Keeping the Faith

NOTE: This is a crossover with my NY fiction, and should be read between “Tomorrow Is Today” and “This Night” if you’re following my NY storyline.

Behold, the next phase of my—I mean Speed’s—sexual deviance. This is Chapter 2 reloaded, if you take “reloaded” to mean pumped up, tied down, and bent backward over a school desk. I hope you all enjoy the latest product of my wonderfully deranged mind. And sorry it took so long to crank this chapter out; I was basically writing this chapter and “This Night” for my NY story simultaneously… and there’s a whole lotta sex in both. In fact, “This Night” is going to be a bit longer in coming because it’s shaping up to be a Chapter Of Nothing But Sex.

Anyway.

The character “Trance” is based on an old friend of mine that I haven’t seen in years, and no, the name I give for him isn’t his real name. The character “Travis,” well, think of Dr. Wilson from the TV show “House M.D.” and you’ll be pretty close, if Dr. Wilson was an absolute asshole.



This chapter’s warnings: M/M, M/M/M, anal, oral, bondage, D/s, moresomes, fisting

This chapter’s pairings: Horatio/Speed, Horatio/Mac, Horatio/God knows how many others, Mac/Speed, Mac/OMC

Baby, all the lights are turned on you
Now you're in the center of the stage
Everything revolves on what you do
Ah, you are in your prime, you've come of age

You can always have your way somehow
'Cause everybody loves you now

Billy Joel – "Everybody Loves You Now"

THREE WEEKS LATER, or SIX MONTHS AND THREE WEEKS AFTER SHOOTING

“Hey, Mac! How’ve you been?”

Mac turned and shouldered his flight bag, nudging down his sunglasses. He hadn’t realized that Miami could be so blasted hot in August, and he was starting to regret the black T-shirt and black jeans. At least his sneakers were white.

“Been a while.” Speed stuck out his right hand in greeting. He had on a pale blue T-shirt with a pair of angry-looking eyes on the front, and below the eyes were the words ‘Speaking is NOT communication.’ His jeans hung loose, and his sneakers were old and battered.

Mac smiled broadly at the gesture, and returned it. “Been fine. Good to see your arm works again.”

Speed nodded. “Just had the surgery last week. There was a pinched nerve, but they finally fixed it. I am healed!” Mac chuckled as he turned to grab his garment bag and follow his host out of the terminal and into the parking lot.

As Mac put his belongings into Horatio’s car, Speed was quietly thinking. It was good to see the Marine again, but recent events had made Speed more than a little irritated towards their New York friend. Speed and Horatio had already agreed to not say anything, but… the thought of Danny’s predicament just made Speed’s blood boil.

Mac had broken up with Danny.

Mac was still pining for his beloved wife—who had died on 9/11—and when Danny had nearly said the ‘three little words,’ Mac had spooked. Then Claire’s son had appeared, and brought back all sorts of memories too painful for the Marine to sort out. Feeling paranoid about society, uneasy about being in love with another man, and feeling somehow unfaithful to Claire, Mac had left Danny.

Speed was just dying to let Mac have it, to run him up one side and down the other for being so callous with Danny, for just dumping him like that, for fucking the Italian for nine months and then just telling him to “go home, and I’ll see you at work tomorrow.” Danny had even been contemplating suicide after the breakup, but fate had been kind enough to give Danny the wild idea to call Horatio. It took a lot of encouragement from Horatio and Speed, but thankfully now Danny was only drinking like a fish and not adding aspirin and razor blades to the mix.

The thought that anyone, especially such a strong and even-tempered man such as Mac, could be so cold made Speed angry enough that had Horatio not cautioned against such, Speed may have even struck at the Marine. Such thoughts were counter-productive, not to mention hazardous to Speed’s health, and Horatio sternly reminded his lover to control the volatile temperament that both of them had inherited from the Emerald Isle. Thankfully Horatio had a better handle on it than Speed did, and so Speed had grudgingly agreed to let the redhead do most of the talking.

For now.

“You like dogs, Mac?” Speed asked as he unlocked the door to the house and closed up the garage.

Carrying his luggage, Mac nodded. “Sure, why? You have one now?”

“Yup.” Speed turned to head into the kitchen. “Set your bags down in the living room, first. He’s kinda… energetic.”

Mac smiled and moved to lay his bags on the couch as Speed walked through the kitchen toward the laundry room. “Ready?” came the younger man’s voice.

Mac cocked his head. “Yeah.”

There was the faint sound of a door opening. “Incoming!” Speed shouted, and Mac’s eyes widened as the dog shot into the living room, noticed the guest, and made a beeline for him. Mac couldn’t help a laugh as the ecstatic canine face closed in on him, and the Marine allowed himself to fall back on the couch as Speed’s dog bounded into his lap and began cleaning his face.

“Locard, off!” Speed snapped, and the dog got in a few last licks before dropping back to the floor.

Mac’s lips curled in amusement. “Locard?”

Speed nodded. “Yep, that’s Locard.”

The Marine cocked his head as he stood. “Why, because he’s smart?”

“Well, that,” Speed allowed, giving a slow nod. “And this.” He stepped over to Mac and bumped shoulders with him, and then stood back.

Mac blinked, then looked at his arm. “Oh. Locard’s Theorem. Whenever two beings come into contact, they transfer small pieces of themselves to each other.”

Speed snickered. “And this Locard here is damn good at transfer.”

“I can see that,” Mac said wryly, brushing at the white hairs clinging to his shirt. They were stubborn things, though, and weren’t giving up without a fight. It seemed like for every one he pulled off, two more floated up on the drafts to his black shirt. There were black hairs, too, but they weren’t nearly as noticeable.

Speed ruffled his dog’s headfur. “Mind taking the same bedroom as last time? I need to take Locard on a walk. H should be getting home in about…” he checked his watch, “an hour.”

Mac shrugged, gathered his things and headed upstairs while Locard dashed and pranced in quick circles around his owner. Mac found his bedroom with no trouble and unpacked his bag efficiently and neatly. He inspected the guest bathroom—and why he always did that first, he had no idea—and decided to take a quick shower.

His hair was damp when he padded back downstairs, barefoot and wearing a clean pair of jeans and an old Marines t-shirt that proclaimed him to be a “Weapon of Mass Destruction.” Locard was snuggled up on the couch, but lifted his head and wagged his tail at the approaching Marine. Mac smiled and gave the dog a scratch. “Where’s Tim, huh?” he asked the dog.

Locard had no reply, but Mac heard the sound of metal clattering in the kitchen, and he walked in that direction. He paused in the doorway to watch Speed fire up the electric mixer in a large bowl of something. When he was done, Speed dropped the beater attachments in one side of the sink (where a deposit of large, soapy water was already waiting) and reached for an ice cream scoop.

Mac came closer as Speed scooped out a nice little chunk of the dough and dropped it on a greased pan nearby. From the Marine’s standpoint, it was a pale tan color and appeared to have chocolate chips in it.

Mac peered over his shoulder. “Cookies?”

Speed shrugged and neatly placed another dollop of dough on the greased pan. “Yeah, it’s been a while since I’ve had chocolate-chip cookies, and I figured what the hell.”

Mac watched for a moment. “Is there anywhere besides the street that I could use to go for a run in the morning?”

“Yeah,” Speed said with a nod, “Go out the back door and follow the path, and there’s a little boardwalk. Our property lines are marked with lines of white beach fence. There’s not much room, but you could always go for a swim instead of running. Just watch out for the rip tide.”

Mac checked his waterproof wristwatch as he mopped at himself again with the soaked beach towel and headed up to the house, the late afternoon sun beating down on his back; next time, he’d have to remember extra sunscreen. Swimming in the Atlantic had brought a welcome respite from the heat, but now he was not only sweating again, he was sure that he could feel the water in his hair evaporating and leaving the salt crystals behind.

New York could get deathly hot, too, but at least there was less humidity up there. Mac hadn’t sweat this much in a single day since he’d gotten out of the Marines.

Having dried himself as thoroughly as he could, Mac tied the towel around the swim trunks covering his modesty and reentered the house. There was no sign of Horatio or Speed, and Locard could be heard grumbling from the laundry room. The pan of cookies was sitting on top of the oven—or at least, the pan itself was. The cookies were gone.

Mac lifted an eyebrow and headed upstairs. His shirt and jeans were still clean, so he decided to take another shower. The water pressure was a bit lower than earlier, but that didn’t bother Mac. Horatio was probably taking a shower of his own in the master bath.

Feeling refreshed, Mac dressed himself and padded out into the hallway. The bedroom door at the end of the hallway was open, and Mac saw something beyond the opening that made him stop dead in his tracks.

Not something, but someone. Moving closer, Mac reached the doorway and halted at the sight before him.

Speed was on his knees, his mouth open, his face flushed, panting quietly. He was also naked, and hard as steel. There was an eye mask covering his eyes, the kind that is often used to help a person sleep on an airplane. His arms were crossed behind his back so that he was almost gripping his elbows, and he had a collar around his neck. On the floor in front of him was a sheet of paper, with the writing facing Mac, that proclaimed “You may look, but please do not disturb. He is not allowed to move or speak.”

Mac’s eyebrows hit the ceiling as he circled around the kneeling man, and he was surprised to see that the leash clipped to the collar was draped down Speed’s back, wrapped around his wrists. There was just enough slack that so long as Speed didn’t relax his arms then the collar wouldn’t choke him. As widespread as Speed’s knees were, his feet were rather close together, and there was a reason for it: Horatio’s handcuffs were on Speed’s ankles. Leaning in for a better look, Mac heard the unmistakable sound of a vibrator, and he tracked the noise to a plug between Speed’s lightly furred asscheeks.

What the hell?

Mac stood and glanced around. In the master bathroom, he could hear indeed hear the shower running. He glanced from the doorway to the note, and back to Speed. The cop in him wanted nothing more than to untie the man and set him free, but at the same time… he looked like he was enjoying himself, on some level.

The water in the bathroom shut off, and Mac stalked through the doorway and onto the tiled floor, where Horatio had just begun scrubbing the towel up his ankles. Hearing the footsteps, the naked and dripping redhead glanced up, saw the expression on his face, and carefully schooled his own expression to one of unconcern.

“Horatio, what in the hell are you doing to him?” Mac demanded.

The older man worked the towel up his thighs and hips. “He asked me to do it.”

Mac put his hands on his hips, giving his host a disbelieving look. “He asked you to tie him up, stick a vibrator in him, and tell him he can’t move or talk?”

“More or less,” Horatio said with a casual nod and swung the towel around behind him, pulling it back and forth and working his way up his back. “Speed is what they call a bondage bottom. It’s a fetish of his, to be tied up and dominated.”

“You mean…” Mac took a glance back at the kneeling, seemingly oblivious man. “He’s getting off on this?”

“Once I give him permission to, yes.”

The Marine’s gaze whipped back to Horatio. “Permission?”

“Permission to come.” Horatio rubbed the towel firmly over his chest and arms. “It’s one of the basic rules of submission, that you never come until you are given permission to do so.”

Mac could only stand there, his hands on his hips, watching Horatio briskly run the fabric over his hair. “How…”

“You’ve never done anything like this, have you?” Horatio asked dryly, wrapping the towel around his waist and knotting it at the hip. He was a little surprised; Mac had been so aghast that he hadn’t seemed the least bit bothered—or aroused—at Horatio’s nudity. Truly the Marine had a one-track mind in many aspects. Had Speed not been blindfolded, he probably would’ve been drooling.

Horatio reached for the little shelf next to the sink and grabbed his bristle-brush—like an oversized toothbrush, really—and straightened his hair. “As I told you before, Mac, it’s not about domination and controlling someone else. It’s about trust and controlling yourself.”

“So you’re not controlling him by doing that?”

“Well, in a way, I am,” Horatio admitted, “in that I’m the one giving the commands, and I’m the one with the keys to the handcuffs. He is also in control, in that he asked for this scene, and he decides how far it goes.”

Mac leaned against the doorframe, watching the near-naked redhead with an entirely platonic gaze. “So what if he wants out of it?”

Horatio glanced over his shoulder. “Speed, what’s your safeword?”

Speed swallowed. “David.”

Horatio nodded. “Thank you.”

Mac cocked his head. “’David?’”

“It’s my middle name,” Horatio said offhandedly, moving to plug in the hair dryer. “And my safeword is his middle name, Allen.”

Nothing else could be said while the appliance was running, so Mac wandered back out into the bedroom and took a seat on the loveseat on the wall opposite the bed, watching Speed. The bound man had started to tremble, faintly, at the sound of the hair dryer, and like Pavlov’s experiments of old, the minute the dryer was shut off Speed’s cock gave a definite twitch.

Horatio stepped into the bedroom, wearing nothing but a towel and apparently unconcerned. He was rather more modest than Speed, but at the same time he knew that it wasn’t anything that Mac hadn’t seen before.

“So what are you going to do to him?” Mac began. “Beat him?”

Horatio tilted his head. “I don’t think so. Not right now, anyway. I think I’ll just play with him for a little while.”

Mac’s brow furrowed. “What do you mean, play with him? Just stroke him off?”

The slim, freckled shoulders shrugged smoothly. “Whatever I feel like, really. Some of the best scenes are those that you make up as you go along.” He noticed the Marine’s look. “I know what you’re thinking, and that’s that I’m too old for this, and I would have to disagree. We don’t stop playing because we grow old, Mac. We grow old because we stop playing.”

The redhead walked past Speed and over to the bed, seating himself on the edge and looking at his lover. “You look, hungry, Speed. Would you like something to eat?” Horatio crooned.

If it was somehow possible, Speed got harder. “If it pleases you, sir.”

Horatio gave a dark chuckle. “Come closer to me.”

Mac watched as the kneeling, blindfolded man with the bound wrists and handcuffed ankles somehow managed to shuffle his way over to the older man sitting on the bed.

“Very good,” Horatio praised, running his fingers through the scruffy black hair. He bent for something on the floor, and Mac was amused to see a wine bucket full of ice. What was puzzling was that the wine bucket held… a half-gallon jug of milk? Horatio’s face was serene as he poured some into a glass on the nightstand, and then reached behind him on the bed for a plate that Mac hadn’t previously noticed; he’d been distracted, after all. On the plate were Speed’s cookies.

Horatio noticed Mac’s look. “It’s calming, really,” he said offhandedly as he grasped a cookie and dunked it in the milk. “It also reinforces trust. It shows him that I will provide for him, and that good things will come to him if he behaves.”

Mac’s breath caught in his throat as Horatio held the slightly soggy treat close to his lover’s lips. Speed scented it and opened his mouth, nosing around until he found it. Speed took small, slow bites until the entire thing was gone, and then he sensually licked and sucked Horatio’s fingers clean.

Horatio flicked a glance at Mac and saw that puzzlement had been replaced by incredulous arousal. He gave an inner smile of triumph and dunked another cookie in the milk, and the process was repeated. “You look like you’re a little thirsty, Speed,” Horatio murmured. “Would you like a drink?”

A small tremor ran through Speed’s body. “Only if it pleases you, sir,” he whispered again.

Horatio smiled down at his lover. “It would please me very much.” He reached down and pulled off the eye mask. “I want to see your eyes first, though,” he said quietly, cupping Speed’s chin. The big brown eyes looked back at him, full of submission and of trust. “I love you,” Horatio whispered, bending down to press a gentle kiss to Speed’s lips, and the brown eyes closed as Speed drank up the attention.

“Now, how about that drink?” Horatio murmured, slowly pulling back. He straightened and took a small mouthful of ice-cold milk from the glass, then tossed a glance at Mac before bending down and capturing Speed’s lips again. He was too preoccupied to see the Marine’s reaction, but he heard the shifting and the quiet intake of breath as Horatio filled Speed’s mouth, and the younger man dutifully swallowed it and licked the inside of Horatio’s mouth once, politely, before withdrawing.

“Anything you want to say to me, Pet?” Horatio asked as he gazed down lovingly at Speed.

Speed gazed back at him with those warm, trusting brown eyes. “I love you.”

Horatio smiled and filled his mouth with the milk again, giving his lover another drink, and he could definitely hear Mac’s breath hitch. He glanced up and quirked a smile. “Mac, you look like you’re enjoying yourself,” the redhead remarked casually. Mac blinked, then glanced down at his pants and the obvious tent in his crotch. “Would you like to feed Speed?”

Would you like to feed my puppy? Horatio was just that casual, and Mac couldn’t believe his ears. “You mean to tell me that he would just sit there and do that?” Mac asked.

Horatio smiled. “He’ll do whatever I want him to. Won’t you, Speed?” He threw a glance at the kneeling man.

Speed looked up at him. “Anything you want, sir,” he said calmly and firmly.

Horatio poured a little more milk and looked at his lover. “Take this over to Mac, and if you spill so much as a drop, you will be punished.” Horatio extended the glass. Speed eyed it for a moment, considering the best course of action, before leaning forward and clenching the opposite rim of the glass firmly between his teeth so that his chin was down in the container somewhat. He turned a bit awkwardly and made his way slowly across the carpet toward Mac, who took the cup with a faintly trembling hand.

