fanfiction.lol^{fun, silly, low-stakes fandom}

Chapter Text

It’s cold down by the docks, wet wind sweeping in from the bay to chill Arin down to their bones. It clings even inside the noisy warehouse. It’s humid here, where the press of bodies competes with the frigid air, too hot and too cold at the same time. And above all, it’s too loud. 

They’re used to loud; they’ve lived in the Cursed Apple most of their life. What they’re not used to is a hundred — two hundred? — drunk people cheering, calling out bets, shouting just to have a conversation over the din, like none of them even know what’s coming. 

There’s seating for a lucky few. One of Arin’s targets is up there, sprawled like a king on his throne as she oversees the proceedings. They’ve never been this close to her; maybe it’s dumb, but they didn’t expect Wraith to be pretty and definitely not younger than forty. Something like envy wriggles in their chest. Maybe when they meet, Arin will ask who her tailor is.

They’re not getting anywhere near her tonight though. Not with those goons she’s got flanking her, and not without a fistful of cash to catch her attention. 

Their other target is in the ring. He’s barrel-chested, with arms nearly as big around as Arin’s thighs, slick sweat gleaming under the sodium lights. 

Best Arin can tell, Jacob Lash’s day job is down here at the docks. Nights like these are when his real talent shines through. 

The fliers littering the warehouse floor are all covered with his face. Arin can't decide if it’s a handsome face. They can’t decide if he’s thirty or forty-five, either. He’s striking, at least, in a sort of squinty Neanderthal way. Heavy brow, strong chin, square jaw. The mustache verges on ridiculous though. 

In person, in the ring, there is a vitality about him that no photograph can capture. He’s a brutal fighter, faster than his bulk would suggest. He’s got a few flashy moves, but the quick jabs he uses to grind his opponent down are ruthlessly efficient. 

Arin’s never been one for needless violence. They’re not their father. It’s an ugly business, and there’s something nauseating about the crowd crying out for blood. But when the fight is finished, when Lash’s opponent falls, bloody-nosed and winded, onto the mat, the crowd chants Lash’s name and Arin’s heart thuds in time. 

Across the ring someone whistles sharp and high. Next to him is another man, big and mean-looking — and familiar. Arin tugs the collar of their shirt higher and hunches into their scarf and tries not to look like they’re doing either of those things. 

Another quick glance says they weren’t imagining things. Hank Renskill has worked for Arin’s father for at least a decade now. Long enough he might recognize them, presumed dead or not. They think a few of the men around Renskill might also be on the Fairfax payroll. Arin figures it’s a good time to make themself scarce. 

Outside the warehouse, there’s a handful of people lurking at the door. They press in when Lash appears, skin shiny and blood-free now. He flexes and flirts and signs whatever his fans have on hand.

Arin watches from a safe distance, back to the wall and collar pulled up to obscure their face. Their skin crawls with anticipation, but neither Renskill nor his buddies have come out here yet. 

When Lash breaks free of the fans, Arin follows him for a block or so before they announce their presence. “Jacob Lash, can I have a minute?”

“I’m done signing autographs,” Lash says, clouds puffing from his lips. His thin coat can’t be doing much, but he’s still flushed from the fight, so maybe he can’t feel how cold it is yet. 

“I don’t want an autograph. I want to talk. In private.”

Lash’s eyebrows shoot up. He looks Arin over head to toe, then he’s smirking. “Yeah, alright. My apartment’s right down the block.”

Arin falls into step next to him. They can sense the precise moment the cold finally catches up to Lash; his steps speed up, and he hikes his jacket around his thick waist. 

Lash glances at them sideways once or twice but doesn’t ask any questions on the way. It suits Arin just fine. 

It’s a short walk anyway. The door to the apartment building is barely hanging onto its rusty hinges, and it creaks horribly as it opens. The stairs groan beneath them. There’s a bucket in the hallway catching a drip from the ceiling. 

Lash’s door doesn’t creak so much in comparison. It’s sturdier. The apartment itself is cleaner than expected, but maybe that’s because he doesn’t have much in the way of furniture. Still, Arin’s seen a lot worse before. 

“Alright, sweet cheeks. How do you wanna do this?” Lash asks as he pulls his jacket off. 

“Do what?” Lash leers in response, and Arin realizes their mistake. “Oh, God. I didn’t— I’m not a woman.” They’re floundering, blushing too, and whether it’s from Lash’s proposition or the fact they somehow didn’t see this coming, it’s hard to say. 

“Didn’t think you were. Doesn’t matter. Everybody loves the Lash, and the Lash loves everybody.” His hands settle on the waistband of his trousers. “Besides, you got a mouth, don’t you?”

“I’m not going to blow somebody who refers to himself in third person.” Their face is on fire now. “That’s not why I’m here. I’m here to talk.”

Lash’s squint gets squintier. “Wait, was ‘talk’ supposed to mean just talk?”

“Obviously.” Their throat is tight, and they want to ask why he would assume that without clarifying, or ask if that strategy has actually worked, or maybe ask how many beatings Lash has taken to the head. 

Lash doesn’t seem embarrassed by the misunderstanding at all. He shrugs and steps into the kitchenette. “Want something to drink? We got water, whiskey, and—” He yanks open the refrigerator, sniffing at a bottle of milk. He pulls a face. “We got water and whiskey.”

The whiskey Lash pulls out is too expensive for this apartment. He serves it to Arin in a cup that doesn’t match the other one.  

“Alright. You got your one-on-one time with the Lash. Let’s talk.”

Arin watches Lash sip his whiskey before they taste their own. They don’t cough, but it’s a near thing. Then: “Another Maelstrom is coming.”

“Uh-huh,” Lash answers. 

“I need allies.”

“Uh-huh.”

“I can pay you. A little up front, and a whole lot if I get a Patron’s favor.”

“Uh-huh.” The suitcase at Arin’s feet ribbits. Lash doesn’t even look curious. 

“Enough to get a new apartment or let you travel anywhere you want. I can get you a new job if you want it.”

Lash looks exactly as bored as he sounds. “I don’t need any of that.”

Arin breathes hard through their nose. “I’ll pay off your debts,” they promise. 

That at least has Lash’s attention, even if he’s trying very hard to look like it doesn’t. “So what?”

“Think of your reputation if you win. People will come from all over to see you,” they try, and again, Lash looks more interested than he wants to let on. “I would prefer it to be you, but there are other brawlers out there. What about that robot? What’s his name? Beamer, Bimbo?”

“Bebop,” Lash growls. There’s a small puddle of whiskey on the table where it’s sloshed out of his tin cup. 

Arin pretends not to notice. “I hear he’s pretty good too. Maybe more useful, honestly, with all those tricks he has.” 

“Seriously? That rustbucket can’t help anyone. He sucks.” Lash stares at the ceiling for a moment, then: “Fine, fine, I’ll do it.” When he reaches out a hand to shake, Arin smiles as big as it’s possible to these days. “Think you’re cute, don’t you?”

“So do you, apparently.”

Lash rolls his eyes. “Look, you got your deal. The Lash will be there. Heads will be bashed, asses will be kicked, misery will be inflicted. Anything else?”

Arin thinks about the Fairfax muscle down at the ring, and they make up their mind right then and there. “You could let me stay the night.”

“And let you mess up my beauty sleep? Why would I do that?”

“For the same reason you brought me up here.” Before Lash can say something else rude or stupid, Arin pulls at the tie around their throat and says, “I won’t just talk this time.”

“You promise me you’re gonna pay for the job, and now you need a place to crash that badly?”

“I told you. A little cash up front, enough to drown in when we’re done. I’m good for it. If I’m not, you still get a favor from a Patron. And tonight, we can have some fun.”

“You don’t look like you know what fun is.” 

Arin feels their smile strain. “Is that a no?”

“Your seduction technique could use work, kid.”

First Lash only wants them here for one thing, and now he doesn’t want them at all. What an infuriating man. Arin is a quick study, but if their gut was always right about people, they’d be uptown sipping cocktails with the city’s elites, not trying to seduce some dock worker for the privilege of sleeping on his flea-ridden mattress. 

It must show on their face, because Lash says, “Ugh, I didn’t hurt your feelings, did I?”

“You couldn’t.” They suppose they could tell Lash the truth, that they don’t want to run into the wrong person out there tonight. He’s full enough of himself that maybe he’d like feeling like a hero. But that opens doors for uncomfortable questions. They settle on a different truth, but one that will hopefully stroke the man’s enormous ego. “Look, of course my technique’s bad. It’s not like I do this all the time. I wouldn’t have offered if I didn’t find you, you know, acceptable, mostly.” It ends on a mumble. 

“‘Mostly acceptable,’ my ass. You know how many people would kill to get a piece of the Lash?” 

They know before it escapes that they shouldn’t say it, but something about this utter jackass makes it impossible to hold back. “I don’t see any of them here.” 

Instead of getting angry, Lash just laughs. “Ooh, kitten has claws.” Arin is going to die of embarrassment, or maybe reconsider their stance on unnecessary violence. Just as they’re ready to declare the whole thing a mistake, Lash says, “Relax, I’m just busting your balls. Do you have balls?”

“Is the answer going to be relevant soon?”

“Yeah, sure. You’re cute enough so far. Show me what you’re offering.”

Arin almost refuses. They have some dignity left. But there’s Renskill outside, and there’s Jacob Lash right here, with his huge arms and his thick torso and surely some way to get him to shut up. 

They shrug out of their coat before they can change their mind. It hits the table with a heavy thud, followed by their scarf. Tie, vest, and shirt go next, and here’s where Arin hesitates again. 

Lash is staring. Mostly appreciatively, they think, but his eyes follow the movement of Arin’s tattooed, discolored hand, then linger on the pale starburst scar in the dead center of their chest. The handful of times they’ve slept with someone these past few years, they’ve done it in the dark. The sense of exposure has nothing to do with their nudity.

Getting naked is the easy part. Arin has a good idea of what they look like; they’ve spent enough time in front of a mirror, trying to reassure themself that it’s nothing like they did five years ago. Aging has produced more angles to their face than there used to be. Circumstance has taken its toll too. They try to keep in shape, but they’re lean, narrowly avoiding looking underfed.

Lash could probably toss them out the window if he wanted. The thought isn’t entirely unappealing. Arin focuses on that while they finish undressing, until they’re standing naked in Lash’s apartment, trying not to look like they’re too cold or too serious. 

Lash comes closer, and Arin’s not sure if he’s going to try to kiss them or not, and not sure whether they want that or not. 

He spares them by reaching around to squeeze one ass cheek in a strong hand until Arin falls against him with a yelp. “Yeah, I can work with that,” Lash says, which is not as bad as it could be.

A quick pat where he’s just left a bruise, then Lash lets them go. While he’s busy unfolding the bed from the wall, they rub surreptitiously at one sore cheek. 

Lash yanks his shirt over his head without any ceremony, and Arin tries to appreciate it. He’s built exactly like they expected, with big pectorals and a pleasing layer of padding over the whole torso. It’s just a shame the head on top of it all is so bloated. 

When Lash’s trousers drop, the ego makes more sense. “Now, I know it can be intimidating,” Lash says. As he gives his cock a few rough pulls, it only gets bigger. 

“I’m not intimidated,” Arin lies. “Just surprised. You act like a man who’s compensating for something.”

“I should have warned you first. You’re obviously struggling to understand how lucky you are. Take your time.”

“I think I’ve got a grasp on the situation,” Arin says. There’s still time to back out. They could get dressed, find somewhere else to spend the night. Surely their father’s goons are gone by now. They really don’t have to do this. 

They take one last glance at Lash, and with humiliation sitting leaden in their stomach, they get on the bed. 

Lash digs around in a drawer until he produces a tub of petroleum jelly. They were ready to work off spit if they had to, but this is a relief. 

“Ready for me to rock your world?” Lash asks, and he doesn’t wait for an answer. He just pushes until Arin’s on hands and knees at the edge of the bed and shoves a slick finger into their hole. They aren’t ready for it, and they aren’t ready when Lash smacks them on the ass either. “Relax,” he says. “Let me in.” 

Another smack, then Arin says through their teeth, “That is the opposite of relaxing.”

“Aww, I like when you get all feisty.” 

“I like when you’re not talking.”

“Sure you do, sweetheart.” Lash laughs his stupid laugh and manages to hook a second thick finger inside. It’s too much too fast, but somehow Arin’s body just accepts it, and the drag of those bulky knuckles inside them is starting to feel good enough that their thighs drift apart. “There you go.”

The shiver that races down their spine at his praise might be the worst thing that’s happened all night.

Of course, as soon as Arin gets into it is when Lash yanks his fingers free. Then the fat head of his cock is nudging against them. There is no way their body is ready for this, but Lash bullies the first few inches in. It’s so much, splitting them wide open, and their breath comes thin and reedy now.

“I don’t think⁠—” Arin starts, before another slap stings their ass. 

“I said let me in,” Lash demands, and somehow it works. He slides in farther, and Arin stops breathing for a second. “That’s it, baby.” He gets both hands on Arin’s ass and pulls, thumbs on either side of their hole and stretching the skin so thin Arin thinks they’re going to snap. They want to get away from the stretch and the pain and the unrelenting pressure, but their arms won’t move and when Lash rocks his cock deeper in, they push back onto it instead of away. “Yeah, there you go,” he says again. “Fucking loving the Lash’s dick, aren’t you?”

Arin should protest, for pride’s sake if nothing else, but all that comes out is “I⁠— oh, fuck” and a whine they barely recognize as their own.

“Got you speechless, huh?” Lash laughs that dumb fucking laugh. “Don’t blame you. It’s a lot. But you’re taking it pretty good, baby.” Arin makes a sound that definitely doesn’t include words, and Lash shoves deeper, smacks their ass again until they squeeze around him. “Gonna have you begging for more by the time I’m done. You’re never gonna get another dick like this.”

There’s no way the whole thing is going to fit. Absolutely no way. Lash is going to split them right up the middle. Then he rears back and slams home, cock shoved so deep Arin’s not even sure it feels good. They’re shuddering along the whole length of it, arms giving out so they’re down on their elbows now, back arched, and that’s worse ⁠— or maybe better. It’s hard to say. Sweat beads on their forehead, breaks out all over their body.

“Bet nobody’s ever been this deep, have they?” He’s moving now, because of course he won’t give Arin time to adjust to that huge dick in their guts. “Have they?” he asks again, punctuating it with another stinging slap.

“Uh-uh” is the best Arin can manage. It makes Lash laugh. Of course.

“Yeah, didn’t think so. So tight now, but this cute little ass ain’t ever gonna be the same. Gonna pound that hole into the shape of the Lash’s cock.”

He moves in quick jabs, yanking Arin back into the rhythm when they try to go still, refusing to let them pretend this is something happening to them. There’s a steady drip of precome drooling from their own cock, forced out by the sheer weight of Lash inside them. 

Eventually Arin’s body can’t even try to fight it anymore, and that’s when Lash lays into them. He’s got one foot up on the bed for leverage and he fucks in deep, no resistance left to stop the slide. “Yeah, you love this dick. Gonna plow you so hard your hole won’t close again. You’re gonna need something inside you, and only the Lash will do.”

His hips slap against Arin’s ass in a punishing rhythm now, bruising them inside and out. “Gonna come crawling back, begging me for it.”

His cock feels like it’s going to punch through a lung, like they’re choking on it, like it’s carving irreversible shapes into them. They’re going to break. But they can’t get away; they don’t even try, instead pushing back on weak, trembling arms and straining thighs, helpless to do anything else.

They almost lose their balance when they get their fingers around their own cock, blazing hot in their fist and slick from root to tip. Their head spins, feels like it’s stuffed with something, ears ringing to finally drown out the sound of Lash’s endless stream of mortifying filth. It could be hours or days or seconds, but then they’re cursing, tensing, sobbing from their wrecked throat and coming with Lash’s cock pounding deeper than anything’s ever been.

Of course Lash doesn’t care, doesn’t let up or let them recover, just keeps fucking into their oversensitive hole while they fall apart around him. When he comes, it’s with one last slam of his hips, his fingers clenching bruises into Arin’s skin, and a triumphant “Fuck, yeah.”

Arin tries not to think about the aftermath too much, but everything feels too open and too wet. They’re also so, so tired, every muscle in their body finally relaxing. Lash is snoring almost immediately. 

Wincing and maybe limping, they creep across the room to their things. Lash is a lump in the bed, loud even in his sleep, and it’s tempting to leave. They’ve wasted enough time. The streets should be empty by now. 

They loop their discarded belt through the handle of the suitcase and around their wrist. Then they climb back into bed and shove the case under it, one arm dangling off the mattress edge.

Lash immediately crowds in to smother them. At least the change in position eases his snoring somewhat. He’s half crushing Arin, but the weight is warm and strangely reassuring, and sleep comes easier than it should. 

Chapter Text

Arin wakes to a metallic clatter and the smell of coffee. Regaining consciousness takes a real nosedive after that.

They’re sore, kind of all over, but especially their ass ⁠— inside and out. As a distant secondary concern, their hand has gone numb and tingly where the belt they looped around their wrist got too snug in the night. But worst is remembering why any of those problems exist in the first place.

The sun isn’t even out yet, and Lash is up and about. Arin can hear him moving around, but they haven’t yet decided if they’re ready to announce that they’re awake. It’s going to be unbearable.

They must have done something to catch his attention though, because the bed shakes ⁠— did Lash kick it? ⁠— and then he’s saying, “Hey, princess.”

Arin groans into the pillow. “Don’t call me that.”

“You like coffee?”

“What?” They lift up to look over their shoulder, and there’s Lash at the end of the bed ⁠— and yes, he’s jiggling the mattress with his foot, but he’s also holding mismatched mugs, one in each big hand.

With a great deal of suspicion and a heroic attempt not to wince, Arin untangles the belt from their wrist and eases upright. Sitting feels exactly as horrible as they thought it would, but they hide the shudder by yanking Lash’s frayed quilt over their lap. 

“I do like coffee,” they say with as much composure as they can muster. 

“Good. I made too much.” 

Lash thrusts the cup at them. It’s either grab it or let it spill hot all over their lap, and Arin’s already in enough pain this morning. 

“Thank you.” If it sounds like a question, that’s Lash’s fault for suddenly demonstrating a measure of hospitality. Lash grunts, and he stands there looking at them. “I’ll get out of your hair soon,” Arin promises. 

“Kind of scrawny, aren’t you?”

Ah, there’s the Lash they met last night. “Okay?”

“There’s eggs.”

Arin sips at the coffee to buy themself a second. It could taste like mud and they’d probably still love the way it perks them up, but this is pretty good, actually. “Did you… make too many of those too?” 

“Yep.”

“If you’re angling for another round, it’s not happening. I need to be able to walk today.”

Lash laughs, because playing to his ego will always work, and then he’s fetching a plateful of scrambled eggs and a fork. Arin’s stomach growls appreciatively, but that doesn’t make them less suspicious. Jacob Lash, serving breakfast in bed? There’s a catch here. It doesn’t stop them from scraping the plate clean.

The bill comes due after Lash has collected the dishes and dropped them into the sink. He says, “Roll over.”

“Did you hear me?” Arin asks, panicked but maybe a little turned on. Their voice is doing something weird that they do not want to think about. “You’re not putting that monster back inside me.”

Lash’s pants are already off again, and looking at it again, Arin’s really not sure how they didn’t die last night. “Aww, does the princess need time to recover?”

Desperate for some way to put him off, they ask, “Why princess? Is it because I told you not to?”

Lash grabs their wrist, pulls until their hand is flexed, palm up. “Don’t know what you’re doing in this part of town, baby, ’cause these hands haven’t seen a day of real work in their lives.” Next to Lash’s thick calluses and split-skinned knuckles, the point is pretty clear.

Panic, real panic this time, spikes cold in their stomach, and they pull their hand away. They’re supposed to be dead, and there are tons of well off people in this city, and what are the chances some guy from down at the docks even knows or cares about the name Fairfax? It’s fine. They’re going to be fine. Maybe the bigger shock is that Lash noticed something past the end of his own nose.

Lacking a better distraction, Arin rolls over. 

“If I feel your dick, it’s getting cut off,” they say, but their heart’s not in it, not while it’s still pounding, sending that sick cold feeling through their veins.

Oblivious, Lash says, “Just trying to empty my balls before work, but I’m feeling generous this morning. You can pick where.” 

It makes Arin’s face burn, but not as much as Lash’s hand skimming over their ass, pressing down on the marks he’s left there. They gasp, shocked at the sudden flood of desire that seems wired to the bruises there. 

“Ooh, that looks like it hurts,” Lash says without an ounce of remorse. It is far too easy for him to get his thumb inside. It aches, the same bruised feeling inside as out, and Arin clenches reflexively. 

They’re tempted to kick him, and they’re hard as a rock, digging into the mattress. 

The thumb disappears, then Lash’s knee settles between their thighs, keeping them spread as he works two wet fingers back in, turns them so his knuckles are dragging over and over and over that spot that makes Arin see sparks. 

“Slut,” he says, almost affectionately, and Arin’s breath blows humid against the pillow. “Not just anybody can take the Lash’s cock, but you did, didn’t you? Got you bruised up and wrecked and you’re still hungry for more. Such a mess back here. Would be so easy to slide right back in there. You’d take it and love it just like before.”

They can feel their hips moving in tiny flexes, dragging their cock through increasingly damp sheets. Even as they say, “Don’t you dare,” some part of them thinks Lash is right, that they would just let him and damn the consequences.

“I won’t. You gotta earn it next time. Gonna let the Lash fuck your throat first, and then you’re gonna ask for his dick real nice.”

There’s a wet sound, the sound of Lash’s other fist on his cock. He loses a little of the finesse in the fingers inside Arin, but not enough for it to matter. 

It would be nice to deny any of it, but there are two fat fingers spreading them open and driving in hard, and no amount of soreness changes that they’re trying to fuck a hole through the mattress because of it.

“Where do you want it?” Lash demands, breathless.

“I don’t care. I don’t fucking care,” they groan, fists clenching into the pillow. They mean it too, even if they might regret it later.

Those fingers stop moving and Arin wants to shout at someone, but then there’s Lash grunting above them and a wet spill on their ass. There’s movement again soon enough, slower now, wetter, and it takes a second to realize Lash is working his come inside them, smearing it around with every filthy stroke. It’s disgusting in a way simply spilling inside them last night wasn’t, but they’re shivering all over because of it. 

Lash’s fingers fuck in as deep as they’ll go, knuckles butting into bruised skin, building up momentum again, and then Arin’s gritting their teeth and moaning facedown in the pillow and coming all over the sheets.

Lash is predictably smug, whistling obnoxiously as he cleans up and gets dressed. He doesn’t bother to help Arin out, but he does toss a wet rag at them that nearly hits them in the face.

“Rise and shine, baby. Time to clear out. Some of us have to work for a living.”

Arin does not mention that they do technically have their own sort of work, because Lash doesn’t deserve that much explanation about their life. Besides, it takes more energy than they want to admit just to move, much less walk, even with Lash ushering them out the door.

Just because Lash doesn’t have any manners doesn’t mean Arin forgets theirs. They pause outside the apartment building, bracing against the chill morning air, and with at least some sincerity say, “Thank you for letting me stay the night.” 

“You’re so welcome.” Lash looks them over, then groans at the sky like Arin has said something as insufferable as he does, regularly. “Ugh, I don’t normally do charity, but if you still need somewhere to crash, I’ll pound that ass anytime.”

There’s a woman on the sidewalk who’s suddenly walking much faster.

Arin stares, dead-eyed, because they are in fact grateful, but Lash doesn’t need to be given permission to be worse than he already is. “Unlikely,” they say.

“Sure it is, kid.” Lash shrugs. “But you should know I got another fight tonight, so don’t come around too early, yeah?” With that, he’s gone, leaving Arin to contemplate the string of bad choices that got them here. Jacob Lash is such an asshole. 

They’ll struggle through the next few weeks, find a hostel or a nice old lady to stay with, see Lash again when the Maelstrom comes, then put this whole mess behind them.

It’s a good plan. Solid. They just need to refocus on the goal.

None of this gives them a way to explain how they wind up back at Lash’s place that night, eyes watering as they try to cram that huge cock down their throat.

Chapter Text

Somewhere between gloating that Arin came back and falling asleep with his dick out, Lash does eventually ask their name. When they say to call them Pocket, Lash goes right back to the pet names. They’re not sure if he forgets or what.

He also kisses them somewhere in there, and it’s kind of a relief to know he’s only okay at it. It’s not really a priority for either of them. Lash mostly uses his mouth for talking, but he also seems to love latching it onto Arin’s chest or between their legs or, one memorable time, between their ass cheeks, which is one of those things Arin vaguely knew one could do but never really gave much thought to. Now they probably think about it too much; it was the first time they came without anybody’s dick getting involved.

It seems stupid to pretend they’re not enjoying themself, at least privately, at least when it’s strictly about the sex. And they’re resilient; they’ve survived much worse things than Jacob Lash running his mouth, and those worse things haven’t been accompanied by orgasms and a free bed and someone else making breakfast.

They would not call Lash generous by any means, but now that they’re used to him, they can see he does speak his own peculiar language. There’s the food and coffee, obviously, which Lash makes without asking. He’s stopped saying he accidentally made too much, but they didn’t really believe that the first time anyway. It’s probably all in service to his own ego, but he also makes sure Arin gets off every time. 

After their toothbrush migrates to a fixed position at the sink, Lash puts a razor there too. “You should remember to shave,” he says, which almost sounds like he cares about Arin taking care of themself until he adds, “Only pubes I like on your face are mine.” It’s somehow only the fourth most repulsive thing he’s said that day. 

Arin fills their time trying to track down other people to work with and attempting to do research on the suitcase. It leaves a distressing gap in their schedule that they sometimes fill by going to Lash’s fights. 

Their ideals about violence haven’t changed, but now they sit uncomfortably alongside the feelings Lash’s powerful body evokes when he’s in his element like this. The sex after a fight is better than other days, with Lash amped up after his inevitable win, which would be more annoying if they had any brainpower left when it’s over.

Tonight is another fight night. Arin is out on the sidewalk, half in shadow, waiting for Lash to finish showering and entertaining his adoring fans, when there’s a familiar voice behind them.

“Pocket? What are you doing down here?” 

Detective Abrams is a blue-skinned Ixian who stands a full head and shoulders taller than Arin. Everything about him is larger than life, including the strange book he’s kept glued to his side for weeks now. 

