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"Do you hear anything?"

"I hear everything, Sandburg."

"I mean, anything good."

"Don’t you think I’d tell you?"

"Well, I don’t know, I thought you might be keeping it to yourself. I mean, you haven’t been saying anything."

"Oh, what, I’m a terrible conversationalist now?"

"I didn’t say that—you’re just a little. silent."

"yeah, well, I’m concentrating."

"okay then,"

[If my feet weren’t wet,] Blair thought, [I would be having a pretty decent time.] They were inside a nightclub, they were having a beer in order to blend, and it was an entertaining nightclub, sleazy as hell, the kind of place he’d never go under normal circumstances. His feet had gotten wet earlier in the evening, when they’d been following the owner of the nightclub, who was using the nightclub to launder money from a drug smuggling operation. Or, actually, they’d gotten wet when Jim parked by a puddle, but the other reason sounded better.

Now they were sitting in a dark booth and Jim was trying to listen in on conversations and Blair was looking around curiously at the two story room, rimmed with a deep balcony. The lights swirled and flashed and was only able to see the expression on Jim’s face (concentrating, annoyed) when the dance floor lights took a particularly adventuresome twirl. The people in the booth next to them were making out; it was that sort of place. [I wish I’d brought a notebook] he thought, as he watched another couple disappear up the wide plush-carpeted stairs. He was fairly certain they hadn’t known each other an hour ago and now they were traipsing happily up to the balcony. [‘Urban mating habits’, or something,] he thought. And there went three people up the stairs together—a woman and two men. [Perhaps something about the liminal space of a nightclub advocating the flouting of normal social boundaries,] he amended. A woman showed up and asked him to dance. A man showed up and asked him to dance.

"no, thanks," he sighed. Jim might zone or something—catching conversations under the music was next to impossible, but they were at a dead end with this case. Jim had felt that he had to try. In truth, Blair was waiting for Jim to give up so they could go home and he could get some dry shoes.

"This is no fucking good," Jim finally said, disgusted. "and I know you want to say ‘I told you so,’ so just go ahead, Sandburg." Blair, who had opened his mouth to say exactly that, managed to change direction at the last minute and say,

"hey, whoah, no, you gave it your best shot, man."

"Yeah, and it didn’t work. And now we’re never gonna get this guy and I’m so fucking sick of his case, you have no idea."

"I’ve been working it too, you know."

"I know."

"I’m sick of it," Blair protested.

"I know, but, Sandburg, a lot of the time, you have this academic approach to these things—like, solving the problem is less important than the search. Or, it doesn’t matter how long it takes, because it’s all just this fascinating unfolding process."

"What? You’re nuts, Jim," but Jim was looking across the room, and Blair turned and saw that their guy was headed across the floor to the stairs, talking with some other guy.

"Fuck," Jim said. "I bet the office is upstairs."

"probably," Blair nodded.

"And there’s not enough cover to go up there without a good excuse. Besides, they’d probably recognize me."

"Oh, will you get over yourself," Blair said. "We can go up there."

"how?"

"People are going up there to hook up."

"hook up," Jim looked at him skeptically.

"Yes, you know," Blair said, making an indeterminate hand gesture.

"I’m calling the board of fucking health on this place first thing Monday," Jim said,

"Look, do you wanna hear what this guy is saying or not?" Jim's eyes flickered across him and Blair shrugged.

"let’s go, let’s go," Jim said, getting out of the booth and walking swiftly towards the steps with Blair hurrying behind him.

"hey. Hello? You’re supposed to be hooking up with me, here," Blair said, catching up to him at the bottom of the stairs.

"I know. What’s the problem," Jim said, barely slowing.

"So, you have to be, you know, a little more solicitous about the whole thing," Blair said, "Everyone else going up these stairs, you couldn’t see light between them."

"It’s dark in here."

"Stop being so fucking literal and at least hold my goddam hand," Blair said, grabbing Jim’s, who said,

"Okay, okay."

At the top of the stairs, Jim dropped his hand and they both looked around,

"I can’t see a thing," Blair whispered.

"Don’t these people know sex in public is illegal," Jim muttered to himself. There were couches arranged along the balcony, most of them, Blair saw, as his eyes got accustomed to the light, occupied. Jim started moving again, so Blair followed. They went around one of the corners of the balcony and Jim silently indicated a door, so Blair looked around for the nearest couch.

It was a rotten location, they were too near some other people, and a girl who was having her neck kissed glared at them. There was also more light here, coming out around the office door.

"Someone’s coming," Jim said, suddenly, and took Blair’s shoulders and shoved him down on the nearest couch, sprawling on top of him. A man came quickly along the hallway, opened the door and stepped inside.

"Jim, you’re killing my legs," Blair said. The music was quieter up here, but still loud enough that it covered conversation. Jim shifted and moved down and Blair said

"ow" and pushed at Jim’s shoulders, wriggling until he’d gotten both legs out from under Jim, breathing a sigh of relief.

"Better?" Jim said, his face near Blair’s.

"Better," he said. Jim moved uncomfortably..

"Can you move left a little?" he whispered, "I’m falling off the couch,

"Not without having my leg amputated," Blair said "you’re goddam heavy, you know?"

"yeah, well, I’m holding myself on the couch with my fingernails here," Jim said,

"oh for god’s sake," Blair said, a little loudly, and saw the girl turn and look at him, so he said, hastily, "uh. oh, god" and moaned.

"Nice save," Jim said.

"Shut up," Blair whispered.

"Here," Jim said, and pulled Blair’s legs more securely around him.

"Are you comfortable?" Blair asked.

"Yeah, I’m comfortable," Jim said against Blair’s neck.

"Well okay." They stayed still on the couch and Blair asked,

"Can you hear anything?"

"The usual. Oh baby. You know," Blair felt him shrug.

"great."

"I don’t know what your problem is," Jim said softly.

"My problem is that I’m on the bottom," Blair whispered back furiously.

"Not your usual position there, Chief?" Even whispered, Blair could hear the amusement in the tone.

"Not usually with a big lug. Or at least, not with a big lug who’s bitching about how uncomfortable he is."

"I was not bitching, you asked if I was okay, and I said no. Besides. It’s not like being on top’s a breeze, here. Don’t you think I’d rather be able to see something other than your neck?"

"I think," Blair said distractedly, realizing that he could see quite clearly in the dim light now, "that I have a very nice…neck, Jim, I think we better take off some clothes here,"

"What?"

"Everyone on this balcony is getting more or less naked, I mean, you have your fucking jacket on."

"oh, Jesus."

"Just, here." Blair said, pushing his jacket off his shoulders.

