In Potentia

by Absoluwhut

Summary:

Morse at the start of season 3. Morse after Blenheim Vale, and during (and after) Bixby. Morse and desire.

Jakes at the start of season 3. Jakes after Blenheim Vale returns to his life. Jakes and desire.

Morse and Jakes before the tiger. Intimacy.

Jakes after Trewlove joins the station. Jakes and insecurity. Jakes and love.

Morse and Jakes some time in season 5. Smut.

Chapter 1

While he’s inside Jakes comes to visit him, every week, like clockwork. They sit across from each other but don’t actually say much. They don’t chat. They’ve never really chatted. He’s not one to make friends easily, and even if he was, the man he’d thought Jakes was wasn’t the kind of man he wanted to befriend. He thinks maybe he was wrong about that. About him.

Of the few things the other man does say to him are the words “sorry” and “thank you.” Not at the same time, and both times choked up, strangled out, Jakes not able to meet his eyes, and both times seemingly out of nowhere.

“Of course,” he splutters out, not quite managing “you don’t have to be sorry.” There’s something mortifying there, in all the words he wants to say, the way he wants to get closer, to learn more, to comfort and reassure. It’s exposing. He’s not very good at bringing his walls down.

When he gets out he doesn’t see Jakes for a bit. He didn’t tell the man where he was going, about the cabin. He didn’t tell anyone, not even Monica, not really, only gave her a number to contact him on.

He’d been thinking of marrying her but it feels like a dream. He can’t bring to mind, to heart, the feelings he had for her. He still likes her, he thinks she’s lovely, but he can’t feel the love he was sure was there.

He doesn’t know why. He can’t account for it.

She did nothing. She supported him the whole time, came to visit him. It just felt like a farce. Like he was pretending to be someone he wasn’t when he was with her.

He feels bitter and cold all the way down, all the way through, to the heart of him. He supposes he feels betrayed. He can understand Jakes, he saw Jakes, he saw Jakes, saw the cracks left behind by whatever it was they did to him back then, saw how easy it would be for him to shatter. Thursday, of course, above reproach there, but part of him doesn’t feel so safe with the rest of them.

Doesn’t feel like the station has his back.

It’s actually Strange that makes him rethink that a bit, talking about how far Bright went to defend him, to keep Thursday safe. It reminds him that even if Strange did hesitate, he came through in the end.

He gets tangled up with Bixby and Kay for a while, and he realises maybe he’s flirting a little with both of them, just in time for Bixby to die on him. He has some kind of self awareness to him, that kind of self awareness. It’s hard not to, when he spends too much time thinking, dwelling maybe. He’s always liked girls enough to ignore the other things he likes. So it’s not a surprise.

It’s easier liking girls when all the everything else about him has always made him into such a pariah. He never needed anything more. Especially not a crime, not one he ever thought should be a crime, but a crime nonetheless. It was always all too difficult. Girls were easy. Girls were safer. There’d never been a bloke he liked enough to make it worthwhile.

Maybe Bixby, but maybe not. Maybe that was all the gloss and broken edges. The vulnerability peaking out. The real person behind the mask.

He sees Jakes again then, when he’s still shaking and shuddery, sitting not too far from his new friend’s corpse. He’s long and lanky, like always, dressed in a dark, sharp suit. Somehow striking against the bright bleariness of the day.

It’s a strange relief to see him. To hear his voice. It’s like things thunk back into place inside of him when he does. He sees Jakes behind his eyelids often. Shakes in the pub, terrified at even the idea of Blenheim Vale. He can’t quite account for the feeling it wakes in him. It’s like part of him wants to burn down the whole world.

Jakes isn’t as classically pretty as Bixby. He’s narrow and sharp, all of him is, face and body, even hands. There are no plush curves, no plump, inviting lips. It takes him a while to realise that even if Jakes isn’t pretty he thinks him beautiful.

It’s not until after the truth of Bixby comes out. After Bixby comes back, but turns out not to be Bixby after all.

Conrad Greel is pretty, the same as his twin. Same face, same body. Still, it’s not just the lacking words, the absence of old man, that triggers that part of him. The hound with a scent. The sense something is wrong.

Bixby, Charlie Greel, was pretty. He found him pretty. Inviting. He doesn’t feel the same standing across from the man pretending to be him. The animal part of him, lust, want, attraction, maybe even sympathy, honest desire, doesn't sit up and take notice. It notices what the eyes don't at first. That the man that looks like the man he wants isn’t actually the man he wants.

It all hurts a bit when it’s all said and done. He’s lost something, he thinks. Not something he was ever going to have, but a potentiality. A thing that could have been reached for, if Kay, Kathy, hadn’t been there first. If Charlie wasn’t lost on her already.

He’ll survive it though. It’s the kind of loss that stings but doesn’t devastate.

Then, a few nights later, he’s in the pub with all of them. Thursday, Strange, Jakes, and Jakes is sitting next to him, the way maybe he wouldn’t have in the past, but seems to want to now, and it’s Strange’s round. Strange is handing out their pints, but he’s at the far end of the table, so Jakes takes his and hands it to him. As he does their fingers brush, just for a second, and his eyes catch there.

Long, slender fingers, a narrow wrist, and he feels something, and then he looks up at Jakes’ face and thinks oh. Then he looks back, thinks back to all their past, even to the first time he saw him, didn’t like him, but found his eyes caught on him, and he thinks oh. So then he has to look away.

He doesn’t think Jakes would welcome it, so he’s careful after that, even if the two of them become closer than they were before. Even if he has to make himself be careful. Even if he has to make himself keep his eyes to himself. They want to go wandering, that’s the trouble.

