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Gabriel knocks on the door twice before he lets himself in.
None of the lights are on inside, and for a moment Gabriel just stands there in the doorway, backlit and unmoving. Jack can’t see his face, but he can see by the outline of Gabriel’s body that his shoulders are tense.
“—Jack?”
Jack peels himself away from the wall. He moves as quietly as possible, but the soft creak of shifting leather gives him away, and Gabriel’s head turns toward him.
Jack pitches his voice as low as possible: “Turn around and shut the door. Don’t turn on the lights.”
At the sound of his voice, Gabriel’s shoulders loosen. He obediently turns away, and his silhouette is erased as the door closes between himself and the outside light source.
Jack’s been waiting in the dark long enough for his eyes to adjust, and he can navigate well enough by the indirect light from the windows. He walks all the way up to Gabriel, lays a hand on the nape of his neck, and pushes him forward until he’s pressed flush against the door. Jack leans into him, his other hand settling on his waist, and scrapes his teeth against the soft, warm skin under Gabriel’s ear.
“I’ve been waiting for you.”
Gabriel body twitches slightly, his mouth parting as he exhales. Then he sniffs.
“What’s that smell?”
Gabriel’s hand comes up and tries to touch his own neck. The backs of his fingers graze Jack’s jaw as he reaches, and he makes a tiny, inquisitive sound.
“—Are you wearing makeup?”
Before Jack can stop him, Gabriel stretches an arm out and hits the manual light switch on the wall. He pulls himself out of Jack’s loose grasp and manages find enough space between the door and Jack’s body to turn himself around.
Gabriel looks at him—and starts laughing.
“What kind of clown are you?”
“I’m a vampire,” Jack says, loftily.
The makeup—well, he admits it could be better. He’d whitened his face all over, but on its own the effect had been jarring and unsensual. So he thought, well, why not add some eyeliner? Vampires always had eyeliner. Eyeliner was simple. But it’d gone on unevenly: longer on one eye than the other, and then thicker on one eye than the other when he’d tried to fix it, and then too long again when he’d tried to fix that. So he’d added black eye shadow to hide his mistakes.
Of course, there was no possible way to predict that applying the eye shadow evenly would also be a challenge.
By the time he got the alert that Gabriel had landed on base, the circles of eye shadow had expanded to fully surround his eye sockets. Some of the powder had spilled down his face, leaving black spatters under his eyes. It’d smeared when he tried to blot up the excess.
He looked like a mime who’d just had a miserable cry, but he didn’t have enough time to redo any of it. He had to simply abandon his face to its present state so he could change his clothes and finish getting ready.
—But he’d decided to switch the lights off before Gabriel arrived.
Gabriel examines his own hand. His knuckles are lightly frosted with white paint. “Did you even use any setting spray?”
“What?”
“Jack, you get your makeup done every day. Have you never questioned what they put on your face?”
He swats Gabriel’s hand away as he tries to touch one of his eyebrows, which are caked down under white face paint. “I use that time I think about important things.”
“Yeah? Such as?”
“You know. Lunch. What your ass looks like.”
It’s enough to get Gabriel to laugh again, at least. “So why are you a vampire today?”
Somehow, he hadn’t thought that would require any explanation. Trying to put it into words, now, in front of Gabriel, makes the whole seem even more foolish. “Well… You missed Halloween. It’s your favorite holiday.” He clears his throat, shifting. Gabriel doesn’t need to be reminded what is own favorite holiday is. “I — wanted to surprise you. I, uh, could have waited, but I didn’t want to lose the chance, and…”
No day or hour they spend together is ever guaranteed. He hasn’t seen Gabriel face to face in over four weeks. Gabriel had missed the Halloween party, had missed the chance to even finish the costume he’d started working on. He hadn’t commented or complained, but he’d been humorless when they’d had their check-in that day.
Jack re-wore his daredevil costume for Halloween; an outfit Gabriel wouldn’t be too sad to miss.
