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"Alastor?"
"Hm?" He hardly looked up from his reading but the soft response came with a raised brow.
The timidly hopeful voice spoke again. "Do you think we could..?"
She needn't say more. Alastor knew well and good what his darling little moth was after. With a resigned, quiet sigh through his nose, he shifted his book to one hand and opened up his arms to invite her in. In the slightest glance he'd spared her, he could see a giddy smile on her lips, though she was clearly trying to contain it, as she shuffled over and settled into the space he'd made for her.
Sugar gently laid one of her lower arms over his torso, attentive to any apprehension he might exhibit. When there was none, she allowed the hand of her top arm to rest lightly on his chest and a leg to overtake one of his own, bending it at the knee around his.
They'd been comfortable with each other for quite some time now; so much so that he was able to very nearly let his guard completely fall away with her. Sugar had never once tried his boundaries or pushed him knowingly. In fact, he'd never even had to outright tell her of his general distaste for physical contact from others until she asked him one day about it. She simply took notice and adjusted accordingly, apologizing if something ever seemed to have made him uncomfortable. Even now, with the natural rhythm and sense for each other that they'd fallen into, she was always subtly making sure not to overstep. She did it, not out of fear of incurring his wrath, but from pure consideration for him. She always had.
Alastor just adored that about her.
And when she'd sufficiently shimmied her way to a comfortable position, her head resting on the front of his shoulder and tucked under his cheek, he put his arm around her- slipping it underneath her neatly folded wings to rest the hand on her hip.
"You are so clingy, dear," he commented, pitching up his free leg to support the book in his hand as he directed a shadowy tendril to open it's pages where his finger was placed. Alastor dissipated it as soon as its task was finished, returning his gaze from Sugar's cuddling form to his reading. He didn't have to keep up appearances or pretend he lacked a certain fondness for her; they were quite alone and at low risk of being intruded upon in the safety of his hotel room. He made sure of that. But it was still fun to see what she might do when he passively acted as though indulging her little whims were a nuisance. His observation drew a soft laugh from her, making one of her antenna tickle the side of his face.
One might have thought his words to be a criticism or made in displeasure, but not Sugar. No, she could tell he was only teasing. "I did say I was stuck on you, didn't I?" she joked back, smiling despite the fact that he couldn't see it as she referenced her own confession to him.
Now it was her turn to feel the rumbling of a chuckle in his chest as he conceded. "Right you are, my sweet. Right you are." His hand patted her hip a few times where it lay.
Alastor did always enjoy a bit of clever word play.
Sugar nudged his cheek with the top of her head, letting him know that the admission was appreciated and to her liking. Again, an antenna tapped at his face with the movement, but he didn't mind. The buggy features weren't a bother to him to begin with, but he'd even started liking them on her as time went on.
"And what brings you to my arms tonight, hm?" He had planned to allow her this indulgence and sate her desire for physical closeness while continuing with his book, but once the question came to him, he had to ask it.
Given his stance on maintaining his personal space, it was difficult to wrap his head around the idea that someone would want anything else. The fact that it was considered a natural and commonplace feeling didn't make it any less strange to him. Alastor didn't seek such things often and there were seldom few instances in which he ever would so he always wondered what the reason was for Sugar's doing so. There were a variety of different answers she'd given when he asked over the span of moments like this and though he could predict a few common ones by now, what he'd get was always a bit of a surprise.
"Do I need to have a reason, dear?" To say that warmth filled her soft voice would be an understatement. She sounded almost like an actress in the old Hollywood films he'd caught her watching on occasion, voice honeyed and alluring in a soothing sort of way. Content and at peace as she relaxed, Sugar's breathing was slowed to match his own. "I'll make one up for you, if you like."
Ah, so it was one of her 'just because' days, then.
Alastor shook his head, the little bit he could without disturbing her, anyway. "No, no need. I was simply curious."
She hummed at that, nuzzling in even closer and adjusting how she lay. "I just wanted to be near you is all. I hope you don't mind."
How she did that, he'd never know. No one let their guard down around him which, frankly, was how he liked it, but Sugar could just melt away like this somehow. It wasn't as though he had any plans to kill her, Heavens no, but with the vulnerability and trust she showed him, it'd be a simple enough task. The most baffling part of it all was that she was fully aware of that fact. He hadn't exactly been shy in his attempts to draw fear from her and be altogether off-putting. It was how he got his fill of fun and something he did with everyone to one degree or another. She had her moments of intimidation, sure, but it never lasted long and seemed to just intrigue her more. That in itself was intriguing in its own way.
He'd be surprised if it wasn't an answer she hasn't given before, yet it touched him all the same, making his chest rise in taking a deeper breath than he meant to.