It’s trouble too, because Jakes seems to always be there, always talking to him, gentled now, and sweet sometimes, and even when he’s not still charming. He’s started to find that sharp edge so charming.

It turns out real desire is the same when it’s a bloke as a girl. The urge to touch is just as strong. The urge to spend every moment together. He’s not sure what it means that Jakes seems to want to spend as much time with him as he does with the other.

He’s not sure what it means, either, the night it’s getting late at the station, and that long, lean body comes to lean against his desk. Then, speaking soft, directed only to him, Jakes is saying, “There’s this girl, but…” for a moment the man drifts into silence, and when he looks up he sees there’s a bit of pink to those pale cheeks, and Jakes is having trouble meeting his eyes. Eventually the man finishes with, “Do you want to get a drink some night, just you and me, without the guvnor?”

Even if he doesn't know exactly what Jakes is after, he still finds himself saying yes.

Chapter 2

Notes:

CW: mentions Blenheim Vale so CSA etc, period typical homophobia, also internalised victim blaming.

There may be more. We shall see. I love this pairing. Also I am ill right now and rewatching Endeavour so...

He’s not quite sure when he realised he was attracted to Morse. Pretty early on, probably, or maybe not, maybe he was just attracted without the words to contextualise it. Either way what he felt didn’t help his attitude towards the man.

It’s not like he’s stupid, or delusional, he knows what he is. It doesn’t matter how hard he tries, he’s not attracted to girls, never was, never will be. He does try though. Tries maybe too hard.

There is this girl he’s seen around the place and chatted to a few times that he quite likes, but it’s a friendly kind of like. For a while he thinks maybe that’s the solution. For a while he thinks maybe he took the wrong tactic, pretending to be Peter the ladies man, never the same girl more than twice. Maybe he just needed to find a nice, understanding, and above all oblivious woman, and settle down with her. But then he can’t do it, and she goes back to America.

Still, the few dates they have were more real than he’s managed with most of the girls he’s thought of going with, or even has taken out on a date or two, before they start expecting more and he can’t keep putting it off, so he lets things fizzle out.

He’s tried that too, sex, not just dating. He’s even managed it a couple of times, but it’s awkward, and he’s never enjoyed it much past the physical sensations, and he doesn’t think the girls he’s been with have enjoyed themselves either. He’s always careful not to hurt them, but he doesn’t really know what to do, how to make it good, and there’s no interest there, no desire, feeding into a need to explore their bodies and to work out how to make them come.

It had felt so important to build a shell to protect himself after Blemheim Vale. He’d needed to be a man, a proper man, the kind that no one would look at and picture the trembling, terrified, and so badly hurt spectre of Little Pete. It’d felt a bit like if anyone found out he was bent, and then found out about Blenheim Vale, they’d think he deserved what happened to him there. That he was asking for it.

He was never asking for any of that. None of them were. The things that were done to them, there’s no words for them, even if there are, technically, they can’t encompass the horror of it. The damage.

He’d been afraid for the longest time too that maybe that’s how it is between men, always humiliating, and degrading, and so, so painful. Every time he’d caught himself looking at another man he’d wondered if that was what he wanted, deep down inside. If he was sick like that. Actually desired to be hurt like that.

It’s funny, being a copper is what taught him different. There have been a few times he’s stumbled across men like him. Some of what he’s caught glimpses of have more than proved it doesn’t have to be hurting anybody, in ways that were mortifying at the time, and oddly compelling to think of after.

Quite a bit of that has just been men tangled up together in little nooks and crannies, dark alleys, always when he’s been chasing a suspect, or pursuing a lead, not looking to arrest anyone for what he sees as a personal matter. He’s always done his best to avoid any case that looks like it’s an excuse to go hassling them.

Even if it is a crime he’s always looked the other way. It doesn’t need to be reported if it’s not hurting anybody. There are so many other things that need the police’s time. Crimes with actual victims.

A couple of times he’s also encountered men rooming together, just good friends, in the course of investigating this or that crime. He lets them be, also. Doesn’t add anything incriminating to his notes. Tries to ignore the stiff faced frozen terror he sees in them when they answer his questions, or the anger, the defiance.

Still, even if he is that way, he never thinks he’ll act on it.

It’s only after Blenheim Vale intrudes back into his life, almost taking out two of the men that mean the most to him, that he starts to reconsider things. What’s buried doesn’t always stay dead.

He realises that part of him wants it to be known, wants to be able to show someone the wounded parts of him, and to receive kindness in return. He wants be be known as himself, the real him, he does want understanding. He doesn’t want a series of girls as a shield, or even a wife as a shield. Why it worked out so well with Hope was that he could talk to her, but even then he couldn’t talk to her the way he thinks maybe he can with Morse, if he could just find the words.

Finding the words is hard, though.

Especially when he realises that at some point while he was being a prick to the man he’d fallen in love with him. A kind of stupid longing. Something more than just attraction. Something he thinks is unrequited, until he catches Morse looking at him.

Not looking at him the way you look at someone you’re talking to, but looking at him when they’re not talking, and not just looking at his face. Blue eyes dark and lingering. It’s frightening, a little, but not as frightening as he expected it to be. It’s more thrilling than he ever could have anticipated.

He doesn’t ask Morse out on a date, but he does ask Morse out for something. Morse agrees. It’s ambiguous. He doesn’t know what he’s doing. He doesn’t know what Morse is thinking.

He tries to make it simple.

They’re just having a drink together. That’s all they’re doing. A couple of nights a week, just them, or just them lingering together in the evenings when the others have left the pub. He can’t seem to keep away from Morse, and the other man seems to be feeling the same way.

