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The thing about Jake Seresin is that he wants, genuinely wants, to be a pain in the ass.
Bradley gets wanting to be the best. Everyone he knows wants to be the best, puts blood, sweat and tears into it – but Jake has to take it that step further, has to rub his perfection into the face of whoever gets too close. And people do get close. However unbearably annoying he can be, Jake is charismatic too, with good-boy Southern charm that he deploys like a missile when he feels like it. That’s why he gets away with calling Penny Benjamin ‘m’dear’ when anybody else would be forced into buying a round for the whole bar after the familiarity. That’s why Natasha still talks to him, still laughs at his jokes, after all the shit he’s pulled over the years. That’s why Bradley is standing here by the pool table, untouched beer in his hand, watching Jake perform his Hangman best at the darts board. Perfect, styled blonde hair. Perfectly pressed uniform. He looks like he just walked off the set of a recruitment ad.
“Take a picture,” Natasha says, tapping Bradley on the hip with her pool cue. “It’ll last longer, and talk a lot less.”
Bradley smiles through his embarrassment. “Yeah, true.”
“Rooster,” she said. “Is this still a thing?”
Bradley took a swig of his beer and looked away from the darts competition, though he could hear Jake whoop with satisfaction as he won yet again. The only people who would still play with him were newbies, who didn’t know better, and Javy, in an act of martyrdom to their long-standing friendship. Bradley had learned better in the first month at Top Gun; it wasn’t much of a high ground to take, given that Bradley had been letting Jake goad him into every other kind of competition as long as they had known each other, including in bed. They had broken up years ago – if you could call it breaking up, when they’d never put any kind of label on it – but one smirk, one well-aimed taunt, and Jake could drag Bradley right back there.
And then there was the other thing.
“He saved us,” Bradley said, more to the ground than Natasha. “Me and Mav.”
“I know,” Natasha said. She sounded tired. “I know he did.”
“He didn’t wait for permission. He just…came.”
“Yeah,” Natasha said, and grinned sideways at him. “So, you gonna fuck him about it?”
Bradley’s face burned. He’d always blushed too easy. “It’s not like that.” It couldn’t be like that. Jake had too many sharp edges, and Bradley bruised as easily as he blushed, and he could hide it from most people but not from Jake, never from Jake.
“This is so high school,” Natasha sighed. “In your head, is he the football jock and you’re the nerd in braces?”
“Who wears braces?” Javy asked, wandering up, having hit his limit of watching Jake win at things for the night.
“What, you didn’t have an awkward phase?” Natasha teased.
“Nope,” Jake drawled, strolling up a beat behind. “We wouldn’t know anything about that, right, Coyote? We wake up like this.”
Bob, hanging back frowning over a pool cue, looked up and blinked. He was still new enough to Jake being Jake to do these double takes occasionally. Natasha just rolled her eyes and Bradley drained his beer. Jake hitched up onto a stool, clear green eyes flicking around the bar. They lighted on Bradley and he braced himself for trouble, but Jake just smiled at him, a little curl at the edge of his mouth instead of the wide smirk. Bradley couldn’t help smiling back.
The thing about Jake was, Bradley always did want to smile back. Even when Jake was being a dick. Even when Jake went too far. Even when Bradley wanted to grab him and shake the bullshit right out of him, he didn’t want Jake to stop. And ever since the mission, ever since Jake appeared like an eleventh hour angel, he just wanted to…look at him, take him in, like somehow if he stared at Jake long enough then the tangle in between them would all start to make sense.
“Hey, Rooster,” Jake said. “You feeling okay? ‘Cause you haven’t messed with my choices on the jukebox all night, and that’s not like you.”
Bradley glanced at him, grinned. “Is this you asking me to play a song?”
“Didn’t say that,” Jake said promptly.
“No take-backs,” Bradley sang at him, and went over to the piano. It was Jake who unplugged the jukebox, settling in to lean against the piano, while Bradley ran his fingers over the keys and decided what to play.
