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Kaz Brekker knew he was a greedy man. Despite the slightly reproachful amusement of his non-Kerch friends, he’d never seen that as a reason for shame. While he didn’t worship Ghezen, he believed the two of them had an understanding. Namely this: the wealth others might call ill-gotten was only his due. He’d earned it with his cleverness, audacity, and years of scraping survival and profit from the Barrel in a way that those he’d taken it from had not. They might go through the motions and preach the ideals of the market, but commerce was just a pretty mask that they put over their own theft and extortion. Beneath all industry was raw greed and the desire to take. Kaz found nothing wrong with that.
But a new greed had taken root in him, and for once, he was hesitant to satisfy it. It had been barely a month since the night Wylan had shown him what it felt like to submit to a partner. The experience had been… Kaz wasn’t sure there were words that could express the catharsis of it, the euphoric release and vulnerability of giving up control and letting himself be cared for.
Ever since his first slow explorations with Inej, Kaz had been determined that sex would be set outside of his constant need to take. She, and later his other partners, deserved all that he could give . He’d found intense satisfaction in learning what they liked and doing it until they were breathless with ecstasy. He’d been triumphant at the pleasure he could take in things that he’d once thought himself too broken to enjoy.
It was bewildering that now, as a man who’d thought himself experienced, he’d discovered one more thing to want.
Kaz wanted to be selfish. He wanted to soak up the attention and tenderness he didn’t deserve and give nothing but his own surrender in return. He wanted to be hurt until he could let himself let go and then lie there and be tended to, taking and taking until he was high off of it.
When he realized this, he abandoned shame and accepted it as one more ugly truth about himself. It was far from the worst of them, and Kaz had no reason to hold back from asking for more. Besides, if there was one thing he knew for sure about Wylan, it was that if he didn’t want to do something, he wouldn’t be bullied into it. Wylan would say no if he’d found it too much of a thankless task the first time. He’d be gentle about it, but he would turn Kaz down.
So there was no harm in asking. Kaz just had to wait for the right time. He could be patient and feel out the proper moment. Make it sexy, at least, if not romantic.
Except that apparently he couldn’t, because his resolve only lasted until he was having tea with Wylan and Inej. The ruler Wylan had used on him that night was pushed to one side of the long table along with a lot of other bits and bobs from one of Jesper’s projects. Kaz’s eyes kept coming back to it, remembering the hot sting of the metal edge against his skin. His leg ached, and he remembered how Wylan had brought him a hot towel and kneaded the stiffness from it. He remembered floating. He remembered the desperate pleasure of being taken and the soft calm of pressing his face against Wylan’s chest while Wylan stroked his hair.
“I want to submit to you again,” he blurted out, making Wylan pause with his sandwich halfway to his mouth and Inej choke on a sip of tea. “Sorry, sorry, are you okay?” He turned to her, immediately embarrassed and remorseful, only to find her coughing and laughing at the same time.
“Can I finish my lunch first?” Wylan asked dryly, making Inej laugh even harder. Kaz groaned, resisting the urge to blurt out something incoherent and flee.
“I don’t mean today, not right now,” he managed, ears burning. “I have things to do! I just meant– fuck– I wasn’t going to ask right now.”
Inej, still giggling, wiped some tea off her chin. “Saints, Kaz. How did us talking about roof repairs lead you there?”
They had indeed been discussing the need to re-shingle part of the roof of the Crow Club and how much Pim’s brother might charge.
“I can think about more than one thing at a time,” he muttered.
“Do you two want to talk about this alone?” Inej asked, raising an eyebrow.
“No! Finish your lunch,” he told her, putting the rest of his own sandwich on her plate because she didn’t eat enough. She immediately returned it to his plate because he didn’t eat enough either. “Forget I said anything, now isn’t the time anyway.”
“We’ll talk later,” Wylan promised and gave Kaz a sly smile that sent a burst of heat down his spine.
“Yeah.” Kaz tore a piece of bread off of his sandwich and put it in his mouth to stop himself saying anything else stupid. “Later.”
-
It wasn’t that day, but two days later when they ended up talking about it. Wylan had stopped by Kaz’s office at the Crow Club– as if his place of work was a more appropriate place to discuss it than lunch at Wylan’s house. Kaz would never understand Geldstraat social norms well enough to know if Wylan was following them or ignoring them.
Then Wylan, seated on the other side of the desk as if they were making a business deal, laid down a new condition.
-
“I don’t want to hit you this time.”
The reaction was more or less what Wylan expected. Kaz’s face fell, sharp disappointment stark in the furrow of his brows and the set of lips. A second later he masked it with indifference. “What do you want, then?”
“Control,” Wylan replied, determination tight in his stomach. “I want you to surrender control and let me do what I want to you.”
“I do know what submission means,” Kaz retorted, and Wylan felt a little pang of affection at Kaz hiding his uncertainty behind sarcasm. There was no reason that should be endearing– except that Wylan knew it well enough to recognize both the defense and the vulnerability hiding beneath.
“And you know that it’s about what both people need,” Wylan countered. “Last time, you needed pain, and I was glad to give it to you. This time, I’m asking for what I need, and what I need is a scene where I don’t hurt you. There can be other scenes where I do, as many as you ask for and I’m able to give you,” he promised. “But not this time. If you don’t want to do it without pain, I need to be in the right… the right place for that in my own head.”
That hit home, and Kaz nodded. “I know I was– difficult,” he said, looking fixedly somewhere just above Wylan’s shoulder. “It might be harder without pain. If you’d rather wait until you’re ready to use force again, I understand.”
“I’d rather have you in my bed tomorrow night,” Wylan said. “Even if it turns out you can’t submit without pain. Even if we give up and I don’t know… jerk each other off or argue about foreign chemical production.” He reached out and touched the back of Kaz’s hand slowly enough to give him time to pull away, and was pleasantly surprised when instead, Kaz turned over his hand and twined their fingers together.
Kaz took a deep breath. “I’ll– I can try. Tell me what you want, besides control and not to hit me.”
“I want you still,” Wylan said. Not letting go of Kaz's hand, he rose and stepped around the desk to slide the fingers of his other hand to the nape of his neck. A muscle in Kaz's jaw twitched as Wylan teased the sensitive skin there, and he shivered. Ever so slightly, Kaz arched his neck into the touch. “Focused on nothing but you and me and how I’m making you feel. Would you let me put your hands above your head? Would you keep your eyes closed?”
“You want to tie me and blindfold me without the ties or blindfold,” Kaz said, easily working out what he meant.
“I’ll wrap something around your wrists to remind you to keep them there, but no knots. Keeping them there will be your choice.”
“And if I pull free or open my eyes, you stop.”
While that made sense as a game, it wasn’t what Wylan had in mind. “No.”
“No?” Uncertainty now.
“No,” Wylan repeated firmly. “I’ll check in, but I won’t stop unless you ask me to. You know if you need your hands unbound or your eyes open better than I do.” He watched Kaz’s face as he processed this.
“I wouldn’t panic,” he muttered defensively.