They start talking more, about things other than the case they’re working. Little things. It feels good. It means something, but neither of them are willing to confront what that something is. No one walks anyone home. No kisses are exchanged. It’s full of deniability.

Until they almost get blown up, well, him more than Morse. He wasn’t about to let Morse get blown up, not if he could help it. Not Morse.

Morse kisses him the moment they’re alone afterwards, cupping his face and pushing him up against the wall of his own flat, because he invited the other man back with him. He kisses back, he wraps his arms around Morse and pulls him in close, and Morse pulls back to breathe against his lips, again and again, the words, “I almost lost you. I almost lost you. I can’t lose you.”

They still have to solve the case, so that’s as far as it goes that night. Kisses, a bit of snuggling on the settee. Still, when the sun rises the next morning there’s something agreed of between them. It doesn’t have a name yet. They haven’t said it out loud. That doesn’t change the fact they’re now together.

Chapter 3

Notes:

CW: Mentions of Blenheim Vale so CSA etc.

They’re curled up together in his bed in the awful basement flat he’s kind of regretting renting. Though, by curled up, Peter is sitting up with his back against the headboard, smoking, and he’s sort of half slumped on a nest of pillows next to him. It’s not quite his head in his lover’s lap, because things would head a certain way very fast if he was to do that, but he is running his fingers gently over the man’s bare thigh, because he’s been having great difficulties with keeping his hands to himself when it comes to his lover. Especially those legs.

They go on forever, Peter’s legs. The first time he saw him with his trousers off after they started this thing between them he couldn’t stop staring. He thinks he said something stupid, but he can’t remember what it was. It’s not like they’re plump, softened up with much fat, but they’re still curvy, all fascinating arcs of muscle and sinew and bone. He should probably stop touching the nearest one, he’ll get ideas he won’t be able to cash until his body recovers a bit more from the last round.

“Two Detective Sergeants,” Peter mutters again, on a lungful of smoke. “You really didn't know?”

“I really didn’t know,” he replies, fingers stroking over that soft, slightly hairy, skin. “I suppose he could have tried to tell me. I might have been distracted,” he lets out a little laugh, fingertips walking their way closer to the even softer, silkier, inner part of the limb he’s petting. Very distracting is Peter.

“It’ll be the funny handshake brigade,” the man muses, a touch of distaste to the words.

He glances up, “You don’t approve of them?” They’ve never properly talked about it before. It’s not what he’d thought Peter would think, not from how he used to act.

Peter shakes his head, narrow lip curling up a little in disgust, before the expression smooths. “I know how I used to be. It felt like it was better to play along with everyone, safer I mean. I always thought they were dodgy, though, more dodgy than I wanted to get involved with,” those blue eyes meet his for a moment, an old kind of hurt lingering in that gaze, before his lover blinks it away. “You know the kind of dodgy I mean,” Yes, he does. The Blenheim Vale kind of dodgy. A little shrug of bony shoulders and the man adds, “That’s why I never accepted any of their offers to join them. Played it off, of course, smoothed over any bruised egos, but stayed well out of it.” Peter offers him the cigarette, which he declines, and then says, “Do you think they mean to have him keep an eye on us?”

Well that’s a distasteful thought. His face scrunches up as he thinks for a moment. “Me, maybe, but that doesn’t mean he’ll do it. He came through in the end, about… you know.” He regrets it the moment the words slip out, no matter that he manages to catch them before they become the name of the place. Peter doesn’t need any reminders. The nightmares are enough to tell him that, even without the few, choked out disclosures, or the things they can’t do together because Peter will freeze up, or worse. He squeezes his lover’s thigh, a reassuring squeeze, not anything else. An apology.

“Yeah, I do know…” Peter pets him gently on the head, then starts playing with his hair, fingers picking at the half-tamed waves. A little laugh then, not really that amused, “But I also know I didn’t like the way he thought he could just boss you around earlier. If any Sergeant’s allowed to boss you around like that, it’s me. Only me…” then the man is leaning down and placing a kiss on the crown of his head, sweet and unexpected, and saying, “And it is an us. Anyone with eyes and ears will be able to tell by now I’m on your side.”

That’s flustering, more flustering than he expected. He’s not quite sure what to say, but he manages something about liking the sound of that. He and Peter, an us.

“If I’d known they’d let us get away with two DSs I would have pushed you to take the exam,” Peter muses, playing with his hair again. “I’d much rather have you than him, if I have to have competition. You’re a much better copper than he is.”

“Strange is alright,” he argues, halfheartedly. He’s been trying not to think about his career, its progression. It’s not like they’re going to let them have three Detective Sergeants, so a promotion will mean a promotion away from Peter. Even if he wanted to leave Thursday’s side, which he doesn’t, he really doesn’t want to leave his lover. “You’re probably right, though. They’ve made an exception for him.”

“I suppose if it becomes unbearable I could always go for a promotion,” the other man says with an air of forced casualness. “If I was a DI I’d need a bagman, one I could trust.”

“You’d take me with you?” he’s not sure why he asks, it’s just he almost can’t believe it. He knows he pretty much wants to get out the rubber cement and glue himself permanently to Peter’s side these day, but he still sometimes has trouble believing the intensity of the feeling can be mutual. It’s not like they’ve talked about it. Anyway, he’s trouble at work sometimes, gets up people’s noses, powerful people, would Peter really want to shackle himself to that?

“Of course I’d take you with me,” Peter replies, looking almost offended. “I’m not going anywhere without you from now on, not if I can help it. You always get in trouble by yourself.”

“I don’t always...” he start to protest, but it’s weak, both because Peter does have a point, and because the idea that his lover wants to be with him the way he wants to be with the other man is flustering him again. Even if Peter had to hide the sentiment with a little barb.