"What, I’m the one who has take his clothes off?" Jim asked,

"It’s your jacket Jim, it’s not a one man naked revue, you know," Blair said.

"I just think--"

"oh god," Blair said, loudly enough that it sounded like a sex noise instead of a frustrated shout and he wriggled around under Jim a little and dragged off all three of his shirts and dropped them on the ground.

"There. I’m topless. Happy now?"

"well."

"Are you gonna take something off?"

"I took off my jacket."

"You suck, Jim"

"Sandburg, someone’s coming,"

"oh" and then Blair saw the man coming along the balcony and he was close and Blair recognized him, even in the dim light, as someone that Jim had questioned just last week. He had gotten to the station in the middle of the interrogation and stood behind the one way glass with Rafe, who had said,

"That’s one dangerous motherfucker," and Jim hadn’t been able to get anything out of him but threats of litigation, and he was close, really close and this was the kind of place, Blair realized, where they’d probably beat the crap out of you or kill you or something and Jim had left his gun in the glove compartment because there were metal detectors at the doors. He clutched Jim’s head in his hands unable to say anything, wanting to say, don’t look up or he’ll recognize you and the guy pulled open the door but before Blair could even be relieved, he came back out and sat down in the chair next to the door and Blair thought [fuck.] They were trapped here because there was no way they could get up without Jim being recognized.

Blair breathed out hard and tightened his grip on Jim’s head. At least the guy wasn’t looking at them; he was looking far more interested in the couple next to them, who were squirming slowly against each other.

"are you gonna let me up," Jim whispered, face crushed against his sternum.

"sh." Blair whispered. "Just, stay down there."

"what?"

"unless you wanna come up here and suck face, or go lower, you’re stuck with my chest."

"great." Jim said.

"um, Jim, you have to move." Blair said, and Jim didn’t, so Blair took his head in his hands and whispered,

"just you know, do whatever, I don’t care," and pulled Jim‘s head up. It was instinct, he thought later, nothing more. What you usually do with someone’s head on your chest is pull them to your nipple. So he did and then Jim’s lips were against his nipple and utterly motionless and Blair said,

"okay, okay" and his foot was going to sleep, hooked over Jim’s leg like that and he shifted again to try to make it stop and the pins and needles, a sudden draft of cold air, something, and his nipple was hard as a rock against Jim’s lips and he shivered and his hands were still buried in Jim’s hair and he couldn’t help moving, blushing, hot and cold and feverish and thinking [Jim can feel this whole thing] suddenly really turned him on, and [well, I’m not made of stone] he thought [put lips to nipple and that’s pretty much what happens.]

Then the guy sitting in the chair got up and went back inside, and Blair breathed a sigh of relief, thinking that they could move, get out of here before things got any worse, and Jim looked up and said,

"what are you doing?"

"nothing, that was the guy, uh, Prelutsky, from last week" he said, shifting restlessly,

"hold still," Jim said, and he was clearly listening to something, so Blair lay back and tried to relax. He realized that his hands were still in Jim’s hair and pulled them out, but then he couldn’t find anything to do with them, finally ending up settling them on Jim’s shoulders. Jim shifted a little, still intent, and suddenly Blair became very aware of the breathless gasps of the girl on the couch near them,

"oh," she kept saying, "oh. oh." and it was strange, it was like porn radio or something and his thighs were sore from the unusual arrangement of being wrapped around Jim’s torso and he ought to have been cold with his shirt off, but he was hot. But, hey, it was a club, it was hot inside. They were on the balcony; heat rises, he told himself. Heat rises.

Finally Jim reared up and looked at him, blinked at Blair as if he didn’t recognize him, and then said,

"let’s go," He pushed himself up and Blair rolled up and scooped his shirts off the floor. He was still pulling them on, following Jim down the stairs, who was shrugging on his jacket as they walked. They were driving out of the parking lot before anyone said anything.

"so. did you get anything?"

"I dunno," Jim grimaced. "sort of. Not really."

"What does that mean?"

"Just, circumstantial stuff. They were talking about shipments and things, but it could be anything."

"you think it’s not."

"It’s not. Can’t prove it, though."

"we’ll get ‘em, Jim," Blair said.

"Who died and made you the head cheerleader," Jim muttered.

"Well, geez, pardon me for positive thinking."

"huh. Wishful thinking more like."

"Oh, well, I’m sorry to interfere with this dour pessimism thing you have here."

"It’s not pessimism, it’s realism."

"oh, realism. Well in that case." By the time Jim was parking outside the loft, their customary sniping had put Jim in a better mood, although he couldn’t ignore the fact that Blair’s usual quick banter was a little off tonight. Jim kept getting the last word.

When they went inside, Jim headed for the elevator, because he thought it might be easier to say what he knew he had to someplace where it wouldn’t be odd if Blair weren’t facing him. Or perhaps he just wanted to keep Blair from disappearing into his room and shutting the door. Still, he waited until the doors were entirely closed and the first floor had clicked past before he said,

"um. tonight."

"oh boy," Blair said.

"you were, uh. I felt you," Jim continued, wincing to himself, thinking he should have thought this through a little more

"Oh boy," Blair repeated. "Um. Jim. I just. look. it was. okay. This is embarrassing," he announced as the doors slid open. He walked swiftly along the hall and had the door open before Jim managed to catch up and said,

"What, that it sorta looked like you wanted to jump my bones in public?" He thought [perhaps I ought to be angry about this.] But he didn’t feel angry, so he just waited while Blair scrubbed at his chin and said,

"I didn’t particularly. I mean, that’s not what got me going."

"It isn’t," Jim said, skeptically.

"No. It’s just," and Blair finally turned to look at him, eyes bright. "Jim, you know how you’re the paradigm of alpha male sexual prowess?"

"what? No, Sandburg, actually," and Blair sighed, looking at Jim as if he were some student who had failed to do the required reading for that week.

"Look in a fucking mirror Jim." And when Jim continued to stare at him blankly, said "It’s, you’re this muscle-y guy with, you know, the piercing gaze and. Okay. I’m going about this badly," He exhaled loudly and then tried again. "Jim. did you know that Martha in records has a recurring fantasy where you toss her over the counter and take her with, just, uh, animal lust? Her words, not mine. Her words," he cautioned as Jim looked at him incredulously, finally saying,

"And you know this because."

"Because, I was, sort of. Listening in. one day."

"Listening in," Jim repeated. "Why were you—Sandburg. Sandburg Tell me this isn’t going in your dissertation."

