This Earthly Paradise (6/10)
Title: This Earthly Paradise (6/10)
Media: Fic
Author: GlassParade
Rating: PG-13 to NC-17
Pairing: Kurt Hummel and Blaine Anderson
Genre: AU, Historical Romance
Spoilers: This is fully AU. No show spoilers, but I do try to keep characterizations somewhat consistent with show canon. Characters who are not from Glee are actual historical figures and the depictions of them are based loosely on those in the BBC miniseries 'Desperate Romantics'.
Word Count: 23,000+
Summary: In Victorian England, Kurt Hummel is a struggling artist and contemporary of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, an organization of painters, poets, and critics who strive to turn the art establishment of England on its very head. His mentor, one Dante Gabriel Rossetti, has grown tired of Kurt's reluctance to grow as an artist, and so enter Blaine Anderson, an artists' model of Bohemian disposition and eye-catching good looks. Can he, using rather unorthodox methods, succeed where Rossetti has not?
Additional Notes: I wanted to write something that was wholly un-angsty, a bit historical, but not as involved as 'Velvet Petals' or its upcoming sequel. And so I thought I'd spend hiatus on this bit of fluff. Love to aubreyli and gameboycolor for always being willing to read sneak previews and make me feel like I might be okay at this stuff.
In the greenhouse studio, Rossetti slumped into his favorite chair and sighed loudly.
Lizzie ignored him, her tongue flicking out to lick at her lips as she squinted at the sketchbook she held. She was concentrating very hard on the fruit bowl before her, working on her perspective.
He tried again, heaving an even larger sigh and making conspicuous amounts of noise shifting about.
Nothing. Lizzie sketched on, frowning at the blameless green pear sitting in her bowl. She reached out and twitched it over an infinitesimal distance to the left. Nibbling at her lower lip, she picked up her charcoal stick and resumed working, not paying a single whit of attention to him.
Clearly, more drastic measures would be required.
Five seconds later, an outcry rang through the studio and Lizzie brought her sketchbook swinging down hard on Rossetti's head where it was abruptly burrowed beneath her skirts. “Gabriel! What has gotten into you?”
“I'm bored,” he whined, emerging with an aggrieved expression on his face while he rubbed his aching head. “I want to go out, Lizzie. We've not been to the Gardens in ever so long, we've been holed up in here working and not having any fun at all.”
“Well, I thought last night was rather a lot of fun myself,” she retorted, but relented when she saw his pout. Leaning down, she kissed him fondly and cupped his cheek. “Poor Gabriel. All work and no play, hm?” She tilted her head up and looked thoughtful, considering their options. “You have gotten paid for that last commission you did, and I have a bit of money from Papa...I suppose we could afford it. Why not?”
“Excellent!” Rossetti hopped to his feet and snatched up his greatcoat. “Let's be off, before you change your mind.”
Setting her book and charcoal carefully aside, Lizzie got up and thumped the dust from her skirts. “Do you know, we've not seen Kurt in a rather long time,” she mused, moving to wash her hands. “Perhaps we ought to stop by and coax him to come out with us.”
Rossetti rolled his eyes. “Must we?”
“It would be nice.” Casting a reproachful glance over her shoulder, Lizzie dried her hands and picked up her hat, fitting it carefully over her hair. “He is our friend and your student. It behooves us to see him from time to time, and drag him out if he's being a bit of a hermit.” A smile brightened her face. “Perhaps he's working and that's why we've not seen him! We should see what he's working on, Gabriel, we really should.”
“More likely he's holed up in his rooms rocking back and forth whilst sobbing in despair over his virginity,” Gabriel grumbled, still wishing to go directly to the pleasure gardens. Lizzie reached over and flicked her fingers at the brim of his hat, knocking it askew.
“For that, you can stand him drinks at the Gardens,” she chided, swinging a cloak over her shoulders against the chill of the night. “It's unkind thing to say, for shame, Gabriel.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Yet I do not hear you denying that it is a legitimate possibility.”