Speed thought hard about that as he began the slow trek back toward Horatio. The look in the redhead’s eyes confirmed that he’d seen it, too: Mac was definitely getting turned on by Speed’s subservience. Speed wondered idly if he was indulging in a fantasy of doing this to Danny, but put it out of his mind once he opened his mouth and allowed Horatio to put two cookies between his teeth.

Speed shuffled slowly across the floor toward the seated Marine, and even though Mac was looking at him, neither of the Miami pair was sure that he was really seeing Speed. Horatio figured that he was probably imagining Danny in Speed’s position.

Mac dropped one cookie on the loveseat next to him and dunked the other one, holding it out with a hand that was definitely twitching, and Speed calmly and gently ate his prize. Then Mac’s jaw went slack and his eyes glazed as Speed gazed up at him with those soft brown eyes while he sucked tenderly on Mac’s fingers. Mac’s breath hitched as Speed swirled his tongue around them before sucking them into his mouth, pulling back with just the faintest touches of teeth, and Mac fought down a groan.

Horatio watched it all. So, Mac has a hidden hot spot, hmm? He likes to have his fingers sucked. He filed the little tidbit away for later, content for now to take in the sight of a definitely aroused Mac gazing down at Speed with glassy eyes, his free hand running fingers absently through his own hair. A signal. He sometimes runs his fingers through his hair when he’s getting turned on, Horatio noted.

“Mac?” Horatio’s voice jarred the Marine out of his reverie. “Mac, would you like for Speed to do something for you?”

Mac couldn’t find a way to put the words together, but Horatio read him correctly anyway. “Would you like Speed to suck you off, Mac?” the redhead asked sensually, and Mac felt his painfully hard cock give a definite twitch. “Undo your belt, Mac. He’ll do the rest.”

Mac fumbled one-handed with his belt, somehow unwilling to take his fingers from the caressing warmth of Speed’s mouth, but he finally had to. With something almost like a growl, Mac unbuckled his belt and suddenly Speed’s nose was to his fly, working the button with his lips and grasping the zipper with his teeth and tugging it down slowly. The tip of Mac’s impressive cock poked out from the front of his boxers, and Speed gently nudged around it until it was free, the thick rod standing straight and proud and with a surprising amount of precome leaking from the slit.

Horatio chuckled. “Something must be agreeing with you, Mac.”

Mac gave a shaky nod as Speed hovered scant millimeters away from Mac’s cock, his breath warm on the sensitive flesh. Mac frowned and twitched his hips, but Speed drew back, playing chicken with him. Mac tossed a glance at Horatio, who gave a casual shrug. “Speed, you may give Mac a blowjob, but it’s up to Mac to tell you how he wants it.”

Something flicked in Mac’s brain, and he placed a broad hand on the back of Speed’s head, aimed with his other hand, and caused the two to meet. Speed couldn’t hold back his groan as Mac’s beer can of a dick filled his mouth completely; he had to concentrate to avoid scraping the Marine with his teeth. He took a desperate breath through his nose as Mac pushed his head all the way down, a low growl emanating from the older man’s throat.

“Remember that he has to breathe, Mac,” Horatio chided. “I don’t mind you doing that to him—he loves it when you do that, by the way—but please be considerate of his airways from time to time. Speed, you have a signal to use if you need to breathe?”

In answer, Speed snapped his fingers twice, and Mac released him. “Good,” Horatio told both of them. “Go for it, Speed.”

Speed took a deep breath, swallowed to close the epiglottal valve, and Mac felt the head of his dick slide into Speed’s esophagus. Mac gave an animal growl and grasped Speed’s head roughly, bucking his hips up before sliding back and giving the younger man’s pharynx a break, and if Speed could have—his airways were blocked, after all—he would have moaned as that glorious hard monster cock raped his mouth over and over.

Twice he had to snap his fingers in order to be allowed to breathe, but in short order Mac was growling and shaking and then coming hard, his cock twitching and firing a blast of come into Speed’s throat, and Speed swallowed it gladly and milked Mac for all he was worth, seeking more.

Finally Mac released the younger man, who pulled back and gently licked Mac’s cock clean, then knelt with his back straight before the Marine, calmly waiting for more commands. Mac couldn’t think of any. All he could think of was how fast and how hard he’d just come.

“Speed?” Horatio’s voice came, and Speed shuffled in an about-face. Horatio stood in the middle of the floor, a white towel and a bottle of lube on the floor at his feet, and one hand gently stroking himself. “Come here, Speed,” Horatio ordered calmly, and Speed made his slow way to his lover, who reached down to cup his cheek. “That was very good, Speed,” the redhead said softly. “Finish getting me hard.”

Horatio was already stone hard but Speed complied anyway, stretching his neck out as Horatio’s length slid into his mouth, and back out, slowly and gently fucking the younger man’s face. Speed’s eyes were closed as he worshipped the redhead’s shaft, keeping a tight seal of suction that had Horatio gritting his teeth in no time. “Turn around, Speed,” Horatio hissed, and Speed released him and turned to face Mac again.

Horatio lowered himself to a crouch behind Speed and slowly pulled out the vibrating plug, silencing it and laying it on the nearby towel before reaching for the AstroGlide and slicking up his own length. “Are you ready for me, Speed?” Horatio rumbled as he positioned himself. In answer, Speed pushed gently back, inviting Horatio to press forward. “Good boy,” Horatio growled, gripping the younger man’s hips and pushing himself in.

Speed moaned as Horatio slid completely inside, and Horatio gave a satisfied sigh as his cock was enveloped in his lover’s heat. “God, Speed, you’re perfect,” Horatio groaned, swaying back and forth on the balls of his feet. His hands gently encouraged the younger man to lower his face to the carpet, his ass a perfect target for Horatio’s repeated thrusts.

The redhead glanced up at Mac. The Marine’s cock was slowly coming back to life, still hanging from his open fly, and his eyes were locked onto Speed’s gently ecstatic face. Crouching behind his lover, Horatio raised one hand and brought it down on Speed’s flank with a sharp slap, and the younger man jerked his head up and moaned.

Mac’s eyes widened. “He likes that?”

Horatio shrugged his shoulders as he pumped in and out of that tight heat. “When he’s like this, he enjoys being degraded, to a small extent.” He pulled back enough so that only the tip of his dick rested in Speed and he reached down and grabbed two firm handfuls of the younger man’s ass, kneading the globes between his fingers. Speed gave a watery groan and pressed his forehead into the carpet. Horatio smiled and drew his hands back, then sent underhanded slaps to both cheeks with both hands, then grasped them firmly and began pounding his lover, and Speed arched his back and all but whimpered.

“Yes, you like that, don’t you?” Horatio hissed, seizing Speed’s hips and drawing that tight ass back onto himself. “Don’t you, Pet?”

Speed’s mouth worked for a moment, fighting off his arousal so he could speak. “It pleases you to do it, sir, and that’s what I like.”

Horatio smiled at him, bending to nip at a shoulder before rearing back and fucking his lover hard. His voice was still calm, and almost clinically dry as he spoke to Mac. “I’m more of an intensivist. I like to play with sensations, with pain, and generally just have sex. Speed here likes you to tie him up and do things to him.”

Mac watched with glassy eyes as Horatio slammed in and out of his bound lover, the redhead’s face tight and eyes closed, Speed panting as the fleshy rod ravaged his depths.

Horatio let out a loud growl, then sucked in a breath and thrust one last time, his ankles twitching as he came inside his lover. He stayed there for a moment, reveling in the wet heat before sliding out slowly. “Hold it in you,” Horatio commanded. “I want to play with you while I know that you have my come inside you.” Speed moaned and visibly clamped his sphincter closed, the tight muscle glistening with the thick liquid behind it.

“Very good,” Horatio praised, running his fingers through the tangle of hair on Speed’s chest. Speed jerked and groaned as both of Horatio’s hands tweaked his nipples. “Roll over, Speed. On your back, and don’t spill a single drop of my come.” Speed did as he was told, and Horatio ran his fingers possessively over the hair on his lover’s chest and belly. “You have such a wonderful body, Speed,” the redhead rumbled. “You have a wonderful body and I love playing with it.”

“Th-thank you, sir,” Speed gasped as one of the slim hands grasped his cock.

“Speed, you may fuck my hand.”

This didn’t seem like much of a reward to Mac, but Speed let out a loud groan and began bucking his hips against Horatio’s palm, letting the redhead jerk him off.

“Would you like to please me, Speed?” Horatio murmured loud enough for Mac to hear.

Speed arched his back. “Always, sir.”

Horatio smiled and tightened his grip on Speed’s thrusting cock. “You may come now.”

Mac could see something happen in Speed’s body, the permission releasing its hold on the younger man’s orgasm, and Speed bucked harder into Horatio’s hand and gave a wrenching cry as his release tore through him, his cock sputtering the ivory streamers that rained down on the dark curls on his chest. Speed stayed like that, his hips up and his ass off the ground, Horatio firmly gripping his cock.

Eventually Speed’s hips sagged and his rear came to rest on the floor, his chest heaving. Horatio’s gaze was intense. “Look at me,” he murmured, and Speed fastened his eyes on his lover as the redhead ran his fingers over the younger man’s chest, collecting the blood-hot fluid on his fingertips and bringing them to his own mouth. Speed—and Mac—both sucked in a breath as Horatio sensually licked the thick fluid off his fingers, then bent down and gave the shrinking cock a lick, taking the head into his mouth and bathing it and cleansing it with his tongue.

Horatio released the cock and sat up. “Very good,” he murmured. “You may speak, Speed.”

Speed gazed up at his lover with such love and trust that Mac felt his breath catch in his throat. “I love you, H,” Speed said firmly.

Horatio stroked his lover’s cheek tenderly. “I love you, too, Speed. You were wonderful.” Horatio bent down again, giving the younger man a sweet, loving kiss before sitting up again. “Unfortunately it’s time to come level.”

Speed sighed morosely and ducked his head, closing his eyes. There was a momentary silence, and when the brown-eyed man looked at them again, the submission was gone. “My knees hurt,” he grumbled.

“Well, you’re the one that misplaced the knee pads,” Horatio said dryly. Speed gave a grudging nod and sat up, and he turned his back so that Horatio could untie him. The younger man threw a glance at Mac as his lover’s hands worked on his bonds, and Speed saw Mac finally snap out of it, then glance down and stuff himself back into his pants.

“You liked that, Mac?” Speed asked calmly as his arms were freed, and brought his hands together in the front and rubbed his wrists. Horatio half-stood and slapped his hand around on the bed, looking for the key to his handcuffs.

Mac nodded slowly. “That was… intense.”

Speed and Horatio hid their smiles; that scene had been incredibly mild compared to their normal level of play, but they hadn’t wanted to scare their guest. Speed heard the snap of his ankle restraints being released, and he climbed to his feet and stretched. “Anything you want to ask me?”

Mac leaned back and thought a moment. “Just one thing, really: why?”

Speed knew what he meant; not ‘why do you ask,’ but ‘why submit?’ “Well, like H said, it’s kinda a fetish of mine. And on another level, it shows him how much I trust him. Honestly, Mac, that scene was pretty damn tame considering what we usually do to each other.”

Mac lifted an eyebrow. “And what do you usually do to each other?”

Speed paused to help Horatio to his feet, and the redhead put the lube back in the nightstand and folded the mostly-clean towel on the bed for Speed to sit. “Well, why don’t you come clubbing with us tomorrow night and find out for yourself?”

The Marine froze, suddenly nervous. “I… I don’t want to impose.”

“Nonsense, Mac,” Horatio cut in. “We’d be happy to have you come along. Consider it a learning experience, if only as further criminalist research.” At Mac’s puzzled look, Horatio continued. “You see a victim with ligature marks on the wrists and extensive bruising on the back, and you think ‘abuse’ or ‘kidnapping.’ To us, it could just as easily be someone who asked to be tied up and strapped.”

Speed nodded. “A lot of things considered ‘abusive’ or even borderline ‘torture’ to people used to vanilla sex, well, for us it’s par for the course. The difference is that we ask for it, and we stop when the bottom wants it stopped.”

Mac cocked his head. “’Vanilla sex?’”

Speed scratched his neck. “Just regular, plain old intercourse. No kinks, no interesting positions, no bells or whistles or anything like that. Kinda like vanilla ice cream: nothing else has been added to it.”

Mac leaned forward, his elbows on his knees, as Horatio dug around in one side of the dresser for boxers and a pair of jeans. “What’s so great about submitting?” Mac asked Speed, who had sat down on the bed and was working on another milk-soaked cookie.

Speed shrugged one shoulder. “It’s hard to explain, but it’s kinda nice to just give yourself to somebody else.”

Horatio nodded, sliding a T-shirt over his head. The shirt was dark blue and had a white-line picture of a stern police officer on it, and the caption said ‘Hi, I’m going to kick your ass.’ “Mac, you were in the Marines, so you know something about obedience. Do you ever remember feeling pleasure at following orders, at someone telling you what to do and you doing it, and they praise you?”

Mac gave a thoughtful nod. “Giving it 110% was always enough for me, but it’s still nice to have somebody else acknowledge it.”

Horatio sat next to Speed and swiped a cookie, and Speed growled and sat the plate down on his opposite side. Horatio eyed him calmly, and Speed sighed and put the plate back in his lap. Horatio smiled and continued. “There is a definite pleasure in pleasing someone else, Mac; Doms and subs take it one step further, where the sub strives with their entire being to please their Dom, their master. There is also the pleasure of discovering your limits, and surpassing them, and all in a safe and controlled environment.”

Mac considered for a moment, processing that. “So, could you say that obedience and submission are the same thing?”

“No,” Horatio growled, nearly cutting off the Marine’s words. “There can be obedience without submission. I could order you to do something, and you would obey just to go along with it, to accede to my wishes.”

“On the other hand,” Speed continued, “submission isn’t an act, it’s a state of mind. I wanted to please him, I wanted him to be happy with whatever I did. I know that I can trust him, and that whatever he does to me will be for my own good, and will usually be all kinds of fun.”

Horatio gave a little smile. “Despite what you may think, Mac, I wasn’t in control of that little scene. He was.” Mac blinked, and Horatio’s smile deepened. “The submissive controls the scene. They determine how far it will go. Any time he wanted me to stop, all he would have to do is make a sound or a gesture that we’ve long ago established, and I would stop right then and there.”

Speed grinned. “I had the easy job. I just sat there and let him take care of me. He’s the one that had to come up with the scene, tie me up, feed me, and order me around.” He paused. “Carting the glass of milk across the floor while tied up like that, well, that kinda sucked, but it was still fun.”

Mac frowned. “It sucked but it was still fun? You’re going to have to explain that one to me.”

Speed shrugged. “Physical challenge, getting it across the floor. Intellectual challenge, how to grip it. Mental challenge, being able to pull it off while still remaining submissive, to make H proud. Mac, BDSM isn’t all about 1001 Fun Ways To Get Off. It’s about really fucking you up, and showing you who you really are and what you can do. What you’re willing to do for somebody that you love and trust.”

“Speaking of what you’re willing to do for me,” Horatio started dryly, “would you like to take a shower and put some clothing on, Speed? You’re distracting Mac.”

“And you?” Speed gave a dirty grin, leaning in for a quick kiss before standing. He wandered into the bathroom without grabbing any clean clothes, and Horatio sighed.

“Another fetish of Speed’s is exhibitionism,” the redhead said with a long-suffering smile. He took the plate of cookies and the glass of milk and moved to sit next to Mac. “He likes people to watch. And you, if I remember correctly, have a small bit of a voyeuristic streak in you.”

Mac made a face and took a cookie for himself. “Not really. I just like being able to see what people are doing to me.”

“Mm-hmm.” Horatio’s tone said he didn’t believe him, but they sat quietly and finished off the plate of cookies anyway. They talked a while longer, and for the rest of the night Horatio and Speed respected the personal space of their guest (to an extent). One step at a time…

You can walk away from your mistakes
You can turn your back on what you do
Just a little smile is all it takes
And you can have your cake and eat it too

Loneliness will get to you somehow
But everybody loves you now

Billy Joel – "Everybody Loves You Now"

The next day was largely uneventful. Horatio went to work again, while Speed stayed home with Mac. It surprised the Marine that Speed didn’t proposition Mac for sex at all that day. He was roped into helping Speed do some more work on repairing his Ducati, but for the most part Mac simply played with Locard and swam in the ocean and was given a general tour of some of the more interesting places in Miami. So far, it was shaping up to be a nice, relaxing vacation.

It was when Horatio got home that things became interesting. The redhead took a shower, and while he was getting dressed in casual clothes, Speed took his own time to get cleaned up. Like they were getting ready to go somewhere.

Mac remarked on it, and Horatio gave him an intriguing smile. “Pack a change of clothes, Mac. We’re leaving as soon as Speed gets out of the shower.”

Mac furrowed his brow. “And where are we going?”

Horatio’s smile turned dark and mischievous. “To the club, remember?”

“Oh.” Mac blinked as a small wave of nervous discomfort hit him. On the one hand, it sounded like an interesting and titillating experience. On the other, he couldn’t help but wonder what he was getting himself into. He merely sighed, looked at Horatio, and said, “Okay.”

