Chapter Text
Alistaire S. Snoke
She is twenty and desperate to escape desperate circumstances when she marries her husband. He is seventy-five, and she is young. He is powerful, and she is pretty. He is perpetually gloomy; she is a bright, soothing light.
Yes, they have a ceremony.
Yes, they marry in the church.
Theirs is an unorthodox arrangement -- a marriage of comfort, a marriage without passion. There are times when he regrets that for her sake. There are times when he regrets it for his own. He often thinks she deserves better, but then he reminds himself from where she comes.
This is better than that.
Anything is better than that.
He can’t fuck his wife. His pretty little wife. He hasn’t been willing to brave the humiliation of trying. Instead, he dresses her up. He makes her show him the soft secrets of her body. Sometimes he looks. Other times he touches. Most of the time, his dick makes an effort, but it is little more than a flaccid hope.
He touches her, but he isn’t blind. It isn’t pleasure, she feels. She endures his caresses. Sometimes it makes him angry. Sometimes it makes him sad. When she cries out, it isn’t in ecstasy. It’s his inelegant clumsy hands. She tries to encourage him, but his frustration turns to anger. Anger turns to abuse.
Hard, cutting words. Rough, punishing touches.
He watches her try. Try to be pleasing. Try to be brave. Try to give him what he wants. She tries with her hands. She tries with her mouth, and with every humiliating, failed attempt, his hatred grows. He hates her youth. He hates her beauty. He can have neither. It will pass, and he’ll hate himself. For hurting her. For calling her “whore,” for calling her “useless,” for calling her “garbage.” He sees how it wounds her. He sees how she endures it. He sees how she tries to be good to him anyway, and it makes it worse. He needs his sunshine girl, but she needs a husband.
She deserves better.
Rey Niima Snoke
She’s grown to hate the night.
At night, he calls her to his bedroom. He makes her undress for him. He makes her lower her hands, allowing him to see her most intimate flesh. He makes her spread her lips for him. Show him her clit. Her entrance. He watches her pinch and tickle her nipples. He asks her to touch herself. He tries to touch her. He tries to touch himself. He asks her to spread her legs so he can watch her dip her fingers into her cunt. She does as he asks, and he seems pleased for a time. But then she can’t get wet enough for him. She can’t make her body want him.
Or want herself.
Those are the nights that make him angry. Those are the nights he gives her sweet pink nipples a hard, punishing twist. Sometimes he tells her to straddle him, and he suckles at her tits, and when her body doesn’t respond, he penetrates her with angry hands. He makes it hurt. It makes her hate him. He tries to kiss her, and she endures it, and when she doesn’t open her mouth for him, he grabs her by the hair and forces her mouth to his.
Other times he forces her mouth down onto his cock. Until she stops fighting.
She inevitably sobs until he slaps her, shoves her off his bed, and makes her stand naked and shivering on the carpet until he is tired of looking at her. Then he sends her away, and if she leaves too eagerly, she’ll pay for it the next day.
Benjamin O. Solo
He is the revered second in command of Alistaire Snoke’s private empire. And in exchange for his every living hour, he’s rewarded again and again for his loyalty. Money. Real estate. Access. Yachts. Planes. Automobiles. Women. He’s indulged in all of them, and nothing is enough to fill the space in his chest.
He has few real friendships. A strained relationship with his parents. He works holidays. He works vacations.
All of it is wasteful.
He has homes he never visits. He has money to spend but nothing he needs. Little he wants. Access is more burdensome than beneficial. Yachts are loaned to clients. Planes are for work. Automobiles are neglected when there is nowhere to go and no time to enjoy.
The women. Well, they are useful as long as they show themselves out when they are done. But they inevitably come with strings attached. Sugar babies are inconvenient, but escorts? Escorts are efficient. One escort exclusive to one client. Available on demand. Paid a small fortune. He can fuck her raw, and if he’s feeling generous, he might ensure she comes more than once. Exactly what he needs and nothing more.
He might be miserable, but he’s been too miserable to notice.
There is one small light in his day, though. His boss's wife. Her name is Rey, and she is beautiful, kind, patient, and unassuming. She wields so much power and influence, and yet there is no need for her to command it.
Alistaire is homebound. He goes nowhere. Attends no parties, no charitable dinners, no board meetings. He pays other people to do that. So Ben only sees her in the mornings when she arrives to collect any work Alistaire might want -- any documents that need his signature.
She is scandalously young—the veritable talk of the office. The talk isn’t kind. Reductive at best. Salacious at worst. The things people feel free to say when there is no Snoke present to contain it. And yet not one of them can identify her when they see her.
She looks like any of the dozens of runners that enter and exit the building every day. She arrives in jeans and flats, tee shirts, and sunglasses. Her hair is sometimes loose around her shoulders, sometimes braided in a crown. She wears sunglasses and lipgloss, and that’s about it. She doesn’t attempt to cover her freckles, which Ben loves. She is the closest thing to outside in the sun he’s been -- for years.
She is incredibly sweet. Genuinely grateful for his assistance. And all he can think when he sees her is how unfair it is that her life is wasted on that sonofabitch Ben calls his boss. Her only tell -- the ridiculously large diamond that dwarfs her little hand. She is so self-conscious about it and usually wears it twisted so it looks like a band, hiding the absurdly large stone in the cool of her palm.
More and more frequently, he finds himself thinking about her. He cannot focus on anything but her arrival inside the one-hour window she usually arrives. He’s begun to meet her when she is announced. He walks her wherever she needs to go. She asks him about his morning, his days, and his nights. And her brow creases every time, and she looks like she is on the brink of saying something.
She never does.
From what he can tell, her days are pretty lonely. She runs errands for Alistaire - a privilege for which she has to fight. He knows she attends fitness classes even though she has a personal trainer on call. She occasionally grocery-shops -- and always makes it sound like an event. She notarizes for Alistaire. She oversees the grounds and any improvements. She wants a cat, but Alistaire is allergic. So she keeps a greenhouse.
She receives no visitors. All of Alistaire’s associate’s wives have grandchildren her age. Any friends she might have her age don’t like visiting. And he recalls how flustered she became after sharing that bit of information. Almost like she’d said too much. She blushed and asked him if he would tell Alistaire.
He’d been shocked she felt the need to ask. Of course, he would never repeat that. Hell, he fucking hates that house, and when he has to visit, even he needs to take a walk and a shower. There is always something oppressive and unsavory about the place.
At night, Ben’s mind cannot help but wander back to the elusive Mrs. Snoke. He worries for her. The light in her is special. Does Alistaire even know what he has?