Gift Horses

Author’s Notes:

This is the second of three epilogues to "Fallout", written in three separate Points of View. This story is from Bobby’s perspective, the day after the conclusion of a mission. My most profound thanks to my ab-fab Betas who made sure I made this the best it could be. Check out their work, they are muy talented in their own right.

Chalie Rucco:

Pipsqueak:

Dawnwind/Dawnebeth:

Spoilers: Pilot, Flowers for Hobbes, Father Figure, Three Phases of Claire, Brother’s Keeper, Exposed, The Other Invisible Man, Flash to Bang, Ralph, those are the ones I noticed, but there may well be others…

Rating: NC 17 for language and explicit m/m sex. Pairing: Bobby/Darien

Disclaimer: Ain’t doin’ this for the $, just for fun. No ownership, implied or real. Unfortunately. No money made, either.

Archive?: Yes, just let me know where.

The

Invisible Man

"Gift Horses"

I’m lying here, watching him sleep, just wondering when I’m gonna wake up. When the dream’s gonna end. He’s sprawled up against me, make that on me, head on my chest, like some adolescent puppy, innocence and trust and absolute confidence in my being here with him. I can’t help lying here thinking about everything it’s taken to bring us to this point. If you’d asked me two years ago, ten minutes after my introduction to Darien Fawkes, if I’d ever picture myself in bed with him – any man, geeze – and the answer would have been an emphatic ‘no’.

What scares the hell out of me right now is that I can’t imagine being anywhere else. Spending my life with anyone else. And that, my friend, is enough to make me break out in a cold sweat. I’m not exactly the world’s most confident guy, okay? I know I bullshit a good story, but I wouldn’t have spent the last ten years seeing more than a half-dozen therapists, taking more than a dozen prescription anti-depressants and anti-psychotics if I had a handle on things, right? Instead, I’ve been migrating from shrink to shrink, medication to medication, looking for some kind of absolution. Some kind of… I dunno, forgiveness. Pardon for my sins.

Then this kid comes along and totally changes my world. Darien Fawkes. Punk. Thief. Lab rat. He’s been dealt a pretty shitty hand in life, and he does his share of whining and complaining about it. But when it comes right down to it, he’s a good guy. Maybe one of the best I’ve ever known. Despite the bitching and moaning, he’s always the first one to step into a dicey situation, especially if someone’s life is on the line. He cares. Sometimes too much. About the wrong things. Like me.

Still, I’m not complaining, not really. It’s been a long time since I spent most of my time in the company of someone who cared. Sometimes I wonder if Viv, my ex-wife, ever did. No, that’s not fair. I know she did, she just couldn’t handle the way I cared. She was the center of my universe, and the idea of losing her scared me to death. So I tried to protect her. Shield her from all the evil and the dangers out there, the things I stood a good chance at dragging home with me in this line of work. She says I suffocated her. Smothered her under my paranoid blanket of over-protectiveness. I guess maybe I did, but she hasn’t had to see the things I have, live with the sure and certain knowledge of just what the human species is capable of. So I wound up driving her away with my compulsive worry.

I guess that’s the difference between her and Darien. Darien knows exactly how morally bankrupt human behavior can be sometimes. So he understands when I start ragging on him about the risks he takes. When I make him come with me to the target range for some shooting practice. He usually refuses to carry a gun, and the Official probably wouldn’t let him, even if he wanted too, but he’s turning into a pretty good shot. He especially doesn’t like handling them after he found out what his old man did for a living all these years.

He even understands when I force him to come with me to the gym and practice hand-to-hand combat. I’m a certified black belt in three or four different martial arts, and Darien’s only real skill is street fighting. I guess it’s not a surprise that he gets the shit beaten out of him on a regular basis. So I keep working at him, trying to get him to take self-defense seriously. Because the largest part of my job is to protect him. Both from himself and from the people like Arnaud and Stark who’re looking to dissect him like the frog in some high school biology class.

Still, I have a hard time getting him to take it seriously, most of the time. He shrugs it off and gives me one of his lines of chatter about how that’s my job. Which it is, but he could make it easier on me, you know? I guess it’s a compliment that he treats me like his own personal security blanket, though. He doesn’t seem to feel smothered, or whatever. Just as well, since by now, I couldn’t help it if I tried. Darien Fawkes is my friend. My partner. And now he’s something else, too. Something I know is gonna get us into trouble. Something that compromises our working relationship, or at least that’s how the Boss is likely to see it.

The standing rule in any law enforcement agency is pretty much that partners who get too involved with each other start jeopardizing not only themselves but the work. Which I guess’d be true under most circumstances, but this ain’t that. Fishing off the

company pier is at the top of the list of things I don’t do, so why I’m lyin’ here with my sweet young thing of a partner is something I’m still tryin’ to figure out. I’ve been willing to lay down my life for him way before now, and not just ‘cause I was paid to.

Somewhere along the way, protecting the kid got to be more than a job. It’s an instinct or something now, something I do like I breathe, or sleep. I can’t help it. Just like with Vivian. The thing of it is, is, he’d do the same for me. And has, more than once, without even thinking about it, or like the time that retrovirus was turning me into a superbrain, killing me by inches, he did think about it, and did it anyway. I think that was the thing that made me realize this partnership went both ways, you know? After it was all over, I spent some time on that one with my shrink.