“Something from this century, please,” Jake said.
“Sorry, honey, I don’t take requests,” Bradley said sweetly. He didn’t miss the way that Jake’s eyes sparked, the way he leaned in a little closer. It gave him a warm, dangerous rush, and maybe that was why he picked the song he did – or maybe it was because, despite everything he’d just said to Natasha, this was still a thing.
Now I’ve got you in my sights
With these hungry eyes
One look at you and I can’t disguise
I’ve got hungry eyes
As dumb things to do went, this was right up there with stealing an enemy aircraft with his insane estranged godfather, and just as likely to end in explosions, but Bradley sang it anyway. Don’t think, Mav had told him, just do. Well, overthinking had never got Bradley anywhere with Jake. Maybe it was time to switch things up.
He caught Natasha’s eye. She was shaking her head with an exasperated little smile. Javy was looking between Bradley and Jake with the incredulous glee of a man about to unexpectedly win a bet. Jake wasn’t paying attention to that, though. His eyes were fixed on Bradley like they were going to a burn a hole right through to his heart. As Bradley hit the last few notes and the bar broke out into a round of applause – Bradley’s performances were something of a tradition around here – Jake straightened up, jerked his chin towards the door and stalked toward the door.
“Ohhhh,” Bob said, enlightened against his will.
“Yeahhh,” Natasha said, handing him a beer. “Tell me about it.”
“Shut up,” Bradley muttered, nudging his way past them through the crowd. He could see Jake hovering impatiently at the door. Bradley’s stomach tightened with a knot of anxiety. Probably, on consideration, it would have been better to have some kind of conversation before serenading Jake in front of a whole bar. Never mind that only a few people would have understood what all that was about – those were the people Jake cared about. Just because Bradley was getting all hung up on all these feelings didn’t mean Jake was feeling anything at all.
As soon as he got within range, Jake grabbed the front of his shirt and yanked.
“Where’s your car,” he said tensely.
Bradley’s eyebrows rose. “Over there?”
“Good,” Jake said, and shoved Bradley up against it, and then he shoved their faces together.
Bradley had a hold on him before he’d really had time to process what was happening. Call it an aviator’s instincts. He grabbed a handful of that artfully styled hair, wrapped his other arm around Jake’s waist, and held on with everything he had. Jake was kissing him like he wanted to stake a claim on his face, sloppy and breathless with tongue and teeth and spit. He was going to have beard burn from Bradley’s moustache but he didn’t seem to care about that.
“You’d better be taking me home,” he panted against Bradley’s jaw. “Right the fuck now.”
It wasn’t a long drive, which was just as well, because Bradley could barely spare a thought for the road, not when he had a wildly horny Hangman tapping impatiently on his thigh the whole way. They made out up against the door, lost some clothes, stumbled down the hallway and kissed some more while Bradley fumbled around for the light switch, lost some more clothes, steered an eventual course into the bedroom and crash landed on the bed with Bradley on top, his full weight pressing Jake down.
“Fuck, Jake,” he breathed, “I’ve wanted this. I wanted you under me all night.”
“Oh yeah?” Jake smirked. “Under you, huh? How about this?” He shoved Bradley over onto his back and straddled him a swift, fluid move. He had an unerring instinct for setting a scene; the light leaking in from the hallway gilded his shoulders and shone in his hair. “You like me like this?”
“Yeah,” Bradley panted, grabbing blindly at his hips.
“I wanna hear it, Rooster,” Jake said, grinning, the cat teasing the canary right before the bite. He leaned over and helped himself to lube from the bedside table. “Come on, hotshot. Got anything to say? How do I look?”
“You look good.” Bradley’s voice was thick and hoarse. “So fucking good, Jesus Christ, Jake, you’re so good.” He went on crooning praise, helplessly. “Look at you, putting on a show. Could watch you all night, baby, I swear.”
