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Jake’s sitting in his cab, gloves painting the wheel crimson.
Is he speeding?
Oh well. Tires screech in the driveway, and he probably shouldn’t be excited to see the nerves on Steven. As he gets out of the car, he growls. The shadow in the window hasn’t moved. Hasn’t gone for the door to greet him or even the floor. The cabbie wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, smearing more blood and scenting it with bourbon.
He hits the door in time to see Steven shoving his phone in his pocket. Eyes narrow, but he doesn’t move closer.
“H-hey babe,” Grant says, shaky. Jake watches him, silent. “How was… uh, patrol?”
Lockley grunts, tilting his head while Steven moves to take his jacket and cap. Making sure not to brush against the red soaking the material, he doesn’t reach for the gloves.
He knows better, now.
Khonshu’s glow is still in Jake’s eyes, a pinpoint of light that makes the way he follows Steven’s movements more a devouring than real appreciation for the lines of muscle under the shirt Jake had put him in this morning. He’s clean, pristine white button-up and soft beige slacks untouched by the divine retribution Jake likes to cleanse from himself with a sacrifice of sanity. The open collar both shows a fluttering pulse and leaves room for the purple smudges to show. Jake’s jeans tighten, thinking about adding to them. “Who you talkin’ to?” He turns to the living room, as if it doesn’t matter.
Steven knows it absolutely does.
But he doesn’t dare reach into his pocket to silence the inevitable tiny, soft ding. He’s dreading it curving out into the silence of Jake’s disapproval. It’s almost less desirable than Khonshu’s had always been.
Almost.
“M-Marc, um. Was checking up on us,” He answers, then trots after his boyfriend, moving the jacket- and the cape he draws from the briefcase Jake throws at him -into the wash. He pointedly ignores the sound of a bottle and tumbler landing on the bar. The locks on the fridge click-click, the sound filtering through one too many times as Steven’s phone dings. He doesn’t reach for it, can’t dare to allow his heart to rise a little at the likely sweet reply.
Jake grunts again, pouring two glasses, one full and the other a single measure. “He knows I take care of you,” he rumbles, setting the bottle down hard. “Don’t I?”
Steven, bent into the washer, allows himself a scowl while shoving down nausea. That second click, the lock re-engaging after Jake has his mixer pulled out has him remembering why he’d texted Spector to begin with. Alcohol alone for him before anything else tonight, apparently. Whiskey he’s never been able to process quickly enough to be sober until morning. What had Jake had to deal with now? In his distraction, his sleeve brushes up against the more-red-than-white cape, and the color transfers.
Fuck. “Of course you do, love,” he murmurs, straightening up.
He’s wishing he and Marc had never walked away from Khonshu, never let Jake Lockley inherit Marc’s mantle for the chance at separate lives. He swallows, setting the machine and goes to his designated chair at the bar. Entirely open, on the end of it so he can’t run.
“The fuck did I tell you about that shit?” He pushes the full tumbler over to Steven. Jake mixes his own drink without moving his eyes off the red stain. Without saying Steven better drink the whole glass in two drags.
“I’m sorry,” Grant says, and he knocks the whole thing back at once, knowing he’d better make up for it. “I won’t do it again.”
Jake fights a sadistic grin. The moonlight in his eyes brightens a little while he watches Steven for any reaction to the liquid burn. “That’s what you said last time, Steven,” he drawls, yanking the glass back to refill it and sipping at his own drink. “You remember what I told you then?”
Steven fights a shiver while the whiskey takes effect- too quickly, he realizes, when his phone dings again and he actually has the gall to pull it out and look. He takes the second glass anyway. “Thank you, papi,” he says absently, staring at the words on the screen uncomprehending.
-You need to get out, Steven. I love you, and you don’t deserve what he’s doing.-
He frowns, partially because Jake does too, snatching his phone. It’s also partly due to how wrong Marc is about it. Steven’s the whole reason their lives had blown up. He’s not allowed to be happy, because Jake can’t be okay without him to absorb the shock of Khonshu’s demands.
