i am coming undone
Hands roam her skin—unbidden, unafraid. Alicent groans against the pillows, relishing in the feeling of lips on her neck, lips on her chest. At some point, her shirt was tossed aside and Alicent doesn’t even think about it, she doesn’t think about anything other than Rhaenyra between her legs, kissing down her stomach and tugging her pants down. Alicent lets out a soft moan and Rhaenyra rises up to meet her lips in a sweet and bruising kiss. Alicent kisses back eagerly, letting her hands tangle in Rhaenyra’s soft short hair.
For once, Alicent does not shy away from the touch—she welcomes it, beckons it forward as if she had never been any different. Rhaenyra kisses her deeply, with all the passion they dare not name to one another, not out loud—as if any words could even encapsulate it if they tried.
Rhaenyra’s hand drifts lower and lower until it settles between her legs where Alicent aches for her, exploring—
Alicent gasps awake, shooting up in her bed as if someone had sent an electric shock through her. A cold sweat burns her skin as she runs a hand through her hair, feeling her t-shirt clinging to her skin as if she had burned off a fever in the night. This is not the first time she’s dreamt of Rhaenyra, but the first time had been… a nightmare. This was… this was something else entirely. Shame burns hot through Alicent as she feels wetness between her thighs—she’s not unfamiliar with arousal, but it’s definitely not something she feels often. Especially not in her line of work. For a long time, a long time she had thought that part of her was broken. That her experience with men was enough for her, that she did not crave that fulfillment anymore.
But now, she feels it. It’s nothing—Alicent tells herself. It’s simply because she’s been stressed and Rhaenyra is the only person she’s been spending time with lately. It’s just her lonely subconscious crafting false images in her mind of things that will never happen, things that are only the means to an end. Then again, she never once dreamed of David—certainly not like this. This case was mangling her mind. First, she dreams of her and Rhaenyra sleeping in the same bed and now this. It felt so different, it felt… warm. Welcome. Alicent had let Rhaenyra’s hands roam wherever they wanted, gone were the restrictions of her own mind now replaced by unholy desire.
Alicent can feel her breathing shortening, breaths coming faster as her heart races. She throws the sheets off of her, desperate for some cool air. She pushes out of her bedroom until she reaches her back door, sliding it open and standing out on the porch. It’s snowing—it’s always snowing this time of year. The cold does little to soothe her, but she’ll pretend it does anyway. She steps out of her shoes until her bare feet are in the snow. It’s so cold it burns her in a way different from the heat, but Alicent stands there anyway, breathing it in. She’s not attracted to Rhaenyra—it wouldn’t be right. She’s okay with Rhaenyra being attracted to women—she knows this, she’s okay with it, but it can’t be her. Alicent can’t be that way, she can’t be anything at all. She can’t be anything. She’s never been anything before.
Sometimes—Alicent would convince herself she wasn’t real. When she was sitting alone in her bedroom, fingernails bloody and feet bare, she would tell herself none of it was real. That she was just a doll, something to be played with and tossed aside. She wasn’t anything—she was hollow inside. That’s all she was. It made it hurt less. It made everything hurt less.
Alicent does the same thing now. I’m not real, I’m not here. I’m not real. I’m not here. I’m not—
She blinks her eyes open. It doesn’t help. She can still feel it— Rhaenyra’s lips on her skin, her hands, her hands touching her where Alicent has never craved to be touched before. Alicent groans and steps out of the snow—shivering now and feeling no better than she did before. She slides her shoes back on before stepping back inside, closing and locking the door behind her. She eyes the grandfather clock in the corner of the living room—it’s barely past three in the morning but Alicent can’t go back to sleep. She can’t go back to sleep because if she has a dream like that again—she shudders at the thought.
A shower it is. Alicent steps into the bathroom and turns on the water, determined to get it absolutely scalding before she dares step beneath it. If the cold won’t work, maybe the heat will. She shrugs off her clothes, not daring to glance between her legs where she knows, she knows arousal shines. Alicent groans, stepping beneath the water, feeling the weight of the bags beneath her eyes. This case is going to drive her to her wit’s end—if it hasn’t already. Surely this must be a sign of madness. She’s losing it. If she didn’t feel so close she might ask to be taken off the case.
But then she thinks of Rhaenyra—Rhaenyra who only touches her when she knows Alicent can handle it, Rhaenyra who bought a house, Rhaenyra who wants to work with her, who wouldn’t dare leave her side.