That’s when I had to admit that the kid’d gotten under my skin somewhere along the line. If he hadn’t, I’d rather’ve let that virus kill me than go back to being the same old thick-headed, screwed-up Bobby Hobbes I was before I did the ‘Flowers for Algernon’ thing. For a while after that, I really hated the kid for making me chose between him and the kind of intellect humans maybe have no business reaching for. I still get these twinges of regret when I look at something and know I ought to be able to see more than I do, understand more than I do. Because once upon a time, I could.

Then the dreams started, dreams that freaked me out big time.

I mean, for chrissakes, I was a friggin’ Marine, a combat veteran. A tough-guy. Yeah, we’d jack off in front of each other out in the desert when we needed the relief, but no one even thought about touching another guy’s equipment. Any of their equipment. Period. Now I’m a government agent. Wet dreams about my pretty young partner are not on the agenda.

But every once in a while, Fawkes would turn his head to glance my way with this look. This look I’ve only seen on one other person’s face. A look that didn’t make any sense, either time. I mean, what the hell did these two young, fucking beautiful kids think they’re doin’, making eyes at Bobby Hobbes? My ex-wife I could kinda understand, sorta, sometimes. She picked me out of a crowd of other Marines, and I still wonder to this day what the hell she saw in me.

But at least she was a woman. One hell of a woman. Maybe the love of my life. The one shot I had at the American Dream, or something like it, anyway. Until Fawkes. I guess I was in denial, or something, because those looks’d make me mad, but then I’d go home and those damned dreams would start playing on the inside of my eyelids like some triple X skin-flick, and I’d come in my shorts like some sixteen year-old. Some nights more than once. And it was always Darien with me, touching me, that look in his eyes, like Viv’s, and I swear, it made me feel like a freaking superman. Invincible. King of all I surveyed, at least in the little kingdom between my sheets.

At first it scared me, pissed me off, those night-time visits to naughtyville. My therapist and I went around and around on that one, let me tell you. He gave me hell for looking a gift horse in the mouth, for always thinking I was being set up for something, for being sure neither of them really felt what I thought they did, hoped they did. Twice a week for six months, and it still freaks me out if I think about it too much. But the dreams were hot. There’s no other way to describe it.

Not as hot as the real thing lying sprawled all over me like a living blanket, but still hot. Hot enough to have me coming in my shorts on a regular basis. And I don’t think it’s just ‘cause I hadn’t been laid in a while, either.

The first time it happened I was coming down off the adrenaline rush that comes with keeping Fawkes outta trouble. We’d just finished up some case, and he’d nearly gotten himself killed, as usual. I spent three hours after our debriefing chewing him out for bein’ so damned impulsive, and he just sat there and smiled that little smile he gets when he’s blowin’ off whatever it is I’m telling him. And I sat there gettin’ madder and madder at him until I was ready to clock him, just to wipe that smirk off his face, you know?

Finally I gave up and went home. It took me a while to unwind enough to fall asleep, but when I did, I started to dream. About Fawkes. In the dream, I was putzing around my condo, checking all the security, like I do every night before I climb into the shower, nothing unusual there. Until Fawkes struts into my bathroom, strips down and walks into my shower. With me. Of course, I blew a fuse, yelling at him to get the hell out, outta my house, for that matter, and he just smirked at me, moving closer and closer, backing me into a corner. Now, anyone who knows me knows better than to corner me, right? So I was warning him to get outta my face, when what does he do?

Leans over and kisses me right on the mouth, the punk. And I just stand there and let him. He kisses me like he’s been saving it up for a rainy day, hot, sweet, insistent as hell, his tongue sliding around inside my mouth like a snake. What freaked me, is, that not only did I let him, but it turned me on so bad I couldn’t think straight. Hell, who am I kidding? I couldn’t think at all. The fact that he was my partner, that he was, well, uh, a ‘he’, just stopped registering. I mean the only blip on my radar was the fact that this warm body was making love to my mouth like no one else had before, and it felt so damned good, all I could do was kiss him back.

When he started working his way down, dropping onto his knees on the wet tile, I knew what he had in mind before he even looked up at me with that stupid, cocky little grin of his, and only the fact that I was jammed up against the wall of the shower kept me from making a run for it. Until he went down on me, anyway. And then the only thing that mattered was the way he was touching me, stroking me, totally turning me on. When he swallowed me whole, all I could think was, I’d died and gone to heaven. Heaven in my partner’s mouth, in a steamy shower, anything like professionalism totally out the window, and now, finally, I know I was right. It is heaven. And I didn’t even have to die to get there.

I spent months ranting about that dream, and the ones that came after it almost every night, whining to my shrink like he could care less about my sexual orientation, until he finally just came out with it, and asked me point blank what would be the big fucking deal if I did want Fawkes that way. Naturally I gave him some more of the usual song and dance about the threat to my masculinity, how boning another guy just wasn’t in the Bobby Hobbes repertoire.