The whiskey -and whatever it’s laced with- searing his insides distracts him from the sound of glass fracturing. Jake’s hand is on his wrist the moment the tumbler is empty, and Steven stumbles, back impacting their bedroom door. He whimpers, biting his lip. “Sweetheart, wait-“
“What the hell’s he talking about?” comes in a snarl, and Steven winces. “He thinks you’re fuckin’ innocent or something?” Jake’s throat closes up even before there’s a bloody white glove covering it. “Don’t you dare. Don’t you dare defend that asshole. He left us, Steven. He doesn’t get to say how you help me deal with this.” The other hand comes up to card terrifyingly gently through brunet curls. “I need you. That’s what you’re for, mijo,” he croons, kissing Steven hard on the cheek before nipping at his earlobe. “Now do your fucking job.”
Steven’s knees buckle and then crack painfully to the floorboards. The avatar’s hand moves from his throat to his hair, drawing tears along with a few roots. The pain makes Steven gasp- which in turn gives Jake space to jam his hard cock into the hot, wet space. He thrusts shallow, as if he cares, but he knows the drugs will have taken effect now.
Steven chokes him down without fighting it.
Steven stares at the shining new device, the screen booting up after Jake had watched him set it up.
It’s expensive. It’s a statement.
It’s a replacement.
“It’s got that camera you were geeking out over a few weeks back,” Jake says, stretching his arms over his head on the bench. They’re sitting in a small park while twilight trickles through the lights downtown. “I know you wanna get better pictures of those little birds across the street.”
Steven nods, trying on a tiny smile. When Jake returns it, he thinks he might be able to make things better. He clicks the screen on once the phone is ready, and Jake reaches over to put in the lock code himself.
Steven knows better than to protest, or to even think about changing it.
Later, when they’re walking home from the bar, Jake grabs his ass and pushes him up on a filthy alley wall. Steven’s whimper is less about the bricks digging into his back and more about the location. “Jake, we can’t, it’s so open,” he gasps, hands braced on the ever-so-slightly bigger man’s shoulders.
Lockley just laughs, a smirk wide against Steven’s jawline. “Oh, hush, I know you love the idea of someone seeing me own you.”
Grant can’t entirely deny it, either. So he just tries to relax, and he’s rewarded by the make-out session ending before he loses any more than a few button closures.
Jake’s eyes are glowing, just that little bit that gleans him strength from the matching moonlight. “You text Marc your new number yet?”
The question, tossed from one to the other like it doesn’t mean anything, trips Steven up. Jake knows he has Spector’s digits memorized, and he isn’t trying to cut off communication. “Uh, not yet,” Steven admits, blushing. His eyes train themselves on the pavement a few blocks from home. “You’re sure?” He wouldn’t ask, wouldn’t allow a spark of hope, if he knew better.
Jake just gestures to Grant’s pocket.
Whatever Spector might have answered is lost on Steven hours later, pressed into the mattress and for once not tied down to it. He moans at another touch, deceptively tender. The slide of his skin on Jake’s whispers that maybe he’s gonna be okay, that they’ll be alright now. “J-Jake, ohhh…” He dares contemplate that every night might be like this, gasping filthy pleas into the air between them like he actually deserves his wishes fulfilled.
“Oh, fuck that’s hot,” Jake groans, teeth coming together on a peaked nipple. His fist is wrapped around Steven’s cock, stroking in time with three fingers that curl just right into a spongy spot that makes Steven see moonlight blending with stars in his head. “Keep going, pretty slut,” follows, a benediction he’s unable to question.