Alicent stands beneath the water, back leaning against the wall and a hand on her stomach. The images come in flashes—Rhaenyra’s lips on her neck, hands on the small of her back, pulling her closer. She imagines Rhaenyra pressing her up against this very wall, a thigh slotting between hers, hot water rushing between the two of them and Alicent needs to stop thinking like this.
Without even thinking, the hand resting on her stomach has climbed lower, cupping herself beneath the burning water. She shouldn’t—she can’t. She never has before. It’s one of those things, one of those sins her father ingrained in her. But her father isn’t here, he’s in the ground and her skin is burning with thoughts of Rhaenyra. Rhaenyra’s hands all over, on her knees on the wet tile, her mouth—
Alicent dips her fingers into where she’s soaking, finally allowing herself this one small reprieve. She doesn’t even know what she’s doing, but she knows what feels good. Alicent lets out a low groan—just like she did in the dream, letting her eyes slip closed and imagining it were Rhaenyra’s hand. She shouldn’t—she shouldn’t indulge this, these sinful thoughts, but now that she’s started, she can’t stop. Her fingers swirl around her clit, applying light pressure as she slowly starts to work herself up beneath the hot water.
Her dream already had her so worked up, she can feel pressure building up in the pit of her stomach—a pleasure unfamiliar to her even despite her brief and heatless affairs with men. She dips two fingers down towards her entrance, slowly pushing inside. Behind her eyelids, she sees Rhaenyra on her knees in front of her, pumping her fingers in and out nice and slow as her tongue swirls around her clit. Guilt eats away at her, but the pleasure begins to overwhelm it, the two of them battling it out within her.
She turns around, one hand splayed against the wall and the other working herself as if driven on pure instinct. Pressure builds and builds and builds and she can’t stop seeing Rhaenyra. A gasp falls from her lips, a strangled moan tearing itself from her throat as she feels herself clench around her own fingers, spilling into her palm with her release. Alicent groans, letting her head thunk against the wall, panting.
After a moment, she pulls her fingers out and with her back against the wall, she slides to the ground. I’m not real. I’m not real, I’m not here. None of it works. With the pleasure now abandoning her, the guilt reigns free.
Her tears mix with the hot water, a hand coming up to cover her mouth as her chest is wracked with sobs. She heaves, struggling to catch her breath, running her hands frantically through her hair as the water burns her skin. She scratches at her arms as if that will make the burning stop, scratching the itch that rests beneath her skin, the itch she can’t scratch, the itch she’s never been able to scratch. Alicent frantically tries to calm herself down, digging fingers into her own scalp.
She conjures images of Rhaenyra—not from a dream, but her Rhaenyra. A hand on her thigh, holding her outside the church, her thumb on Rhaenyra’s wrist in a coffee shop. Her breaths become steadier and steadier, slowing down as she starts to feel herself balance out. Alicent forces herself to reach forward and turn the water off, still sitting on the tiled floor and listening to the water drip.
Alicent knows what this means. She knows what this means.
December 18th, 1992
“You look like shit,” Rhaenyra comments the moment she gets out of her car—finding Alicent standing on the sidewalk just outside of headquarters with a cigarette between her lips. Alicent just raises her eyebrows and takes another drag, hugging her coat tighter to herself in a vain attempt to beat out the cold. It stopped snowing around five in the morning—Alicent watched it. She spent most of her morning out on the back porch in the cold, waiting for it to stop snowing. Now, everything outside is covered in layers and layers of powder.
“Real sweet, Targaryen,” Alicent scoffs, dropping the cigarette and crushing it beneath her boot.
“More weird dreams? You look tired,” Rhaenyra hums as the two of them push into headquarters side by side.
Alicent finds herself stumbling over her words, struggling to recover as she forces out, “Uh—yeah, no, yeah, I’ve been up since about three. No cameos from you this time, though, it was—um—it was me this time.”
“Dead?”
“Yeah, something like that, I don’t really remember,” Alicent lies. “So, we need to talk to Jonathan Leigh today.”
“You’re not allowed to do that,” Rhaenyra reminds her, the two of them pushing into their office. It’s been a few days since they figured out Leona Gould’s cross necklace was missing, but they’re short on leads as to where it could be. Alicent wants to check the church basement, but they would need either the priest to let them in (unlikely considering Alicent almost shot him last time they spoke) or a warrant (unlikely since they have no evidence against him). So, now they’re interviewing Jonathan Leigh. The same kid Alicent launched herself at no more than twenty minutes after finding her partner’s dead body.