Jake moaned and reached behind himself, arched his back, twisting his hips as he began opening himself up. “Better keep talking,” he warned.
Like old times, Bradley thought, a wave of fondness making him smile. “You wanna hear you’re hot?” he asked, stroking up Jake’s sides, thumbing over his nipples. “You know you’re hot. You’re a damn fireball, Hangman.”
Jake lifted up on his knees, reached for Bradley’s dick like it was his due. He moaned again as he sank down, and Bradley gripped his hips so hard it was going to bruise. He wanted it to bruise. He wanted to leave some trace of himself on Jake’s beautiful body, some evidence that Jake couldn’t brush off in the morning, the way he’d brush off everything else. He wanted Jake to mark him up too but didn’t know how to ask for it, so he just braced his feet, jerked his hips and set a punishing rhythm that had Jake shouting out his pleasure, slapping a hand down to grab the headboard for balance.
“Oh my God,” he wailed, rocking down hard to meet Bradley’s thrusts. Sweat gleamed on his chest. “Bradley, Bradley.”
“Yeah,” Bradley said, satisfaction surging through him, almost as good as an orgasm. Watching Jake unravel on top of him, bucking and squirming in his grip, was fucking magical. He shifted his hold and rolled them over, grabbing Jake’s flailing hands and pinning them to the mattress, swallowing up his noise of indignant surprise with a messy, demanding kiss. Jake resisted at first, always contrary, biting into the kiss and bucking up like he was going to try and get back on top. Bradley let go of his wrists and Jake frowned, made another annoyed sound. Impossible to please, Bradley thought, charmed as he usually was in spite of himself by Jake in all his prickly, perfectionist glory. He squeezed his wrists again and Jake relaxed into the sheets, letting Bradley shift him into position for the fucking of a lifetime.
Jake liked it both ways; hell, he’d try pretty much anything once, as reckless in bed as he was in the sky. When he was the one getting fucked, he liked it hard, and he liked to be worshipped – that much didn’t seem to have changed. Bradley kissed him anywhere he could reach, face and shoulders and chest, and fucked him like there was no tomorrow. Jake came almost silently, mouth open wide, nails biting into Bradley’s forearms. Bradley couldn’t last much longer, moaning into Jake’s shoulder as he shuddered through the aftershocks.
They came down slowly, still wrapped around each other, Bradley’s head on Jake’s chest. Jake stretched a couple of times with a pleased sigh and Bradley thought he might be about to get up but instead he just sprawled more comfortably out in Bradley’s bed and started to pet his hair.
“Damn, you’re good,” Jake said.
“Too good to be true,” Bradley said, smiling against warm, sweaty skin.
“Oh, fuck you,” Jake said, but he was laughing.
“Whenever you’re ready,” Bradley said, grabbing for the blanket tangled at the end of the bed. “If you can get it up again, of course.”
Jake was quiet for a second, long enough to reignite Bradley’s earlier anxieties, then his chest rose and fell quickly and he growled, “Oh, now it’s on.”
The next day, Bradley woke up to an armful of gorgeous blonde. He was always kind of slow first thing in the morning; for probably a good couple of minutes he just lay there blinking and trying to process the sight of Jake Seresin sprawled out asleep with his face pressed against Bradley’s shoulder. Bradley could feel the soft, warm tickle of breath against his skin and it was actually quite hard to think about anything else, but he tried.
This hadn’t happened, back when they were first together, when they were hooking up whenever they had a rare free moment. They’d rarely made it to a bed. When they had, Jake had always been gone by morning. Hate sex, Bradley guessed you could call it, but even when he’d been mad at Jake nearly all the time, it hadn’t felt like hate. It had felt more like hunger. Sometimes he had thought it was the same for Jake, who couldn’t stay away from Bradley, couldn’t leave him alone, couldn’t miss any chance to get his attention. Jake was a dick, sure, but he was a dick who knew what he wanted.