Horatio drove, with Speed in the passenger seat and Mac in the back, talking idly as they drove. Mac tended to avoid the subject of their destination, instead sticking to Horatio’s day at work.

That is, until they started driving down the back roads and Speed pointed out the huge mansion in the distance. It wasn’t true that this was the only building for miles; it was simply in a rather isolated location, with most of the locals either working at the club or providing services like utilities or supplies, and others refusing to acknowledge its existence. There was a tall and snugly-boarded wooden fence around most of the grounds, which Speed explained to be for people who wanted to do outdoor scenes.

“I’ll bet the neighbors love that,” Mac observed.

Speed twisted in his seat and grinned at him. “Why do you think it’s out in the middle of nowhere? And let’s be honest, here, complete basements aren’t the most practical things in Miami. At least it’s high enough above sea level that there’s just a little bit underground.”

Mac took a good, long look at the building. “It looks… friendly.”

Horatio snorted as they took the slow drive up the small hill. “Only the truly brave man—or woman—with no reputation to lose would willingly walk into an obvious dungeon wearing nothing but bondage gear.”

“Don’t misunderstand it, Mac,” Speed put in. “It is a dungeon, with plenty of dark and scary places where people can do all kinds of dark and scary and insanely fun things to each other.”

“It’s a friendly dungeon,” Horatio finished with a smile.

Mac had no idea how to take that. “A friendly dungeon, where people willingly come to be tortured?”

“Exactly,” his hosts said in unison, tossing knowing smiles at each other.

Mac scratched his head, inwardly wondering Why the hell am I coming here, again? “So, tell me some more about the whole scene.”

Speed cocked his head. “That’s a broad question. Where do you want me to start?”

Mac gave a casual shrug. “How about safety guidelines?”

“Good question,” Speed replied. “I’ll be honest, Mac, we try to follow SSC but not everybody sticks to that level.”

Mac looked blank.

“Sorry. SSC is ‘safe, sane, consensual.’ We try to stay safe, with the Monitors watching close and sometimes having somebody else Second the top to help out with the scene. We strictly adhere to the safeword. And we treat our wounds immediately, and we keep everything nice and sanitary. Mistress Pamela is… obsessive-compulsive when it comes to hygiene.

“Sane, well, most people really wouldn’t think that restraining somebody and flogging them is sane by any stretch. It’s more like ‘keeping within reasonable human tolerances.’ I don’t consider it sane, either, but it’s fun.”

Mac tilted his head. “I’ll take your word for it. Now, consensual?”

Horatio answered for the younger man, giving a wry smile. “Come on, Mac, you know that consent means a world of difference in so many of the things people do to each other. What we take it to mean is that if you didn’t ask for it, if you didn’t give permission for it to happen, then it’s not going to happen. If you don’t consent to keep going, then the scene will stop.” He flicked a glance at his lover. “While Speed may not always ask for my consent before he starts a scene, he always offers a chance to safeword almost immediately into it.”

Speed gave a dirty grin. “You know what they say. You can’t rape the willing, and you can’t torture a masochist.”

“Well, of course you can torture a masochist,” Horatio shot back.

Mac fell for it. “How?”

Speed and Horatio looked at each other and smiled. “You don’t,” they said in perfect unison, and began laughing.

“Don’t? What… oh.” Mac got the joke. “You mean, you torture them by not torturing them.”

“Something like that, yeah,” Speed muttered as Horatio pulled into the gravel lot in front of the building. There were no official parking spaces here, but the cars were parked neatly nonetheless. Mac carried his tote bag as he followed the other two up to the front door.

Horatio held the door open for his guest. “Will you walk into my parlor?’” the redhead started in a deceptively smooth voice.

Mac eyed him warily. “’Said the spider to the fly,’” he finished.

Horatio chuckled before giving him a pointed look. “When you pass through this door, you leave your public life behind. Your private life becomes your public life.” Horatio stared hard at him, making sure that he understood. “You are no longer Mac Taylor, Detective, First Grade. You’re just Mac, a newcomer to the club and under the tutelage of myself. I am no longer Lieutenant Horatio Caine. I’m just H, or Master Cain as most call me. That’s Cain, without the E.”

“And I’m Mr. Deeps,” Tim piped up. “Only a couple of people call me by my real name, and those are people that we’ve known a long time, and we know their names. Until you get to that level of trust with somebody else, the only things anybody knows about you are your preferences and your nickname. Which, by the way, you need to pick.”

Mac thought about that as he entered the club, taking in the sights and sounds. It didn’t look like a dungeon. Really, it looked like a Victorian mansion that someone had turned into a nightclub. “Fender,” he said suddenly.

Speed cocked his head. “Fender? Like a car bumper?”

Mac gave him a look. “Like the guitar. I play a little.”

Horatio gave him an even look. “Is that your nickname, Mac?”

The Marine nodded. “Yeah. I mean, it’s not like I’m going to be using it very much, am I?”

The Miami couple had to give him that one as they waved hello to the bouncer and stepped to reception, where the same middle-aged woman with the blood-red nails was waiting for them. “Master Cain, Mr. Deeps,” she greeted. “You bring a friend with you tonight?”

Horatio nodded. “He needs to register. Club name is Fender, please. Bisexual.” Mac threw him a wild look, but Horatio merely kept that calm stare.

“Medical history? Any allergies? Blood type? Oh, and his real name?” Sandy—the woman—poised her hands over her keyboard.

Mac swallowed and gave it all up, and she punched in the keys. “Now, I just need to see some ID and to take your picture, and you’re all set,” she chirped. Mac shot his hosts a nervous look but complied. She didn’t bat an eyelash at the badge in his wallet, but merely looked up at the regular patrons. “I wish I had your job,” she cooed in Speed’s direction. “You meet so many hot men there.”

Speed shot his lover a steamy look. “Yeah, I do.”

Mac couldn’t remember the last time he’d blushed, but he was definitely about to start now. With unbelievable casualness, Sandy grabbed a tag and stuck it in the engraving machine. When it was done stamping Mac’s club name onto it, she took it out, blew off the shavings, and wheeled around to the other side of her little booth to grab a half-pink half-blue rubber ring and fit it around the tag. “You have a collar for him?” she inquired casually as she peeled a barcode sticker off a page and stuck it on the back.

Mac coughed.

Speed looked sideways at him, then turned back to Sandy. “You got a chain we can borrow?”

Sandy dug around in a few drawers before coming up with a small-gauge beaded chain not unlike the one that usually held Mac’s dog tags; he didn’t wear them much anymore. “Only for you two,” she said firmly, giving Horatio a stern look as the redhead took the tag and the chain and fitted them together. “And I need that back by the end of the night. That’s one of my temporary chains, remember?”

“No worries,” Horatio soothed, attaching the tag to the chain and handing it to Mac. He and Speed then dumped all of their pockets’ contents into Sandy’s waiting basket, and Mac swallowed and did the same. “Perhaps I should’ve said ‘enter freely and by your own will,’” Horatio said dryly.

Speed snickered. “I’m not calling you ‘Count Cain’ tonight, H.”

Mac stood there for a moment. “Bram Stoker’s Dracula?”

“Yup.” Speed extended his elbow, and Horatio took it. “C’mon, Mac, let’s go get changed. Your education awaits.”

Ah, they all want your white body and they await your reply
Ah, but between you and me and the Staten Island Ferry
So do I

Billy Joel – "Everybody Loves You Now"

“Glad Speed had some pants to fit you, Mac,” Horatio told the Marine as the trio began changing clothing in the locker rooms.

Mac was a bit hesitant at stripping along with his hosts. If Horatio and Speed had lacked modesty before, they were downright shameless now, especially with Speed taking extra care to help tuck his lover’s cock into the redhead’s incredibly tight leather pants. Never in a thousand years would Mac have expected to see Horatio Caine in black leather pants, especially pants that tight. It looked like the older man had been poured into them.

Speed noticed Mac’s stare. “Don’t worry, you’ll get a piece of him later.”

Mac furrowed his brow, as did Horatio. “I thought I was in charge tonight,” the redhead started.

Speed shrugged and dropped his pants and boxers, switching them for his ‘clubbing’ jeans. “This place, you never know what kind of scene you’re going to get roped into.”

Mac swallowed and stripped to his shorts, and he could feel the heat creeping up his neck at the sudden and incredibly lewd stares Horatio and Speed were sending toward him—or more specifically, to his groin. “Do you mind?” he growled after a while.

“Not really,” Speed said absently. “Nothing we haven’t seen before.”

Horatio sighed and ran his fingers through Speed’s hair, turning the younger man’s head to face him. “Let’s go easy on him, Speed. It’s his first time here.” He flicked a glance at Mac. “Hurry up and get dressed, and I’ll distract him.”

Before Mac could wonder what the redhead meant, Horatio’s tongue dove between Speed’s lips, and his lover gave a choked moan and slid his arms around Horatio’s waist, grabbing a handful of leather-clad skin. Mac blinked, remembered something about Horatio ‘distracting’ Speed, and quickly changed clothing. Gone were the black jeans and black t-shirt; he was now wearing a white muscle-shirt (he didn’t know why he’d packed it, but oh well) and an old pair of Speed’s jeans. Speed and Mac were the same height, but Mac’s extra muscle made the denim a bit more snug than he was used to. He left his boxers on, to prevent undue friction burns.

A pair of simple sandals and his new neckchain completed the ensemble, and he finished stuffing his clothing into his bag and placed it neatly in the locker. “I’m done,” he said absently over his shoulder.

No response.

He turned, to see that Horatio had sank down onto one of the benches with Speed in his lap, and Mac was seeing enough tongue to put Locard (the dog) to shame. Despite both of them being fully clothed, they also seemed desperate to try and break one of the most fundamental laws of physics: ‘no two distinct objects can occupy the same space at the same time.’ They weren’t, but they were trying. “Guys?”

The Miami pair broke apart for much-needed oxygen, and Mac sighed. “Didn’t the sign say to not have sex in here?”

“We weren’t!” Speed protested as he untangled himself from Horatio’s legs and stood.

Mac crossed his arms, and Horatio grudgingly stood as well. Speed paused to give his lover a quick swat on his second skin. “You need to loosen up, Mac.” He reached into the locker for a large mesh bag and pulled out several loops of metal-accentuated leather (and a few nylon), sorting them out into his and Horatio’s collars and wrist-and-ankle cuffs. Horatio took out a leash, but looped it diagonally around his shoulder and waist.

“I’m sorry, I’m not used to walking around in a place full of people who aren’t very subtle about trying to get in my pants,” Mac said dryly, hiding his sudden surge of lust at the sight of his hosts in collars. Maybe he’d enjoy himself tonight after all.

“Just remember the rule, and they should get the hint,” Speed tossed out as they began heading out of the locker room.

Naturally, Mac wondered “What rule?”

Speed shrugged. “Don’t sweat the petty things, and don’t pet the sweaty things.”

Horatio shook his head, but he couldn’t keep the smile off his face as they walked down the hallway. “You have a filthy mind.”

Speed grinned and slung an arm over the redhead’s shoulder. “Only the best for you, H.”

Mac rolled his eyes. “Have I ever told you that you two are the Devil made flesh?”

“You may have mentioned it once or twice,” Horatio replied idly, wrapping an arm around Speed’s waist. The trio emerged at the edge of the dance floor, where already a large crowd was bumping and grinding away despite the fact that the sun hadn’t even set yet. They moved along the outer edges of the dance crowd until Mac realized they were headed for a set of double-doors over which was posted a large metal sign with the universal circle-and-arrow symbol for ‘male.’ Next to it was an equally large circle-and-cross ‘female’ symbol, with a red X painted over it.

Speed grinned at Mac’s look. “Mistress Pamela was kind enough to give us homosexuals our own separate areas. I don’t have to look at a single naked woman if I stay in this section.”

“Congratulations,” Horatio grumped, “but not all of us hate the sight of a naked female, Speed.”

Speed patted his lover on the head. “You know what they say, H, admitting you have a problem is the first step to recovery.”

Mac snorted and moved ahead of them to open the door, feeling a bit self-conscious at the sudden interested looks that random men were sending him—as well as more than a few disappointed looks from the women. Apparently he was too far away for them to see what color(s) graced his tag ring.

“We don’t get down here too often,” Speed said idly as they passed into XY-dominated territory. “There’s just not enough room for all the elitist, same-sex snobs to have their own separate dungeons, so if we wanna get our asses shredded, it has to be in a one-rack-fits-all area. Unfortunately that means that I have to see women naked every now and then, but I think the pros outweigh the cons. But down here, in the men-only section…” he paused for effect, and grinned, “It can get pretty damn kinky.”

“Speaking of which,” Horatio murmured as they ducked into the first room on the left of the hallway, “get naked.”

Mac blinked.

Speed’s grin was downright lascivious. “We dressed up to walk through the dance floor, Mac. Down here, everybody’s got the same parts and since we kinda come here for that sort of harassment…” He let his voice trail off as Mac saw yet another bank of lockers, except that these were quite a bit smaller. Some had locks secured on them, and others had opened locks with keys in them. Speed took one of the locks off and opened the door, and clipped the key to one of his wrist cuffs. He then promptly stripped himself of his vest and patched jeans.

Horatio threw a look at Mac as the Miami pair stood there wearing nothing but body hair, collars, cuffs, and sandals. “Come on, Mac. Believe me, you have absolutely nothing to be embarrassed about.”

Mac was hesitant until Speed grabbed the leash and snapped it onto Horatio’s collar. The redhead blinked, gave Speed a long look, and ducked his head. The younger man then grinned at Mac. “Get naked, and I’ll let you hold his leash.”

Mac’s jaw went slack, and he made up his mind. He could put up with being surrounded by other naked men for a while, if his prize was Horatio Caine on a leash. The redhead didn’t even look at Mac as the Marine was finally naked, but Speed’s gaze swept up and down him as though considering putting a collar on Mac’s muscular neck.

Mac gave a wry smile and held out his hand. “You promised.”

Speed grinned and suddenly reached out for the back of Horatio’s neck, and the redhead closed his eyes and dropped (carefully) to his knees. “Make no mistake, Mac,” Speed said casually as he laid a possessive hand on Horatio’s copper hair, “H belongs to me. Later on I might let you order him around for a while, but right now I’ve got something planned for him.”

“May I speak?” Horatio asked quietly, his eyes to the floor.

Speed looked down at him. “Sure.”

Horatio dared a glance up at his lover. “Are we still going to give you a strapping?”

“Yeah, sure, you betcha,” Speed said a little too quickly. “Now, Pet, you may explain things to Mac if he asks, and you can walk when we do and stand when we stop, but I still want your eyes down and your mouth shut. Got it?”

“Yes, sir,” Horatio murmured, and Speed handed the leash over to Mac.

The Marine stared down at his new acquisition, feeling a strange thrill of lust shoot through him at the sight of the redhead on his knees, a collar around his neck and his leash on Mac’s wrist.

“Cool, huh?” Speed’s voice came, and Mac glanced up to see Speed looking slyly at him. “You oughta do this to Danny. I bet he’d look all kinds of sexy in a collar.”

Mac’s gaze dropped back to Horatio, but the Miami pair was sure that Mac was picturing Danny in Horatio’s place. “Yeah, I should,” he murmured after a while. Then he suddenly seemed to remember that he’d dumped Danny a week ago, shook his head as if to clear it, and looked up. “So, now what?”

Speed turned and beckoned, and Horatio got to his feet and stood behind Mac and to one side. The youngest man began walking. “I’m going to find a backup for the scene, first. It’s a little risky.”

Mac furrowed his brows and tossed a glance over his shoulder at Horatio. “Strapping is just hitting somebody with a leather belt, right? How risky could it be?”

Horatio didn’t answer, which made Mac frown until Speed jumped in. “That’s a rhetorical question around here. Just about anything can be dangerous if it’s done the wrong way.”

“Isn’t that the truth,” a male voice put in, and the trio turned to see a mostly-blond man in his early thirties, with brown eyes and a slim build, and a light dusting of hair on his chest that condensed into a thin stripe down his belly to his limp cock. There was a white band around his bicep with a red cross on it, and a matching messenger-style tote bag hung at his left hip from his right shoulder. He had on a loose-fitting gray collar with a tag that said Travis and indicated that he was bisexual. A second, large orange tag hung behind the first.

Speed eyed the newcomer. “Hey, Travis, just the man I wanted to see.”

Travis put his hands on his hips. “Why does it make me nervous every time you say that?” Speed didn’t answer, and Travis sighed. “I heard you put in a request that you’d need a member of the medical staff to Second you tonight.”

Speed nodded, and leaned in to whisper something in the Medical man’s ear. Travis frowned, and sighed. “What is it with you and potentially dangerous scenes?”

Speed crossed his arms. “What is it with you and trying to dictate everybody else’s comfort zones?”

Horatio coughed and shifted his weight to stand more comfortably. Speed glanced back at him, dropped his shoulders, and gave a grudging sigh. “Sorry. Last time I did something like this, I was kinda occupied and I didn’t have much of a chance to pay attention to all the safety guidelines.”