“I’m not saying you would. I’m saying that I want you to be able to free yourself without the help of me or your lockpicks.” He squeezed his fingers lightly around Kaz’s hand and let the steel of authority creep into his voice. “I’m not allowing you any distractions. No pain, no punishment, and no surreptitiously working yourself free to prove that you can. Just the chance for me to enjoy your body.” He noted Kaz’s faint, sheepish smile and bit back a smile of his own.
“You’ll take what you’re given and know you can stop me at any time,” Wylan continued, “and I’ll get to watch you go to pieces when you realize that you don’t want to stop.” He let the silence stretch out, let Kaz’s imagination sketch it out more fully than words could.
“I’ll try.” The words were quiet and throaty. He could see Kaz’s breathing had sped up and knew his heart was racing.
“Good.”
-
Kaz had never been so comfortably and ineffectively restrained in his life.
Kaz felt strange and backwards, lying with his head at the foot of the bed, feet toward the wall and open air behind him. Wylan had placed a chair with its back to the foot of the bed and its seat facing the door and guided Kaz’s hands to grip the rungs of the chair back. Kaz could feel the smooth pressure of rope as Wylan wrapped it around his wrists, then left it untied so that a single sharp jerk of his hands would free him. It would have been insulting, except– you know if you need your hands unbound or your eyes open better than I do.
Wylan wasn't doing it because he thought he knew what Kaz could handle. He was doing it to prove that he didn’t need restraints to take charge, and because he knew Kaz knew what he could handle himself, better than anyone else could. Somehow that made all the difference.
“This okay?” Wylan asked. He felt the mattress dip as Wylan settled beside him on the bed.
“Green.”
He’d never realized how freeing it was to use colors before he’d been the one to submit. There was no room in those three colors for double meanings or messy emotions. They were as simple as the numbers on a loan contract– I will let you have this much and no more. Nina would have laughed herself sick at the metaphor. But what was currency, if not another kind of power that could be borrowed?
Kaz had laid out his own terms with the same honesty he’d demand from a sub himself. He could handle closeness and the touch of bare skin tonight, but he didn’t want his back or leg massaged as part of the aftercare. After the last time… the heady relief from the constant muscle pain had been good. Too good. This time, if he gave up all control, he wanted it to be a conscious decision, not a slide into something he didn’t realize was happening.
“You look so good like this,” Wylan said quietly, trailing a reverent hand down his side, and Kaz couldn’t help the wave of fondness that swept through him. He’d never been ashamed of his looks, but he knew the limits of their appeal. Wylan didn’t like looking at him because he was a lovely sight– he liked it because Kaz was his lover, laid out before him in an act of trust.
He drew in a breath as Wylan’s hands traced the contours of his chest and ribs, imagining Wylan’s look of satisfaction. The clever, unassuming mercher had a complicated relationship with power. He took comfort in controlling the patterns of his life, but he craved the safety and praise that came with physical submission. He still wasn’t used to wielding power over others, but it thrilled him to the bone. He would always need both control and the relief of surrendering control, and he would always need tender reassurance after each.
And it was Wylan who'd been the one to give him the sort of scene Kaz hadn’t realized he needed. He’d never imagined how deep the double-edge of merciless determination and kindness would cut.
Now Wylan pushed Kaz's head to the side just firmly enough to send an extra jolt of arousal through him. He traced the faint scar at the corner of Kaz’s jaw with his tongue– the souvenir of a punch from a man wearing a ring years ago– then moved on to press slow kisses to his neck. He alternated between gentle brushes of his lips and something dirtier and hungrier, and Kaz felt the ache of desire spread low and hot in his stomach, making his breathing deepen and his cock twitch.
Wylan smelled like black tea and pine soap, and the soft linen of his shirt brushed Kaz’s skin as he found each sensitive place on Kaz’s neck and lingered there. He knew how his senses sharpened in the absence of sight– Kaz had made love with Inej in complete darkness and the memory of her gasps and her hair sliding over his naked body that night was still enough to shut down every thought in his head. But being told to keep his eyes closed, intentionally cutting off his vision to please his lover, was new. It was a different kind of intensity, fragile and heart-pounding.
Wylan had moved onto the other side of his neck now and he let himself arch into it slightly with a sigh, shifting his hands slightly on the chair rungs so the angle of his neck was more comfortable. He was careful not to so much as loosen the ropes. Pride, maybe. He’d consented to keeping his hands there, and he didn’t intend to back down for anything less than flood, earthquake, or plague.
Wylan’s teeth scraped over the tendon of his throat, sending a visceral surge of adrenaline through him. More blood rushed into his cock. “Green,” he breathed.
“Are we using green to mean ‘ do that some more’ now?” Wylan asked, sounding amused, and Kaz felt his ears heat slightly.
“I was consenting to being bitten,” he muttered.
Another gentle bite grazed his collarbone and Kaz shivered. “I was consenting,” he repeated.
“It’s all right to consent because you like something,” Wylan reminded him. “Do you like this?”
He let out a silent huff of laughter. “Yes.”
“Good.” Wylan brushed his lips against the center of Kaz’s chest. “Thank you for telling me.”
Kaz rolled his eyes behind closed eyelids but didn’t argue. It wasn’t as if he were too proud to admit he liked something. That would be ridiculous.
Besides, Wylan wouldn't push for more than he could give, even if it was something he knew Kaz would enjoy. He'd proven that last time. Wylan had never asked will you let me; he'd asked do you want me to. He'd made sure that everything he did was not just something Kaz would allow in his submissive state, but something that he wanted .
Thinking about it, it wasn't really surprising that Kaz found himself using "green" for "do that some more." When he’d been unable to speak, Wylan had used it to make sure that he did want more, every step of the way.
Wylan was using his lips and tongue to explore Kaz's chest, brushes of his mouth and flickers of his tongue that reminded Kaz of the way fabric merchants tested to see if a piece of silk was real. Tasting, feeling the texture with lips more sensitive than fingers.
There was another test to determine if silk was real– how it burned. Kaz knew he’d always been cheap, damaged goods masquerading as the real thing, but fire seared through his disguises. Wylan knew, and it hadn't stopped him from loving Kaz. Hadn’t stopped him from touching and kissing and fucking how precious he was into him until there wasn't even a shadow of a doubt how much he meant it. From protecting him after, the way you protected fragile things that you couldn't bear to break.
The best craftsmen could create something expensive from even ordinary materials, giving it worth in the expert work and shaping of their hands. Wylan had melted him down and shaped him, with his artist's hands, into something valuable. Something worth caring for, even if only for a night.
Kaz wanted him to do it again.
He swallowed hard. “I like it,” he said plainly. “I want you to do it some more.”
Wylan could have laughed and said no to assert his power over this scene. Instead, he slowly left a trail of bites from Kaz’s chest down his stomach, hot and lewd and playful, and Kaz moaned, abandoning himself to the scrape of Wylan’s teeth and the slow throb as his cock filled and rose. Wylan’s body brushed and pressed against his when he moved, letting Kaz feel where he was rather than trying to guess.