They don’t panic exactly. They know Abrams. They like Abrams. And they trust him well enough, at least as much as they can trust anybody these days. So they don’t panic, but maybe they don’t want to tell him what they’ve been up to lately either.

“Still recruiting,” they answer. Truthful enough, if only some of that truth. 

“Had any luck with that?” The detective was first on Arin’s list, but he hasn’t given an answer yet, which they try not to find irritating. 

“A little.”

“Who have you—” He stops abruptly, and Arin just knows what caused it. 

Lash crowds in. “Detective! Finally come to see what a legend looks like?” 

Abrams is not looking at Lash’s face. He’s looking down at where Lash has brought a proprietary hand to rest on Arin’s hip. 

“Hardly.” Abrams’ wide mouth presses tight. “I need to speak with Pocket. Alone.”

Lash bristles in a way Arin feels, standing this close. Before he can say anything repugnant or simply deranged, Arin puts a hand on his chest and says, “I’ll just be a minute.” 

Miraculously, Lash doesn’t argue. He only rolls his eyes, then he’s off to meet his fans again, loud and cocky as always. 

Abrams has Arin by the wrist immediately, dragging them halfway down the block. “What are you doing?”

“You’ll have to be more specific.”

“Jacob Lash is a massive asshole. You can do better than that.”

They almost laugh, but only almost. “I needed a place to stay, and he’s putting me up. That’s all.”

Abrams does not look convinced. They’ve never been a great liar, so they just hope he doesn’t ask for further clarification. 

“Lash doesn’t do anything out of the goodness of his heart.”

“This isn’t a case to solve, Detective. I’m fine.”

“How did you even meet?”

“I recruited him. He’s going to help me when the Maelstrom comes.”

Abrams’ mouth twists in disgust, which would be more insulting if it weren’t so clear it’s directed solely at Lash. “Why him?”

“Well, you turned me down. I didn’t know he was going to be… like that.” Their gesture is vague, but it does seem to capture a lot of the problem.

“I didn’t turn you down. I said there were intervening factors.”

“That’s still not a yes. I got one from him.”

“At what cost?”

Abrams’ disapproval seems to deepen with their blush. “Nothing I’m not willing to pay,” they say with as much dignity as they can rally. 

Abrams pinches the bridge of his nose, briefly unsettling his glasses. “Listen, if you need a place to stay that badly, you can come stay with me. No, uh, cost. You don’t need to be tangled up with that mess.”

Arin would like to protest that they’re an adult who doesn’t need to be babysat, but Abrams is unfortunately correct to call it a mess. They’ve known all along that Lash is a bad idea and a distraction, and they’ve simply been too enthralled by his cock to do what they should. 

It’s bracing, like cold water to the face, if water was also a humbling confrontation with one’s own weaknesses. And there’s something freeing about offloading the decision onto Abrams. 

Arin clears their throat. “Give me an address. I need to collect some things first.”

“Is he gonna give you trouble?”

“He’s an asshole, but he’s not that kind of asshole. I’ll be fine.”

Abrams nods. It’s nice to have their judgment easily trusted so soon after displaying how bad it can get. 

“Got some business to finish up first,” Abrams says, handing them a scrap of paper with a hastily scribbled address on the back. “But meet me there.”

When Arin leaves, Lash is nowhere to be found. That he couldn’t be bothered to wait five minutes is a good reminder that this arrangement is nothing but a dead end. They make the short trip to Lash’s apartment alone. 

The door is unlocked. Inside, Lash is seated at the table, having already poured himself a nightcap. He stands with an expression like he might say something of actual value, then says, “Finally, you’re here. The Lash needs to get his dick wet again.”

It’s uncharacteristically considerate of him to make things easy. “No,” Arin says firmly, which seems to shock him. “I just need to get my things, then I can be out of your hair.”

“Sure.” This is where Lash would normally say something else insulting or gross or arrogant or all of the above, and he doesn’t. “The detective put you up to this?”

“No. I need to focus, and you’re distracting.” Arin glances over to see Lash turning that one over in his dim head, so they add, “It’s not an insult. The opposite, kind of.”

“Dick so good you can’t think straight, huh? Yeah, I’ve heard that one before.” Arin chooses not to dignify that one with a response, but that doesn’t stop them from blushing at the truth of it. 

Gathering their things doesn’t take long. It’s really just the toothbrush and some spare clothes. “I think that’s everything,” they say. “Thank you for putting me up. Will I still see you at the Maelstrom?” Lash looks skeptical, so they preempt him with “Don’t worry. I’ll pull my weight.”

They’ve gotten good at noticing the silences with Lash, mostly because they’re so rare. Rarer still is the sense that he’s actually thinking about the words that come out of his mouth. In the end though, it’s just another joke. “Thought you were gonna make me do all the work there too.”

“I can’t do it alone, but that doesn’t mean I’m helpless.”

Lash moves in, places a big hand on Arin’s cheek, sprawling down their neck like he might try to shake them. “Yeah, I’ll be there. You better have cash in hand.”

They nod, then they swallow hard. Lash is close enough they can feel his body heat. They’ve grown accustomed to the size and shape and smell of him, and they’ve developed a habit of sorts. Arin’s body isn’t aware this is a goodbye; it’s just reacting to his proximity the way it has been conditioned to. They try to draw back, but then Lash’s hand is skimming down their side and across their waist. 

“How about one for the road?” he asks. That hand slides into the crease of their ass, pulling them closer like he already knows the answer. 

They’re here to cut out the distraction, quit wasting time and stop getting tangled up with someone they know is a bad idea. “Make it quick,” they say almost involuntarily. It comes out breathless, and then Lash’s whiskey-flavored mouth is trying to devour theirs. 

Their coat lands heavily on the floor. Lash worms a hand down the back of their trousers, squeezing a handful of ass hard enough that it might bruise again. Arin might protest, but they’re too busy groaning into his mouth and yanking his belt open. 

Lash steers them to the table, where he finally tears his mouth away from theirs to push them until they turn around. He seems to have taken the order to make it quick to heart; their trousers and underwear are down around their thighs in record time. 

Wet fingers press in, and they brace themself against the table and spread their legs as wide as they can. It feels like it’s too fast, like it always does with Lash, and yet their body lets it happen anyway. 

“Right as I’m getting you broken in too,” Lash is saying into Arin’s neck, fingers twisting as deep as they’ll go. His other hand is shoved up under their shirt, pinching at a nipple until they squirm. 

He jerks his fingers free, then the head of his cock bounces against their tailbone. He slides it down, nudges the wide head into their hole, and it’s easier than the first time, but it still stretches too sharp, makes their breath stutter in their throat. 

“Gonna miss this cute little ass,” Lash says.  One of his typical slaps lands hard, and Arin gasps and writhes and feels him drive in deeper. 

Lash works his way in with mean jabs of his cock, and their hands curl into fists on the table and they lean over it, trying to spread their thighs farther and trapped by their clothes. It doesn’t matter how many times they do this, they’re never going to get used to how much Lash’s cock stretches them open, how deep it sinks by the time his balls finally come to rest behind theirs. 

“Fucking strangling my dick.” They can’t tell if it’s a complaint or a compliment, but Lash is moving again already, now at a punishing pace, hips smacking hard into theirs. The table creaks, rattles, but it holds even as Arin leans more and more weight onto it, down on their elbows and trying to fight the urge to rub their face over the smooth top. 

“Yeah, you’re gonna miss the Lash’s dick, aren’t you, baby?” Lash says, barely out of breath even with the speed he’s going. Arin mumbles a mindless agreement, which is all he ever wants anyway. “Good luck finding another one like it.” 

The worst part is they think he’s probably right. When he bottoms out, Lash’s cock hits so far inside that it hurts almost as much as it feels good, and it drives Arin crazy, leaves them thinking about it all day and feeling the ghost of it sometimes and yes, missing it when it’s not inside them, because the only ache worse than the one they feel afterward is the one they feel when they’ve gone a few days without. 

“Tell me how much you love the Lash’s cock,” he demands, tangling a hand in Arin’s hair and pulling until their spine arches. 

He’s so deep they can practically taste it, so deep they want to cry or shout or beg to keep it inside them all day long, but saying any of that out loud is mortifying. “God, shut up,” they say through gritted teeth, which makes Lash sputter and laugh, but it doesn’t slow him down at all.

He listens though, and now that he’s not directing any energy toward running his mouth, he seems more focused than ever. He’s got both hands on Arin’s waist, forcing them back to meet him as his hips jerk sharp and stinging against their ass.

Their body feels too hot, thighs shaking, and they reach down to touch themself only for Lash to slap their hand away. His callused hand scrapes over the sensitive skin of their cock, wringing roughly until they’re seizing all around him, shaking as they spill all over his fist and the table. Lash has never shown any mercy for their overstimulation, and that doesn’t change now. He keeps fucking relentlessly into them while they twitch in the aftermath, only stopping once he’s come inside Arin, in one final heave against them.

He thrusts a few more times, jerky and involuntary, then pulls out so quickly that it leaves them gasping. They’re still trembling, worried about standing up now, worried about how walking is going to feel, when the wet towel lands on the table in front of them.

“Heard you got places to be,” Lash says. “Better get cleaned up.” That’s all the help he offers.

Arin takes a few minutes to pull themself back together, cleaning as much of the mess off themself as they can. They count their blessings that there’s nothing on their clothing, then they tug all of it back into place.

Lash doesn’t pay them much attention during any of it, but he does meet them at the doorway. Arin isn’t sure what to say now, so they settle on, “Thanks again.” After a moment’s hesitation, they press a quick kiss to his stubbled cheek.

“Yeah, yeah,” he mumbles, quieter than usual as he opens the door. Then he barks out a laugh.

In the hallway, looking like he’d rather be anywhere else, stands Abrams. The heat that floods Arin’s face has to show at least as bright as the color already staining the detective’s cheeks. They know exactly how thin these walls are. 

Lash, meanwhile, seems extraordinarily proud of himself. He’s got one hand on Arin’s neck as he ushers them out into the hallway, and they’re reminded of nothing so much as a baby animal being carried by the scruff. That impression isn’t helped when Lash says, “You’re gonna need to feed and water them. They’ll forget to eat if you don’t.”

Once Arin’s out, they turn to say… something, anything else to ease the sudden awkwardness. Lash spares them the effort when he adds, “See you around, kid. You can be somebody else’s problem now.” Then he shuts the door in their face, the sound too loud in the narrow hallway.

Abrams clears his throat. 

“How long have you been waiting, Detective?” Arin asks, although Abrams’ blush is telling enough. They can’t look at it again without feeling like they’re going to implode, themself, so they start walking. Maybe once they’re not in Lash’s apartment building, they’ll be able to breathe again.

“We do not have to discuss that.”

“Fair enough. Why are you here?”

“Finished up early and thought I’d see if you needed an escort. Better than you getting lost on the way.”

“Thanks, I guess.” The cold air outside does not make any of this less humiliating, but at least it’s distracting from all the other uncomfortable things their body is doing.

They walk in silence for a time before Abrams laughs quietly. At their glance, he asks, “What did you do to that guy?”

Arin flushes again, but they’re irritated enough that their tone is sharp when they say, “Thought we weren’t going to discuss that.”

Abrams coughs. “Not what I meant, but you’re right. It’s nothing. Come on, let’s get you somewhere warm.” He looks them over one last time. “Could use a bite to eat. My treat.”

They think again about being passed on like an unwanted pet, but it is true that they’ll forget if not occasionally reminded. So they sigh and say, “Sure,” and let the detective lead them to one of the dozens of shitty diners this neighborhood has to offer.

Chapter Text

It comes as no shock that once the embarrassment has dulled, one of the first things Abrams wants to know is why Lash. 

“I told you. I needed a place to stay,” Arin says between bites of their sandwich. 

“Well, yeah, but you’ve made it this far without him specifically,” Abrams says. “If you say he’s less of an asshole in private, I’m not gonna believe you.”

“He’s not. You just sort of… get used to him.”

“People get used to all kinds of pains.” Arin would laugh, but there’s a cup of soup in front of them that needs addressing. “But you didn’t have to. You could have left.” Abrams looks like he’s going to hate himself for asking, but he lowers his voice and does it anyway: “Was it that good?”

“Trying to solve the case of my taste in men, Detective?” It occurs only belatedly that it maybe sounds like they’re flirting ⁠— while sitting here freshly fucked by someone else, which Abrams knows. They’ve never been so shameless, and now it’s happening by accident. It’s probably Lash’s influence. 

Abrams doesn’t take the bait anyhow. “Trying to figure out how someone as smart as you could get involved with a guy like that.”

Their soup is gone now, and the sandwich. They must be too obvious, because Abrams pushes over what remains of his pile of potato wedges.

Mostly out of gratitude that Abrams is, in fact, feeding them like the lost pet Lash suggested they were, Arin takes the sincere approach. With a quick glance around the mostly-empty diner, they lean in farther and keep their voice low. “You of all people know how complicated things are for me. Maybe I wanted something simple. He’s, you know, an asshole, but he wasn’t out to hurt me. I knew exactly what I was getting into.”

“Did you now?”

“It’s all right there on the label. No surprises, no hidden agendas, nothing lurking under the surface.”

“Everybody has something under the surface.” Abrams sighs, then concedes, “Even if some hidden depths are shallower than others.”

Arin smiles, picking at crumbs. Emboldened by the warm diner and the belly full of food and the decent company, they add, “And since you’re so curious, I certainly didn’t go back because it was bad.”

“Huh. Always thought that personality was compensating for something.”

“That’s what I thought! But no.” Arin hides their embarrassed cough with a drink of water, but nothing can suppress the warmth in their cheeks. “At least not anything in that department.”

Abrams looks torn, but he must decide they’ve come too far now to back down. “I know I’m gonna regret asking, but how big are we talking?”

Flushing deeper, Arin holds their hands apart at a distance that approximates the length of Lash’s cock. They study it for a second, then spread their hands another inch and a half or so. They can only hold it so long before the shame grows too powerful. 

Abrams tilts his head and shrugs uncomfortably. “Impressive enough, I guess,” he says in a voice that suggests he is entirely unimpressed. 

It’s an insane thing to say, unless— Arin stops the thought before it can fully form, slamming back the rest of their water. 

They resolve not to think about it at all. They’re almost successful. 

Abrams pays, as promised, then guides them another few blocks to his apartment. On the way, Arin stumbles on a cracked sidewalk, and Abrams catches them, crushing them against his big body. His arm nearly engulfs them, and when he helps them stabilize, his hand spans so much of their waist.

“Thank you,” Arin says belatedly.

Abrams looks up from his hands with an almost guilty expression, as if he had anything to do with them falling. “No problem.”

They make it to Abrams’ apartment without further incident. This one has rooms distinct from one another, which almost feels luxurious after Lash’s studio, even though it’s not much bigger. 

Abrams points toward each door off the main room. “Bedroom, toilet, kitchen. You can have the bed. I’ll take the sofa.”

“Oh, you don’t have to—”

“I’ve slept on that couch more times than I can count. I’ll be alright. You need anything before I wash up?”

“No, thank you.” The floor is cold under their socked feet, but from the ankles up, the apartment is warm enough. Abrams calls out for them to make themself at home, and they try to take it to heart. 

The bed takes up most of the bedroom, which makes sense for a man the size of Abrams. There’s barely room between it and the door for the lamp. Otherwise, a tiny writing desk sits in the corner, with a chair that blocks the open closet and nearly brushes the mattress. 

It feels strange to shove the suitcase under the bed, and stranger that they intend to move more than three feet away from it. They eventually stopped strapping it to themself at night at Lash’s place, but they never left a room without it. 

A whole bed to themself — and more than that, an entire room — is an unbelievable luxury these days. They climb into the bed and flop facedown. 

It’s creaky but comfortable, and it smells like the detective’s pomade and soap and sweetly stale cigarette smoke, which is more pleasant than they would have guessed. Full and warm as they are, it should be easy to sleep, but they’re restless and can only stand to lie there for so long. 

Back on their feet, they change into proper sleepwear then poke around the living room. The couch looks equal parts threadbare and comfortable, with a pillow and blanket already there. There’s a big leather chair too, worn enough to have a pale indent in the seat. There are a few file boxes strewn about, a rug that’s seen better days, and a radio on a small table. In the center of it all sits a coffee table covered in more of those files, an overflowing ashtray, and a small collection of glasses and mugs. 

There aren’t many ways to repay Abrams for letting them stay, but that one seems easy enough. They carry an armful of dishes through the curtain that hangs across the kitchen doorway. 

“Wait, wait!” Abrams says, but it’s too late. 

He’s standing naked and dripping wet in the bathtub. He snaps a towel in front of himself, but not before Arin catches an eyeful. No wonder he was unfazed by their estimate of Lash’s cock. Abrams is larger than life everywhere, it seems.

Arin doesn’t realize they’re staring until Abrams belatedly adjusts the towel over his groin. “I am so sorry. I thought this was the kitchen. I’m⁠—” Glancing around to look at anything but Abrams’ huge, naked body, other information finally pierces their brain. There’s the refrigerator, stove, and sink. They weren’t wrong. “Why is there a bathtub in your kitchen?” 

“I don’t know. Something to do with building codes. I should have warned you.”

Abrams has managed to wrangle the towel around his waist. It doesn’t hide much, but it lets them both pretend that his enormous dick is not currently airing out beneath it. At least Arin tries to pretend, but the towel is kind of thin, and it’s not as if it’s retreated inside his body, so there’s a sort of outline and⁠—

The only safe thing to do is put the dishes in the sink. It means walking past Abrams, but at least their back is to him once it’s done. The glasses probably do not need to be scrubbed that vigorously, but if they squint hard enough they can imagine spots that still need several rounds of cleaning, probably.

“I’m decent,” Abrams calls from the living room, and Arin’s shoulders can finally creep away from their ears.

The only real comfort is that Abrams is still blushing at least as much as they are. Now he’s in faded red and white-striped pajamas, which their mind helpfully labels adorable before they can suppress it. 

“I am still so sorry,” Arin says. 

Abrams is looking at their chest, or more likely the top of the scar there, just visible before the buttons of their shirt begin. Then he blinks and waves a hand as if to banish Arin’s worries. “It’s fine. You didn’t mean to, I didn’t mean to, et cetera. Let’s just forget it ever happened.”

Easy enough to agree in the moment, but it comes back to haunt them once they’re in bed, surrounded by the smell of him. Now when they close their eyes, they can still see it with crystal clarity: the expanse of blue skin, shoulders as broad as two of Arin, pecs bigger than their head, waist clipped in, muscle under a layer of fat like padded steel, and between the thick columns of his thighs, the biggest cock Arin has ever seen. 

God, what would that even be like? Lash’s already reached a point where pleasure blurred with discomfort and even pain, and this is bigger, noticeably so even at a glance. Surely it would be too much. 

Pressure tugs at their belly, heat between their thighs. 

They lie there, staring at the stained ceiling and listening to Abrams’ heavy breathing and the sounds of the city below. Their skin feels tight, too cold and too hot at once, tingling with every imagined pass of air.

Worst of all is the strange sense of emptiness, like an itch they can’t reach. It’s maddening. Not for the first time, they wonder if Lash has cursed them somehow, if all his nasty talk about molding Arin into the shape of his cock was more than just mindless filth. 

They clench down, imagining anything at all inside them, and it feels so good, but it won’t ever be enough. Their cock pounds between their thighs, but they can’t touch, not with Abrams right there, not about him, not while they’re still aching as a result of another man only a few hours ago. But the ache sits as a reminder of what it could feel like, and a tremor races through them.

That Abrams is right there makes it worse somehow. They can smell him in the sheets, can still picture his enormous cock. Abrams could fill that emptiness, and he’d be so nice about it.

They press their hands flat on the mattress, every muscle in their body locking to keep them from squirming, and they try to think about anything else at all. Sleep is a long time coming.

In the morning they avoid watching Abrams get dressed, and they hope he chalks it up to them not being a morning person. Abrams does not make coffee ⁠— “I usually pick some up on my way to work” ⁠— but he does show Arin where the dusty coffee pot is. 

Before he leaves, Abram sets a key down on the coffee table. “Don’t lose that,” he says. “You go anywhere without me, lock up. Once you’re inside, lock up. Don’t open the door for anybody but me. This neighborhood’s going to shit.”

Arin nods along, and then Abrams disappears off to work, that strange book still in tow. They’ve spent a lot of time alone in their life, but it feels strange to do so inside someone else’s home. As soon as they’ve washed up and made themself presentable, they grab the suitcase and leave too.

They develop a routine quickly enough, mostly around Abrams’ work schedule and whatever he is doing after hours with that book. Arin doesn’t ask, any more than they volunteer anything about the suitcase. 

In the evenings Abrams brings back takeout, they might chat for a time, and then both retire to their respective beds, where Abrams promptly begins snoring and Arin stares at the ceiling for a while. 

A week in, Abrams tells them, “Gonna be out late. Don’t wait up.” 

The only thing weirder than being in Abrams’ apartment alone is being in it alone for hours after nightfall. When they get bored enough, they drag the suitcase out from under the bed, intending to study it further. It catches on something this time, and there’s a drag. A thin blanket comes out with it. That’s not all that interesting, but what the blanket was covering certainly is.

It’s a small stack of nudie mags. On the cover of the first is a lavender-skinned Ixian looking coyly at the camera, ample breasts threatening to tumble out of a tight dress. She’s not nude on the front here, but flipping through the pages, they find other photos of her wearing nothing but her skin or the occasional artfully draped bedsheet.

Amused, they keep flipping past beautiful, busty Ixians, some horned, some with tails, some with both or neither, in a variety of poses. Halfway through the magazine, Arin finds a different body: another demon with dark blue skin, but this one is flat chested and broad shouldered, soft dick lying against one thigh. 

The entire back half of the magazine is full of these, as if Ixian pornography doesn’t bother to make separate publications for these things. The next one they pick up is more jumbled together, with the models grouped by theme rather than the sex or gender. 

The last magazine is the most graphic, no longer even pretending at tasteful nude photography of individual models. This one has humans too, posing with Ixians. Most are pretty standard fare, but every now and then there’s one that surprises them, like the one of a gray Ixian taking two human dicks at the same time. 

One dog-eared page features a single human trapped between two massive Ixians, pierced from both ends. The human looks so tiny between them, like either Ixian could break him in half, and he’s somehow managing two. The cock in his throat creates a visible bulge, straining against the leather collar he’s wearing. A huge hand is fisted into his black hair. The one behind him has one black-gloved hand at his waist, and the other hooking a finger into a metal loop on the back of his leather harness. 

Arin closes the magazine in a flutter of pages. They shouldn’t have gone snooping. They shove the magazines back under the bed and toss the spare blanket back over the stack. 

The back of their neck is sweaty. Their upper lip too. Flipping through the earlier pictures felt like more of a scholastic endeavor, mere curiosity, especially with the women’s bodies. But that last magazine, that last picture—

Is that what Abrams likes? The leather, the human trapped between two giant bodies? It was folded at the corner as if he wanted to remember its location. 

Now that they’ve asked themself the question, they can’t get the image out of their head. It’s so easy to see where they fit in the picture, with Abrams starring as either of the Ixians. At first the other Ixian is nameless, faceless, but they still have clear memories of what Lash’s cock feels like, how heavy it sits on their tongue. 

Instead of sitting there shocked on the floor, they climb into bed. Guilt still spikes through them over this invasion of Abrams’ privacy, the defilement of his bed, but he’s not here right now, and it’s been too long as it is. They grew accustomed to getting off nightly with Lash, and now it’s been a week.

They shove their pajama pants down and take their cock in hand. 

It’s blood hot in their fist, and the first touch is already intense. Slick spills from the head, and they smear it down the length, grip loose and lazy. It won’t take long, but they don’t have to rush it either. 

They picture it again, the tableau of them with Lash and Abrams. They know what Lash feels like in their mouth, know what he tastes like, how their jaw stretches wide around it, how deep it pushes into their throat, how hard they have to focus not to gag ⁠— how easy it is to gag anyway, throat seizing around him while he fucks in shameless and unapologetic. 

What they don’t know is how Abrams would feel, but they can extrapolate. He’d be kinder in comparison, warm hands smoothing over ass and thighs while he works his way in, stretching them impossibly wide and pushing impossibly deep. Maybe that would finally scratch the itch, leave them feeling full enough for long enough, or maybe they’d only crave it more, again and again and again until they’re useless for anything else.

In their mind, Abrams and Lash both build up a rhythm, and all Arin has to do is hold themself up. Here and now, they clench again, mouth going dry as they fuck into their fist. It isn’t enough though, and maybe won’t ever be, because all they really want is something inside. 

They roll onto their side, curling in on themself and shoving two fingers into their mouth. It’s awkward, but they manage to twist that hand  to rub spit-damp fingers over their hole, one leg sliding up to make more room. 

Something about it feels pathetic ⁠— imagining what they had and left behind, and what they can’t have now, projecting them both into this fantasy where they get to be exactly as greedy as they feel, where they only have to be some sort of vessel for their use. 

They imagine Lash grabbing them first by the hair, like he’s done before, then by the ears, like he hasn’t, in order to thrust as deep down their throat as he can go, forcing his way down right past any resistance until they can only drool and take it. They imagine Abrams doing the same, shoving hard into them until they rock forward, choking on Lash’s cock.

Their fingers can barely push in and can only move slowly, because the spit isn’t enough. Two slender fingers aren’t enough either, not at the strange angle, not without any real leverage. It helps the fantasy though, and they fuck into their fist in short, sharp thrusts, shoving their face into the pillow to muffle the sounds they’re making, ashamed even in private by their own wantonness.

This is Lash’s fault somehow, like he unlocked something inside them. They’ve felt desire before, but never like this, never this aching, empty, desperate thing that leaves them humping their own fist, halfway into the mattress trying to do anything at all that might remotely approximate an enormous cock stuffed deep inside them. They squeeze around their fingers, hips moving without any rhythm, and they whine into the pillow.

They’re so, so close, lightheaded and body overheating. It will only take a little bit more, one last twist of a wrist, one last nudge of fingers inside them, and ⁠—

“I am so sorry,” Abrams says, and there’s a crashing sound.

Arin yelps, yanking their fingers out ⁠far too quickly and pulling the blanket over themself. Their face was already hot, but now their ears are too, burning and burning with sheer humiliation.

“Sorry, sorry,” Abrams is still saying. He’s knocked over the chair in the corner. When Arin dares to look, he’s got his hand over his eyes, and he’s trying to back blindly out of the room. “I heard…” He coughs. “I thought there might be trouble. Oh, God, I’m sorry.”