Mac was bewildered. “I thought you said you’d done this several times. Is a strapping really that dangerous?”

Travis eyed the Marine for a moment, then his gaze shifted to Horatio, where the redhead gave a single nod as if to tell him that everything was under control and don’t worry about surprising big, muscular Fender. The blond man looked back at Speed. “How many?”

“Six or seven, at least,” Speed answered vaguely.

“Has he done something like this before? Are you sure he can handle that many?” Travis’ voice became dry and clinical, much like a doctor asking where it hurt.

“He can handle it,” Speed assured him. “I know how to read him.”

Travis thought hard, putting his hands on his hips. “I don’t know if I can, Deeps. You know I hate scenes like this.”

Speed wouldn’t hear it. “Come on, you still owe me from skipping out on that one orgy, the night that Reno came in!”

Horatio leaned over to whisper quickly to Mac that Reno was another old friend of theirs that had moved out to Vegas.

Travis’ eyes grew wide. “Deeps, that was almost a year ago!”

“Ten months, to be a bit more precise.”

Travis sputtered and rubbed the back of his neck. “I… I had plans that night,” he offered lamely.

Travis was fishing, and Speed knew it. You can’t hide from a criminalist. “Come on, Travis, at least shoulder me. Play medical, for Cain’s well-being. You’ve done this kind of scene before and I want your expertise.”

The blond man thought for a long moment, put his hands on his hips, sighed, and nodded. “All right, all right, I’ll do it.”

Horatio, however, looked rather confused as he dared to look Speed in the eye, playing along. “What do you mean, for my well-being? I thought we were going to strap you.” His brows furrowed suspiciously at his lover. “What kind of scene have you set up, Deeps?”

The kind of chuckle he got as a reply was not reassuring.

“Cain,” Speed began casually, “It occurred to me, on Fender’s last visit, how much you enjoyed the little scene that I set up for you. I wondered how I’d be able to top it.” He gave his lover a dark look, grinning wolfishly, and held out his hand for Mac to give him the leash back. “I think I came up with something.”

Horatio suddenly felt his arms grabbed from behind, by two sets of very large hands. Before he could protest, someone else came up behind him and blindfolded him. Stripped of his sight, his handlers began bodily moving him in the direction of Speed’s voice, and he realized from the sounds that Speed had begun walking again. The leash was far too slack, and Horatio figured that Speed had dropped it completely.

He had also begun talking again. “If you thought that little scene was intense, Pet, then you’re about to receive the fucking of a lifetime.”

Sound changed, and Horatio felt that he was being ushered into a larger room, full of quiet people. How many, he had no idea. He heard Mac grunt a question at Speed, and while he couldn’t distinguish his lover’s words, the tone said that Speed was reassuring Mac that everything was on the up-and-up.

“Felix? Jaelix? If you would, please?” Speed asked cordially, and Horatio’s handlers—now identified, which reassured him slightly—walked him a bit farther.

One let go of him, and the other turned him slightly, then the other hands reappeared on his arm. One hand moved to his back, not-so-gently urging him to bend over until he felt his stomach come to rest against something with some sort of padding. “Hold still,” one of them—Jaelix, he reasoned by the voice—said gruffly, and he felt his arms become crossed behind his back, folded across each other levelly. “Comfortable?” Jaelix whispered. Horatio nodded, and he felt a metal clip being attached to one of his wrist cuffs. His arms were lifted enough for what felt like a long leather belt to wrap around both forearms in a loose spiral that was clipped to his other wrist. His arms were comfortable enough; he just couldn’t move them.

Since Jaelix was at his wrists, that meant that Felix was working on his legs. They were nudged far apart, more clips becoming attached to his ankle cuffs. When he was secured like that, they began taking more measures for his comfort; what felt like kneepad slings and something like stirrups were slid into place, and also clipped to the legs of his little bench-like perch, so that he could keep his legs bent somewhat comfortably without straining his calves to keep his feet flat on the floor.

The padding on the table only covered his upper belly and most of his ribcage, he realized. Another strap was laid across his lower back, tying him to his bench. Two more straps were crossed in an X across his back, over his shoulders and under his arms, to keep his chest pinned. His leash was removed, to be replaced by a shorter strap that secured his neck to the bench. As a last resort—and he almost protested, as if he could—some sort of strap was slid over his head to rest at the base of his skull, and a rubber-coated steel bit was nudged into his mouth.

“Stretch your neck out,” Felix’s voice ordered, and Horatio did that, to find that at the edge of the padding was a small depression that fit his chin comfortably. So why the bit, he wondered. At this angle, he was perfectly positioned to suck on somebody.

“Looks good, guys,” he heard Speed say. “What’d you call this thing again, Artie?”

Artie is here? Horatio thought wonderingly. The owner of Artie’s Adult Playground, and an acquaintance of Horatio’s for many years. Of course the man would be here, the lecher, and the thought made him smile inwardly. Artie was something of an exception to the club: he wasn’t a patron here for sex. He was more like a traveling salesman, and occasionally he brought “samples” of his “products” for an “appreciative audience” to try and to ask questions about. More than once, this practice had lead Mistress Pamela to purchase something from Artie to be used in the club. They also referred clients to each other, making it the perfect business relationship.

“I haven’t thought of anything more glamorous than a ‘man’s fuck-bench,’” Artie confessed. “Although from the height, maybe it should be a fuck-table.”

Speed laughed, and Horatio felt something small and hard and cube-ish pressed into the palm of his right hand, then his fingers were curled carefully around it and his thumb was pressed into an oval-shaped depression on one side. “Pet, this is gonna be your safeword,” Speed explained. “It’s a dog-training clicker. Go ahead, give it a few.”

Horatio squeezed his thumb down, and a loud, tinny click-clack! echoed in the rather large chamber. He took his top’s advice and clicked it a few times, settling it more comfortably into his hand. The sound reminded him of the ‘tamper-evident cap’ on a jar of pasta sauce; once the seal was broken and pressure was equalized inside the jar, pressing on the raised circle near the middle of the metal lid resulted in a loud, metallic double-pop.

Speed went on. “Okay, now here’s the system: if somebody asks you something, one click is a positive response. Two clicks is negative, three means you want something, and four means ‘Stop right the fuck now.’ Got it?”

Click.

“Sure?”

Click.

“Want to stop?”

Click. Click.

“Good boy.” Horatio felt a hand, probably Speed’s, run affectionate fingers through his hair as his lover raised his voice. “Friends and fellow ass-rammers, I’d like to thank you for coming to this little scene. I’m Mr. Deeps, and this handsome fuck-toy is Cain. The big, nervous guy next to me is Fender. Fender is a friend of ours from New York that’s been wondering why we do what we do, so we’re going to show him.

“What we’re gonna do here is simple: we’re gonna fuck Cain’s brains out. I want you to get yourselves hard, and then we’ll line you up in order of dick size. No offense to anybody, but the smaller guys go first. We wanna save some friction, after all.” A few chuckles washed over Horatio’s straining ears and he had to wonder, not for the first time or even the tenth, just how many men were in the room.

Speed continued. “Condoms are a must, so anybody that doesn’t like ‘em or can’t wear ‘em, I’m sorry we wasted your time. Feel free to watch, though. Or fuck each other, it’s all good. As far as Cain goes, other things you need to know are: no biting, no pinching, no scratching, no tickling, no playing with the hair or nipples, no spanking, and no fondling; we’re saving that for the end. He’s a living, breathing glory hole. Basically, you lube up, you fuck him until you fill your rubber, and you pull out and let the next guy have a go. Travis, your ball.”

“My pleasure,” Travis replied. “I’m acting as second to Mr. Deeps tonight. I’m also playing medical, so anybody caught trying to go bareback or not using enough lube is gonna get a nice hello from Felix and Jaelix. And another thing: I’m going to closely examine him from time to time, so if I tell you to stop what you’re doing, you’d better damn well stop.”

Travis sounded like he was finished, but then Horatio heard some murmuring from Speed.

The blond man raised his voice again. “Oh, and Deeps has informed me that Cain is one of the lucky bastards that can come from behind, so everybody may not get a turn. We don’t want him cumming blood, guys.”

Speed’s hand disappeared from Horatio’s hair, and the sound of one man clapping twice made him jump a little. “Jeez, Cain, we haven’t even started yet,” Speed said in an amused over-loud tone, noticing his reaction, before addressing the group again. “All right, guys, let’s see what you’re packing.”

All the people want to know your name
Soon there will be lines outside your door
Feelings do not matter in your game
'Cause nothing's gonna touch you anymore

So your life is only living anyhow
And everybody loves you now

Billy Joel – "Everybody Loves You Now"

Mac stood by, bewildered. “What the hell is going on… Deeps?”

Speed grinned at him. “Weren’t you listening?”

“Well, I was, but…” It was just shocking to Mac, that so much planning and consideration and even concern had been put into what was basically shaping up to be an orgy. And everyone was acting like it was just par for the course. So you want to have your lover grabbed, blindfolded, tied to a table, and fucked by an entire room full of men? No problem!

It was insane. It was borderline debauchery. And heaven help him, but Mac liked it. The calm demeanor and all the ‘safety guidelines’ reassured him somewhat.

Speed grinned. “Since H is my own personal fucktoy, I’m going to start the festivities myself. No offense, but you’re going last, okay?”

Mac took a quick look around the room, where roughly ten men were standing around stroking themselves and kissing and petting each other. “I guess I am the thickest one in the room,” he admitted after a while.

“Yeah? No shit,” Speed grinned. He walked behind the bound Horatio, where a small table sat off to one side. On it sat several bottles of lube, a roll of paper towels, and a gallon-sized ice cream bucket full of more types of condoms than Mac knew existed. Underneath the table was a garbage can. Speed was humming casually to himself as he selected a condom and set it to one side, then picked up a bottle of lube. He applied some to both hands; one hand went to his own cock, while the other hand lifted to Horatio’s waiting ass, gently teasing the clenched pucker.

Mac felt himself growing hard as he watched Speed prepare himself and his lover, and another quick glance around the room said that he wasn’t the only one that felt that way. Some of the men had split off into couples, stroking and kissing each other. Others just watched and stroked themselves. One couple was doing something interesting: the top was a man that looked barely younger than Horatio, with a head of steel-gray hair. The bottom was a younger Hispanic man, and the bottom was on his knees with the top’s cock in his hand and the top’s balls in his mouth.

“Ready, Pet?” Speed’s voice came, and Mac turned to see the younger man with his dick positioned at Horatio’s glistening entrance, and his hands grasping handles built into the ‘table.’ Speed closed his eyes and pressed in slowly, ever so slowly, and Horatio gave a soft growl as his lover buried himself. “God, you’re tight,” Speed hissed, pulling back out and pushing back in, finding a slow and easy pace.

More motion caught Mac’s eye: past Horatio on the other side of the room, the older top had sat down on a couch and the Hispanic man was now riding him, and beside them on the couch a younger man stroked himself with one hand and reached over to stroke the Hispanic man with his other.

Just like that. No breaking the ice or even exchanging names; apparently ‘evidence in plain sight’ was fair game here, too. Back in the center of attention, Speed was now pulling hard on the handles, thrusting into his lover, his head thrown back, eyes closed.

Mac found himself walking right up to Speed, wanting a first-person view of the proceedings. Speed leaned over to whisper in Mac’s ear. “Remember when you said you wanted to see him cum from behind?” Mac nodded. “Look under the table.”

Mac gave him an odd look but knelt, and beheld a strange sight: Horatio’s cock was hard as stone and leaking wildly, dribbling into a bucket on the floor that, Mac realized, had been placed there exactly for this purpose. There was far too much fluid for it to be precome, but that had to be what it was because it was too pale and thin to be full-blown come… Mac stood, his eyes wide.

“I’m just hitting his prostate every time,” Speed said softly. “You believe me now?”

Mac scratched the back of his neck. “I don’t know…”

Speed gave him a challenging smirk and began fucking the redhead harder, changing his angle so that Horatio was groaning with every stroke, and Mac could see the older man’s muscles in his back begin to tense. “Look down again,” Speed grunted as he slapped against his lover’s ass.

Mac knelt again, and as he watched, Horatio twitched and shuddered and gave a long rolling growl, and the volume of his come increased noticeably, as did its coloration. Horatio was coming from behind!

“Oh, fuck, that’s good,” Speed moaned, bringing Mac topside again, just in time to see Speed’s head lolled back, eyes closed as he thrust into his lover one last time, and his face twitched as he came with a watery groan. He stayed in his pet redhead for a few moments, running caressing hands on his back and even bending down to place a kiss on the back of his neck, and then Speed pulled out.

Travis noticed Mac’s look. “It’s actually not all that rare, really. It just has to be done right.”

Mac furrowed his brow. “What do you mean?”

Travis indicated Horatio. “You can get an excess of precome just from milking a man’s prostate. Not every man can orgasm from it, true, but Cain seems to be wired where it’s easier for him to experience an anal-centric orgasm than most people.”

Speed peeled off his condom and tossed it in the garbage, then rubbed his hands together. “Next!” he called.

Almost instantly a line started to form, but the men were all polite and patient. Nobody squabbled or tried to cut in front. If it wasn’t their turn, they would more often than not start playing with the person in front of or behind them.

Next in line was a tall man with a long, thin dick. He prepared himself, checked Horatio’s entrance with a finger to make sure all was ready, and slid in without a second’s pause. He immediately grasped the handles and started pounding away, and Horatio groaned with every thrust, his hands clenching and unclenching behind his back.

This didn’t sit right with Mac, and it took him a moment to realize why. He could see utterly no similarity between his little scene with Speed yesterday morning and what Horatio was going through now. They were basically tying him down and gang-raping him! Horatio’s words earlier about ‘consent’ came back to him and he stared hard at the redhead’s hand, which gripped the clicker loosely but made no effort to safeword out of it. Horatio wanted this?

A different sound came from Horatio’s throat, and Mac’s face tightened as he noticed a thin trickle of moisture begin to make its way down the redhead’s cheek. Just use the damn clicker! Mac shouted silently, but the abuse continued. Finally he’d had enough, and he marched back to Speed. “Stop this,” he growled.

Speed gave him an odd look. “Why?”

“Because you’re tying him down and gang-raping him, that’s why! And he’s crying!” Mac’s fists were clenched, the muscles in his neck standing out.

To his utter disbelief, Speed smiled. “He’s crying already? Good.” Mac’s jaw dropped in furious shock, and Speed noticed. “It’s a good thing. That means he’s in the right headspace.”

“The right…? You mean, like you were last night?”

“Exactly,” Speed explained. “Right now, he’s at the point where nothing matters but making me happy. And despite everything that’s happening to him right now, the only thing he’s thinking about is me enjoying myself while I watch him go through that.”

“Lemme try, Deeps.” Another man stepped up, the young man that Mac had seen stroking the Hispanic man on the couch earlier, the tag on his braided-hemp-and-beads necklace identifying him as Trance, bisexual. He had a second necklace on, a single strip of what looked like red ribbon with a different tag on it: white with a blue cross. He was in his mid-twenties, rather compact—stocky would be a better term, but powerfully built despite the beginnings of a definite beer gut—with a dick that was slightly longer than average, but also slightly thicker and with a gentle upward curve. At the moment, Trance’s erection hovered at around half-hardness, and Mac found himself staring before a hand flew up into his face, fingers snapping. “Up here, big guy.”

Mac blinked, his eyes locking onto a pair of amused green ones. “Hey, you’re new to the scene. No big deal,” Trance drawled and shrugged, his accent screaming ‘Kentucky.’ “But anyway, what Deeps was trying to say is that Cain knows that Deeps went through a lot of trouble to set this up, and he wants Cain to enjoy it. He also knows that this is exactly where and how Deeps wants him at the moment, so that’s where he’s happy to be.”

Speed nodded. “It’s like giving a kid a playroom and a new toy. The kid plays with it because it’s new and it’s neat, and it’s fun, and at the same time they know that you’re standing in the doorway watching ‘em so they try to have as much fun as possible.”

Trance shot him a sideways look. “When was the last time you were around kids?”

Speed rubbed the back of his neck. “Not in recent memory, why?”

“Nothing. It’s just that the way you described it sounds pretty close, but I have yet to meet a kid that will have extra fun with a toy just to put on a show, because they know you’re watching them to make sure they like it.” Trance scratched his short brown hair and grinned again. “Maybe a really, really conscientious kid, but only if you told them beforehand that the gift from somebody is just going to suck and they’d better put on a damn good show anyway.”

Speed snorted. “I’m no good with kids. And that was a really shitty explanation, Fender; I’ll get Cain to explain it to you later. Just trust me; what’s going through Cain’s head right now is the exact same thing as what was going through my head last night. It’s trust.”

Mac gave an accepting nod and (temporarily) gave up trying to understand it. It was all so surreal to him, having casual conversation about children and presents while they were all stark naked, casually watching a good friend of his getting strapped down and pounded in the ass by a conga line of eager men. Instead, he asked, “How is this anything like what you two were doing last night?”