But that morning he’d thought, why not play a little dress up to make up for lost time? He doesn’t have Gabriel’s imagination, but he’d gotten himself a little kit of stage makeup, rummaged through his wardrobe, and then kept himself busy for the rest of the day—and well into the night.
Awkwardly, he adds, “Thought you’d like it.”
Gabriel’s expression goes a little softer. He lays his hands on Jack’s shoulders and trails them down the lapels of his jacket. “And what kind of vampire are you, exactly?”
He’s wearing a motorcycle jacket over a compression shirt and dress pants: the best outfit he could come up with what he had available. “Well, I don’t own much black…”
“But I do. None of these blacks match.”
“Like you wouldn’t have thrown a tantrum if I’d touched one of your precious capes.”
“I don’t have capes. They’re clo—”
“Cloaks, yes, your precious cloaks. You’re ruining the scene with all the damn questions.”
Gabriel doesn’t look remorseful. “What’s the scene?”
Jack gestures emphatically at himself. It’s obvious!
“I’m a vampire, and you’re my — my — mmh — I don’t remember the word.”
“Thrall?”
“Thrall. Yes.”
Gabriel smiles. “Oh, no. What are you going to do with me?”
Jack raises both his arms. He braces his hands on the door, one on either side of Gabriel’s head. Then he leans forward and brings his mouth to the shell of Gabriel’s ear. “Fuck you.”
Gabriel—laughs. But it sounds breathy and strained. A hand cups Jack’s waist. “Don’t get your fucking clown paint on my hoodie.”
Jack takes the hoodie off him. He drops it on the floor and peels down the high neck of Gabriel’s own compression shirt, dragging his tongue along the fast-beating pulse point. He wedges a knee between Gabriel’s legs and pulls their bodies together, caging Gabriel into the small space between his arms and the door.
“Bite me,” Gabriel urges, tilting his head to offer his neck.
Jack takes the offer. He fits his mouth against the slope of Gabriel’s neck and presses his teeth into the dense band of muscle. Gabriel’s soft groan thrums in his ear and under his mouth.
“Harder.”
Gabriel’s hips roll against his thigh, and Jack bites harder.
“Come on, harder.”
Jack clamps down, more and more. Gabriel grasps at him. This can’t possibly feel good; he’s never bitten Gabriel this hard before. But Gabriel’s hands are gripping the back of his head, fingers laced through his hair, holding him close, and Gabriel’s hips are twitching forward. He keeps biting, even though it must be too much, it’s surely too much.
Gabriel will ask him to stop when it gets to be too much.
“Fuck, just— Bite me, bite me.”
As soon as the skin breaks, he regrets it. The sound and feeling of his teeth punching through Gabriel’s skin is grotesque. Thick, bitter blood seeps over his tongue. A human bite wound is a bad thing to deal with. Gabriel won’t be destroyed by infection, but blunt teeth leave ragged, pulpy wounds that bruise and swell. And right beside Gabriel’s neck, where it’ll rub on his clothes and pull whenever he moves his arm…
Why did he let himself hurt Gabriel like that? Fucking stupid.
He draws back, wiping his mouth, wanting to spit but having nowhere to do it. Saliva floods over his tongue, and he gulps unwillingly.
He’s still holding Gabriel’s shirt out of the way, revealing two crescents of dark ugly gouges in the skin. The blood isn’t fast-flowing, but it’s already smeared across the base of Gabriel’s neck, and more swells to the surface and begins to trickle toward his chest.
It’s all over his lips. He can smell it when he breathes.
He lets go of Gabriel’s shirt, and it snaps back into place to cover the wound.
“I’m—going to get something for that.”
“Jack, it’s fine—”
There’s a medical kit in every room of his quarters, but he goes to get the one from the master bathroom. He nearly punches the mirror out when a strange man—white face and hollow eyes and bloody mouth—confronts him ghoulishly. He drops his head to avoid the reflection, stooping to grab the kit from under the sink.