“Please, papi,” comes out in a gasp. He writhes on the expertly employed digits, motions he’s unable to predict and memorize to his own completion. Frustrated tears leak from the corners of his eyes. “I can’t take it, I need you-”
Lockley laughs, the hand on his cock slipping upwards, dragging nails across abs and the planes of his chest. Steven bucks, missing the contact. His own hands dig in, trembling over shoulders bunched with potentially deadly intent. He’s about to beg again when his air is taken from him; the large hand squeezes over his pulse too, cutting off bloodflow. “What, I got you speechless? Pathetic.”
He's more than had enough of waiting anyway, and he lines up dry, hand still moving to stroke the head of his erection once it pierces the ring of muscle too. He’s heedless of the way Steven tries to scream. Too busy enjoying Steven’s diaphragm convulsing, he almost misses the ringing coming from the other room. He doesn’t say anything, doesn’t let the feral snarl rising up in his chest disrupt the fact of what is surely Marc calling while Steven is impaled on Jake’s cock dawning in the softer man’s eyes.
And then he snaps his hips, watches a dusting of eyeliner run and that gorgeous, puffed-up pair of bitten-bloody lips drop open in a wordless cry. The way Steven tightens around him nearly makes him let go and rut in earnest.
Not yet, he tells himself. He’s waiting. Jake drives in shallowly, testing his control, and fights Steven bucking while imagining the inferno his veins have surely become at the lack of oxygen. The cabbie puts all his weight on the arm holding his toy down, pressing out every chance of breath from those lungs with deep, decisive thrusts. Steven’s grip is by turns hard, desperate, slack, soft, barely holding onto consciousness, clawing.
“Oh come on, you’ve gone longer than this before, mijo,” Jake croons, sadistic amusement threaded into every syllable.
And damn him, but Steven finds it in himself to fight the black. His abs lurch, an involuntary attempt at drawing in air. The shame in the coil of arousal in his gut, the fact that Jake has trained him to crave this and get off on it, would color his cheeks if only the blood could get there. It takes insane levels of focus not to come without permission, to not make a mess Jake won’t clean up between them. His cock throbs; electricity catapults around his nervous system with each drag of Jake’s flared head across his prostate.
It’s only once his doppelganger’s body starts to slow, when his movements dip off into unconsciousness, that Jake’s demented sense of power surges up and he shoots white-hot seed into that abused channel with a shout. He pants for air, rolling sideways and finally letting the other set of lungs start to expand unimpeded. A few seconds are spent regaining control and then he gets up. The shower’s short and to the point. In the kitchen, there’s a bottle on the counter, a tumbler to his lips.
His smirk grows wider when another call comes in and his boyfriend is too busy gagging to be able to answer it.
Marc gives it two days before he tries going to the apartment. It turns out he’s waited too long.
As he gets to the door, the merc’s ears catch crying, a slap of skin on skin, the clank of a chain.
His heart clenches.
“Jake, please, I didn’t-”
A blow lands somewhere, unmistakable to the trained mind of a boxer. Spector’s eyes are stormy when he busts the door open in tandem with a sob.
“Don’t pretend you aren’t asking for it,” Jake snarls. Marc can’t see them except in his mind’s eye, in the echo of memories he’d once been blindsided by from Jake when they’d shared a psyche. His cursory glance takes in two glasses on the counter, a nearly empty bottle lying on its side nearby.
“Jacob fucking Lockley!” Spector roars, punctuating it with a reverberating slam. There’s a splintering sound in the doorframe.
He only quiets down because Steven’s cadence devolves into sobs, then a scream, and the sickening sound of Lockley’s grunted satisfaction rolls out the open bedroom door.
Steven would be mortified to be seen right now. It’s the only thing that makes Marc seethe in the living room instead of the doorway. That, and the suspicion that Jake had been hoping for it.
“Coming, dear!” Jake calls, jovial and clearly fifteen sheets to the wind. When he strides over the threshold, sweatpants and a tank top clinging to his sweaty frame, Marc almost sees the appeal.
The red all across his chest and on the waistband kills it.