He stroked his hand down Kaz’s pelvis, deliberately brushing his fingers along the edge of his pubic hair but avoiding his cock. Skimming down to his balls.
Kaz’s breath grew ragged as Wylan traced whisper-light patterns, the sensation making him squirm. Wylan placed a firm hand on his thigh and held it down with a surprising strength and Kaz made himself keep still.
Wylan moved his fingers down and used the same gentle touch to tease Kaz’s perineum. Kaz’s cock swelled fully hard as the pressure slowly grew firmer, rubbing in a small circle and teasing the nerves beneath. A small sound escaped his mouth, then another. It felt a little like being fingered but without the same deep vulnerability. He angled his hips forward into it, pleasure coursing through him steady and sweet. Wylan experimented a little to see what worked best and discovered that even more pressure made Kaz curse aloud and his hips jump.
It was really, really good, and a part of him wanted to push back against being indulged this much. This wasn’t how it was supposed to go. Last time, he’d earned every second of his pleasure. This time, it was being lavished on him as if there were no power dynamic at all. As if Wylan wasn’t focused on the control he was exerting over Kaz, only on the chance to love him.
He wanted Wylan to get off on being in control. If Wylan had wanted just sex instead of a scene, Kaz would have said yes to that. But he’d agreed to a scene, and now instead of–
“Yellow,” Wylan said, stopping and pulling away from him, and Kaz’s breath caught despite himself, immediately longing for the stimulation to come back even though he’d stopped responding to it. “Kaz, you are so far inside your own head right now. Do you want to stop, or do you want to tell me what’s going on?”
He slowly released the breath in his lungs and shook his head, keeping his eyes shut. “This isn’t a scene, it’s just sex with my hands tied. There’s no domination, no– you’re not making me submit.”
“You don’t feel like I’m pushing you enough,” Wylan translated, then sighed softly, stroking Kaz’s face. “It doesn’t all have to be pushing. You’re allowed to just enjoy being touched the way you would outside of a scene.” He paused. “Is it because you can’t give pleasure back?”
Shit… Wylan was right. It was. When there was no dynamic, Kaz could give as good as he got. When they’d done this the first time, it had started off with Kaz pleasuring Wylan and being given the punishment he needed. He’d been able to take the pain and earn the sweetness that came after. But right now, all he could focus on was the fact that he wasn’t being made to submit.
“I’m doing exactly what I want right now,” he was told firmly. “Just because you like it doesn’t mean it’s all for you. I feel the same way you feel when you’re kissing my forehead and stretching me with your fingers and telling me how good I am.”
Kaz’s cock twitched at the memory. He loved how good Wylan was for him. He loved the high of having all that trust and need focused on his words and his touch. But he didn’t know how to give Wylan that same sweet, instinctive submission in return. He could do as he was told, endure pain, and enjoy being used for Wylan’s pleasure, but…
“I’m not good like you are,” he said bluntly. “I’m difficult, and instead of punishing me for it, you’re just giving me what I want.”
“I’m giving you what I want.” Wylan said firmly. “Your job is to take it . Just like you’d take my discipline and my cock, you’ll take my tenderness as well, whether you think you deserve it or not. I decide what you deserve, and that’s what you’re submitting to.”
Kaz swallowed. “I’m not sure how.”
“Stay still,” Wylan said simply, placing a hand over the vulnerable place where Kaz’s ribs met and pressing down lightly. A blow to the solar plexus would knock a man’s breath from his lungs and leave him weakened and gasping. Wylan’s touch felt like protection and domination at the same time. “Let me make you feel the way I want you to feel,” he was ordered. “Let me watch your pleasure. You’re mine tonight. You don’t get to decide that you’re not being punished enough. Deciding that is just another way of trying to take control.”
He was right, and Kaz knew it. And Wylan deserved better, even if, no– especially if Kaz couldn’t go into subspace this time. That wasn’t the point of a scene anyway; Wylan didn’t go into subspace either most of the time, and Jesper drifted in and out with delightful unpredictability.
He was trying to top from the bottom again, and just like last time, Wylan had caught him and shut it down. This was the same bullshit that had frustrated Jesper and turned Nina off so much that she’d ended the scene. Wylan was persistent– he’d keep trying to give Kaz what he needed. But even his patience wouldn’t last forever.
Kaz took a deep breath, then let it out. “Let’s try again,” he said, his voice scraping in his throat, and Wylan moved from between Kaz’s legs to beside him. He slid his hand over his jaw, tracled teasing fingertips up the sensitive shell of his ear, and then speared his fingers into Kaz’s hair. He just petted it for a while, gently nudging Kaz’s head to turn so that he could drag his fingers over more of his sensitive scalp. His hand was strong but soothing, drawing out the pure, tender sensuality of the touch.
Was this some sort of reward for being honest, or for trying again? Reassurance for a skittish submissive who was trying to do as they were told?
Kaz didn’t need pampering or reassuring. He just needed to accept that this was a fair deal. And despite not needing the reassurance, he was forced to admit to himself that with each pass of Wylan’s hand through his hair, the part of his mind that insisted otherwise grew quieter. All the muscles in Kaz’s neck and face were softening and turning pliant, and he had to hold back a moan of bliss when Wylan grazed his fingernails over his scalp. He bit his lip, let himself tilt his head into it just a little. Maybe more than a little.
“I love this,” Wylan said quietly. “Touching you like this. The moments when you trust me with your pleasure.” He brushed a kiss over Kaz’s temple that sent little shivers through him. Then a kiss on his mouth, long and deep and perfect, that left both of them a little breathless.
Kaz felt a pang of guilt, because that was exactly what he’d shied back from, trusting Wylan with his pleasure instead of questioning and pushing. But he would– he would try. He wanted to feel the way he had the last time, when he’d been able to surrender to the sweetness as Wylan dug his fingers into aching muscles and soothed abused skin. He wanted the intense, white-hot simplicity he’d experienced when Wylan had obliterated every wall he put up and then made love to him.
Now he’d turned his attention to Kaz’s ribs, tracing each one as if fascinated by the shape, touching each scar that marred the pale skin.
“You’ve fought so long you don’t know how to stop fighting,” Wylan mused. “You don’t know how to react when you feel safe.”
“Being safe means there’s time to think before you react,” Kaz pointed out. “You don’t have to just rely on your body and your reflexes.”
Wylan hummed thoughtfully. “What if you did, though? What if you let your body react without thinking right now? What would you do?”
Kaz shrugged as much as he could without loosening the ropes around his wrists, because after their exchange earlier, he’d have thought the answer was obvious. “Pleasure you back.”
His breath caught slightly as Wylan grazed the backs of his knuckles up and down Kaz’s side. “Like I said earlier, if it turns out you need pain to submit, this doesn’t have to stay a scene. We could just have some fun without a dynamic. We’re good together.”
Kaz swallowed. He and Wylan were very good together.
"I'm not giving up that easy," he said, because as much as the thought was tempting, the possibility of more still hovered just out of reach, the glint of gold and gems from a glass case.