Speed gave a wry grin. “H likes to get fucked, remember? He may not be as big on bondage as I am, but trust me, he’s having a blast.” He saw Mac’s look. “He has the clicker, Mac. He has the safeword. All he has to do is use it, and we’ll stop. But until he does, we’re going to give him the ride of his life.”

“You’re good at that,” another voice said dryly, and Mac realized that the speaker was Horatio’s latest top, a short, wiry man in his mid-forties with a head of steel-gray hair and eyes like algae at the bottom of a frozen pond. Dark, frosty green, much like the same color as his collar. Mac couldn’t read his name, but his tag ring was blue. The man grinned at Speed, but in Mac’s eyes it seemed like there was more to the look than just the moment. “How you been, Deeps?”

Speed came around Mac to wrap his arms around the man in a crushing hug from behind. “Hoppy! Where in the hell have you been?”

“Around,” Hoppy grinned, rearing his head back and pressing a kiss to the corner of Speed’s jaw.

Speed moved around to take a good look at the man. “I was almost afraid that you weren’t going to make it. We need ya for the finale, after all.”

“I know you need me,” Hoppy said, giving Speed that special look again. “Travis is going to hate you, though.”

“Travis hates everybody,” Speed grumbled, tossing a glance at the Medical man who was in deep discussion with another patron and apparently ignoring the whole scene. “Fucking cocktease. He’s got a sweet face and a nice ass, but he’s only orally bi.”

Mac walked closer. “Care to explain that one?”

Hoppy snorted. “He’s a freak for giving head, but he only fucks girls. Says he doesn’t like messing with prostates unless he’s giving a guy a checkup. He’s a proctologist, and he runs his practice exclusively within Deviate.”

Speed shrugged. “Takes all kinds.”

“He could use a good, hard fucking,” Hoppy muttered, grasping Horatio’s hips and pounding harder into the redhead. “Like you, Cain. You’ve been needing this for a while, haven’t you?”

Click.

“Thought so,” Hoppy continued, changing his angle slightly to ignore Horatio’s prostate. “You enjoying yourself, Cain? You want to come on my dick?”

Click.

Speed glanced over at Trance. “Hey, aren’t you going to get in line?”

“Nah. I’d love to, but I’m allergic to Latex and I don’t see any polyurethane condoms in Artie’s stash.” Trance looked understandably disappointed, but he also seemed to have accepted it. Just one more fact of life around here.

“So that’s what your other necklace means?” Mac asked, pointing to the red ribbon and the blue cross on the white tag.

Trance nodded. “Yup. It’s what passes for a medical alert bracelet around here.” He grabbed the tag and flipped it over so Mac could see the word ‘Latex allergy’ stamped on it.

Speed got an idea. “Hey, Trance, how about you let Cain suck you off? I hate to leave you high and dry just because we don’t have the right condom here for you.”

Trance brightened, then just as immediately drooped. “I don’t know, Deeps. Whenever I’m with guys, I usually bottom, you know? And my legs shake a lot, so…”

Speed shrugged. “Fender can hold you up.” He tossed a look at Mac. “What do you say? Would you mind making sure that he doesn’t fall over while he’s getting his dick sucked?”

Mac blinked, made a noncommittal noise, and suddenly he was standing right behind Trance with his heavily muscled arms around the younger man’s slightly pauchy stomach while Speed stroked Trance to full hardness. Speed was kneeling, and he leaned over into Horatio’s ear. “How about it, Cain? Want to put Trance’s dick in your mouth so he won’t miss the fun?”

Click.

“Good boy,” Speed murmured, running a finger underneath the strap behind Horatio’s head and sliding the bit out of his mouth. He captured a single drop of precum from the tip of Trance’s cock and held it under Horatio’s nose, where the redhead promptly stuck his tongue out, searching for it. “Oh, you want it, don’t you?”

“Yes, sir,” Horatio whispered as he finally found Speed’s finger and sucked on it.

Speed drew his finger back. “Did I say you could talk?”

Horatio started to answer, paused, and shook his head. Behind him Hoppy gave a sensuous grin, having slowed his pace considerably. He was taking his time, making it last, and also making it a little easier for Horatio to keep his head steady in spite of the constant pounding in his backside.

“That’s better. Trance, you mind gagging him anyway?” Speed leaned back to give the younger man room.

“I can do that,” Trance agreed, stepping forward and holding his cock right in front of Horatio’s mouth. The bound man smelled it, stretching neck and lips out, begging silently. “Oh, fine, here ya go,” Trance said cheerfully as he twitched his hips forward. Horatio wrapped his mouth around the curved dick and sucked hard, prompting Trance forward another few inches. “Holy shit, Cain,” he moaned, “You could suck the nails out of a wall!”

“That’s my Cain,” Speed said with obvious pride. Behind Trance, Mac could feel the younger man grinding against him as he gently fucked Horatio’s mouth, and it was getting him hard. Harder.

Suddenly one of Trance’s hands slipped behind him, wrapping around Mac’s beer-can cock, and he groaned again. “Jesus fuck, Fender, you’re huge!”

Mac didn’t know what to say, other than “Thanks.” Trance let go of his dick and began grinding against him again while Horatio sucked on the younger man’s length, and soon enough Trance leaned fully back against Mac, his legs shaking, and Trance let out a loud groan as he came, Horatio swallowing every drop and milking the length for more.

Trance’s legs quaked, and Mac gently pulled him back. Horatio released the dick with a loud popping noise, and for a moment looked disconsolate until Hoppy took his cue to suddenly begin pounding into the pale backside again. Horatio grunted at the abrupt change of pace, his entire body quivering slightly as Hoppy brought him to a second orgasm. Hoppy hissed at the contractions that began gripping and milking his cock, and it wasn’t long before he joined the redhead in bliss.

Trance leaned against Mac as the Marine walked him back over to the couch. There was a look of weary thanks on the young man’s eyes, and Mac smiled and nodded as he made his way back to Speed. Back at the table, Hoppy blew out a heavy breath and pulled out, giving Horatio an affectionate slap on the rump before putting his condom in the garbage. “Thanks, Cain. That was tight.”

Horatio grunted acknowledgement of the comment, then Hoppy walked over to Speed. “Deeps, I’m gonna go hit the head. Be back in a little bit.” Speed nodded, and Mac took the opportunity to lean in closer to him.

“What was that about?” Mac murmured in Speed’s ear as Hoppy went to use the bathroom.

Speed cocked his head. “What do you mean?”

“You were flirting with him, while he was screwing Horatio.”

Speed gave a little grin. “Me and Hoppy go way back, and H knows it. We’ve had a few threesomes, and I still get hard just thinking about ‘em.”

Mac blinked. He just couldn’t understand it. “So, you’re flirting with an old flame while he’s screwing your current flame. And that has no emotional bearing on your relationship with Horatio.”

“It’s just sex, Mac. No emotional involvement here. You don’t really come to an orgy to find a soul mate, you know?”

It irritated Mac, for reasons that he couldn’t quite understand. Speed shouldn’t still be that emotionally attached to Hoppy, not if he really loved Horatio. “You can only love one person at a time, Tim,” Mac insisted.

“Speak for yourself,” Speed growled and gave him the finger, and Mac sighed and gave him the benefit of the doubt. He glanced over at Horatio and saw that yet another man had prepped himself and was sliding into the bound man, bucking into him with short, quick thrusts. “Just take the time to enjoy yourself, Mac, at least for tonight.”

Mac gave him a level look. “Can I leave now?”

Speed blinked. “Yeah, of course you can. You can always leave Deviate, any time you want. That’s the founding principle of this place, that nothing will happen to you unless you want it to.” He gave Mac a pleading look. “Please just stick around until the end of tonight, and we’ll never ask you to come here again.”

Close your eyes when you don't want to see
And stay at home when you don't want to go
Only speak to those who will agree
Yeah, and close your mind when you don't want to know

You have lost your innocence somehow
But everybody loves you now

Billy Joel – "Everybody Loves You Now"

Mac watched as the new man fucked Horatio to his own completion, and he’d barely slid out when yet another took his place. All around the room, men were touching and kissing and fucking each other, and there was a threesome going on over on the couch. The air was heavy with the scents of sex and sweat, as well as the continuous litany of manly grunts and groans. Mac took the time to study the gathering, and was surprised to notice that there were very few people younger than thirty. They were mostly around Mac’s age, and came in several different body types and fitness levels, and it added a strange and inexplicable air of realism to the whole thing. A shout closer to him grabbed his attention, and Mac turned in time to see the fifth man come inside Horatio.

Another man started to walk forward when Travis held up a hand. He snapped on some Latex gloves and knelt behind the trembling redhead, poking here and prodding there, and then he stood. “I think he can bottom for one, maybe two more people and that’s it.”

Speed nodded and turned to Mac. “Fender, looks like you’re up. You wanna do Cain?”

After Trance’s little impromptu bump-and-grind, Mac was more than ready to find some relief, and he nodded. For some reason, his erection wasn’t going down despite not having had any stimulation on it for a while. He supposed that the atmosphere and all the ambient pheromones were getting to him.

He sheathed himself in Latex and slicked up, and positioned himself behind Horatio. For some reason, he felt the need to warn the redhead, and to let him know who was next in line. His cock nudging Horatio’s entrance, Mac leaned over the body. “It’s me,” he growled softly, knowing that Horatio would know his voice, and he felt the redhead tremble underneath him. “Ready?”

Horatio nodded and Mac began sliding slowly in, surprised—although he knew he probably shouldn’t be—that the older man needed absolutely no stretching. In no time at all he struck a quick and easy pace, stroking himself into that wonderful heat. He didn’t feel like coming hard and fast, like the others had that night. He felt the urge to make it last, to be about enjoying the body of another rather than just getting his rocks off.

Speed was suddenly behind his shoulder, whispering in his ear. “Wanna make him come?”

Mac nodded, panting slightly as he slid in and out of the exquisite warmth. Speed spoke again. “Change your angle so you’re just sliding against his prostate. He’s probably pretty damn sensitive by now, so take it easy.”

Mac nodded again and did as suggested, and he felt Horatio’s trembling become more pronounced. Speed hadn’t bothered to put the bit back in, and Horatio was finally groaning and panting with Mac’s thrusts. Mac could feel his own orgasm building as Horatio vibrated beneath him, and suddenly Horatio cried out and clamped down on Mac, his insides squeezing and milking Mac as he came, and it was too much for Mac to take and he snarled and pushed deep inside, his legs quivering as he joined the redhead in ecstasy.

Mac pulled out slowly, running an appreciative hand up and down Horatio’s back, and he glanced over to see Speed talking to Hoppy. Hoppy was fooling with something that Mac couldn’t see, and he nodded to Speed as the younger man stepped back to his favorite redhead and bent down close to him. “Cain? You remember the signals?”

Click.

“You want to stop?”

Click. Click.

“Think you could go for one more fuck?”

Click.

“Good. Because after all you’ve been through so far, you ain’t felt nothing yet.”

Mac watched as the slim, prematurely gray man pulled up a stool behind Horatio’s gaping rear. His right hand and, hell, his entire right arm was covered in thick black rubber. A calving glove, Mac realized, for the aid of safely delivering livestock. His left was covered in an ordinary Latex glove, and suddenly Mac had an idea of what was about to happen.

Speed stepped back over to Hoppy as the gray-haired man began coating Horatio’s wide-open crevice with lube. More of the slick stuff went on Hoppy’s glove. Honestly, Mac had never seen so much lubricant being used at one time as Speed helped Hoppy get prepared. The older man placed two fingertips at Horatio’s entrance, plunging in delicately, pulling out again, adding a third finger. “Jesus, Cain, you’re loose,” he grumbled. He worked his fingers slowly, stretching and lubricating.

Mac found that he couldn’t do anything but stand behind Hoppy’s shoulder and stare. “You’re not…”

“Gonna fist him? Sure I am. What do you think the glove’s for?” Hoppy didn’t look at him as he spoke, but simply concentrated on Horatio as three fingers turned into four, preparing the way.

“How the hell…”

“With patience, steady hands, and a metric fuckload of lube.” Hoppy’s left hand had joined his right, using three fingers from each hand, stretching top and bottom as well as the sides. “Here, check this out.” Hoppy went back to just his right hand, positioning his fingers so that the pinky and forefinger were under the middle and ring like a spear, with his thumb tucked underneath. “Need you to relax for me, Cain,” Hoppy announced.

Speed took the cue and knelt next to Horatio’s head, whispering things in his ear and gently stroking the back of his neck, and Mac could see the muscles on the redhead’s back begin to relax. Hoppy nodded, took a careful breath, and began pushing slowly in. “Hey, Fender, squirt a little more lube, would you?”

Mac found the bottle and aimed a large glob at the back of Hoppy’s hand, which he smeared all over his glove and then began using a gentle corkscrew motion in addition to his pushing. Horatio was still as relaxed as possible but he had started trembling. Mac could see the sphincter keeping out Hoppy’s knuckles, and the whole world seemed to hold its breath.

And suddenly, Horatio jumped and gave a loud grunt, and Hoppy’s hand slid slowly in to the wrist. “I’m not going any deeper than that,” Hoppy murmured in Mac’s direction. “His intestinal tract’s really not built for it, and I’d like to avoid tearing something or cramping his heart and lungs.”

“Sensible,” Mac muttered. He watched Hoppy’s wrist rotate as he turned his hand palm-up, and the tendons flexed as though he’d closed his fingers, and Horatio shook violently and moaned.

“Some people,” Hoppy continued calmly, “might take a hit of amyl nitrate to help the muscles relax, but Mistress Pamela frowns on any and all drug use. To her, if you if you need drugs to be happy with wherever you are, then obviously you need to be somewhere else.”

Mac couldn’t help but agree. “Honestly, I expected there to be a little more action,” he admitted, nodding at Hoppy’s fist. “I thought you were going to, well…”

“Fist-fuck?” Hoppy snorted and kept rotating his hand and moving his fingers, and Horatio started shaking harder. “That’s pretty damn dangerous, really. If I go in just a little farther, I can overload his system. It can actually send him into shock.”

Mac blinked, and Hoppy glanced up at Speed. “I think he’s ready.”

Speed looked his lover over, nodded to Hoppy, and then walked over to Mac. “Fender, I’ll let you do the honors,” Speed whispered, although why he would speak so quietly was something of a mystery to Mac; it was hard to hear much over the sound of Horatio’s incoherent howls. “I want to be up here, by him. Just slide under the table and take the place of the bucket, but don’t touch his dick until you’re sure you’re in the right spot. He’ll probably shoot off as soon as you touch him.”

Mac did as he was told, and was amused to find a small mat lying under the table-like structure to protect his naked flesh from the cold tile floor. “Damn, these people think of everything,” he muttered to himself as he moved the bucket and slid quickly into position, his head to Horatio’s ass and his legs sticking out under the redhead’s chin. Opening his mouth quickly, he immediately began catching some runoff from Horatio’s wildly leaking cock. He braced one palm on the floor beneath him and sat high enough up to grasp the redhead’s cock, intending to suck him in almost a 69 position.

He never got close. The moment his hand brushed the swelled, nearly purple organ, Horatio gave one last scream and came, his cock twitching and shooting a surprisingly large amount of seed that nearly struck Mac’s eyes. He closed them and leaned up quickly, craning his neck and grasping his friend’s cock and sucking him halfway down, and he could hear Horatio’s knees thumping the table, the man howling like a deep-voiced banshee as his cock splattered Mac’s throat with cum.

After several seconds, Horatio stopped screaming and Mac felt a hand on his shoulder. Releasing the redhead’s dick, Mac turned to see Travis squatting next to the table, motioning for him to slide out. “That’s enough… Fender, was it? I don’t think his prostate can take much more activity this evening.”

“Yes, Doctor.” Mac lifted an eyebrow in amusement as he slid out from under the table. Behind Horatio, he saw that Hoppy had already pulled his arm out and was flexing his hand as though it had been nearly crushed.

At the head of the table, Speed was leaning down until he had his lips in his lover’s ear, stroking his hair and whispering things of love and praise to him. Seeing Mac standing up, he gave a little grin and wiped his mouth pointedly on his wrist. Beside him, Travis chuckled as Mac repeated the gesture, suddenly remembering the glob on one cheek. Speed licked his lips, and Mac figured What the hell as he stepped over to the younger man who stood and licked it off his cheek, then looked him deep in the eyes. “Thanks for doing that, Mac.”

“No problem,” Mac replied, bewildered, when Speed gave him a friendly kiss on the lips.

“All right, guys,” Travis said loudly, “let’s get him off this thing. Trance, Hoppy, you wanna grab that chair and bring it over here? Felix and Jaelix, un-strap him. Get him loose, but for God’s sake, don’t let him move yet! We need to get all the kinks out of his muscles, or he could wind up straining something. As long as we’re careful getting him unfolded, I think he’ll be fine.”

“I also think,” Horatio said in a voice rough from all his screaming, “that I will never have trouble finding a place to park ever again.”

Speed squatted so that he was at eye level with his blindfolded lover, his breath tickling the redhead’s cheek. “Welcome back, Pet. How was it?”

