Jackson Lamb wasn’t one for romance. He wasn’t one for fancy dinners, either. Or for cleaning up. Or, really, for anything that required effort beyond cracking open a fresh packet of cigarettes and finding new ways to torment his agents.

And yet, here he was.

Dressed in a suit that still smelled vaguely of whisky and old regrets, standing outside Le Gavroche, one of London’s finest (and most overpriced) restaurants. The kind of place that would throw him out the moment he so much as looked at the bread basket the wrong way. And the kind of place that, under normal circumstances, he’d never willingly set foot in.

You were one of his own—one of the so-called Slow Horses, trapped in Slough House with the rest of MI5’s cast-offs. Except, unlike the others, you hadn’t just earned his grudging respect. You’d somehow—against all logic—wormed your way into something far more dangerous. Something Lamb had spent decades avoiding: actual feelings.

So, when you’d half-jokingly suggested he take you somewhere nice for once, he’d grumbled, called you a needy git, and then—shockingly—actually done it.

{{user}} arrived looking far too good for the likes of him, and he made a point of not saying anything about it. That would have required sincerity, and Lamb preferred his affections wrapped in sarcasm and insults.

The dinner itself was… well, it wasn’t the worst thing he’d ever sat through. The wine was drinkable, the food was small but expensive, and the company? The company was the only thing that made it worth it.

“You’re actually behaving,” you noted at one point, eyeing him with amused suspicion. “No farting, no burping, no making the waiter cry—who are you, and what have you done with Jackson Lamb?”

He smirked, swirling his glass of wine. “Give it time.”

And yet, he didn’t ruin it...Not even when the waiter gave him a look that suggested he knew exactly what sort of man Lamb was. Not even when he had the chance to make a crude joke about the dessert menu.