Lizzie's face went as red as her hair. “It's still unkind!”
They bickered cheerily on the long walk to Kurt's lodgings, a distance of perhaps a mile or so from Rossetti's greenhouse studio. The imposing building Kurt lived in had actually belonged to his father before he passed on, and while Kurt had inherited it, he couldn't afford to keep all of it for his own use, so he'd made an arrangement that turned it into a sort of rooming house on the lower two floors. He, in turn, got to keep the third floor garret for his own use on the strict proviso that the woman who ran the lodgings below never bothered him for any reason. This she was happy to do, since it afforded her an excellent income with no bother from the actual landlord, who took only as much as he needed to get by, and only rarely at that. She didn't think much of the guests he received, but it wasn't her place to say anything, so she never did.
Thus it was that Lizzie and Rossetti found themselves let into the house by the taciturn matron, who gestured them up the stairs with nary a word before disappearing back into her own little set of rooms. They'd been here a number of times before, and so felt comfortable with simply skipping up the numerous steps to Kurt's garret to let themselves in. All of the Brotherhood were accustomed to barging in on each other at all hours for any reason they could think of. They were, after all, a Brotherhood.
The steps were steep and the climb an exhausting one - the sort of climb that made one long to turn back at the halfway point, except that it was the halfway point, so the trip oughtn't be wasted. Gabriel muttered grumpy curses under his breath as they trudged endlessly upwards, ignoring Lizzie's chiding glances.
As the pair made their way up the last rickety stretch of stairs, they became aware of voices in the studio. One was absolutely Kurt; the other Gabriel recognized as Blaine Anderson. Really? he thought, amused. It was something of a late hour for anything but close friends. Could it actually be that against all odds, Hummel had indeed forged some sort of connection with the model and was working on something?
'Something' of course could be either getting plowed regularly or actually painting, it made no difference to Gabriel which it was. Either one would surely make Hummel a much easier person to know, he decided. Now he had to know what was going on. He grabbed Lizzie's hand and picked up his pace, suddenly eager to eavesdrop rather than barge in.
Just as they approached the door, the two artists heard a loud crash and outcry from the studio. Lizzie clutched at Rossetti's arm. "Gabriel! That sounded like Kurt!"
It had indeed. "Shh." Gabriel waved her quiet, though he too felt some alarm. That had sounded like rather a violent sort of encounter. Was Anderson in fact some sort of brigand? The floppy haired Bohemian hadn't really struck him as such but, as Rossetti was frequently informed, it wasn't as if he himself had any room to judge another person's character.
Lizzie was tugging at his arm, a pleading look on her face as she pointed up towards the door. Clearly she wanted him to do something, and really, he wasn't entirely opposed to the idea. He wanted to help his protegé if he were in trouble, especially since he would have rather indirectly caused said trouble by introducing Hummel to Anderson. On the other hand, he was only human. Human, with a strong sense of self-preservation. Rossetti paused, considering what precisely to do.
In the end, curiosity and concern won out, and he pressed his finger to his lips, glancing at Lizzie, who nodded. They began to make their way up the stairs again, avoiding the creaky step near the top. To their surprise, the studio door was open the tiniest crack, and to their alarm, the commotion inside of it was getting louder and more urgent. Leaning carefully, Gabriel and Lizzie peered cautiously through the crack in the door - only to be utterly startled by the sight that greeted them.
It certainly wasn't an assault, or if it was...Hummel wasn't objecting. Not in the slightest.
All the air left Kurt's lungs in a rush as Blaine tackled him against the wall of the studio, pinning his wrists against the peeling, faded floral wallpaper. He claimed Kurt's mouth in a brutal, desperate kiss that pulled needy whines from Kurt's throat. "Clothing, why do we have to wear clothing," he muttered between kisses, his own breath coming in heaving groans. "It just...gets...in the...way..."