“It’s fine,” Arin mumbles, ears ringing so hard they can barely hear their own voice. They don’t know what causes them to look ⁠— maybe more shame or some way to punish themself for having dared to do this in Abrams’ own bed ⁠— but they do, and there, straining against trousers that are valiantly trying to hold it back, is Abrams’ dick.

Abrams’ hand comes down from his face, and helplessly they lock eyes. Arin doesn’t think it’s possible to be any more embarrassed than they are right at this moment, but the sight of Abrams’ half-hard cock is flattering, at least. 

It could be purely physiological. There’s a naked person in Abrams’ bed, and Arin doesn’t think they’re bad-looking, and the room probably smells like sex, but maybe there’s more to it than that. It’s a struggle to make any words come out. “Detective,” they say quietly, plaintively. 

The look on Abrams’ face is dumbstruck with open desire, and maybe guilt too, the same sort of guilt Arin feels, wanting something they were sure they couldn’t have. If they’re wrong it’s going to be miserable, but it can’t get much worse than it already is. 

“You could help me,” they say, almost without their permission.

Abrams swallows hard, but he’s definitely still staring. “You’re too young for me,” he protests weakly. It sounds rote, like he’s said it before, maybe to himself, maybe thinking of Arin, and that makes the blood rush in their ears.

“I’m twenty-three.”

“Still, I⁠— I’m supposed to be taking care of you.”

They laugh, feeling possessed by some kind of deranged, horny spirit. “You still can.” It strikes them that he hasn’t said no, merely laid out his excuses for why he shouldn’t. But Arin knows perfectly well that shouldn’t and won’t are two different things. “Please.”

“I don’t want some sort of payment,” Abrams says.

“That’s not what I’m offering. I just want you.”

Abrams makes a noise, strained, then he’s dropping to his knees at the bedside, mumbling, “I tried,” against Arin’s mouth, and then they’re kissing. Abrams holds their face in two giant hands to kiss them as thoroughly as he wants. His lips are soft and generous, his tongue demanding and hungry. It’s all Arin can do to hold on for dear life.

Eventually one of those huge hands shoves aside the blanket to grip their cock, which leaps from half-mast to painfully hard so fast that it’s dizzying. They groan directly into his mouth, or maybe it’s a sob, and they have no control over the way their hips move, stuttering into his grip.

Maybe it’s because they were so close already, or maybe because it’s Abrams, their entire body feels electrified, desire flooding them from head to toe and pooling in their core, and they should warn him, but Abrams hasn’t stopped kissing them like he’s trying to suck their soul out, and they moan around his tongue and come all over his hand.

Abrams kisses them through the aftermath, one hand resting gently on their waist, bared where their shirt has been rucked up, and the other strokes sweetly through their hair, and they might be swooning.

He pulls at their shirt to help them out of it. When he finally retreats, he licks the mess they left off of one broad palm.

“Lift,” he says firmly, and Arin’s hips follow his instruction without conscious thought. Abrams pulls their underwear and pajama bottoms off in one smooth motion, then he’s sliding a gentle hand up their bare calf and along their thigh. 

It’s all so sweet, which they mostly expected, but which feels so strange after Lash. There’s no grabbing or roughness, only the soft skimming fingers over their skin like they’re something precious.

It takes a moment to recover from their daze, but then they’re pushing at Abrams’ clothing. He’s still in his coat even, and that seems very wrong. Once Arin has begun the task, Abrams helps, shrugging out of his coat and then his shirt and tie, undershirt, until his bare chest is exposed. Arin hasn’t been able to get that huge, muscular chest out of their head any more than they’ve been able to forget his cock, but somehow it’s better than their memory allowed, covered in a dusting of dark hair.

Abrams has to stand to get his trousers off, but then he’s sliding his underwear off, and there it is again, that gigantic cock, even more impressive now that it’s filling out ⁠— and it’s doing so for Arin.

They lean in, more than ready to see how much of it they can fit in their mouth, but Abrams stops them with a hand on their shoulder. He sounds amused when he says, “You’re young, but I’m not. If you do that, we’re all done. But I bet we can get another one out of you first.” 

“You don’t have to do that.”

“Oh, I know I don’t. I’d like to though.” Arin blinks up at him dumbly, then Abrams says, “Roll over.” Maybe they should be embarrassed by how fast they comply.

Abrams strokes one hand down Arin’s back. Every muscle seems to shiver under it, and they can’t help but tip their ass upward toward him like some kind of animal presenting. 

Those big hands land on their ass, thumbs slipping into the divots to either side of their tailbone. Then one slips down to stroke dry over their hole. Before they can process it, the weight of the bed shifts, and his tongue replaces his thumb. It’s wet and so careful that Arin melts into the bed.

Everything with Lash was always so immediate and frenetic. Abrams works slowly, like he could do this all night. It’s hard to distinguish any one movement from another, but it’s all soft and slick, slipping over and around and in. At some point they think Abrams’ lips get involved, like the filthiest kiss they’ve ever experienced. At first he’s peeling them open with his thumbs, but as Arin becomes increasingly boneless and opens up just for his tongue, his hands move, hooking into the crease between hip and thigh to hold them up in exactly the position he wants.

There’s no telling how long it lasts. It’s nothing but soft, dirty sensation that makes their skin buzz and their head swim, makes it feel like every nerve in their body has rerouted to their hole and the wet tongue working it over.

They’re lightheaded and halfway to insane by the time Abrams eases slippery fingers in. Two at once, and there’s no resistance, no need to adapt, because every muscle in Arin’s body has gone lax except the ones keeping their cock stiff and leaking. They whine into the pillow.

Abrams chuckles, smug sounding, and eases a third finger in. Even if it’s not yet what they need, it’s better than their own fingers by a hundredfold. They squirm on wobbly legs to press into it, trying to egg him on. 

“Patience,” Abrams says, and one hand slides warm up Arin’s lower back. 

“Please, I’m ready.”

Abrams hums to himself, and he keeps on doing it at his own pace. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

They’re trembling all over by the time he decides he’s done. With those same terribly gentle hands, he helps them get their knees back under them, and then he’s massaging their ass, digging fingers into their hips, running hands experimentally up to their waist, and oh, they’re sure it would only take the lightest squeeze for his fingertips to touch.

Arin’s not a giant by any means, and maybe they’re on the lankier side for their height, but they’ve never felt particularly small either. Now they’re forced to come to terms with their own relative fragility, right as Abrams’ hard cock nudges behind their balls. 

One of those hands disappears, and then the crown is kissing their hole, sweet as anything else about him. They breathe, relax, stretch around the intrusion. 

He pets mindlessly at Arin’s back, his hand so warm, and he rocks so carefully in. The head pops in. It’s already so wide, and he’s barely even begun.

Arin pants, trying to stay relaxed as the widest thing they’ve ever had up their ass slowly works its way in. If it were Lash, he would be merciless ⁠— or maybe it was more merciful than Arin gave him credit for, because this is torture, waiting an eternity for each consecutive centimeter like this.

“You’re doing so well,” Abrams coos, petting their spine, and Arin melts enough that he slides deeper, the longest so far. “There you go. Perfect,” he says, and slips in farther.

There are still several inches to go, and Arin’s nearly ready to cry. It’s stretching them so wide that Abrams has to rub more slick around their rim with his thumb.

It’s hard to get enough air, at least until Abrams commands, “Breathe.” 

He rocks out carefully, more than before, then slides back in a little farther, a little more smoothly, while Arin groans. He’s already hit that point where it’s so deep it’s uncomfortable, that point that they’ve learned to crave, and his hips still haven’t settled against Arin’s ass. 

“So good for me,” Abrams says, and Arin practically whimpers in response. 

“Please,” they mumble into the pillow. “Please, I need⁠—” Abrams goes deeper, and they cut off with a full body shudder, squeezing all around him involuntarily. 

They feel like they have a fever, too hot and too cold, sweating and skin tingling, ears ringing, and they can’t move at all, thighs locked so they’ll stop shaking, even with Abrams petting along the backs of them.

“Relax,” he says. “I’ve got you.” He moves like he thinks they might break, and maybe he’s right. They’re stretched impossibly wide, and he’s pushed impossibly deep and still going. It feels like he’s going to bump into their diaphragm any minute now, knock the breath out of them for real. 

It feels like it takes hours with them tightening around him and groaning because it feels good and it hurts and it’s strange and it’s overwhelming. Finally, his hips come to rest against their ass, and they could cry. He stops there while they adjust, and no matter how many soothing words he’s murmuring or how gently his hands stroke Arin’s sides and flank, it’s so fucking much ⁠— too much.

That’s before he begins to move again in careful, tiny motions that just keep him lodged up in there. They want to escape and they want him to never pull out, and it’s hard to even remember to breathe. He rocks them gently, tenderly, colossal dick barely moving, and one of their thighs is shaking now, muscle twitching.

“Feels so good,” Abrams says almost mindlessly, while Arin’s body tries to wring the life out of his cock. It gets easier, but only by increments, and even then, it never becomes less overwhelming. Once he seems convinced Arin won’t snap in half, Abrams moves more, pulling out farther then stuffing his cock back in so deep they can feel it between their teeth, and they’re going to go insane. Tears cling to the corners of their eyes and their insides cling to Abrams’ cock, and when he moves it feels like he’s going to turn them inside out.

The sheet is wet beneath them already, but it only gets wetter as that massive cock coaxes more precome out of them. They try their best to grind back onto it, but they’re barely able to move at all. It lasts a thousand years, lasts until their body finally relents and Abrams can fuck them properly, and even then he’s so careful, so sweet they can hardly stand it. Heat builds in their limbs, in their belly, and electricity crackles down their spine, and they could cry or scream but the only sound coming out by now is a broken, shaky panting, and then they come untouched, just from getting spread out on Abrams’ heavy cock.

They shudder, body trying so hard to keep squeezing around him, but it can’t anymore, and Arin can’t move. Abrams starts to pull back, and they manage to mumble, “Please.” Face hot and feeling half insane, they say, “Leave it in.” 

It’s too much, especially now, rubbing them raw and overstimulating them, but Abrams does as they ask, fucking just as leisurely as he did before, like he wants to enjoy their body as long as he can. 

They shove their face harder into the pillow, swaying with every rock of his hips, still shivering along his length occasionally. It’s almost hypnotic at this point, being nothing but a hole to fuck. Finally, Abrams shoves in deeper, fingers clenching hard on Arin’s hips, as he comes so deep in their body they might never get him out.

After, he pulls out as carefully as he went in, and it’s a relief, but they also regret the loss. “Do you want me to stay?” Abrams asks, stroking fingertips down their spine. 

“Uh-huh,” they manage, which makes him chuckle. 

The bed, which felt so huge when Arin was in it alone, feels suddenly tiny with Abrams in it. He doesn’t seem to mind though. He budges them aside to make room for himself, then pulls them in, back to his chest, knees tucked behind theirs. The hand that’s free pets down their side, their thigh, their belly, anywhere he can reach, soothing. 

“We’re talking about this in the morning,” he says, but they’re already halfway to sleep.

Chapter Text

“Was this a one-time thing for you?” Abrams asks while Arin’s in the bath. It seems he prefers a captive audience.

“Not if you don’t want it to be,” they say. He looks irritated so they amend it: “I don’t want it to be.” That softens him back up. 

“Good. Me either.” For the first time in a long time, Arin feels like smiling for real. Then Abrams asks, “You always want me to top?”

“I mean, if— it’s not like I’ve never done it, but, um, probably. Mostly.”

Something about the answer seems to amuse him. “It’s what I’d prefer, mostly, but I’m happy when you’re happy. All I really need is to know I’m the reason you’re getting off. The rest is negotiable.” He’s kneeling beside the bath now. “Anything else specific that I should know?”

“I don’t know, really. I haven’t ever done all that much besides, you know, regular stuff.” 

That makes Abrams sort of groan and laugh at the same time. He doesn’t say it, but Arin would bet money he’s thinking about the difference between their ages again. 

At least it’s a good distraction from having to confess that their few weeks with Lash constitute the longest so-called relationship they’ve had since holding hands with Irene Kensington when they were thirteen. They tried a few times in high school, but it was always some sweaty, furtive thing with boys who either wanted nothing to do with a Fairfax afterward or who wanted them only because of the Fairfax name. Their adult experiences have been restricted to a few days at a time at most, primarily with men they hardly know and who will forget them easily later. In sum, it hasn’t left much room for exploration. 

Abrams has mercy on them; he stops asking questions for now. Instead, his hand dips into the water to slide along their thigh. “It’s too soon. I can’t,” they complain, even as their legs spread.

“Oh, I think you can,” he says, low and dark, “but if you don’t want to…” He starts to withdraw his hand, and Arin grabs his arm to keep him in place. Victory is a good look on him.

It’s an excellent way to start the morning. 

The evening is not much different. Abrams greets them at the door with his tongue in their mouth. When their knees turn to rubber, he finally lets them go. “You know what I’ve been thinking about all day?” he asks. His huge hands are around their waist, pressing in like they’re testing the give.

“I can make an educated guess.”

“The way I found you last night. Couldn’t get it out of my head.”

“Oh,” Arin says, surely flushing from the roots of their hair all the way down their chest. No matter what followed after, it was still humiliating. 

Their embarrassment doesn’t slow Abrams in the slightest. His hands are everywhere, and his stubble prickles their neck, accompanying the wet slide of his mouth, kissing when he isn’t using it to speak instead. “What were you thinking about?”

If it were possible to blush more, they would. “I wasn’t snooping or anything, but I found your magazines.”

Abrams scrapes a hand down his face, but he’s laughing. Then he guides them back toward the bedroom, pausing only to kiss them or discard clothing along the way. By the time Arin’s ass hits the mattress, they’re both down to their underwear.

Abrams drops to the floor for a moment, only his flicking tail visible from the bed. When he emerges again, it’s with the magazines in hand. “Which one was it?” he asks. Abrams is always handsome, but right now, with his shirt off and his dirty grin cocked to one side and his hair disheveled, it might be the best he’s ever looked. It makes it impossible not to answer. 

“That one,” they say, tapping Fiend, the one with humans and Ixians posing together. 

Abrams lets the other two fall unceremoniously to the floor, and he shoves the magazine at Arin. “Show me what you like.”

They still don’t know how Abrams went from being so flustered to so confident. Maybe all he needed was to know they wanted him in return. Arin does not share that confidence or the lack of shame that comes with it. At this rate their face might turn red permanently. 

Still, the idea of disappointing him feels worse. Arin takes the magazine in one sweaty hand, neck bent over it so they don’t really have to look at him while they do this. That doesn’t stop Abrams from crowding in close, big hands all over them. When he finally settles, it’s behind them, with one hand on their chest and the other petting the thin skin of their inner thigh. 

He hooks his chin over their shoulder to see when Arin stops flipping. The first one they land on is one of the tamer ones, a slim human riding an Ixian’s cock. Then there’s the one of the Ixian taking two human dicks at once, which makes Abrams laugh, a soft puff of air against their neck. His fingers on their thigh are tracing the hem of their underwear now. 

There’s one of a human on his back, tiny compared to the blue-green Ixian swallowing him down, then one of two Ixians together, one fucking the other with a huge purple cock strapped to the leather harness on their hips. They flip a bit faster; most of these are sexy enough, but they are variations on the same, and only the position and the chosen surface change much for several pages.

Abrams strokes them through their underwear now, until wetness seeps through the fabric. Their cock flexes into his palm, and their hips move of their own volition. All that does is slow Abrams down, until his touch grows lighter, more teasing. They can feel his hard cock digging into their back, making their breath stutter with the memory of the night before.

“Surely there’s more,” Abrams says, because Arin has forgotten to turn the page. 

“Only one.” They flip to the dog-eared page, and there it is again, like a punch to the gut: the picture of one human with a muscular Ixian at each end. Neither Ixian’s face is even visible; the photograph cuts off at the shoulders for both, centering the man who looks so small between them. He looks content too, though, as if his favorite place in the world is right here, choking on one cock with another buried deep up his ass.

Arin’s breath catches, and it might be the image, or it might be Abrams’ hand slipping beneath their waistband. 

“That’s the one?” Abrams asks, humid air fanning their neck.

“Yeah.”

“I like that one too. Did you think about yourself in the middle?”

“Yes.”

Abrams rewards them by pulling their waistband down, freeing their cock to the open air and sliding his slick fingers along it, grip loose and relaxed. His thumb rubs under the crown, and their hips won’t stop shifting with nowhere really to go.

“Which part did you like?” Abrams’ other hand slides up their body, up their neck. “The hair-pulling?” With that, he tightens his fist in their hair, blunt nails scraping lightly over their scalp. He doesn’t pull hard enough to hurt, but enough that every follicle seems to tingle, so much that their skin pebbles all the way down their arms. 

Shuddering, they say, “Yes.”

He releases their hair, and his hand comes to rest at the base of their throat. “The collar?”

Their heart pounds like it’s trying to escape, and they’re not sure if it’s desire or anxiety. “I⁠— maybe. I don’t know.” 

Abrams chuckles against their neck, presses an incongruously chaste kiss to their cheek. “There’s not a wrong answer.” His hand just sits there, heavy, thumb resting on the vein thudding in the side of their neck. “Two guys at once, huh?”

“Yes.” Their voice is high and tight now. Uninvited, they can hear the memory of Lash calling them names, the almost affectionate way he’d say slut. They brace for it now, for the sick rush of shame and pleasure side by side, but it never comes. 

“Was one of them me?” Abrams asks. His hand finally drops from their neck, huge palm sliding down their body to pull their hips back toward his. His cock is a rigid line grinding against their back. “Were you thinking of me while you touched yourself?”

His grip shifts on their cock, and Arin’s whole body goes tight for a second. “Yes,” they breathe.

Abrams groans, then he’s sucking a kiss into their shoulder, up the side of their neck. He grabs their jaw, turning their head until he can reach their mouth. The angle is strange and the kiss is messy, too wet with too much space between them, but it doesn’t matter. 

Abrams’ hand wraps fully around their cock now, pumping evenly, smearing slick from the sensitive crown down the whole length of it. It speeds up, squeezing just tight enough, and they can’t help but fuck up into it, hips moving in awkward little circles. 

They mumble something — even they aren’t sure what — against Abrams’ mouth and he lets them go, lets them rest their head back on his shoulder while he jerks them off, pulling them closer and closer to the edge. They move restlessly, legs spread and unable to ground themself. One hand lands on Abrams’ thick thigh and squeezes, bracing. He’s surrounding them completely, legs bracketing either of theirs, a big arm pressing them back against his warm body. 

Their head is still full of the images too, now with the recent sense memory of Abrams’ cock moving hot and huge and overwhelming inside them. They haven’t gotten it in their mouth yet, but they can extrapolate. They know what it feels like when their jaw stretches too wide and they have to work to relax, to remember to breathe. 

“Come on, I got you,” he murmurs, and they’re gritting their teeth, biting down on some strange animal noise as they spill all over his hand. 

He strokes them through it, squeezing out every last drop until they’re writhing to get out of his grip. Only then does he let them go. 

He helps them out of their underwear finally, and he doesn’t stop them this time when they try to get their mouth on his dick. Try is perhaps the most important part; it’s a struggle, and they end up mostly sucking the tip while their hand does the rest. Abrams does not complain. 

He does clean them both up, and then he pulls them close, wrapping around them like a heavy blanket until his stomach growls and they both remember they haven’t had dinner yet.

The next morning, Abrams is in a rush to leave, but that evening he greets them again, this time dropping to his knees to suck them off against the door before he carries them to the bedroom for more. Over the next few days, he jerks them off on the couch and eats them out on the bed and fingers them in the kitchen and fucks between their thighs on the floor. They finally fit his cock down their throat on the third try, and he’s hesitant to make it too rough, but at least he pulls their hair again. 

Between all this, Abrams likes to cuddle and tug them close and sometimes just touch like he wants to remember he can. His fingers somehow always find a hip or a hand or a knee or their lower back. 

And there’s always talking. So much talking, actually, because Abrams wants to know what they like and don’t like and what they’ve tried and haven’t tried and want to try and⁠— well, it’s a lot. They’re so accustomed to avoiding scrutiny that it’s overwhelming to suddenly be put under the microscope, even for what is ultimately a net positive.

Abrams knows who they are and still likes them, and if the Fairfax name is any factor in that equation at all, it’s only that Abrams likes them in spite of it rather than because of it. The relentless questions just mean he’s paying attention, and he’s sweet and affectionate, and if he’s more protective than they really need, Arin doesn’t think they can blame him, given both their circumstances and his job.

He doesn’t seem to expect them to answer every question, anyway. “What’s with that case?” Abrams asks precisely once.

“What’s with that book?” Arin shoots back, and the conversation ends there. Abrams doesn’t seem particularly upset by the exchange, just shrugs it off as one more boundary set.

The endless barrage of questions means Arin does get to ask their own, including the one that’s been wriggling at the back of their mind for over a month now, and especially the past few days: “Are you still not going to help me in the Maelstrom?”

One benefit of sleeping with Abrams, they suppose, is that at least he doesn’t brush it off this time. “I’m already working with someone, and I don’t think you’re gonna want to work with her too.”

“Oh?” They try to keep their face and voice as neutral as possible. Abrams would be so useful to have out there, and frankly without knowing exactly what the Patrons might want, Arin doesn’t want to work against him, and it would be nice to have someone they really trust there instead of only people they’re paying for the favor. But it’s a big ask, and maybe they don’t have the right to be disappointed yet. It hasn’t even been a week since they started sleeping together.

Abrams’ face falls; they’re not very good at hiding things from him. “Jeanne Geist. You know her, don’t you? From back then?”

Arin’s blood turns cold, and they can only nod. 

“You think she’d recognize you too?”

“Probably.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought. I need her help to solve an important case, but I don’t trust her farther than I could throw her.”

“She’s tiny. I think that would be pretty far,” Arin says.

Abrams smiles as if it’s in spite of the conversation. “You know what I mean.” He clears his throat. “So it’s not personal. I’m just trying to keep your secrets. Keep you safe. But if you wanna risk her knowing, we could work together. I wouldn’t let her get too close even then, but I’ll leave it up to you.”

It’s touching, the realization that Abrams has been keeping their best interests in mind long before they started this new thing. “I’ll think about it.”

Abrams nods, and it’s easy to pull him down into a kiss. There is blessedly little talking after that.

It’s Arin’s experience that nothing good lasts long, and they’re right again. At least this time it doesn’t appear to have anything to do with their family, though.

The next evening is crisp, cold wind blowing in off the harbor again. Abrams doesn’t greet them inside the apartment. He catches them a block away, and he starts pulling them back the direction they came. His grip is tight on their arm, his steps so quick they have to scurry to keep up with his longer legs.

“You can’t stay with me anymore,” he says, voice gravelly. 

Their pulse spikes and something sticks in their throat, but Abrams wouldn’t just end things by tossing them out unceremoniously. He loves his conversations too much. They steady themself, then ask, “Has something happened?”

“Someone’s been trying to intimidate me. My office has been broken into twice already. Now they’ve found the apartment, and I don’t think they’re planning to stop at intimidation.”

“Shit” is the only appropriate response to that.

Abrams’ grip gets gentler on their arm, but he doesn’t let go or slow his walking. “They fucked up my shitty furniture and some porno mags. Gonna cost me some time redoing paperwork. Who cares?” He glances sidelong at Arin, trying and failing to hide a painfully earnest look. “But you can’t go back there. I’m not going back there.”

“Okay. So what now? We could get a hotel or⁠—”

“No,” Abrams says. “The sooner I get this book out of my hands, the sooner things go back to normal. I’ve already arranged to stay with Geist.” He finally lets Arin’s arm go, trailing down to twine their fingers together instead. “You’ve made it this far without me. You’ll be alright.” He sounds like he’s trying to convince himself, and when Arin tries to pull their hand away, his grip tightens. “I don’t mean it has to be over. I just mean do what you have to do. Take care of yourself. I’ll check in when I can, and when this mess is over, we can… get back to it, if you still want that.”

They both fall quiet for a while, but Arin doesn’t try to pull their hand away again. 

One neighborhood gives way to another, but Arin is so lost in thought that it takes them far too long to realize what’s happening. Abrams stops them in view of the same apartment building he picked them up from a couple weeks ago.

“You can’t be serious,” Arin says.

“If you’ve got a better idea, let’s hear it.”

“It’s a horrible idea. He probably already found some fan or something. Or, like, ten of them. I don’t know.”

“You know how many fights he’s lost?” Abrams asks after a moment. 

“Like one. He doesn’t shut up about it.”

“One. One, in his entire career, and I’d bet money he’s got a gun tucked away somewhere too.” Abrams sucks in a breath. “I’m not saying I like him or any of this. I’m saying if I can’t be around all the time, I’d sleep easier knowing you’ve got somebody with that skill set at your side. And this one’s got a vested interest in you, personally.”

It really recontextualizes Abrams’ earlier do what you have to do. Flushing, Arin says, “His ‘vested interest’ was basically charging me rent.”

“Sure.” Abrams smirks in a way that is almost condescending. “But fine. Go knock on his door and see for yourself. If you’re right, I’ll escort you somewhere else. Your choice. But if I’m right, you stay right here. Deal?”

Fully expecting Lash to shut the door in their face, or have someone in there already, or to simply ignore their knocking, Arin says, “Deal.”

Chapter Text

Contrary to their expectations, Lash does open the door, and he doesn’t immediately shut it in Arin’s face. Instead he smirks. “Well, well. Look who came crawling back. They always⁠ do.” His eyes flick past Arin toward Abrams, who’s hovering just to their left, and his expression rapidly shifts from smug to suspicious. “What is this?” 

“Hi,” Arin starts, then stops. They weren’t exactly prepared for this possibility. They almost wish Abrams weren’t here; what should be a comforting presence at their back is instead only making their nerves spike. “I need a place to stay again, if that’s alright. I wouldn’t bother you if it weren’t sort of urgent, but I can also… go?”

“I got a busy schedule, kid. Places to be, people to do. It’s not really⁠ convenient.” Lash sighs, groans up at the ceiling. Then his eyes flick between the two of them. “Just you? ’Cause I don’t think there’s room in this shoebox for the big guy too.”

“Just them,” Abrams says. 

Lash looks Arin over one more time while they awkwardly shift their weight. “Whatever. Come inside before I change my mind.”