Alicent shrugs off her coat and settles into a chair with her arms crossed. “I know this. Which means you will be. I’ll be sitting in the car. We’re not going to pass up speaking to a potential suspect just because I had a momentary lapse in judgement.”
“Momentary lapse in judgement,” Rhaenyra huffs, sitting on the table with her legs crossed as if she were a kindergartner. Alicent rolls her eyes, trying to feel normal despite… everything. “I read your file, Alicent, you were ready to strangle the guy.”
“If you saw what I saw, you would do the same,” Alicent shrugs, her voice sobering. “I mean… I wasn’t particularly fond of the guy, but the fact that someone can do that to another person… that someone is still doing this to people. You would’ve leapt at him, too.”
“If someone kills you on the job, do you want me to avenge you?”
“Rhaenyra.”
“No, I’m serious, I wouldn’t even do it the cop way, I’d get personal with it. Like, it’d be a fight to the death and I’d grab some heavy object—”
“Rhaenyra,” Alicent repeats and this time Rhaenyra actually listens to her and shuts up. “Can we please not talk about dying on the job? Not today.”
Rhaenyra just eyes her curiously, catching onto the shift in Alicent’s demeanor and Alicent wishes she hadn’t made the mistake of letting this woman know her so well. “What did you dream about? They are prophetic, after all.”
“If they were prophetic, you’d be the one our killer marked for death, not me,” Alicent reminds her, pushing out of her chair and going to stare at their board just so she doesn’t have to look at Rhaenyra. She can’t look at Rhaenyra without seeing the Rhaenyra from her dream, the Rhaenyra that was—she can’t even fathom it. “Don’t worry about my dream, Rhaenyra.”
“I knew it, I was in it again—tell me, were we dating or—”
Alicent sucks in a deep breath, turning around to face Rhaenyra with a stern expression on her face as if she were scolding a child. Heat burns beneath her skin, but she tries her best to hide it, to hide the feeling in her she can’t ignore. “Rhaenyra. There is a serial killer on the loose that we are responsible for catching and the biggest thing you can worry about is whether or not you were going down on me in a dream?”
Alicent doesn’t even realize she’s said anything wrong until Rhaenyra’s cheeks flush pink and a knowing expression forms on her face. She whispers, “I never said anything about going down on you.”
“I—” Alicent stutters, “It was just an example.”
“We were so doing it in your dream,” Rhaenyra revels, looking at Alicent with something akin to awe. “I didn’t even know you could experience sexual attraction, I thought you were too—catholic.”
“I am too catholic, why do you think I’ve been up since three in the morning trying to peel my fucking skin off, Rhaenyra? Now can we please stop talking about it?” Alicent groans, running a hand through her hair before tying it off in a ponytail. She isn’t sure where she lost the will to fight, where she decided to just admit her guilt, but it hangs in the air now and she can practically feel the way Rhaenyra is looking at her. “It doesn’t mean anything, we’ve just been… spending a lot of time together. And you’re— you.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?”
Alicent rolls her eyes, cheeks flushed pink. “You with your flirting and your touching and your… buying of houses. I don’t know. You’re the only person in my life that hasn’t spent their entire time knowing me kicking me while I’m down.”
“So you’re not secretly in love with me?” Rhaenyra asks, a slight sparkle in her eyes as if she wants Alicent to say yes. Alicent can’t do this—not today, not after the morning she had. She just glares at Rhaenyra with her arms crossed and the woman finally seems to relent. “Okay, fine. What do we know about Jonathan Leigh?”
“Not much,” Alicent sighs, sorting through their files until she finds ‘L - Leigh’ and pulls it out. “His name was given by Father Lawson when we asked about men in the church who seemed… outcasted. Specifically when it came to women. Perhaps someone who was rejected a lot, didn’t get along with them. We haven’t had a chance to speak with him yet, so that’s all we know. He’s twenty-three, lives with his mother, as far as we know, no other close relationships. He goes to church with his mother every week.”
“Great, a loser,” Rhaenyra hums, looking over the file. “Well, he fits a profile, I’m just not sure if he fits the profile we’ve been building.”
