Rating: NC-17
Warnings: some bondage
Author: Trekker
Pairing: Giles/Ethan
Fandom: Buffy
He recognized his scent before he even saw his face. It stopped his protesting cry halfway out of his throat as a hard arm shoved him against a harder brick wall, and a strong body pressed him there.
“Ripper,” he said.
“Ethan Rayne. What are you doing here?”
The predictable question, the predictable use of both of his names, as though such formalities would give Rupert the distance he needed. The inherent hypocrisy of such attempts at distance even as Rupert was pressed close enough to get off on.
He could feel his former lover’s breath against his jaw, and the heat in his own groin. To think, a moment earlier he’d been thinking of nothing but milk, eggs, and cheese.
“Well, actually, Rupert old mate,” he said, “it so happens that I live here. Was actually on my way to buy groceries, if you must know.”
Giles stepped back, and the cool air rushed between them. Pity.
Although watching Rupert battle the contrition off his face was almost worth it.
“Paying with your blood money, I suppose.”
Who are you trying to convince, Ethan thought, me, or yourself? Banter came easily, naturally, falling off his lips with barely any input from his actual mind. A skill, honed over years of life.
“Now, now. You know blood isn’t my business. I only aim for mayhem.” Even as he spoke, he was looking the other man over. Rupert looked tired. He looked *old*, like his fires were burning low. It was rather unsettling, so Ethan pushed, just a little, brushed against a raw nerve: “Anyone who may be standing in the way is... a regrettable accident.”
A fist, his jaw, and suddenly his shoulder and the hard brick wall were once again communing. He was seeing stars as he carefully stepped away, touching his lip. No blood this time.
“Ow,” he said. As far as pain went, this was nothing. “Perhaps that wasn’t the best choice of words.”
But of course, it had been exactly the right choice of words, because now the fire was back in Ripper’s eyes. For a moment at least. Then, a silence fell between them, and slowly the heat drained away, leached, perhaps, by the cool night.
He looked to be about to walk away. Slink away, even. It wasn’t like his Ripper to admit defeat this way.
Ethan offered an olive branch.
“So what now, my dear man? You can hardly tell me to leave, seeing as I’m perfectly within my rights to be here.”
He paused, then waved a hand behind himself, at the bright windows of the store.
“Shall we?”
Didn’t expect him to say yes. But hoped.
And then, with a sigh of, “what the hell,” Rupert accepted, and suddenly Ethan found himself in a run-of-the-mill supermarket with his old friend-lover-nemesis beside him. The milieu was so wildly inappropriate that he had to laugh the first time Rupert picked up a green pepper for inspection.
Even if it did earn him a rather thunderous glare.
“If you plan on taking issue with my choice of vegetable, I believe I do have grounds for requesting that you leave.”
Rupert looked so different under bright fluorescence. Stark and harsh, and every line on his face showing. That wasn’t who he was. He was a man made for moonlight, for candlelight.
“So sorry. It’s a lovely pepper,” Ethan said, exaggerating his acquiescence just enough to be true to character.
“Thank you ever so,” Ripper shot back, with matching dry sarcasm and a tilt of his brow that brought back days of guitars and stage lights.
He bagged that pepper and one other, and they continued on, not speaking until they’d left the produce aisle and moved on to canned goods, where Rupert actually gave in first and broke the ice.
“The Initiative?” he said, as Ethan was debating whether the price difference made the store brand peas worth buying. He decided it did, and picked up the can, and then answered with the casualness the question demanded.
“I was out of that car before we hit the state border. Although, I suppose you know that.”
A gentle prod. Giles was silent until the end off the aisle, where he finally said, “Yes. Well, I-- Aside from what you did, I believed you, what you said about them. It wouldn’t have been right to let them...”
He had suspected that those handcuffs falling open when they did was rather more of a coincidence than even he was accustomed to.
“Wouldn’t be right.” He laughed softly, at the nervous sniveling in Giles’s voice. It must be hard, he thought, to be so completely subservient to something, even just an idea, a principle, all the time. “You do know that morals are all, at their cores, nothing but opinions, don’t you?”