There’s a strange shuffle where Arin gets to go inside, but Lash gets pulled out into the hallway with Abrams. They shut Arin in, and the only thing audible is their low voices, which sound more or less equally annoyed. When the voices go quiet, they move quickly away from the door lest they get caught snooping, trying to look busy with putting their coat and scarf away.

Lash enters alone, and they try not to be disappointed. They already said their goodbyes to Abrams anyway.

“What was that about?” they demand.

Lash shrugs, brushing past Arin as if they’re simply in the way. “None of your business.”

“If it was about me, that sounds like my business.”

“Not everything is about you.”

“Point. But in this case, it seems like a safe bet.”

“And? If you were supposed to hear it, you would have.” Lash sounds agitated, and with their nerves already jumpy, it’s hard not to match that energy. 

“You don’t get to decide for me what⁠—”

“Take that up with your boyfriend. Not me.” 

Well, they were only irritated with Lash, but it’s true that it looked like Abrams’ idea to be cagey about it. “I mean, he’s not my— or I don’t know if we’re⁠—” Arin starts, unsure why they’re suddenly changing the topic. 

Lash cuts them off with only a look, surlier than they’ve ever seen him, but when he speaks, it’s only to say, “There’s food on the stove if you’re hungry.”

It’s only then that Arin sees the half-eaten bowl of stew on the table, with a hunk of crusty bread on the plate beside it. Now that they’re paying attention, they can admit the whole apartment smells good. Their stomach rumbles. Lash wears a wry half-smile as he drops his heavy body back into his chair. He eats noisily, and somehow the sound isn’t all that obnoxious. 

It’s weird to move through his tiny kitchen again, to realize they still know where the bowls are and the plates and the spoons, to be able to guess that the bread comes from the bakery down the block but the stew is something Lash made himself. Not that they expected to forget any of it; they simply hadn’t expected to think of it ever again. 

When they finally settle at the table and get to take their first bite, they make an embarrassing noise right into their bowl. It’s just shy of too hot, which feels perfect now that the nights are getting colder, and the last time they had a decent home cooked meal was— well, the last time they ate with Lash a couple weeks ago. 

“Sorry. It’s really good.”

“No shit,” Lash says gruffly, but it’s easy to see he’s proud. He’d never admit it, but he likes cooking, or at least he likes being good at things other than only punching people. 

“Thank you, by the way. I really don’t want to impose, so if you need me to go, I can.”

“Told Detective Dickhead you’d be here. He implied you were in some kinda trouble.”

“I’m not helpless. I mean, I appreciate that you care, but—”

Lash scoffs. “You can’t pay me if you’re dead.”

“Oh,” they say quietly. They should have expected it would be something like that, and they’re not sure why it bothers them. “Still, I don’t want to get in the way of you doing… whatever you were going to do tonight.”

“Was gonna go to the bar, but maybe there’s a game on the radio or something.”

“You can still go. I don’t mind.”

“Remember how I’m not supposed to leave you alone?”

“Well, I could go with you.”

“No.”

“And why not?”

“I’m not your boyfriend.” 

“Oh,” Arin says again. “I didn’t—”

“I’m not taking you out,” he snaps. Whatever strange thing has been bubbling under the surface since Arin arrived finally overflows. “I’m Jacob fucking Lash, baby. I’m nobody’s backup plan. So no, we’re not gonna go paint the town, and we’re not gonna play house this time either. You can sleep on the floor for all I care.” He sniffs angrily. “You know how many people would kill for what you got?”

They shouldn’t let him rile them up, and they know it, but it doesn’t stop them from saying, “What, paying rent to some jerk by sleeping with him?”

“Says the piece of ass who used me for a place to stay. Left the minute you got another offer, and now you’re back for more favors. Didn’t even have the courtesy to blow me this time. And I’m the jerk? Un-fucking-believable.”

“Oh,” they say a third time, and they don’t know why they have to squeeze to get even that much out of their throat. 

“‘Oh,’” Lash mocks. 

Maybe they misread him or didn’t give him enough credit, but none of it changes that he’s still horrible, and he’s making Arin feel horrible, which is a power he shouldn’t even have. “Is that what you want then? For me to blow you?”

He sneers then, leaning back to spread his legs wide. “Sure, sweetheart. Get under the table and prove how bad you want to stay.” It’s no worse than a thousand other things Lash has said, but the tone is vicious in a way he’s never been before. 

Arin’s blood spikes, and something sick turns over in their stomach, and they sneer right back at him. “And if I don’t?”

“What answer’s gonna let us skip to you bouncing on my dick the fastest?”

Something inside Arin is rearing its mutinous head, and alongside it is a stab of unexpected desire, and their breath is coming faster. “Fuck you.” 

Lash laughs, an ugly gloating sound like he’s won some competition Arin didn’t know they were in. “Whatever. I gotta take a leak,” he says. He barely misses elbowing Arin on his way to the bathroom, and they’re left in a room that feels so empty it’s echoing the rushing in their ears. 

They once described Lash to Abrams as an asshole who was ultimately harmless, at least to them. They’re not sure that’s true anymore. 

Whatever this anger is, Lash has been sitting on it a while. Maybe since Arin left. Is he really that mad at losing some piece of ass, as he so eloquently put it? 

Arin sniffs, rubs at their face. Maybe Lash has every right to be angry. They’ve been so convinced he was using them that they didn’t think about it from his point of view. All things considered, he’s given a lot more than he’s gotten in return.

There was the bed and the food and basically all of his free time, the toothbrush and razor and dancing around each other in the bathroom, coffee and breakfast in bed, making out in the hallway on the way inside, Arin laughing at his stupid jokes and making him laugh and going to his fights. They think about tonight, about Lash insisting twice now that he’s not their boyfriend ⁠— and oh, God, Arin is absolutely the asshole here. 

Lash made it so easy to pretend there’s not a real person under there. Abrams tried to tell them. Abrams, who doesn’t even like Lash, saw it anyway, clearer than they did — and suggested Arin take advantage of it if they had to, which is maybe worth bringing up in the next of the thousands of conversations he likes to have. 

The point is they used Lash, as much if not more than the other way around, and they were planning to do it again if they had to. They’re already paying him to risk his neck for them, and they keep asking for more, with little regard for what he feels or thinks about any of it. 

What’s wrong with them? Maybe they really are their father’s child. 

The thought comes with a crushing weight in their chest. Something oily and cold slithers in their gut, and their eyes are stinging. They rub at their cheeks, but it’s not quick enough. 

“Stop that.” Lash is out of the bathroom now. “You don’t get to do that,” he says.

They can’t look at him. “Sorry,” they mutter, scrubbing a sleeve over their face. They try to hold it back, which only makes it harder. A tear escapes, sliding hot and humiliating down their cheek. 

“Disappointed? Thought you’d show up and have me wrapped around your little finger? Tough shit,” Lash growls. His presence feels heavy in the small room.

“No, that’s not—” But it is true, sort of. Of those they could have anticipated, it was the ideal outcome, and even now, selfishly, they’re crying in part because they fear he might hold a grudge — might have a reason to dislike them. “Sorry.” Arin hates the creak in their voice. “Sorry. I’m sorry.” They can’t stop saying it, and they can’t stop the stupid tears, and wanting to stop seems to only make it worse, which is embarrassing, and being embarrassed also makes it worse, and—

A clean kitchen towel lands on the table in front of them, which almost brings on a full-throated sob, because they’re not sure they can handle Lash showing kindness right now. “Quit it,” he says again, voice tight. “I don’t want to look at you like this.”

They nod, trying to collect themself. They finally risk a glance at Lash, who doesn’t look nearly as angry as he sounds. If anything he seems like he’s on the verge of panic. “Thank you,” they manage. “Do you still want me to—”

“No.” Lash looks disgusted, which they have absolutely no right to find insulting, and yet. “Don’t want your snot all over my dick,” he says, but it’s delayed and not particularly convincing. Another few fat tears roll down their face, then Lash crumbles. “You don’t have to sleep on the floor. I don’t know why I said that.”

“I wouldn’t blame you. If you’re so mad at me, why did you let me stay?”

“You promised me a paycheck. And call me sentimental, I guess, for not wanting you to die.” Arin sniffles, wringing the kitchen towel until Lash pulls it free of their grip. He crouches by their chair, carefully wiping their face. His mouth twists, compresses, and then he doesn’t quite meet Arin’s eye when he says, “Come on, kid. You know why.”

They suck in several shaky breaths. “I didn’t before. I wasn’t trying to⁠— I didn’t know. You never said anything.” As their sanity’s last line of defense, they blurt, “You’re not nice to me.”

It’s an absurd thing to say while Lash is gently dabbing the tears off their face, and the arch of his eyebrow says he knows it too. “I let you stay here. I cooked for you, took care of you, took you out. What, did you want flowers and candy too? Should have said something.” Lash smirks, small and fleeting. “Besides, you don’t like nice.”

Arin sputters then, but not five minutes ago, their heart was pounding in the face of Lash’s fury, and it wasn’t entirely nerves or anger. Worse, if Abrams has one flaw as a lover, it’s being perhaps too attentive, too patient, too gentle. They really thought they’d kept themself a mystery to Lash, but it seems he’s read them better than they’ve read him.

“I do sometimes,” they say stubbornly. “And you don’t know anything about me. You don’t ask me about my day or anything normal like that.”

“Since when do you want to tell me about your day? Can’t ask a question without you looking like you’re about to start running,” Lash says with a shrug. “When I asked your name, you gave me some stupid ⁠— what, nickname? Secret codename? Did you look around the room and pick the first thing you saw?” 

“You literally call yourself The Lash during sex.”

“It’s literally my name.” Lash sounds exasperated. “What kind of name is Pocket?” 

Explaining it would require explaining the case, which would require explaining a lot more, and that is one mystery they’re determined to hold onto. “It’s the name I go by.” It’s the best truth they can give him.

“But it’s not your real name.”

“It’s…” Arin sighs, looking for the words and coming up short. “It’s the name I go by,” they say again.

“Does he know your real name?” Lash’s voice sounds tight again.

“Well, he’s a detective. So yes, he knows the name my parents gave me, but not because I volunteered it.” Lash doesn’t look entirely convinced, and he has an unfamiliar look on his face that makes Arin’s stomach curdle, so they add, “Don’t take it personally. It’s not safe to share it. If the wrong people found out I’m here—” They rub at their chest, not entirely consciously, hand pressing into the starburst scar Lash has seen but never asked about. “I survived once. I don’t know if I can do it again.”

Lash’s rough hand brushes theirs aside. Even through two layers of clothing, he finds the scar unerringly, settling so carefully that it almost tickles where there’s any sensation at all. Arin’s heart thumps against it, and their eyes sting again, but they couldn’t name the reason if they tried. “Okay,” he says, glancing between Arin’s face and where his hand sits. “Okay. So you’re Pocket.”

They know they shouldn’t, and the knowledge doesn’t stop them any more than it ever has; they kiss Lash. For a single, exhilarating moment, his lips cling to theirs, but then he’s drawing back. “That’s not fair,” he says, rising to his feet.

“Sorry,” they mumble on reflex, but that’s not entirely true. They’re not sorry at all for trying to kiss Lash, only that the things they did before made kissing Lash more complicated than it should be. “He and I aren’t— I mean, we were— it’s confusing, but— you’re not the backup plan. You’re not second place.” Half horrified by their own words, they admit, “I like you. Kind of in spite of the weird shit you say, and you could stand to learn some manners, but I do. I didn’t understand before, but now I do, and I’m— I like you,” they finish lamely, almost afraid to look at him. 

A rough hand is on their cheek though. “You’re a real piece of work, kid.”

“Yeah,” they can’t help but agree. 

“Don’t know what I’m supposed to do with you.”

“You could let me make it up to you.” Their stomach flutters, but Lash is already standing within reach. They push the hem of his shirt up, pressing fingers into his skin and tracing the waistband of his pants. They’re close enough that they can feel the way his breath hitches and his stomach muscles jump. He hasn’t tried to stop them and he hasn’t said no, but he doesn’t seem entirely convinced. Flushing, Arin says, “You don’t have to be nice.”

Lash lets out a breath like he’s almost laughing, then his hand hooks under Arin’s jaw, holding their gaze firmly. “Try that again.”

That, at least, he has in common with Abrams. Their face feels unbearably hot against his hand, but they can’t look away now. “I want to. And you were right. I don’t want you to be nice. Not always. Not now.”

Lash’s whole posture shifts. He always looks arrogant, but this is somehow more. When they’re standing, Arin has a couple inches on Lash, even if he’s significantly broader. But right now, he looks huge and imposing. Arin’s heart sticks in their throat, and their cock twitches. 

He says, “Get on your knees,” and Arin scrambles to comply. It’s not graceful; the chair clatters behind them as they drop to the floor. It makes Lash laugh, that mean laugh he’s always had, and some of their nerves settle from the familiarity. “Missed the Lash’s dick, didn’t you? Show me how much.”

His hand joins theirs in digging his cock out of his pants, and they don’t resist when he wraps a hand around the back of their head and pulls them forward. He rubs their face against his dick, his balls, pubic hair scratching softly against their skin. Wet lips part, suck the salt from his skin at the base of his cock, then he grinds their face in until their nose hurts. It’s degrading, and humiliation burns hot in their cheeks and throbs between their legs.

When they try to grab his cock, though, Lash commands, “No hands.” Unsure what else to do, they rest them on their thighs, digging into their trousers. “No touching yourself either,” Lash adds, and they clench their fingers harder.

He tangles a hand in their hair, tugs, and goosebumps break out all over their arms. He pulls them back, hard cock leaving a sticky trail as it slides along their cheek. Somehow that is what makes their nipples tighten.

“Open up, baby.”

Their mouth drops open without question, without thought. He guides their head and his cock, and finally the tip slides in with a burst of salt on their tongue. He’s slow at first, but it isn’t gentle; it’s a test, measuring Arin to see what they’ll do. They know it when their throat tries to close around his cock and he pauses, watching, while they fight the reflex, eyes watering for the third time this night. 

Then he’s pressing deeper and deeper with each thrust, gaining momentum, fist clenching in Arin’s hair. They’ve never done it like this before, but now that they’re past the hurdle, it’s so easy. With Lash moving their head for them or holding it steady when he wants, deciding for them how deep to take it, refusing to let them touch, the only thing they have to do is mind their teeth. Everything else is out of their hands, simplified. No mysteries, Maelstroms, or life or death decisions; no past or future, just this.

“Look at you taking it like you’re getting paid for it. Knew you missed this dick.” Lash builds up a sloppy, wet rhythm, and their lips go numb and maybe their brain does too. Everything feels soft and fuzzy at the edges, even as their knees and jaw begin to ache, even with the ball of heat in their belly growing tighter.

“You’d do this all day if you could, huh?” They can’t respond, but they’re moaning before they realize. Lash laughs, changes the angle just so, and doesn’t let up. “That what you want? Spend your whole day with a dick inside you? Doesn’t even matter which end, does it?”

Their face is hot, feverish, and their cock is pounding between their legs, straining like the slightest contact could set them off. They know they’re not supposed to touch, but their thighs inch apart and their fingers flex, and Lash makes a noise above them like he’s close too.

Then he yanks their mouth off of him, and they splutter with the shock of it. “Take your clothes off,” he orders. 

While they struggle to do as they’re told, they’re aware of how slick their lips feel, how hot and swollen. Their face stays flushed. Every slither of their clothes over their body feels like too much, especially when they try to peel out of their underwear. 

Lash has pulled the bed down again, and they crawl in on hands and knees. “No. Roll over,” he says. They do, and he’s between their thighs, looming again, this time with his whole impressive body on display. One meaty hand clasps their jaw and the other probes slick at their hole. “You’re gonna look at me.”

They can only nod and spread their legs wider around his thick waist, watch the way his arm muscles bunch while he fingers them open. 

It’s perfunctory as usual. There’s no time to get used to anything before he’s pressing their knee up and nudging the head of his cock in. He spits down between them, fucking that into their body too. It’s one more way to demean them ⁠— or mark them, maybe ⁠—  which should make their stomach turn, but which causes another flare of heat instead. 

He has to let go of their face to push at their other thigh, but they don’t dare to look away. Then he’s bullying that heavy cock all the way in, too much too fast like he always does. He slams in deep, nudges his hips against their ass, then backs out to do it again and again. He pushes on their thighs, their knees, maneuvering them however he wants. Their hamstrings strain and the muscles in their abdomen start to ache, but he’s also bottoming out on every thrust, hitting so deep they could cry again.

They’re so full, aching, stretched tight around Lash’s dick while it rubs them raw inside, leaves them soft and open. Abrams’ might have been even bigger somehow, but Lash is plenty big and relentless to boot. He holds them down and pounds in, bruising so deep they’ll never get him out, and maybe that’s the whole point.

Their muscles strain, and they burn where they’re speared open, and they’re trembling all over. They dig short nails into his skin, slipping through sweat and catching on hair and muscle when they try to drag him closer, pull more of his heavy weight down onto them. Their head feels foggy and feverish again, and their cock might as well have a fever too, throbbing desperately between their thighs. 

“Please,” they mumble, thighs shaking around him. Their tongue feels clumsy, numb like their lips, and they’re not even sure what they’re asking for now. “Please.”

“Yeah, come on my cock, baby.” Lash rears back and grabs their dick roughly, fucks in faster still, and they’ve been so starved for it that it takes no effort at all to tip over the edge. Their whole body seizes, and they’re squeezing down around Lash’s cock, muscles locking, and they finally break on a near-sob.

Lash fucks them through it but barely lasts any longer. He crushes them when he surges forward, mouth smashing against theirs as his cock bottoms out one final time. 

It’s the sort of kiss that would be unbearable any other time, too sloppy by far, but in the moment makes Arin’s slowing pulse kick up again. They meet it with the same fervor, a hand curling around the back of Lash’s neck. 

It can’t last long. Without the sex to distract them, the strain in their body becomes a lot more noticeable. “Ow,” they say against his mouth. 

Lash extricates himself then flops back on the bed. They can stretch out now as aches both pleasant and unpleasant settle in. A big hand paws at them until they curl up close, head coming to rest with Lash’s huge, relaxed pec as their pillow. From the way Lash stiffens, that was maybe not what he was trying to communicate, but after a moment, he curls that arm around them. 

“You should finish eating,” he says after a moment. They wait for the rest to drop, and he doesn’t disappoint: “Gonna need that energy when I wake you up on my dick.”

It’s not funny, but they almost laugh anyway. “I’ll eat when my legs work again.”

The rise and fall of his chest slows, but he trails his fingertips up and down their arm, so he can’t be asleep. Still, it’s something like sleep that pulls them along with it, drifting, while the sweat dries. 

Then Lash snorts quietly, almost to himself. “Still a dumb name, you know.”

They put a hand over his mouth. “Don’t ruin this.”

He still sounds amused, but all he says is a muffled “Okay.” Then he falls quiet, but they swear they can still feel the faint curve of a smile under their fingers.

Chapter Text

It’s weird to be naked when Lash is still fully clothed. It makes them too aware of the chill outside, always trying to creep its way in. More than that, it makes them feel vulnerable, exposed.

Maybe it has more to do with the position they’re in though: knelt the best they can across Lash’s lap at the end of the bed. They’re angled so they can rest on their elbows on the mattress, but their legs don’t have a lot of support. It’s undignified in about a thousand ways, and they just know Lash will find some way to make it worse.

The first slap to their ass is unexpectedly light. It barely even stings. The next one, too. Not that they want it to hurt too badly, but that’s sort of the point, isn’t it?

His hand descends a third time, this time catching the top of their thigh, and okay, that one does smart. The next lands right where the first was, and they start catching on. It’s not about the immediate pain; it’s about the way it builds. 

His smacks stay light, alternating between each half of Arin’s ass, with the occasional detour to their thighs to make them jump. They tense in anticipation, but that only makes it worse. Their skin warms as blood rushes toward the surface. 

“Oh, God,” they groan into the sheets when they realize how hard they are. The last slap makes them rock forward, grinding into Lash’s muscular thigh.

His hand comes to rest lightly on overheated skin. It nearly itches under the gentler touch. “All you gotta do is tell me to stop.” There’s something almost sing-song about it, like he’s teasing, like he knows Arin won’t. He pets for a moment, waiting, and it’s almost worse now that there’s time to process.

They clench their jaw and say nothing. Lash laughs, shoves their face down onto the bed and starts again.

Now the pain blooms, a sharp sting layered over a blood-hot throb over a deeper ache, with each and every impact. It’s careful and controlled, but the momentum builds anyway. 

Lash asks again if they want mercy. It hurts so bad, and God, it’s mortifying, but maybe that’s what they deserve. They don’t tell him to stop.

It goes on and on, until they’re made of nothing but that horrible ache and the pounding need between their thighs.

Their skin feels too tight, buzzing with static. Their mind fuzzes over. They lose track of time like that, only dimly aware of the weight of their limbs, the way they’re grinding against Lash’s thigh.

There’s a sound coming out of their throat, but they can’t even really hear it. 

Eventually Lash pauses again. When he pets one hand gently over their ass now, his calluses scratch and their skin throbs and they try to press up into the touch.

“I think that’s enough, don’t you?” He tugs on their hair enough to get their face out of the bedding. It’s only when the cooler air hits that they realize how hot it was too. That and the hair-pulling make their answer nothing but a moan. 

They swallow around too much saliva and try again: “Enough.”

Lash laughs meanly, but he listens ⁠— sort of. He doesn’t hit them again, anyway. Instead he digs the tips of his fingers into their abused flesh until they curse and squirm and don’t tell him to stop. They can’t, not while they’re rocking helplessly against his thigh. 

“Sorry,” he says, not sounding sorry at all. His touch grows lighter over their tender skin, but even that prickles maddeningly after the onslaught, their nerves ignited and overwhelmed. Fingers slip between their thighs to pet the thin, untouched skin there, then his nails scrape back up over the inflamed flesh again.

Arin twitches, one leg jerking, which earns them a pinch. It’s not even hard, but it doesn’t have to be to hurt like hell now. “Be still,” Lash says. 

It’s humiliating how easily they fall into it, obeying him without thought. This whole thing is humiliating, and they’re not sure how they got here anymore. Maybe it was only the logical conclusion after Lash’s habit of slapping their ass during sex. They thought maybe he hadn’t fully forgiven them yet, and this is one form of penance, but they can’t say anymore whose idea it actually was.

None of that explains the knot of arousal in their belly.

Lash traces his fingers down between their ass cheeks, rubbing dry over their hole. Their legs want to spread, but he told them to be still; the warring impulses make them whine into bedding that’s wet beneath their cheek. 

“Did you say something?” Lash asks, and his fingers move idly like he’s lost in thought ⁠— or teasing.

They didn’t, but that doesn’t mean they won’t now: “Please.”

“Please, what? Stop? Start over? Keep going?” His tone is obnoxious, and there’s no way it isn’t on purpose. 

“Fuck me,” they say through gritted teeth. Shame burns as fiercely as desire.

“Aww, babe, I don’t know.” His hand moves back to their aching ass and gives it a quick squeeze. It takes all their willpower not to yelp. “You’ve gotta be sore. I don’t wanna hurt you.”

He’s having fun at Arin’s expense now, which should only infuriate them and should not make heat flare inside. “Don’t be an asshole.”

Lash laughs again. “Big talk for someone in your position.” His hand slips down again, stroking their perineum now, slowly increasing the pressure of it. This time they can’t stop their legs from spreading. “I should make you ask for it. Should make you beg. ‘Please, Lash, fuck me with your huge dick. I love it sooooo much. I can’t get enough. Please, Lash, I can’t live without it.’”

“That is not what I sound⁠—” They cut off with a mouthful of sheets as Lash pushes their face back down. 

His other hand disappeared while he was talking, but now it’s back, slick fingers pressing rudely inside. Further arguments fly out of their head. Rude Lash might be, but he is giving them what they asked for.

One hand rests hot on the back of their neck, holding them down while his fingers spread them open. It should be terrifying, how easy it is for him to do. If he wanted to hurt them, they can think of very few more vulnerable positions to be in. But somehow Lash has managed to bypass the vigilant part of their mind with hardly any effort, rewiring everything in the process until they’re rock hard and whining instead, torn between trying to stay still for him and trying to roll their hips back to meet him.

It doesn’t take long before he’s letting them up, arranging them on hands and knees on the bed, then stripping down. He kneels behind them, blunt nails scraping streaks of fire up the backs of their thighs and over their ass before he lines his cock up and works his way in.

Every slap of his hips against them reignites the sensation from before, every layer of it, from the stinging surface pain to the deep ache beneath. They want to crawl away or give in and tell him to stop, but instead they meet every powerful thrust with a wet gasp. 

Eventually it reaches a point where they can barely feel the pain anymore. It twists up with the pleasure flooding their body, and their head feels light and buzzy again. All they can do is float while the heat builds in waves. When it finally crests, it hits so hard they can’t even see straight, pulsing through them so intensely they could cry. It feels like it lasts forever, like their body doesn’t even belong to them anymore. 

They don’t know how much time passes, only that it does, and when awareness comes back, their limbs are still shaky. They collapse onto the bed. It’s not graceful, but they can’t be bothered to care.

Lash pulls their uncoordinated limbs back into something resembling human, then he gathers them close. They lie there with their ear pressed against his chest, listening as his racing heart slows. 

They’ll probably never get up the nerve to tell him that this is sometimes their favorite part. 

He smooths a warm hand from their nape to their tailbone. They might doze off for a moment; it’s hard to be sure. 

Eventually they summon the energy to lift their head and look at him. “Do you forgive me?” they ask. 

“Told you there’s nothing left to forgive.”

“Are you sure? I mean—”

“This was your thing. I’m fine.” 

“My thing? It was your idea.”

Lash snorts. “Sure.”

Heat floods their cheeks. Maybe it wasn’t technically Lash who came up with it, but he was the one who asked, What do you want me to do, punish you? Surely that means he has to take some credit for it. 

It’s hard to believe Lash of all people wouldn’t hold a grudge, that none of what he just did bore any real anger or resentment. But maybe that’s their guilt talking, and he really is fine. 

Changing the subject is easier. “I’m gonna be so sore tomorrow.”

“Tomorrow?”

“Now, really,” they admit, which only makes Lash laugh. Sadistic bastard. 

“Want me to kiss it and make it better?”

They still can’t look at him when he says stuff like that. They bury their burning face in his chest and groan. “Maybe later,” they mumble. 

There’s silence for a moment. Lash’s hand on their back still feels warm, grounding, even when his chest rises on a deep breath in. “You gotta say when.”