He’d wanted Bradley last night, all right. But now it was a brand new day, and Jake was starting to wake up.
*
The thing about Bradley Bradshaw – seriously, what kind of sadist gives their kid a name like that – is that he’s good, he’s really good, but he could be better and that just pisses Jake off. What can he say, he’s a judgy kind of guy, he gets it from his mother. Put that together with the dumb moustache, the sad puppy eyes, the way Bradley reacts to every single jab Jake tosses his way, and, well – was he expecting Jake to be capable of leaving him in peace?
Probably not. Bradley might be over-cautious, but he’s smart. He knew Jake was trouble from the day they met. It didn’t stop them from banging the whole way through their training at Top Gun; it just meant that when they graduated, Bradley walked away from the whole thing without a second thought.
Maybe the most humiliating thing about that, the thing Jake is never going to tell a soul, is that the competitors with benefits arrangement with Bradley is the longest lasting relationship he’s ever had. Being the best doesn’t open up a whole lot of room in your life, and whatever time Jake had left, he gave to Bradley. Jake had even put some tentative thought into how they could make it work, after graduation. At least he had not been stupid enough to put any of it into words. When they met again at the Hard Deck, another competition in the air, Jake could play it off with the polished veneer of the team asshole.
Hangman, you look…good. Of all the shit Bradley could have said. The tiny smile in the shape of his mouth. The way his eyes followed Jake around the room. It was a classic Rooster Bradshaw ‘you’re the one that I want’ special. Half the time he used it on girls in bars and half the time he didn’t even seem to know he was doing it. And people called Jake an asshole.
Well, Jake was a fucking moron, anyway, because look at him now.
He wasn’t one of those people who needed time to get their bearings in the morning. Before he opened his eyes, he knew where he was, what had happened, who he was with. There was a weight on the other side of the bed but no soft snoring so Bradley was awake, probably staring at him. Jake was aware of an ache in his shoulder and had a sudden sense memory of fucking into Bradley during round two, Bradley’s teeth biting down to muffle a howl of pleasure. Bradley was loud in bed, once he got going, louder than Jake. Heat washed through him and his body, despite being so sore in so many places, put in its two cents for round three. Jake’s brain, thankfully, took charge and slapped that idea out of the air.
He sat up. Bradley, slumped against the headboard, said, “Hey.”
“Good morning,” Jake said, scanning the room for his pants. No sign of them. Underwear? Nope. At what point had he got naked on the way to the bedroom? Unclear, but evidently before Bradley, because his pants were lying next to the bed. Jake made an executive decision and stole them.
“Those are my jeans,” Bradley noted, not moving from his spot.
“No shit,” Jake said. He’d have stolen the shirt too except it was a lurid Hawaiian print that Jake couldn’t be seen wearing by even an audience of one. “When you were ripping my clothes off all over the house last night, I hope you remembered where you put them.”
“Not really,” Bradley said. He was looking at Jake’s shoulder. Jake rose above it.
“Gonna raid your fridge,” he announced, and walked out the bedroom.
Bradley’s fridge was actually pretty well-stocked, because however he tried to play himself as cool and carefree, he was a big mother hen who liked to be ready for anything. Jake wished he didn’t find that so attractive. He poured himself orange juice, located his shirt and shoes, and – against his better judgement – threw on some toast, because Jake never ate breakfast first thing in the morning but Bradley did. It was a good turn that paid off, because from this angle he finally located his pants, draped over the back of the couch. Jake stalked over to claim them and shrugged off the stolen jeans.
“That’s a good look, Hangman,” Bradley said, sloping out of the bedroom and pausing to appreciate the view. It was mutual; Bradley had not bothered getting dressed at all. Jake couldn’t help stopping for a second, tongue running over his lip. Maybe round three wasn’t such a bad idea?