Wylan brushed his mouth over Kaz's right nipple in a teasing kiss. "It’s all a challenge, isn’t it? Everything you touch, everything that touches you. Every one who touches you. You don’t know how to stop fighting, don’t know how to stop trying to win. Not unless someone takes you apart piece by piece first, and even that's a challenge to you.”
“You’re more than just challenges to me,” Kaz argued as Wylan traced a fingertip down the center of Kaz’s torso.
“But we are challenges. Locks for you to pick.” He circled Kaz's belly button lazily. “Tell me how to unlock Jesper.”
That was a question he was glad to consider, one that made a different kind of warmth curl through his chest. “Possessiveness. Silly, lewd puns. Light touches at the base of his spine. Praise.” He sighed softly as Wylan’s fingers skimmed over his hipbone. “Telling him he's beautiful and loved while you fuck him hard and fast like a slut.”
“Nina.”
“Honesty and affection. Incredibly crude dirty talk. Body worship. Kissing her eyelids when she shuts her eyes.” He arched into Wylan’s touch as he teased and caressed the crease of Kaz’s inner thigh. "Making her come on your fingers one last time in the afterglow while she's still breathless and sensitive."
Wylan firmly pushed Kaz’s thighs apart and he gasped, anticipation ripping up and down his spine, cock hardening even more.
“Inej.” He suddenly felt Wylan’s breath hot against the head of his cock and his hips jerked. Kaz squeezed his eyes shut as Wylan’s tongue touched the slit, licking away a drop of precum. He forced himself to concentrate.
“Inej. Ah, flirting with your body instead of with words.” He bit back a moan as Wylan moved away but refused to give up and open his eyes. “Making her laugh. Kissing her neck and shoulders and the insides of her thighs. Your mouth on her clit on lazy mornings to keep her in bed with you a while longer. Holding back and teasing her until she pins you down and fucks you senseless.”
No touch, now. His body tingled and ached, waiting for it.
“Me.”
“Long, sweet, messy kisses. Pressing a hard cock against you." Kaz swallowed hard, the next words catching in his throat even there was no reason for them to. "Fucking you up against a wall and holding onto you just a little too tightly when you're coming down from your orgasm. Saying yes and your name and demanding more."
Wylan's hand on his face, cradling it, a thumb sliding over Kaz's lower lip. "You."
"Me what?" He licked his lips, his tongue brushing against Wylan's finger, which came back to press into his mouth. He caught it gently in his teeth and laved it with his tongue. The distraction didn't work.
"Tell me how you unlock Kaz Brekker."
He let Wylan's finger slip from his mouth. "Four million kruge." Then he gasped as his head was yanked back by his hair, and a sharp, hot thrill lanced down his spine.
"Kaz," he said, voice quiet but firm, “give me a color."
“Green,” Kaz rasped, startled.
“Then answer the question.”
Kaz swallowed and nodded, as much as Wylan's grip would allow. It hurt, but it hurt good. "Teasing. Banter." Wylan let go of Kaz's hair and began tracing a vein up the inside of his forearm, making him shiver. "Roughness. Gentleness. Both at once. Telling me what you want so I can pretend I'm not going to give it to you. Letting me hold you like you're mine." He let out a shaky breath. Wylan's arousal was almost palpable in the air and Kaz realized that he wanted to continue. He wanted to make Wylan ache until he did whatever it was he already planned to do harder and faster and more desperately. "Sucking my cock, and touching yourself while you do it so I can feel your moans and the hitches in your breath.”
Wylan's hum of approval stirred more of a response in him than he wanted to admit to himself. He wanted this for the rush of giving up power and the comfort of being safe when he did, not– he didn't want to be good for anyone. That wasn't his thing. So why did Wylan's approval hit him so deeply?
He swallowed and kept going. “Saying my name when you come. When you hold me down, if you hold me down, doing it with your hand in mine."
Silence. Wylan’s hand trembled slightly as he cradled Kaz’s jaw.
"Wouldn't have answered if I'd known you'd just sit there and look at me all night when I did," he needled his lover when the quiet stretched on and grew uncomfortable. "Maybe I should have let you fuck it out of me. One word for each stroke." He resisted the urge to open his eyes so he could read Wylan's expression.
"Always more backtalk," Wylan said, sounding fondly tolerant, then he felt Wylan's weight shift and teeth on the inside of his upper arm, slowly biting down. Kaz's back arched.
"Nnn."
"You forgot biting," Wylan whispered against his skin.
"That's– ahh– included in roughness," he managed. "Biting, hair pulling, shoving me down. Not for the pain. For the–" He wasn't sure how to put it into words.
"The intensity," Wylan suggested, and he nodded.
"And leaving marks on my body. Proof how much you liked it," Kaz added, then realized with bewilderment how much he was talking, how much he was giving away. It was nothing Wylan didn't know for the most part, but saying it…
He'd been manipulated into talking about his feelings under the guise of sex talk. That little shit.
He could pull free of the pathetic excuse for bonds Wylan had put him in, turn the tables on him and fuck him into submission, make him cry and beg. But the rungs of the chair felt good in his hands, as steady and reassuring as the grip of his cane, and the thrill of trying to work out just what Wylan was planning…
He kept his eyes shut and his breathing steady.
“The bruises you left last time were there for almost a week,” he said quietly.
“You took a lot of punishment for me,” Wylan said, and it wasn’t praise, not exactly, but he felt a swell of pride nonetheless. He’d been strong enough to earn the comfort he’d been given. Wylan said he didn’t need to earn it, but he liked knowing he had.
Wylan ran his hand down Kaz’s side, tracing the memory of welts and bruises.
“Could have taken more,” Kaz muttered, letting the touch melt through his body.
“I could have beaten you bloody and you could have taken it,” Wylan agreed. “But that wouldn’t have been any fun. I prefer not to damage what’s mine.”
“Mmm,” Kaz agreed distractedly as Wylan stroked a hand down his hip to his thigh. His legs were still spread. Then Wylan placed both hands on his inner thighs and began tracing the sensitive crease of the thigh with his thumbs, up and down.
Unlike some of his other caresses, there was a focused intention to this, and Kaz's cock throbbed as slowly Wylan's thumbs circled inward until they were brushing over the sides of his balls and the base of his cock with every pass, teasing at his rim slightly, then moving back up along the crease of his thigh again.
The rhythm of it was almost soothing even as he burned for more. He could be patient, he would be patient, but he wanted to feel Wylan's fingers pressed against his perineum like before, or cradling his balls, or pressing slowly inside him. He wanted a hand or mouth on his cock.
“You like this, don’t you?” Wylan asked, and Kaz could hear the smile in his voice.
“Mm-hmm,” he said with a nod, then bit back a sharp moan.
“Your cock is distracting me. I want to suck on it,” Wylan muttered.
“Green,” Kaz said hopefully.
“But then you’d think I was doing it because you said it would unlock you,” he pointed out wickedly. “So I’d better not. That would be taking advantage of your honesty.”