It’s such a change in tone. Somehow it doesn’t sound like it’s a reply to the last thing they said. They grunt the question against his skin. 

“You weren’t gonna tell me to stop.” His hand has stopped petting their back, drifting up into their hair now instead. “If I wanted to hurt you for real, I’d drag your ass into the ring.”

They manage to look at him now. It seems important, even if his face isn’t doing anything particularly different than usual. “I know that. You stopped on your own.”

“Yeah, this time.”

“I can handle more than you think.”

“It’s not about that. I’m just saying I don’t wanna fuck it up.” He tugs at a handful of their hair then, but not hard. Maybe fondly. “I’ll do whatever weird shit you want, but not if I can’t trust you to say when it’s too much. Or if I’m supposed to choose for you, tell me. Don’t agree you’re going to and then just…” His voice goes quieter. “Don’t make me the bad guy.”

Arin stares at him for a moment before moving in closer. “Okay.” They kiss him then, soft and quick. 

Then he pulls them down for another that isn’t so quick, and then another, so maybe they’re done talking for a while. 

Chapter Text

“Spread your legs. There you go. You gotta relax.”

Arin does as they’re told, but they still feel sort of strange and exposed like this.

“Good,” Lash says. “Now hit me.” Their punch smacks into the padded palm of Lash’s glove. “Sucked less than the last one, but you still need to loosen up your shoulders. Elbows in.” 

They adjust, and they try again. Between their own problems, whatever business Abrams may have embroiled them in, and the upcoming Maelstrom, it seems inevitable that they’ll have to defend themself once more. They knew some things coming in, but if Lash is an expert in anything, it’s this. They’d be a fool not to accept his help.

“Again,” he commands. They keep at it until they’ve broken a sweat and their hands begin to ache from the repeated strikes. He offered them gloves, but nobody trying to hurt them in real life is going to wait politely while they put their gloves on. They compromised by letting him wrap their hands, at least. 

As good as they feel about the progress they’re making, Lash easily reminds them of the work they still have to do. On their last punch, he sidesteps, grabs their forearm, and pulls them down for a quick kiss. It’s insultingly easy.

“Time’s almost up,” he says. The owner of this boxing gym has made a lot of money betting on Lash, so he was more than happy to honor their request to use it privately, if only for so long. It’s nice, even if the space feels too empty with just the two of them in here. 

They’re already sweaty and their heart rate is already up, so they ask, “How long do we have?” and go in for another kiss. 

“This is a sacred place, babe.” Lash sounds scandalized. “I can’t take you to pound town here.”

“Wait, really?”

“No.” Lash laughs like he’s told a much funnier joke than he has. “But I can’t guarantee all those stains are blood.”

Arin looks down at the rust brown spots that litter the floor, nose wrinkling. “Never mind. The mood is gone.”

Lash’s hand slides over their ass, deceptively gentle until his fingers press into skin that’s still bruised. Those bruises send signals directly to Arin’s cock, and Lash has figured out the precise pressure required to make heat curl slow and lazy in their belly. “Think it’ll come back in the showers?”

They try to keep their voice even, but they’re fighting a losing battle. Lash has already pulled them close enough that he can feel the effect he’s having. “There is no privacy in there.”

“Anything’s private if we lock the door.”

It’s a thin excuse to concede, but Arin does. They’re rewarded with Lash going down on them in the shower, cold tile at their back contrasting with the molten heat of his mouth and the steaming water racing down both their bodies.

Shacking up with him isn’t much different than the last time they did this, but the small changes make it more pleasant by far. It’s probably not possible to truly domesticate Jacob Lash, but with appropriate feedback and the knowledge that he likes them, even the worst things he says are, if not socially acceptable, then at least sort of funny. 

Arin doesn’t miss their father, but they do miss a great deal of their life before. The creature comforts of exceptional wealth are self-evidently better than Lash’s cramped apartment, which is nonetheless a remarkable improvement on some of the other places Arin’s slept before. But they also have family who aren’t entirely irredeemable. Sometimes they let a flight of fancy take them back there, constructing the life they may have had if not for the attempted filicide of it all. They get a perverse joy out of imagining their father’s reaction if they brought Jacob Lash over for dinner. It is a not-insignificant part of his charm.

Arin has learned over time that Lash is not unself-aware. He knows exactly how abrasive he is. He certainly doesn’t treat the grocer or the baker the way he does his opponents in the ring, and so far he’s only mentioned his dick when they’re in private. So he understands social niceties; he simply doesn’t care about most of them. It’s almost admirable.

They have come to terms with liking him. He makes it surprisingly easy.

They do feel the occasional pang over Abrams, but it is quickly suppressed by their general capacity for denial, as well as the specific sense of fairness learned from being the eldest child: miscommunications aside, Lash got here first. Besides, Arin has several reasons to be irritated with Abrams, all of which swarm in any time they entertain notions of guilt on his behalf.

Absence does not make their heart grow fonder. The opposite, in fact. Every day that they’re left wondering when they might see Abrams again and explain how the situation has evolved, they grow more annoyed that he abandoned them on Lash’s doorstep. It made sense at the time, but the more space they have to think about it, the more fault they find. 

Lash somehow escapes their ire, despite having similarly handed them off. It may have something to do with Arin’s residual guilt over how badly they misunderstood him, but it could easily be that he is very, very good at distracting them, mostly with his body or the things he can do to theirs.

It could also be that Lash is willing to help them prepare for the Maelstrom rather than obstruct it, and not only by helping with their fighting form. 

When they say they still hope to recruit Wraith, he doesn’t stop them, but he does offer a warning: “You might have trouble. She kinda hates me.” He says it like he’s observing the weather.

“Doesn’t that bother you?”

“Makes it inconvenient sometimes, but nah. Most people don’t give me a reason to care what they think.” His sideways glance makes them feel warm all over, like he’s confessed something illicit. “Anyway, she has a weekly poker game. Easier to meet with her there than ringside.”

“You think she’ll still work with you?”

“Probably. She knows an opportunity when she sees one.” If Arin weren’t already looking, they might miss the small tic in his jaw. 

Their window to recruit allies is closing, but some of their father’s business lessons had value. A Lash in the hand is worth two Wraiths in the bush, or something. Besides, that tic might be their fault. “If she won’t, there are other people I can ask.” They kiss him with a hand on either side of his face, and they don’t stop until he’s smiling.

Whatever his feelings on the matter, Lash follows through on helping them. Wraith is, as expected, not entirely pleased by their presence, but she hasn’t tried to shoot anyone, so that’s probably a good sign.

Abrams, however, is not so expected. Arin racks their brain for any memory that should have prepared them for this, and the most they’ve got is that he mentioned poker in passing. It’s what he was doing the night he stayed out late, before he came back to find them⁠— 

Well, he could have been playing poker with any number of people in this city. Names didn’t really come up. 

“You know these two, Abe?” Wraith asks, perfectly casual like she couldn’t have them riddled with bullets before they could react.

At least Abrams has to stop staring at them to address her. “You could say that,” he answers after a moment. 

Arin clears their throat. “Don’t be mad at Lash. I asked him to bring me.”

She looks amused and perfectly in control. Arin would like a fraction of that self-assuredness. “Now, why would you do that? This game’s invitation only, and I don’t see you on the guest list.”

“I wanted to speak with you. It’s a business proposal.”

“Don’t take it personally if I don’t trust Lash’s taste in company.”

“Then trust mine,” Abrams says. “Hear them out. It’s right up your alley.”

“Is that so?” Wraith purses her already pouty lips while she thinks. “Alright, but make it quick. And just you. Lash can sit in the corner and think about what he’s done.” She walks away with all the confidence she’ll be obeyed. When they hesitate, watching some goon of hers ushering Lash back toward the bar’s entrance, she barely glances back. “He’ll be fine. I don’t have all night, kid.”

In the back room, Wraith leans against the edge of a table, propped up by the strange wooden arms she wears. She uses the original models to light a cigarette. She radiates the sort of effortless cool they’ve never been able to pull off.  Even if it’s a performance, they’re a little envious.

“You’re taller than I thought you’d be,” she says. 

Anxiety squirms in their gut, but it doesn’t have to mean anything. She clearly loves to ruffle feathers. Their best chance of getting through this is to remain as unruffled as possible. “I wasn’t aware you’d thought about me at all before now.”

“God knows I don’t understand why, but you took Jacob Lash off the market. That’s gonna cause a stir around the Bear Pit. From what I’ve heard, I expected someone sort of waifish. Delicate. Maybe capable of smiling.” She smirks, inviting them to share a secret. “Between you and me, it looks like you’ve got him wrapped around your finger. It might be cute if it were anyone else.” Her affability fades a bit. “Like seriously. Anyone.”

“Surely you didn’t invite me back here just to gossip.”

“Gossip’s part of the business. I always know what’s going on in my city.” She looks like she’s about to tell them who got caught kissing behind the school when she says, “You wanna know something really juicy? Max Fairfax has put a bounty out on his own son ⁠— the one that’s supposed to be dead already. For those in the know, there’s a lot of money in turning Junior in.” Arin can’t breathe for a moment. Their fingers flex on the case’s handle, tingling with power already. There’s a trick to unlatching it quickly. They might be able to do it before she grabs a gun. “Bet Lash could use the money.”

They wet their lips before they can speak. “Why share this?”

“What do you think your boyfriend would do if he knew? Maybe he likes you enough that it wouldn’t change anything. We could find out together if you want.” Her smile turns razor sharp; so much for pretty and pleasant. 

They square their shoulders against the threat and keep their chin up, even if their insides feel like lead. “I’m already here to make a deal. What are you getting out of this?”

Wraith tilts her head. They don’t know if she sees in the typical way or if there’s magic involved, but she’s studying them for sure. “Just letting you know that whatever you got better be good.”

“I want your help in the Maelstrom.”

She barks out a surprised laugh. “You’re asking for a favor?” 

“I’m giving you an opportunity,” they say with all the confidence they can muster. “You get our help summoning a Patron.” Surely even if she hates Lash, she’s reached the same conclusion they did the first night they met him: he’s exactly as good as he claims. Arin’s own skill set can remain a mystery, but the promise of money and a Patron’s favor will hopefully carry them a long way.

“And all that that entails. Alright, I see where you’re going. And what are you gonna ask for? Wait, wait. Let me guess. You want the keys to the kingdom.”

“I want what it takes to get peace.”

“So many ways you could get that, but you’re gonna pick the one that lets you take what Daddy has. Freud would have loved you.”

Arin flushes, but they stand their ground. “It’s better off in my hands than his.”

“Entirely altruistic, I’m sure. Lucky you, Abrams vouched for you, and the Tunnel Rats told me to keep an eye out for their favorite urchin. I can see the investment potential here. See, your boyfriend owes me some money, and I know you won’t have a problem paying it with interest if we do this thing. That’s of course on top of my retainer’s fee, as well as payment for services the day of, and depending on how much Lash annoys me, a surcharge for not shooting him.”

“How much?”

“I understand you’re not exactly flush at the moment. I’ll invoice you.”

They wince. God knows how many zeroes are going to be on that invoice. And she answered terribly fast, like she was prepared for every part of this meeting.

None of that can be allowed to matter; they knew coming in the cost would be steep. If they stop their father, they get to claim everything that should have been theirs, and maybe the profits from Fairfax Industries’ future ventures. “You know I can’t pay it if we don’t succeed, right?”

“Then you better make sure we don’t fail.”

“We’ll need more than the three of us.”

“You don’t have Abrams on the hook yet?” Her smirk says she knows ⁠— or has guessed ⁠— way too much.

They don’t feel like clarifying that they’re the one complicating it. “Not exactly.”

She scoffs. “We’ll have to work on that. I love a good gamble, but I’d rather stack the deck for this kind of thing.”

“And you won’t tell anybody about… you know?”

“Nothing but the truth. I’ve never met Fairfax’s son.”

Outside the office, Abrams is waiting. She gives the two of them a look that makes Arin’s arm hair stand on end. Whatever she has or hasn’t guessed already, there’s no way she doesn’t think something of the strange tension in the air.

Abrams looks like he’s trying to make himself smaller when he asks, “Could we get a moment?”

Wraith’s expression doesn’t get any less intrigued, but she stands aside. “Game starts soon.”

With that, they’re shut in the room with Abrams. For an instant, he stares with that same starved expression from before.

Then he surges into motion, mouth descending to capture theirs. They gasp and he sucks the air right back out of their lungs. For a moment their head spins, an effect magnified by the taste of scotch on Abrams’ tongue. It’s all they can do to stay on their feet, even with his arms winding tight around them.

It takes longer than it should for their brain to catch up. They push gently on his chest and back away, ashamed by their own reluctance to stop it. Their breaths come too quickly. 

“Sorry, I shouldn’t have⁠—” Abrams starts.

“It’s okay.” Arin sucks in air, then corrects themself. “Well, no, you shouldn’t have. We’re not⁠— you can’t do that.”

Abrams looks exactly as wounded as they knew he would, like the world’s largest, saddest puppy. “You’re right. I made that weird. And I suppose you have to keep up appearances with Lash.”

Ah, there’s the irritation that’s been plaguing them lately. It certainly helps keep the effects of Abrams’ big sad eyes at bay. “I’m not just keeping up appearances.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“I’m serious.”

Abrams scoffs. “Seemed to me you thought Lash was a little easy come, easy go.”

“But you didn’t think that, did you? You knew it was real to him when you told me to go back there. You wanted me to manipulate him. It was cruel, and you wanted me to be cruel, and I was and⁠—”

“I want you to survive.” It cuts through their rambling like a knife. “I’d do a lot worse than hurt Jacob Lash’s feelings to make that happen.” Abrams’ nostrils flare with frustration, but he softens rapidly. His words are harsh but his tone isn’t when he says, “If you’re gonna come out of the ritual on top, you better get comfortable with a little ruthlessness.”

“I know that.” They’re fighting a losing battle with their own exasperation. Of course they know these things. They don’t like thinking about it, but they understand. The price they would pay to wrest Fairfax Industries from their father’s hands might be higher than they’re entirely okay with, but it’s for the greater good, isn’t it? “I know it’s going to get ugly. Maybe… maybe I’ll have to get ugly, but I never want it to be comfortable.”

“I know you don’t.” An enormous hand reaches for theirs. “One of a lot of reasons why I want you safe.”

“But the Maelstrom isn’t here. I don’t have to do any of that yet.” It’s easy to see that his heart was in the right place, even if his methods weren’t very nice. It doesn’t absolve him, but it does make sense. Still, they pull their hand free of Abrams’ grip. 

Abrams laughs without any humor in it. “That’s a lot of angst over a guy like Lash.”

“It’s for my sake, not just his. But I don’t want to hurt him.”

There’s another of those laughs. “Did he get a full personality transplant? Get possessed, maybe?”

“No, but he doesn’t treat me like I’m breakable.”

Purple stains Abrams’ cheeks when he flushes. “I’m twice your size. You are breakable. Easily. Most humans are.” 

“You don’t always know better than me either.”

Abrams’ mouth opens then closes silently.  Then he says, “Not exactly how I was hoping this would go, if I’m being honest.”

“Then you shouldn’t have left me on his doorstep.”

“Seems like the best thing I could have done, if you’re so happy now.” His tone is dry and dark and still disbelieving. 

Even Arin’s ears feel too hot. Their arms have crept in around their body like they can hold themself together in some literal sense. They don’t even know why they’re so upset. They told Lash he wasn’t second place, and they meant it. But Abrams never really was either.

They are happy, or as close as someone like them can get anyway; they don’t know what that feels like in any undiluted form. They know they got damned close with Abrams too, though. Maybe that’s why they somehow still feel like he betrayed them — abandoned them. No amount of reason can quite shake that feeling. 

“Don’t mock me,” they say, voice small. 

“I’m not. I wouldn’t. I do want you to be happy, just—” It hangs there for a second, then Abrams sighs. “Did it have to be a guy who talks about himself in the third person?”

Their own laugh surprises them, but they’re grateful for the way it unspools the tension in their chest. “Would you believe that’s one of the first things I said to him?”

“Did it make him stop?”

“You know it didn’t.”

That makes Abrams smile, even if it seems a little sad. “You ask Wraith what I think you asked her?”

“Of course.”

“And what did she say?”

“Yes.” They can’t quite look him in the eye when they say, “She wants you to help us.”

He laughs, disbelieving again. “You made up your mind about that?”

“I think so. If we don’t tell Geist I’m involved until the day of the ritual, my dad won’t find out until it’s too late.” 

“You know that means Wraith and Lash are gonna know too, right?”

“She already knows. Let me worry about Lash.” Abrams’ bitter little laugh says plenty. There’s no reason this should be so difficult, but Arin’s chest hurts. “Is that going to be a problem?”

“I’m working with Jeanne Geist. I’ve developed a tolerance for unsavory types.”

There are a thousand things they could probably say next, but none of them seem willing to come out. “I’ll see you soon then.”

They leave Abrams behind in Wraith’s office, feeling strangely lighter and heavier at once. He lets them go, but his gaze on their back feels like a real, weighted thing. 

Everyone else’s gaze does too. They can feel it with every step they take. Lash really is seated in a corner by the door like a child who’s being punished, but he stands as they approach. He looks them over, jaw tight and brow drawn, like he’s expecting something horrible to fall.

He’s been sitting here listening to them say God knows what to him. He brought Arin here, to a place where he knows people don’t like him, and there’s no way he didn’t see Abrams enter the back room. Wraith’s words still ring in Arin’s ears, and maybe they’ll worry about that later, but here in the moment, only one thing feels right.

They kiss him in front of everyone, hands cupping either side of his face like he’d pull away if they let him go. It’s not a harsh kiss or even particularly passionate, but it feels… heavy, like everything else suddenly does. When they’re done, Arin is slow to pull away.

“Take me home?” they ask, and they’re rewarded with a smile that is shockingly sweet and almost shy, which doesn’t suit Lash in the slightest. They pretend not to notice when he flips off the whole room behind their back.

⁠

Lash drags them bodily into the apartment, pressing them against the door as it closes. Whatever sweetness he displayed when everyone else was around has disappeared now. His mouth and stubble scrape down their neck, and his hands feel like they’re everywhere, and Arin is going to burn alive.

Lash feels like he’s trying to devour them. He tugs at their clothing, and with every bit of skin exposed, his mouth follows. Arin can barely keep up with shrugging out of their coat and shirt, working their shoes off, dropping their trousers. They don’t get to the underwear before Lash is hauling them off the ground. 

Their thighs clamp around his hips and the full weight of his body crushes them against the door. “You’re so fucking…” Lash trails off, like he’s finally run out of words. His cock digs in just beneath their ass. They’ve never done it this way, but Arin thinks he could probably fuck them right here without even breaking a sweat. They clutch at his huge arms and bite into his mouth and rock against him the best they can in this position.

If he’s not going to speak, maybe they can do it for him. They’re feeling generous. “Get these clothes off and fuck me. I want to feel the Lash’s cock.”

Immediately, everything stops. He stares at them, hands suddenly frozen at their waist. “Why would you say it like that?”

“You’re joking, right?”

“It’s weird when you do it.”

Arin stares at him for too long, then they’re laughing. It’s so stupid, but all the stress of the evening seems to float away. Bemused, Lash hauls them to the bed while they sag against him in helpless laughter. They land awkwardly, but he is already swarming over them, looking unbearably proud of himself. 

“I don’t understand,” Arin says. “I thought you would love to hear how much I want the Lash’s huge, throbbing cock.”

“When did you turn into such a menace?”

The question catches them off guard, if only because they realize they’ve been smiling for several minutes now. It feels like maybe getting something back that they had forgotten they lost in the first place. 

“I don’t know. Maybe the Lash rubbed off on me.”

He groans, “Stop it,” and buries his face in their neck. He can complain all he wants; his hands haven’t stopped moving. One of them inches up into Arin’s shorts and along the meager curve of their ass, fingertips just managing to brush dry over their hole. They shudder, hooking that ankle over Lash’s hip to give his hand more room. “Feel free to keep telling me how big it is though.”

Arin wants to laugh again, but instead they moan softly when Lash’s hand circles around to stroke their cock through their shorts, coaxing enough precome from the tip to saturate the fabric. 

“So big. I love it. Like it feels so good I could cry sometimes.” They have cried, actually, but for all his rudeness, Lash is at least polite enough not to mention that. 

“Not the biggest you’ve had though, is it?”

They freeze. “What?” How are they supposed to answer that? Lash is still teasing their cock, and he doesn’t stop when their hand lands on his, because all the strength has left their fingers.

“Is his bigger?” Arin’s breath catches in their throat, and they don’t have any answer save the color flooding their face. “You let him fuck you, right? No way you didn’t. I know you.” Somehow the words fill them with the same hot spike of shame and desire they feel when Lash used to call them a slut. They never thought they could miss that. “No way you felt that guilty over a handy or something. You let him have this, didn’t you?” His hand has moved again, squeezing one of Arin’s ass cheeks like he owns it. 

It takes them a moment to find their voice again. “I thought you were over it.”

“I am. But I still wanna know: is it bigger than mine?”

He’s too heavy to move, but they can avoid looking at him out of sheer spite if they have to. “No one’s is bigger than the Lash’s,” they say flatly in the direction of the wall. “Never, in the whole of human history, has there been a bigger dick.”

“Don’t be a shit.”

“Why would you even want to know?” If their roles were reversed, no way in hell would Arin ask for the details. They would stuff the whole thing in the same mental box where they keep things like the insults from their father and what it feels like to be really, really hungry, and they would shove it into a far corner to collect dust. 

“He’s huge everywhere else. Hard not to wonder if it’s proportionate.” His hand hasn’t stopped roaming, and they’re trying not to writhe beneath him. “Come on,” he wheedles. 

They want to argue, because surely there’s no way he means this as anything but a punishment, but he’s pressed up close to them, close enough they can feel the rigid line of his cock. “Wait. Are you turned on right now? Still?”

He laughs, hums an affirmative as his teeth sink in between their neck and shoulder. 

“Pervert,” they say, which he doesn’t argue with. 

“Come on,” he says again. “Humor me.”

He’s staring them in the face now. They want to look away, to do anything but humor him, but instead they meet his eye. They suck in a few breaths. It feels prickly and strange and like they’re doing something terribly illicit, but that makes their neck hot and their heart thud in their chest too. Shame cleaves their tongue to the roof of their mouth. In lieu of speaking, they grab Lash’s hand and guide it slowly, inch by careful inch up their abdomen, refusing to break eye contact lest they lose all their nerve.

Lash’s eyes widen when he catches on, then again when they finally stop his hand ⁠— right where they’re sure they felt Abrams’ cock when he bottomed out inside them. 

His fingers dig into their side at exactly that height. “Holy shit,” he mumbles. He wets his lips, gaze flicking from their eyes to his hand and back. 

They suck in a shaky breath, every moment wondering if he’s going to turn angry or sad or jealous, but he only presses his palm in, curls his fingers, hips twitching against them like he can’t help himself.

He studies their face a moment longer, brows drawn down in a silent question, like maybe he’s as worried as they are about how fragile this might be. Then: “I’d pay money to see that.”

“What?” 

“You, taking a cock that big. I bet you loved it, didn’t you?”

Their face can’t get any hotter than it already is, but the relief that he’s not upset makes everything feel too light and bubbly and strange. “Yeah,” they admit, voice going quieter. “Almost too big.”

Lash doesn’t seem upset at all, if the stiff jut of his cock is anything to go by. He peels off their underwear and then his own, and when he returns, it’s with slick fingers prying at their hole.

“What else did you do with him?” Lash asks, digging his fingers in and up, stroking with more patience than he ever usually shows.

Arin holds off for a moment, some last ditch effort to be stubborn even as they lift one knee to make more room for Lash’s fingers. But Lash doesn’t stop rubbing, pressing, circling until their hole pulses involuntarily, hot and sensitive. They can only do so much in the face of that, and he knows it. 

Soon enough, they cave, describing what they can remember of their stay with Abrams: the magazines, the way he ate them out first before burying that huge cock inside them, the way he coaxed their desires out of them with clever hands, not so different from what Lash is doing now. The whole time, Lash’s fingers move, and the warmth inside them spirals outward from that one spot, flooding their chest and their limbs, until they’re struggling to form the words. 

By the time Lash hitches their knees up to slam his cock home, they’re already trembling, and it’s all they can do to hold onto him, riding the wave of that building heat, growing with every thrust. They cling to him with weak arms, drawing Lash’s weight down onto them while they shake apart on his cock.

When the wave finally crests, they can’t move, can’t think, can’t even see, paralyzed and blinded by the power of that orgasm. Lash fucks them through it, just as overwhelming as anything happening inside their body. When he finally finishes, he barely avoids crushing them. 

They both lay panting, sharing the same air, before Lash lets go of their legs and carefully eases out of them. Arin strokes a hand down his face to keep him close, watching his eyes come back into focus after all of that. They catch their breath, then ask, in a voice barely louder than a whisper, “I don’t know what that was. Are you sure it’s okay?”

Lash sounds just as breathless when he smirks and says, “I’m not worried about it. I know whose name you say when you come.” 

It’s embarrassing and hardly romantic, and they’re not even sure they’d want romantic anyway, but Arin’s heart tries to pick up speed again, and they’re laughing when they pull Lash down into another kiss. 

Chapter Text

On the one hand, Jacob Lash works very hard to keep his life as effortless as possible. On the other hand, his dick takes charge of decision-making at least a third of the time.

Take Pocket, for example. If he’d known how much trouble they were going to be ⁠— well, he’d have made most of the same decisions, because Little Lash has been in control from jump with that one. But maybe he would have said a few more things out loud, and that could have spared him some bruises to his ego.

He really should have known they were trouble from the start, but they sort of snuck up on him. He’s no stranger to some dark-eyed, leggy piece picked up ringside or down at the bar, but he’s not usually curious about them. Pocket says one thing, then Lash’s enormous brain lights up with a dozen questions, and he can’t voice any of them, because they’d get skittish if he tried to ask about their favorite color.

He’s licked his own cock snot out of their wrecked little asshole, and they still haven’t told him their real name. That’s how married to their mysteries they are. 

Figuring them out is sort of like approaching a wild deer. Got to creep up on them with food in hand until they get used to you coming close. Probably. He wouldn’t know for sure. He’s always been a city boy.

The food thing has to be right though. God knows they eat like they need it. Which is fine. He likes cooking, and it’s better when there’s someone to bear witness to how great he is at it.