I was kinda tough on the kid for the first few months we worked together, until my shrink finally nailed me on it and told me to deal with it. He said there were a lotta things that could be goin’ on in my screwed-up head, none of them necessarily meaning I was suddenly gonna start wearing pink, or leather jock straps, or lipstick or anything. That took me a while to get a handle on, let me tell you. Why now? Why Fawkes? Those were the things he told me to start thinking about. So I did. A lot. Then he started in on my ‘no fishing’ policy.

In some ways it was the same thing that happened with Viv, right? I kept tryin’ to tell him that. Beautiful young thing, older guy, not a match made in heaven. Especially when the guy is me. It’s hard not to make the comparison, and harder to believe this is gonna end any other way than badly. When Vivian left me, I sorta went off the deep end. Thought about suicide. A lot. Started to get psychotic on top of depressed, and it cost me my job at the FBI, for one. It wasn’t until I started working with Fawkes that I began to snap out of it. There’s nothing like having to spend all your energy keeping a naive and rashly impulsive kid alive to take your mind off your troubles.

There are reasons I choose not to get emotionally and physically involved with coworkers, and this thing with Fawkes is a prime example. Yeah, it’s too late as far as the emotional attachment is concerned, but add sex to the mix? I just couldn’t see it working. I’m already a little obsessed with the kid, and this, well, this isn’t gonna help, I can tell you that much.

One thing I will say about it, though, I’d never have done anything about how I feel if it hadn’t been for the way Fawkes looked at me two nights ago. Like he was ready for me to kick him in the teeth. Throw his feelings back in his face like he was a pervert or something. Because there was no hiding the simple unvarnished truth that split second when he looked up at me, his hard-on tenting the sheets, sure I was going to walk away, sure I was gonna throw two years of friendship back in his face. Because he wanted me. Like that. Wanted me as a partner. In just about every sense of the word.

That was when I finally figured it out. That we’d been making assumptions about each other. It never occurred to me he’d spent time with other men, you know, like that, until I thought about it. The kid’s done time, after all. I’d be kidding myself if I thought he’d had any choice inside, a fucking prettyboy like him. Someday, maybe I’ll get up the nerve to ask him about it, but I figure, he probably found himself a ‘husband’ damned quick when he realized the kinda moves they’d be puttin’ on him.

I stroke the thick hair out of the closed eyes softly, trying not to wake him up. He’s done more for me than the pharmaceutical industry ever has. And in way less time. It’s amazing what a difference it makes to be wanted by someone. Needed.

Shit.

Desired.

And he does. That’s what blows my mind. I don’t get why, especially after he met Viv, and heard the whole sad story and all. But even knowing I’m a lunatic when it comes to lovers, he still wants this. And so do I, for however long it lasts. Losing it may kill me, but right now, I think it’d be worth it. Worth it to see that sultry, sexy expression in his eyes when he looks at me. Knowing he wants me. I’m not stupid enough to think it’s gonna be forever, and when it changes for him, I know better to than to think I’m gonna get a third shot at something like this. But for right now, this is enough.

"Penny," I hear his sleepy mumble and look down into his face.

"Huh?" I grunt.

"For your thoughts," he clarifies, shifting slightly so his head tilts back, his eyes focusing on mine. I see the sleepiness vanish while I watch, replaced by that sultry look I was talking about. Geeze.

Talk about a turn-on. The kid is the friggin’ poster child for sex. I don’t know how anybody can look at him and not want him. I don’t know what the hell took me so long to wake up and smell the coffee, so to speak. The grin creeping over his face tells me he’s making a pretty good guess about those thoughts all on his own.

"I gotta spell it out for you?" I ask sarcastically.

"I like hearing it," he admits.

"What – that I’m totally nuts about you? That ain’t saying much since the general opinion is that I’m totally nuts about everything," I tease him.

He laughs silently, his eyes, the color of old wood, glinting at me in the warm sunlight of a late October afternoon. "That’s okay, I know the general opinion is wrong," he answers a little smugly.

"That right, Sigmund? What makes you the expert on Bobby Hobbes’ mental state?" I ask.

"Practice," he grins as he runs a hand down my belly and grabs me where it’ll do the most good for his argument.

"Christ, Darien," I groan, knowing he’s going to get yet another rise outta me.

"It makes perfect," he reminds me. "Not that it isn’t already, but I can’t have you getting rusty on me," he adds, laughing again as he starts nibbling his way across my chest.

"Fawkes, I’m an old man, here. You don’t cut me some slack and I’m gonna have to add Viagra to my list of prescriptions," I complain, kidding him about his appetite. I may be eight or nine years older than he is, but I can give as good as I’ve been getting, so far. And the kind of attention I’ve been getting the last two and a half days is mighty inspiring when it comes to making the effort.

‘Hah," he grunts dismissively against my nipple before he circles it with his tongue, then nips me. "There is nothing ‘old’ about you," he adds, working his way up to lie on my chest, resting his forehead against mine, smiling his Fawkesy smile, the one I’ve finally figured out the translation for; Darien shorthand for ‘love ya’. It’s not the same as the look he gets when he’s bein’ serious, but the feeling is the same, and it sends a little thrill through my guts. He’s just so easy to read, this kid. His heart isn’t just pinned to his sleeve, it’s freakin’ plastered all over him. "You’re doing it again," he says, his expression sobering.

"Doing what?" I ask, startled.