Horatio’s face tensed briefly, and a single click-clack! hit Speed’s ears. Positive response. “I’ll tell you more when everything returns to its God-intended proportions.”

As hands worked over his lover’s body, carefully undoing the restraints and still holding him in place, Speed pulled the blindfold off and uncovered Horatio’s slightly foggy blue eyes. “Hey, you,” Speed whispered in greeting. “I know it’s kind-of a moot point, but you ready to level out?”

Horatio blinked once. “I love you, Speed,” he declared quietly.

Speed blinked back, and a slow and happy smile spread over his face. “Love you, too, H. Now let’s get you off this fuck-table and onto something more comfortable.”

“Appreciate it,” the redhead groaned.

Mac stood back and watched as a fully unbound Horatio, still held in position, was approached by four other men. Each one took a limb and began massaging it with steady hands as Felix and Jaelix held his arms in place. Slowly, ever so slowly, one dug sure fingers into the elbow joint and forearm muscles, and Horatio groaned for entirely different reasons as Felix slowly straightened it. The process was repeated for his other arm, and now four hands worked on each arm and the attached shoulders, working out the stiffness of having been so tightly clenched for so long.

Two other men were kneeling, one at each leg and completely ignoring the redhead’s eye-level privates, massaging calf and thigh muscles. Travis was working Horatio’s glutes, standing between the redhead’s legs and massaging the large muscles, and Mac wondered briefly if there was a muscle group in Horatio’s body that wasn’t going to be sore in the morning.

Travis finally declared his limbs tolerably loose and supervised the redhead’s return to the upright position. He didn’t come close, though, as they had to massage his back and stomach, too. Felix and Jaelix supported his arms and shoulders as they hobbled the poor man over to the ‘chair’ Travis had indicated, what looked like a padded poolside lounge chair built for two. They eased Horatio onto his back with all the care of hospital orderlies and a stiff old man, and Horatio couldn’t hold back a wry smile as he was lowered onto the thick cushion with an appreciative groan.

Speed eased down next to him and offered him a glass of ice water with a straw. “How you feeling, H?” he murmured. Mac eased himself to sit at the foot of the ‘chair,’ noting with a small bit of irony at how Horatio was keeping his knees bent to shelter his abused asshole.

Horatio took a long drink, feeling his raw throat sting. “Well and truly fucked, thank you,” he croaked. Travis reached into a bag that Mac hadn’t even noticed and pulled out what looked like a tiny piece of candy but was in reality a throat lozenge, which Horatio accepted with a nod of thanks. “There is one thing I want to know, Speed.”

“What’s that?”

Horatio looked levelly at him. “How many people fucked me tonight? I lost count.”

Speed glanced around the room, counting with his finger. “Four, not counting me, Mac, or the fist. I think you came four times, by the way, if you count the last one.”

Horatio blew out a heavy breath and shook his head. “I can’t believe you thought of that. I haven’t been fisted in years.”

“Well, thank Hoppy. He’s the guy that had his arm halfway up your ass.” All three of them glanced over at the late-thirties man with the head of steel-gray hair, who was busy packing his things to take them to be sanitized.

Mac spoke up. “I still can’t believe you actually did that. I can understand how you think that getting my dick inside somebody else is a struggle, but… my God, Horatio, he had his arm in you!”

“Aw, that’s nothing,” Speed said casually. “I’ve been double-fisted.”

Mac blinked slowly. “Do I want to know what that means?”

“He means two hands at once, Mac. Laced fingers.” Horatio clenched the glass between his knees and demonstrated. “I think it was… nearly twenty minutes, right, Speed? Before you were stretched far enough for him to get both hands into position? And he was a fairly small man, too.”

“Something like that, yeah,” Speed nodded. “Twenty minutes of nothing but slow anal stretching. But God damn, it was worth it.”

Trance strolled over, somehow pulling off a look that was both jovial and bored. “I’ll bet it wasn’t worth it for Cain, though. For the next week straight, he might as well have been opening up a window and fucking the night.”

Horatio shot a bemused glance at the man. “And how would you know?”

Trance shrugged. “Because that’s what my ex said to me, last time I got single-fisted.”

It was then that Travis came stalking up to them, looking less than happy. “I think you’re going to be fine, Cain, but you,” and he pointed at Speed, “have a problem. You didn’t tell me you were going to fist him.”

Trance eyed the angry proctologist and casually wandered away.

“I didn’t think it would be a problem,” Speed replied, looking annoyed. “Hoppy knows what he’s doing.”

“I don’t care!” Travis snapped irritably. “Do you have any idea how many people end up in the hospital each year, or the morgue, because they were getting fisted by somebody that got careless or didn’t have enough experience?”

Speed’s face and tone indicated to Mac that they’d had this discussion before. “Travis, half the things we do in this club could kill you, and you know it. That’s why we do them here, with good equipment and experienced players and medical personnel. You take that away and we’re not going to stop doing it, so you might as well make sure that we do it right. Hell, that’s the reason you’re practicing out of Deviate in the first place, isn’t it?”

Travis could only glare at him. “You want to know something? That’s why I bailed out of your last scene.” And he stalked away without another word.

Mac glanced back at the Miami lovers, who were both looking at him. “Mac,” Horatio said smoothly, “remember our little session back in New York, and you asked me about over-stimulation?”

Mac nodded. “You said it was dangerous if done improperly, right?”

Horatio nodded. “Fisting is even more powerful than that. Travis wasn’t joking, Mac, when he said that it could kill you. So if you ever want to try it, please make sure that it’s in a respectable establishment.”

“Respectable, my ass,” Trance shot back, returning to the group now that Travis had stormed out. “If this is respectable, then why haven’t I seen my incredibly hot Art professor in a leather body suit yet?”

“You know what he meant,” Speed growled good-naturedly.

They lapsed into a comfortable silence, Trance plopping on the foot of the lounge chair next to Mac, and the group watched as Artie dissembled his creation and the sanitizer crew began going to work. “You know what?” Trance said suddenly. “I think what we all need right now is alcohol.”

Speed nodded thoughtfully. “I wanna get drunk, and I was just watching Cain get his ass pounded.”

“You started it,” Mac cut in. Speed ducked his head and muttered something Mac couldn’t hear.

Trance reached up to casually—and carefully—slap Horatio’s ankle. “So, how about it, Cain? Wanna go get plastered?”

“I believe I do, Trance.” Horatio started to get up, and stopped. “Fender? Can you…”

“Oh, say it, H,” Speed said with a grin. “Nobody expects you to be up and running after a session like that. Here,” and he leaned over to help lift Horatio as Mac stood and carefully caught one of the redhead’s arms. “Oops-a-daisy, Grandpa.”

Standing but still a bit stooped, Horatio turned to glare at his lover. “Watch it, boy, or you’re next on the table.”

Speed made his eyes big and pouty as he stood. “You promise?”

Trance flopped onto his back on the now-empty lounge chair, clutching his stomach and laughing. “That’s why I like you guys so much,” he gasped. “You’re so fuckin’ funny!”

Mac could appreciate the humorous response, but “I don’t think he was joking.”

“I wasn’t,” Speed confirmed.

“Neither was I,” Horatio seconded as he hung on Mac’s arm.

“Exactly!” Trance finished. They all looked at one another and couldn’t help a few more chuckles and snorts. “C’mon, let’s go get drunk.”

Ah, you know that nothin' lasts forever and it's all been done before
Ah, but you ain't got the time to go to Cold Spring Harbor no more

Billy Joel – "Everybody Loves You Now"

The quartet got dressed and headed for the bar near the dance floor. In the dim light, all the tables and chairs were done in black-light paint, with red bulbs hanging over the tables for quite the interesting visual effect.

Mac volunteered to drive the group home, so he only ordered water. Mac’s eyebrow lifted when Speed asked the bartender for a Car Bomb, and Horatio ordered something called an Ankle Breaker. The trio got their drinks and found a table while Trance was arguing with the bartender about his own drink.

Mac watched Horatio sip his combination of lime, rum, and cherry brandy. Speed looked like he was about to need a spoon, the foam on his drink was so thick. And then Trance walked over to the table with three pony glasses, the ingredients layered. He slid one over to Mac, who immediately held up a hand in protest. “I’m designated driver.”

“Aw, c’mon, it’s just a Well-Greased Dwarf.”

Mac stared at him.

Trance waved his hand dismissively. “Long story. It’s Crème de Cacao, Sambuca, and Bailey’s.”

Speed furrowed his brow. “Isn’t Sambuca made from aniseeds, which are also used to flavor absinthe?”

Trance’s eyes traveled around the table, and he suddenly reared his head back and downed an ounce of the layered mixture from one glass. “Maybe.”

Mac frowned at the young man. “You’re trying to give the designated driver a hallucinogen?”

“It’s not real absinthe!” Trance protested. “It just tastes like licorice! Look, here,” and he switched the half-empty glass for the full one in front of Mac, “drink half of one, take a while to see how it hits you. If you’re drunk, I’ll call all you guys a cab and the fare’s on me.”

Speed lifted an eyebrow, absently licking a glob of foam off one fingertip. “It’s gonna be kinda hard for me and H to get to work tomorrow on my bike, and it’s not even fixed yet.”

The argument was solved when Mac suddenly growled and downed the sweet, syrupy mixture in a single gulp. He leaned back and waited for it to hit him.

Nothing.

Mac shrugged a shoulder. “I like licorice.” He pushed the glass away and reached for his water. It was a myth that drinking plenty of water diluted alcohol’s absorption into the bloodstream; he just wanted something to do with his hands.

“We’re making you walk in a straight line before you drive home,” Speed said sternly.

“Glad I’m carpooling,” Trance muttered, downing another ounce in a few gulps. “I just wanna get laid one more time before I leave.” He turned to leer outright at Mac as he spoke.

Mac stared at the younger man, the alcohol in his system momentarily forgotten. “Are you always this…?”

“Horny?” Trance gave an evil cackle worthy of any bad pirate movie. “Come on, I’m a college student. My primary vocation is finding ways to get laid.” He tilted his head back and finished off the drink, slapping the glass back on the table. “I felt what you were packing earlier, and I want a real piece of it.”

Mac’s bewildered and somewhat startled look shifted to Horatio and Speed, who were both grinning shamelessly. Horatio lifted his drink, speaking over the rim. “I’m honestly surprised that this is only the first proposition you’ve gotten, Mac.”

“Me, too,” Speed seconded. “I was sure they’d start falling all over you the minute you whipped it out.” He lifted his glass, as if in toast.

Mac looked back at the eager young man, his own face still frozen in shock. “You want me to fuck you?”

“Hell yes!” Trance slid his empty glass towards the middle of the table, standing up. “Come on, next set’s about to start. You can warm up out there.” Mac set his drink down and allowed the younger man to grab his hand and start yanking.

Mac shot a glance at his Miami hosts, who were looking at him with a mixture of amusement (Horatio) and glee (Speedle). Speed lifted his glass again. “Have fun,” he said almost offhandedly.

“I almost feel sorry about doing that to Mac,” Horatio remarked as he watched Trance drag the Marine to the dance floor.

“I’m just glad Trance was so high and dry,” Speed muttered, snuggling closer to his lover.

Horatio sighed and put an arm around the younger man’s shoulders. “It’s a bit cruel, but it’s something Mac needs to find out on his own.”

Speed nodded. “Think it’ll work for him like it did for you?”

Horatio cocked his head, thinking. “I believe it will. He needs a stranger for this. We’re too familiar. And after him seeing how much we trust each other, how willing I am to bottom to you, hopefully this will open his eyes.”

Trance had actually been perfect for this little job, and again Horatio had to marvel at Speed’s sexually charged ingenuity. The goal was to have Mac see how much Horatio trusted Speed, that Speed could put his lover through all that and both of them still be in love. Then, when Mac was aching with frustration and feeling like the third wheel missing his fourth, that’s when Speed would have the horny college student take advantage of him.

Speed had done the exact same thing to Horatio, except that Speed had been the bottom and Hoppy had run the scene. After being paired with Speed for so long, the sight of him getting fucked by all those other men and subbing to Hoppy—his former Dom—had definitely opened Horatio’s eyes. He had realized that there was more to his relationship with Speed than just sex. He had wanted Speed back, desperately, and then Speed had gotten shot before Horatio could put his feelings into words.

“I love you, Speed,” Horatio said quietly and suddenly.

Speed’s face cracked into a wide grin. “Old memories, huh? And I love you, too, H.”

They glanced down at the table, and their barely-touched drinks. Speed’s look at his lover was more than a little guilty. “I don’t want to be the one to tell Mac that Bailey’s is one of those delayed-reaction whiskeys.”

“Neither do I.” Horatio reached across the table for Mac’s water and took a sip, and handed it to Speed. “A single 2-ounce drink should only be enough to slightly impair him for a few hours at the most, as healthy as he is and as infrequently as he imbibes.”

“Just enough for this whole scheme to work, huh?” Speed’s look was purely devious. He took a swig of the water, then grabbed his and Horatio’s alcoholic drinks and stood. He walked over to another table full of rowdy college students. “Free drinks, just a few sips taken out of both. Nobody’s done anything nasty to ‘em. Cop’s honor.”

Mac wasn’t much of a dancer, but he allowed Trance to lead him to the middle of the thronging crowd. The younger man immediately resumed their earlier position with his back to the Marine as the next techno song started up. It took Mac a moment to realize that it sounded familiar. “Vivaldi’s Four Seasons?” he wondered with eyebrows high.

Trance nodded and let Mac get used to the situation. “Classical music remixed makes some of the best damn techno. You like it?”

“It’s… nice,” Mac allowed, amazed at how the gentle synthesizers and pulsing beat didn’t jar with the piano at all.

“Well, you’d probably like Robert Miles’ stuff, then,” Trance told him. “He puts a lot of piano in his songs.” He began grinding subtly against Mac as the song picked up pace, and Mac found himself grinding back before he realized it.

It was suddenly evident to the older man where Trance’s club name had come from: he loved techno, and he was a surprisingly lithe dancer considering his physical build. The song ended and another started up, this one Mac recognized as a remix of Edvard Grieg’s In the Hall of the Mountain King, and at this point Trance turned to face him, running subtle hands up and down Mac’s sides and pressing their bodies together, and Mac was getting hard again. He’d forgotten that he got horny when he got drunk.

By the third song, both men were nearly painfully hard, sweating and panting, and Trance had taken to pressing his lips against Mac’s neck, and Mac gave a low growl in his throat and placed broad hands on Trance’s gyrating ass, and the younger man moaned into Mac’s flesh.

As soon as the song was over, Trance pulled away and grabbed Mac’s hand again, tugging him toward a small hallway at the edge of the room that the older man hadn’t noticed earlier. He was amused to note that the sign over the entrance read “Quickies,” plain and simple. There was a little booth just inside the aperture, and the thin blonde behind the counter saw them coming and lifted an infrared scanner.

Mac paused long enough for Trance to thrust his neck over the edge of the receptionist’s little desk for her to scan his tag, and then the younger man followed her pointing finger to the doors lining the hall. Noises of sex from both genders—and all sorts of pairings and more-than-pairs—sounded out from behind the doors in lewd waves as Trance found an unoccupied booth, slapped the marker on the wall from “vacant” to “occupied,” and hauled the Marine in with surprising strength.

Trance kicked the door closed behind him and started yanking Mac’s clothing off, and Mac found himself responding to the enthusiastic lust of the younger man, pulling his shirt over his head and then going to work on Trance’s. The college student, meanwhile, was busy unbuckling Mac’s belt, his lips attached to Mac’s collarbone.

Finally they were naked, and Trance’s hands wandered every inch of Mac’s body, and the Marine wasn’t entirely surprised to realize that he was doing the same thing. Trance’s touch became more and more frantic, groping Mac, stroking him, the younger man’s breath hot in Mac’s ear. “Do me,” he hissed urgently, thrusting the foil square of a polyurethane condom into Mac’s hand, and Mac’s animal side took over.

Trance was suddenly sprawled on his back, laying on the cheap and surprisingly clean mattress in their little booth—the whole space was little bigger than two cubicles put together, now that Mac actually took the time to take a quick glance around—and Mac found several bottles of lube in the little ‘nightstand,’ slicking up two fingers and working them inside the younger man as slowly as he could bear. Trance was already somewhat stretched, interestingly enough; he’d probably gotten laid already at least once that night.

It was with a growl of lust that Mac sheathed and slicked up his thick cock and pressed it against Trance’s entrance, and the younger man spread his legs wide as Mac pushed slowly in, burying himself in this (mostly) stranger. Mac started to move almost instantly, quickly building up a rhythm, his mind distantly cataloguing the interesting sensations coming from his cock. Turns out, polyurethane condoms were thinner than Latex, allowing for more friction—and also with less tensile strength.

Mac couldn’t bring himself to care at the moment, however. It was a cheap, nasty little back-of-the-bar fuck, and that was exactly how he treated it. Trance writhed and howled on the mattress as Mac grasped his calf muscles and pounded into him over and over again. Mac was surprised at how aroused he was, and so recently after fucking Horatio, but then he’d never been one for a spontaneous, casual fuck. Having one seemed to do odd and incredible things to his libido.