"It’s. Oh. Jim, look. come on. It’s like a classic case of, you know, someone picking up on a certain. Primal. Quality. Which you so exude," he grinned persuasively at Jim, whose ears had achieved an interesting shade of red.

"It’s a classic example of me being unable to look anyone in the eye ever again. I think you’re making this shit up just to torture me," he said, suspiciously, "I mean, Martha? I mean. She works on Wednesdays and Fridays, right?"

"Right."

"okay, then," Jim said, wondering if he could get away with ending the conversation right then.

"Oh, you’re not going to avoid her now are you?" Blair asked.

"of course I’m going to avoid her. It’s embarrassing. I don’t like people. fantasizing. Like that. it’s too weird."

"Fine. Leech her life of any small pleasure. Go ahead."

"Sandburg, shut up. Why are we talking about this?"

"I’m getting there. All that was by way of explaining, that next to you. uh. well. let’s just say, it’s not a certain primal quality I exude."

"Oh."

"To Martha at any rate. I mean her recurring fantasy about me—"

"Sandburg! No, don’t, I don’t—" but there was no stopping Blair,

"I mean, not to say it wasn’t kinky, or anything," he mused, ignoring Jim’s pained shout of,

"Sandburg"

"It was. I was just, sort of, on the bottom."

"I’m not really interested in this," Jim said, after an embarrassed pause.

"uh. right. It’s just, I have this all worked out. Which is that psychologically, as a less alpha sort of guy, you know, I crave the sexual recognition of my peers. Especially the alpha male. Which you definitely are. so. that’s sort of what tripped my trigger," and then he grinned and said, slyly, "Plus, you know. you were all over me."

"I was not."

"Hey. whose lips were one whose nipple?"

"You put me there."

"Didn’t see you moving."

"Oh you want me to move now," Jim smirked.

"you’re a blast in the sack, aren’t you Jim?"

"You’re a picky bastard in the sack, aren’t you Sandburg?" Jim said, mimicking his tone.

"Hey. I give good value for money."

"So I’ve heard. So I’ve heard," Jim said. And then, considering the matter officially closed, asked, "are you hungry?"

Simon was less than pleased with their progress.

"Let’s get this straight," he said. "You heard something. But nothing useful. And then you left before they said anything useful."

"We didn’t want to get caught," Blair tried.

"Were you in eminent danger of being caught?"

"Not really," Blair admitted.

"Well. Get back there and get something useful."

"I don’t think," Jim said, quickly.

"Jim. It’s the only lead. I’m sure I don’t need to remind you that we’ve been unable to get anything on the phone taps, which means they’re talking face to face, and it sounds like they’re doing it wherever you were. Where were you, again?"

"Outside an office," Jim scowled.

"Right. So you can go back."

"With all due respect, Simon, don’t you think it’s a crapshoot for us to just go there? Can’t we wire it?"

"You were there—you think that’s possible without someone noticing?"

"No," Jim admitted.

"Then you’re the best we’ve got. I’d say you’re pretty much stuck following him around until he does talk."

"I really don’t think—" Jim tried again.

"Duly noted. I believe you have a stakeout to get to?" Simon said, waving them out the door.

"I don’t believe this," Jim said.

They were on day three of the stakeout and Blair was yawning tiredly in the seat next to him. Jim had been getting a bare minimum of sleep, getting spelled occasionally by other teams, but they were the only ones still officially working on the case. His head hurt from listening so much and when he’d gone to get Blair at the University the other day, he’d found him asleep in his office chair, head flat on his desk.

"You don’t have to go, you know," he’d said.

"no no, I’ll go," Blair had said, getting up quickly. "You need someone to wake you up when you fall asleep anyway."

"I don’t believe this," Jim said again, because Blair had said nothing the first time. "We may as well go home. I mean, it’s obvious that this guy is gonna do nothing but dick his mistresses and play Lotto. Why is he playing Lotto," he demanded, "he has plenty of money, he doesn’t need to play Lotto."

When Blair failed to come out with some wacky theory on security and gambling and habit or something, he turned to look and found that Blair had fallen asleep again. He was snoring faintly. He looked comfortable. Jim sighed.

He kept thinking about it, he admitted to himself. Too little sleep gave memories a startlingly real quality, like dreams where you couldn’t quite remember if they’d actually happened. Last weekend seemed sharply tactile, the whirl of lights, the low whoop of the bass, and the way Blair’s body, heavy and hot, had twisted in his hands. He’d often thought that one of the best things about sex, another person’s involuntary writhe, mouth half open. It had been a while since he’d felt it.

It was interesting too, he thought, how Blair’s nipples had hardened like that. Until he’d unrepressed all his Sentinel stuff, he reflected, filing this train of thought away in his ‘never tell Blair or it will go directly into the dissertation’ file, his nipples had been your standard guy nipples. What he thought of as your standard guy nipples. Nothin’ much. Something to encourage someone to move lower than. Of course, now it was a different story. Lila had nearly taken the top of his head of when she’d bitten one, gently, while they were making love. And he liked to touch them, felt himself blushing for thinking about this, but oh what the hell, it felt good now, it was like a little goldmine. Like there was a little something to make up for all the crap, the headaches, the way he sometimes saw people’s awful clogged pores really close, but hey, on the other hand, his nipples felt good when he touched them. great.

Blair, though, his nipples had tightened right up—[figures], he thought. If anyone would have nipples that would do that, it would be Sandburg. [I bet he likes everything], he thought, [I bet you could do anything to him and he’d say ‘mm, yeah, oh again.’ He’d moan your name. Or maybe he’d shout. Probably not, though.] Blair struck him as kind of a breathless enjoyer, sort of an, "oh, yeah, Fuck me harder Jim please" kind of guy.

And shit. There was a new train of thought. That ought to have been ruthlessly quashed, say, yesterday, except that it had sounded so good. He shrugged and shook himself, but it didn’t matter, in his mind, Blair was still stretched out underneath him and Jim was inside him and he was clutching for something, for him, for

"hey, Jim," Blair said.

"what?" he said.

"Isn’t that our guy?"

Well. It was all very well and good to joke with someone, all very well and good for someone to have a perfectly good excuse why they’d gotten turned on underneath you, but that was no excuse to go around thinking about how they’d react to getting your dick pushed inside them. [Slowly! Hotly!] a merry part of his brain kept screaming they followed the guy around for two more days before ending up back at square one, same club, same balcony, same couch and this time Jim said,

"take off your shirt," and Blair huffed,

"well, I don’t see why it’s always my turn" and Jim replied,

"because I’m the one who’s on top, doing stuff to you. hypothetically, of course,"

"hypothetically," Blair agreed, peeling off the shirt. His hands were surer this week, holding Jim’s shoulders, and his legs parted easily under Jim as he wiggled into place with a sigh.