You son of a bitch, Kaz thought, amused despite himself. His hands tightened on the chair rungs and he groaned when Wylan took away his touch.
“I love it when you’re good for me,” Wylan mused, stroking Kaz’s thigh so lightly that it tingled. “I’m going to take care of you tonight. You know that, don’t you? I’ll make sure you get the intensity you need, even without the pain.”
Wylan rose up onto his knees and ran his hands down Kaz’s arms, just enough pressure to make him feel held and remind him of his position. A brush of Wylan’s lips over his temple, then his cheekbone. Kaz felt as if he were lying on the surface of a frozen canal. The cracks were spreading through the ice beneath him.
“Tell me,” Kaz said, carefully keeping his breathing even. “Tell me what it is you’re going to do. I need to know what to expect if you want me to– to let go.”
“I’m going to give you a choice,” Wylan said. “I’m going to touch you. You can say nothing and come when you want, or you can tell me when you’re about to come and let me decide whether I’ll let you or just stop and make you wait a little longer for it.”
Kaz had edged himself a few times. The first time, it had been to test his self-control. The times after that, it had been because of how fucking hard it made him come. Every nerve in his body flared bright with anticipation. He wanted Wylan to do that to him. He wanted to feel that razor-sharp desperation. He wanted to know he had an easier option and earn his pleasure the hard, cruel way instead. “ Yes . Green, yes.”
“If you go into subspace, I’ll take care of you like last time,” Wylan told him. “If you don’t, I still get to tease you and watch you lose control.” He paused. “Like you always say, the best cons are the ones where no matter what the mark does, you win either way.”
Having his own words quoted back to him made him snort. “Running a con on me during a scene? I think I’ve taught you too well.”
“I’m hopelessly corrupted,” Wylan agreed. He dragged his thumb over Kaz’s lower lip but pulled it away when Kaz tried to suck it into his mouth.
“Mmm. And you used to be such a sweet boy.” Kaz drew in a slow breath as Wylan eased away, moving back down the bed to sit between his thighs. There was a quiet sound– the oil being opened, Kaz guessed a moment later when he heard the sound of slick skin rubbing together.
“I was never a sweet boy,” Wylan said, his now slippery fingertips raising prickling goosebumps on Kaz’s inner thigh. “I’d like to think I’m a good man, but I’m not a very nice one.”
Then his hand closed around Kaz’s cock and slid down to the base. Kaz’s hips jerked. Then Wylan began to stroke, no fancy tricks or teasing, not yet, just the simple friction of his palm and the strength of his grip.
Wylan went slow at first, but he sped up quickly. Kaz knew he wasn’t going to get to come this time, but his body didn’t, and it was ready to go. More ready than he’d expected– he wasn’t going to last long before he had to stop him. He shifted his hands on the chair rungs and braced his feet on the bed.
“Shit,” he breathed, then moaned shamelessly as Wylan added a swipe of his thumb to the upstroke. “Oh yeah.”
Wylan was bringing Kaz off like he might have done himself at the end of a long day, urging him quickly toward an orgasm that was going to hit good and hard and leave him drifting contentedly to sleep. His breathing was already growing shallow.
“Say ‘now’ when you get too close,” Wylan told him, and Kaz nodded, heat twisting in his stomach, knowing what was about to happen. His heart raced, he felt the tightening of his muscles, the pressure in his balls–
“Now,” he gasped, and Wylan released his grip and left him throbbing at the brink. He squeezed his eyes shut tighter as need coursed through him, resisting the urge to thrust into empty air. A broken groan escaped him as the tension lingered.
“Oh, this was a very good idea," Wylan murmured, and Kaz felt his hand squeeze his thigh firmly, approvingly. He didn’t reply, just gripped the chair rungs to anchor himself against the rioting demands of his body to take himself in hand and finish. He could feel the heat of Wylan’s attention on him. When his breathing evened out a little more, the mercher spoke again.
“Ready for more?”
He nodded, and a quiet sound escaped him when Wylan dragged his fingers over his stomach. The air felt cool against his flushed skin, and Wylan’s touch was pure teasing, lightening to a brush of fingertips and ghosting away when it neared his cock.
More lingering touches. His hips, the trail of hair down his abdomen, and then– his hips jerked– lightly spreading a drop of precum over the head of his cock in delicate spirals. His lips parted, heart pounding, wanting more, but he said nothing.
The touch was slow and gentle, but more than enough to keep him hard, especially knowing Wylan was watching his every expression and aching to fuck him the way he had last time. Kaz wondered if Wylan would do that after he edged him, pushing into him just before he came, maybe, and pounding into him as he clenched and shuddered through his climax.
Did he want that? He wasn't sure what he wanted. Wasn't even sure what he needed beyond that feeling again– having his walls crumble, being able to be vulnerable without being afraid. Deserving to be taken care of and letting someone do it.
Inej made him feel cared for, but Inej didn't do scenes. She was sometimes assertive, sometimes playful, sometimes gentle, but she always came to him as an equal. It soothed the broken edges of him and made him feel exultant and loved and whole. She gave him the joy and strength to keep going.
When he dominated Jesper or Wylan, he felt the same heady, hungry focus as he did when executing a successful scheme, sharpened by the arousal of using his hands and body to give them what they needed most. Their trust in him was an almost addictive high that lingered long after. And when they came together without a dynamic, as he did with Nina, it was pure fun, sharing pleasure and laughter and intimacy with his closest friends.
All were forms of love. But here, now, he didn't want to be put back together or take charge. He wanted to be destroyed, obliterated, and then gathered up in tender hands. He didn't want to be whole.
He didn't have to, if he could only let go. Wylan was playing with his foreskin now, pushing it up and down in almost-strokes, still paying that torturously gentle attention to the head of his cock. Kaz kept his hips from thrusting. Submit, he told himself. Stop thinking. Submit.
Then he felt Wylan's weight shift on the bed and his mouth was on Kaz's balls. He cried out, hips jerking without his permission, already closed eyes squeezing more tightly shut.
"Ghezen–" he gasped, and the delicious wet heat lifted for long enough to say a single word.
"Color?"
"Green, very green, ahh –" Wylan laved his tongue over them, sucked one, then the other into his mouth, and Kaz's breath became hitching and uneven. When he tightened his hand on Kaz's cock and began stroking for real, the surge of rising pleasure was almost like an orgasm itself.
"Wylan, oh fuck yes–"
"Not yet," he was told, and the hand slowed. Kaz was reminded suddenly of the rope around his wrists, not tied because it didn't need to be. Because Wylan knew his will was stronger than rope, knew that he could do this and that he wanted to.
"Not yet," he repeated. Wylan rewarded him with a firmer stroke that he arched into.
"Tell me how badly you want to come."
"Very. When you let me it'll be so good it hurts." A twist of Wylan's wrist ripped a grunt from his lungs. "You're not gonna let me."
"And you fucking love that, don't you? Are you sure you don't want me to take you over the edge this time? Let you come all over my hand like a desperate slut?"