Gabriel comes to the doorway, still protesting the need for treatment.
“Jack, come on, it’s nothing.”
“Can you take your shirt off so I can get to it?”
He lays out the irrigation bottle, antibiotic ointment, bandage.
“It’s barely bleeding.”
He snags the neck of Gabriel’s shirt and pulls it down again. A patch of blood has seeped outward from the bite. The inflammation response has already caused the skin to start swelling.
“Can’t get to it like this. Shirt’s in the way.” He drops his other hand to the bottom of Gabriel’s shirt and tries to lift. “Raise your arms.”
Gabriel pushes his hand down. “Stop worrying so much about it.”
“Gabriel—just—it won’t even take five minutes.”
He snags a handful of Gabriel’s shirt, but Gabriel shakes him off and takes a big step backwards. Jack loses his grasp on both parts of the shirt, and the collar snaps back against Gabriel’s neck. The sound it makes is slightly wet.
Jack pursues him. Gabriel backs all the way out of the room, but he seems to underestimate Jack’s doggedness; he simply moves in a circle, letting himself be followed just out of arm’s reach. Jack makes one more attempt to get inside Gabriel’s guard and pull up his shirt. Gabriel deflects him.
Jack stops following him. They both stop moving. Then he swings his arm out and smashes his fist into the wall behind himself. The lights flicker once.
“Take. Off. Your goddamn shirt. So I can help you,” he breathes.
They stare at one another.
Stiffly, Gabriel reaches over his head, grasps the back of his shirt, and hauls it off.
Between his ribs and hip, Gabriel’s side is plastered in bandages. If there was any bruising, it’s already faded, but there’s a reddish swath all around it as though the top layer of skin has been rubbed away. A few scratches radiate out from the area, deeper and more pronounced, with thin scabs dotting the center of each line. There’s no fresh blood visible, except around the raw bite wound at the juncture of his neck. The wounds don’t look that bad, on the whole—but they must have been bad, if they still looks like this now. Nothing lasts for long on them, and Gabriel was in transit for hours.
“What the fuck happened to you?” He brings his hands to Gabriel’s body, laying them gingerly where the skin is undamaged. Gabriel rocks his shoulders back and forth.
“Complications. Nothing broken; no internal damage.”
Nothing worth mentioning.
“I didn’t— You didn’t say anything about—” He can feel a kind of horrified fury heating his blood. “You weren’t even going to tell me?”
He stares straight into Gabriel’s face, but Gabriel drops his eyes, looking, instead, at where Jack’s hands are touching him, dimpling into his skin. “It’s late; I know you have to be up early. I didn’t think I’d see you tonight.”
He was counting on being healed before they saw each other tomorrow. No bandages, no evidence, nothing to explain.
“How did you think we were going to have sex without me noticing?” he presses.
Gabriel shifts his weight. “I thought you’d be happy enough if I just took off my pants.”
Jack presses a hand over his eyes and cycles through one deep breath.
“Let me clean the goddamn bite.”
Gabriel does. Jack brings him back into the bathroom to rinse, disinfect, and cover the fresh punctures, and then Gabriel even lets him lift a corner of the bandage on his side, though he hisses and grumbles when the surgical tape pulls his body hair. Beneath the bandage he glimpses a straight, clean-edged gouge that looks like it was closed with dissolvable staples, which Gabriel’s body has already begun to break down. Gabriel probably made someone patch him right in the field and then carried on without even seeing a doctor afterward. It’ll serve him right if it leaves a scar.
He doesn’t bother asking Gabriel what caused the wound.
Afterward, he goes to the kitchen and makes a cheese sandwich.
Gabriel takes his second slice of bread and eats it as he’s applying cheese to the first piece, so he has to get another from the bag. He ends up with the heel piece.
As he chews his sandwich, he realizes he hadn’t wiped the blood off his mouth.
