must be very nice.
Once there are jets of steam coming from the kettle she makes the coffee, inhaling the bitter aroma with delight. She'll get a cigarette in a bit, but for now, this will do to wake her up. The first sip is ecstasy, even if it's a little bitter. She likes sugar and cream in hers when she can get it, though, and she turns to the little icebox to rummage for cream. She pours it into the coffee, adds some sugar from the little container that sits next to the coffee tin, and she's putting the cream back when she notices a bowl of eggs sitting in the icebox as well. Her stomach gurgles, reminding her that while they certainly had a lot to drink last night, she hasn't actually eaten anything in quite some time.
Okay, she says to herself, very confident. I can make eggs. This is not hard.
Ten minutes later, she's staring at a ruined, scorched mess that is probably never going to come out of Gereon's very nice cast-iron pan. She has no idea what happened—she tried to fix things when the eggs first started smoking and then it just got worse and worse. And now here she is, the first time in his flat, having ruined his eggs and probably his pan and she feels like a giant idiot. She's not built for this kind of thing, she's not some domestic little hausfrau who's used to elegant gas stoves and cooking for her man every morning. That isn't her, isn't ever going to be her.
And then, to make matters even worse, she hears the bedroom door open and a voice call down the hallway, "Lotte?"
She sighs heavily and shoves the pan with its mess towards the back of the stove.
"Here."
He comes padding in, in his tidy blue pajamas, and the sight of him almost makes her smile despite how ridiculous she feels. He stands there for a moment, still looking sleepy and slightly bewildered.
"What happened?" he asks. He doesn't sound angry, just…confused.
"I can't make eggs on this stove, that's what happened!"
She hates the defensive note in her voice, but she can't help think of Helga, pretty Helga who no doubt was excellent in the kitchen, who probably made Gereon a perfect breakfast every morning before he went to work, and she flushes.
"Oh."
He stares at the mess a little longer, as if his brain isn't quite picking up on what's happening, and then looks at her. Her flush deepens.
"Look, I am good at a lot of things, okay?" She gestures towards the bedroom and is suddenly delighted when he starts to blush, a wave of red creeping up from the collar of his prim pajamas. "I just…I am not good at cooking. Eggs. Or anything."
He blinks and then nods once.
"I see."
She's not sure what he means by this, if he's judging her for making a mess of his kitchen or being the kind of girl who never learned this sort of thing, the kind of girl who knows an arsenal of dirty tricks that can make him shout and moan and cling to the bedposts in desperation but who doesn't even know how to cook eggs.
"Look, I can go, I–"
She makes an abortive move to go past him, go find her clothes and her coat and get out of here before she does something else stupid, but his hand on her arm stops her. That, and the softness in those big, haunted eyes.
"You're wearing my sweater," he murmurs, and the way he says it, she doesn't think he has a problem with this.
"I was cold," she whispers, and God, she drowned once and she thinks she might do it again looking into his eyes, go right under and forget how it is to breathe.
"You look good in it," he says, and she gathers up her courage and reaches up to cup his cheek. His skin is rough with morning stubble, and she beats back the thought of what it would feel like to have his cheeks scratching up the delicate skin of her inner thighs, the stinging pain in contrast to the sweetness of his mouth on her pussy.
He turns his head so he can kiss her palm, and fuck, fuck, why does he have to be so gentle, so sweet? She doesn't know what to do with him now, not when he's like this.
"It's okay that you can't make eggs," he says, smirking at her from behind her own fingers, and she huffs at him, glaring even though his teasing eases something that was drawn tight and bitter in her chest.
"I can make eggs, I just…" she starts, and then he kisses her, soft, sweeter than the sugar she used in her coffee, and she melts into him. She can't help herself. Never in her life has a man touched her like this, like she's made of the most delicate glass, and part of her is terrified by it and part of her just wants more.
"You made coffee," he notes when he pulls away, and she's an idiot, but she nods and then tucks herself into him, her head against his shoulder, safe and warm. He makes a pleased little sound in his throat and kisses the top of her head, and it's disgustingly romantic and domestic and all the things Charlotte Ritter is not, but she doesn't care.
"I can make coffee," she says, defensively, and he snickers.
"Okay, okay, you can make coffee," he says, and eases her away from him until he can look her in the eye. "Shall I show you how to make the eggs, then?"
She sniffs and gives him a haughty look, as if she's a grand lady and he's nothing but the hired help, and then hops up to sit on his table, crossing one leg over the other elegantly.
"You can make the eggs for me, Herr Kommissar," she says, and he laughs and then touches his cheek, wincing.
"I'm the one in pain but I'm also the one to make the eggs?" he queries, going over and looking at the pan, shaking his head. "I see that there is no respect for my title around here."
She grins at him and takes a sip of her coffee, which is now lukewarm but still good.
"What, do you mean to tell me that someone so brilliant as to be a ranking detective in the Berlin police force can't make breakfast?"
He shakes his head as he pulls the pan from the stove and scrapes the eggs into the trash pail.