It was a tease, it was almost a demand for him to beg or give up. Kaz wanted to say something snarky, but he couldn't focus enough to find any words but “You won’t let me.”
He was close now, sensation flaring to the breaking point. "Now, now–"
Wylan’s hand squeezed tight around the base and he couldn’t help the whine that escaped him as his hips bucked helplessly.
“Wy–”
“It's all right, Kaz,” he said quietly. “I’ve got you. I’ll give you what you need from this.” His hand loosened and drew away.
"I– know–" he gasped. "I know."
"You're mine."
Those words made him feel so many things all at once. He swallowed hard and nodded. His body was coming down slowly from the near climax, more slowly than last time. It felt like all the blood in his body had concentrated itself in his cock.
Wylan slid up his body to stroke Kaz's hair and trace around his lips with a fingertip. Kaz wondered if this was what Wylan’s musical instruments felt like under his hands as he drew note after shivering note from them.
His frantic heartbeat was slowing, but he still couldn't hold back a quiet groan. The desire to come raged in him even as he reveled in being denied.
“So hot.” A soft kiss on his forehead, then Wylan pressed the stiff length of his own cock against Kaz’s hip. “I am so hard right now,” he whispered. “Feel.” The tip was wet with precum, leaving a trail over his skin and making his own arousal rocket higher.
“Do you– want to come?” Kaz managed to ask, trying for impertinent and failing.
“The next time I take you to the edge, I’m going to come on your face. Color?”
Kaz tried to dispel the haze of need that clouded his brain long enough to consider the question. He liked the way Wylan’s voice had gone lower and hotter when he’d said it. And imagining how it might feel didn’t bother him. “Green.”
Wylan’s hand wrapped around him, and wonderfully, mercifully, terribly, he started pumping his cock again. Kaz’s head thrashed.
"Wy," he gritted out from between clenched teeth. "You– didn't wait very long. Getting close really fast."
"I said I'd give you intensity," Wylan said calmly. "If I gave you too long to calm down in between, it wouldn't be as intense, would it?"
Kaz heard a wild laugh escape his own throat. "Gonna kill me."
"If it doesn't take that long to get you back there, imagine how many times I could do it," Wylan said, his voice a promise, and even just those words hit like lightning.
"You–" Kaz gasped out brokenly, and he was close, close, close–
Wylan’s thumb rubbed hard over the sensitive spot on the underside of the head and Kaz’s entire body jerked.
"Oh fuck, fuck, now–" Wylan let go of him. Kaz felt his face contort, and his head thrash as he was hit hard by the crest of the wave but didn't go over. "Wy–Wy…"
"Beautiful. Ghezen, you're fantastic." Wylan's voice had grown rough, and Kaz could hear the sound of his hand moving over his own cock frantically. "Want to keep you like this forever. You want that, don't you? So good– so close– and you need– just a little bit– more, and you’re– waiting– ‘cause I told you to. "
Wylan wanted to keep him like this forever . An insane part of Kaz wanted to let him. It was an overwhelming, mind-shattering high. He could feel nothing, think of nothing, but this moment
He was covered in sweat. His balls ached like they were being squeezed. He was being consumed by a need so fierce he shook with it and Wylan was getting himself off watching his desperation. He could picture those blue eyes would be unfocusing, the way the tension would be gathering in the tendons of his throat, the red flush all over him as he bit back the cries–
He wasn't being touched, but the edge was still torturously close. It would only take a few strokes and Kaz would be coming uncontrollably. But Wylan's hand was working his own cock instead, moving to straddle Kaz's chest, one hand sinking into his hair to tilt his face up.
"I'm– close– open your mouth for me, love. Perfect– fuck, treasure–”
Wylan moaned long and rough, and he felt the hot come hit his face and lips. The sharp, deep spike of arousal that triggered surprised him. He hadn't known he'd be into this, but… Slowly, intentionally, he licked his lips, then swallowed.
Wylan's hand loosened in Kaz’s hair, letting his head sink back onto the pillow. A finger touched his cheek, gently gathering the rest of the fluid of his release and pushing it into his mouth. Kaz sucked it clean, savoring the bitter, salty tang and wrenching another ragged sound from Wylan's throat.
"So fucking hot, Kaz." A hand cradling his face gently and tenderly.
He didn't want to beg. He wouldn't beg. But he needed more. He was so hard. Throbbing, aching, desperate. And he knew Wylan wasn't done with him. If only, if only he'd touch him, something, anything.
Wylan reached up and carefully brushed a sweat-damp lock of hair back from Kaz’s temple. "I'd offer to let you come as a reward, but I don't think that's the reward you want," Wylan whispered. "You still want to earn it, and I'm going to let you. But it's not about that for me. For me, it's about knowing that I control your pleasure and at the end of this, I'm going to make you come so hard you cry. I’m going to spoil you with love, and you'll be so soft and shaking and vulnerable that you won't try to stop me."
Kaz felt the shape of the chair rungs in his hands, the agonizing throb of his cock, the reassuring pressure of Wylan’s weight resting on his torso. His heart raced and an almost dizzy feeling surged through him.
His senses seemed to heighten and blur together at the same time. For a long moment, he felt a part of himself resisting, pushing back. Wylan’s thumb brushed over his lower lip, and there was something possessive in the gesture– a claiming. A promise.
It wasn't as all consuming as before, but slowly, profoundly, the world grew softer and simpler. The everpresent tension between his shoulder blades began to ease.
"Color?" Wylan asked, and he realized distantly that he’d gone completely silent.
"Green," Kaz breathed, and felt the resonance of that surrender deep in his stomach.
Wylan made a soft sound and moved to lie beside him. Then he leaned over and kissed him passionately. Kaz felt the warmth of the blood coursing through his own veins, spreading through his body slow and sweet. There was still a lingering tightness in his muscles, an ache betraying how close he’d been brought to the edge. Even now, it wouldn’t take much to bring him off. He imagined Wylan’s perfect hands gripping him and pumping, or the soft heat of his mouth… that same heat he was parting his lips for now. Wylan’s tongue slid against his as he moaned very quietly, arching into the touch as gentle, sure fingers slid into his hair.
He was floating. He was flying. The rope around his hands was an anchor, and Wylan kissed him and held him and made him feel. Shatter me, he thought.
-
Wylan kissed Kaz deeply, heart still pounding from his orgasm. His head swam with victory at the words Kaz’s lips had just formed against his own in an almost inaudible whisper. Shatter me.
“So good,” he murmured against Kaz’s lips as he pulled away. “You’re so good for me, fortune.” Kaz’s hands were no longer gripping the rungs, he noticed. “Are your arms getting uncomfortable? Do you want me to untie your hands?”
Kaz shook his head, eyes still shut. The tension that was a constant presence in his features was gradually melting away, and his breathing was evening out.
“Are you in subspace, Kaz?” Ghezen, he was beautiful right now. Wylan wanted to look at him this way forever.
“Some. Feels good.”