"Over-analyzing something," he tells me. "Cut it out, will you?"

"I’m not doing anything!" I protest. See, this is the downside to having a lover. They think they know you, know what you’re thinking, when the reality is, they don’t usually have the first clue.

"Hobbesy," he starts in on me, "You’re lying there obsessing about something. Want me to take a wild guess about what?"

"What, you’re Miss Cleo, now?" I snap, not wanting to get into this. I don’t need to listen to him tell me this is for real – for keeps. I know he thinks it is, but with my track record in this department, I’m not counting on it. And then there’s the little problem we’re gonna have explaining it to the powers that be. Because this isn’t the kind of thing Darien is gonna be able to keep under wraps. The Keepie and I’ve compared notes a few times on Fawkes’ transparency, and I don’t mean the quicksilver kind.

"Alright, try this on for size," he says, running the fingers of both hands through the hair behind my ears, palms warm against my skull. "You’re either lying here worrying about what happens when the Fat Man clues in that the well-oiled machine of the Fawkes/Hobbes partnership has discovered the joys of Vaseline, or you’re convincing yourself I’m probably gonna dump you as fast as I dragged you into bed with me," he guesses.

I can’t help grimacing. "Two for two," I admit at last. Okay, so maybe he does know me. "Only, as I recall, you weren’t exactly the one doin’ the dragging."

Fawkes grins at me, kissing me lightly. "Do I know my Hobbes, or do I know my Hobbes? News flash for you, partner, I don’t care what the Fat Man says when he finds out. And I’m not leaving you. Period. Not unless you throw me out."

"Hate to break it to ya, but we’re at your house. You’re gonna have to do the tossing," I warn him.

"Then you’re safe. At least from that," he grins, just the corners of his mouth and eyes crinkling, a subtle little smirk, just for me. "I can’t promise how safe you’ll be in my bed, though," he warns as he kisses me again, this time like he means it.

Oh, man. He’s not kidding. Safe is not the word I’d use to describe the things he makes me feel. Terrified would come a whole lot closer.

So would terminally horny. Ask me if I’d give any of it up, though.

Just ask.

And when I can breathe again, I’d say ‘no fucking way’. Even if it means he walks away from me tomorrow. Because right now, he’s all over me, mouth and hands, teeth and tongue, tasting me, touching me like he hasn’t been dining out on Bobby Hobbes for almost three days now.

We’ve hardly done anything besides sleep and screw like rabbits, basics like food a distant afterthought. Even personal hygiene degenerates into sex if we make the mistake of going into the bathroom together. Neither of us can get enough, and if I could make a career out of fucking Darien Fawkes, I’d do it in a heartbeat.

The neat little kink is, that when he approaches orgasm, he loses control of the gland, and starts going invisible on me. Which would be kinda weird, if it weren’t for the fact that when he does, he takes me with him, and the feeling is unbelievable – hot, cool, the quicksilver not wet, not dry, not anything except some kind of super lubricant or something that sort of increases the volume on everything hitting the old nervous system. I’ve never come for anyone else the way I have with him, begging, screaming for the release, begging it not to end.

And he’s no better, howling like a banshee. He’s by far the most vocal sex partner I’ve ever had. He makes it absolutely clear when I’m doing something right. ‘Course, I have yet to find a way to touch him that doesn’t have him panting for me in minutes. It’s not just ‘cause I’m that good, it’s also ‘cuz he’s wired like no one else, nerves right under the skin, everything connected straight to his libido. Maybe it’s just that it’s been so long for him, but I kinda think he’s just hair-triggered. Oh, not that I can’t drag it out for him, for us both, but he feels things differently than most people. Stronger. And makes me feel ‘em right along with him. Damn, I love this kid.

He’s determined to take my mind off whatever it is that’s worrying me, and he’s doing one hellova job, let me tell you, but damned if I’m going to let this be a one way street, so I start getting pushy, taking control away from him. When he reaches for my mouth again, I grab him by the shoulders and use my weight and the leverage of my position to knock his arms out from under him and roll him onto his back on the mattress, then pin him with my body, trying to suppress the little shiver of excitement as I look down into his surprised face, easily preventing him from freeing himself. Combat training has advantages, in case I forgot to mention that.

"Bobby -" he starts, but I don’t let him finish, eating his words along with his lips and tongue as I kiss him hard. Hell, violently. If he really wants to know how much I want this, want him, I’ll show him.

His startled gasp pulls the air out of my lungs and I explore the inside of his mouth with my tongue, tasting him, tasting toothpaste and coffee, and loving it all. He’s panting when I let him come up for air, and still surprised, but the way his eyes have dilated, the pupils so wide I almost can’t tell what color his irises are, tells me this is a major turn on for him.

"You like it rough, prettyboy?" I growl, and the flash of uncertainty that flickers across his face amps me up like I can’t even believe. I shift my grip to his wrists and pull his hands up over his head, holding him down with the weight of my body on his, and I can feel the hammering of his heart as I take possession of that gorgeous mouth again. When I move down to his chest, never loosening my grip, and start in on one of his nipples, he whimpers with the sound I’ve learned means he’s on his way to losing it. I don’t know what it is, but he trusts me. Trusts me not to hurt him. Trusts me in ways Viv never did, never could.