“They probably wouldn’t let me, though,” the other man says after a moment, leaning over to stub out his cigarette in the ashtray on the bedside table. The bend and flex of his skinny body is distracting, the way the dim light of the single lit lamp casts shadows that trace his form like a lover’s caress. Like what could be his caress, probably will be, before long.

“And even if they did…” something about Peter’s tone makes something swoop in his stomach, apprehensive. “...I’m not sure I’ve got the stomach for the job anymore. Not after… I didn’t just become a copper because it seemed the best way to keep myself safe. I wanted to help people. Help kiddies, mainly, if something like… But we’ve all seen how far up the rot goes now.”

“It’s not all the way through, though,” he points out, panicking a little at the thought of days without his lover by his side. Cases spent with just Thursday, and now Strange. It wouldn’t be right. Things would get missed or something. They couldn’t function without Peter. “Look at Bright, and anyway, it’s worth sticking around. It’s something worth fighting for… and you’re a good cop too, Peter, a much better cop than Strange.”

“You’re just saying that,” Peter dismisses the idea, not looking at him.

He finds himself sitting up then, frowning at his lover. “I am not just saying that,” he snaps, “You’re a lot smarter than he could ever hope to be, and when you’re actually doing the job properly you’re a bloody good detective.”

“That when is doing a lot of work there,” the other man observes, shooting him a small smile. It’s not a happy one, though, it’s kind of frozen around the edges and reminiscent of the look you might give a snarling dog held back by a leash you don’t quite trust.

He feels a little guilty then, he didn’t mean to snap, he just doesn’t want the other man to leave him. Leave the job, really, but leaving the job feels like leaving him. “You are a good policeman,” he reiterates, trying to be calmer, more measured. “You work hard, you don’t cut corners any more, you’re diligent, observant, methodical, and you don’t go upsetting people the way I do. Anyway, I need you to rein me in sometimes. You know how I sometimes get mad ideas into my head…”

“More often than not right ones, no matter how mad they are, how mad it means the world we live in is,” Peter interjects.

“Well, yes,” he admits, trying not to be too smug about it, too vain, “But not always, and when I’m wrong I’d rather hear it from you than Strange.” Strange, whose interests he’d promoted, and who it feels is now lording it over him. “Anyway, you said you weren’t letting me out of your sight. Who knows what kind of trouble I’ll get in if you leave.”

“True,” Peter replies, sounding amused, but shooting him a small smile to soften any sting. “It was just a thought, one that needs more thinking, because even if I did quit I’ve got no idea what I’d want to do with myself.”

“You could study something?” he offers, “You’re smart enough.”

His lover shakes his head, face scrunching up, “That’s more your scene than mine. Lectures and libraries and pompous old gits… Nah. If I had to do something else I’d want to do something simple, something clean.”

“Like what?’ he asks, intrigued. He wants to know anything he can about Peter, anything the man will let him know. Peter’s the most interesting thing in the world for him right now. Just sitting together in his narrow bed in his really quite awful flat feels like enough. It’s filling some yearning he’s had at the heart of him since everything fell apart with Susan.

“Oh, I dunno,” Peter shrugs, and the light and shadows shift over his collarbones, and he thinks about putting his mouth there, kissing there, licking the soft skin and sucking little purple-red love bites into it, like drops of blackberry juice. “Maybe something outside. Something where I could be my own boss. Thursday’s alright, the same with Bright, but there’s a lot of men out there I don’t think I feel like being bossed around by…” a tiny hesitation, and then Peter’s looking at him with something he can’t quite read in those blue eyes. It’s a little coy, but also a little vulnerable. Tender like a fresh shoot. “I mean, you, maybe. If somehow you got promoted ahead of me. I think I could live with being your bagman.”

There are probably things he should say, but he can’t think of them, too busy leaning in, reaching out and cupping his lover’s face so he can press a soft kiss to the other man’s lips. Peter gasps, mouth opening, an invitation for his tongue. They can talk more later.

Chapter 4

Notes:

CW: For some slightly stronger mentions of Blenheim Vale, so CSA and trauma, also period typical homophobia.

This is probably rubbish but I decided to post it anyway. I've been working on it off and on when I've been capable of doing anything. I am that bloody sick right now. Not sure if there will be more.

It’s difficult for him, a bit, when Trewlove first joins the station. It doesn’t take long for him to realise Morse likes her, actually likes her, respects her mind, and likes her personality. Which is more than he can say for a majority of the people of not only Oxford, but he’d guess the whole wide world, if Morse ever decided to go out and explore it. So he gets a bit insecure for a while.

He’s not horrible to her, he doesn’t make any off-colour remarks, and doesn’t try to undermine her or anything. He’s trying to be the better version of himself, the truer version, the one worthy of Morse’s affection. Still, he knows he comes off as cold and standoffish, and far from welcoming, and maybe he might come close to scowling at her a couple of times, when she and Morse are standing so close together talking about this or that.

He may not actually be attracted to girls, but that doesn’t mean he can’t look at Trewlove and see that she is stunning, and not only that, smart. Smarter than him, no doubt, maybe even as smart as Morse. She is the perfect package, the exact all of everything that his lover should be looking for in a life partner, instead of him.

If Morse opened up his eyes and looked at her properly, pursued her, won her, which of course he would, because he’s Morse, and he can’t imagine anyone not finding him devastatingly attractive, then his lover could have a proper relationship, a normal life. A wife. Kids. None of the constant low-grade fear they’ll get caught and their lives will fall down around their ears.