He could see Giles’s spine growing a bit stiffer.
“Our beliefs and our actions give them meaning.”
“They cripple you. You used to be beautiful, Giles, and free. Don’t you remember?”
“I was pathetic, Ethan. And so were you. You still are.”
And somehow they managed to have that whole exchange in normal speaking voices in the dry goods aisle. They didn’t speak again until they reached the end of the store--dairy and eggs--but Giles continued to walk beside him, head ducked down most of the time, seemingly a million miles away.
A part of Ethan wanted to touch him, then, even just his shoulder, his arm, burn a little of that pain away. Another part, less charitable, wanted to root around, find the source and press there. See Giles writhe a little.
In the end, he settled for simply shopping.
But then he had to speak up again, because they were nearly to check-out and the end of any excuse to continue to walk together, and that just didn’t sit quite well with him. The warmth and presence of Rupert beside him was pleasant.
“What brings you here?”
“That isn’t any of your business,” Giles said, calmly, as he pulled down a pint of milk. But his show of placidness didn’t fool Ethan. He was well-tuned to Rupert’s pain signals.
“Slayer decide she didn’t need you anymore?”
Not well-tuned enough, apparently, because it became quite clear when Rupert neatly dug a thumb into the pressure point on his wrist and nearly drove him to his knees that he’d pushed that button a little too hard.
“Mention her again, and I will kill you,” Ripper hissed in his ear.
And then everything went instantly back to normal.
They made it through checkout with a meaningless exchange about the lives of Hollywood celebrities whom neither of them were at all familiar with, and then they were back out in the night air. Traffic and people and a light breeze vied for the attention of his senses, but now nothing could draw him away from Rupert. It was like he was seeing him for the first time that night. Now, in the darkness, only backlit by the glow from the store, and highlighted by a street lamp, he looked so much more the man he used to know.
Still powerful. Still beautiful.
They’d stopped, only a few feet outside and were standing in the center of the sidewalk.
“Come back to my place. We’ll have a drink,” Ethan said, so suddenly he almost surprised himself.
Then he had to wait, in silence, watching the internal debate flickering across Giles’s face. Half-wishing he’d never even spoken up, because frankly, rejection was an uncomfortable feeling, and he could really do without it.
And he hated feeling so needy. Like a dog, waiting on his master’s word before snapping up a treat. Tense all over and just... waiting.
Janus, he hated that man.
But then Rupert was agreeing, albeit with a certain reluctance, and they were walking back to his place, and damn it if he wasn’t feeling triumphant. He was exalting, even.
“Good lord,” Giles said, as Ethan flicked on the light.
He glared back at him, finding him hovering just outside of the threshold like an uninvited vampire.
“Sorry if it’s not up to your kingly standards, Rupert. The going rate for blood just isn’t what it used to be.”
Rupert didn’t react. He stepped into the flat, with his brow furrowed, holding his grocery bag a bit close to his chest as though expecting something to leap into it at any moment. Ethan opened the fridge and set about putting the food away.
“Besides,” Ethan continued, in a blase tone, hating the nervousness it masked, “The roaches make better company than most humans and the neighbors provided a free nightly porn show.”
He flinched a bit when, turning away from the refrigerator, he accidentally brushed against Rupert, who’d seemingly come up out of nowhere. He skirted around him carefully, but the space was tight, and he still managed to get full-body contact. Which for once, actually *hadn’t* been what he was going for.
Back out of the small kitchen area, away from Rupert, his body was still tingling and a bit shaky.
He didn’t look back as he said, “You can put your things in the fridge for now. Liquor’s in the cabinet.”
He was intensely aware of the fact that it took only two long strides to cross the main body of his one room flat. Hated that awareness. Hated the reflected disdain he caught from Rupert, who no doubt lived on some inherited property in the country somewhere, massive rooms, family lands.