"Someone is trying to flatter me shamelessly," he mutters, but she can see the little quirk of his mouth as he sets the pan in the sink and runs water over it. He likes the praise, she realizes suddenly, likes being told that he's brilliant. She doesn't know why she's surprised—he's a man, after all—but what surprises her after a moment's thought is that apparently he wants praise from her.
She hides another grin in her coffee cup as he washes out the pan and dries it.
"No, no, if I were flattering you shamelessly, I would tell you that you're brilliant and handsome even in those very prudish pajamas, and that never has anyone looked so good washing out a saucepan before."
She can the flush creep up the back of his neck and stifles a giggle. So this is what he's like when no one is shooting at them and no one's drowning and there isn't a murder right under their noses. It's unexpectedly charming, realizing that he's susceptible to quite frankly ridiculous compliments even when he knows perfectly well that she's teasing.
"My pajamas are not prudish," he says, with dignity, setting the pan back on the stove. He reaches in the icebox and comes out with the bowl of eggs and a butter dish, which is, she now realizes, the crucial ingredient she left out the first time.
She hops down from the table and sidles up behind him as he puts a bit of butter into the pan.
"Such tidy pajamas," she mocks him, running one finger over his collar with its piping in a slightly darker shade of blue. "And here I am in just my chemise and your sweater. See what I mean? Prudish."
He switches on the gas burner and turns to stare at her, his eyes dark and hungry now, devouring the sight of her in his clothes.
"You're trying to distract me," he accuses, reaching over to shake the pan so that the melting butter is evenly distributed. "This is unfair."
She giggles.
"No one is distracting you!" He's focusing intently on cracking eggs into the pan, one after the other, the broken shells piling up on the counter. She industriously grabs the garbage pail and sweeps them in with the flat of her hand. "It isn't my fault you can't think properly when there's a half-dressed girl in your kitchen."
He makes a little outraged huffing noise. It's adorable.
"See, see, now you're deliberately distracting me."
She lets him mess about with the eggs for a moment, watches as he carefully pushes them about with his little spatula, a frown of concentration between his eyebrows. Then, she sidles close to him again and reaches out to trace a line between his shoulder blades, down his spine, all the way to just above his ass. (She likes thinking about how he looked getting undressed last night, all the tidy, trim lines of him. He's not a big man, but there's more power in those lean muscles than most people would think.)
"Charlotte."
She bites back a laugh and retreats, having gotten exactly what she wants. He groans and pokes viciously at the eggs.
"If you're going to be up and about, you can go get the creamer out of the icebox," he says, very grouchy, and she gives him a little mock-bow as she goes.
"Certainly, Herr Kommissar."
He makes more huffing noises and then pours in a little of the cream. She watches in fascination as he makes sure it's mixed in thoroughly, eyes narrowed at the pan as if he's trying to puzzle out a particularly difficult facet of a case. Then he quickly turns off the gas, grabs a dishtowel, and moves the pan to another part of the stove.
"Done," he says, nodding approval at the eggs, and heads over to the cabinet to grab a pair of plates and two forks. He neatly scoops half the eggs onto a plate and hands it to her. "Here, you start while I make toast."
He gestures to the salt and pepper shakers sitting on the table and then to a chair.
"You don't want me to help you?"
He turns and gives her a half-fond, half-exasperated look.
"Schätzi, I saw what you did to the eggs. If you think I'm letting you anywhere close to the toast…"
She holds up her hands in surrender and sits down, sprinkling salt and pepper on her eggs. She doesn't think he even realizes he said it, the endearment fell from his lips so naturally. Sweetheart. It makes her heart pound.
In an effort to distract herself, she gobbles up the eggs, which are, unsurprisingly, delicious, and lets him fuss over the toast. He brings it over in a few minutes, perfectly golden-brown, along with a little jar of jam and his own plate of eggs.
"Look at this, such a natural in the kitchen," she teases, finding his foot with her own cold toes. He yelps and then gives her that same half-loving, half-exasperated look that he had before.
"I can make eggs and toast," he says, rather primly, and forks up a bite of his own eggs. She watches him eat, marveling at how different he is, here in his own home, and yet how much the same. At work he's so serious, so focused, and yet here he'll tease and laugh and make her eggs and then revert to his prim little self, Saint Gereon all over again. It makes her want things she knows she shouldn't want. Things she can't have.
"They're good," she says softly, and he looks up, his eyes big and soft again. She wonders sometimes how Helga could have preferred his brother to him when he has eyes like this, when his face is so tender. How could anyone not want him when he cracks open like the eggs from earlier, when she can see so clearly the vulnerable center of him.
"Thank you," he says, and clears his throat, as if he's embarrassed to have been caught having actual feelings. He applies himself to his eggs and toast in silence, taking refuge from all the things she thinks he can't make himself say yet.
"Gereon," she says quietly, when she's finished. He looks up, smiling a little at the use of his Christian name.
"Mmm?"