"comfortable?" Jim asked, trying to preserve some vestige of his sarcastic demeanor, wondering why he hadn’t noticed that this couch was soft, that the cradle of Blair’s thighs was sweet and hot and one of Blair’s legs was pressed right into his side by the back of the couch and he could feel the rush of blood through the veins, or maybe that was the rush of his own blood and Blair’s nipple, hard again, was about a centimeter from his face. He licked it. A quick hard swipe and Blair leapt in his arms, letting out a short soft sound of surprise, his whole body arching against Jim, before falling back down away from him and Jim thought, disjointedly, [I probably shouldn’t do that again], when Blair’s body swerved up under him again, the muscles of his back bunching against his hands, just a quick aftershock, but this one made him find the nipple again, it was so easy with Blair’s hands on his neck, his head, urging him, until he was flicking his tongue over the nipple again, holding Blair’s body in one arm and reaching up to run a thumb over the other one, to which Blair said

"shit," and Jim didn’t want him to say shit, he wanted to hear his name, just like he’d imagined it, so he came up and wiped his tongue in a long swipe across Blair’s neck, Blair’s hands tightening against his shoulders, Blair panting now, he was panting, he looked up hastily, and saw that a few people were walking into the office, so he lowered his head and kissed Blair, whose hands clutched at his back, whose heart rate sped up, whose tongue ended up in his mouth.

And he thought that nothing could bring him back from that, from Blair’s reckless mouth, the heavy grind of his pelvis against Jim’s, but when Blair yanked his mouth away to gasp for air, Jim heard, across his harsh excited breathing, something about a shipment. Blair’s mouth came up again, seeking his, but he pushed him gently back down, and concentrated on tuning into the conversation in the office.

At any other time, the specific information they were throwing around in there, dates, times, locations, would have riveted him, but now he could barely concentrate, distracted by Blair’s partially opened mouth, the balance of his intense heat against the heat of the club.

It was a short meeting. People began trickling out and he kissed Blair perfunctorily, trying not to forget anything they’d said. As soon as they were gone, he scrambled into a sitting position, groping for his notebook.

"Jim," Blair said.

"wait, wait," he answered, trying to remember whether they’d said flight 28 or 38 while Blair stood up and pulled on his shirt, back to him. They left the club quickly, once again, this time Blair leading the way. But when they got to the truck, Blair turned to face him, face dark, and he said,

"Look, um, Blair," but Blair only shook his head and said,

"you aren’t gonna drive like that, are you?"

"Drive like what?"

"like what? Jim. give me a fucking break, give me a," and he stretched out a deliberate hand and wrapped it across Jim’s erection, "we’ll get in an accident,"

"don’t get yourself into something you can’t handle," Jim warned, thinking of himself, his ungoverned thoughts, the way a few thoughts of a scientific nature on the physiology of what was, after all, a vestigial body, part had led to some uncooperative thoughts on things of a decidedly nonscientific nature and to some ungoverned nipple licking and, finally, to Sandburg raising his eyebrows and saying,

"I can handle you, Jim, no problem. I can handle you just fine." He curled his hand over Jim’s belt and pulled Jim to him and kissed him hard, in the harsh light of the parking lot.

"give me the keys," he whispered and gave Jim’s mouth a hard lick. Jim gave him the keys.

They didn’t talk on the way home; it was dark in the truck and Blair’s hand was on his thigh, easy, confident, the headlights of the other cars flashed by in a dizzying blur. They didn’t talk on the way up the stairs and Blair unlocked the door with Jim’s keys and tossed them in the basket before turning to him and saying,

"We’re going upstairs," Jim nodded dumbly and went, Blair at his back.

Blair pushed him down on the bed and unbuttoned his shirt, quickly, smoothly, accepting Jim’s restless hands on his forearms and thighs and then he leaned down and tongued Jim’s nipple and whispered,

"turn about’s fair play," putting his fingers on the other nipple, and this was really unreal, he hadn’t even gotten the maddening thump of the club out of his system and Blair was kissing him and saying something, his hands were sliding over Blair’s shoulders and he couldn’t get a purchase, and he managed to tune in just in time to hear Blair say,

"I’d say the alpha male is doing a pretty good job of confirming my sexual draw, I mean, I," and Jim interrupted him, saying,

"kiss me," but Blair just smiled and said,

"that’s not what you really want,"

"what," he started to say, but Blair’s lips were on his, kissing him, fingers undoing Jim’s pants, and Blair said,

"that’s not really what I want either," and he shivered, and said, "turn over,"

Jim discovered that Blair was more the breathless, I’m-gonna-fuck-you-harder type.

They slept tangled together in Jim’s bed and Jim woke up first, with Blair jammed against his back, and he thought, "oh here we go," and resigned himself to morning of talking, already cringing at the wrong things he was sure he’d say, but determined to do it, anyway. Maybe it was just a one shot thing, some weird alpha male acknowledgment thing, something like that, anyway, and it wouldn’t take their friendship too off track. He heard Blair wake up and braced himself for the onslaught of explanations and demands, but Blair only opened his eyes and looked at him and croaked,

"Jim" and then cleared his throat and said, "Jim."

"yeah," Jim said. And then he said, just to stave off anything that might come first, "it’s okay." and Blair grinned and then sobered very suddenly and said,

"I wanna fuck you again,"

"um. okay, I guess," Jim said, so much for one shot deal, but,

"no, now," Blair said, "I want to do you right now."

"oh," Jim said, because Blair was already pushing him down, climbing on top of him, saying,

"I know you liked it," kissing his neck and grazing his teeth against his chest and Jim was suddenly frantic underneath him,

"I’ll just, I’ll just turn over,"

"That’s okay," Blair said, smiling again. "You’re good just like that."

He was still breathless, squinting at the light coming through the skylight, when Blair said

"You’ve done that before."

"Yeah, so’ve you," he answered

"So, where?"

"What where?"

"Where did you, uh, do it before?"

"Around. It’s none of your business," Jim said defensively.

"It’s not?"

"I don’t—couldn’t you at least wait until I recover here?"

"Recently?" Blair persisted

"No, not recently."

"okay."

"you?"

"huh?"

"You, recently?" Jim said, not looking at him.

"What counts as recently?"

"Since I’ve known you,"

"okay. yeah, then, recently."

"oh."

"Does that bother you?"

"What, does it bother me that you have sex with guys? Have you not been paying attention here?" Jim looked up at him.

"You know that’s not what I meant."

"yeah."

"you gonna answer the question?"