*Fuck you, Ripper,* he thought, *this was good enough for you once upon a time.*
He dropped to his knees before his shrine and reached for his lighter.
The illusionary feeling of Rupert’s disapproving eyes on him grew stronger and he scowled as he lit the candles. My life, my world.
Then he took a deep breath and laid the lighter aside. Negative thoughts had no place here, in this moment, in this space. He cleared his mind with the ease of years of meditation. Picked up the razor and nicked the center of each of his palms. Small, shallow cuts welling red blood, surrounded by a scatter of dozens of tiny white scars.
In the olden days, millennia ago, they would sacrifice a pig, a lamb. Now his own blood was all he had to offer.
He spoke his daily prayer as a drop of red worked its way down to his wrist.
Then he sat for a moment in simple silent communion, feeling the forces around him, inside him. The slight ripple in the normal ambiance of his apartment.
He reached for a tissue and cleaned away the blood, dabbed on a bit of antibiotic ointment, and then rocked to his feet.
Only then did he finally turn back to Rupert.
He fully expected to find censure. But he didn’t. He wasn’t sure what Rupert was thinking, in point of fact. He stood in the kitchen, on the other side of the island, holding a bottle of brandy and two glasses, just watching him. Inscrutable.
There was nothing to do but step up to the counter. Rupert silently poured them both a glass. Ethan sat down on one of his stools and watched cautiously as Rupert walked around the island to claim the other.
They sipped their drinks in silence, and didn’t dare break eye-contact for a moment. It had, really, far more in common with a battle than a companionable shared drink. Sizing each other up. Looking for weaknesses. Anticipating a strike.
Why *was* Rupert here? Here in his flat? Here in England?
*Well,* he thought, after Rupert finished his last swallow and yanked him across the space between them, kissed him with brandy-flavoured lips, *aside from the obvious reason.*
It was a hard kiss, mouths pressed together with all of Ripper’s usual violence. He tasted blood where his tooth cut his lip.
Ethan pulled away.
“I tried to kill you,” he said.
“There’ve been times I would have killed you,” Giles said.
“Yes, but--” Only for your Slayer. Only for your precious morals.
“Do you want to kill me now?”
Amazing how Rupert could ask that so calmly. No, not just amazing. It was strange. Unsettling. Worrisome.
“Possibly,” Ethan said.
Rupert was silent, but unmoved.
“I tried to have your Slayer kill you,” Ethan said, despite earlier death threats regarding mentioning *her*. Ripper this calm was far too odd to abide.
“You did, yes. It is your brand of irony, of course.”
He poured a bit more brandy as he said this. As though discussing the weather, or particularly uninteresting politics. He picked it up and sipped it.
Ethan suddenly wanted out. Out of this conversation. Out of this flat. Out of the country might not even be a bad idea. Something was simmering in Ripper, something deadly. This could be nothing but the calm preceding a storm to end all storms. Cattle lying down before an earthquake, birds falling silent.
And then it all made sense.
“She’s dead, isn’t she?”
The liquor in Giles’ glass trembled ripples out from the center. Then he set it down softly.
Ethan breathed in, one very small breath.
“Giles. I’m sorry,” he said, and he meant it. Truly and deeply and with everything he was. Because she was gone, and there was no reason to envy the dead. “How?”
Rupert’s eyes were downcast, watching his finger trace scars in the countertop.
“She gave her life to save her sister. And the world.”
A pause, and then:
“I should have killed Dawn.”
Ethan had a flash of a memory then, of a small girl in his costume shop with long brown hair and braces. Even in his mind she faded in and out of reality, and exuded an odd sensation of green. Just a girl, though. Kid sister to the Slayer. Giles’ eyes were cold.
Then Giles stood, and the fight and the tension drained out of him again, leaving behind just a tired man cloaked in loss.
“I should go.”
“No,” Ethan said, standing, catching his arm before he could finish turning away. “Stay.”
The way Ripper was tonight, moody and unsettled, it was best for all of them that he go. But Ethan had never claimed to be sensible. Never wanted to be sensible. Least of all where Ripper was concerned.