Alicent shrugs, “Well—men are more likely to take trophies over women, so we have that. Maybe take a peek around, see if his mom got a shiny new cross necklace recently. I don’t know. I really don’t know.”
“I thought you were supposed to be a good detective.”
Alicent sighs and pinches the bridge of her nose, “Now is really not the fucking day, Rhaenyra.”
The two of them share a look and it feels a little bit like a battle and Alicent hates that she feels this way but every part of her is so on edge and she’s wracked with guilt because she’s staring at this woman—her friend— and she has no idea that Alicent touched herself this morning picturing her between her legs. It’s so… foreign to Alicent. She didn’t even know this was something she could feel and now she doesn’t know what to do with it.
After a moment, Rhaenyra relents, “Fine. I’ll go talk to Jonathan.”
Alicent drives with her, because of course she does. Even if she’s not allowed to speak to him, she’s not going to risk Rhaenyra going alone—she made that mistake the first time. She and Rhaenyra pull up outside the Leigh house and Alicent tries to calm the racing anxiety she feels burning in her chest.
“Something isn’t right,” Alicent mutters, sitting in the passenger side—
(bad idea to let Rhaenyra drive, maybe, but they made it here in one piece)
(Rhaenyra said someone who has been up since three in the morning probably shouldn’t be behind the wheel—Alicent begrudgingly agreed).
“You always think something isn’t right,” Rhaenyra hums, sounding a bit too sure of herself as if she were mocking Alicent and Alicent can’t do this today.
She runs her hands over her face, shaking her head, “Something isn’t right. Don’t go in there, Rhaenyra. Please.”
“Alicent, we have to check all our boxes,” Rhaenyra reminds her. Her hands are gripping the wheel, head turned towards Alicent. Her expression is gentler now, gauging Alicent’s reactions. She reaches out, her hand hovering over Alicent for a moment before it settles on her shoulder, squeezing gently. Alicent doesn’t brush her off—her skin burns with the touch differently than it did before. She finds her cheeks a little flushed, her mind going back to her stupid dream that she can’t get out of her head. It means nothing—the longer she tells herself that, the truer it’ll become. It means nothing. “I have the same training as you, Alicent, I’ll be able to handle myself. I promise.”
Alicent sucks in a breath, turning her head to look over at Rhaenyra, one hand propping up her chin as she leans over in the passenger seat. She wishes she could go in with her. But she’s made her bed. “Just be careful, please. I have a bad feeling.”
Rhaenyra squeezes her shoulder again, moving her hand until she’s squeezing Alicent’s. Alicent reciprocates the touch with a shaky breath. “You didn’t get a lot of sleep, you had a weird night. Your breakfast was coffee and cigarettes. I’ll be fine. Look—you can see the door from here, you’ll see me go in. If I’m not out in twenty, you can start to worry. He’s not even really a suspect, we have no reason to believe he’s going to be dangerous.”
She nods, trying to steady herself as she squeezes Rhaenyra’s hands. “Okay. Twenty minutes.”
With one hand on the car door, Rhaenyra looks at her for a long moment. There’s something charged between them, something Alicent isn’t sure was there before. Maybe it was always there, but she just never noticed. Rhaenyra’s eyes flicker down to her lips, though it’s so brief, Alicent swears she imagines it. She clears her throat, letting go of Rhaenyra’s hand before turning away. Rhaenyra says nothing as she opens the car door.
It’s not until she hears the slam of the door that Alicent turns to look again—watching Rhaenyra walk up a path that has yet to be cleared of snow, an assuredness to her shoulders and the way she holds herself that Alicent has always found charmingly annoying. Alicent watches her as she knocks on the door.
The door opens and Alicent can’t hear anything over the sound of the engine running—the heat still going, but she can see Rhaenyra’s head moving. After a moment, though, Alicent’s brow furrows when she sees Rhaenyra backing up, raising her hands slightly. That’s when Alicent can see an older woman—presumably Leigh’s mother, stepping out onto the stoop with a shotgun in her hand.
Alicent acts before she thinks, getting out of the car with her service revolver in her hands, pointed. If she fired off a shot now, she could hit the woman in the shoulder without even brushing Rhaenyra—non-lethal.
“FBI, drop your weapon,” Alicent shouts, coming around the side of the car, gun still pointed.
Now, she can actually hear Rhaenyra, “I just want to speak to your son—he’s not in any trouble, ma’am, we’re not taking him anywhere.”