I could never have teased her like this, risked her wondering about my intentions. I was so afraid of losing her that straight-out animal lust never found its way into our bed. Maybe if it had, if I’d trusted her enough, trusted that she loved me enough, I’d have made her beg the way I can make Fawkes beg. And maybe she wouldn’t have walked away from me.

I’m not going to make the same mistake twice. I swore that when I decided to lie down next to Darien three nights ago and stake my claim. If he leaves me, it won’t be because he didn’t know how good things could be between us. And they are good. Hell, they’re fan-friggin’-tastic. So good I wonder why the hell I never tried it with another guy before.

But then I look into Darien’s flushed face, see the way his mouth has swollen, still wet with the kiss I just laid on him, and I know exactly why I never did. Because no guy has ever looked at me the way Fawkes is looking at me, desperate for me to touch him, desperate for me to kiss him, desperate for me to hold him, fuck him, never let him go.

As if I could.

I swear to myself that I’m gonna convince him nothing will ever make him feel the way I can as I look into his wide-eyed face, his lips parted, the tip of his tongue just brushing the inside of his upper lip nervously in a way that short-circuits anything resembling self-restraint. I dive back in like a finalist in a pie-eating contest, sampling every delicacy his mouth offers, and I feel him arch up against me, his cock warm and hard and leaking against the front of my thigh, where it’s wedged between his legs. The rush of power, knowing how much a few kisses have turned him on, is absolutely amazing.

shift my weight, using my hips to keep him from lifting himself against me, determined to control this particular ride. "Hold still, Fawkes. We’re doing this my way, got it?" I rumble at him. I can’t keep my voice from dropping into a lower than normal register with my own state approaching critical, but the tone has a sort of lust-drenched menace that makes his breathing go all irregular.

We’re out of the known realms, here, and into territory I’ve never let myself enter before. I’m not necessarily talking bondage; whips, chains, all that whacko crap – though god knows, at this point, I’m open to just about anything that’ll put this look in Darien’s eyes.

Helpless. A little scared. And under it all, total, unquestioning, unshakable trust. I can’t even begin to describe what a rush it is, having someone I love look at me that way, not knowing what I’m gonna do next, but trusting me to make it good for him.

I set about proving that trust isn’t misplaced, biting, nipping, kissing my way down his throat, pausing long enough to revisit one of his favorite erogenous zones, the hollow of his throat where his pulse is fluttering like some wild thing in a net. His breathing gets more and more shallow, rapid, and he’s resorting to ragged little pants by the time I get back to his chest and start in on his nipples.

Mine aren’t all that sensitive, but his; man. His are like direct connections to his prick. I wonder if any of the women I’ve had relationships with have even been this sensitive. I’ve made him come just working on them like I’d reverted to infancy, sucking and pulling and giving them just the tiniest hint of teeth, him moaning and egging me on, his hands gripping my skull, holding me in place until I satisfied him.

This time though, I’m not after the fast answer. I want this to be like nothing else he’s ever done, even though I really don’t have much of a clue just how experienced he is. Not that it matters, since I’m not at all. The only thing I know is what I’ve read, but I’ve made something of a study of homoerotica, lately, and there are ideas racing around my head that I can’t wait to try out, even though there’s no way to make them all happen at the same time. That’s okay, we still have almost a week to experiment, uninterrupted, just him, and me, and a bed.

His little whimper when I let up on the nipple action is erotic like I can’t even believe, all his need, all his desire in that little sound, and it makes me even more determined to call the shots on this one from beginning to end. But I can’t do what I have in mind without having him secured in some way, and being a good six or seven inches shorter than he is, I can’t keep my grip on his wrists and concentrate on the rest of his long lean body. I make a decision in that split second, one I hope won’t freak him out totally, and get up, ignoring the plaintive "Bobby?!" that follows me across his floor to where my pants landed when he tossed them across the room three nights ago.

I fish in the rear hip pocket and take out the cuffs and the key, determined that he’ll know he has the ultimate say in what happens to him. This isn’t about psychological torture, it’s about trust.

"What the hell are you doing?" he complains in his best little-boy whine, rolling onto one side, elbow on the bed, head propped in his hand as he watches me suspiciously.

"I’m gonna make you beg, gland-boy," I tell him as I wiggle my eyebrows at him, showing him the cuffs. He’s staring up at me in astonished disbelief as I snap one bracelet around the wrist he’s propping his head up with, and then yank his hand out from under him and fasten the other around one of the slats in his headboard. He is now, effectively, at my mercy – if he wants to be.

There’s a slightly panicky look in his eyes as he stares up at me, and I dangle the key on it’s ring over his face. "Hold out your other hand, Fawkes," I order him, and hesitantly he does, not knowing what to expect from his whacko partner by this time. "I don’t want you leaving till I’m done with you, buddy," I say, then drop the key into his palm, watching as his fingers close over it tightly. "And I don’t want you interrupting my train of thought. So you’re just gonna lie there and take it like a man, right?" I tell him.