He’s picked up other things here and there. They’re too young for him, for one. Not, like, in a creepy way ⁠— he’s not Abrams ⁠— but in a way that made him feel weird for maybe five minutes before he remembered they came on to him. Besides, it’s not like they invented this kind of thing; it’s a vital part of the queer ecosystem.  

However close-lipped they’ve been about the circumstances that have them wandering the city like a penniless vagrant, they clearly come from Money with a capital M. He thought at first they might have worked some cozy desk job, maybe a bank clerk who’s fallen on hard times, but they’ve let slip enough that he’s sure it’s more than that. 

Not like it was hard. Nobody from a modest background would offer to throw money they don’t have at every problem. Add that to the boarding school elocution and the sliver of entitlement that has survived whatever tragedy gave them a bullet scar and a thousand-yard stare, and it paints a pretty clear picture. 

Few things are as fun as being told something’s off limits then getting his grimy hands on it anyway.

They’re not the first trust fund baby to fall into his lap face first. Starfuckers exist even in high society, and status doesn’t make a person resistant to Lash’s pure animal magnetism. The difference between Pocket and the others is that they aren’t just slumming it or spending a few nights rebelling against Mommy and Daddy. This is some true fall from grace family drama. 

He’s the real detective, piecing all this shit together from the breadcrumbs they spill. The intrigue works for them though. It’s kept him interested long after he would have tossed somebody else out on their ass. 

Now maybe he’s invested for other reasons. Instead of a steady rotation of nameless fucks with faces he forgets five minutes later, he’s just got the one ⁠— and he’s happy that way. 

They’ve got a tight ass and a bottomless throat and a well of kinks he’s only barely begun to tap. They’re lightweight and flexible enough he can hold or pin or twist them into any position that crosses his mind, and they’ll still take every last inch like he’s paying them. They let him do nearly anything he wants, and they get off on it.

They’ve said no to getting tied up, which is a real shame, but he’s not gonna blame his favorite flight risk for a little justifiable paranoia. Besides, they haven’t said no to anything else yet. It’s one of his favorite things about them. 

There’s no place he’d rather be than balls deep inside his pillow princess. The only thing that comes close is a good fight. 

All that’s bad enough, but it gets worse.

They don’t smile enough, but as with all those mysteries they withhold, prying one out of them feels like victory. Their voice is this hushed, breathy thing that slides under his skin and their too-rare laugh is even better. Somehow he likes those more than he likes the desperate noises they make when they’ve got a dick rearranging their insides.

The idea of them leaving again makes his lungs feel like they’re going to explode out of his asshole. 

This shit’s fatal. He’s a goner. The best he can do is try not to look like the chump he is while he entertains their every whim. If he plays his cards right, when they get whatever they’re after with the Patrons, maybe they won’t immediately forget him. 

He knows exactly how pathetic that is. He’s doing it anyway. Maybe that’s why he’s stupid enough to take them to see Wraith. 

⁠

When they show up to poker night, Abrams looks like a starving man with his favorite dessert in front of him ⁠— only Lash is standing in the way. 

It’s embarrassing. Lash hopes he’s never looked that fucking stupid because of Pocket, but he probably has. They just kind of do that. The fact that they’re not trying to tie him in knots is why it works. 

Ice crawls up his spine when Abrams disappears into that back room. He doesn’t distrust Pocket, but he sure as shit doesn’t trust Abrams. Who knows what he’s saying to them?

Looking at the guy, he understands the appeal. He’s fucking huge, which is attractive on its own merits. Lash has firsthand experience with exactly how much Pocket likes that sort of thing. And it’s not just the muscles. Abrams is the kind of handsome that ought to have Lauren Bacall slinking into his office with a tight dress and a suspiciously dead husband. And he’s got to be at least kind of smart, if he’s a detective; Lash doesn’t know for sure if that matters to Pocket, but he wouldn’t put it past them.

Lash is, of course, a specimen. But it’s hard not to feel challenged by the size of Abrams’ body, the cut of his jaw, and what is no doubt an absolute monster in his pants.

As with the muscles, Lash knows for certain Pocket likes that. He’s pretty sure if his dick were average sized, they wouldn’t have been so easy to win back. As it is, if they could cut it off and use it without the extra step of interacting with him, they probably would. Sometimes he thinks he’s holding them hostage by sheer virtue of his cock size. But hey, whatever gets results. 

That talk is taking longer than it should. Lash would go check, but he can’t possibly look like that much of a loser. If he blinks too long though, he can see Abrams bending them over or pushing them to their knees, or worse, talking them into leaving out the back.

The first two are at least spank bank material. The last one grabs Lash by the balls and twists until he can barely breathe. 

He scowls at the wall, trying not to seem restless in his chair, but when the time comes to be mad at Abrams, it’s not for any of the reasons he expected. It’s because Pocket walks out of that room wearing a miserable expression ⁠— more miserable than usual somehow.

Instead of gloating over his rival’s fuck-up like he should, Lash kind of wants to hit Abrams for hurting them. 

They’re pretty clear about choosing Lash though. Looks like the big guy did him a favor in the end.

He fucks a few confessions out of them, then he doesn’t bring it up again. Maybe it was weird. Who knows? It was still hot as hell.

Not bringing it up again means he never does find out what Abrams said behind that door. Maybe he doesn’t need to know. Maybe it was just goodbye.

He watches Pocket flounder for a day or two, somehow looking sadder and wetter and more stressed out than ever, then they nearly give Lash a heart attack.

“I need to talk to you about something,” they say. They’ve got that fight or flight look about them, which makes his hands sweaty. 

If they were back at Wraith’s placing bets, Lash would put all his money on the phrase we need to talk resulting in an unhappy ending for one or both parties. On the list of things he’d like to come out of Pocket’s mouth, it ranks only slightly above I’m calling the cops. 

“Could you sit down maybe?” Pocket asks.

He does, right at the end of the bed, and he makes a conscious effort to relax. “Why do you look like someone pissed in your coffee?”

They don’t smile, but one side of their mouth lifts like they at least thought about it for a second. “Everybody else already knows. I don’t know how, but they do, and you shouldn’t be the only one in the dark.” 

Something ugly rises inside him and seizes him by the neck. Is this what lesser mortals know as fear?

Pocket’s rubbing their hands on their trousers, and yeah, they look afraid too. His heart thumps in his chest and his throat and his ears, and he waits. They breathe deep, then let it out again. “Arin Fairfax,” they say, watching him carefully. Slowly, they add, “That’s my name.”

The freight train in his head hits the brakes, but the smoke left behind takes a minute to clear. “Okay,” he says slowly.

“Do you⁠ know—”

“Everyone and their dog knows who that is.” A few years back, you couldn’t go anywhere without hearing about the Fairfax family’s dead heir or the mystery surrounding it. The papers love a tragedy. The radio blasted that name so often that for a while Lash heard it in his sleep. He’s never asked their exact age, but it looks about right, even if the kid from the stories has always been locked in his mind’s eye as, well, a kid. He can’t help but stare at their chest, like he could see the bullet scar through their clothes. “Aren’t you supposed to be dead?”

“Supposed to be.”

He tilts his head, looking them over. “You’re pretty solid for a ghost.”

There it is again, that hint of a smile before it’s gone. “I’m not a ghost.”

“No? Undead maybe? Please don’t tell me I’ve been nailing a corpse, babe.”

“You have not been nailing a corpse. I’m not undead or anything. I’m just the regular sort of not dead. I think.”

“God, you had me worried there for a second. I mean, imagine fucking a wight. Or a ghoul! A vampire might be sexy, though. Are you sure you’re not a vampire?”

They scoff. “Be serious.”

“I am.” They let him grab their hand, but they resist his tugging. He sighs, resigning himself to a serious conversation for at least the next minute. “So if you’re supposed to be dead, how’d you end up here with me?”

They scowl at the floor as if it’s wronged them, then finally their gaze rises to meet his. “My father was the one who tried to kill me, and now he knows I’m still alive, and he’s put a bounty out on me, and who knows how many people are going to be looking for me now?” The words come out in a rush, then they watch his face, waiting for… something.

“Okay.”

“It’s a lot of money. Enough to motivate a lot of people.”

“Okay.”

They’re still searching his face. “It doesn’t… change anything?”

“Is that what you were worried about?” This time when he pulls, they move stiffly into his lap, warm thighs splayed to either side of his. “Sorry to ruin your dramatic reveal, but I don’t give a shit.”

They huff. It’s still not quite a laugh, but he’ll take it. “It wasn’t dramatic,” they say in that breathy, radio play voice of theirs. “It’s really serious.”

“Already knew you were keeping secrets. Already knew you grew up with a silver spoon in your mouth. Hate to break it to you, babe, but you’re not very good at hiding that part.”

“My father is a dangerous man.”

“Don’t see much difference between one rich dickhead and another.” He pauses, turning over what he’s just said. “Former rich dickheads don’t count.”

Normally it might make them laugh or even lob their own insult, but right now the wrinkle between their eyebrows is threatening to get stuck there. “My father tried to kill me. He has an arsenal of weapons nobody else has even thought of yet. He’s not just any rich dickhead.”

Lash shrugs. “Maybe your dad’s got more resources than I thought, but I already knew you were in some kinda trouble. So what was supposed to change exactly?”

“I thought⁠—” They stop, but at least they’re flirting with the idea of a smile now. “Not much, I suppose.”

“That’s right.” He gets his hands around their waist and pulls until there’s no room to breathe between them. “Thought you’d figured it out by now. Tell me you really are a ghost, and I still won’t care. Change your name to Trenchcoat. I don’t care. Wake up tomorrow and want me to call you Miss? Don’t care. None of it makes a difference to me.”

There’s a moment where they only stare, all big wet eyes and parted lips, and he’s tempted to say more to see if he can get a real laugh out of them or something. But then their fingers are death gripping the back of his neck, and they kiss him like he’s the last gasp of oxygen before they drown.

Normally it’s not his thing — and he suspects it’s not theirs — but this kind of sickeningly sweet kiss has its place and time. He feels them sigh against him and yeah, okay. Maybe he could get used to this sappy shit. He’ll spit in their mouth later to make up for it.

⁠

He doesn’t want to think about Abrams anymore. And he doesn’t, at least not in the way people might expect him to. He’s not jealous. He’s not even all that upset by it. Whatever wounds his pride took, his come smeared across Pocket’s face makes an excellent balm.

But he still thinks about it. About all the things Pocket confessed. About that five o’clock shadow rubbing their ass cheeks raw. About the way Abrams must have dwarfed them, surrounding them in every direction. About how huge that dick has to be, and about what they had to look like by the time he was done with them. 

Now they have to work together. He’s going to have to look this man in the eye, knowing what he knows about what Abrams did to Lash’s… whatever you’re supposed to call someone like Pocket. They’re Lash’s, anyway. That’s the part that matters.

But it’s because Abrams sent them back, delivered them to his doorstep knowing Lash is enough of a chump to take them back. They wouldn’t have come back on their own. That’s another favor Abrams did him, no matter the motive.

⁠

Two nights later he’s got his mouth between Pocket’s thighs and their hands fucking up his hair. Normally he’d only do this if he could get head at the same time, but he doesn’t mind so much when it’s Pocket. Every time he descends and their cock slides along his soft palate, they make this husky, breathless sound that zips straight to his dick.

He wrings the base of their cock in one hand and pins their hips with his arm so he can feel them writhe, trying to fuck his mouth and barely able to move. Slimy precome mixes with his saliva and drips down over his knuckles. Their thighs tense by his head and their fingers twitch in his hair. 

Their hips buck and strain against him, and they cry out, then they’re coming hot over his tongue. He slurps up as much as he can, milking them with his hand and mouth until they’re flinching away. Then he crawls up their body, pawing at their flushed face. He grips their jaw and spits the whole load into their baby bird gape of a mouth. Whatever noises of protest they make, when he chases it all with his tongue, they kiss him right back. 

They jerk him off and then peel away to the kitchenette to rinse their mouth out. They crack the window over the sink, lighting a cigarette and watching the smoke curl outward. It’s not their typical postcoital behavior. He has to keep his eyes open, at least until they come back to bed. 

From the chest up they’re painted silver by the moon above and red by the neon below. If he didn’t know their background already, it jumps out in the way they hold their cigarette.

They’re all lines and angles and long limbs, naked skin glowing with drying sweat. They don’t pose or preen or anything. It’s too casual, like they take it for granted that they’re sexy. Funny, considering the bad haircut and how often they neglect to shave that sad peach fuzz off their face. They’re not wrong though.

They’ve put on some weight since he met them. He’s too familiar with the shape of their ribs under his fingers not to notice. They weren’t exactly a wilting flower before, but he’s proud of his part in filling them out. 

They bend at the waist, propping themself on the counter with that fucked up hand so they can peer moodily out into the night. Their voice barely reaches him when they say, “It’s almost here.”

Lash grunts in acknowledgment. There’s no need to ask what it is. It’s the same thing that’s been hanging over their heads for weeks now. Hell, it’s the reason they met at all. 

They’re pouting again, or maybe thinking. It’s hard to tell the difference. “You don’t have to, you know,” they say once the cigarette’s nothing but a stub to be ground and flicked out of the window. 

He scratches at his chest even though he knows the sudden sensation isn’t physical. “Don’t have to what?”

“The ritual. You can stay back. I can… I can do it without you, I think.”

There it is, that feeling like someone’s piling weight after weight on his chest. “Is this because I made you eat your own—”

“No,” Pocket says quickly, all their poise suddenly scattered. They’re probably blushing, but he can’t tell from here. “No, I mean you don’t have to risk yourself. Not for me, or money, or whatever it is you’re doing this for.” 

“Yeah, whatever it is,” he scoffs. Lash hasn’t cared about the money for a while now. He’d thought that was clear enough. He sits up to relieve some of the pressure. Might as well rip the bandage clean off. “So, what? You want to do it without me?”

“No.” They pause, their eyes too sharp all of a sudden. They’re really fucking perceptive when they manage to look away from their own navel. It would be more intimidating if it weren’t so rare. He can see the calculations in their head, and for a moment he gets it ⁠— where they came from, what that family must be like. It’s a world he’ll only ever see from the outside. But when they speak again, it’s not some distant rich asshole; it’s only Pocket. “I want the Lash there more than anything. He’s good in a fight. He’s… useful.” Their pretty mouth twists with a hint of disgust. “But I don’t want you there. I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“Oh,” he says, unable to breathe for a whole different reason now. He clears his throat. “As much fun as we could have if there were two of me, the Lash is one of a kind.”

Their lips twitch. “Truly singular,” they agree.

“I promised you I’d be there. How are you gonna win without the Lash?” He looks them over now, searching for the signs they’re gonna bolt. “Unless you don’t want to anymore. You don’t have to be there either.”

“I don’t see an alternative.”

Lash grins and pats the bed beside him. “We could stay right here. Lock the door, barricade the window, count how many times I make you come before the Maelstrom’s over.”

“I wish I could.”

“Aww, what’s wrong? Don’t think you have the stamina?” 

“It’s not a real option.”

He refuses to let it suck the wind out of his sails. “Of course it’s real. There’s at least, like, twenty positions we haven’t tried yet. We could definitely knock out a few of those if we had a whole day.”

They’re smiling now, even if it’s sadder than it should be. They’re coming back to bed too, crawling in next to him. “A whole day, huh?” they ask. “You could wake me up fucking me. You know, get a head start. You don’t even have to wait until the Maelstrom. You could do it tomorrow if you wanted.”

The uncertainty that wavers in their voice at the end is absurd. He couldn’t turn them down at this point even if he wanted to. No need to make it that easy though. “You want me to do all the work first thing in the morning?”

“Absolutely.”

“And that’s supposed to be an incentive for me?”

“We both know it is.” That coy look says they’re right and they know it. Their voice grows huskier in that way that sinks hooks under his skin. “Show me how you’d do it.”

“Thought you wanted me to fuck you in the morning. You’re gonna be sore, babe.”

“Do it anyway,” they say with a poorly suppressed tremor.

They’re trying to distract him, but knowing it and fighting it are two different things. It doesn’t stop him from flipping them roughly to face them away from him, then brushing a hand down their side as gently as he’ll let himself. 

The lube is never far these days. He barely has to move before he’s back, pressing one slick finger inside. They open up like they were made for this, made for him, even if he knows that that’s not true.

Normally he doesn’t have the patience to draw this shit out. Their body just takes it so eagerly. There’s no point in wasting time to get what they both want. He can make exceptions, though. When their ass presses back against him, he grins into the side of their neck. “You’re supposed to be asleep,” he says. “Be still.”

They shudder once then stop their squirming. He rewards them with a second finger, eased in just as carefully, just as slowly as the first. Their body is so tense, trembling with their effort not to move, hole clinging hungrily to his fingers. Shaky breaths rattle out of them, and he can hear every ounce of effort it takes them to keep quiet.

Their thigh inches forward to make more room for his hand, and their hips twitch, starting to rock then stopping again like they can’t help it. Lucky them, he only has so much patience. It’s only a few minutes before he’s lining up his cock and easing the head in. He goes as slow as he can stand it, but he’s not even halfway in before they start moving in earnest.

“Lot of activity for someone who’s sleeping,” he says.

“I would definitely be awake by now.” Their voice is tight but amused. “You’re not very subtle.”

“Well, excuse me for having a huge hog. I can pull it out if you don’t want it.”

He doesn’t even get to make good on the threat before their blunt nails are sinking into the meat of his ass, trying to hold him there. “Don’t you dare.”

He slides his hand up their side to end with a squeeze at their tit. “Aww, I wouldn’t do that to you, babe. I know how much you need it.”

Their head ducks away, but he knows them enough to know they’re probably blushing again. He’d be grinning if he weren’t so busy digging his teeth into their shoulder and shoving his cock home. He should keep going slow to draw it out or to give them some novelty or something, but they shudder and squeeze all down his length, and all he can do is drive in again and again.

“Yeah,” they say. It’s too late to be a response to anything but the cock carving out their insides, but he’ll take what he can get. 

The angle’s all wrong to give them the pounding they usually like, but it’s still his cock sliding through slick, silky heat to the tune of their breathless groans and half-formed words. He slips one hand between them to grab their thigh, lifting to make more room for himself, to get as deep as he can. 

They’ve got a hand on their cock and their face in the pillow now. They’re panting out nonsense, but maybe sometimes it’s his name. He’ll take that too. 

He’ll take whatever they’re offering ⁠— every last piece, no matter how small. Here and now it doesn’t feel all that small anyway. It feels like the only thing that matters is right here in this bed, with Pocket’s hole milking him for all he’s worth. When he comes, it rolls down his spine and bursts out of his cock, spraying their trembling insides. 

Never let it be said he’s not a giver. Even with his head still spinning, he paws clumsily between their legs, his hand joining theirs on their cock. 

When it’s over, neither of them moves. Maybe when they catch their breath, it’ll be a different story.

He’s got to pull the quilt over them both before they get cold. Pocket’s arm settles on his, their hand on his wrist and his hand on their chest where he can feel their heartbeat slowing. He’ll get to the covers in a minute maybe.

Mostly his brain’s empty after a good nut, but eventually he can have more than one thought strung together. Pocket is definitely too young for him if they think he’ll be able to fuck them awake in the morning too. Oh, he will find a way, because the Lash is nothing if not a stubborn bastard, and a horny one, but they’re definitely taking that youthful refractory period for granted if they think three times in twelve hours is normal. 

Those are the safe kind of stupid thoughts though. The other stupid thoughts are gonna fuck him up bad one day.

Like Pocket can hear the stuff rattling around in his head, they say, “I have to see the ritual through. I don’t have a choice.”

They’re wrong. They have so many options. They could run away, start a new life entirely with that last bit of money they’ve saved. Hell, maybe Lash would go with them if they asked. They could confront their old man directly, with or without a Patron’s blessing; he’d help them do that one for sure. It’s been too long since he got to punch somebody who really deserved it.

They could stay here. Get a real fucking job and eat his food and keep his dick warm. But they’d never be satisfied. How long until they’d start seeing this apartment as a prison instead of a quaint stepping stone? 

They don’t belong here. Any claim he’s got on them will only ever be temporary. 

“I know,” he mumbles against their nape, and he pulls them closer while he still can.

Chapter Text

One of these assholes decides it’s a good idea to plan ahead. Lash’s money is on Wraith. She didn’t get to where she is by flying by the seat of her pants, or by being shy about inconveniencing everyone around her, especially Lash. 

The conference room they meet in is only a few blocks from the Bear Pit, where the apartments and businesses start putting on airs despite their proximity to the docks. This part is definitely Wraith; whether she owns the building or extorts the real owner, she’s the one with access. The only other possibility is Geist, who looks so disgusted to be somewhere without marble floors that it rules her out right away.

“These are your friends?” she asks Abrams. 

“Acquaintances,” Abrams says with a stillness that suggests he’d be glaring at Lash if he let himself turn his head.

“Colleagues now,” Wraith says pragmatically.

Geist looks them all over, before making a disgusted sound. “You, I understand,” she says to Wraith. “And that one, I suppose.” She gestures at Lash without quite looking at him. He bets Abrams would hate knowing he’s got that in common with her. “But I don’t understand the urchin. What do you do? Are you a burglar?”

Pocket’s eyes anxiously flick around the room before they settle on her. “Me?”

“Yes. Are you deaf as well?”

“I⁠— you really don’t⁠—” Pocket makes a sound that isn’t a laugh. “I’m not a burglar.”

“I don’t know where you got that overcoat, then. It certainly does not belong to you.”

Lash tries to look at the garment with new eyes, but he doesn’t see shit. Other than being in better condition than any of Pocket’s other clothes, it looks like any other overcoat.

“It’s mine,” Pocket says firmly.

“Hardly.” Geist scoffs. 

Before she can press further, their final teammates arrive in the form of a giant mole and… whatever the other guy is. Lash groans inwardly, because he’s dealt with Mo and Krill before. Apart from Geist, everybody here is from roughly his neighborhood ⁠— or below it, in the Tunnel Rats’ case.

“Pocket!” Krill exclaims, while Mo envelops them in a hug. Whatever Pocket says next is muffled in stinky fur. Krill reaches into the tangle to pat Pocket’s arm, then addresses the others. “Wraith, Detective, a pleasure as always. Lash,” he starts, then pauses. “Oh, my. Lady Geist, it’s an honor.”

“For you, perhaps,” she sneers.

“For you,” Krill says with a sudden edge, before he returns to his typical polite manner. “Forgive Maurice. He can be shy, but I assure you he is also pleased to be among such esteemed company.” 

Pocket has been released from Mo’s embrace, but not before their face has turned a deep red from nearly suffocating. “We know each other,” they say to Lash.

“No shit.” He brushes their shoulder, and a white puff drifts to the floor. “You got fur on your stolen coat.”

Pocket meets his smirk with something approaching a smile of their own. “Shut up.”

Behind them, Krill pauses his efforts to pull out a chair in order to stare at Lash in disgusted disbelief. He’s not the only one. 

Lash couldn’t care less. In fact, he’s starting to feel smug again. If these jokers think he’s undeserving, then victory is even sweeter. Maybe he won’t get to keep the prize forever, but Pocket is his. Nobody else here gets to say that ⁠— not even Abrams. 

Abrams tried to fight dirty, and Lash won anyway. He won. He can’t even bring himself to hate Abrams for any of it, not really. 

Lash’s hatred is reserved solely for Bebop, whose single victory over him was total bullshit. He’s beat that golem’s ass a dozen times, and once he gets one past Lash? Complete and utter bullshit. 

Abrams is a little bit bullshit, but the hot knot that tightens in Lash’s stomach when he thinks too hard about the detective is not the same. Lash isn’t jealous of Abrams, and he’s definitely not threatened by him, no matter how huge and square-jawed Abrams is, and no matter how many times he glances at Pocket during the meeting, and no matter how many times Pocket evades eye contact with him, and no matter how frequently Lash wonders what it’s like to be that deep inside Pocket or sometimes maybe even what it’s like to be Pocket in that scenario, and no matter how much everyone here seems to like Abrams, or at least respect him, or think he’s nice. Lash is fine.

He is so fine that he misses a lot of the discussion, but he gets the broad strokes: pair up, work together, blah blah blah. He’s with Pocket anyway. That was always the plan, even if there are more people involved now. Trying to come up with contingencies is overthinking it.

When it’s over and everyone has begun to trickle out of the room, Abrams grabs Pocket by the wrist. “Can I get a second?” he asks. “Alone?”

“Really?” Lash mutters. Wraith is the last of the others to leave. She glances back like the nosy busybody she is underneath the crime lord veneer, but she seems to decide it’s not worth her time.

The door shuts on all three of them. Pocket stands frozen between him and Abrams, though their eyes are on Lash. “No,” they say after too long. “Whatever it is, I’m sure it doesn’t need to be a secret.”

Abrams looks like he’s got a bug up his ass, but that’s not unusual. “Fine. Are you sure about this? About him? You’re trusting Jacob Lash to keep you safe out there.” He says Lash’s name like it’s a curse word.

“I’m sure,” Pocket answers gratifyingly quickly this time, but they look irritated.

“Didn’t you bring them to me just for that a few weeks ago?” Lash asks. Abrams also threatened his reputation and his career and his life and his balls for good measure, but maybe Pocket doesn’t need to hear about Abrams’ excesses right now. If the detective keeps acting like he’s the only one with a level head here, Lash might reconsider.

“Yeah, I trusted you to fuck up a few goons if you needed to. This is different. We have to expect whoever’s out there to be at least as prepared as we are. We don’t need you showboating when you should be watching their back.”

“They hired me for a reason. The Lash is more than capable of making up the difference.”

“What?” Pocket says, frost creeping in around the word. “Let go of me,” they snap at Abrams, then wheel on Lash. “You think you have to make up the difference? You think I can’t carry my weight?

“Isn’t that what you’re paying me for?”

“I never asked for you to do everything. And I didn’t ask to be kept safe.” Their eyes cut toward Abrams with equal annoyance before they’re back on Lash, who feels strangely like a bug about to be pinned. “I need you because it’s not a one-person job. That’s strategy, not helplessness.”

“Come on, babe. You don’t even have a weapon.”

“Yes, I do.”

“You do?”

“You do?” Abrams echoes. 

“More than one,” Pocket says. “I’ve been preparing for this for months. I should be asking you two if you’re ready, if you need my help.” 

“Babe,” he starts, and even he doesn’t know where it’s going next. 

Pocket doesn’t let him figure it out. “You don’t think I can do it, do you? You think I’m going to hold you back.”

“Nobody said that,” Abrams cuts in. 