"I’m gonna eat breakfast and call Simon and tell him that the first shipment is coming in," his voice stopped as he thought, "shit. In an hour. Fuck."

They scrambled out of bed and into their clothes, taking quick but necessary showers. They arrived at the airport just in time.

"Thanks for the notice, Ellison," Simon barked.

"You’re here, aren’t you?" Jim said. It took them all day to secure the shipment. The fact that the plane had come into the United States from Venezuela called their jurisdiction into question and they ended up losing the whole case to the FBI and as much as Jim tried to be fiercely annoyed by them, he finally gave up, just relieved to get rid of the case. Still, with the forms and making up a convenient lie about how he’d gotten the information, it was growing dark when they got back to the Loft.

"well," Jim said.

"hm," Blair said.

"We should get some sleep," Blair said.

"Yeah, the stakeout, I’ve gotten about ten hours total the last few days," Jim agreed. Which wouldn’t really explain why twenty minutes later he was on his back on Blair’s bed, staring at Blair’s reddened nipples, ordering him to fuck him.

"oh yeah," Blair kept saying, digging his hands into Jim’s hips, the ‘oh’ obscenely drawn out, groaned almost, he kept licking his lips, until Jim finally had to close his eyes against Blair’s lust-clumsy, lavish tongue, his stomach curling with pleasure.

They didn’t do anything else after that for another three days. Both of them were busy but not unpleasantly so. It didn’t seem to have changed anything, Jim marveled. Blair still complained about excess meat at dinner and the cold and showed up at the station and let himself get dragged along to question some witnesses and Jim, for his part, asked him about a few cases here and there and zoned out on the turpentine that had been dowsed over an entire crime scene and needed Blair to come out of it and remembered that Blair had a late class on Wednesday and left him a dinner plate in the refrigerator. They were fine.

On the fourth day, Blair was finished with his work at eight o’clock. He came wandering out of his room and got a glass of water, obviously at loose ends.

"Whatcha doin’?" he asked Jim.

"Watching McNeil-Lehrer," Jim said. "it’s over, though."

"mm," Blair said and came over and sat down on the couch. After a moment he said, "you wanna fool around?"

"Yeah, yes," Jim said already moving towards him.

Blair, when he wasn’t too turned on to be coherent, was an inveterate dirty talker and while Jim was kissing his neck and groping him industriously, he was unbuttoning Jim’s shirt and working his way into the third round of "I’m gonna fuck you so hard and so good," when Jim suddenly stopped and asked,

"why do I always get fucked?" Blair looked at him, eyes wild, and said, quite obviously, the first thing that popped into his head.

"Because, Jim, just thinking about fucking you gets me so hard I can hardly see straight."

"oh." And this actually seemed reasonable, so Jim reached for him, but Blair held himself just out of reach and asked,

"do you wanna fuck me?"

"I—"

"because that would be okay," he said, nodding , smiling.

"no, never mind," Jim shook his head.

"no, it’s okay," Blair said, reaching for his pants, but Jim swatted his hands away and said

"I don’t want it to be just okay, Sandburg."

"you don’t," Blair said, looking frankly confused,

"No. I mean, if we’re gonna be fucking, I want a little more of a stirring endorsement out of it than ‘it’s okay’ if you don’t mind."

"oh. God you’re surly when you’re horny."

"I’m not horny," Jim said and Blair laughed at that. Laughed and reached out to run a quick hand over Jim’s erection.

"From what I’ve seen, Jim, you’re basically horny all the time. I don’t know how you manage it on your three women a year regimen."

"Look, I don’t think you can really go around casting stones—you’re the, the king of the kingdom of horny."

"We’re not talking about me, here, I’m not surly."

"I’m not surly."

"Yes you are. Do you wanna go down on me?" There was a moment of silence and then Jim said, diffidently,

"okay," and Blair grinned and said, "oh, I don’t know. I don’t want it to just be okay,"

"you little fuck," Jim breathed and Blair said,

"hey, you aren’t advancing your cause." And Jim said,

"shut up, " and slid down off the couch, pulling Blair towards him and shoving apart his knees to get in between them.

That night, Blair got up out of Jim’s bed and was on the first step before Jim said,

"you can stay. If you want to." Blair turned and made a noncommittal noise, and Jim said, "I mean, you did that first night."

"so?’ Blair said.

"I’m just pointing out a friggen precedent," Jim said. "Go sleep in your bed if you want to," and he flopped over, drawing the covers up.

"No, no," Blair said, walking back towards the bed. "I’ll stay." Jim turned over on his back and stared up at him and said

"Don’t do me any favors."

"I wanna stay, so move over, you jackass," Blair said.

Blair started sleeping in his bed on a regular basis, mostly because his bed had rapidly become so covered with journals and books and clothes as to be uninhabitable. He kept odd hours. Jim would go to bed alone and wake up staring at Blair’s neck. He got used to coming home from the station and finding Blair asleep in the middle of the bed, laptop thrumming and purring next to his head.

He’d never had occasion to know before how quickly Blair went from thinking to sleeping and back again, but he discovered that Blair could be wide awake in about seven seconds. The first time Blair smiled at him, blinking in the late afternoon sun, reaching for him, he expected some slow, lazy sex, Friday afternoon plenty of time sex, but they’d only gotten to that after Blair nailed him, pulling him down to the bed and panting,

"I’m gonna to give you such the blow job, and then I’m gonna fuck you, I was dreaming about sucking your cock and now I can’t wait," pulling his t-shirt off over his head and squirming out of his boxers. He tugged Jim’s jeans down to his thighs and took a deliberate lick of his cock, then pulled the jeans the rest of the way off. He pushed Jim down on his back and stayed up on his knees a minute, so Jim could see him wet his fingers one by one, before sinking back down to take the whole head of Jim’s cock in his mouth, sucking hard, stroking the wet fingers along Jim’s hole.

Afterwards, Jim kissed and licked from Blair’s chest to his knees, while Blair made up ridiculous sexual fantasies that he accused Jim of having, until he couldn’t think anymore and the stories mutated into broken breathless directives, until he couldn’t stand it any more and pulled Jim up to lie on top of him, fitting their cocks together, murmuring "kiss me, kiss me."

He knew that you were supposed to worry about people getting used to you, seeing you as part of the furniture, but he felt almost as if that was what he was working towards. He wanted to become one of those big armoires that people could never get rid of because they were too big and too heavy, he wanted to become the chair that you wouldn’t think of getting rid of, even if it’s losing its stuffing, even if the dog vomited on the upholstery. His plans were so secret he didn’t even really allow himself to think about them—only that he was creeping in under Jim’s guard, letting Jim get used to his books and his body, letting him come to think of them as normal, natural. Furniture.