It may be looking increasingly like they’re living in miraculous times, but the miracle is yet to be made manifest. The younger him, still struggling with what he is, had never thought he’d live to see the day homosexuality might be decriminalised. There seems a strange poetry to the idea that it may happen now, this year, or perhaps the next, while he’s in the first relationship he’s ever been in with another man. The last relationship too, if he has his way. He never wants to be in another relationship, he just wants this one for ever and ever after. It’s strange, maybe it’s stupid, maybe it’s just that they’re still in those early, glossy days, the honeymoon period, but with Morse he feels kind of like he’s found the one. His one. The one made just for him.

He hopes for the kind of decriminalisation that means they don’t have to hide, but he fears it’ll be something more out of sight, out of mind. That what two consenting adults do behind closed doors is their business, as long as they don’t let anyone else catch a glimpse. Still, even that will be a big step forward, and from small things big things grow. He can dream of a perfect future, where they can be open about what they are and face no consequences, even if he has to live in an imperfect present where that is far from the case.

For now the state of things in the world means they can’t let on, let anyone know. It’d be the end of both their careers, in the very least. He’s seen how punitive the system can be. He fears they’d be made an example of. Maybe that will change, maybe not. Even then he just can’t imagine Thursday, or Bright, or Strange, finding out and not reacting in some way that’ll hurt them both. Morse, maybe, more than him. He’s used to being betrayed by men in power over him.

His lover wouldn’t have that problem with Trewlove. They’d all be delighted. It’s not like Morse is like him, either, he’s seen enough, and from the few times they’ve talked around the topic learnt enough, to know that Morse can go for both men and women. It seems a little silly for someone who has the ability to choose to choose him, and not the easier path. It makes him worry, and feel sort of sad, and maybe like staying with Morse is the selfish thing, that it would be better to let the man go off and live a more normal life.

There are so many ways it would be easier for Morse to be with her. It’s not just all the obvious, man and woman, potential husband and wife, future kids, doing the thing everyone is raised up to do. There are some other things. He’s walking wounded from Blenheim Vale, he always will be. The nightmares are part of it, but there are also other issues. There are things he just can’t do. Ways he can’t cope with being touched. At his worst he can’t help thinking it leaves their options for lovemaking a little juvenile. Morse must want more than hands and rubbing off against each other, and mouths only if Morse is the one doing it, because that’s one of the things he just can’t do, and he feels so guilty for that one-sidedness sometimes. His lover is good about it though, so good about it. It’s not Morse that makes him feel like he’s not enough, but the things crawling in the mire at the back of his own head.

Morse could have it all with a girl, especially one like Trewlove.

So, he gets a bit down for a while.

They don’t talk about it. He thinks Morse notices, because the man is so bloody observant, but maybe not. In the end it doesn’t really matter if Morse is doing it deliberately, aware of what he’s up to, it still has the same effect on him. Somehow Morse convinces him that he’s the one the man wants. Only him. That he’s enough. That Morse feels the same way as he does.

It’s the way his lover can’t seem to keep his hands to himself, is always sneaking ways to touch him, not just when they’re alone, when those hands can go well and truly wandering, but even at the station, even at the crime scene, even if it’s just the brush of fingertips against his wrist as they pass by close.

It’s the way his usually standoffish lover always seeks him out, seems eager, happy to spend time with him, even if that’s just leaning against his desk and doing the crossword while he’s finishing up his paperwork, instead of heading home alone or staying at his own desk.

It’s how Morse asks his opinion about whatever mad idea the man has before mentioning it to the others, and seeks him out to bounce ideas off, sometimes not even explaining himself, which can be rather irritating, just speaking the fragments of thoughts he’s had out loud, like the man is talking to himself, but that self now includes him.

It’s in how the man will actually agree to come to the canteen with him and eat lunch, actual food, just to spend a few more moments together. It’s in how Morse listens to him, and remembers the things he says, even if they’re small, even if they’re stupid. It’s in the way his lover smiles, even if the case is bad and everything is grim, Morse still smiles when he sees him, like his very presence is a balm to the irritations of the world.

He’s never had this before, with anyone. Someone who just seems to want to be with him, the way he wants to be with them. Because he’s always reaching back, when Morse reaches for him, and he’s always wanting to sit next to, sit closer to, stand beside, talk to, laugh with, eat with, smile at, listen to Morse. Even if the man is talking incoherent rubbish that only makes sense to his strange, brilliant, but undeniably strange mind, he loves listening to it.

They find in-jokes, reference points, a world building between them. He starts calling Morse Trouble sometimes, because he’s always getting into it, and because Endeavour makes the man scrunch up his nose in distaste. When they’re alone Morse starts calling him Peter.

Even his lover’s fondness for Trewlove stops worrying him so much. It helps that whenever he wanders past and finds Morse tucked up with her talking earnestly about something there’s never any guilt on his lover’s face when he spots him, and Morse never makes any indication he’s not welcome to come over and join them. There’s no sense of secrecy between them, just friendship, and Morse always smiles that smile when he sees him. That smile just for him. A lightening of the storm in his blue eyes.

 

Chapter 5

Notes:

CW: for mentions of Blenheim Vale, so CSA etc. Also period typical homophobia.

I think this is the end of it for now. I suppose I might write more but I am out of ideas.

He’s not quite sure what kind of mood he’s in. Annoyed, certainly, annoyed with everything, almost, aside from Peter, but also frustrated, wound up. It’s been a long, stupid day, preoccupied with a long, stupid case, that was thankfully easily solved, even with his mind wandering for most of it.

It was a burglary, the theft of a handful of priceless books from a particularly irritating don at the collage, and not for any particularly tricky or interesting reason. Just a flatmate of one of the man’s prized students with a bit of a drug problem hearing said student go on about how much the books were worth, and then having no idea how to fence them, but instead having split them up and hidden them in stupid places.