“You’re incredible.” Wylan murmured. “I’m so proud of you. Remember the rope isn’t tied, all right? You’re still mine, even if you need to pull free or ask for a break. Still mine and still so good.”
“Yours,” Kaz repeated, his voice just a little unsteady.
“Will you still be able to tell me when you’re close?” Wylan could only imagine how surreal and intense being edged while in subspace would feel.
“I can say colors. And tell you when I’m close. Things are just… softer. Warmer. I still want…” he trailed off as if searching for words.
“You still want me to edge you?” he prompted.
“Yes.” The response was immediate. A glance at Kaz’s cock revealed that it was still fully hard, the twitching head flushed darker than he’d ever seen it before.
Wylan hadn’t realized he could get off on denying a partner to the point of cruelty. In Kaz’s place, Wylan or Jesper would have begged to come long before this point. He had leaned into the denial part in response to Kaz’s reactions, but he’d never expected it to continue for this long. The fact that Kaz not only could take this but had taken this and still wanted more …
This wasn’t just submission. This was definitely a kink that Kaz had never brought up until Wylan had suggested it.
“I’m not going to let you come,” he promised, and was rewarded with a whimper of arousal. “Do you want me to punish you if you come without permission?”
“I won’t,” Kaz murmured, stubborn even now, Ghezen help them both.
“Well, I won’t punish you unless you ask me to. Maybe I’ll tell you how desperate you were, remind you of how you couldn't keep from spilling all over yourself for me. Would you like that?”
Kaz swallowed back another whimper. “Yeah. But I won’t, not until you say.”
“Good.” Wylan stroked a hand down Kaz’s side, lingering on a scar so old and faded that it was only a slightly whiter line against his pale skin. Kaz shifted slightly as if wanting to press into the contact, so Wylan made it firmer and was rewarded with a sigh.
“Such rich profit from every touch– you are an indulgence that reaps unexpected rewards, Kaz Brekker.”
Kaz said nothing, but his face softened further. Wylan caressed his stomach with gentle fingers. Kaz twitched, but Wylan kept just enough pressure that it didn’t tickle and make him flinch away. Then further down his stomach, and Kaz’s cock released another drop of precum in anticipation. Wylan stroked through the hair at the base of it, eliciting a desperate little noise that he wanted to keep hearing forever.
“I’m going to suck on you,” he said quietly, “But if you try to fuck my mouth, I’ll stop immediately and I won’t do it again for the rest of the scene.”
Kaz nodded, and Wylan could actually hear the creak of the chair rungs under his hands as his grip tightened.
“Be good,” Wylan warned him, and then took the flushed head into his mouth. He held it there, curling his tongue around it but not moving, and Kaz threw his head back with a ragged groan. Wylan could feel his muscles tremble with restraint. He stayed like that, an occasional light suck or movement of his tongue, but taking Kaz no deeper. Kaz’s breathing grew fast and shallow, and a torturously slow swipe across the slit made his whole body jolt, but he didn’t thrust. Wylan pressed a hand to Kaz’s hip, giving him a point of contact, and tried a longer suck.
“Wy,” Kaz choked out. “Ah–”
Wylan lifted his mouth. “Are you close?” he asked.
“No, no, no, feels so good. You don’t have to stop. Pl– you can keep–”
Please, he’d almost said. Wylan rewarded him by wrapping his hand around the base of Kaz’s cock to keep it steady and tonguing the head.
“Nghh–”
Slow strokes of Wylan’s tongue, as if he were licking an ice treat. Enough to feel good, but not enough to send him over the edge. A firm hand wrapped around the base of him. The flush on Kaz’s face and throat deepened. His wiry muscles rippled between relaxation and shivering tension. Wylan tongued the slit and got another beautifully frantic cry.
Wylan risked a single stroke, and Kaz choked out, “Close,” but Wylan had already stilled his hand and softly pressed the flat of his tongue against the tip, touching but not licking. He watched Kaz’s head thrash once, then twice on the pillow before he let out a long, unsteady breath. Wylan licked up the length of him a few times, dragging piteous moans from him. Then he sucked hard on just the underside of the head until Kaz warned him again in what was almost a sob.
“Fuck, you’re good,” Wylan marveled, kissing it softly and carefully and making Kaz’s whole body shudder violently and his teeth sink into his lower lip. “Give me a color,” he checked.
“‘reen,” Kaz managed to pant, still biting his lip.
“Are you still in subspace at all?”
“Dunno.”
“Stop biting your lip like that, fortune. You’re going to hurt yourself,” Wylan admonished gently, and there was a moment’s pause before Kaz let his lip slide out from between his teeth. It was flushed dark, but not bleeding. “Good. That’s it, that’s good. Do you want me to put my fingers inside you, or not this time?”
“Shit, anything, green.”
Wylan pushed his legs further back and apart, not because he needed them to be but because he wanted Kaz spread and vulnerable. He’d had the presence of mind to leave the oil within reach, and he slicked his fingers, then pushed them in so slowly that Kaz tried to thrust his hips down for more. Wylan took them away immediately, then pressed his mouth to Kaz’s inner thigh, sucking on the skin until he’d left a mark. Then he began again, pressing slowly in. Kaz was soft and hot inside, and this time he didn’t try to push for more, just made a wordless, pleading sound.
“I’m in control, Kaz,” Wylan reminded him. “All you have to do is use your colors and tell me when you’re going to come so I can decide if you get to or not.” Then he sucked and bit a mark into his other thigh, fingers buried inside him unmoving as Kaz’s body clenched and unclenched around them. Fuck, he looked incredible right now, hands bound above his head, soaked in sweat, a vein on his cock visibly throbbing as another few drops of arousal ran down its length.
I can do this to him, Wylan thought. The most feared man in Ketterdam lets me do this to him– trusts me to.
He searched with his fingers, finding the sensitive bundle of nerves and rubbing it lightly. Kaz moaned long and hoarse and his back arched. Wylan didn’t press harder, but he also didn’t let up for a moment, and Kaz’s moans grew breathier and more desperate as he crooked his fingers and stroked over the spot again and again and again. He didn’t thrust, didn’t move his fingers in and out at all, just did that and lightly pressed against Kaz’s perineum with his thumb.
“Ghezen– Wy– ” he choked out.
“Beautiful. Do you think I can make you cry if I do this for long enough? Make you beg? Make you come?”
“N-never come without having my dick touched before,” Kaz gasped.
“Maybe that’s the only way you’ll get to come tonight,” he teased, and Kaz’s breath caught hard. “Maybe I’ll try to make you come untouched, and if you can’t I’ll leave you hard and desperate while I do this until you safeword.” He pressed harder and got a very satisfying moan.
He wouldn’t actually go that far, but it was fun to let Kaz imagine it. He circled his fingers, gentle again now but without pausing for a second, and watched Kaz’s breathing speed up and his muscles clench as the pleasure peaked further and further. Sweat beaded on scarred, flushed skin as he alternated between gasps and moans of pleasure and cursing through clenched teeth.
His balls were so tight and swollen that they looked painful. Wylan blew cool air over them, fingers still working, and Kaz let out a whimper that was nearly a sob.