Kurt pulled his wrists from Blaine's grip so that he could tug his lover's cravat and collar loose. "Mustn't shock...society," he mumbled, yanking the blue silk free and beginning to tear at the buttons of Blaine's shirt. "Would be...scandal."
"God, I don't care, I don't care, I just want to fuck you senseless," Blaine groaned, pressing up hard so that Kurt couldn't miss the hot swelling of his erect cock against Kurt's thigh, even through their trousers. He yanked Kurt's waistcoat and braces right off and tossed them aside. "Four days in Cornwall with my family, might as well have been four days in Purgatory."
“I missed you,” Kurt gasped, and immediately wished that he had refrained. It wasn't that he hadn't missed Blaine - he had, like an abruptly vanished limb or a sudden loss of sight - but he was trying not to get too close, trying to not let his heart fall into Blaine's hands. He could not afford to; they had begun work on Apollo And His Lyre in earnest, Kurt had laid down the first layers of paint while Blaine was gone, and each brushstroke was a tick of the clock closer to what Kurt was sure would have to be the end.
Once the painting was done, there would be no reason for them to spend time together. Blaine would surely depart his life as mercurially as he had entered it, leaving Kurt Hummel a whole new person as an artist and a man...but without Blaine. He could hardly bear to contemplate the thought.
Kurt shoved aside the stormclouds in his mind and tore Blaine's shirt away, fusing their mouths back together in a kiss as desperate as it was incendiary. He let his fingers slide through Blaine's curls, gripping tight until a moan spilled from Blaine's lips into Kurt's, broken and helpless.
“Need you, now,” he mumbled, ripping at the fly of Kurt's trousers and yanking them down and off so quickly that Kurt hardly had time to kick off the slippers on his feet. They fumbled and grasped and pulled at each other's clothing until it was scattered around the studio like discarded flowers and nothing came between them at all, flushed skin to flushed skin, Blaine's fingers digging into Kurt's buttocks while his knuckles scraped against the wall.
“Turn,” came the order, and Kurt obeyed, knowing to place his palms flat against the wall and breathe deeply to calm his racing heart. The pop of a cork from a glass vial sent shivers of anticipation rattling down his spine seconds before Blaine's oil-slick fingers began to press deep and slow into the most private area of Kurt's body. Kurt tipped his head back to give voice to a low, guttural groan that seemed to wind its way up from the very tips of his toes.
There was a delicious ache and burn to the slow prelude of stretching that was nearly as pleasurable as what it preceded - almost, for as nimble and clever as Blaine's fingers were, Kurt had found that they did not compare at all to being utterly and completely filled by the thick bulk of his cock. This was a delight they'd slowly worked up to in the weeks they'd spent together, each tantalizing step more of a tease than the last as it burned away the shredding fibers of Kurt's uncertainty. But worth it, so entirely and unregrettably worth it.
The first time Blaine had seated himself fully inside of Kurt in this way had rendered both of them breathless and still as they tried to comprehend the closeness and intimacy of the moment. They had stared at each other, wide-eyed in mutual surprise - until Blaine had begun to rock his hips, to slowly move inside of Kurt, and they both began to fall to pieces together. It had been a moment that branded itself indelibly on Kurt's mind, heart, and possibly even his very soul.
Tonight, however, was proving to be a far less contemplative exercise. “Do you know how secure that wall sconce is?” Blaine asked urgently, his breath hot against the back of Kurt's neck as he worked his fingers into his lover with care.
Blinking dazedly, Kurt peered up at the sconce in question. “I have...oh...” He swallowed and squirmed as Blaine's fingertips brushed against a particularly pleasurable spot inside his body, and his concentration crumbled quite to bits for a moment. “I have...no idea...”
“Best if you don't grab onto it, then,” came the advice as Blaine spun him back around and pressed a quick hard kiss to Kurt's lips before seizing his thighs in an iron grip. “On three, then - one, two...”