“What the fuck do you think you’re doing?” Marc snarls, fist already curling, arm half drawn back. “Is he okay?!”
Jake laughs, going back for the bourbon. “He’s fine.” The last of the liquid slides behind his lips, a bloody hand coming up to wipe his whiskers clean. “Takes it like a champ. He’s a good boy.”
Spector fights a red haze. “You can’t be doing this shit again,” flies between them, a step closer than before. He jabs a finger at Jake. “He deserves better than your bullshit!”
The bedroom is quiet, and that worries Marc more than the screaming had.
Jake’s dark honey eyes roll, a spark of moonlight in them. “He’s not yours to worry about anymore. Deal with it.”
Glass shattering against the bar startles even Lockley. “No, you’re right. He’s his own goddamned person, actually, and you’re done fucking him up.” He swings, one shard gripped in a reverse hold. Nothing’s stopping Marc from eviscerating the bastard here and now.
Jake’s quicker to react, though. He ducks, parries Marc’s arm and grabs the opposite wrist. But he’s off-balance for all his speed, goes down hard with a hiss of pain.
Marc slams one hard fist into Jake’s jaw, then a second. Again, twice more. He doesn’t care. He’s painting the wood with blood he used to share, vision blurred with tears.
“Marc, stop it!”
He halts on another sob mirroring his.
“Don’t- don’t hurt him,” draws the merc’s attention to Steven slumped in the doorway, a blood-soaked blanket clutched around himself. His eyes are red, too, and Marc loathes what he’ll find underneath based on the level of saturation. Grant sniffles. “It’s my fault. I m-messed up the cab…”
Marc can’t imagine any damage to a fucking car that would warrant the purple bloom still creeping across that beautiful, puffy, stubbled cheek. “He’s done,” snaps from his scowl. Steven stepping back to hide behind the frame stops his advance; he glares down at Jake’s watery laugh.
“Don’t get dirt all over the seat, yeah?”
Marc’s vision goes red again. He barely resists the urge to kick his former headmate into silence. Instead, “You fucking work for me now. Obviously you can’t hack it as Moon Knight by yourself.”
“¿Disculpe? The fuck you gonna do-”
Marc cuts it off with a hand on Lockley’s throat. “Exactly what the fuck I said.” They glare, dark chocolate boring into darker honey, until the latter melts and drops away. “Clean yourself up.” Marc shoves off Jake, stalking into the bedroom.
He finds Steven trying desperately to erase evidence, robe tied tight around his frame while he shoves the bedding into a basket. The brown streaks of former passage tells Marc all he needs to know. He refuses to look at the bed, to acknowledge the bloody metal and leather on the bedside table, the bedframe, the godddamned floor.
His gaze is trained on the bit still on Steven’s neck, on the little heart padlock at his nape, a choke-chain tight enough to dig in- and the way Steven’s stopped in the middle of the room, one hand toying with the extra length he’s drawn forward over a purple-blotched shoulder. The yellow underneath, half-healed, sends Marc back to shaking. “Are you…”
He can’t finish it.
Steven looks down, holding the robe further closed. “I’m fine. It’s fine. Like I said, I just messed up. I’m getting better.”
Spector moves to reach out, halts at Steven holding his breath. “It’s not right. He’s insane, Steven.”
He doesn’t get an answer except in the way Grant’s eyes close, his little swipe of eyeliner smudging under a hand trying to rid his face of the evidence. Water turns on deeper into the apartment.
“I meant what I said.” Marc softens his tone, pleading with himself for patience as much as Steven to just listen for once. “I’m taking back over. We both knew he couldn’t handle it.” I’m so sorry I left, he doesn’t add. He’s able to take a step without sending the bloodied man back one. Another, and a third, a fourth measured pace takes him close enough to nearly cradle the uncolored cheek.
“I’m sorry, Marc,” is a whisper. “I’ll do better, I promise, I can be good enough…”
Fresh tears fall on two faces as smug humming drifts in, the scent of soap choking both of them on steamy air.