The panic is starting to give way to excitement again, his pupils dark and wide, a faint flush in his face. I can’t tell you how hot he looks, all stretched out for my viewing pleasure, cock flag-pole straight, jutting up over his belly, foreskin tight against the head, seamlessly bronzed skin gleaming a little with sweat and lubricant. He’s got a beautiful chest, narrow little hips, long slender thighs, muscled calves, beautifully arched feet, and I stand there, just admiring him in all his glory, watching the blush darken to embarrassment.

"Hobbes, dammit, stop staring at me," he complains a little breathlessly as he slides the ring of the handcuff key over one finger distractedly. I realize with another little thrill it’s the ring finger of his left hand he’s wearing that little piece of unorthodox jewelry on, and the rush of possessiveness that washes over me with that unconscious gesture has me excited beyond belief.

I struggle to hold onto the look that Fawkes calls my ‘bad cop’ expression, not wanting him to see how aroused he’s got me, even though I know my own cock will give some of it away. "C’mon, Bobby, come back to bed," he urges.

Stubbornly, I cross my arms over my chest and lean a hip against the footboard of the bed, just continuing to watch him, licking my lips deliberately to express my appreciation for what I’m seeing. His eyes widen, then narrow suddenly, and I watch him relax abruptly as he rolls onto his back, his free hand tucked behind his head as he looks back at me, expression as languid as one of those paintings of naked ladies – what’re they called: odalisques? – that they used to hang behind the bar in old west saloons. He’s beautiful, and he knows it, and he’s showing off for me, subtly tormenting me into giving him what he wants. "C’mon, Hobbesy, you know you can’t keep your hands off me," he teases husky-voiced, sultry.

That’s the absolute truth, thanks.

Still, I can make him wonder, make him beg, and that’s the point of this whole exercise, after all, to show him it goes both ways.

That he wants me as much as I want him. He may not have any doubts, but I do, and I want to make sure we’re both totally clear on it. I settle back to watch him, just running my eyes over every inch of his fully exposed body, and it’s fascinating to see how turned on it’s getting him, the blush spreading down his throat to his chest like a post-orgasmic woman. God almighty, the kid oozes sex-appeal. It goes on like this for another few minutes before he locks eyes with me and starts taking matters into his own hands. Well, hand, anyway, as he slides his free one out from under his head and starts touching himself, working his way down his chest slowly, teasing his own nipples. The soft sigh of his moan is almost inaudible and I can see his lips move, but I can’t make out what he’s saying. Then he slips further south over the tight muscles of his belly, down, down to run a fingertip along the length of his own penis, and now I can understand what he’s murmuring so quietly; my name.

"Bobby," he whispers, eyes half-closed, watching me watch him turn himself on as he slides his fingers over his balls, around the base of his shaft, then wraps them tightly around himself and begins to stroke, long forceful pulls designed to bring him off as fast as possible.

I launch myself across the room again, this time going for his cuffs. If anyone is gonna bring him off, it’s gonna be me, dammit, and I’m back beside the bed in a split second, catching his wrist in the cuff and pulling his hand away from himself to secure him to the bed frame totally.

The frustrated and wounded look is window dressing for the absolute excitement I can see pulsing in his veins, throbbing in the hollow of his throat and along the swollen one that runs the length of the underside of his cock. "You’re not getting off that easy, kid," I warn him, unable to keep a little of the smugness out of my tone.

"Dammit, Bobby, what are you tryin’ to prove, huh? That I want you? I thought I’d kinda made that clear, here, already," he grouses, the usual self-involved whine in his voice, only I can read him well enough by now to know he’s serious, and the bitchiness is just his charming way of saying so.

"I just want to know exactly what’s going on in that twisty brain of yours, partner," I grin at him, kneeling on the edge of the bed as I gaze down at him spread out in front of me like a five course meal. "Just so’s there’s no confusion," I add, then straddle his waist and lean forward, stroking the soft skin along the undersides of his arms as I trail my hands down from elbow to armpit, smoothing the pubic hair there, as I move on to his chest.

I can feel his breathing lift his diaphragm up and down between my thighs, his belly brushing my balls, and it’s maybe the most intensely sexy thing I can imagine. Darien is a feast for the senses, and I intend to use them all to commit him to memory. Some people are wine connoisseurs, some people are food connoisseurs. I, well… I’m planning on being a Darien Fawkes connoisseur.

The sight of him is like reading the menu, the pleasure of wondering what each course would be like. Touch is the hors d’oeuvre, and I use it to whet both our appetites again, starting with my hands, then switching to a full body press as things heat up. Feeling him under me, the warmth of his skin, the dampness of the sweat that slicks us both, is a totally mind-blowing thing, better than anything else I can think of, except for what comes next.

Taste is the first course, light, stimulating, delicious. The salt on his skin brings on a hunger that needs satisfying and I sample him like a banquet, savoring everything I find, including the little hints of my own presence in his bed, in him. I can taste myself on the skin of his belly, a little bittersweet, a different sort of savory than his own, distinct as spices. I ease my way down and start sucking on him like one of those red, white and blue rocket-shaped popsicles I remember loving as a kid, tasting the melt-water oozing out of him. That alone would be enough to bring him to the end of the road, but I have other ideas, so I short-circuit things for him with a tweak to the balls and a little judicious pressure on the bulge behind them.