Mac felt his orgasm rising and he welcomed it, snarling as he slammed into this young stranger hard, fast, deep, and then he was coming, shaking and growling, his body quivering as released inside the younger man, and then Trance was screaming, his hand on his own dick, shooting the thick white streamers that rained down onto his slightly hairy belly.

Mac didn’t feel satisfied. He felt… even more uptight than ever. This whole scene, hell, this whole place bothered him. He pulled out, peeling off his condom and flinging it at the garbage can, and then flopped back onto the bed. To his surprise, Trance scooted over to make room and covered Mac’s modesty with the bedsheets, and they shared the cloth as they stared at nothing and caught their breath.

“I feel like I’ve cheated,” Mac finally grumbled at the ceiling.

Trance glanced over. “On what?”

Mac gave a heavy sigh and closed his eyes. “On Danny.”

“Who’s Danny?” Trance asked reasonably, and his eyes widened. “Your boyfriend?”

Mac started to deny it, and then he remembered where he was, and the whole thing between him and Danny was so damn complicated anyway and he didn’t feel like explaining it to the stranger that he’d just fucked, so he simply said “Yeah.”

Trance sat up, dislodging the sheets. “Shit, you didn’t tell me you had a boyfriend!”

Mac looked over at him, puzzlement warring with his own guilt. “Would it have affected your behavior if I had told you?”

“Abso-fuckin’-lutely!” Trance declared, his vehemence surprising the Marine. “I only went along with Deeps and Cain’s little scene because I know that that’s what they came here for. They fuck other people every now and then, but they’re all about each other, and I respect that. I don’t come between people, not if I can help it.”

Mac was oddly touched. “I’m sorry if I made you uncomfortable.”

Trance blinked at him. “Hey, I’m the one that should be saying sorry to you.” They looked at each other for a moment, and suddenly Trance grinned. “Wanna go make them sorry instead?”

Mac considered that. “What do you suggest?”

Trance shrugged. “I was hoping you’d have an idea. I was just gonna get in their faces and chew ‘em out.”

“That works.” Mac tossed the sheets aside and swung his legs over the side of the bed.

“Hey,” Trance said softly, putting a hand on his shoulder, and Mac paused. The hand slid down to grasp Mac’s, and then shook it. “Darrin Keith.”

A slow smile spread over the Marine’s face. “Mac Taylor.” They gave each other a little smile before standing up and locating their clothing. “Now,” Mac wondered idly, “are you really going to get in Hor—in Cain’s face and scream?”

Trance froze, then shook his head. “I’m standin’ behind you. I’d rather shave a bobcat’s ass in a phone booth than piss those two off.”

Mac gave his new friend an amused look at the image that sprang into his mind, of the college student trapped in a telephone booth with an electric shaver and an angry wildcat. “Why is that?”

Trance shrugged and hop-stepped into his cargo pants. “They’re cops. They do all that shit with the evidence, you know? With the DNA and fingerprints and all of that, they know how to find it and they know how to make it go away.”

Mac quirked a smile. Should I tell him? Oh, why not? “So do I, actually. That’s how I met them.”

Trance froze, then gave a dramatic sigh and flopped back onto my bed. “Just my luck.”

Mac chuckled. “Don’t worry about it. To my knowledge, nothing illegal was done here tonight. And besides, I’m out of my jurisdiction anyway.”

Darrin blinked at him for a moment. “New York, right?”

Mac nodded and sat on the bed, sliding his sandals onto his feet. “So what do you do?”

The younger man cocked his head. “Well, like I said, college student. Born in Kentucky, if you couldn’t tell by the accent. I’m going to Dade University right now, majoring in electrical engineering.”

Mac couldn’t resist. “Hair-raising stuff.”

Trance gave him a Look. “You have any idea how often I get that one?”

“Not often enough, I’m sure.” Dressed, Mac stood and reached a hand down, and Trance clasped it and allowed the Marine to haul him to his feet. It surprised Mac when Trance ran a gentle hand along one cheek and then kissed his other. “What was that for?” Mac sputtered, eyebrows furrowed.

Trance smiled at him. “Just wanted to say ‘thanks for the fuck,’ and I hope everything works out between you and Danny.”

Mac couldn’t find anything to say, other than a quiet “thanks.” He wanted Danny back—GOD, he wanted Danny back—but there were so many unresolved issues within himself, and it was wrong in so many ways, anyway. He’d meant what he’d said to Speed, that he could only love one person at a time. Maybe Speed could love more than one, but not Mac. And as far as Mac was concerned, his heart still belonged to Claire.

Odd, he was having trouble picturing her face, and that disturbed him on some level. It felt wrong, like he was spitefully ignoring her or something along those lines. It was strange: instead of Claire’s warm brown eyes and long, curly light-brown hair, he was seeing an attractive Italian man with crystal blue eyes and a lazy smile, looking up at him from his spot next to Mac on the bed.

Mac blinked and shook his head, turning off the images in his mind. I must be drunk, he reasoned. I’ve been doing just fine about not thinking about Danny tonight. At the same time, he was getting the same nagging, neglecting feeling about the Italian. In a split-second, Mac wanted nothing more to wrap his arms around the younger man and kiss him slowly, before the sound of Trance opening the door brought him back to reality. Danny was back in New York, anyway.

“So, tell me about Danny,” Trance began as they walked slowly down the hallway, before heading back out into the pulsating lights of the dance floor.

Mac cocked his head; for some reason, he was having trouble keeping hold of the fact that he’d dumped the Italian, and instead allowed a gentle smile to cross his face. “He’s a little older than you, dark blond, blue eyes, my height, athletic build.”

Darrin halted so quickly that Mac nearly plowed into him, and the younger man turned to give the Marine a steady look. “Try again, and this time leave the cop out of it.”

Mac lifted an eyebrow but humored him. “Well, he is my height and a little older than you. He’s… athletic. He wanted to play professional baseball, but he threw out his arm before he could ever sign a contract.”

“Yeah, what else?” Trance was gently encouraging as they paused at the edge of the dance floor, where there was still some soundproofing between them and the pounding subwoofers.

“Dark blond hair, more of a tan, really. He’s got… the most amazing blue eyes I’ve ever seen. He’s nearsighted, though, so he usually wears glasses.”

Trance smiled at him. “Is he smart? I’ll bet he pulls off the smart look really well.”

“Very.” Mac’s small smile grew. “And he’s got this smile… this wonderful smile, like I can just look at him and know that…”

“That everything’s okay?” Trance’s own smile was quiet and sympathetic. “There something you not telling me, isn’t there?”

Mac sighed and leaned against the wall. “We had a… a falling-out, about a week ago. I used some vacation time to spend a couple of days down here with Cain and Deeps. I just had to get away from the city. Get away from him.”

Darrin leaned next to him. “Why? He sounds great, so why’d you two split up?”

Mac looked away. “My wife died… on 9/11. I just…” he sighed and scratched his head. “I can’t seem to let her go.”

Trance leaned up to put an arm around the Marine’s shoulder. “I’m not going to say anything about that, because there’s nothing I can say.” His sad smile belied a deeper empathy than a regular, slightly drunk college student might show. “Like I said, I hope it works out between you two.”

Mac’s lips curled in a sudden smile, and he looked down at his young friend. “Did I mention that he’s Italian?”

Darrin’s eyes widened and he blew out a sudden, aroused breath. “Lucky man. You’d better go back to him before somebody else snatches him up.”

Mac allowed himself a slightly possessive smile as they wove through the crowd back to the bar. Horatio and Speed’s drinks were nowhere to be seen, and they were sharing Mac’s water in between not-so-casual groping under the table.

Trance was still cheerful, but as they approached the table Mac could see the anger starting to emerge into the younger man’s eyes. Darrin stomped right over to his friends, slammed his palms down on the table, and glared at them. “You didn’t tell me he had a boyfriend.”

Horatio schooled his expression and looked at Mac with puzzlement. “Didn’t Fender mention it to you?”

“No, he didn’t,” Trance growled. “He was too doped up on pheromones and booze to do more than fuck me stupid. I’m gonna be walking funny for a week.”

“Guess you had a good night, then,” Speed said casually, his hand suddenly doing something under the table that made Horatio’s eyes flutter closed.

Trance shook his head and pointed a stubby forefinger at both of them. “If you ever pull a stunt like that on me ever again, I’ll kick your asses so hard, you’ll be rimming yourselves!”

“That would be something to see,” Horatio said in an aroused growl, returning Speed’s favor and making his lover give a little moan.

Mac sighed and put his hands on his hips. “If you two don’t mind, I’d like to go home now.”

Trance suddenly swung in front of Mac and planted a casual kiss on his lips. “Nice to meet you, Mac,” he murmured. “Good luck with Danny, okay?”

Mac blinked in surprise, and then smiled and gave a small kiss back. “Thank you, Darrin.”

“Hey, I thought we were leaving,” came Speed’s insistent voice. Mac turned to see that he and Horatio were already standing with their arms around each other.

Mac looked back at Darrin, smiled, and shook his head. “Take care.”

See how all the people gather 'round
Hey, isn't it a thrill to see them crawl
Keep your eyes ahead and don't look down
Yeah, and lock yourself inside your sacred wall

This is what you wanted, ain't you proud?
'Cause everybody loves you now

Billy Joel – "Everybody Loves You Now"

Mac drove himself, Horatio, and Speed home. The Miami couple had given Mac an impromptu sobriety test, which he passed with flying colors. Horatio and Speed did let go of their inhibitions enough for Mac to believe they were a bit tipsy, though. On the drive, the Marine sat by himself up front, his eyebrows high as he couldn’t help catching glances in the rearview mirror of his friends pawing each other like teenagers in the backseat.

Finally Mac pulled into the driveway, located the remote button for the garage door, and pulled in. Speed’s mostly fixed Ducati sat proudly in the second space, surrounded by tool benches. Mac closed the garage door, opened his own door, and paused. Odd, his hosts were suspiciously quiet. He twisted in his seat and instantly regretted it.

Speed’s bare back was plastered against his window and Horatio had somehow managed to make his six-foot frame comfortable while laying facedown on the seat cushion, Speed’s dick halfway down his esophagus. Speed’s shirt had been wadded up and pressed against the window to act as a cushion for the younger man’s head, and Horatio’s suit jacket was hanging over the seat, and Horatio looked as though he was bound and determined to suck Speed’s brains out through his dick.

For his part, Speed’s head was back, eyes closed, mouth open in a silent cry, and Mac was beginning to think that Horatio was sucking Speed’s brains out. Speed even had one hand outstretched, frozen in midair, and Mac wasn’t even sure the man was breathing. Matter of fact… he hadn’t seen Horatio come up for air yet, either.

“I hate to interrupt,” Mac said dryly, “but this is a crime scene photo that I’d rather not have to discuss in court.”

Horatio pulled back, and the lovers both took heaving gasps. Carefully Horatio rearranged himself back into a sitting position and grabbed his jacket while Speed stuffed himself back into his pants and grabbed his shirt, and they opened their doors and climbed out of the car. “Mac, you mind walking Locard?” Speed asked casually as Horatio unlocked the door to the house.

Mac shrugged. “I can do that.”

“Thanks.” The Miami lovers headed upstairs, and Mac quirked a little smile as he went to the laundry room for the dog and the leash. He took his time, enjoying the warm breeze that blew in from the ocean, letting everything that had happened to him that night sort itself out in his mind.

He was almost regretful to put the dog back in the laundry room; he really did like dogs. He locked the back door and went up the stairs, his ears immediately assaulted by the sounds of moaning. He sighed and headed down the hall to the master bedroom, where Horatio and Speed lay naked on their sides, kissing and petting. Speed’s hand pushed Horatio’s shoulder down gently and the younger man climbed atop him, slurping on a peaked nipple.

“My God, you’re like rabid animals!” Mac grumped. “How in the hell can you still be in the mood for sex? I would’ve thought you’d be exhausted by now!”

Horatio gave Mac a tired smile. “I am, but scenes like that… I’m not sure why, but it just fills me with the urge to make love to Speed.”

Speed lifted his head from Horatio’s nipple. “Like I said before, Mac, orgies are all about sex and nothing else. Now that we’ve got the mindless debauchery out of the way, we can concentrate on why we stick with each other; what makes H so special to me and me alone.”

Mac blinked back the sudden hurt that came from the half-unintended barb, and he found himself wishing that Danny was next to him. The realization that he wasn’t, that here Mac was just a third wheel, cut him more deeply than he wanted to admit. He closed his eyes and banished the image of Danny’s crystalline eyes and dazzling smile, and opened them to see Speed still on top of Horatio.

“So, H, you wanna do me?” Speed gave the redhead a sultry smile.

Horatio nipped at his lover’s neck. “Speed, I would love to do you.”

They rolled so that Speed was on the bottom, and Horatio reached over to the nightstand for the lube, stroking himself as he began stretching his lover, and Speed moaned again. Mac gave a long-suffering smile and sat on the loveseat, feeling himself get hard again.

Finally Speed was ready for Horatio to slide into him, fucking him gently and running lips over Speed’s neck and chest. Speed groaned and wrapped his legs around the older man’s waist, his hands clenching the pale shoulders while Horatio slid in and out of him, a look of erotic euphoria on both their faces.

This was the sort of sex that Mac could get into: two or three familiar people, loving and appreciating and enjoying each other. And damn him, but Horatio was right: Mac was a bit of a voyeur, and Speed loved to put on a show. He found himself taking his cock out of his pants and stroking it, watching as Horatio thrust into the younger man, rutted into him, cherished him.

Horatio began panting, but it wasn’t from orgasm. He shook his head and slowed, then grunted and sped up again. Finally he came to a stop and sighed. “I don’t think I can come again, Speed.”

Speed gave his lover a comforting smile. “It’s all right, H. I honestly didn’t think you’d be able to, after all I put you through tonight.”

Horatio returned the smile. “Love you, Speed,” he murmured, lowering himself to lay atop the younger man and giving him a soft kiss. “Thank you for this evening.”

“No problem.” Speed kissed his lover back, and he heard a grunt from across the room. He broke the liplock and peered over Horatio’s shoulder to see Mac with his cock still in his hand, looking a little frustrated. “Want some help with that?”

Mac sighed and glanced between the lovers. “If you don’t mind.”

Horatio gave Speed another kiss and rolled off of him, and Speed spread his legs shamelessly. “Here, kitty kitty,” he crooned. Mac shook his head and gave a lopsided grin as well as a sarcastic purring noise that came out as more of a growl, shedding his clothing and climbing onto the bed. “Horny bastard, aren’t ya?” Speed teased as Mac crawled between his legs.

“Takes one to know one,” Mac grunted, taking the condom and lube that Horatio held out to him. “You two start messing around with each other and that gets me going, and the whole thing snowballs.”

Horatio chuckled as Mac prepped himself and then began sliding slowly in, letting his careful entrance finish stretching Speed out, and in no time Speed’s legs slid around the muscular waist and locked at the ankles, and Mac planted his hands on either side of Speed’s torso and bucked his hips into the younger man, growling quietly and stroking himself into the tight heat.

Speed was moaning with every thrust as Horatio slid over until one hand found Speed’s cock, the redhead nosing Speed’s neck and nibbling on his ear, and Speed arched his back and tightened his hold on Mac, groaning out his lover’s name as he came around the Marine, and the contractions gripped Mac so wonderfully that his body jerked and shuddered and he let out an animal growl as found his own release.

Mac was tired now, but in his mind he was still frustrated. He’d fucked three different people tonight, and it still didn’t seem to be enough. He refused to acknowledge that maybe, just maybe it was because none of the people he’d fucked had been Danny.

“That was good, Mac,” Speed told him, bringing the Marine out of his reverie, and Mac took the hint and pulled out. He climbed off the bed and stretched, trying to ignore the thoughts nagging at his mind as well as ignore the sounds of soft kissing and sweet nothings being exchanged by his hosts still on the bed.

Speed finally stood as well, and Horatio rolled onto his stomach on one side of the bed, letting his face hit the pillow and giving a tired sigh. “Could you do me a favor, Mac?” he began quietly.

Mac shook his shoulders, little popping noises sounding up and down his spine. “Sure.”

“Please get me a pair of shorts out of the dresser across the room. I don’t think moving would be a very good idea right now.” He burrowed his face into his pillow, leaving his ass an open target which Speed gleefully pounced on, giving one globe a kiss in cartoonish fashion, over-loud sound effects and all. After the comical pop! of air returning to the space between Speed’s lips and Horatio’s ass, the younger man brought one palm down in a playful smack on the other cheek. Then he sat back on his heels and waited.

Horatio lifted his head to look over his shoulder and gave a glare that normally would’ve sent chills down Speed’s spine, if the redhead hadn’t been so worn out. Unfortunately, with his mussed hair falling over his face and the definite lines of exhaustion under his eyes, the best he could pull off was a Look. Frowning at his own weakness, Horatio growled and let his forehead drop back into his pillow, which made a quiet little whuff! noise as he did so.