"This is…" She fumbles for words, the right words, because suddenly it's very important that he knows this wasn't just a casual fuck for her, but she can't tell him that she has feelings for him. It's so risky, so foolish, when she doesn't know yet what he's thinking. She's stuck, trying to walk two paths at once and failing miserably.
"This is what?" His voice is very soft.
"This is…nice." It's such a weak word, but she can't find a better one. "This. Here. With you. It's nice."
He reaches over and takes her hand, running his thumb along the knuckles. If she thought his face was gentle before, that was nothing compared to this. He's looking at her like she's the whole world, the moon and the sun together.
"I'm glad you're here, with me," he whispers, and okay, she's been through a lot of terrible things in a fairly short life, but this? This is making her throat close up and her chest heavy, because neither one of them is going to say I love you out loud, not here and now, but the way he's looking at her he doesn't have to.
"Gereon…" she whispers, horrified at how touched she is by this, how much she wants to hold him and protect him and love him back. How much she wants to hear him call her sweetheart again, how much she wants to dance around the living room with him to some sappy record he probably has sitting next to the gramophone, how much she wants to wake up in his bed every morning, in his arms.
She has to do something to break this spell he has her under, or all of this will come spilling out of her mouth and she'll be lost. So, she gets up without a word, comes around the table, and plops down in his lap.
"Lotte?" he says, a bit bewildered but not unhappy with the situation. She reaches over, deliberately dips a finger into the little pot of jam, and slowly and with great care dabs it on his upper lip.
The look on his face is priceless, something caught between indignation and amusement.
"Did you just…"
"Oh look, Herr Kommissar, someone is making a mess," she says gravely. He grabs her waist, holding her firmly in place.
"Someone is indeed making a mess," he says in a tone that's probably supposed to be stern but sounds like it's trembling on the verge of outright laughter.
"Someone should clean that up," she murmurs, cupping his face in her hands, and then she leans down and slowly licks the jam away, drinking in his little gasp.
"Lotte." His pupils are big, and she takes a good deal of pride in knowing that it's not from his drugs. Just her.
"Yes?"
"Lotte, we're in the kitchen."
She bites her lip, trying hard not to laugh.
"Gereon, have you really never done it in the kitchen before?"
His shoulders hunch and his gaze flicks down, and she immediately regrets the question. She isn't sure what caused this reaction, this shame, but it isn't the mood she wants between them.
"I…" he starts, and then trails off. Determined, she cups his face again, making him meet her eyes.
"You've never done it with me in the kitchen before," she says, with all the bravado she possesses, and something catches fire in his eyes.
"This is true," he manages, his voice husky, and she edges closer to him until she can feel the heavy bulge under his tidy pajama pants. Slowly, she slides her hand down his front until she's brushing against it. She takes great pride in hearing him moan.
"Lotte, please."
"Please what?"
He bites his lip, blushing beautifully, and she knows she has him right where she wants him.
"Gereon. Use your words," she goads him. "Tell me what you want to do to me. Here. In your kitchen."
He's just as stubborn as she is, though, and instead of talking he runs his hand up her leg, toying with the lace at the hem of her chemise. He edges his hand up higher, between her thighs, seeking the slick warmth of her, but she grabs his arm and he stops immediately.
"Words." It's an order, and they both know it.
His eyes are huge, burning, laying waste to her, and even though she's holding the power in this moment she knows he's got a grip on her too, one that she may not ever be able to shake off.
"I want to take you," he whispers. "Here, on my kitchen table. I want to have you."
It's the language of mastery, of possession, and after all she's been through, she thinks it should turn her off. Should remind her of grasping hands, of demands she couldn't refuse. Instead, it makes her feel giddy, like she's drunk on the power she has over him. Like the ferocity of the way he wants her is the best liquor money can buy.
"Then have me," she whispers back, and slots her mouth over his, kissing him greedily. He groans, loudly, and blindly pushes back his breakfast dishes before lifting her up onto the table. It creaks and wobbles alarmingly, which makes her laugh and put a hand on his chest.
"Maybe not on the table then, Schmusebärchen."
He stops midway through lifting her back down and raises an astonished eyebrow.
"Schmusebärchen? Really?"
She's giggling again as she slides back onto his lap. This is new, this combination of laughter and sex. She's dismayed by how much she likes it.
"Do you want a different nickname, then? Honigbienchen? Igelschnäuzchen? "
He snorts, then gasps as she reaches down to fondle him again through his pajamas.
"I want…" He breaks off with a strangled noise as she squeezes him experimentally. "I want you. Preferably on a piece of furniture that is not going to break."
She assesses the kitchen chairs for a moment and then hops up, ignoring his comical expression of dismay.
"The sofa it is, then," she announces, and heads for the living room, smirking when she hears him in hot pursuit.
"Charlotte!" she hears him calling, and she's laughing again as she flops down on his living room sofa, laughing as he half-runs in and looks down at her as if he doesn't know what to do with her.
"C'mon," she says, holding out a hand for him. "If this doesn't work out we always have the floor."
He's on top of her in seconds, nibbling at her neck and sliding his hand back up her chemise, and Charlotte can't remember being this happy in a long, long time.