Because they both know no one is good enough to exorcise Jake Lockley’s demons.
Sweat drips onto his face, disgusting for not being his. His lower lip stings -bitten bloody- and he growls, enduring it.
Jake hates bleeding.
He takes the shaft like the slut he’s supposed to be, bitching for a target he’s pretty sure should be going into cardiac arrest anytime now. He’d sure as fuck dropped enough cyanide into that nightcap.
Lockley’s listening for the retching, so he’s able to roll out of the way and avoid it. His ass aches, but he grins anyway, standing by the bed far longer than he needs to. It’s easy enough to make sure he was never there; by the time he hits the door, he’s cleaned himself up and there’s a merry flame dancing over anything he’d touched in the remote, overly lavish building. Over everything. He sits in the cab until there’s so much smoke rolling into the night sky that he can feel the moonlight unable to hit him- it saps his strength some, momentarily.
But he needs to go home. That makes all three traffickers, and Marc’s threat to take Steven overseas if he’s late is one he’s not willing to chance.
Traffic is a blur, even as slow as it is in the middle of Brooklyn. Jake’s anxiety ratchets up when he has to switch routes around a pile-up. Glowing green numbers show him ten minutes to disaster. He practically runs up the driveway, needing to get his hands on something soft, something yielding.
He can’t forget, but he can make it less gut-wrenching if he delegates the pain.
Jake does not seethe when he swaggers into the living room. He doesn’t bother with the whiskey tonight. Couldn’t anyway, because the keys are in Marc’s pocket under Steven on the couch. He makes a point of dropping into his chair across from them with a sigh, eyeing the way Steven flinches. It makes him grin despite Spector’s scowl.
“You get it done?”
Lockley grunts a reply, and Grant burrows into the merc’s chest, turning away from the TV.
Away from Jake.
“Good. You fucking move and I’m sinking silver into your eye.”
The lines of Marc’s arms, draped over shaky shoulders, go tighter. Jake’s aching to tear Steven loose, to drag him off their ex-headmate and calm the maelstrom in his own system. He stays in place. He’d tested that resolve... and twice Jake had ended up on the floor. Khonshu had never had to repair so much damage, not for the cabbie.
It was vengeance nonetheless, and the god had laughed in his head while he took his time making sure Jake felt each bone, every joint and torn muscle, as it snicked back into place while leaving his hearing intact to the soft moans and little teasing gasps which floated to him from Steven’s lips in their bed. Had even happily devoured the burning shame as Jake shot white into his jeans, listening to himself unable to draw them from his boyfriend in Marc’s stead.
Now it’s happening again, he realizes, as the echoes in his head become reality. Marc’s got one hand in Steven’s hair, the other stroking one bared flank. The sweater Grant’s wearing isn’t something Jake would ever let him touch. Not only is it Marc’s, but it hides all the fading blotches and still-broken skin. He growls.
He stays put, zipper straining.
The two figures on the couch ignore him. Marc’s kissing Jake’s property, and his black honey gaze is fixed on a string of saliva between them once, twice when Steven pulls up to breathe. He’s panting, milk chocolate irises glazed, by the time he moves down Marc’s body. A fleeting glance in Jake’s direction causes Spector’s hand to come up, soothing his attention away where Jake knows he needs a firmer hand. More rough memories of jerking Steven’s head to the side until sinew snaps dredge up in Jake’s mind.
He smiles anyway, because he knows Marc can’t do it. Can’t get violent enough to make Steven come anymore. He’s been gone too long; Jake’s had plenty of time to make sure of the ruination.
Regardless, Marc’s head tips back. That groan should be dragging from Jake’s lungs. It should he his cock in Steven’s mouth, his skin under those delicate, shaking hands, that mess of hair twisted up in the stitching of his leather gloves. No bare hands are clean enough to touch something so pure, so ready to soak up the blood on them. He rubs a palm over his jeans, his shaft twitching. Want coils in the base of his spine, pitched to match Marc’s hip-jerk. He doesn’t give voice to the order bubbling up; Marc wouldn’t shove that hot mouth down to the root and rut properly anyway.