This time it was he who pressed a kiss to Rupert’s unresponsive lips. It felt strange, touching him when he was like this. Ripper was always active, always either fighting it or encouraging it. Never like this, never just limp as a marionette, unmoved by Ethan’s hand on his side, Ethan’s lips against his own.
Ethan slipped his hand up to Giles’ shoulder and squeezed gently.
“Come to bed, Rupert. Let go of all this for a while.”
And Rupert let himself be lead by the hand like a child, back behind the curtain that passed as Ethan’s bedroom wall. He remained abnormally passive as Ethan peeled off his shirt, ran his hands up his bare chest. Avoided the recent-looking scar just beneath his ribs.
They were neither of them truly in the mood for this. Tension crackled between them like their magic used to. The way Rupert shifted as Ethan brushed his thumbs over his nipples was more discomfort than interest. As he settled his hands on Ripper’s shoulders on either side of his neck, he thought that perhaps this wasn’t a good idea. Worse of an idea than he’d even suspected.
He couldn’t meet Rupert’s eyes. But his skin was still... good... under his hands. Not warm, though. Cool like the undead. Rupert’s pulse, a sluggish throb just below Ethan’s thumb in the hollow of his collarbone, was the only tangible sign of life.
Outside, someone was shouting. A truck rumbled past.
Still, nothing changed. He decided that it was a lost cause, and started to lift his hands away.
Rupert reacted. His body moved, seemed to come back to life. He took a sharp breath.
Then he said, “Ethan,” and it sounded like something was breaking in him. Or like something, already broken, was shifting, and grinding painfully.
His hand cupped the back of Ethan’s neck, fingers cool at the fringes of his hair. Ethan leaned back into that hand, almost subconsciously, found his eyes on Ripper’s again. So he was able to watch as those eyes fluttered shut and Ripper step up close. He fully expected him to kiss him. But he didn’t.
“I... I need... Ethan--”
He didn’t open his eyes then, nor did he as he dropped heavily to one knee, then lowered his other, kneeling before Ethan. He lifted one hand and wrapped it loosely around the back of Ethan’s knee. Then waited, perfectly still, head bowed.
All the air rushed out of Ethan’s lungs and he was dizzy with-- too many things. Panic, for one. Desire.
“Giles,” he said. “Giles, you bleeding idiot, do you not remember what we were just saying about me and killing you?”
Rupert’s fingers curled and relaxed, soft weight on the top of his calf through his jeans.
Either he was being completely stupid--and Giles was many things, but rarely stupid--or... he didn’t care. In any case, this was all exceedingly unprecedented. The shadow of the curtain marked an angle across the pale curve of Rupert’s bowed back. His shoulders rose and fell with the rhythm of his breath, and Ethan could feel the echo of that movement in the hand at his knee.
Too tempting, and Ethan rarely turned down temptation.
He sank his fingers into springy hair, and said, gently, “What do you need, Rupert?”
“Tell me,” he continued, still soft, but using the voice that could bend reality to his will. He commanded the forces of chaos. He could command this man.
The curve of Rupert’s skull was warm and damp under his hand, locks of hair coiled around his knuckles.
“To forget. Everything.”
*Oh, Ripper, do you know what you’re offering?*
He swallowed hard. Knew that such a statement should not be enough to make him groan. But oh, it did.
“Stand up,” he said, his voice even and measured. As when he casted, clear-headedness under stress. “Hands together in front of you.”
Giles stood slowly. His eyes opened once he was standing, and he looked at Ethan. Such tired eyes. He crossed his wrists.
Ethan was under great deal of stress, in fact. Giles was still beautiful after all these years, even now with all of them weighing on him as they were. His beauty had aged and changed with him. Not the same as when they were boys, not the fiery violent brilliance any longer, that anyone should have known could only burn fast and hot and quick. Now there was something to him that was deeper, steadier. A majesty to him, in the way of old stone walls and misty mountain ranges.