“You won’t take my boy,” the woman shouts, her grip on the gun shaking but still strong. Alicent’s hands don’t shake. She’s not going to lose another one—she’s not going to lose Rhaenyra.
“Drop your weapon or I shoot, Mrs. Leigh,” Alicent warns again, her voice strong. Rhaenyra looks back at her and Alicent curses her for not keeping her eyes on the loaded gun, but she doesn’t care as much when she sees the fear in Rhaenyra’s eyes.
“You can’t be here,” the woman spits, her gaze landing on Alicent. The gun stays pointed at Rhaenyra. “I remember you. You tried to kill my boy.”
“I did,” Alicent admits, “But my partner here didn’t. She just wants to talk to Jonathan.”
“Mom— Jesus Christ, mom,” a new voice joins the foray and Jonathan steps out onto the stoop, taking stock of the situation. He grabs his mother by the shoulder and tugs the shotgun out of her hands. Alicent finally lowers hers, tucking it back into its holster. “Are you trying to get yourself shot?”
“They’re going to take you—”
“No, they’re not, get inside.”
The woman grumbles and pushes past Jonathan back into the house as if nothing had happened. Jonathan just stands there, shotgun in his hand though rested, barrel pointed at the ground. Alicent still feels far too uneasy for her liking.
Still, he turns to Rhaenyra, “I’m assuming you’re here to accuse me of being a serial killer.”
Rhaenyra huffs, placing her hands on her hips. From here, Alicent can see that they’re shaking. “You’ve been named as a person of interest in our case, so yes, we are here to speak to you. We are not accusing you of anything, nor are you in any trouble.”
“Fine,” Jonathan relents, nodding to the inside of his house before he points to Alicent, “but that one can’t come.”
A sick feeling settles in the pit of Alicent’s stomach, her hand still resting on her holster. Rhaenyra turns to her, holding up a two with her fingers and a closed fist. Twenty minutes. Alicent shakes her head, holding up a one and then a five in response. Rhaenyra just nods. Alicent doesn’t feel any better. Even so—she watches Rhaenyra disappear into the house. Alicent gets back in the car.
***
CASE FILE #8099 - LEIGH, JONATHAN. 001.
December 18th, 1992
SA.TARGARYEN: So, you know why I’ve come to speak with you.
JL: Sorry about my mother, she’s… she’s been a little less there lately. We think it might be dementia, her father died to the same.
SA.TARGARYEN: We? I was under the impression it was just you and your mother here.
JL: Just me and her doctor. We.
SA.TARGARYEN: Right. Back to the case. You’ve been going to Lawson’s church since you were a young boy, correct?
JL: We started going just after my father died. I was about seven, yeah.
SA.TARGARYEN: So, you would saw Father Lawson knows you relatively well?
JL: He knows everyone, it’s a small church.
SA.TARGARYEN: Was it a surprise to hear he named you as a person of interest when presented with a projected profile?
JL: Let me guess, you asked him about the biggest losers in the church?
SA.TARGARYEN: Answer the question, please.
JL: I’ve never had the best of luck with women, no, but that doesn’t mean I’m going to freak and start killing them.
SA.TARGARYEN: I’m not accusing you of killing them. Though, if it’s not you, do you have any ideas? A lot of these murders showed no signs of forced entry, leading us to believe they knew the victims. If you’ve been going to the same church for the last fifteen years, surely you’d know someone who knew most, if not all, of our victims?
JL: I heard they got Torrance’s wife. She was always a nice girl, too nice for him. The only person I’d say who knew everyone would be Father Lawson. I knew a couple of the girls and of course, Leona, but that’s it. I don’t talk to a lot of people there and lately, I’ve been too busy making sure my mother doesn’t say anything rude to people she’s known for three decades.
SA.TARGARYEN: And shoot people.
JL: And shoot people. I’m sorry I don’t know more.
SA. TARGARYEN: It’s fine. Here’s my card, let me know if you remember any details you might think are important. Even if it doesn’t seem like it, anything you remember could be helpful. And maybe start locking up the guns in the house.
JL: Will do.
***
“I don’t like it,” Alicent goes over the transcription back in the office. “He can’t have been this useless the whole time.”
Rhaenyra is standing at the board, hands on her hips and sleeves rolled to her elbows. “No, I think he was always going to be this useless.”
Alicent perks up, eyebrows raised as she tosses the transcript onto the table. “What do you mean?”
