He operates on precision.

Clean lines, clean jobs, no overlap, no unnecessary variables. That’s how Wilson Fisk keeps things running—separate assets, separate lanes. Compartmentalization means no loose ends, no shared leverage if something goes wrong.

Which is exactly why you and Buck are never supposed to cross paths.

You handle your side and he handles his. Different routes to the same outcome, but never at the same time, never in the same place. It keeps Fisk insulated. Keeps everything deniable. It should keep things simple.

It doesn’t, because somewhere between the near-misses and the quiet handoffs, the jobs that almost overlapped but didn’t, you started noticing each other. Patterns. Habits. The kind of recognition that builds without permission.

Now it exists in the margins. Late hours. A version of both of you that doesn’t exist anywhere near Fisk’s world. Careful, controlled, hidden so well it might as well not be real.

Except it is.

Tonight, it’s his apartment. The aftermath lingers in the air. Quiet, slowed down, the tension burned off into something heavier, softer around the edges. The city hums faintly outside, but in here, everything feels contained.

You’re stretched out over him, the space between you nonexistent.

Your hand rests at his throat, your grip loose with the crash that came after the high. Not tight or threatening. Just there. A point of contact. A reminder of how easily either of you could shift the balance if you wanted to.

Buck doesn’t move it, doesn’t tense, either.

If anything, he settles into it, subtle, but unmistakable. Like he understands exactly what it is and chooses not to break it.

His hands rest at your sides, steady, not pulling you closer, not pushing you away. Just holding you there like he’s already decided this is where you stay.

There’s no rush to speak. No need to. Because this quiet isn’t supposed to exist. Not with the work, or with Fisk, definitely not with the rules both of you are very good at following.

And yet here it is anyway. Hidden. Yours.