"Darling, if I did, I guarantee you wouldn't be here right now."
He made her laugh again, gently jostling the both of them with the sound. She knew that statement to be true. If the Radio Demon didn't want to be touched, you'd be damned again to so much as think about it because he wasn't going to let that happen.
It wasn't every night that he'd tolerate Sugar's affections, of course. When there was a compromise to be reached, they'd settle for laying beside each other, in their own space, and each casted a leg out to meet in the middle. More often than not, that's usually how they fell asleep. Even if they'd cuddled a bit before bedtime, Alastor would have his fill of it and then need his space for the next approximately 8 hours aside from the place their legs would cross. Sometimes they even found themselves doing it subconsciously.
Tonight, rare as it was (though growing slightly more common for him), Alastor was open to the idea of letting this canary of his fall asleep where she lay. Perhaps he was feeling sentimental, but he found himself watching Sugar more than the words on his page.
"Alastor?" she voiced quietly, an almost noiseless yawn punctuating his name as the wings on her back rustled for just a moment before they settled into their resting position once more.
He hummed, just as he had before when this whole thing began.
"Would it interrupt your reading if I asked you to play some music for us?"
She still thought he was reading. How cute.
Instead of responding in words, Alastor lifted the hand on Sugar's hip for a second. With just a snap, the cathedral radio he kept on his dresser was on, volume low as soft jazz trickled into the room. She thanked him and when his hand returned to it's previous placement, Alastor's thumb stroked gently over the fabric of her nightwear. Sugar only sunk further into comfort. Even her droopy antennae hung lower.
Alastor did find her cute. Small, gentle soul that she was, it was hard not to. At first it'd been in more of an amusing way- the same way a person watched a baby animal just waiting to see what trouble or tragedy it tumbled into next out of the lack of experiential knowledge for the world. Then, it grew into curiosity. For how could such a delicate thing survive Hell's streets, let alone so many exterminations? When factoring in Sugar's disposition, it became more of a mystery.
That was, until he'd discovered the reason she ended up here.
Far from being among the topmost powerful demons in the Pride Ring, Sugar still possessed quite the delicious streak of bloodlust in her- locked away to be forgotten about for all of her Afterlife if she could help it. Still, it came out to play when necessary, of course, and he was seeing more as he coaxed it to the surface. But he wouldn't dwell on that now. That was work to be dealt with later.
Right now, looking at the dozing demon belle in his arms, all Alastor was concerned with was the warm fuzziness of comfort and ease she brought him. He wasn't foolish enough to think himself deserving of it by any means, but oh how good it felt to be loved by her.
To say he was in love was an outlandish notion. In fact, he'd laugh and then promptly execute whatever idiot soul dared to accuse him of such a thing. The words with regards to his own feelings, which he'd just begun coming to terms that he had, made him recoil still, but he'd been right back then- that night they'd started getting along. Sugar was enjoyable company to keep and he had an attachment to her above all others. Yes, he was fond of her, indeed.
The hand beneath her wings pet her side and hip soothingly as Alastor's quiet humming aligned with the music. He took notice of Sugar's steady breathing and was about to finally return to that book when he had a thought. His eyes drifted back over to her figure (though they'd only just left it for the briefest second) to confirm that she was, in fact, asleep.
With a quiet snap, he dimmed the lights in the room. Not all the way for his own eyes, but also because he knew that if he were to shine a light on his reading in the dark, Sugar's sensitivity to the contrast would likely wake her, even behind closed eyelids.
He slipped his hand out from under her wings, bringing it up to cradle the back of her head, caressing the brushed-out curls and length of hair she released from its usual faux bob style. Turning his own head slightly downward, he placed a chaste kiss atop her head; and though Sugar was so infatuated with the radio quality of his voice, never missing a chance to compliment it, Alastor decidedly dropped the filter.
"Sweet dreams, ma chérie."
There was a tenderness to his gaze as he sent her to sleep, moving his hand back to where it was before and letting it absentmindedly rub her back, tracing lazy figures over it with the tips of his claws. He supposed this cuddling thing really wasn't so bad.
With Sugar asleep and the jazz playing, Alastor thought she wouldn't be aware of his moment of affection. If some barely conscious part of her brain remained awake enough to hear the murmur, at least she wouldn't be able to fully make it out, understand the language, or notice that he'd let his true voice shine through to say it. So as he returned to his book, for sure this time, radio effect back in place and softly humming along to the music, Alastor was confident that his secret was safe with the most trustworthy person he knew- himself.
But even in her sleepy daze, Sugar had felt and heard exactly what happened.
And he thought she wouldn't be able to tell him apart from the radio itself.