Gabriel hands him a glass of cold water as he puts the last bite into his mouth. He nods a wordless thank-you as he washes the final mouthful down. He’s tired.
“Are we still going to have sex?” Gabriel asks. He’s still shirtless, his arms folded over his chest. They’re both leaning against the kitchen island, facing the refrigerator, an uneasy half-meter of space between them.
“What do you think?”
Gabriel looks straight ahead, silent for a moment. Then he says, in a stilted voice, “I still want to.”
Jack grunts. “Oh, do you now?” He folds his arms, as well.
Gabriel pushes off from the counter and steps directly in front of him. Jack eyes him warily.
“I know you’re not… hm.” Gabriel exhales a stream of air through his nose instead of finishing that thought. “I haven’t seen you in weeks, and. I. I want something that feels good.” Gently, he pries Jack’s hands away from his chest and draws him to his face, making Jack hold him between his palms. “I need this right now.”
Goddammit.
“—Are we still gonna do the vampire thing?” Jack asks, gruffly. He strokes a thumb back and forth over Gabriel’s cheekbone. God, the man hasn’t even had a chance to shave yet. His hair and beard are overgrown.
“Do you want to do the vampire thing?”
“I dunno. I’m out of material.”
“How can you be out of material? You used like one line.”
“I didn’t think I’d have to do much talking.”
Gabriel sighs out a laugh, drawing one of his hands around to his mouth to kiss the upper part of his palm at the base of his fingers. “If you don’t want to…”
Jack spreads his fingers and pinches the tip of Gabriel’s nose. “Didn’t say that. C’mon, let’s at least get out of the goddamn kitchen.”
His bed is decked out in a luxurious and seductive combination of expensive wine-red sheets and high-absorbency towels. There are platters covered in black candles set out around the room. Having followed him into the bathroom earlier, Gabriel has already seen the arrangement, but he makes a point of looking around with interest.
“It’s very—ah—vampiric,” he says, graciously.
“Sorry it doesn’t live up to your standards of vampire authenticity,” Jack grunts. “Take off your clothes.”
“Is than an order, O Dark Prince?”
Jack rounds on him, stalks forward, and grabs his chin, pressing his fingertips into the meat of Gabriel’s face. “It is, actually.” He slaps Gabriel’s face lightly as he lets it go, stepping back.
Gabriel’s nostrils flare. He just stands there for a moment, then methodically finishes undressing himself and looks at Jack with anticipation.
Jack tilts his chin toward the bed. “Go kneel beside the bed, facing me. Wait there.”
He’s not sure yet how he wants to proceed, so he buys himself some time by walking around the room to light all the candles and turn off the lights. The window opacity is set at about half: enough to let in a little extra outside light to supplement the candles, enough to keep them obscured.
Then he stands in front of Gabriel and says, “Open my pants.”
As Gabriel reaches for his pants, Jack unzips the motorcycle jacket. It’s too warm to wear comfortably inside for long, but he’s been too distracted to think about taking it off. He’s already sweating inside it.
Taking over from Gabriel, he pushes his pants and underwear halfway down his thighs and tilts his hips forward. Gabriel meets him with an open mouth.
He’s not very turned on yet, but using Gabriel’s mouth is another opportunity to stall for time. He rolls the motorcycle jacket off his shoulders and down his arms, placing it on the bed, then pulls off his shirt and adds it on top. He lays a hand on Gabriel’s head as he thinks. He’d planned to use restraints, maybe treat Gabriel to something rough, but now that doesn’t seem advisable.
But what Gabriel’s doing starts to feel good, even though he hasn’t been paying attention to it. The heat and wetness and the little puffs of Gabriel’s breath draw his attention back to own body, to the way he’s begun to rock lightly in place without noticing, grinding himself into and onto Gabriel’s mouth. He looks down and find Gabriel’s eyes closed. The candle light flatters him, playing attractively off the planes of his face.