Steven bobs his head. Remembered sensation only makes it harder for Jake not to pump himself.
But he’d ended up on the floor for that too, just yesterday.
He can’t see it, but he knows Spector is smirking anytime Steven’s eyes close. He’s taking it slow, a gentle roll of his hips telling the slightly leaner of them when to take in air. Jake’s stomach knots. He’s letting Steven breathe too much. The sounds are so soft, so sweet, he can’t handle it. It’s not enough, and Marc knows it. He deliberately shifts, the better view only serving to finally draw a frustrated groan from behind Jake’s moustache.
“God, Stevie, just like that, baby. You’re doing so good for me,” the merc rumbles into the syrupy atmosphere, a slap in Jake’s face delivered with ruthless efficiency.
Steven moans, and Jake’s missing the vibration he knows is there. “Anything for you, sir,” is followed by another slow sucking sound. Jake squeezes his eyes shut, imagining the gagging that should properly follow instead of the -admittedly pretty- hum of contentment drifting to his ears while his head spins.
He rubs harder through denim, unable to quell the rise of orgasm even though he knows he’s going to pay for it.
There’s an urban legend that says the full moon brings out the crazies.
Steven’s pretty sure he can confirm at this point, because he’s dizzy, panting, covered in sweat, and he isn’t in any pain. He must be insane. Marc must be psychotic, his mouth locked around Steven’s erection like it’s dripping the elixir of life.
Grant’s gasp has less to do with the front door slamming than it does a wickedly-aimed tongue laving up the underside of rigid flesh. Nothing can stop what’s been building for the last three hours, the physical eruption of pent-up denial uncoiling right as he hears an exhausted body flop into soft cushions in the living room. Marc rides out uncontrolled bucking, the keening of his name all the mercenary seems to ask of Steven- as if the wrecked notes are blessing enough for the privilege of worshiping him.
That he can taste sweet air and come at the same time is revelation to him, fit for distraction while Marc licks away the evidence of his triumph.
“I’ll be back, sweetheart,” Spector whispers, a kiss dropped on Steven’s nose before weight leaves him. “Take a nap if you want.”
Steven’s eyes are already closed, but he can hear Marc shifting his stance, reining his breathing in. Water trickles in the bathroom- the bedroom door clicks shut.
He startles at it banging against the wall what seems like moments later. It’s full dark now, though, and he’d rub sleep from his eyes if they didn’t fly open at a strangled noise.
“Told you I’d get my chance, Marc.” Jake’s voice is a smooth menace, makes panic strike Steven to stillness. His breath comes faster when he registers the shiver of power in the words, catches sight of Lockley’s hands, one on Marc’s throat in a crushing grip and the other slamming tanned wrists on top of one side of the headboard. Marc’s struggling, but only weakly. Steven recognizes that glazed look in the merc’s eyes, seasoned with regret and apology.
He's watched it come over his own in the reflection of amber whiskey more than once.
“Talons.”
Steven has no choice but to obey, shaking. He fumbles the chains, pricking himself, but he doesn’t dare spare Marc the razorblades of Jake’s favorite tie-down. Lockley shoves the mercenary’s legs under him, forcing Spector to kneel in one quick-bloodied corner of the bed and watch Steven’s collar drop onto his throat. Jake yanks down, hard, grinds Steven’s face into the pillows to spring tears. There’s a clicking sound, but Grant doesn’t test the binding.
His chest won’t get more than a few inches off the bed, the effect compounded when Lockley pulls his hips back, up. He’s left the leaner man’s hands free, a silent dare to just try touching Marc. Steven’s eyes lock with Marc’s, both their cheeks wet. Spector jerks against the bladed chains.
