by Elizabeth Dunn
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Disclaimer: Not mine, yadda, yadda, yadda. I'm not sure if I should give this an R or an NC-17. Oh, well, I'll err on the side of caution and say NC-17.

Archiving: PKSP site, all others can as well, just keep my name and disclaimers on it.

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Harry and Tom walked back to Tom's quarters from Sandrine's. This wasn't an unusual occurrence - since Tom had broken up with B'Elanna about a week ago, Tom had been spending lots of time with Harry, almost as if he was afraid of being alone. Not that Harry was surprised. He knew that, with himself at least, that when you were used to the companionship of a serious relationship, one tended to get clingy to other people after a breakup, as if trying to fill that empty space.

Look at all the time Harry had spent with Tom after they had been first stranded in the Delta Quadrant, missing Libby so terribly and trying to hide his loneliness with someone else. Now it appeared that Tom was employing the same strategy. Not that Harry was complaining. He had been secretly in love with Tom for quite some time now. Only the wish not to hurt B'Elanna had held him back from saying anything to him. But now, with the relationship ended. . .

Harry steered his thoughts away from that particular track and concentrated instead on steering Tom down the corridor. He had had a little too much too drink. Finally, they reached Tom's quarters. Harry punched in Tom's code and guided the man into his room and on to the couch. He turned to leave, but Tom's hand on his arm stopped him. Tom pulled him down beside him, and leaned forward. Softly, he said, "Har, do you know how much you mean to me?"

"About as much as you mean to be Tom. We're best friends." Harry repressed the small surge of sadness that came with that, his hopes that they could be more than friends.

"No, it's more than that. I think. . . I think we could be. . . more. Like me and B'Elanna were."

Harry ignored the small flare of hope and concentrated of his friend. There was more than a small possibility that this was just the drunken rambling of a lonely man. "Tom, I don't think you mean that."

Tom grabbed Harry's wrists and pulled him in close. "But I do, Harry. I. . . I think I'm in love with you. I broke up with B'Elanna because I felt so strongly about you. And, if I read you as correctly as I think I have, you love me too."

Harry was shocked. The mere thought that Tom loved him was enough to make him well on his way to being hard, but still . . . The man had been drinking all night, real alcohol too, and it was entirely possible that Tom was turning his good feelings from the drink and amplifying his feelings for him. How to approach this then. He thought for a second and decided on a combination of truth and damage control. Drawing in a deep breath, he said, "Yes Tom, I do love you. But, I don't know if you really love me."

"I do, Harry, I really do."

"I know you think you do, but-." Harry's words were cut off by Tom's mouth as he bent his head down and kissed Harry. Harry moaned and leaned into the kiss, opening his mouth to Tom's exploring tongue. After untold minutes, he pulled back, breathless and harder than he'd been in a long time. Maybe ever. Harry looked into Tom's eyes and saw passion and love shining out at him. "Well," he said shakily. "Where do we go from here?"

Tom began to unbutton Harry's shirt and trailed his fingers over the golden skin exposed. As he bent his head to kiss and nibble on Harry's neck, he whispered, "Well, I thought that we'd go to my bed next."

"Good idea," Harry said, his words turning into a sharp cry as Tom's mouth found his nipples and began sucking on them. Harry writhed in ecstasy as Tom kissed and nibbled his way across Harry's chest to give the same attention to the other one.With a small gasp, Harry's knees gave out, and he fell to knees in front of Tom, on eye level with his straining erection. Tentatively, Harry reached out and stroked it and whispered, "Let me love you Tom. Let me love you like I've always dreamed."