Without a word, Jack takes a step back, leaving Gabriel with his tongue out. Gabriel swallows and opens his eyes, visibly puzzled.
Jack kicks his pants and underwear off and steps up to Gabriel again. He places a knee on the mattress beside his head and leans his weight onto it. His shin presses down on Gabriel’s shoulder—the one opposite the bite. The angle lets him crowd Gabriel up against the bed, forcing his head back, letting him press himself directly over Gabriel’s mouth. It gives him all the control. Gabriel’s pinned in between the mattress and his pelvis. He slips a hand down his stomach to his pubic bone and rucks the skin above his groin up, exposing more of himself for Gabriel’s lips and tongue.
They grasp at each other. Their hands fumble for places to grip. Jack ends up holding Gabriel’s head with both palms, keeping him at the angle he wants while he grinds deliberately and forcefully onto his face. Gabriel digs his fingers into his hips like he’s putting up a fight, but he isn’t. He’s letting this happen. And when Jack slows the grind of his hips, he feels Gabriel still pulling, urging him to keep moving.
Jack’s thigh muscles start twitching. He adjusts the angle of his body, shoving his cock into Gabriel’s mouth instead of letting him lick. He rocks between Gabriel’s lips, and pleasure reverberates through the rest of his body like a drum beat building on itself. Then he goes over.
He never has subtle orgasms. They’re always embarrassingly over-wrought: heaving chest, shaking legs, breathless moans. Like he’s fucking faking it. He starts to gasp and then can’t stop gasping. He curls forward, putting more and more weight onto his bent knee until he’s hunched all the way over Gabriel’s head, a hand coming down on the mattress to brace himself. Gabriel’s hands travel up the back of his thigh, supporting the leg he’s balanced on.
He only endures having his cock sucked like that for a few more seconds before there’s a building pressure between his legs that’s like the need to urinate. It feels - good. He wants to give in to it. But he has no intention of soaking Gabriel’s bandages in extra bodily fluids, so he clumsily pops himself off and readjusts, letting Gabriel lick into him again. But soon even that stimulation starts to feel like too much, too much, and he has to peel himself away from Gabriel’s head and lean back. Gabriel’s face, when it’s revealed, is sweat-dampened from being pressed against his abdomen, and his mouth remains parted even when Jack lowers his other leg to the floor and steps backwards.
Jack stands with his feet shoulder-width apart and uses a hand to bare more of his cock. He hopes there’s enough light for Gabriel to see it still twitching. Gabriel’s eyes rivet there, and he leans forward as though in expectation that it’ll be fed to him again.
He’s nothing if not a dutiful—fuck—what was the word—thrall.
“C’mon, up with you,” he murmurs. “Onto the bed.”
Gabriel rises from his knees, then moves backwards onto the bed. He comes to rest with his legs slightly bent and parted, reclining back on his elbows. Considerately, he placed himself on the towels. It’s too dark to really get a look at him, but he smells Gabriel’s arousal.
Jack crawls after him. He stretches out on his side next to Gabriel, supporting his head on one bent arm. He likes being able to look down and watch what he’s doing to Gabriel while still being close enough to pick up on his subtler reactions. Without preamble he runs a hand down Gabriel’s body and toys between his legs. Gabriel’s cock is framed by two vertical hood piercings, curved barbells mirroring each other on either side. Jack pinches them lightly inward, against Gabriel’s cock, stroking along his length. Gabriel groans through his teeth.
Jack watches his profile and steadily, patiently jerks him off. Gabriel probably hasn’t touched himself for weeks now; Jack isn’t surprised when it takes him barely a couple of minutes to orgasm. Gabriel holds his breath and squirms on the bed. As Jack keeps touching him, Gabriel jerks and twists away, turning onto his side with his back toward Jack.
Jack follows after him. He scoots up against the length of Gabriel’s body and keeps his hand wedged between his legs, working at him persistently. Then he slips two fingers directly into Gabriel.