Crow’s feet and scars and silver chest hair.
And lord, he could bollocks this up badly. Possibly intentionally. He was trembling.
He slipped Rupert’s belt from his waist, and secured his hands with it. Not that he expected him to disobey. Rupert shifted his weight and twitched his arms up just a bit, testing the bonds, or perhaps simply reacting to them. His left arm was turned towards Ethan, and the tattoo was a dark mar on pale flesh.
Ethan didn’t touch it.
He did, however, reach down and gently work the ring off Giles’ pinky.
“Hush,” he soothed, at his indrawn breath, “It’s perfectly safe.”
He set the ring on the dresser, well in Giles’ view, and turned back to him. Knelt to deal with Rupert’s shoes, jeans, everything. His watch and glasses were placed beside the ring on the dresser, and then he was utterly naked but for the belt restraining him. He stood motionless beside Ethan’s bed, his half-hard cock alongside his bound hands, his feet spaced shoulder-width apart, his eyes cast down towards the floor near Ethan’s feet.
Gorgeous.
“Lie down, love,” Ethan breathed.
One word erased twenty years. Impressive even if it was really Rupert who was supposed to be forgetting.
Rupert. Stretched out across his bed--barely more than a cot, really, but it would serve--one leg extended, one knee bent. Rupert’s arms, already over his head, relaxed over the pillow, elbows slightly crooked. His eyes were closed and soft.
Ethan took a careful breath.
He could barely take his eyes off him long enough to kneel by his dresser and gather what he needed from the bottom drawer. Too afraid that Rupert would vanish, or, worse, change his mind.
One loop of the cuffs went around a bar in the headboard, the other around the belt binding Rupert’s wrists. He tied a strip of dark cloth over his eyes.
Cast one quick glance down at Ripper’s cock.
He was doing ok. He told himself this. But it wasn’t his role. Not usually. Not with Ripper.
He couldn’t resist reaching out, touching Ripper’s chest, feeling his nipple harden beneath his fingertip.
“Oh, Ripper. You are exquisite,” he said, and Rupert’s hips shifted a bit and his braced foot slid a little further down the bed, his toes tensed and then spread. Ethan’s jeans cinched tighter around his cock.
He knelt beside the bed and leaned in, finding that same nipple with his tongue. His teeth.
The geography of Ripper under his hand. Subtle swell of stomach, dip of his navel. Flank warm and smooth. He nipped a little harder as his fingers settled into the valley were abdomen met thigh. Sticky sweat there.
Ripper pressed his hips up.
Ethan followed the crease, felt Ripper’s legs fall open, heard his small, pleading breath. As his hand cupped loosely around yielding flesh. Weight rested in his palms. He stroked softly with his thumb.
And a part of him was still so aware that he could hurt Rupert now.
Instead, he moved his hand higher, curled it tight around familiar hardness. He stroked him slow and sure. Looked up to watch his face as his lips parted for breath. Watch his hands as they clenched and relaxed. Felt the cock in his hand swell hard with blood and desire.
Then he let go, found the small strip of supple leather and wove it into place, looped around cock and balls, restraining. Rupert groaned.
Ethan pumped his cock twice more; a teasing gesture. And another chance to feel Ripper hard in his hand. Never could feel that enough. Especially not now, but even back then.
Only thing better was feeling him hard inside him.
It wasn’t time for that yet, though, no matter how tempting it was. Ripper’s cock: hard, lying flat, one sticky strand of precome between the head and his stomach. He could still remember how it would taste, could still remember the way Ripper’s breath would grow heavy and uneven, the way his hips would roll. The way his cock would feel nudging at the back of his throat.
The power of it. Knowing Ripper wanted him, more than he’d ever wanted, ever would want, anyone else. Desire that went beyond logic or diverging morals. Knowing his tongue and his teeth and his throat could drive this powerful man to his knees, this eloquent man to incoherence.
Knowing he himself never felt more possessed, more owned, more needed than he did with that man, that cock, taking its pleasure from him.