No one at the station noticed anything, not even in the first days when Jim felt like he might as well be wearing a sign that said, ‘Blair fell asleep on top of me last night, because he was really too tired to fuck me but I coaxed him into it anyway.’ In the past he’d found that things like this involved a lot of work, equivocating, sneaking around, but Blair seemed to require less work. He was easier to find, complained less about being cold, and, if he was not more amiable about staying put when asked, his cooking improved. Or perhaps, Jim realized, sitting at his desk one day, it wasn’t so much the food, as that Blair, more often than not, ended a meal of questionable sludge by sliding down Jim’s body and giving him a hot enthusiastic blow job. And, see, it was things like this that made him wonder how no one could notice: two-thirty in the afternoon, the bullpen buzzing, no one even blinking an eye at the fact that he was sitting, staring into space, feeling his face flush as he remembered Blair’s lips.

In time, it seemed more normal, people had their own problems, after all: Connor’s landlady raised her rent and Rafe’s mother was dying of arthritis, Brown’s dog injured her spine jumping off his porch and her back legs were paralysed. Jim saw that Blair swinging into Major Crimes and one o’clock and saying, as he always had,

"hey, Jim," and sitting down to talk about the latest case wasn’t really going to raise any eyebrows. No, in order for anyone to get really interested in the fact that Blair was fucking him, Blair would probably have to be fucking him on his desk. At first, he only tried to stop worrying about it. After a few weeks, he was slightly surprised to find that he had.

"Do you ever think about this?" Blair asked, once, late at night, a proprietary hand still on Jim’s ass.

"Think about it? Of course," Jim replied. He was gearing up to say something else, but Blair continued

"you know what this is called?"

"what? yes, of course, I had to take a six week course about it in the military. Mostly they just showed us slides of what VD does to you, though." Blair’s hand moved a little, but Jim caught it and pulled it back and Blair stroked the small of his back and his hand tightened, briefly, across Jim’s ass.

"Not this. this this thing we’re doing. This, coming home from work and getting naked thing. This knowing my roommate has the hottest body this side of the continental divide thing."

"I’d suspect you were trying to butter me up so you could fuck me. Except, you never bother to butter me up,"

"never need to, I mean except in the most literal sense"

"and, besides, you already did."

"so do you know what they call it?" Blair said again, after they had finished leering at each other.

"I guess not."

"Eating at home.’"

"What?"

"eating at home; you know. Getting your action where you live."

"everyone gets their action where they live," Jim objected

"okay. getting it on with your roommate then—you know what I meant."

"yeah. I know."

"so?"

"so. Sandburg. I think about it, yeah. But, you know. You seem happy. You like it, right? I like it. So I figure, we’re not doing anything wrong. I like that you’re happy."

"okay. good. I like that you’re happy. You are happy, right?

"right."

"good night, then."

"good night," Jim said, but Blair was already asleep, his hand slipping slowly from Jim.

Everyone else he’d slept with, except maybe high school, the sleeping with part had come first, a happy expression of comfort, a way of banishing the uncertainty of the first steps, that ‘does-she-like-me’ edge, the first date front door kiss. It was a way of letting everyone know where you stood. And he figured, with Blair, well, why go out of order?

Blair hadn’t shown any real inclination to talk about it, and after that first "you’ve done this before," hadn’t brought up the subject again. Jim didn’t want to know about just what men he’d been screwing in Cascade and he suspected that Blair wouldn’t appreciate hearing about the guys Jim had screwed, years ago now, just buddies in covert ops, when they were trapped for days in isolated locations. Usually they spent the first few days playing cards, but there were only so many rounds of poker you could play, especially if you were playing for each other’s rations, which you couldn’t really even take because everyone had to be at full strength. And it was so boring and so cold, those years when the Soviet Union loomed, threatening and dark, and they spent a disproportionate amount of time in training being dropped out of planes in Alaska.

To tell the truth, being sent to Peru had at first seemed like a fucking vacation—somewhere warm, at last, after years of huddling together with soldiers in the snow, mapping Soviet Military Bases. At night, in the cold, just the fact that someone, anyone, would let him put his hands against them seemed a miracle, and their warm flesh, just by virtue of being warm, was the sexiest, the most alive thing he’d ever felt. He’d thought: danger, proximity, cold, isolation. But the loft was warm and he saw other people every day and perhaps he was intermittently in danger, but touching Blair, that was safe haven. Still sexy as hell, though; there were times when Jim couldn’t believe how sexy it was, Blair straddling him, leaning down into his hands.

It was nice to be wanted; and he didn’t even have to rely on guessing, Blair told him all the time how much he wanted him, how he wanted him, how good he felt. Stupid, vanity, conceit, he ignored the prickings of shame at the pleasure that Blair’s words, his panting enjoyment of Jim’s body, brought him. Jim knew when to lie low, to take each day as it came. He was waiting for something.

"Do you want a bite of this?" Blair asked, one Sunday, shuffling out of the kitchen with an apple in his hand.

"Yeah." Jim nodded. Blair held out the apple and he took a bite out of it and it was a good apple, tart and crunchy. Blair sat down next to him on the couch and finished the apple, giving him the occasional companionable bite and Jim tried out a few angles on a case with him, to which Blair replied,

"uh-uh, no way," and

"maybe," and,

"that sounds like the most reasonable explanation," so Jim kissed him. He tasted like apples and there was apple juice on his chin and he laughed and let Jim kiss him again, coming up on the sofa and wrapping his arms around Jim’s neck, more a hug than a sexual embrace and he kissed Jim back and Jim lost his balance a little, feeling the curve of his contented smile against his lips and fell back against the arm of the couch with Blair across him, who snorted and said,

"Motor skills, Ellison," and flopped back on the other end of the couch, saying, "You should see the stack of papers I have to grade."

"bad, huh."

"yeah. gross. Are you gonna watch tv—because I can go work in my room,"

"no, no, I was just going to read some. Do it out here." He had been planning on catching some college basketball game or another, but it didn’t seem all that important now. He couldn’t really remember the teams, anyhow. There were books he had been planning to read. And it was an enhancement for any book to have Blair’s toes stuck underneath his thighs, to have a background of his small grunts of dismay or approval as he flapped the pages of the papers.

"Do you want to eat or something?" he asked at seven o’clock.

"I really need to get these done," Blair said.

"How much to you have left?"

"half, maybe?’

"So you’re half done. Let’s eat."