The really aggravating part of it was chasing the stupid little oik down near the canal, the young man pushing Fancy when the constable almost caught him, and Fancy going careening into Peter, so Peter ended up in the water. The thief had been captured, but Peter had ended up with a ruined suit, a bruised nose, a turned ankle, and a nasty gash on his hand that had needed to be thoroughly disinfected.

Since the excitement of everything was pretty much over he’d been sent home, after having his injuries tended to, leaving the task of interrogation, book recovery, and then the interminable paperwork to the rest of them. It’s not as if he’d wanted his lover trapped in the station, soggy, grumpy, and sore, it’s just that he’s spent the hours since missing him.

He likes having Peter nearby, ideally within arm’s reach at all times. It winds him up, that body, those legs, ears, hands, wrists, shoulders, that neck, face, mouth, back, arse, all of it, but if Peter’s nearby that’s also enough to sate the worst of the cravings. Alone, without him, but unable to stop thinking of him, and thinking of touching him, kissing him, fucking him, all while trying to do paperwork, was its own kind of torment.

When the case is serious enough it can keep his attention, keep him focused, but this was nothing like that, neither serious, nor interesting, nor difficult, so he’s spent the last few hours both bored and irritatingly horny. Irritated with Fancy too, even though he knows it’s not the lad’s fault. Not really. He didn’t mean to push Peter into the canal. It’s just that he is irritating, and since he joined the station he and Peter have to be more careful.

Trewlove figured them out first, just from observation, though she didn’t say anything until later. Strange came around to his old flat when he and Peter were engaged in some pretty heavy petting on the settee and happened to peek through the crack in the curtains and caught them. Then it became impossible to conceal things from Thursday and Bright after he got dosed by Emma Carr during that mess with the Wildwood. It was hard to deny things after he’d ended up in Peter’s lap, trying to crawl into his lover’s skin to hide from the terrible things he’d been seeing. Calling him Peter, too, and Peter fretting and panicking and making it all so obvious.

He’d thought his world might end, both their worlds might end, if they were discovered, by rights they should have, by rights there should have been repercussions, punishment, but that’s oddly not what’s happened. Not that it’s been easy, not that things are exactly as they were before, but they haven’t been forced out of the job, and everyone will still associate with them. Things may have been awkward at first but they are improving now, almost going back to normal.

Trewlove has been the best about things, unbothered and supportive. She has never treated them any differently, though that may be in part because she had her suspicions even as early as the incident with the tiger. Bright, of all of the men that know, seems to just want to ignore it, and treats them both as if he never found out. Strange and Thursday have been a different matter, but they’re both calming down now.

Strange has stopped his desperate attempts to set both he and Peter up with some new girl every other day, and Thursday has stopped having awkward, stilted conversations with him about whether he’s sure it’s what he wants and wouldn’t a wife and kids be better and how he’s still young and shouldn’t be making life altering decisions unless he’s really sure. Thursday’s also warming back up to Peter, after a period of coldness and dark looks that had almost made him want to punch the old man, that had made him say some things he doesn’t regret saying, but were perhaps not all that politic.

So, until Fancy came along, they’d been an open secret. Not one everyone was perfectly happy about, but one everyone has decided to tolerate. Now they have to be careful again, because neither he nor Peter get much of an impression Fancy will be quiet about it if he finds out. Fancy could cause them problems. Fancy could tell someone higher up the pecking order. Fancy could let something slip to some member of the press other than Miss Frazil. It doesn’t endear the lad to them, even outside of his personality.

It’s a relief just setting eyes on the building housing the two bedroom flat he and Peter are currently renting. They’re talking about buying a place together, if they can save up enough, and find a good enough excuse if anyone asks. The key sliding into the lock, the door swinging open, the golden light inside sliding over his skin. He can feel it, that sense of coming home.

The flat smells of reheated beef stew and sounds of The Beatles, but he can’t see his lover lurking anywhere in the little joined kitchen, dining room, living room he just stepped into. “Peter?” he calls out.

“Bedroom!” the man calls back, “I mean, my bedroom. I’ve got my foot up. I reheated the stew and made some mash if you want it. I ate already. Wasn’t sure when you’d be back.”

He glances over at the cooker, sees two saucepans, both missing Peter’s serving, but with plenty left for him.

Neither of them are great cooks, but they’re managing well enough. It’s big pots of things to reheat for a few days after, and a roast at least once a week, to eat on the day, and then to become sandwiches and rissoles, it’s food in the fridge, and lunches in the canteen, and getting a curry or some fish and chips every now and then. He can’t remember when he last ate so well. He’s never really been fond of food in its own right, but it’s less of a chore if he’s eating with his lover.

“In a bit!” he calls back, divesting himself of the detritus of work, briefcase and overcoat, then heading to the sink to wash the day off his hands. He’s about to go put them all over Peter and he doesn’t want to leave grubby smears of the station or the trip back home all over that lovely body.

The door to Peter’s bedroom is open as he approaches. They each have one, and they tend to move between them, spending some nights in his, some in Peter’s, instead of sticking to one or the other. It’s in part for deniability, but also in part because their tastes in some things are very different, and this way they’re both respected. He doesn’t care about fashion the way Peter does, or the cutting edge of interior design, so his room can be plain and comfortable, while Peter’s can be interesting and comfortable. It also means that if his lover wants to listen to Revolver and he wants to listen to Turandot they’re not arguing over the record player. They can go to their rooms and listen to their separate music, and it’s only a little annoying, and kind of endearing even if he doesn’t want it to be, the way the very different sounds blend around the edges.