The aftershocks of the orgasm haven’t faded yet. Gabriel’s body gently contracts around his fingers, and he matches the rhythm to stroke inside him. He always tries to get Gabriel off before fucking him. He’d like to say it’s out of altruism, but it’s pure selfishness. It just turns him on. He likes the way it makes Gabriel more reactive and disarrayed. He likes the way it feels.
His hand bumps up against Gabriel’s cock as he fingers him, but it’s erratic. Just enough sensation to make Gabriel breathe a little sharply each time it happens. Stubbornly, he wedges his other hand under Gabriel’s side until he manages to slide his forearm beneath him and curl it around the front of his body. He can’t see much of what he’s doing, but he manages to tuck his fingers under his other hand so that they’re layered one atop the other, two fingers pushing and curling into Gabriel and two rubbing him from the outside.
Gabriel says hah! and twists farther, one of his elbows jerking inadvertently into Jack’s ribs. Jack hooks a leg around and between Gabriel’s, tangling them together to keep Gabriel from moving too much and from trapping his hands between his thighs as they clench.
He should’ve grabbed a bottle of lube before doing this, maybe, but Gabriel seems to be doing all right. Fluid seeps out around Jack’s fingers, making every stroke audibly pornographic.
He studies the bandage on Gabriel’s shoulder. “You really wanted me to hurt you earlier. Why?”
“—Already hurt. Wa-ah-anted it to be from you.” Gabriel tosses his head, and Jack sees his teeth flash for just an instant as he grimaces, like a butterfly knife flicking open and shut. “Wanted you to, ah, get it off my mind. Give some...something better.”
He doesn’t plan on hurting Gabriel anymore tonight, but Jack can put him through other kinds of agony. He nuzzles into the back of Gabriel’s shoulder, brushing the warm skin with his lips as he redoubles his efforts with his hands. Gabriel flexes, his back bowing away from Jack, and a hand comes back to grip and rake at Jack’s hip. Jack sticks stubbornly against him, refusing to let Gabriel get away. He rolls his own hips forward in time with his fingers, even though he doesn’t get any direct sensation out of it. It’s just reflex. It just feels right.
Gabriel comes again with a kind of snarl that tapers off into an airless exclamation as all the air is wrung out of him. Jack pushes his face against the nape of his neck and rides it out with him. He keeps at it until Gabriel paws at him, trying to drag his hands away.
Jack allows it. He stops rubbing Gabriel’s dick and withdraws his fingers, and he feels the expansive swell of Gabriel’s ribs as he finally takes a full, deep breath. His hand is startling to feel cold and prickly from letting Gabriel’s weight press down on his forearm, so he wiggles it out from under him and flexes his fingers.
He feels satisfied but not sated. He unhooks his leg from between Gabriel’s and sits up, looking down at him. Gabriel has folded his lower arm across his face as he catches his breath.
Carelessly, Jack wipes his hand on the towel. Then he draws his fingertips back and forth along Gabriel’s hip, shivery-light touches that raise goosebumps elsewhere on Gabriel’s body. Jack feels himself leaking and double-checks that he’s still on top of a towel.
“You ready for another?”
Gabriel groans, peeking out from under his arm. “That wasn’t enough?”
“Of course not. This is the, the source of my, uh, my—evil power.”
Gabriel groans again, but Jack sees the corner of his mouth turn slyly upward. “Well, as your thrall, how can I possibly resist your power?”
Jack grins. “That’s right.” He finds handholds on Gabriel’s body and turns him onto his back, prying at his knees. “Open up.”
Gabriel lets his legs fall apart, but Jack leans away momentarily to pull open one of the under-bed drawers. He comes back up again with their heftiest vibrating wand. Gabriel closes his legs.
“I asked,” Jack reminds him, mildly.
“Jack…”
“I could do a lot worse, you know.”
Gabriel looks at him ungratefully, but he presents himself again.