"but,"

"Take a break, Sandburg, a fucking break," he said, gently pulling the paper Blair was working on from his hands. He came up with the paper, still gamely holding it, saying,

"no, come on, Jim, don’t rip it," but he was smiling, and Jim said,

Maybe I need a break,"

"oh, from a challenging afternoon of sitting on your ass," Blair scoffed, "I think you’re getting soft, Ellison," he added, or he would’ve, except Jim pulled him into a kiss and Blair dropped the paper to press his hands against Jim’s cheeks and one of Jim’s came up to his shoulder, the other one holding him steady and Blair twisted suddenly in his arms, flipping so he was sitting in his lap, pulling Jim’s head down to kiss him and it was curious how absorbing kissing could be, understandable at first, how the way mouths fit together, lip and tongue and hand on the nape of your neck, might be entertaining, but once you do a puzzle once, once you’ve seen the picture and fumbled through without losing a single piece, the thrill is gone, you don’t keep it around to do again, so it was a little odd, that he could enjoy kissing Blair so much. They separated, and Blair said,

"I’m half done."

"yup."

"I could go for a grill cheese sandwich."

"do we have cheese?"

"of course—"

"and I don’t mean that Swiss crap. I hate Swiss cheese."

"yes, I’ve heard the ‘Buying Swiss cheese is an affront to honest American dairy farmers who didn’t use the Holocaust as an excuse to make money’ theory, Jim"

"well, the Swiss—"

"I don’t think the farmers really, y’know, were in on that. Besides, Swiss cheese is made in, like, Wisconsin."

"I don’t like it."

"I know. We have American."

"right, then," Jim said, appeased. "You want sprouts on yours?"

"That was making out," Blair said, as Jim slid the second sandwich onto a plate.

"so," Jim asked.

"making out," Blair repeated thoughtfully. "I mean, we’ve never done that before."

"What kissed? We’ve kissed."

"Yeah, but, you know, there was always, um, nudity and screwing commingled with the kissing."

"uh, okay. You wanna pickle?"

"yeah, thanks."

"so it was making out, so what?" Jim said, a minute later.

"I don’t know. it was just new," he shrugged.

"mm. did you like it?"

"I like everything," Blair said, and Jim nodded,

"yeah," he said, with a private grin.

Eventually, this all ended. It didn’t end because either of them had a bad day or got shot at; in fact, it ended at the end of a normal day. It ended because no one came to Blair’s office hours, not an unusual state of affairs. But he came home, and Jim heard his feet on the stairs, unnaturally heavy, angry, he thought and then Blair had flung open the door and walked in and found Jim and said,

"Are you on Valium, man, because this is not normal." Jim looked up.

"what?" he said. Blair dropped his backpack on the floor and ripped his hat off.

"I mean, I’m sitting in my office this afternoon and no one’s coming to ask about their midterms and I don’t really care because I’m having a pleasant afternoon thinking, hey, about exactly how I wanna get naked with you tonight and it strikes me that we’ve been doing this for for for a while now and how long has it been?"

"six weeks."

"See and that’s just indicative of the whole problem, I mean, how could I possible just, you know, la-di-dah, start fucking someone, not to mention that that’s you and just not even think about it?" He took off his coat and hung it up and waved his arms accusatorily when Jim didn’t say anything.

"I don’t know," Jim said, obediently.

"And so I really start to think about it and I think, maybe it some sort of Sentinel thing, like the Sentinel and the Guide aren’t allowed to fight because it will endanger the tribe, so there’s some sort of hardwired response, you know, instead of fight or flight, we got fight or fuck."

"oh."

"Except that doesn’t make sense, because we’re fighting right now, and I think it’s going pretty well," he stopped and considered Jim, who had taken a relaxed sip from the mug of coffee in his hand and sighed. "Jim. What the fuck is wrong with us? We can’t just start fucking and have that be that."

"Why not?"

"Because it’s weird. Because I am not a calm person and gettin’ it on with you has made me extraordinarily calm and that is totally fucking bizarre. Because it’s not really like you’re Mr. Calm and you’re taking this all like we decided that maybe the chair would look better over there. How could this not be a big deal to you?"

"I don’t know."

"That’s what I’m saying. What the fuck is wrong with you, man? Why are you doing this?"

"I don’t know," Jim said again.

"But you’re plan ahead guy. You’re the Boy Scout."

"And you’re the intellectual," Jim retorted, "You’re supposed to be thinking. How’m I supposed to know this isn’t part of some master plan thing you have?"

"Oh what, now you’re the sheep?"

"Maybe."

"And you just do whatever the fuck I tell you."

"looks like," Jim shrugged.

"You’re lying," Blair said mistrustfully.

"You said ‘turn over’ and I turned over, didn’t I," Jim said.

"Yeah, well, I didn’t think you were gonna do it," Blair said belligerently.

"At the time, you seemed pretty sure,"

"I was pissed because you started kissing me and stopped."

"I was listening to the, you know, the people in the office."

"I know, I know. Still made me mad."

"So you never expected it to go that far,"

"No, I guess, I sort of expected you to say no or want to do me, but you just didn’t. Why didn’t you?"

"I don’t know," Jim said.

"Stop saying that, stop it," Blair said, and shoved him. So Jim shoved him back, not hard, pushed him back until his back was against the door and then considered him for a minute before kissing him.

"Are you saying you didn’t like fucking me," he finally asked softly.

"No," Blair said. "no, Jim, of course not."

"You should’ve just asked," Jim said, carefully opening the buttons on Blair’s shirt "You only had to ask," he murmured against a nipple.

Blair’s hands twisted in his shirt and he kissed him again, hard this time and when he lifted his mouth, Blair said,

"okay, will you fuck me then? I mean," he gasped, as Jim’s hands slid down his back, as Jim pulled him to the floor, "I’d really like it if you’d fuck me."

"I’d really like that," Jim replied, trying to get his shoelaces undone. And Blair grabbed his hands fiercely,

"Fuck your shoes, screw your shoes, never mind, please, Jim, now, okay? All right?"

"What, you could wait a month and a half, Sandburg, and you now you can’t wait ten fucking seconds?" Jim said, licking his lips, realizing that it was unlikely that he’d be able to wait ten seconds.