His moans are getting louder, more emphatic, more desperate, and that’s the main course, the thing that tells me he’s way past the point that fighting me is an option, here. Not that he’s done more than jerk against the restraints when I do something he especially likes, that especially turns him on.

Still, it does prevent him from getting his way the minute he wants it, and I spend a good twenty minutes leading him up to the brink, then moving on. I can gage where he is by the taste of the quicksilver that starts to mix with the sweat, so at the first hint of it, I switch tactics. His vocal performance is everything I could hope for; breathy sighs, deep moans, shaky wails of frustration and desperation when I don’t give him the release he wants, is dying for, by now. He’s chanting my name, pleas, endearments, and encouragement, without breaks between them, one long endless word that rises and falls in tempo and pitch like a cat’s purr.

I lie down alongside him, my head resting on his thigh, feeling the muscles tremble under my cheek as I nuzzle the satin skin from knee to groin, rubbing myself slowly against the rumpled sheets, ready, now, to give in to him. I glance up to see him watching the flex of my ass as I please myself and frustrate him. He looks like a character out of Dickens or something, nose pressed to the glass, gazing longingly at something he wants desperately inside a shop window that’s as inaccessible as if it was on the moon.

That’s when I know he’s begging. I’ve reduced him to a pauper, and suddenly, I know it’s time to satisfy us both. I go back to sucking on him briefly, his groans deepening, his own hips lifting, forcing himself deeper into my mouth, helpless.

Still, that’s not what either of us wants, and I reach for the almost empty Vaseline jar on his nightstand and scoop out what I need to accomplish the job at hand, working it into him as he lifts himself up to make it easy, thighs open wide. One finger, two, a third, and he’s beginning to sparkle and glitter as the quicksilver gets out of his control.

And it’s time. I wipe the rest of it along my own cock, grab one of his pillows, shove it under his raised hips, and drop between his legs, finding my way into him as easily as if I’d been doing this for a lifetime.

He’s tight, unbelievably tight; hot, eager, and in tears again as the relief of knowing he’s about to have the last residual control stripped away from him hits. If it weren’t for the fact that he’s moving up to meet me, his hands in fists, struggling to free themselves to grab hold of me in case I’m thinking of reneging on this promise, I’d be afraid I was hurting him, had pushed him too far.

Maybe I have, but not further than he was willing to go. The key is still clenched in his fist, the ring around his finger, freedom in hand if he wanted it. This is what I’ve been looking for. The answer to the question of how badly Darien actually wants me. And it’s enough to trust me with his freedom.

His eyes are closed against the tears that are running down his cheeks, and I plant my elbows along either side of his ribcage reaching up to stroke the wetness away. "Darien," I say as I begin to move, "Darien, babe, look at me," I whisper, and his eyes, brilliant, luminous as smoky topaz, open to mine, locking on, pinning me with the intensity of that look.

My own breath is whirled away from my lungs as I realize what I’m seeing in his face.

Something I’ve never seen like this in anyone else’s’ face before. Not even Viv’s.

This is love.

It’s more than that, but whatever it is doesn’t have words to describe it.

"Bobby, please, oh, god, please-please-please-please-please," he begs.

Needlessly, since I saw his body ask before he actually reiterated the words he’s been using since we started. I get my hands under me, lifting myself away from his belly, preventing him from finding his release against mine, and drive into him, pistoning slowly, as deep as I can go, feeling his hips buck uncontrollably as I slide past his prostate. I pace myself, determined to do this for him, bring him to the orgasm he needs just by moving inside him. I pray I can do this for him. For both of us. The books say it’s possible, and that it’s one of the most intense a guy can have.

He’s struggling now to free his hands; not dangerously, just insistently, without being aware of it, really, his eyes still focused on me, my name on his lips, desperate to be touched.

Except that what I want is to touch him inside. I know, now, how much he feels for me, and I want him to know the same thing about me. So I move. Faster; gradually increasing the rhythm, the speed, until the icy heat of the quicksilver flows over him like a tide, then over me, and we have to rely totally on feeling, and on the panting, guttural wails that escape from him as he calls my name, an agony of pleasure in his voice.

I know he’s close, but I know I’m closer, and I groan, committed to hanging on, denying myself the release until he gets his, and I change my angle, and there, finally, that’s it.

I’m ramming into his prostate both in and out and he howls, a low, keening sound that nearly makes me lose it myself, and finally, I feel the wet heat of his orgasm spurt upward between us, coating us both from navel to chest. I drop back onto him, moving purely for my own satisfaction now, his blurred, gasping cries of "Yes, oh, god, yes, Bobby, yes-yes," doing their part to tip me over the edge of that cliff myself, and I explode into him with everything I’ve got, moaning his name.

When I’ve stopped shaking so badly I feel like I’m flying apart, I raise my head from his chest and stretch upward, the quicksilver falling away with the movement, and he raises his head off the pillow to meet me, our mouths finding each other in a hungry imitation of the duet our bodies just danced. I lace my fingers into his hair, loving the disheveled softness of it, sweat-spiked now, staring into dazed eyes. "Darien," I murmur against his mouth. "Give me the key," I suggest.

He smiles, a strange mix of devilry and sweetness, and opens his left hand, tipping the ring off his finger and the key falls into his palm. Then to my amazement, he opens his fingers and lets it fall through the slats of the headboard onto the floor under the bed.