Jake laughs. “You’re stuck, pretty boy.” A loud smack cracks through the room. Steven yelps, face crumpling in pain. It’s not even the beginning. His skin is red and blotched, broken in places, long before the crescent dart comes out.
“No! Don’t you fucking-”
Steven pleads with his eyes for Marc to shut up. Of course he doesn’t. A shoulder visibly pops out of place while he’s trying to get loose. Crimson has seeped dangerously close to Steven’s face from mangled wrists. Too much. You’re losing too much, stop it, Grant thinks, while the bite of a curved blade flays down his spine.
Screams drown Marc’s frantic sobbing.
Jake’s tongue flicks out, diving into the wounds one after another with a manic chuckle. “You did this, Steven. My sins are nothing compared to yours. Nobody else can take care of them for you.”
Grant holds onto consciousness long enough to register a rock-hard cock, slicked with his own blood, breach him. Lockley takes his time pumping in and out, each slow stroke tallied across shredded shoulder blades. There’s not enough fight in Steven to do more than close his eyes against the roofie further addling Marc’s slackening gaze. There’s an apology there, a wish that he’d done better.
“He got closer than expected,” brings him back up from a haze of agony. Jake’s still buried in him to the hilt. A slow grind forward and another slap to his bruised ass makes instinct try breaking him free. More pain in the back of his neck pulls at the tiny hairs there as the collar halts his progress. “I guess you deserve a reward for making it a whole three weeks.”
Steven’s only aware of how tight his tether gets and Jake pulling out long enough to make him, dementedly, miss the stretch. Somehow Marc’s pulled sideways across the head of the bed, Steven’s chain digging into one bare hip leading down into darkness at the wall.
“Here, since you’re such a slut for it anyway.” Jake squeezes Steven’s jaw until he opens up, then forces Spector’s erection into it.
It doesn’t occur to Grant how it’s possible with all the lost blood until his lips meet a silicone ring. He gags, tears in his eyes. But he can’t pull off. The extra slack is taken up by the body holding his arms down. He’s not getting any air, and what little was left is driven out by Lockley returning to his spot, hand coming down again and again. Absurdly, it’s only the sluggishness of his own pulse that has Steven soft at this point. The pain, the humiliation, the fact that he was right, that he’d known something like this would be the outcome, would have him as hard as Lockley is when he drives in again with a grunt. The stretch makes his eyes water, and it takes all he’s got not to be forced into biting. The slow balm of blackness creeping in at the edges helps, though. Helps him sift through his mind while Jake roars completion and find sick, twisted gratitude.
Because he’ll have Marc now, too.
Spector wakes slowly, in agony. His shoulder throbs in tandem with what seems to be the hardest he’s ever been, but he’s not buried in Steven’s mouth anymore. He’s pretty sure there’s going to be permanent damage.
“Clean it the fuck up.” Do it right is implied by, “Or he gets it worse next time.” A zippo strikes, tiny flame seeming to destroy the shred of sanity left in his head. Smoke breezes over them, making his nose twitch.
Marc’s eyes snap open at a groggy moan next to him. The sheets come up with Steven, collar still locked tight around his neck again but stuck to the pillow with ichor instead of anchored to the wall. The blood’s had time to dry.
How is he able to move? And without a sound. The merc marvels at the quiet strength.
Marc can’t. Whatever Jake had slipped him won’t let his muscles function except to breathe, shallow. His wrists jerk painfully, and he loses all sense of anything but black. He’s vaguely grateful he can’t see Steven’s reaction to his broken yell. Regrets the missed chance to try drowning them both in the bath.
It’s better for Steven, after that. They spend their days waiting, making sure nothing’s out of place. Their evenings kneeling on the floor, together if they’re good. Nights confessing the sin of loving each other despite the surefire punishment of blows, blades, words decrying the filth of each transgression.