He could smell Ripper’s musk and sweat.
He shook. And he wanted. God, yes, he wanted.
But that alone would not be enough tonight.
Not for Ripper, and not for him. Not with such an offer on the table.
He paused. What would be?
There was so much he could do. Giles was half-gone already, under his control completely and willingly. He could carve runes on his flesh that would make him his own forever. Or destroy him. And yet, somehow, the very fact of Rupert’s submission and trust stopped that line of thought.
It would be an empty victory, and while Ethan normally wouldn’t give a care to such things, with Ripper, it was different. Tonight it was different.
He trailed his fingers in absent-minded patterns over Rupert’s belly and side as he thought.
So many new scars. Certainly, they were products of twenty years of being a Watcher, but most of them seemed recent. And some... some were not battle scars. Not in the traditional sense.
Raised, round bumps of shiny smooth skin, scattered where his collarbones met, and along the insides of his upper arms. Cigarette burns. A trio of long vertical lines on his stomach, skin twisted and indented. Deep knife scars. Then there were the semicircles of individual points. How many of those? One on his right wrist. That was very old, and Ethan knew its origin. But others, now: One in the crook of his left elbow, just above the tattoo. One in the crease where his left thigh met his groin, and one, ghostly pale and half visible to Ethan in the fold of his right knee. Vampire bites.
“Who did this to you?” he asked, suddenly, almost without intending to speak. His fingers wandered to one of the knife scars, and Giles flinched. He pulled his hand away.
“Angelus,” Rupert said, softly.
Well, now. That was... rather impressive.
“Tortured by the Scourge of Europe? Well, you never did go for second best, did you?”
Rupert shifted, tugged, probably half-unconsciously, at his restraints.
“Ethan--”
And contrary to popular belief, he did occasionally regret his knack for inappropriately timed humor. A cold wash of dread passed over him, and he fully expected Ripper to demand to be released, to storm out the door.
But then Rupert went limp against the sheets again and sighed.
So he was forgiven. This once at least. He spread his hand over the base of Giles’ sternum, felt the flutter of his heartbeat.
One thing was for sure, and that was if Giles had ever gleaned any real enjoyment from his own pain, he almost certainly wouldn’t any longer. That ruled out a large class of possibilities for tonight’s festivities, although Ethan didn’t find himself overly upset by that. In spite of Giles’ tendency to call him a sadist, he’d never really particularly enjoyed inflicting physical pain.
Receiving it was another matter, but of course Ripper’s own sadistic streak was not on topic at the moment.
So, he would be gentle, then. Something rare for him, something he couldn’t find with his one night stands. Never trusted them enough, never felt it wise to let his shields down. Easier, safer, to be rough and anonymous.
And fun, of course. He didn’t miss it, usually. Tenderness.
He ran his hands up the fragile skin of the undersides of Giles’ arms. Leaned in as his hands settled around Rupert’s wrists. Rupert’s fingers curled a bit, and he breathed in softly. His chest pushed out against Ethan’s side.
He began with the very tips of Rupert’s fingers, gently massaging the soft pads, edging down to knead each joint, down further to touch the webbing at the base. Sensitive skin. Then he flicked his tongue over where his fingers had gone. Moving slowly.
Taste of skin and sweat. Pure Ripper. He worked his tongue down to Rupert’s palm, and the taste of salt was stronger there. Nervous sweat. Nice to know he wasn’t the only one, at least.
At Rupert’s wrist, he traced the edge of the belt with his fingers, then the tip of his tongue. Taste and smell of leather and Giles.
Who said his name. Desperate, whispered like the breeze through aspens. Rupert said his name twice, like it felt good on his tongue. Like knowing who made a difference. Ethan’s heart beat faster, and he nipped gently at the thin skin over traced blue veins, just beneath the belt.
Ripper’s hands closed into fists as Ethan trailed his fingers down both arms from wrist to elbow. Light, light, barely-there touch, making those nerves strain for it, come alive.
Under the fingers of his right hand, dark, indelible ink stained the skin.