"I don’t think so," he answers, and glances up at the monitor tattoo on the inside of his right wrist. I follow the look and feel my stomach knot up as the fact that all but the last segment of the snake is red impacts on my shocked brain.

"I really don’t think that’d be such a good idea, right now," he adds, and I see him wince as the first stabbing agony of quicksilver madness replaces the sensual bliss of seconds before.

"Oh, crap," I mutter as I brush his hair out of his face. "Darien, babe, stay with me, kid. I’ll get the Keeper to bring you a shot, okay?" I assure him as I start to move off of him.

"No. Not yet," he answers, that little glint of mischief, of foolhardiness still in his eyes. "There’s still a little time, Bobby," he contradicts, wrapping his legs around me, holding me where I am, and I can feel the building strength in him that signals the approach of madness.

The thing of it is, is that this is different.

This is the same thing we saw with him and Claire on the piers a couple of months ago, when she was all whacked out on the Beta-C.

I scramble through my memory of what Claire said about that episode, and I flash on her description afterward of the madness as more accurately described by the concept of heightened responsiveness to stimuli. Most of the time, when he goes red-eye on me, we’re being shot at, or our lives are in danger some way or another.

But with Claire, and now with me, there’s no threat to his life, and the response that’s being heightened is the one to sexual stimuli.

Even though all of me knows it’s a bad idea with a capital ‘B’, a tiny part of me wants to know what this other Darien is like. No inhibitions, no restraint, no nothing, Nothing except pure feeling. The animal lust I was talking about earlier.

"Fawkes, it’s too dangerous, partner," I remind him gently. Not dangerous for me, not with him cuffed to his bed, but too dangerous for him.

I’ve seen the way he bleeds inside when he falls into the abyss of madness, hates himself for what he does when that Mr. Hyde takes over. I won’t put him through that, not just for my own selfish pleasure, not just to ease the twinges of jealousy when I think about him. On the docks. With a half-naked Claire.

"Please, Robert," he whispers, the glint in his eyes going from topaz to ruby while I watch, and I know I’ve hesitated too long.

"Let me call Claire, first," I suggest calmly, trying not to let my heart rate start climbing. Getting out of this, getting him out of this, is going to mean staying as calm as possible.

If I start letting it get to me, he’s going to pick up on it, and that’s when things will really get dangerous. "C’mon, babe, let me go. I’ll make a phone call, and the Keep’ll be over in fifteen minutes."

Darien smiles up at me, eyes glowing like live coals, shaking his head a little. "Robert, just fuck me again, alright?" he says, this unholy joy in eyes that aren’t his, and are, this time.

It’s weird beyond belief to hear the demon in him speaking with his voice, with the same intensity Darien uses when he says my name these days. Like it’s a blessing. And he raises his head, reaching up to me, mouth finding mine, and I feel myself starting to stiffen inside him again. He feels it too and grins against my mouth, curving upward against me like a drawn bow, legs tightening around me. "I told you, you can’t keep your hands off me," he reminds me as I catch his head in my hands and kiss him back with all the violence I can feel in him right now. And he moans, deep in his throat.

"I love you, Darien," I whisper into his mouth, knowing there’s still a part of him that can hear it, that knows what it means to me to say it.

And for a split second, I see it register, feel the grip of his thighs and calves around me loosen, and I ease free of him without breaking the kiss.

"I love you. Don’t forget it, kid," I add as I move clear of him, kissing him one last time before I practically fall off the bed and walk calmly across the room to the end table next to the couch where his phone is, dialing the Keep from memory.

"Claire?" I say when she answers. "I’m at Fawkes’. He’s in QSM. Get over here with the counteragent as soon as you can. I’ll try and keep him calm, okay?" I tell her, then hang up before she can respond. I go back to the bed, sitting on the edge, watching Fawkes carefully as he smiles up at me with those crazy eyes.

"I love you, Robert," he says calmly, something I have a hard time connecting to the raving monster he usually is when he’s like this. "And I still want you to fuck me again," he adds, the impish little grin back.

"Oh, I will, partner, I will. I’m planning on spending a real long time doing just that," I tell him, and I can’t keep from grinning back at him. "As soon as you get your shot, as a matter of fact," I assure him, wondering if it’s a promise I can keep.

I distract both of us by stroking him, watching him arch under my hands like a cat, the rumble in his chest a dead ringer for a purr, thinking about what’s going to happen when Claire comes through that door.

There’s no way she’s not going to know what was going on in here. The whole apartment reeks of sex and sweat, and there’s no time to spruce the place up before she gets here, not that there’s much point, anyway. This isn’t exactly how I figured the Agency would find out, but I’m not naïve enough to think Claire isn’t going to put this into some report or other.

Well, if my days of government service are over, at least I’m going to have someone to come home too, this time, I think irreverently, grinning as I nuzzle Darien’s ear, then his throat, then start back in on his nipples again. This is one partnership the Fat Man can’t touch.

As far as I’m concerned, he can fire me tomorrow, as long as Fawkes is serious about the rest of it. In fact, I almost hope he does. All in all, I think maybe I’d be getting the better end of the deal…

End.