Jack reclines beside him. He starts the wand on the lowest setting. The toy hums against his hand as he nudges the wide round tip against Gabriel’s cock.
Gabriel’s legs snap shut. But they reopen just as quickly as he fights the reflex to guard himself. Jack murmurs appreciatively and leans in to kiss the side of Gabriel’s neck as he presses the wand against him again.
Gabriel’s thighs clamp around it.
Jack clucks softly, sitting up. “Come on. Legs open.”
“Can’t—”
“You need some help?”
Gabriel covers his face and makes a miserable little noise. He could always object. He could always tell Jack to stop. He’s simply making the decision to be dramatic, instead.
Jack pats his leg and sets the wand aside as he rummages over the side of the bed again. He’d set up the under-bed restraints in preparation for a more intense night. The restraints are nothing special; either of them could pull the chain links apart if determined enough. But it’s the thought that counts. A person who’s bound spread-eagle to a bed knows they’re supposed to stay that way.
Jack pulls the ankle restraints up one at a time, giving Gabriel ample opportunity to protest, before he drags one of Gabriel’s legs toward the corner of the bed and fastens the ankle cuff around him. Then he secures the second leg.
Getting Gabriel like this never fails to thrill him. The wealth of things he could do is overwhelming. He wants to use his hands, his mouth, a strap-on cock. He wants to give Gabriel everything he has and everything he can take. He wants Gabriel to be undone. He runs his hands up the lengths of Gabriel’s legs and leans in to kiss his mouth. Their lips are still nearly touching when he finds the wand with one hand and presses it between Gabriel’s legs before turning it on.
He hears both lengths of chain snap taut as Gabriel’s legs jerk and try to close. Gabriel heaves under him, his hips lifting and falling mindlessly as he tries to escape.
“God—” Gabriel’s breath catches— “dammit.”
Jack sits back to give himself a better vantage. He kneels in the open space between Gabriel’s legs, working the wand in little patterns: up and down one side of his cock, then the other, and across the hood. He avoids touching the head of Gabriel’s cock directly, but Gabriel’s whole body winds up with every pass. He grabs the bedsheets with one hand and Jack’s forearm with the other, and grips both as though they’re equally unfeeling.
It’s bearable, though. So Jack bears it.
When it starts to become less bearable, he shifts the vibrations up a level.
Gabriel shouts and sits up. His stomach tightens and his body tries to fold in on itself, but when the ankle cuffs keep his legs down, his torso comes all the way up instead. Jack catches him with a hand flat against the center of his chest, stopping him from curling any farther forward.
“Shhh,” he murmurs. “You can handle it.”
He can. Jack knows he can. But Gabriel gives him a pained look, as though Jack is subjecting him to torture.
He takes the wand away for a moment as he presses Gabriel back into the mattress. Jack pats his chest consolingly. “I don’t want to cuff your wrists, but I can. Would that make it easier?”
Gabriel stares straight up at the ceiling. Then he nods.
Jack places the wand, still buzzing merrily away, onto Gabriel’s stomach before he crawls to the head of the bed to draw up the wrist restraints. He sits himself squarely on Gabriel’s chest, a knee on either side of his torso, as he cinches each cuff. Gabriel tugs twice against one of the cuffs to show the range of motion he’s left with. He can raise his wrists about ten centimeters and move them back and forth somewhat, but no more than that without breaking them.
He’s chosen this. Which also means he’s chosen to let Jack do worse.
He lifts himself off Gabriel’s chest and walks backwards down Gabriel’s body on his knees, retrieving the wand as he passes over his hips, until he resettles between Gabriel’s legs.
He waits until Gabriel looks directly into his eyes before he cycles to a pulsing pattern of vibrations and presses the wand directly against Gabriel’s cock.
Gabriel immediately throws his hips to the side to escape, but there’s no getting away. Not that Jack would let him. He’ll get Gabriel to the edge through sheer, blunt, unrelenting force. It will probably hurt. It probably already hurts.