Any coherent thoughts left in Tom fled as Harry unfastened his pants and drew out his hard cock. Suddenly his only priorities in life had narrowed to the ultimate goal of coming as hard as possible in his best friend's mouth. In a distant corner of his mind, he was wondering exactly where this seemingly innocent man had gotten such talent at blowjobs, but the rest of him was too busy enjoying to care about silly details. Harry worked him skillfully, by turns gently kissing and licking, and swallowing all of him and sucking him hard. It felt so good that Tom couldn't hold back for long. With a hoarse scream, he came, hard, pumping into his friend's - lover's - mouth. Tom collapsed to the floor, trying to regain the powers of speech, then kissed Harry, enjoying the taste of himself on Harry's lips. Pulling back he said, with a wicked grin, "Let's try making it to the bed this time, and we'll see how good I can make you feel."

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Harry walked quietly into his quarters a few hours later, feeling absurdly like he was sneaking in even though they were his quarters and he hadn't been doing anything wrong. In all honesty, he wished he was back in Tom's arms, sleeping with him, but they had agreed to keep their relationship quiet, and Harry leaving early in the morning in his clothes from the night before was a sure way to start the rumors going. This way, it would look to any curious passerbys that they had merely been talking. All things considered, Harry was feeling pretty good.

That is, until he noticed the form lurking in the shadows of his quarters. He had no idea how B'Elanna had overridden his lock, but she was there now, and from the way she looked, she was not happy.

B'Elanna advanced on him, growling softly. "How could you?" she hissed.

"How could I what?"

"You were with him! You slept with him! And you knew he's MINE!"

"He's not yours, B'Elanna. He broke up with you remember?"

"Ohh, that was not smart, Harry. And here I thought you were intelligent."

Harry couldn't resist provoking her, even though he knew it was at peril to him. "I thought you were too. I thought that surely such a brilliant engineer would realize when a relationship is over. Tom isn't yours anymore." Harry looked B'Elanna in the eye as he said, "He's mine now."

"He's MINE!" B'Elanna was desperately clinging to that thought. "He just needed some. . . space. But he loves me, and he'll come back."

"Sure he will. That's why he spent the last few hours fucking me and declaring his love for me."

B'Elanna paled. "He didn't."

"Sure he did. We did. Watch," he sat down, and B'Elanna watched as he flinched. "You want to know why I flinched? Because I was just fucked, very enthusiastically I might add, up my ass by Tom Paris. Now don't you think that if he was yours he would've been doing that to you?"

"You bastard," she hissed, the shock outweighing the anger for the moment.

"Sorry. My parents were firmly married when I was born. Now, I invite you to leave my quarters."

"This isn't over, Starfleet."

"It is. Tom is with me. Deal with it." With that, he literally shoved a very stunned B'Elanna out of his quarters and locked his door. He was pretty sure she wouldn't try anything that night, but it never hurt to be careful.

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Tom was worried. He knew that Harry and B'Elanna had had a big, blowout fight the night he and Harry had first slept together. Hell, the whole ship knew it. That wasn't what was worrying him. Harry's refusal to talk about what had been said, and B'Elanna's brooding silence--now, that was something worth worrying about. Tom sighed silently and turned his attention back to his helm console. It wouldn't be good for him to be caught with his attention drifting while on duty. All he could do now was hope for the best--that B'Elanna wouldn't kill Harry.

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Harry was in his quarters alone, reading. It was actually the first time he had been alone since he and Tom had gotten together three weeks ago. Normally, the two of them would've been in Sandrine's, or the resort program, or even just in one of their quarters, but wherever it was, they would've been together. But since Tom had sickbay duty nights this week, Harry was taking the opportunity to catch up on his reading and music. Suddenly, his door chime jerked Harry from his musings. "Come in," he called.

B'Elanna stepped in hesitantly. Harry watched her warily, but when she didn't make any over-threateningly moves, he gestured her to a seat. "Sit down. What can I do for you, B'Elanna?"

"I ... need to do something for you, Harry."

"What do you mean?" When she didn't answer right away, he half-jokingly said, "Well, if you came to try and kill me, can I at least have a head start?"

B'Elanna looked shocked. "No! I don't want to hurt you. I want to apologize to you."