“Well, here comes Trouble,” Peter says with a pleased smile as he enters the room. Peter’s tastes are hardly all flower power, running more to sprightly looking teak furniture and solid colours. There’s something very sharp, very snappy about it all, but it’s also surprisingly comfortable, even if the walls are orange.

His lover is lying propped up in a mountain of pillows on the double bed, on top of the coverlet, foot up on a small pile of velvet covered cushions, paperback novel in hand. He’s had a wash at some point, the aldehydic scent of soap in the air, Peter’s hair loose from its usual rigorous confinement and lying soft and fluffy across his forehead. All he’s wearing is a clean vest and a pair of pyjama bottoms, and a glance at the thin, light blue cotton is enough to tell he’s not got on any pants underneath. It’s distracting, the soft, shadowed shape of him there. It makes him want to touch. His cock twitches, starts to fill.

“You had a bath?” he asks. He’d imagines coming home and finding Peter grumpy from his dousing in canal water, but unable to do much about it because of his ankle and wounded hand, so of course they would have had to climb into the bath together. So he could help. He reaches down to readjust himself. His mind is wandering, heady images, Peter’s naked body, skin smooth, slippery, warm from water, smelling of skin and soap.

“I did,” Peter replies, closing the paperback and dropping it onto the bed. It’s a Kent Finn, he sees, he won’t touch the things, especially after meeting the obnoxious man, but Peter enjoys tearing the plot apart as he reads them. “I’m quite proud of myself,” his lover adds, “I managed to get in and out of the bath without doing myself any further injury. Or getting my bandages wet.”

“I wanted to help,” he speaks his earlier thought out loud. It comes out slightly more plaintive than he intended. He’s hard, body ready and raring to go. It’s ridiculous, he’d think Peter was giving him the dirtiest kind of strip tease instead of lounging in bed in his pyjamas, watching him with faint amusement in those beloved blue eyes.

“Did you, just?” Peter asks, lips twitching up at the corners. “Well, get your kit off and you can come and help now.”

He intends to grumble a little, make some comment about how he’s not a walking, talking libido, even if that’s what that look on Peter’s face is suggesting he is, but his lover is sitting forward to strip off the thin, white cotton covering of his vest, and that’s enough to have his own hands going for his tie. Then jacket. Then shirt, fingers moving as fast as he can on the buttons, trying to kick his shoes off at the same time, because all Peter has to do is lift up a little to strip off those barely concealing pyjama bottoms and then the man is naked and he’s far too many steps behind.

Oh, those legs, they go on forever. Pale and slender, covered in a dusting of dark hair, leading up to the crux of the man’s thighs where Peter’s cock is stirring. He wants to put his mouth all over that soft, pink flesh, to feel it swell to full hardness against his tongue.

He’d climb aboard still half in his suit, but that’ll just get Peter hissing about the dry cleaning, and it’ll be quicker to just keep getting undressed than to try and talk his lover around into not caring about the suit the man picked out for him.

Peter starts edging down the bed as he’s desperately trying to strip his shirt and vest over his head. When he’s managed it, dropping the bundle of fabric to the floor, he finds his lover now lying prone, head propped up on just the one pillow, foot still on its little pile, blue eyes dark, watching him. He reaches for his fly, hunched over, eager. It’s a relief to pull the zip down.

Peter sits up a little, which makes his fingers fumble his trouser button. He stops, stares, wondering what the man will do, whether there’s about to be a show, a tease, but all the man does is lean over and grab something from the bedside table. The Vaseline.

He hurriedly goes back to fighting with his trousers as his lover scoops out a great big lump of it out with his uninjured hand, dropping the jar on the bed and lying back down to smear the grease up the soft, tender skin of his lovely inner thighs. “Hand’s not much good for anything,” Peter explains with a little wiggle of the fingers of his dominant hand, where they’re sticking out of the bandage covering his injury. “Could do the other, but after the day you’ve had I thought you deserve a treat more than an inexpert fumble. I don’t suppose he had some secret reserve of smarts hidden away to make the end of the case any more interesting than the beginning?”

He shakes his head, “He was stupid and it was boring…” The button finally pops through the hole. He lets out a groan of relief, stripping trousers and briefs down his legs to puddle on the floor. He doesn’t even bother thinking about the socks. “… And you weren’t even there.”

“Poor Trouble,” Peter coos, only a little mocking, arms open wide to receive him as he eagerly climbs onto the bed. “No exercise for his brilliant mind. Trapped investigating cases any old copper could solve. If you were a dog the RSPCA would be on to Bright for cruelty.”

“Don’t you start,” he begins, trying to think of something witty to add, but Peter’s just there, his face is just there, his mouth, his body, those legs. He ducks his head down to take Peter’s lips in a kiss, which his lover returns eagerly, before flinching, letting out a soft hiss. “What? Are you alright?” he pulls back to ask.

“Nose,” Peter explains, “It may not be broken, but still…”

The red of earlier is darkening to purple. A flash of irritation, anger, has him muttering, “I should have pushed Fancy in after you.”

“Not sure Thursday would have been that pleased, he seems to like the obnoxious little bastard,” Peter replies, reaching up with his uninjured hand and stroking fingertips softly down his cheek. They’re a little sticky from Vaseline, but that doesn’t stop his heart from feeling like it’s swooping in his chest. The fondness in Peter’s gaze, the tenderness of his touch. Very, very carefully he leans in and presses the gentlest of kisses to his lover’s lips, before pulling back to nuzzle the edge of the man’s jaw before laying a biting kiss there. He must have shaved too, when he bathed, there’s just a hint of stubble.

Peter makes a soft sound, hips arching up, trying to grind up against him. “Come on,” the man groans, “Fuck me properly. I’ve got myself all slick for you.”