Gabriel swivels his wrists to grab the lengths of chain attached to the cuffs. His thigh muscles jump with every pulse of vibrations. He bucks and jolts, and the horseshoe-shaped outline of his ribcage comes into relief as his chest arches up and his stomach tightens down.
Then his legs kick straight out and his head snaps back as he peaks. His throat clicks airlessly. Jack watches and waits, rolling the head of the wand back and forth over his cock. The candlelight highlights the cords of Gabriel’s neck as they strain under the tension. When it seems like Gabriel is at his absolute limit, when he’s in agony, when he can’t take any more, Jack switches to a faster pattern and pushes two fingers into him.
Gabriel’s wet but he’s clenched tight. Jack has to pet and coax his way into him. When he manages to work two fingers past the resistance, he adds a third. He curls his fingers and rubs upward, in the direction of Gabriel’s abdomen, tormenting the sensitive spot under his fingertips.
“Relax,” he whispers. He’s asking for something he doesn’t expect Gabriel to give him “Shhh. Just relax.”
Gabriel strains out an anguished sound, and Jack works his hand harder, urging, coercing.
Gabriel shatters from one orgasm directly into another with a spasm and a sudden rush of fluid against Jack’s hand. He crows triumphantly as he persists, rewarded with another gush over his palm. Gabriel thrashes under him.
“Ja—aa—”
He knows a request to stop when he hears one, so he stops. He takes the wand away and stills his fingers, though he leaves them where they are, feeling the steady squeezing pulses of climatic aftershocks, like a heartbeat.
Gabriel exhales.
Jack leaves him there for awhile. Gabriel lies still and quiet under him, eyes shut, until Jack takes his fingers out, and he remains still and quiet while Jack crawls over him and grinds onto his thigh as he jerks himself off until the ache between his own legs subsides.
He lets Gabriel out of the restraints, Gabriel kicks the towels off the bed, and for a few minutes they do nothing but lie there together on the cusp of sleep in the inconsistent darkness, tucked wearily and wetly together.
But eventually Gabriel climbs out of bed, and he follows.
They blow out the candles and raise the lights slightly to help themselves see. They move the towels into the laundry basket and add the clothes they’d left on the bed and the floor. Gabriel limps into the bathroom, and Jack goes in with him.
The mirror shocks him all over again. He looks—worse. Circles of paint have rubbed away from the center of his forehead and the tip of his nose, and there are more bare areas around his mouth and chin. A couple flakes of dry brown blood have managed to cling to his face below his bottom lip. He’s sweated white paint down his neck.
“Jesus.” He leans forward over the vanity. “Can’t believe you let me fuck you like this.”
Gabriel studies him noncommittally. “Well, you look about the same as usual.”
“Oh, hardy har, jackass.”
Gabriel opens one of the vanity drawers and starts pulling things out. “Here. Hold still. Close your eyes.”
Jack swats him half-heartedly as Gabriel makes him turn face to face, but he shuts his eyes. Something cold and soft and damp touches his face and rubs a little circle, then expands outward. Jack holds still as Gabriel gently cleans the makeup from his face and neck. When he opens his eyes, the face he knows better than his own is in front of him. Gabriel’s eyes are heavy with fatigue, but his expression is all diligence as he finds a stray spot to clean beside Jack’s earlobe.
Jack interrupts any further efforts to clean his face by pressing it into Gabriel’s neck.
“Missed you, you rotten son of a bitch,” he mutters. Gabriel grumbles indistinctly, but an arm winds around his back, and he feels Gabriel’s cheek rest against his head. “You gonna stay? Tonight?”
Gabriel’s soft huff of laughter stirs his hair. “Well, I fucking hope so.”
It won’t be much of a night. Soon Jack will be out of bed again, and Gabriel will have to follow. But for now they have the darkness and quiet, and there’s no distance between them.