It called to him. His mark, as much as it was Eyghon’s. He leaned over Giles and replaced his hand with his mouth. He dragged the marked skin up in a hard, sucking kiss. Felt the heat of Giles under his chest, felt the way he shifted, heard his gasp. When he pulled away, the blue ink was ringed with red.
Then he settled back, just enough to find Rupert’s lips with his own in a deep, searching kiss, and this time it was returned with passion. Giles lifted his head to get more, get closer, mouth open and tongue moving against Ethan’s. Sharp, panting breaths against Ethan’s cheek.
*God, Ripper. My Ripper. I hate you. I love you. What the hell have you done to me?*
He’d pressed his hand over Rupert’s ribs, and now he could feel the echo of Rupert’s heartbeat through bone and muscle.
Ethan broke the kiss like a drowning man reaching the surface, gasping for air.
Rupert lifted his head, looking for him. He said his name again, in that way.
“Hush,” Ethan said, “Lie back.”
He stood and stepped away to strip quickly. Then he was back beside Rupert, in the bed now, stretched out alongside him, one leg hooked over Rupert's, one arm snug around his chest. Rupert turned his face towards him, and they kissed again. Slow and thorough, letting time melt and run like warm chocolate.
Ethan slowly wove a real spell around them. Strands of magic like silk, curling around them, blocking out the rest of the world. No more street noises, no more scent of mildew, nothing but the heat of their bodies, the sounds of their kiss.
Sticky sweat gently bound his palm to Rupert’s skin. The taste of brandy gradually faded from their lips.
Kissing shouldn’t have felt so good. He shouldn’t have been so comfortable.
A sparkle of nerves ran under his skin and he started to pull away. Nostalgia he could handle, he was used to, with Ripper. But this felt too good, too much like something he wouldn’t be willing to give up.
He couldn’t get away, though. Not when Rupert made that little sound, not when he rolled towards Ethan, pulled against his bonds to get to him, not away from him.
This illusion was too tempting to resist.
He settled again, arm around Rupert’s back, chest to chest now.
More time slipped past unnoticed before Rupert wrapped his leg around Ethan’s hips, and pulled him tight against him.
“Inside me. Ethan, please.”
The blindfold had been lost somewhere along the way, and Ethan knew the situation had gotten out of his control as he opened his eyes to dark green. Rupert’s hips rolled against his, and they were close enough to still be breathing the same air.
Ethan reached up to free him.
The necessities were quick and easy to deal with, and then he was draped over Rupert, easing into him. A small twist of Rupert’s hips as he settled, adjusted to the feeling. Rupert’s hand, hot and damp and heavy, gripping just above his elbow, digging into his skin.
Rupert’s body was tight and resistant even as he groaned, “Don’t stop. Please, don’t--”
Ethan eased back and pressed forward, dizzy with the pressure, the pleasure, the way their hearts were galloping side by side, the heat of Rupert’s erection against his stomach.
Slow going, rocking just a bit deeper with every thrust, small flickers of pain in Rupert’s eyes, tension across his brow. Ethan didn’t bother to ask him how long it had been. Didn’t want to disprove his theory that he’d been the first and the last.
Then he was finally relaxing, rocking up to meet Ethan, pain replaced with fuzzy pleasure in his eyes. His hand relaxed, stroked Ethan’s arm lazily, tenderly.
“Oh, that’s wonderful,” he whispered.
It was.
Movement and friction and pressure. Heat and sweat. Ripper gasping and shaking beneath him, urging him on. Taste of his lips and tongue and the feeling of his hand, knotted in Ethan’s hair, holding him close enough so he couldn’t pull away. Gave him a good excuse not to.
And then they came, first Ripper, shuddering and thrusting into Ethan’s hand, and then Ethan, and it was over.
The next morning, he woke alone, with the strangest sensation that the world had been set upon a lopsided table. That evening, he found out why.
He came home to a note taped to his door.
“I have to go.
“She’s alive.”
The End