It takes a moment of shuffling about and being careful not to knee or elbow each other until he’s in place, crouched over Peter, his legs either side of those long, slender ones. He reaches down, grabs his own cock to guide it into place. The touch shatters through him, he almost wants to stroke himself, pull himself off to the feel, sight, smell of his lover beneath him, but he manages to hold himself back for the moment it takes to ease the head into the tight space between Peter’s legs.

They can’t do it the other way, what some would call the proper way, but he hardly cares. Men have been fucking like this for thousands of years, between the thighs. It’s one of those other useful things he’d learnt about at university, though no whispered conversations or images of the risque-er kind of ancient greek pottery prepared him for how good it actually feels.

He doesn’t want to think about why it has to be like this, not because he wants more from Peter, but because the slightest thought even brushing on Blenheim Vale makes him want to burn the world to ashes these days. He needs to think about Peter here, now, alive, beautiful, safe, happy, in love with him the same as he is in love with the other man. In this sweet moment he can’t bear to evoke the shadow of Peter then. Peter so badly hurt.

He groans as his cock slips further into the slick tightness. He knows they must look ungainly from the outside, him hunched over Peter, straddling his legs, grinding away at him like a lad having his first time, but it feels so good he doesn't care. Beneath him his lover is gasping, hips thrusting up to rub that pink cock against his belly, legs clenched together as tight as the man can manage, just to make it good for him. “Fuck,” he gasps out, the word escaping him on a breath, “Peter. So good.”

Because Peter is all legs they can line up like this, he can nuzzle in against Peter’s throat, mouthing at his skin, kissing, licking, biting, but also keep his cock pressed into the slick, warm space between his lover’s thighs without either of them having to contort themselves much.

His hands go wandering, cupping the side of Peter’s face, then caressing down his neck, touching collarbones, groping distractedly across his chest, tweaking a nipple, thinking about putting his mouth there instead when it makes his lover gasp and wrap his arms around his shoulders. He wants to crawl inside Peter’s skin, he wants to press them so close together they fuse into one. He needs to get closer.

One arm worms its way beneath Peter’s back, the other beneath his thighs, touching, groping, not letting them pause, hesitate, every time they slip across scarred skin. Then he’s holding Peter there, around his narrow waist, by his thighs just beneath his arse, and using that grip to pull the man’s body against him as he ruts forward. Faster, faster, rougher, rougher. He’s almost there. He’s almost…

A grunt slips loose as he surges into climax. For a moment he is lost, obliterated by the pleasure rushing through him, a vessel for it instead of a man experiencing it. Then he’s a landed fish, flopped forward uselessly on top of his lover, gasping for air as reality returns.

Beneath him Peter squirms. He realises the man’s managed to get his uninjured hand between them and wrapped around that still hard cock, but now he’s squashing his lover in such a way the man can’t get any good friction. “Sorry,” he gasps out, feeling his selfishness.

In his eagerness, his hunger, he forgot to even think about his lover’s pleasure.

He pushes himself back up to his knees, crawls down the bed, eager and ungainly, grabbing for Peter’s legs and tugging them apart enough he can worm his way in there between them. He can see his own seed there, see his spend slicking up the space between his lover’s legs. It sends a dizzy surge of arousal through him that makes his cock twitch painfully.

For a moment he just indulges himself, smearing his spend into the silky, slightly hairy skin of Peter’s inner thighs, touching it, feeling it spread and mark the man as his, before ducking his head down and sucking his lover’s hard cock into his mouth.

He likes this. He’s always liked giving his lovers pleasure, always liked using his mouth, and this is no different, even if Peter’s anatomy is very different to the women from his past. He hadn’t thought he’d like sucking cock, in fact he’s not sure if he would like sucking some random cock, it’s just that it’s Peter’s. He likes every part of Peter.

He uses his hand on the part he can’t easily fit in his mouth, especially with the awkward, hunched angle he’s approaching this from. Spit drips down his lover’s shaft, and he uses that to slick the way, stroking in time with the shallow bobs of his head.

Beneath him Peter goes wild, whining and thrashing, legs coming up to wrap around him, to pull him close, hands landing on his head. His lover would never force his head down, won't even grip him by the hair even if he’s told the man he doesn't care, might even want it to happen, instead Peter pets at him with a kind of uncoordinated urgency. It doesn’t take long, a few more bobs of his head and Peter is trying to warn him, words coming out muddled as the man makes a halfhearted attempt to push him away that he ignores in favour of swallowing the bitter spurts that follow.

They’ve talked about it. It’s not that Peter doesn’t want him to swallow, it’s that Peter can’t imagine why he would want to. He does though. It’s as close as he can come to swallowing Peter whole, to making them one entity.

When his lover is down to the shivery aftershocks he lets himself slump to the side, pressing kisses against every part of Peter he can reach while he tries to pretend he can’t hear Yellow Submarine finishing up in the background. The torso beneath his lips shakes, and he quickly looks up, in case that’s distress, in case he pushed things too far unwittingly, but the man seems to be laughing. “What?” he feels his face scrunch up, knows he must look a bit offended.

“Looks like you’ll get to help after all,” Peter replies, smiling at him fondly. The man’s face is a blotchy kind of red, his hair sweaty and mussed up. A wave of his lover’s uninjured hand to take in the mess of spend and Vaseline and sweat they have become and he realises what Peter means.

Images of warm water, slippery soap, the two of them tangled up in their bath cross his mind quick and feverish. He groans as his cock twitches painfully, too soon for it to fill again, even if he knows it wants to. Even if he wants it to. “Oh, let me eat first,” he manages. “I’ll need my strength.”

Series this work belongs to:

• Part 1 of Endeavour Fics