“You’re being so fucking good for me, taking everything I give you and not coming even when you want to so badly,” Wylan praised. “I can’t wait to watch you come all over yourself. Can’t wait to lick the come off of you and take care of you after. Love on you until you’re drunk on soft touches and I’ve shown you just how well you did for me.”
He heard Kaz’s breath catch hard and felt his full-body shudder at the words. Still, even edged to the point of physical pain and while being fingered until he couldn’t think straight, that was what got to him– the promise of having earned the tenderness that he wanted so badly. If Wylan’s heart could break and melt at the same time, it would have.
“You’ll let me keep you safe like I did last time, won’t you, fortune? Let me have you all to myself?” he pressed, and Kaz made an indescribable broken sound. The look on Kaz’s face, when Wylan looked up, was something between ecstasy and fear.
“Do you want me to keep going like this?” he checked.
But before the final word of the question was out of his mouth, Kaz was repeating, “Green. Green. Green.”
“Green,” he echoed, reassuring him that he had heard, and continued the steady curls and circles of his fingers. Clear fluid was running down Kaz’s cock and pooling on his abdomen, and he was beginning to arch off the bed. Wylan didn’t relent or slow down.
“Ahh– Ngh– fuck– fuck– fuck – so close, so good–” Kaz’s words dissolved into something that was almost a shout, and his control snapped as suddenly he began thrusting onto Wylan’s fingers. “I can’t– I can’t– I need–”
“You can, fortune. You will.” Wylan sped up his strokes, pressing hard against his prostate now until Kaz’s entire body jerked and he let out a grunt each time.
“T-too much– still can’t–” Kaz sounded frantic, delirious.
“Color?”
“--Green–” Kaz growled the word through clenched teeth. Pride and arousal filled Wylan all the way down to his bones as Kaz’s body clenched tight and the tendons stood out in his neck and arms.
When the climax finally broke over him, it was glorious. Kaz’s mouth stretched open soundlessly, his back arched, and come streaked from his untouched cock to cover his stomach and chest. Watching his face raptly, Wylan didn’t stop, didn’t pause, and the pulses of come turned to dry, body-wrenching spasms that went on and on. Kaz’s eyes were open now, pupils blown black, and his hands had released his grip on the chair and were tangled in the rope. The little bundle of nerves was swollen now, and each stroke against it made Kaz jolt and whine.
He wondered if he could make Kaz come a second time before his cock softened. Pulling his fingers out elicited a breathless grunt, and when he thrust them back in, Kaz keened and bucked his hips hard . Again, then again and again, sharp, direct stimulation, and less than a minute later, the same clear liquid as before spurted from Kaz’s cock as his legs and head thrashed. Wylan pressed deep and rubbed, prolonging the brutal peak until Kaz was throbbing with dry spasms once more.
Ghezen and all his treasures. “Give me a color,” he urged. Kaz’s eyes stared unfocused and he made a quiet, guttural sound with each now-gentling pass of Wylan’s fingers. “Kaz. Give me a color?”
No response; he stopped immediately and pulled his fingers out. Kaz lay gasping for breath and Wylan watched the tension slowly drain from his muscles. He looked absolutely, thoroughly wrecked and the occasional aftershock still visibly shivered over him, transforming his expression to one of tormented ecstasy.
“You did so well for me.” Wylan kept his voice steady and warm, moving up Kaz’s body to gently unwrap the rope from his wrists and lower his hands to his sides. “I’m going to take care of you now. You don’t have to think, all right? Just ask for something if you need it. I’m going to clean you off now, okay?”
Kaz said nothing, but his eyes drifted to Wylan’s face, still fully dilated. Wylan smoothed a damp lock of hair from his forehead. “I’m going to get a wet cloth and clean up the mess you made of yourself, precious one.” He didn’t have to go far; he’d put a basin and towel near the bed on purpose. Kaz arched into the cool, damp sensation against his hot skin, then cried out when Wylan gently cleaned his softening cock. His hands gripped the sheet beneath him tightly and were slow to let go as Wylan wet another washcloth and used it to wash himself.
“So good, that’s it.” He carefully pulled the top sheet around Kaz, easing his shaking grip loose so he could tuck it under Kaz’s arms rather than trapping them beneath it. Then he lay down beside him, pulled the blanket over them both, and pulled Kaz gently against him. Kaz lifted his head to look hazily at Wylan.
“I love you,” Wylan told him, running a hand up and down Kaz’s back and feeling his breath gradually even out. “You were so good for me tonight. But I love you when you aren’t good. I love you when you lie and pretend you don’t need us and push us away. I love you when you make mistakes. I love you when you’re soft and sweet like this and I love you when you’re sharp-edged and guarded and cold. You don’t have to be good to deserve this. You’re something better than good– you’re Kaz and you love us and you’re ours.”
Kaz’s breath grew shallow and he trembled suddenly, pressing his face into Wylan’s neck.
“I’ll hide you if you need to hide,” he murmured as he felt hot, hitching gasps against his skin, “and hold you for as long as you need to be held.” He kept rubbing Kaz’s back, slow and steady. “I’ll give you whatever you need, not just because you earned it but because I want to give it . Because taking care of you is what I need right now too.”
He felt Kaz nod against him.
“In a few minutes, if I help you, can you drink some water for me, sweetheart? And eat a few bites of food?”
Another nod. Wylan kissed the side of Kaz’s head and felt the weight of him in his arms grow heavier as he slowly went limp against him. Wylan’s head was spinning with adrenaline, with protectiveness, with wonder.
Even after the last time, it was almost surreal. The fierce devotion with which Wylan cherished this ridiculous man– it made him ache. He’d felt this for their other partners, but this was somehow more fragile. From Kaz, this vulnerability was the most priceless of gifts.
When Wylan’s own thirst was too strong to resist, he gently untangled himself. With the trusting passivity of a man still in subspace, Kaz sat up and sipped water from the cup Wylan held for him. Wylan fed him a sweet, buttery biscuit by hand, kissing a single crumb off his lip afterwards. Kaz drank more at Wylan’s urging before they sank back down together to linger in the closeness.
It was a full hour before Kaz began to stir, tensing and shifting in Wylan’s embrace restlessly, and Wylan let go. But Kaz didn’t pull away; instead, he thrust both hands towards Wylan, his wrists together. Wylan blinked at them in confusion.
Kaz did it again, pushing them insistently against Wylan’s chest. Suddenly it came to him what Kaz wanted. Slowly he wrapped his own hands around Kaz’s wrists, holding them firmly together as if bound and pressing them to his heart. Kaz’s entire body relaxed and he let out a long, shaky breath. His clever thief’s hands lay still, caught in Wylan’s grip. The flush still hadn’t left his cheeks.
Wylan watched his lover fall asleep, cradling his bony wrists close.
He’d thought of himself as weak for so long, and now he was protecting one of the scariest people he knew– who trusted Wylan to keep him safe.
And somehow, Wylan knew that he could and he would.