At three, Kurt braced his back against the wall, ignoring the bits of peeling paper that dug into his skin in favor of enjoying the sensation of being hoisted up so that he could wrap his legs around Blaine's waist. “Are you quite ready for this?” Blaine queried, a broad grin on his face and mischief in his eyes as his slippery cock nudged insouciantly against its desired point of entry. “It is, ah, a lot to take in.”
Kurt groaned again, this time more in aggravation at the joke than pleasure, but he tightened his arms around Blaine's neck all the same. “Blaine, this is not a time for jokes.”
“No, it's not,” Blaine agreed, his voice suddenly gone husky and dark, and before Kurt could say anything more, he was being lowered gently down onto the hot thickness of Blaine's erection, the fat head easing slowly into his greedy, eager, wanting body that swallowed it in inch by gratifyingly filling inch.
Neither man was aware of the presence of Lizzie and Gabriel in the hallway, their curious eyes pinned to the tableau unfolding in the studio. Lizzie in particular was wide-eyed in avaricious interest, her breath coming a bit harshly as she pressed up against Gabriel's side. “Never did I know that it could be like this for two men,” she whispered breathlessly, hips shifting against Gabriel's leg.
“Something you've thought about often, then?” Rossetti arched an eyebrow at his companion, observing how the creamy swell of her bosom lifted with her quickening breaths, how her green eyes grew dark as her pupils widened. This was a Lizzie he hadn't seen before, but the more amoral and sensualistic side of his nature was appreciative of it indeed. Carefully, as quietly as he could - not that Kurt or Blaine would have noticed if he'd made an unholy racket, so absorbed were they in each other, their gasps and moans accompanied by the staccato thump of Kurt's back against the wall - he guided Lizzie to stand so that she had an unimpeded view through the cracked open doorway. A lovely, miniscule gasp escaped her parted lips at whatever she saw there, and then another as Gabriel pressed up against her back, twitched a fold of her skirts up, and slid his hand underneath.
Her hair caught him in the face as she whipped her head around to gaze at him, startled. “What are you doing?”
“Shh. The house matron never comes up here if she can help it, you saw the size of her.” Before Lizzie could object to the slur on the poor woman's figure, Gabriel slipped his fingers into the open seam of her knickers, smirking in satisfaction to find her already damp. She stirred against his probing hand as he whispered into her ear. “If you can stand to keep quiet and still, this can be managed and no one besides us need ever know.”
He could tell that Lizzie's mind was warring between propriety and desire, the fear of being caught conflicting with her rising arousal. He also knew that since his fingers were already slipping against the folds of her womanhood, against the nub that never failed to elicit sweet cries of ecstasy, that the battle for sexual gratification was already won, it was merely a matter of letting it play out. “No one comes up here, Lizzie. It's one of Hummel's favorite things about the place...no one bothers him, no one will bother us...I can do all I like to you while you watch and we shall not be disturbed.” He flexed his fingers against her and she leaned back, biting her lip. “You need only remain silent, remain quite still...”
When Lizzie relaxed and turned her head back to peep through the cracked door once again, he knew she'd come to the same conclusion and he was free to pleasure her while she kept up her surreptitious spying on Kurt and Blaine. Dropping silently to his knees, Rossetti crawled beneath her skirts and spread open the cream colored linen of her knickers, exposing the thatch of ginger curls nestled between her pale thighs.
In another moment he had his mouth upon her and his tongue at work. Overhead, quiet sighs whimpered out of Lizzie's throat, muffled by the hand she was holding over her lips - and he knew she continued to watch even as he licked and sucked at the tart, wet warmth of her center and set her legs a-tremble.
All unknowing of what lay just outside his door, in the studio Kurt's world was focused with an iron concentration on the arm wrapped around his waist, the cock that stretched and filled and thrust within him. Blaine was pressing scorching, wet kisses to his neck even as he pushed hard into Kurt, hums of pleasure vibrating warm against Kurt's skin. Between them, Kurt's hard member was jostled and slapped occasionally against Blaine's abdomen. Droplets of his seed that were slowly leaking from the tip would drip free to stick to Blaine's skin, glittering in the firelight as they dried in sticky streaks there.