“But you thought it, didn’t you? Both of you did. You’ve been assuming you’ll have to carry dead weight, because I’m weak and incompetent and I don’t solve all my problems by punching them or drinking myself to death.”

Floundering, Lash grasps for one of the few things he’s good at: making Pocket laugh. “I kick things too.”

“You’re not funny,” Pocket says. He thinks about telling them that it’s not nice to lie to your boyfriend, but then their face screws up and their big eyes shine wetly, and a pit of despair opens inside him. “I thought you were the only person who didn’t underestimate me.”

Lash gets punched a lot. It’s part of the gig. Mostly he avoids taking them to the face, but it’s standard to leave the ring with some scrapes and bruises ⁠— always victorious, but rarely unscathed. 

When Pocket’s words settle in, combined with the naked betrayal on their face, it hits harder than any punch he’s taken. He’s gaping like a fish out of water. 

“Babe,” he croaks again, humiliated by the pleading note in it. 

“Don’t.” Pocket yanks the suitcase closer to them, then straightens their coat. “I’m going for a walk.”

Abrams clears his throat. “I understand you’re upset, but one of us should really come with you.”

Something snaps inside Lash. “They weren’t even talking to you.”

“Excuse me for giving a shit,” Abrams mutters. 

“You just can’t help yourself, can you? Keep your big blue nose out of—” Lash is cut off by the sound of the door clicking shut. By the time he yanks it open, Pocket has disappeared. 

Panic squeezes his throat so hard he can’t speak for a moment. But Abrams is right here ⁠— not coaxing them into leaving, not stealing them away, but in the same boat Lash is. And Pocket only said they were going for a walk. He has to believe it. 

Until the ritual is over, they need him, if not quite in the way he assumed. They won’t disappear just yet. Not for long. 

Abrams stalks the hallway, searching for clues as to where they went, but even he has to give up eventually. If their roles were reversed, Lash would probably make fun of him or something. Abrams simply broods in his general direction.

“What?” Lash asks after Abrams has stared too long for his liking. 

Abrams grunts, shakes his head. “Guess the honeymoon phase is over.”

“They’ll be back.” Rolling his eyes distracts briefly from how tight his chest feels. There’s a noncommittal noise from Abrams, which annoys Lash enough that he adds, “Again.”

“You’ve noticed I’m twice your size, right?”

Lash has, in fact, noticed this, maybe two or three or thirty times, but Abrams doesn’t need to know that. “Is that another threat, Detective? You’ve noticed I never lose a fight, right?”

Abrams takes a deep breath, then knocks his glasses askew when he rubs a hand over his face. “I’m not doing this.”

“You’re smarter than you look.”

Abrams’ jaw tightens, making him look surlier than usual. “I’m not having some schoolyard fight over them.”

“Good, ’cause you’d lose.”

“Don’t push it. If I punch you because you’re really, really annoying, that’s a different story.”

Honestly, it’s kind of a relief not to have to follow through. Abrams would probably hit him in the face. He’s pretty sure Pocket’s favorite part of him is farther south, but his striking mug has to make the top five. Besides, then he’d have to hit Abrams back, and Pocket would probably disapprove of that, and they’re already mad enough that they’re going to have to talk about things. “Whatever,” he mutters lamely.

“Still don’t know what they see in you,” Abrams says.

Lash ticks them off on his fingers. “One, the face. Two, the body⁠—”

“Three, the ego?”

“Three, the dick. Not that you’d know, but trust me. They can’t get enough. Four⁠—”

“So a real deep relationship.”

“Oh, it’s deep, alright.”

Abrams makes a disgusted face. “Do you know anything about them, you know, as a person?”

“I know enough. I know who they are. Their real name, all of it.”

There’s a pause while Abrams absorbs that. Then he says, “Yeah? They tell you their name before or after they found out about the bounty?”

Lash scoffs, but the memory bubbles up, unasked for: the way Pocket seemed poised to run, asking him whether learning their identity changed anything. What was it they said? It’s a lot of money. Enough to motivate a lot of people. Lash distracted them after that. Maybe all they were ever after was assurance Lash wasn’t going to turn them over to their father. Maybe they even thought he would.

He passed that test with flying colors. But still, he thought they were nervous about the effect it might have on their relationship, like someone who’s invested would. 

“So after,” Abrams says when Lash takes too long to answer. 

“Whatever,” he says again. “Not like they ever told you. You had to act like a creep and detect it.”

“Like a creep? Is that how they told it?” Lash doesn’t answer before he continues. “I was looking into a cold case, and they were a potential informant. I had to do some digging. Professionally.”

“Cold case,” Lash mutters. 

Slowly and as if it pains him, Abrams says, “That’s detective lingo for a case that hasn’t—”

“I know what it means. I’m not an idiot.” Abrams makes a skeptical sound that Lash graciously chooses to ignore. “So what, you were looking into the murder of Fairfax’s kid and found them less dead than expected?”

Abrams blinks in surprise, enough that he answers without any vitriol. “Yeah.”

“And then?”

“And then I buried it.”

Lash would like to say something impossibly cool in response to that, but his brain sort of putters in circles. By doing this, Abrams almost definitely saved Pocket’s life, or at least made it easier than it would have been otherwise. It might explain at least some of Pocket’s attachment, loath as he is to admit it. But more than that, it’s one more favor Abrams did for Lash, whether he meant to or not. By his mental checklist, that’s at least three. 

“Shit,” Lash mutters.

“What?” Abrams asks. He doesn’t even sound like a dick right now. He’s staring at Lash like he’s some creature at the circus.

Owing anyone for anything is something Lash goes out of his way to avoid. Unfortunately he didn’t have much say in this one. He grunts, irritated, and changes the subject. “I don’t know if they’re coming back,” he says, voice surprisingly steady. “Here, I mean. They might go home.”

“I could wait here, if you wanted to go on.” There’s no challenge in it like there could be. Not like Lash could stop him anyway.

“No, they’ll think that’s annoying. If they come here first and we’re all gone, they’ll know where to look next.”

“I need to know they’re alright,” Abrams says.

Lash scowls at the wall for a moment. If he doesn’t invite Abrams, the guy’s just going to brood around outside his apartment until Pocket shows up anyway. Lash can’t keep him away, but he can pick the method that lets him keep an eye on Abrams. “You can wait at my place,” he says, a picture of fucking civility.

He thinks Abrams is going to argue, but the big guy is digging around in his coat for something. Eventually he frees a small pad of paper and thrusts it at Lash. “Maybe leave a note though.”

With Abrams looking over his shoulder, Lash is too aware of his own clumsy grip, his blocky penmanship. Went home, he writes, then lets the pen linger so long it leaves a spill of ink on the page. It shouldn’t be this agonizing to sign off, but it feels like he should say something more. In the end, he chooses to end it only with his initials.

Abrams is like a dog at his heels for the whole walk home. A very, very big dog with heavy footsteps. It’s like he thinks if he doesn’t keep up, Lash will run on ahead and lock him out. It’s admittedly tempting, but he’s trying to set aside the pettiness for the moment. Just until they know Pocket’s fine. Because he owes Abrams a teeny, tiny bit.

The wait could be worse without whiskey. Abrams takes some without Lash having to use a single word. It’s more tolerable when they have an unspoken agreement not to speak.

Abrams is too big for the apartment, including Lash’s dining chairs. He turns away from the table and splays his long, long legs four miles out in front of him and sips from a cup that looks dainty in his huge hand. He soaks in the details around him, and he doesn’t even try to pretend he’s doing anything less than cataloguing the whole place. Detecting, or whatever.

When he’s finished the first cup, Abrams lets out a prolonged groan, rubbing at his face. “You would have done the same thing,” he says finally.

It takes a moment for Lash to catch on. He’d rather scowl out the tiny kitchen window than look at Abrams now. “Wrong. I wouldn’t have been stupid enough to bring them back to you.”

“You think that was an easy choice? Do you have any idea how much shit I’m dealing with?”

Lash risks a single sidelong glance, but he refuses to be curious. “Doesn’t matter. I wouldn’t have left them.”

Abrams snorts. “You’re mad I left them?”

“No.” Lash drains his glass and thinks about lancing a boil. “I’m mad you hurt them. I’m mad you could. I’m mad that you talked them into leaving, and I’m mad you slept with them. I’m mad that I’m mad, and that I have to be grateful you fucked up, and that I can’t even punch your stupid chiseled jaw to make us even because then they’d be sad.” Not that he’d ever go for the jaw literally. With a guy as big as Abrams, he’s better off taking him out at the knees. But that’s not as sexy a metaphor, nor would it bust up his devilishly handsome face enough. Knowing Lash’s luck, Abrams would probably look good with a few scrapes anyway.

“Yeah, well, you won in the end. Hope it feels good.”

“It does.” With the reminder of his victory, he’s feeling more magnanimous. Lash pours them both another drink.

They don’t have to wait much longer. It feels like forever, but it’s only another half hour or so before there’s a tentative knock at the door. Lash has been meaning to get them their own key, but they haven’t really needed it until tonight. 

He finds Pocket standing on the other side looking uncertain. They suck in a breath then very quickly say, “I can’t blame you for not knowing things I didn’t tell you, but don’t underestimate me again.”

“I don’t think you’re helpless. I just assumed you’d leave the skull cracking to me.” He pulls Pocket across the threshold just in case they get any funny ideas about disappearing again. Then he smiles until it makes Pocket’s stubborn mouth twitch. “I know you’re capable. If you can handle the Lash, you can handle a Patron no problem.”

Pocket snorts. “You’re an idiot,” they say fondly, he hopes. 

Behind him, Abrams clears his throat. Pocket stiffens. They don’t put any distance between themself and Lash, but it still feels like it. 

“What’s this?” they ask with a feigned ease that isn’t convincing anyone.

“Maybe it’s crazy,” Abrams says dryly, “but when you run off like that, we worry a little.”

“You don’t have to worry about me.” Pocket’s words are clipped, testy. 

“I’m not gonna apologize for caring what happens to you,” Abrams says, just as short. 

Lash’s pettiness and spite make him thrilled at their failure to get along, but for once he’s not rooting for Abrams’ downfall.

“I didn’t ask you to apologize,” Pocket starts, before Lash, for God knows what reason, steps in.

“There’s a lot of scary shit going on out there these days. That’s all,” Lash says.

“You two are on the same page now?” Pocket asks with a laugh. “I wasn’t gone that long.”

“Yeah, well, turns out we both prefer you not-dead. We might even have some things in common, even if I’m sexier and better at punching stuff and smarter and⁠—”

“And so modest,” Abrams says. 

“Modesty is for losers.”

“You’re insufferable.”

“This peace only lasts as long as I say it does, buddy,” Lash snaps. “You’re in my apartment.”

“And why is that, exactly?” Pocket asks.

“Did you want him to wait outside? That’s what he was gonna do,” Lash says, but it’s not convincing even to his ears.

“You’re not exactly a courteous host,” Pocket observes. They’re so rude sometimes, even when they’re right.

“You’re barely housebroken,” Abrams says.

Lash sputters, stares at the ceiling for a moment. This has gone off the rails, and he’s the only one who can get it back. Besides, there’s still that wormy feeling in his brain telling him he owes Abrams. “Fine, the detective came here for a drink while we waited for you, and now that you’re back, I’m about five minutes from letting you make it up to me by sucking my cock, and if you want him to stay and watch, he can.”

Pocket blinks at him like there’s nothing but air between their ears. Abrams makes a sound like he’s a telephone that’s been left off the hook too long.

“What?” Lash asks. He glances back at Abrams. “Is that a no? It doesn’t sound like a no.”

To his credit, Abrams recovers faster than Pocket, which makes sense; he’s a lot more experienced, because he’s fucking old. “What the hell, Lash? Is that why you really brought me here?”

“Yes. Obviously.”

“I’m not here for a pity fuck.”

Lash rolls his eyes. “It’s not pity. I owe you one, and they’re not gonna say no. Unless they do, then I guess we can work something else out, but they won’t.” He turns his attention back to Pocket, whose entire face has flooded red. “Will you, babe?”

Their mouth works awkwardly while they try to gather up their wits again. “I don’t⁠— I mean, no? Yes? I’m⁠— there were double negatives in there.”

“Do you want the detective to stay the night?” he asks.

Pocket can barely look at him, and they’re certainly not looking at Abrams, which is how Lash knows he was right about all of this⁠ — and how he knows it’s important. Their thoughts are all scattered and flighty now; it’s written all over their face. There’s one solution he knows of. 

He grabs their chin and forces them to make eye contact with him, watches their pupils dilate and their cheeks flush, feels their breaths come quicker across his hand. But their body starts to relax like they know he’s got them, because he does. “Do you? Yes or no?”

“Yes,” they answer, quiet and shaky.

“Say it louder. Say it to him.” Lash doesn’t want to look at their face when they do it, so he looks at Abrams instead, taking vicious delight in watching him squirm. 

“Yes,” they say again, louder this time. 

Abrams is too busy gaping to answer. 

Lash has to do everything around here. “What do you say, Detective?”

Oh, there’s anger simmering under there somewhere. Or maybe that’s just his face. But probably if their roles were reversed, Lash might feel bitter. Lash took this away from him and now he’s offering it up again, because as the winner, he can afford to be generous. It’s funnier, knowing it rubs everything in Abrams’ face and that he wants it anyway. He might feel bad about using Pocket this way, but the kid’s wild-eyed look says they don’t mind at all, even if they’d never have come up with it on their own. 

“Yeah, okay,” Abrams finally says. The hint of self-loathing only makes it sweeter. 

When Lash dares to look at Pocket again, their eyes are wider than he’s ever seen them. “Take off your clothes,” he says, which shakes them out of their stupor. Their hands are shaking when they begin. They never even got a chance to take the scarf off before Lash pulled the rug out from under them.

He can barely stand to let them shrug out of their coat before he’s yanking them forward into a kiss. They sink into it, body angled heavily into his, almost as reassuring as the solid feel of them under his hands, the heat of their flesh when he rucks up their shirt to grab them. 

There’s a distracting weight at his back though: Abrams’ stare. It’s palpable, heavy as his breathing. Lash extracts his tongue from Pocket’s mouth long enough to ask, “You just gonna stare or what?”

It’s all the detective needs to lurch into action. He has to set aside that book, shrug out of his big coat to reveal the wrinkled white shirt and suspenders beneath. They’re barely able to contain his huge shoulders, his huge chest. There’s not time to appreciate it before he’s grabbing Pocket by the collar, angling their face up, and kissing them like he wants to suck the air from their lungs.

Pocket sags against him, seemingly held up by Abrams’ mouth. Those huge hands are moving though, tugging at their clothing. The kiss has to break for their vest to come off. 

Lash takes advantage to pull them close again, tugging at the buttons of their shirt. Their mouth finds his easily, hungrily, even with their lips still wet with Abrams’ spit. Abrams plasters himself to their back, big hands dwarfing their waist as he bites at their neck. 

This is how they undress Pocket. It’s not quite a tug of war, but it’s too messy to be proper cooperation. Their efforts are still rewarded with a Pocket who looks dazed and overwhelmed. 

“Come on, baby,” Lash says. “Let’s show him how much you love the Lash’s cock, and maybe you can have both of ’em.”

He steers them toward the bed and down onto it with a swat on the ass, which hasn’t entirely healed from the last time he got too enthusiastic about it. 

Lash yanks his shirt off, but he doesn’t bother doing more than unbuttoning his pants before Pocket is climbing into the bed next to him, batting his hands away so they can do the rest. 

Their dark eyes catch his and their lips part, and they’re so unbearably pretty in that moment that his chest squeezes and he has to look away. Abrams still stands, now looking between their legs like he’s seen the pearly gates. As far as Lash is concerned, Pocket’s ass might as well be heaven, but he’s not sure he’s ever taken the time to admire it. He’s usually too busy wearing it out. 

“You just gonna stare, Detective?”

He waits until he knows Abrams’ hot eyes are on him, then Lash’s hand tangles in Pocket’s hair. He might have guided them here, but they rub their face along his cock all on their own. They drag their tongue down the underside then suck his balls into their mouth one at a time. 

They’re still there when they let out a moan, vibrations buzzing pleasantly all through him. A glance tells him Abrams has eased a slick finger in. He’s staring at Lash’s cock though, or at least at Pocket’s mouth on it. 

When their lips trace back up to the tip of his cock, Lash smirks right at Abrams. “You don’t have to baby them,” he says. Then he yanks them forward by the hair until he’s buried to the root down their fucking perfect throat. They stiffen once with surprise, but then they relax into it, letting him guide their mouth along his cock however he wants.

Abrams is still watching, so Lash says, “See? Told you.” To punctuate his point, he eases his cock all the way in and holds them there, listening to the sound of their breath coming faster in between their throat constricting around him. They don’t even try to move, utterly content to stay there keeping his dick warm all night if they have to. “They’re not gonna break. They like it.” He gives them a light smack on the cheek. “Don’t you, babe?”

Not like he’s given them much way to answer. They manage to moan something that sounds like a yes, and they stare right up at him, eyelashes damp and lips stretched pastel pink.

As much as he’d love to spend all night giving their gag reflex a workout, there’s Abrams to contend with. Whatever he does to their ass, they shudder all over, and Lash is sure the only thing keeping their attention on him is his fist in their hair, his cock wedged down their throat. 

When Abrams’ hand lands hard on their ass, the slap practically echoes off the walls. Their mouth leaves Lash’s cock with a wet pop. They keep staring though, face flushed and eyes huge and looking at Lash like they feel things he knows they don’t. That guileless, open expression would make it easy to pretend.

He doesn’t care to lie to himself today, but it does tempt him into a single moment of gentleness, fingertips tracing the line of Pocket’s cheekbone.

Then Abrams drags them away, pulls and turns until they’re up on their knees. They’ve never been delicate, but they look so small in Abrams’ huge arms, swaying like they’re drunk. He grabs them by the jaw, staring at their red, wet mess of a face. 

“You wanted me meaner, you should have said something,” he growls. Then he hooks a hand behind one of their knees and yanks until they’re straddling his wide lap, nearly unbalanced by the motion. 

Lash’s neglected cock is already throbbing between his thighs, but the sight of Abrams, naked and posed between Pocket’s long legs would have him hard in an instant. Abrams reclines back against the wall, and Lash fixates on Pocket’s long fingers splayed over one of those enormous pecs.

Abrams’ cock is enormous too, somehow bigger in person than Lash imagined in even his worst moments. And now he’s lining up the fat crown of it with one hand and steadying Pocket with the other. “Go on then,” he demands.

For a moment, Pocket hovers there, thighs tense and shaking. Then they sink, clumsy and infuriatingly slow, down, up again, testing. Lash never makes them do any of the work, so it’s fascinating to watch the way they work up to getting even the head of Abrams’ cock inside them. It stretches them wide right from the start, and the wordless sounds they make shoot all down Lash’s spine.

Eventually gravity helps things along. “God, fuck,” Pocket grits out when they finally sink down on the thickest part. They’re flushed and panting, starting to squirm, and they’re barely halfway down. One thigh muscle visibly spasms. The hand on their hip urges them upward, then back down, and their breath comes shaky and thin, but it does let them take another inch or two. 

When progress stalls, Lash sighs, grabbing the lube. He wraps a rough hand around Abrams’ cock, getting a grunt of appreciation. Pocket moans softly when Lash eases more slick around their tightly stretched rim, around Abrams’ cock where it meets their body. Everything feels hot to the touch, feverish.

“Come on, baby,” he says. “Relax. I want you good and open when it’s my turn.” The glide is smoother now, and when they’re finally seated on Abrams’ lap, they sag back against Lash for a moment. 

“Oh, you’re not done,” he tells them, both hands sliding to their hips. He pushes down, steady pressure until they sink that little bit farther, until Abrams moves beneath them, almost involuntarily, digging his cock upward. 

When Lash claws his fingers into their stomach, he can ⁠almost — holy shit. There it is, Abrams’ huge fucking cock hitting so deep inside them that he can feel it, almost see it. With a feral sound, he eases both hands under their ass, guiding them back up, back down. He’s doing all the work again, really, but Pocket picks up the rhythm and starts participating on their own after a few turns.

Abrams looks like he’s lost at first, but when he finally rejoins the action, it’s to seize Pocket’s waist again to speed them up, urging them on until he’s sliding them along his whole length like some kind of sex toy. It’s a far cry from the patient, tender care Pocket described from before. Abrams fucks them like they’re nothing more than a hole to bury his cock in, and they cry out, overwhelmed, blunt nails digging into his chest like it’s all they can do to stay upright.

Why hasn’t Lash ever made them do this? What they lack in rhythm they more than make up for in how fucking wrecked they look. Abrams is so deep that they’re shaking all over, eyelids fluttering, mouth open wide and all but sobbing.

When Abrams finally comes, it’s with a slam of his hips so hard he nearly unseats them. He pins their hips down as he empties those huge balls inside them, jerking and grinding up into them like he doesn’t want to waste a drop. Then he collapses back against the wall like his strings have been cut, panting hard and eyelids heavy.

Lash helps Pocket slide carefully off his cock, which slips free wet and easy, still impressive even when it’s soft. 

“Looks like you’re gonna be sore, baby,” Lash says. Some of his sympathy is even real. When he bends them forward over Abrams’ body, their hole is an angry red. They mumble something in response that almost sounds like words, but then they moan softly when he nudges his cock in. 

It slides in easier than it ever has, like a hot knife through butter. Everything is wet already, and scorching hot, and they curse and shudder on his cock, sagging their weight right on top of Abrams, who watches their face with an unreadable look on his own.

A wet mess is dripping down Lash’s balls before he’s done. Pocket has to be so sore by now, but they still whine for it, barely managing to wiggle their hips backward into him. He could be kinder after all they’ve been through, but they keep on moaning for him, “Please, Lash,” again and again, and sinking down farther until their mouth is right against Abrams’ skin, and that’s all he really needed out of this. 

When he comes it’s with a sense of triumph, knowing that Abrams watched him fuck every ounce of the detective’s come back out of them. The guy can’t even let Lash revel in the thrill of victory; while his head is still spinning, Abrams’ mouth suddenly crushes against his. Lash blames the recent orgasm for making him kiss back.

Chapter Text

“Ow,” Pocket groans first thing in the morning. Entirely fair, all things considered. The protective instinct rises, regardless of the why.

They don’t need him.

Lash is there already, curling himself around their back with his mouth on their shoulder, casual like this is the routine. He says something low that Abrams refuses to hear, but he can’t tune out Pocket’s quiet laugh or the light smack of Lash’s hand on their flank. 

“Ow,” they say again, but this time it’s playful, even turned on. 

Abrams doesn’t want to see this, but he can’t look away. Pocket’s sleepy smile isn’t for him, and neither is the lazy way they stretch under Lash’s hand. 

It’s a big hand, for a human of Lash’s height. Or maybe it only looks that way when it splays over Pocket’s slim waist, digs into their flat stomach, slips beneath the sheet draped precariously over their hips. 

Abrams drags his gaze away, but he doesn’t get far. He’s distracted by watching Pocket’s lashes flutter closed again — and by Lash’s eyes on him. Lash smirks, and the muscles in his arm move smoothly under the skin as he does something beneath that sheet. It doesn’t take much imagination to guess, because Lash looks perfectly composed while Pocket begins to squirm. Their head turns, gasping pink lips scraping along the rough edge of Lash’s jaw. He only looks more smug after that. 

Abrams’ heartbeat strains the thick vein in his neck, thudding in his chest, darting hot between his thighs. He’s not even sure he can get it up after last night, but his cock twitches anyway. 

All that’s before Lash starts talking. Of course he can’t get enough of his own voice. 

“Took two dicks last night, and you’re already hungry for more,” Lash says, never looking away from Abrams. Pocket arches, one hand clawing at his arm before it goes lax, slips down to join Lash’s hand beneath the sheet. “Wanna throw out a welcome mat and see how many you can take before you cry mercy?”

Something sick spikes through Abrams’ gut. It’s one thing to have to share Pocket with Lash, but other men? He’s grinding his teeth before he knows it. It doesn’t drown out the sound of Pocket’s shuddery moan. 

Lash’s motives for the offer he made last night are opaque, but Abrams doesn’t think he’d do that for real. Too selfish, maybe, or too insecure to see how he stacks up. 

It doesn’t stop him from talking about it. “How many before you’re begging us to stop?” Lash has this feverish look, but he hasn’t broken eye contact with Abrams. Pocket murmurs something indistinct, and the sheet finally loses its tenuous hold. It slips away to reveal both their hands working the length of Pocket’s cock, wet red crown popping in and out of view in Lash’s big fist. “But you’d keep going if I told you to, wouldn’t you?” 

“Yes,” Pocket says, but only after a couple of wordless, failed attempts. 

There’s vicious triumph glinting in Lash’s narrow eyes. The message to Abrams is clear enough: you’re not special. 

What an asshole. 

Not like he’s much nicer to Pocket. He smirks one last time at Abrams, then rubs his mouth along Pocket’s neck to their ear. “Then go entertain our guest.” He lets go then, and they make a noise that’s somehow indignant and needy and hot all at once. 

“You’re joking,” they say. 

“Nah, babe. Someone’s gotta make breakfast.” He wipes his hand off on their stomach, then he’s up. 

Abrams would like to say there’s nothing remotely impressive about the guy, that he can’t see whatever Pocket sees. He’d be lying. 

It would be so easy for Lash to be another top-heavy meathead, but even if Abrams had never noticed the painted on blue jeans, seeing Lash naked robs him of any hope he may have had for the egomaniac to suffer unfortunate proportions. His thighs and calves are as muscular and pleasantly thick as the rest of him, peppered with dark, curling hair, and his ass is no different. His half-hard cock isn’t the biggest Abrams has ever seen, but it’s big enough to make Lash insufferable. 

Pocket certainly has a type. 

“I didn’t mean it like that,” they say. They look guilty, but guilt and shame might be their default setting at this point, right after paranoia. 

It takes a moment to even realize what they’re referring to. “Oh, so you’re not offended at having to entertain me?”

“No.” Their eyes rake over his chest and arms, down his stomach and… well, that’s had their attention from the start. Funny, though, how big their eyes get, like they haven’t seen his cock — haven’t had it inside them — before. 

He doesn’t move, just lets them look. Maybe it’s stupid or petty, but he wants to see if they’ll come to him. “It’s alright,” he says. “You don’t have to do anything you don’t want to.” He knows it’s a little manipulative. It’s hard to care about that. 

Pocket’s mouth twitches, amused. “That’s not a problem.” They do come to him then, one hand sliding up his stomach to his chest. 