Usually, it’s Steven enduring the wrath. But it’s Marc’s turn to take the hit one dark, moonless night. He can’t help that Steven has to watch him struggle against Jake’s natural strength, for once unenhanced as Khonshu’s Fist. The conditioned responses fall from his lips like boiling lava. “I let him kiss me today,” he pants, bracing for the slap. “Forgive him, Sir.” His hands twist in each other in Steven’s grip. They’re tied together at the wrist, chain crushing tendons mercilessly. “It’s not his fault.”
Jake sucks his teeth. “Hope it tasted good, slut.” His hand closes over Marc’s jugular, dragging them both to the couch. He makes Steven kneel behind it, wrenching Marc’s shoulders out of place to accommodate. Steven’s hiss of pain is muffled against the backing fabric. “Should cut your tongue out for it, but I like it on my dick.”
He strips off Marc’s jeans less violently than he shoves said flesh into the merc’s unprepared hole.
Marc takes the choking, the blows, in stride. Every thrust is met with rage, with conviction that he can take it. He has to. He doesn’t flinch away from spilled blood and split flesh, or the wetness of tearing open to make Lockley’s movements go smoother. He grunts, a shameful moan stealing the last oxygen left in his lungs at the treatment.
Anything for Steven to not endure it for a night.
Heat blooms deep inside him along with the stuttering of hips, Jake's cock twitching forcefully across his prostate. A cackle presses words past Marc’s ear. “Look at him, mijo. Gonna blow like a teenager for it.” The cabbie grinds up again, throwing unwanted sparks along Marc’s spine.
Steven has the sense to do nothing more than sniffle and add the customary callback. “Thank you, papi.”
Marc hates himself more than ever, his abs convulsing to splash his release on himself. He knows better than to get it on Jake.
Later, when the weight is gone from him and everything is cooled, half-dry, he shifts his shoulders just enough to keep the chain from clinking and drawing attention. Everything hurts, muscles stiff, tears tracking in two gushing streams from each of them glittering salt into stubble. His fingers squeeze Steven’s. Marc is amazed he can move them at all, with so much damage done to abused tendons.
It takes so long to feel the return motion that he starts to panic. Breath comes short, a broken rib defeating any attempt at more. The quiet of the apartment oppresses, and he risks making noise. “Stevie, baby…?” His voice is wrecked, larynx all but crushed. It comes out in a scrape.
There’s the sound of messy trusses whispering reassurance against the couch between them in return. He gathers that Grant has lifted his head. No speech, at first. More fabric rustles, a knee pops loudly. Steven hisses in a breath. But, eventually: “We can’t let his demons get anyone else, Marc.”
He’d be more panicked if he hadn’t spotted the absence of gloves and cap from the table in the hall. How long have they been alone? Fresh tears slide. “He’s insane,” Spector croaks.
“He’s one of us.”
Not anymore, Marc wants to say. Wants to deny that anything so vicious had ever been birthed of his mind. His mistakes, actions, wants and needs over the years. Neither of them moves, save for the clatter of metal links as Steven rearranges their hands as best he can. The bloodstains will tell Jake if they’ve tried getting closer. “Where’d he go?” Spector regrets his weakness, his inability to stay awake through the torture.
“He had the cowl. I think…”
“Khonshu.” That’d be the only thing promising the expression of more sadistic urges than the prospect of breaking them. The only calling higher than cleansing himself of the ways the moon god demands Jake’s particular brand of sacrifice.
The silence stretches. Adrenaline keeps both of them from sleep, from real rest of any kind until the sun comes up. Too bright. It lights on the scene, and Marc closes his eyes to block it out. Mostly.
The rumble of an engine snaps them both painfully awake. But it’s not followed by doors slamming, and they relax fractionally while it stays that way.
Still they wait, watching the sun move, parched and painted crimson.
Marc lets Steven have a little more peace.
Too much.
Jake meets his eyes through the crack in the curtains, sitting in the car while he gears up for another round of purging his sins.