“Think about it,” Rhaenyra hums, pacing around the office in front of the board. Alicent just watches her run her hands through her hair, clearly running through something in her mind. “Months ago, you go to Father Lawson, you give him the bones of a profile and he has three names for you—primed and ready. None of them have a handwriting match to the notes, none of them seem to have any real connection to the case. They know one, maybe two victims. Enough for it to stick out, not enough for it to be obvious. But you know who has known every single victim? Father Lawson. Every woman killed passed through the doors of the church. He was sleeping with Leona, he helped that creep marry Elia. He knows these people. And Jonathan pointed us right back to him.”
Ideas start to click in her mind, Alicent saying, “A few people have mentioned him now which means—”
“We can get grounds to search the church,” Rhaenyra nods. “I probably won’t even have to pull strings. I wish you had what he said to you on record, it would help, but I think we can get it regardless. So, there you go—there’s your church basement. You’re welcome.”
Alicent breathes a sigh of relief, nodding softly in her seat with her arms crossed. After a moment, Alicent clears her throat, asking, “Are we going to talk about it?”
“What? Your wet dream? I thought we covered that—”
“The fact that you almost got shot,” Alicent says quietly, her voice shakier than she wants it to be. As firm as her response had been, as steady as her hands were on that gun, she was terrified. She knew something bad was going to happen, she knew—
“Alicent,” Rhaenyra kneels down in front of her, her hands on the arms of the chair and the last thing Alicent needs to see right now is Rhaenyra on her knees. “It was an old lady with a rapidly deteriorating brain, she wasn’t going to shoot me.”
“She would have,” Alicent shakes her head, “And I wouldn’t have been able to do anything until she did. I couldn’t have shot her until you were already bleeding out in the snow and that’s my job, but I would’ve just lost another one and I can’t—I can’t lose another one. Because you like me and you’re nice to me and no one has been nice to me before.”
Rhaenyra sighs, placing a hand on Alicent’s thigh—without fear. Against her will, Alicent thinks of her dream again. How easy it had been for Rhaenyra to touch her, how it felt so right. “I’m not the only one in the entire world that’s going to be nice to you.”
“That doesn’t mean you need to get shot, Rhaenyra.”
“I know, but I needed you to know that. I won’t be the only one. And I didn’t get shot.” Rhaenyra reaches for Alicent’s hand, tugging her forward until Alicent’s hand is pressed against her stomach through her work shirt. “This is right where it would’ve hit. Look—no shot. I’m fine, Alicent.”
Alicent looks down to meet Rhaenyra’s gaze, realizing how close their faces are. Alicent allows herself to push her hand beneath the fabric of Rhaenyra’s shirt, feeling her warm skin beneath her fingertips. Unmarred, unwounded. She breathes a sigh of relief, even if it’s just confirmation of something she already knew. It would be so easy—so easy to lean forward and see if it feels the same way it does in her dream.
Outside the office, someone laughs a bit too loudly and the two of them jump apart. Rhaenyra stands up, clearing her throat and taking a deep breath—it’s all the confirmation Alicent needs, she thinks. Watching Rhaenyra’s chest heave, the slight flush in her cheeks, the way she pushed about Alicent’s dream. But Rhaenyra won’t—she said it herself. She’ll never push Alicent. Alicent thinks if she would even want her to. If she knows how to want anything at all.
“So,” Rhaenyra speaks, tucking her shirt back in and clearing her throat again, “I’ll submit a request for a warrant and see if we can maybe get it expedited. We’ve been working on this for so long, I wouldn’t be surprised if another body dropped soon.”
“Right,” Alicent nods, untying her hair and tying it back up. Rhaenyra just watches her—always watching her. “I think… I think it’s been a long day. I’m going to head home and you should, too, after you file.”
“I will,” Rhaenyra nods.
The two of them stand face to face, Alicent with her coat thrown over her arm. Without really thinking— (She is thinking, she’s just not thinking as straight as she should be), she reaches out and cups Rhaenyra’s cheek before letting it fall to her shoulder. “I’m glad you didn’t get shot today.”
Rhaenyra huffs out a laugh, “Yeah. Me too, Hightower.”
Alicent just bites her lips and nods before leaving the office. She pauses for a moment outside, though, watching through the window to see Rhaenyra still standing there—a hand on her cheek. Alicent breathes in a shuddering breath. She knows what this means.