"That’s right," Blair said, fumbling through his backpack, finding a condom and a battered tube of lubricant and shoving them at Jim, declaring, "I’m gonna take my pants off." He had reached the point where he couldn’t modulate his voice and this sentence came out too loud, but Jim didn’t notice. He unbuckled his belt, watching as Blair hastily pulled his pants off, taking his shoes with them, and then Blair was nearly in his lap, pulling his pants down, smoothing the condom down over his cock, looking at him with bright hot eyes and finally rolling over to his hands and knees, saying,

"okay. hard, I want it hard. I’m ready." Jim stroked a slow hand along his ass and Blair said, sounding almost irritated,

"hey, and by ‘I’m ready’, I mean, Jim, fuck me now,"

"okay, okay," Jim said, running a thumb along the outside of Blair’s hole, dipping it in, making Blair nod his head jerkily and say,

"right, wonderful, yes, just. your cock Jim. now would be good." And Jim, noticing bemusedly that he was still wearing all his clothes, shirt to shoes, leaned over Blair’s naked back, found a nipple with one hand, whispered,

"God, you’re bossy when you’re horny," and thrust, deep and hard, into Blair, who moaned, and couldn’t seem to stop.

Later, much later, Blair said,

"Jim, you’re squashing me."

"sorry," Jim said.

"Ah, no, it’s sort of nice," Blair answered, but Jim was already rolling off him and sitting up.

"You know, you’re heavy too, and you don’t see me complaining." Blair looked at him in disbelief.

"But you obviously get off on suffering in silence."

"hey. I. My knees hurt," Jim offered.

"Yeah, well. My ass hurts." Blair answered, standing up slowly. Seeing the expression on Jim’s face, he added, "Entirely worth it; I’m considering becoming a masochist."

"Do masochists bitch and moan?" Jim asked, smirking.

"Right now, I’m a little more interested in whether masochists take showers," Blair said, heading for the bathroom.

When Jim came out of the bathroom after his shower, pulling a clean t-shirt down over his head, he found Blair waiting for him on the couch. He sat down and pulled on a pair of socks tucking them under the cuffs of his sweatpants and Blair said,

"Jim, I know you don’t want to talk about this, but,"

"Who said I didn’t want to talk about it," Jim asked, not looking at him.

"Are you saying you didn’t fuck me to get out of the discussion?" Blair said.

"Fight or fuck," Jim reminded him.

"Yeah, well, maybe I wanted to fight."

"Then you shouldn’t have asked me to fuck you," Jim said, reasonably, putting his hand on Blair’s knee.

"You started it."

"In the first place?"

"Yeah, that too."

"You held my hand," Jim said, sliding the hand higher,

"That’s weak, Jim, and stop changing the subject." He took Jim’s hand off his leg and Jim turned to look at him and touched his hair, still wet from the shower, making small wet spots on his shirt.

"okay, then," he said, resolutely, "Say what you want to."

"oh. well. I mean, I’d like it if we could just talk, a little."

"Let’s go," Jim nodded.

"you wanna start?" Blair scratched his nose.

"What, I have to start now, too?"

"no, no."

There was a pause, and then Blair sighed and said,

"Look, before we start this, I only. There’s. I’m. I’m having a really nice time, so far. I wanted you to know, you know, just in case."

"Just in case of what?"

"In case, whatever. It’s not that anything’s going wrong," Blair gave Jim a lopsided smile, "Because everything’s going really really right. really good. And um."

"what?"

"I just really don’t want to screw this up, you know?"

"me neither," Jim agreed.

"Really?"

"Yes, of course, really. I like this—I want to keep on doing it, if I see anyone else hovering around the Sandburg honeypot, I’ll kick his ass." Blair gave him a real smile at that, and turned to face him, sitting sideways on the couch, tucking his ankles under his knees.

"Um, how long did you have in mind for that?"

"I don’t know," Jim said quietly. "a while. the foreseeable future. How ‘bout that?"

"okay. good, yes me too."

"then are we good?" Jim touched his face.

"We’re good." Jim would have been content to sit there in silence, but Blair took off on a new tack,

"Jim does it really bother you to be on the bottom so much?"

"no, I told you."

"I just wanted to make sure. Because if we’re going to do this for a long time, then."

"Oh, you weren’t planning on a long time before?"

"You were?"

"Yes, Jesus Christ. I was practically picking out china patterns, Sandburg," Jim blurted, and looked embarrassed.

"Um, I just wasn’t sure. The thing at the club kind of surprised me,"

"well, me too," Jim said.

"So it took me a while," Blair explained.

"I don’t recall it taking a while—I remember being under you at the next earliest opportunity."

"Well. I was processing," Blair said, with dignity.

"Oh, processing now involves my ass?"

"It does bother you."

"Will you lay off, it doesn’t bother me."

"Jim, um, honesty is really import—"

"oh, god, Sandburg, fine," Jim snapped, "I love it, I love it when you fuck me, it’s fucking hot, you know? And it makes you so goddam happy, and I love that, too, okay? Is that, I mean, do you want some sort of signed affidavit?"

"It makes me happy?"

"Oh, don’t even. Sandburg. Maybe I’m not the master of analysis or anything, but you love to fuck me."

"okay," Blair said grudgingly. "fucking you is very nice."

"oh come on," Jim said.

"I don’t," Blair said,

"come on," Jim said, rather vehemently.

"for crying out loud," Blair said, "I love to fuck you. Happy now?"

"Honesty is very important," Jim said flippantly.

"oh be quiet."

"well, I was assuming that your fascination with my ass was some sort of thing about taking possession of the primal beast," Jim informed him.

"oh it was not, I swear, I’m so full of shit, Jim. I got all turned on because of you, because I wanted you."

"yeah?"

"I want you," he said, seriously. Jim nodded and ran a quick hand down his chest and Blair recognized that touch, that was Jim’s ‘are your ribs broken’ touch, the one he’d felt so many times over the last three years, the one Jim always used. Even when he protested that he was fine, Jim’s gentle hands had always been on him, just checking, just making sure. The hand lingered this time, at his waist, and he looked up and saw Jim looking at him, intently, so he looked back, holding Jim’s steady blue gaze with his own until he couldn’t stand it anymore. Then he said "well. okay, then, the alpha male thing doesn’t hurt."

Jim poked him in the ribs, and said,

"I knew it."

"You still haven’t come up with a convincing explanation for licking my nipple, though," Blair said.

"I was maintaining the cover," Jim said, solemnly.

"convincing is the key word here," Blair dead-panned.

"Fuck you," Jim said, and found Blair’s nipple under his shirt, resting one broad forefinger on it.

"You, just, really like my nipples," Blair said, breathing a bit more quickly. "I find it interesting."

"They’re what brought us together. They have sentimental value," Jim said.

"Has anyone told you that logic isn’t your strong suit?" Blair leaned forward.

"But you’re gonna stay with me anyway, right?" Jim asked.

"Yeah. I’m gonna stay. My nipples have a thing for you," Blair stated.

"Funny how that works," Jim said, and wondered if he would ever stop smiling.