“Glad you didn’t do that on my side,” Speed said casually as he slapped his woodhusk-filled pillow. “That mighta hurt.” He snickered and put his fists on the bed, crawling over to his lover to press a gentle kiss to the proffered neck before climbing off the bed. “I’m gonna grab another shower,” he announced. “I reek of sweaty, sexy goodness.”

“Congratulations,” Horatio muttered, his voice muffled against the pillow.

Mac cocked his head and stepped over to the dresser, taking a moment to figure out which section of clothing was made for Horatio’s slimmer waist and grabbing a pair of rust-red shorts. “There a reason he doesn’t have feathers on his side?” he asked, just to make conversation.

Horatio shrugged one shoulder. “He’s allergic to goose-down. He’s around it long enough, it makes his skin break out.”

Mac hadn’t known that, and he filed it away as he stepped over to the bed and handed the redhead his shorts, and Horatio put them on quietly and went back to laying face-down. In the bathroom, Mac heard the shower start up and he realized that once again Speed hadn’t taken clean clothes with him. The man truly had no shame.

They lay there in silence for a long time, so long that Mac was beginning to think that his companion had drifted off to sleep when the older man lifted his face from the pillow to look at him. “I wanted to try to answer your earlier question, Mac,” Horatio began quietly.

Mac furrowed his brows at the redhead. “What question?”

“When you were asking Speed about why it was a good thing that I was in tears.”

The Marine blinked. “You were listening? I would’ve thought you were… occupied.”

“I was, in more ways than one,” Horatio admitted with a chuckle. “Sometimes the best way to enjoy something is to let yourself get distracted from it. Eventually whatever’s happening to you becomes a sort of all-encompassing background.”

Speed came back into the bedroom, his hair damp and a towel around his waist. “Pretty accurate way to describe it, H.”

Horatio raised a warning finger. “Thank you, Speed. And you know better than to get into bed while you’re still wet, don’t you?”

“I know, I know,” Speed grumbled, bending to scrub the towel up his ankles. “So Mac, what’d you and Trance talk about?”

Mac wanted to tell them about his breakup with Danny. He felt horrible about lying to his friends, and at the same time he knew what kind of preaching he’d get if he came clean. So he folded his hands behind his head and shrugged his shoulders as he stared at the ceiling. “Nothing much. He asked me about Danny.”

Speed dried his arms and chest, not the slightest bit self-conscious about his nudity. “What’d you say?”

Mac tilted his head, pondering. “He wanted to know what Danny was like. I don’t know why I gave up as much as I did, honestly. I may have had a little too much to drink.”

Speed stared at him. “Mac, you barely had any alcohol at all!”

Mac sighed. He wanted to blame the alcohol for spilling so much about Danny, and for fucking Trance. He refused to admit that he couldn’t let go of the Italian any more than he could let go of Claire. He couldn’t get Claire’s eyes out of his mind… or Danny’s heart-melting smile.

Why couldn’t love just leave him alone?

“Well, you’re not mad at him, are you?” Speed interrupted his thoughts.

Mac focused his eyes on the younger man. “At Darrin? No, I don’t suppose so.”

“Good.” Speed wandered back into the bathroom and slung the towel over the bar, pausing to take a piss before returning the bedroom. He started to climb into bed when Horatio stopped him.

“Shorts, Speed.”

Speed pouted.

“We have a guest, so be polite. We’ve made Mac uncomfortable enough as it is.” Horatio turned to look at their guest. “I apologize, again, for setting you up with Trance.”

Mac sighed. “It’s all right. I guess I just didn’t see it coming. I mean, Danny knows that I’ve slept with you, Horatio, and I don’t think he would mind Tim.”

“You still haven’t told him?” Speed interjected, digging through his side of the dresser. “Mac, that was three months ago!”

Mac sighed and rubbed his face with both hands. “I know, I know, I just… I don’t know how he would take it, and I keep putting it off.”

“Mac,” Horatio said gently, “Danny and I discussed this, the day that I topped you back in New York. I asked him specifically how he would feel about you sleeping with someone else. He said that he thought it would be okay, as long as you came back to him, and as long as he knew about it beforehand. The longer you hide it, the more it will seem to him like you’re trying to.”

“And we all know what it looks like when somebody doesn’t say something because they think it’ll look bad,” Speed added, sliding on a pair of dark green boxers.

Mac gave a growl and flopped onto his back, draping a forearm over his eyes. “I’ve really made a mess of things, haven’t I?”

“Well, I wouldn’t say that,” Speed amended, crawling onto the bed and depositing himself between the older men. “The problem is, you’re not treating this like a regular relationship.”

Mac peered from under his arm at the younger man. “How do you mean?”

“Think about it. If Danny was a girl, would you even be in this room right now? Would you have gone clubbing with me and H?”

Mac thought about it. And he realized, “No, on both counts.”

Horatio leaned up on his elbow to see over Speed. “Exactly. You’ve gotten into the mindset that since your relationship with Danny isn’t the same as with a woman, then the normal rules don’t apply. Mac, they absolutely apply.”

“But, you two—“

“Are just like every other couple. We fight, too. I’m admittedly irritable about Locard’s hair everywhere, and Speed snores.”

“I do not!” the man in question protested, and Horatio tapped him on the flank.

“Speed is also an excellent cook,” Horatio continued. “We take care of each other, Mac. Why do you think I was so eager to have him move in here, besides the obvious? Because I felt that he needed me next to him, to help him through everything.”

“Still do,” Speed murmured, leaning back against his lover’s chest.

“There are only two differences between a heterosexual relationship and a homosexual one. The first is, of course, physiology. The other is that we have to hide it.” Horatio’s voice was stern, but there was a definite sadness behind the words. “Some people can afford to come out of the closet, but we can’t. Even holding his hand in public is out of the question.”

He made up for lost time by sliding a hand across his lover’s waist, and Speed threaded their fingers together. “Mac,” the redhead continued, “Danny loves you. You just refuse to admit it because he isn’t a woman.”

“Hey, does Danny ever top?” Speed’s question came suddenly.

Mac didn’t even have to think about it. “No, he doesn’t.”

“Because he never wants to, or because you never offer?”

Now, he did have to think about that one. “I never offer,” he admitted, “but I don’t think he wants to.”

Horatio bent a kiss to his lover’s shoulder, but delivered just a hint of teeth to rein him in. “Some people are born to be tops, Mac. Some people are born to be bottoms. And some people are born to be switches. It can actually vary between relationships. Not usually, but… I’m sure that when Danny is with women, he likes to be on top.”

The thought of Danny with a woman just seemed odd to Mac, but he took it at face value. “I think he does. I’m not sure.”

“Ask him.” Speed’s warm brown eyes regarded him with something closer to forgiveness. “That’s why we go clubbing. We’re feeding desires that we didn’t even know we had. And before you ask, we actually don’t fuck other people all that often.”

Horatio nodded. “Maybe once a month we’ll have a session with a third party. Other than that, though, the only time we sleep with other people is whenever I’m on a cover date.”

Speed grumbled at that. He tossed an aside to Mac, saying “No need for you to do that, Mac. You’re not the dating type, anyway. Anybody can see that.”

Mac furrowed his brow. “How do you mean?”

Speed glanced at Horatio, who shrugged as if to say ‘I give up.’ Speed gave an apologetic half-smile and turned back to the Marine. “The whole night, you were just uncomfortable and disinterested. There’s two kinds of voyeurs: the ones that make you feel like a freak while they stare at you, and the ones that get you hot because they’re appreciating what you’re showing them. Sure you participated, but it wasn’t out of emotion.”

“You were being polite,” Horatio agreed. “Think hard, Mac. You participated in an all-male group fuck because you didn’t want to be rude.”

“And that’s why nobody was hitting on you,” Speed finished. “Even though you had one of the biggest dicks in the room, nobody wanted to talk to you because you just had this look on your face like you were uncomfortable. I’ll give you that you were new to the scene, but that wasn’t all that was bothering you.”

Horatio locked eyes with Mac. “It was because Danny wasn’t there, wasn’t it?”

Mac gave a long sigh and stared at the ceiling. “Yeah.”

Speed shrugged. “You’ll fuck us, because you’re used to us. And because we have our little unspoken agreement about whatever happens in bed stays in bed.”

“Or on the couch,” Horatio put in with a rare spurt of glee, and Speed snorted.

Mac couldn’t help a chuckle at that one and he pulled the sheets over himself, suddenly unwilling to sleep by himself. “If you gentlemen don’t mind, I’m kinda tired now,” he said calmly, hoping they would get the hint and stop talking about Danny.

Horatio nodded. “Sleep sounds good to me. We’ll see you in the morning, Mac.”

Another day, another crime scene. Horatio sighed and stood amidst the carnage. Four young people lay dead in the grass with bullets in their heads, and two more men in white shirts and red ties were laid carefully on the ground side by side. The grand majority of his crime scene consisted of a small, wrecked twin-engine airplane with the word “Police” clearly painted on the tail.

A downed police prison transport in the Everglades… not the way he wanted to start off his day. He glanced over his shoulder. “Copilot dead too, Frank?”

Frank sighed and tapped his notebook absently. “Yeah, he’s inside,” he drawled gruffly.

“And they got the Marshal’s gun,” Horatio grumbled.

Frank nodded. “Pilot radioed a Mayday, but the controller couldn’t understand what he was sayin’.”

Horatio took a step forward, glaring at the aircraft as though he could see through the exterior to find the problem. “Frank, this plane was sabotaged. Witnesses saw smoke a mile away.”

Frank’s face was tight as he stared at the wreckage. “This is gonna fall on the Chief. He’s the one that authorized Henry Darius flyin’ down here to find the body of Lydia Johnson.”

“Against my wishes,” Horatio growled.

Frank decided to leave that one alone, and flipped open the notebook sitting in a hand the size of a catcher’s mitt. “Kids’ parents say they drove a yellow convertible Mustang. I’ll put out a broadcast, for Darius and a convict to be named later.”

“Armed and dangerous, Frank,” Horatio reminded him. He stepped toward the aircraft, to check in with Calleigh and Eric who were poking around inside. Eric had found the cause of the crash, a punctured air duct containing hot-bleed air that kept the warmth away from the engines. With the pipe punctured, one engine had overheated.

Horatio nodded at the findings as Calleigh began to dig out the black box, and the redhead went back out into the sunlight where Tripp was stepping carefully through the grass toward him. “I notified New York,” Frank informed him. “Detective Taylor sends his regards and offers his services.”

“Mac’s a good man,” Horatio mused. Through sheer dumb luck, Frank had reached Danny of all people, and the Italian had forwarded the call to Mac’s cell. They had agreed to not say anything about Mac’s little ‘vacation’ unless it came under direct scrutiny.

“I figured you’d say that,” Frank went on. “I’ll tell him to come on down.”

“We need everybody that Darius dealt with at Attica, okay?”

Frank nodded. “I’ll tell him.”

Horatio paused. “I’ll call him, Frank. I know his cell number.”

Frank thought about that, and shrugged his huge shoulders. It was good that his boss had such good relations with the guys in New York, especially since they seemed to work together so often. He tossed the whole idea over his shoulder and into Horatio’s capable hands and went back to talk to his officers.

“You’re kidding.” Mac’s voice came from Horatio’s cell phone. “My people at the crime lab redirected your Detective Tripp’s call to me, but I almost didn’t believe it.”

“Believe it, Mac. Darius is armed and at large.”

What followed was a good thirty seconds of some of the most vulgar swearing Horatio had ever heard, which was saying something considering Speed’s occasional outbursts. He heard a noise that sounded like a cough, and then another sound not unlike Mac wiping his mouth on his sleeve. “Darius, loose,” Mac finally grunted. “That’s a nightmare I hoped that I would never face again.”

“No argument here,” Horatio sighed. “I’ve read his case files, too.”

Mac gave an answering sigh. “This tosses a wrench into all my plans. I was going to fly back to New York tonight.”

Horatio chuckled. “Come on, Mac, we both know that you were going to wait until the morning, so you could enjoy more of the ‘hospitality’ of Speed and myself.” He wanted to delay Mac’s return as long as possible, to overload the Marine’s mind with scenes of love and trust before sending him flying straight back to Danny.

The redhead could almost hear the grin quirking the corners of Mac’s mouth. “I need to get back home before Tim adds another ten pounds to my waistline.”

“You’ll exercise it off, I’m sure.”

Mac snorted. “No wonder you two are in such good shape. Healthy diet and all the exercise you can stand.”

“Mm-hmm.” Horatio let the mirth slide from his voice, putting his free hand on his hip. “And I hate to do this, but I’m going to ask you to wait until you can match times from flights entering Miami from New York. That is, unless you’d like to explain why you’re already in town.”

Mac thought hard; his reputation versus the trail of a killer. Naturally, he’d pick the killer’s trail any day—and Horatio would as well—but there could be a way to have his cake and eat it, too. “Maybe I came down here to watch you walk Darius around the Everglades on a leash,” he suggested.

Horatio shot that idea down. “Then wouldn’t you already be here, waiting for the jet?”

Mac thought a moment. “Jet, that gives me an idea. Maybe I’ve just caught a direct flight on a private jet. If you don’t mind, I’m going to get on your computer and contact the New York crime lab, get all the relevant files from the case.”

“Feel free. I’ll see you in a few hours.”

“Cocoa Riding Club,” Calleigh’s voice came through the earpiece of Horatio’s cell phone at the crime lab, several hours later. “She would have arrived at around eleven AM this morning.”

“I know where that is, Calleigh. Thank you.” Horatio flipped his phone shut and looked up in time to see a familiar figure step off the elevator, a red binder in one hand and his flight bag over his shoulder. Good thing he’d brought along a suit, too.

“Lieutenant Caine,” Mac greeted, shaking the hand of the redhead that he’d woken up next to.

“Detective Mac Taylor.” Horatio returned the greeting.

Mac gave a grudging smile. “I could’ve used a tailwind,” he said, loud enough for any bystanders to hear.

“No worries,” Horatio soothed. Don’t overdo it, Mac.

Mac was all business, though. “I heard that Darius already hit a sorority house.”

“Yes, Miami University,” Horatio confirmed, likewise shunting his innuendo. “He’s looking for somebody specific, Mac.”

“We have a name?”

Horatio nodded. “Alexa Endecott, twenty-one, no longer using her cell phone.”

“We know where she is?” Mac asked, feeling a small knot of dread building in his stomach.

Horatio gave him a worried, protective look. “We do. The bad news, Mac, is that so does he. Come on.” Mac nodded and followed the redhead through the brightly lit warren of steel and glass and lights, heading for the garage.

The garage attendant saw Horatio coming, saw the purpose in his stride, and held up the clipboard and the keys for the redhead to swipe with his left hand even as he scribbled his initials with his right. He had a job to do and not a lot of time to do it in, and paperwork just got in the way.

“I still don’t believe this,” Mac growled as he tossed his flight bag into the back of the Hummer. “I fly down here for a couple of days off, and Darius downs his own plane?”

Horatio was not without a sense of irony as he slid behind the wheel. “No rest for the wicked, hmm? By the way, nice touch with the flight bag. Are those the case documents in that binder?”

Mac nodded and climbed into the passenger seat. “I can’t decide if this is serendipity, or what. Maybe Darius is screwing with me.”

Horatio turned the ignition. “Darius doesn’t toy with people, although sometimes it can seem that way. How’d you get to the lab, by the way? Take a cab?”

“No, Tim brought me.”

Horatio drummed his fingers on the steering wheel as he pulled out of the garage. “It’s another one of his days off and I hate to push him, but I may end up having to call him in. Alexx has an entire row of bodies from that sorority house, and that hopefully means plenty of trace.”

“Well,” Mac sighed, tilting his head from side to side, popping the vertebrae, “When I got the call, I was helping him with his bike again. The dog is fed and walked and there’s no laundry to be done, so I don’t see why he couldn’t pop in to help with the lab work.”

Horatio snorted. “Never figured you for the domestic type, Mac,” he chuckled as he drove.

He wouldn’t be chuckling for long.

They worked fast, frantic, but in the end they were too late. Darius had found who he’d come for and made a break for New York. Mac, of course, had no choice but to cut his vacation short and follow.

“I’m going with you,” Horatio said firmly. “And I’m bringing Speed with me.”

Mac cocked his head as he packed his bag. “I can see why you’re wanting to come, Horatio, but why bring Tim, too?”

Horatio gave a neutral shrug. “He wants to see the city, and he’d also like to meet Danny in person. They’re friends, Mac.”

Mac blinked nervously before going back to his packing.

Horatio noticed, of course. He was hit with the sudden urge to spill the beans about his knowledge of Mac and Danny’s breakup, but reined himself in. Now is not the time. First we catch a killer, and then we can go about helping Danny. “Do you mind, Mac? Me bringing Speed?”

Mac sighed. “I guess not. Is he packed?”

“It won’t take long,” Horatio assured him.

It didn’t. Just a few bags to pack, a few pointed glances between the Miami couple, and then they were off.

THIS WAS A CROSSOVER with my NY fanfiction. If you’d like to continue following along with Mac and Danny, it picks up in “New York State of Mind” chapter 6, “This Night,” in the CSI:NY section. Miami fans, just continue as usual.