"Apologize?"

"Yes, apologize. About our fight a few weeks ago. I was. . . angry. Hurt. I didn't mean to come down on you that way. If Tom is happy with you, then I'm happy. For both of you."

"Oh, B'Elanna." Harry sighed. "I should apologize to you too. I should've known that it might've been too fast for you, Tom and I getting together. I shouldn't have rubbed it in your face like that."

"No, Harry. I should've backed off. If I had been honest with myself then, I would've known that Tom and I were over, had been for some time now. I had no right to react that way, like a jilted bride. If Tom wanted you, I should've been able to accept that."

"But B'Elanna--" Harry broke off and laughed. B'Elanna looked at him oddly. Trying to pull himself together, Harry explained, "Only we can have an argument about apologizing." B'Elanna began laughing as well. After they calmed down, Harry said, "B'Elanna, we both did and said things we shouldn't have. I feel awful about that, and I would like to ask for forgiveness."

"Done. Will you forgive me?"

"Done."

They sat there smiling for a minute, then B'Elanna stood and grabbed Harry's hand. "Come on," she said. "Let's go to Sandrine's and have a drink celebrating the repair of our friendship." She dragged a still-laughing Harry out the door.

---

Tom entered the holodeck, eyes searching for Harry before the doors even finished closing. He had gotten off shift earlier than he had anticipated and tracked Harry down to Sandrine's, intending to spend the rest of the evening with his lover. Ah, there he was, sitting in the corner, laughing and talking with--wait, with B'Elanna? Sure that something wasn't right there, he strode over to the table, intent on defending his love from the wrath of B'Elanna Torres.

Harry glanced up and spotted Tom approaching. He stood and walked over to greet him. "Hey, Tom, didn't expect to see you so early."

"Har, are you all right?" asked Tom, searching Harry for signs of bodily injury.

"I'm fine, Tom. Why do you ask?"

"Well, you're with B'Elanna, and I thought. . . I mean that . . . " Tom was very confused, and didn't bother trying to hide it.

"We were just talking. You're acting like you expected to see her standing over my lifeless corpse," Harry teased.

"But you had argued, and she was so mad at you. . . "

"We had a talk tonight, and we made up. Besides, you can't blame her for having been a little jealous. You guys were together for a year, and you're such a good catch." Tom smiled at that, but didn't quite look convinced. "Come sit with us. B'Elanna won't bite." The pair made their way back to the table where B'Elanna patiently waited.

She smiled up at them. "Finally convinced him to join us, Harry?"

"Yep. I think he doesn't trust you."

"Now whyever not?" She then saw the serious look in Tom's eyes. "All right, I'm serious now. I admit I was hurt and angry when you started going out with Harry. I felt that, if you could fall for someone else so soon after we had ended, that I must've not meant much to you. And that did hurt. I won't try to deny that, just as I won't deny that a small part of me is still a little bit jealous and angry. I think that's natural. But I had no right to take it out on Harry the way I did. He's always been a good friend to me, and when I got over myself a little, I realized that if he's happy, then I should be. And if he's happy with you, then even better. I think of you as a friend still, Tom, and I want my friends to be happy. If it's with each other, then, well, so be it."

Tom leaned across the table and clasped her hands. "Thank you, B'Elanna. That means a lot to me. And never think I didn't care for you. I just couldn't care for you in the way you deserve to be cared for."

B'Elanna removed he hands from Tom's and placed them on Harry's. "Just take care of him. You better not give me any reason to call you a pig again." She smiled, softening her words while keeping the serious meaning behind them intact.

Harry smiled at both of them. "I think this calls for a toast," he said. Raising his glass, he said, "To friendship!"

"Friendship!" Tom and B'Elanna chorused as they all clinked glasses. Then the friends settled into talk, starting the rebuilding of their former camaraderie, while Tom and Harry continued to hold hands.

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End