“I like your hair,” Bradley said. He grinned. “You wake up like that?”
Oh, it was a bad fucking idea. Jake raked his fingers furiously through his hair, which was all floppy and wavy and wild. “Not a word about my hair,” he said, jamming his feet into his shoes. “Or next time you want a life-affirming fuck with your saviour, I’ll be washing it.”
Bradley’s eyes narrowed and he opened his mouth. That was when the toaster popped.
There was a little silence.
“That’s,” Bradley said. He looked at the toast. “For me?”
“Yeah,” Jake said, aware of how tense he sounded but unable to quite control his voice. “Figured you’d be hungry. Throw it away if you want, it’s your bread.”
Bradley blinked at him. “You made toast for me?”
“Jesus fuck, Bradley, I shot a plane down for you,” Jake exploded. “What do you think!”
The thing about Bradley was, he could be so careful, so deliberately, painfully measured, that it made you forget how fast he could be when he wanted. He was right up in Jake’s space before Jake even saw him moving, and then he was kissing Jake – not a hot, starving kiss like last night, this was…firm, sure. Earnest.
“Jake,” Bradley said softly, against his lips. “I’m gonna put this out there. Don’t be a dick.”
Jake bit down the perfect barbed response and said, “Okay.”
“I didn’t want life-affirming sex.”
“Oka-ay,” Jake drawled.
Bradley placed a big warm hand over his mouth. “Yeah, sure, I wanted the sex,” he said patiently. “Mostly I wanted you. You know that, right? It’s you.”
Jake swallowed, feeling the roughness of callouses against his lips. He stuck out the tip of his tongue and delicately licked Bradley’s hand, making him gasp, rock forward.
“This a recent development?” Jake asked. He had no idea what his face was doing, but whatever it was, Bradley looked really happy about it.
“No,” Bradley said. He ran his thumb back and forth over Jake’s lower lip. “It's pretty much all the time. It’s getting to be a problem.”
“Sounds like it would be,” Jake agreed. “I’m a real heartbreaker.”
“Yeah,” Bradley said, and kissed him again, very softly.
“I drive you crazy,” Jake said. “On purpose, even. That’s what I’m like.”
“Yeah.” Bradley’s mouth drifted down his neck.
“That’s not gonna change,” Jake said, quite desperately. “I like who I am. I’m not a fixer-upper, I am a work of art.”
Bradley laughed. He’d backed Jake up against the arm of the couch. “You’re the most fucking annoying person I know,” he said. “No one else wants to annoy me half as much as you.”
“Yeah,” Jake said, and let himself be lowered all the way across the couch, Bradley kneeling over him. He let himself smile; let himself return the kisses, pulling Bradley down to his level. “You got me there.”
“Do I?” Bradley said. It was a question, a real question, his eyes warm and waiting.
Jake didn’t like vulnerability – in himself, in other people. He couldn’t watch movies with second-hand embarrassment, cringing away from the screen. He’d worked so hard to erase his weaknesses, to let barbs bounce off a wall of well-earned arrogance instead of hitting home, that when he saw an open sore spot, he couldn’t leave it well enough alone – each little jab was a warning, come on, get ready, put ‘em up. Don’t you know how bad you could get hurt? But Bradley did know. He knew, and he’d asked Jake not to be a dick about it, and he’d trusted him to do it.
Jake closed his eyes. “You got me,” he said, so quietly that Bradley wouldn’t have heard it if they weren’t breathing the same air, inches apart. And it did hurt, letting his big dumb heart do any of the talking, but it wasn’t an entirely bad hurt. Like the print of a mouth on his shoulder. Like something that he could maybe get used to, if Bradley was the one doing it.
“Say that again,” Bradley said. Jake could hear that grin. He opened his eyes.
“You got me,” he said, and let himself grin back, wide, eyes wet. “You lucky bastard.”
Round three happened on the floor, after Bradley shoved him off the couch.