They’re bolder than they were before. Lash’s doing, most likely. 

His mark is all over them. Their neck is red from his stubble, and there’s a yellowing, mouth-sized bruise on their collar bone. Abrams knows from last night there’s another one on their flank about the size of Lash’s palm. 

That asshole got to almost everything first, and anything he didn’t do before, he got to do after Abrams hand fucking delivered Pocket back to him. That’s the worst of it; not that it’s going to take forever to wipe the memory of Lash off their skin, but that it’s all his fault. He should have taken them with him. Should have shelled out for a hotel or cashed in a favor somewhere for a place to stay. Trusted that Geist was too busy trying to save her own skin to betray them ⁠— or trusted that she’s too self-absorbed to see who’s under her nose, as it turns out.

They could have been happy. 

He’d never forgive himself if something happened to them though. They seem happy enough with Lash anyway. Abrams is too selfish to be satisfied with it, but that doesn’t make it untrue. 

It doesn’t make any sense, except in all the ways it does. Pocket needs someone who can take care of them without underestimating them, and somehow, as far as they’re concerned, all the disrespectful shit Lash does translates as I trust that you can handle it. Lash is horrible to everyone, but outside of bed he’s done nothing but dote on Pocket where Abrams has seen. He looked sick when they were missing. Even this was Lash’s idea, because he thought they’d want it, and he was right, because he’s been paying attention — though, in hindsight, maybe that one didn’t take a genius to put together.

Jacob Lash is ass over teakettle in love. If Pocket doesn’t know it, it’s only because they’re terminally incapable of looking away from their own problems long enough to notice.

He’s in the kitchen now, clattering around and even humming to himself, and he’s in love with Pocket. Abrams kisses them, and he hopes Lash sees; viciously, he hopes it hurts. 

He knows it’s ugly, and maybe it bleeds into the kiss. Pocket breaks it with eyes like some animal about to bolt, but they’ve been with Lash long enough to be accustomed to his way of doing things. When Abrams seizes them by the hair and goes in harder this time, they meet it, melt into it ⁠— surrender.

His hands slide along their smooth skin, feeling it pebble beneath his touch. If he’s honest with himself, he’s missed this at least as much as he’s missed them specifically ⁠— someone to hold, another body warm against his. That book’s been at his side too long. He was lonely before Pocket came along, and it’s only grown worse since.

It’s a weakness. It makes him susceptible to stupid shit, like accepting an arrangement where Jacob Lash makes the rules. 

He pinches one of their nipples to distract them both. Not too hard; he doesn’t really want to hurt them. But it’s enough that they gasp, and he follows the flow of air with his tongue. 

They arch against him, chasing the path of his palm down their back. He squeezes their ass and they shudder, lips trembling against his, but they don’t tell him to stop. 

He thinks about sliding his fingers back into the mess he and Lash both left, seeing if they’d be willing to go again. But as much as it tempts his cock to finally fill out, he doubts they’d be so eager to ride him again. He can imagine it though, imagine their body clenching around his fingers, then his cock. Not as tight as last night maybe, but just as willing, just as hot. He could break them open again and fuck in dangerously deep, watch their eyes roll back in their pretty head. He wouldn’t even hate for Lash to be there.

He keeps all that in his head. What he does instead is wrap his hand around their cock to find it wet already. He gives a slow, slick pull, and with his other hand tugs on their hair, until they’re shuddering against him and breathing hard into his mouth. 

For the second time in a matter of hours, they come all over his stomach, then they peel away from him. It’s not exactly the reunion he was hoping for, but what did he expect? Good things always slip through his fingers.

No time for self pity, though. 

“Breakfast is served!” Lash announces. “If you get your batter on my pancakes, I’m tossing you out the window.”

Pocket lets out a sound halfway between a groan and a self-conscious laugh. A laugh. Trying to wring the slightest chuckle out of them feels like pulling teeth sometimes, and here’s Lash getting a laugh with something that barely constitutes humor.

They leave him cold when they vacate the bed. Abrams does not want to watch them walk away. He does it anyway. They bypass the kitchen in favor of the bathroom, but not before Lash lands a light swat on their ass. They yelp, then laugh again.

Abrams sits up. It’s a good distraction from the sudden knot in his stomach. “You got another place I can clean up?”

“Sink’s right there.” Lash’s tone is nothing like the one he uses with Pocket, but it’s not peevish or overtly hostile, which might be a miracle on its own.

It’s hard to ignore the way his eyes linger and the way he tries to hide it. It’s also hard to ignore the body still mostly exposed ⁠— though he’s apparently put on underwear, if only to protect his favorite body part while cooking. Abrams huffs, thinking of dogs circling each other.

“Something funny, Bluey?”

“Yeah. Feeling real entertained.” Abrams gestures at the room broadly, unsure which part to focus on first. “What about this isn’t funny?”

Lash narrows his eyes like he thinks it’s a trick question. “Glad you’re enjoying the hospitality,” he says almost sullenly.

Abrams hides his next chuckle by turning to the sink. For the briefest moment, he understands Pocket’s affection. Lash is still infuriating, but tilted at this strange, intimate angle, it’s easy to think he’s funny, even ⁠— maybe especially ⁠— when he isn’t trying.

Then there’s the loyalty he’s shown Pocket and the willingness to help them, whatever his motive may be. Abrams dries off his hands and everything else, turning to face Lash, who sneers down at the towel in Abrams’ hands. Even pulling a face, that jawline is nothing to sneeze at.

Abrams really doesn’t need this, but he wants to know what Lash will do. He steps closer, and Lash looks surprised but stands his ground. He’s tall for a human, but he has to crane his neck to keep eye contact. It satisfies some primal bullshit in Abrams’ brain.

Abrams is good at his job. He knows how to read people. Those impressive tits rise and fall with the sudden change in Lash’s breathing. His jaw tightens, and the longer they stand close, the more pink suffuses Lash’s cheeks. Abrams lingers, not entirely sure what to do with the body of evidence collecting in front of him.

“I leave you alone for two minutes, and we’re back to this?” Pocket asks, exasperated.

Lash breaks into motion immediately. “Put that towel in the bathroom,” he all but mumbles.

By the time Abrams has done so, Lash and Pocket have taken their seats at the table. He thinks briefly about leaving, but that feels like letting Lash win whatever this next phase of the game is. So he pulls on his underwear and trousers, then settles in at the table with them.

The pancakes are perfectly fluffy. Pocket is smiling and Lash looks proud of himself, disgustingly fond every time he glances at them. He’s less doting with Abrams, but he’s civil, which isn’t so bad. Abrams wants to resent all these things, but the maple syrup on his tongue makes it hard.

When he leaves, they’ll still be here like this, together. Pocket will be laughing, and he’ll be alone again.

Having Pocket in his arms felt like a win for a few minutes there, but when he finally pulls the front door shut behind him, the only sense of victory that remains is the memory of Lash’s cheeks, flushed pink.

What the fuck has he done to himself?

Chapter Text

Abrams knows a few things about Jacob Lash. One, the obvious, he fights in the Bear Pit and makes a pretty decent chunk of change doing it. He’s obnoxiously good at the fighting part. Better than he has any right to be. The money clearly isn’t life-changing, but comfortable enough that when he pulls it out from wherever he’s stuffed it, he’ll have a nice little nest egg.

Two, he has a day job down at the docks, which may or may not grant him opportunities to participate in some occasional extracurricular smuggling. Three, he has almost no friends, or none that seem willing to admit it beyond bragging rights at the Bear Pit; for someone with so many fans, he’s sparse on genuine connections. Four, he’s arrogant, petty, and impulsive, and he’s not afraid to make enemies.

Abrams knew all of this before the whole situation with Pocket began. The only thing he’s learned since is that, five, Lash is in love. Abrams wonders if Lash even knows it himself.

Pocket probably doesn’t know. They’re harder to read, which is why Abrams only has half the story here.

None of it should matter. It’s not his business anymore, and a one-off threesome doesn’t magically change that. He’s still on the outside, burdened with this wretched tome and all the assholes who want their hands on it, and they’re together. Without him. Happy, or near enough.

Abrams is not in love. He likes Pocket, likely more than he should, but he also knows his own weaknesses. He’s lonely, has been for too long, and he’s got a soft spot for big brown eyes asking for his help. He’s surprised Pocket came on to him, but he’s not surprised he said yes.

Contrary to popular belief, Abrams leads with his head. Or, okay, maybe sometimes with his fists, but not his heart or his dick — even if the latter does sometimes takes control when his faculties are compromised and there’s a naked person in his long-empty bed, and then that part talks the heart into getting involved.

Just because it wasn’t love doesn’t mean there was nothing. He cares about Pocket, and that hasn’t changed. It’s easy to imagine they would get to love eventually, if he hadn’t gone about this all wrong. But now, no. Not really. He doesn’t think so, anyway. What he misses is the possibility of love, but that’s not quite the same.

Besides, it never would have worked out. Pocket wants their old life back, and there’s not a place for someone almost twice their age. No place for a worn out private eye when the life they’re reaching for is lived between a mansion and a boardroom.

He wonders if there’s a place for a pit fighter. Probably not.

He wonders if Lash knows. Probably so. Lash is an idiot, but he’s not that stupid.

Abrams saw it at the start, Lash’s soft, gooey feelings barely contained inside that crunchy asshole shell. They’ve only grown more obvious since. Still, Lash doesn’t strike him as particularly self-reflective; even if he is more astute than Abrams previously gave him credit for, it’s easy to clear a bar that’s floor level. The point is that whatever Abrams let Pocket do to his tired, lonely heart is chump change compared to what they’re going to do to Lash’s when they leave. You’d be a fool to think if stands a chance against when.

It’s not pity, what Abrams feels. What do you call it when you’re envious but know you dodged a bullet? Is it gratitude or something else?

The Ritual can’t come fast enough, as far as he’s concerned. He’ll be able to put all this behind him just like he’s hoping to do with the tome. Naturally, every day leading up to the Ritual drags on endlessly.

He gets antsy at Geist’s place. Feels like the high ceiling is closing in on him if he looks too long. She’s out again, and it makes his skin crawl to think what she might be up to. Makes his skin crawl to stay here without her too.

Against his better judgment, he lets his restless feet take the lead while his mind wanders. He’s not aware of where they’ve taken him until he hears the crowd.

The Bear Pit.

The whole place reeks of alcohol and humanity. The metal tang of blood is a faint base note beneath the sweat and oil, even if it’s soaked from floor to rafters at this point.

This close to the Ritual, it would be stupid for Lash to risk an injury. But he always wins, and he is stupid. His face is on all the posters for tonight. And if Lash is here, Pocket won’t be far. Abrams lights a cigarette and skirts the crowd, looking for the familiar mop of hair in the audience.

He finds them before the round begins, leaned against a wall and half in shadow, which he should have expected. Their paranoia feels contagious, rippling across his skin. All the ease they showed in Lash’s apartment is gone here in the crowd. They smoke with stiff movements of their arms, jerking their hand to their mouth and away again.

As if they feel him watching, their eyes flick toward him. Maybe he should take it as a compliment that their shoulders inch away from their ears at the sight of him. Whatever they had before can’t be what they have now or maybe ever, but it wasn’t built on nothing.

Pocket’s mouth twitches like it’s considering a smile. “Not sure I expected to see you again. Not so soon, anyway,” they say.

“Couldn’t stay at Jeanne’s without her there. That place gives me the creeps.”

“Jeanne,” Pocket repeats. He’s not sure if it’s a question.

“Yeah, we’re close now. Best friends.”

They do smirk then, head lolling against the wall to look at him more directly. “I bet.”

If he’s not imagining it, they give him a once over then seem to think better of it, turning away more quickly than they turned to look.

Abrams wants to say more, but the lights dim and the spotlight goes wild, and the sudden thunder of the crowd drowns out even his thoughts. Lash leaps into the ring to deafening screams — and plenty of boos. Even the audience knows he’s fun to hate. Not so easy anymore though, Abrams thinks with some chagrin. He wonders if some of the same magic Lash worked on Pocket has rubbed off on him. Just an ounce of it, maybe.

Once the first round starts, Pocket leans forward, a half-smile on their face as they zero in on Lash like they’re proud of him. This isn’t the dutiful appearance at a match one might expect; they want to be here, actively rooting for him.

Abrams follows their gaze to the ring, and maybe he gets it. Lash dances around his opponent obnoxiously, flashy and loud, but when he hits it’s fast, brutal, efficient. It’s a sleight of hand. Look over here at the imbecile so you don’t see the hit coming.

Strange to think Jacob Lash might be relying on someone to underestimate him. If Abrams were in the ring, he probably wouldn’t be so willing to buy the ruse. This is Lash’s calling, and he is great at it.

It’s annoying, how good he is at it. It’s annoying that he can be so unthreatened by his opponent and that it pans out in his favor anyway. It’s annoying that when he brags about his beautiful physique, he’s not wrong. Annoying that he’s handsome, annoying that he gets the one that got away from Abrams, annoying that his dick is as big as he says it is, annoying that he’s so goddamned cocky and so right to be.

Abrams grunts in irritation, trying to resist the roar of the crowd that pulses in his veins. When he tears his gaze away, he finds Pocket still rapt with attention. In the dimmed lights, it’s hard to say, but he thinks their cheeks are flushed, eyes feverish as they watch Lash’s every move, lips parted, breath coming fast.

Abrams doesn’t need more reminders of this. Pocket might not be in love with Lash, but they certainly want him. There’s no faking that kind of look, not when they aren’t even aware of their audience.

He remembers that first time, catching them in his bed, writhing around their own fingers. Remembers the way they looked up at him through their eyelashes and said please and offered him exactly what he felt so stupidly guilty for wanting. But he’ll never know if they looked at him like that when he wasn’t paying attention, if they want him as bad or in the same way, if they would want him the same way if he had made a different calculation.

He wishes they would. It doesn’t have to be love to make him jealous. That doesn’t feel like the whole story even to him, though. It’s the other part that nags worse, no matter how hard he tries to shove it down.

He stands with them, one hand dangerously close to theirs, like this is some delicate Victorian flirtation where the brush of their pinkies is considered scandalous. After the things they’ve done together, it’s almost funny. He doesn’t touch though. He can’t. So he leans against the wall and he watches the fight and he pretends he can’t feel their excitement.

Lash wins, of course. The other guy loses a tooth. He’s lucky to get out with his jaw intact. The crowd goes crazy for Lash, and Pocket glows with an easy, proprietary pleasure. Half this audience would fuck Lash right now, and word on the street is he hasn’t so much as looked at another person since Pocket came around. They’re proud of him, sure, but they also seem to like having something other people want.

They burst into motion when Lash exits the stage. “Are you coming?” they ask, eyes sweeping down Abrams’s body. They’re not so confident they can’t do it without blushing, but still, bolder than before. He wonders if there’s any way to tell that they’ve rubbed off on Lash too.

His feet have minds of their own again. Pocket beckons, Abrams follows. They keep to the back wall until it’s time to descend into the crowd. Down at the floor, they skirt around the ring, then make it to a door packed with people waiting to catch a glimpse or an autograph of their favorite fighters.

Pocket waves at the two meatheads flanking the door and they’re ushered through, familiar enough to the Bear Pit staff that nobody asks why Abrams gets to follow. Why did he come down here anyway? This is Lash’s territory, maybe even more than his apartment is, and Pocket’s right at home here.

Sweat and hairspray overwhelm the back hall, and glitter sticks to the floor. Pocket clings to one side of the hall, so Abrams follows suit. He’s grateful for the precaution when he’s almost barrelled over by a tiny woman dashing by with only half her costume in place.

It’s easy to piece together: the doors closest to the exit are dressing rooms. Farther back are a matched pair of locker rooms. When Pocket enters this one and locks the door behind them, it seems clear that the resident champion gets his own.

“It’s me,” Pocket calls before Abrams even catches sight of Lash.

“Did you see the whole thing?” Lash asks excitedly, rounding the corner. He’s shirtless, down to only a pair of shorts that can’t contain his muscular thighs, and he’s gleaming with sweat. Pocket doesn’t have time to answer him before he’s sweeping them into a kiss — one they seem to try and fail to pull away from, by virtue of whatever Lash’s hands are doing inside their coat.

Abrams clears his throat awkwardly once it’s clear Lash will keep going if he doesn’t. “We have company,” Pocket says, belated, unnecessary, and breathless.

“Don’t stop on my account,” Abrams mutters.

Lash smirks. Abrams has to remember he’s more perceptive sometimes than Abrams gives him credit for. “Aww, Detective. You missed me.”

Abrams would like to deny it, but loneliness let him fall into bed with them before and it probably will again, provided the opportunity. Still, he can’t let Lash think too much of it. “I found myself in the neighborhood.”

“You wanna watch the Lash get his post-match reward, that’s no skin off my nose.”

“Actually, that’s not—” Abrams stops himself. What is he doing here? He’s not begging Lash for permission to fuck Pocket again. God, he probably couldn’t. Not here, not where the best usable surface is a narrow bench. He’s more than aware that it takes a certain amount of work to get most people — human and Ixian alike, but especially human — ready for him. This sweaty environment isn’t exactly the place for it.

“Cat got your tongue?” Lash asks with a smirk.

“Stop antagonizing,” Pocket says. Lash’s mouth shuts immediately.

Lash studies him for another moment, looking increasingly pleased as Abrams’s cheeks grow hotter, before he turns to Pocket with a stage whisper. “Babe, I think he wants to watch you suck my dick.”

“Oh, is that what he wants?” Pocket asks.

“You’re not gonna break tradition just ’cause we’ve got an audience, right?” Lash’s hand tangles in their hair, which Abrams knows from experience that they like. The quiet sound they make is a sharp reminder that it wasn’t just him they were responding to before.

With an almost guilty glance at Abrams, Pocket nonetheless sinks to their knees, shrugging off the overcoat on the way down. They toss it aside, which is all they really have time to do before Lash is pulling them closer, rubbing their face against the tent in his shorts. They mouth at him through the fabric, a pretty flush staining their cheeks right away.

Abrams swallows, tongue dry and clinging to his palate, and he’s half aware that Lash is smirking again. Smug asshole. Heat swirls in Abrams’s belly and he can feel sweat prickle under his arms, but nobody’s invited him to do anything. He can only stand there while Pocket and Lash work together to ease Lash’s waistband down.

Pocket’s fingers tug those shorts and the jock strap beneath down Lash’s thighs, but their lips are already on him, starting with his balls before smearing spit all the way up the length of his cock. They bring one hand into the mix when they finally ease the crown into their mouth, lashes fluttering closed.

Breath rushes from Abrams’s lungs at the sight. He remembers seeing Pocket from above while they did this, thinking they seemed to like it then, but from this angle it’s somehow more. They suck Lash’s cock like they could do it for hours, like when he finally breaches their throat it’s as good as when they’re the one getting all the attention.

The hot flush crawls from Abrams’s face down to his gut, leaving pinpricks of sweat all down his body. He needs to get out of this thick coat.

Lash strokes a hand through Pocket’s hair, leisurely fucking their mouth, but his heavy eyes are on Abrams. “You should see how turned on he looks, babe,” Lash says. “Can’t take his eyes off your slutty mouth.” Pocket makes a sound around Lash’s dick that causes his fingers to spasm in their hair and his eyes squeeze shut for a moment. They fly back open right away, zeroing in on Abrams. Lash might sound a little breathless, but he’s perfectly in control of the situation when he says, “He’s so hard I can see it from here. Bet he wants to jerk off so bad right now.”

Lash isn’t wrong. Abrams’s dick strains almost painfully against the front of his trousers. He could walk over there and join and they wouldn’t protest, he thinks. Lash probably has lube in here if this is their alleged tradition. For a moment, the idea that he could slam Lash into one of these lockers and fuck him until that smug look disappears is so overwhelming that he has to focus on breathing to keep himself in check.

“You wanna take pity on him?” Lash asks. “Wanna let me watch you suck that fat blue dick?”

He tightens a hand in Pocket’s hair, yanks until their mouth dislodges with a pop. They look dazed, red in the face, fluid dripping from their lips and the tip of Lash’s cock. “Yes,” they say when the fog clears, and it feels like someone’s punched Abrams in the gut.

Lash glances at him, a challenge and an invitation, and says, “Take your coat off before you overheat, Detective.” In his mouth, the title sounds like an insult.

Humiliation burns in his gut as he complies. It means unlatching the handcuff holding the tome to himself, and it makes him feel strange to leave it sitting on a bench so near Pocket and even Lash, as dangerous as it is. But it hasn’t done anything merely by lying around, and it’s not going to start in the middle of an ill-advised threesome. He drops his coat right on top of it.

He shrugs out of his suspenders and steps closer, trying and failing not to look as eager as he is while he fumbles the button of his trousers. While he’s busy, Pocket also wriggles out of their top layers, leaving them shirtless on the floor with their knees spread, ignoring the obvious erection in favor of the two now in front of them.

Lash guides their head, but it’s Pocket who reaches for Abrams, Pocket whose mouth opens and wets the tip of his cock with their soft lips and eager tongue. “Shit,” he mumbles, eyes closing as they suck at the crown, content to let their hand do most of the work at the moment. It’s fair, he thinks; it’s not any less of a struggle to get his cock down this end as it is the other. But he knows they could if they worked up to it, because they have once before, and that knowledge burns in his spine and makes his tail and toes curl restlessly.

Their mouth eases off but their hand stays as they go back to Lash, who fucks their throat with ease. Pocket’s arm has to reach so far to get to Abrams that it’s ridiculous. His eyes catch on Lash’s face, so close now, at the pink bottom lip just visible under his stupid mustache, shining wet with his spit. He steps closer until their hips are brushing, for Pocket’s sake.

As if they’re trying to incentivize him, their mouth returns to him, slippery with more than just spit, and it’s insane how good it feels to know that Lash’s precome is easing the way for their mouth. It’s a filthy thought, one that steals the air from his lungs. They look just as content like this as they did getting their mouth fucked by Lash, even when Lash’s grip in their hair pulls them back then shoves them down so far on Abrams’s dick that their throat spasms around him.

They withdraw, back to Lash’s again, and he gets lost in it, in watching Pocket’s lips redden and swell as they fuck their mouth onto two different cocks, watching the way they make it farther along Abrams’s length with each attempt. Their chin shines with spit and their face flushes red, and they look like they’re exactly where they want to be forever.

It could be minutes, hours, seconds. He’s so distracted by Pocket that he doesn’t notice when Lash settles a hand on his hip, but he notices when it begins to move along the top curve of his ass. The tip of Pocket’s nose nearly brushes his pubes and their agile fingers tease his balls, and at the same time, Lash’s hand closes around the base of his tail, the rest of his fingers dipping down into the crack of Abrams’s ass. “Oh, fuck,” he says, feeling it from scalp to toes.

“I knew it,” Lash says smugly, still toying with his tail. Abrams doesn’t have any recourse except to yank the back of his neck and kiss him.

He doesn’t know what the boundaries are here, because they were never set, but he knows this one feels like crossing them. What they did agree to was sharing Pocket between them — Lash acting like he’s loaning them out, magnanimously sharing some possession, which should not be hot but which somehow so clearly is, if only because any one of them could reveal it for the lie it is at any moment. Lash is wrapped around Pocket’s little finger, not the other way around.

Still, Lash himself was never on offer. Maybe that’s why Abrams does it, why he sinks his teeth into Lash’s bottom lip, clenches his fingers around the nape of his neck, digs his thumb into the pressure point behind his ear. Whatever Lash thinks of this breach, he doesn’t stop Abrams, and in fact his fingers abandon Abrams’s tail to dip lower, rubbing down the crease of his ass until they’re brushing dry over his hole.

Between that and Pocket’s mouth, he’s about to shake apart where he stands. It’s a matter of willpower not to fall to his knees. He wants to do more, wants to grab Lash and shove him around, show him that Abrams isn’t a pushover, but when he’s trapped between the two of them like this, maybe he is.

The pressure that’s been building in his gut finally tightens, coalesces, then spills. Pocket makes a sound of surprise but swallows dutifully. He comes with Jacob Lash’s mouth under his, and he tries not to think too hard about it because at least his cock was somewhere less involved with Lash himself. Still, it feels… damning.

When he’s done he backs away, knees still rubbery, to watch Lash wrench Pocket’s head back by the hair and strip his cock. Still dumbfounded by his recent orgasm, he’s mesmerized by the way Lash’s come stripes Pocket’s face. Despite its recent workout, Abrams’s cock tries to twitch.

Lash drags them to their feet, gets a hand down their pants — the same hand that was in Abrams’s, which he tries not to think too hard about — and they’re coming almost as soon as he touches them. Then he laughs, wiping at their face with his comparatively cleaner hand. He smears a streak of his come off their cheek and sweeps it into their mouth. Their red lips close around his thumb like it’s reflex, and he says something quiet to them that Abrams can’t hear over the ringing in his ears.

Pocket leans their weight into him like their strings have been cut, forehead pressing into the enormous pecs that even Abrams can’t pretend aren’t impressive, and Lash’s face goes soft. Sweetness doesn’t suit his craggy features, the rugged jaw or the stark cheekbones or the caveman brow, Abrams thinks. Lash punctuates the thought when his mouth comes to rest on the top of their head, filthy fingers stroking through their hair.

He catches Abrams looking and the expression hardens again. It’s not outright hostility for once, but certainly whatever soft thing is at the core of him wasn’t meant to have a witness — not even Pocket, and certainly not Abrams.

“You’re a mess,” Lash says, squeezing a hand around Pocket’s hip. “Why don’t we say bye-bye to the detective then hit the shower so nobody out there knows how nasty you are?”

Pocket snorts into his chest, but they nod too.

Abrams is dismissed, just like that. He doesn’t know what he expected. Not like there’s a place to spend the night here in the locker room. And he’s absolutely not going to beg to stick around or head back to Lash’s place, so yeah, he’s done here. He’s not exactly getting any of that authority back.

“Yeah,” Abrams says, tugging his clothes back into place. His trousers aren’t as sticky as they could be, and he’s walking back in the dark with a coat. He’ll be fine. “Guess I’ll see you around,” he says as casually as he can. With no rules or expectations, he figures he doesn’t get to be disappointed either. He excuses himself before Pocket can do something ill advised like try to kiss him or say something sweet, and before Lash gets any further opportunities to reassert his control over the situation.

Abrams returns himself to his usual state, drags himself out onto the street, and lights a cigarette hoping it will wipe the taste of Lash’s tongue out of his mouth.