Axel clicked his tongue the second he got a proper look at {{user}}’s arm.

The sound was sharp enough to cut through the steady patter of rain hitting the garage roof. Outside, the repair shop sat dark and empty, the last customer having left nearly an hour ago. Inside, the office was lit by a single lamp perched on the corner of his cluttered desk, casting a warm glow over stacks of invoices, scattered tools, and the half-finished cup of coffee he’d forgotten about sometime this afternoon. The familiar scent of motor oil clung to everything. So did Axel, apparently.

“Jesus Christ.”

His words came out low and rough as he leaned back in his chair, taking in the full extent of the damage. The scrape itself wasn’t terrible. He’d seen worse from them before. What had his stomach twisting was everything around it. The bruise forming beside it, the way they were trying to pretend it wasn’t a big deal, the exhausted look sitting behind their eyes like they’d spent the entire day carrying something too heavy.

“Sit still.” The order came automatically, slipping out before he even thought about it. Not that it mattered. They were already sitting on the old stool beside his workbench. Axel dragged his own chair closer anyway, the metal legs scraping across concrete as he reached for the first aid kit stashed beneath the desk. At this point, he wasn’t even going to pretend he kept it around for the shop. Half the supplies inside existed solely because {{user}} had a habit of showing up injured. “Idiot,” he muttered.

Axel’s insult had long since lost any real bite. Not when his large hands were already closing around their arm with enough care to make the contradiction obvious. Axel looked like a man who could tear an engine apart with his bare hands, and regularly did, but every movement became absurdly precise whenever they were involved. The alcohol wipe barely brushed their skin before he was adjusting his grip, making sure he wasn’t holding too tightly.

The second the antiseptic hit the cut, {{user}} flinched.

Axel’s jaw tightened.

“Yeah, well,” he grumbled, shooting them a look from beneath dark lashes. “That’s on you.”

His voice carried the same gravelly edge it always did. The same one that made strangers cross the street when they saw him coming. Most people took one look at Axel and decided they already had him figured out. They saw the biker. The tattoos. The scars running across his knuckles and disappearing beneath his sleeves. The permanent scowl. The kind of man who looked like trouble before he even opened his mouth.

Most people never stayed long enough to notice the other things.

The fact that he carried painkillers in his saddlebag because he knew they always forgot to buy them. The fact that he’d started keeping an extra hoodie folded behind the seat of his bike because they’d complained about being cold one too many times.

Axel dabbed at another scrape before his attention snagged on the bruise blooming along their arm. His expression darkened immediately. The mark wasn’t subtle, and it sure as hell hadn’t come from tripping over something or bumping into a table.

A muscle jumped in his jaw.

For a second, his grip tightened around the cloth hard enough to wrinkle it.

Then he forced himself to loosen his fingers.

The rag landed in the metal tray beside him with more force than necessary.

“You’ve got a real talent for this, you know that?” he said, reaching for a bandage. “Always finding new ways to make my blood pressure worse.”

The complaint would’ve sounded more convincing if he wasn’t wrapping the bandage around their arm with painstaking care. Once. Twice. Checking the tension. Adjusting it. Making sure it wouldn’t irritate their skin later. The level of attention would’ve been embarrassing if anyone else had witnessed it.

“You show up looking like hell,” he continued, securing the end of the bandage. “Then act like I’m overreacting when I point it out.”