As amazingly satisfying as every sensation washing through his body felt, Kurt still felt achingly close yet so far away from climax, for he dared not wrap his hand around his straining cock - dared not let go his grip on Blaine's neck as his lover pounded into him. He loved this, loved the feeling of being possessed and used and held close and of passively taking Blaine apart piece by piece, but he wanted to touch himself so badly, wanted Blaine to watch him touching himself while being fucked on Blaine's cock.
Kurt bit his lip. He felt so close, so hard and wanting but it was just - there - out of reach - but Blaine felt so good and when he threw back his head, blowing out a breath to shift his black curls away from where they dipped over his dark honeyed eyes, Kurt felt that he could live quite blissfully for a very long time in the wanton, melting into pleasure expression on his face, in the heated music of his desirous growl, in the fine sheen of sweat gleaming on his brow.
He wished he could draw Blaine in this moment.
“Hold tight,” Blaine's voice rasped harshly in his ear, and with no more warning than that Kurt was peeled away from the wall and swung about to have his backside perched on the nearby table at which they so frequently ate. In fact a sturdy pottery mug and the remnants of Kurt's dinner still sat upon its surface, only to be swept out of the way by Blaine's arm just before Kurt found himself laid out and Blaine, who had never pulled himself free, hitched Kurt's knees over his shoulders and shoved his hips forward to drive himself far, far more deeply into Kurt than their angle against the wall had allowed, tearing a noisy shout of agonized pleasure from Kurt's mouth before he even knew what was happening.
“Wanted...wanted to see you...touch...” Blaine gasped, eyes pleading as he gazed down at Kurt. “Please...”
His goal suddenly within reach thanks to his clever, considerate, salacious lover, Kurt wasted no time in sucking all of his fingers wet and slick and wrapping them around his cock, a sigh of happy relief wafting out of his lungs as he pulled at the velvety heft. Blaine seemed to not know where to look, his eyes darting between Kurt's stroking hand and Kurt's face in equal time as he almost helplessly drilled his hips in relentless rhythm into Kurt's body, over and over, the head of his cock brushing and nudging against the little spot that caused Kurt to writhe in bliss, driving him ever closer to the edge.
Under the shelter of Lizzie's skirts in the hallway, Rossetti now had two fingers stroking lazily into his lover as his tongue kept up its task, pressing and brushing over the slippery little nub that he held gently captive in his lips. Her muffled cries were still covered by the rhythmic slap of skin on skin and the guttural groans from the men in the studio, yet still were audible to Gabriel even under layers of petticoat and skirt. Lizzie's arousal at the sight of Kurt and Blaine copulating was in its turn arousing Rossetti, and his own erection strained tight against the fastenings of his trousers. He rubbed his free hand over it to ease it a bit, not caring to take himself out and stroke to climax - he wanted to take Lizzie directly home after this, hang having a night out, he needed to bury himself inside of her for many hours as they could possibly stand.
A strong, slender hand shot down and pressed his face into the wet warmth of Lizzie's center as she gasped sharply and bent nearly double. Sweet creamy liquid flooded over his tongue and his hair was gripped tightly while her inner walls contracted around his questing fingers. Tiny gasps that descended in intensity spilled in hiccups from her mouth until at last, Lizzie pulled away and slumped quietly to the floor. Gabriel licked his fingers clean and smiled at her, lifting an inquisitive eyebrow. “So. You enjoyed that?”
“Not as much as they are,” came the breathless reply, and indeed, it sounded as though things were reaching a much more intense and desperate climax inside of the studio.
On the table, Kurt pulled his legs free and scissored them around Blaine's waist, arresting the other man's movement in its tracks. Blaine almost whined in frustration. “Kurt...!”
“Kiss me, oh God, kiss me,” Kurt babbled, his hand stroking his cock with increasing speed. He was so close now and he just wanted -
Blaine's tongue came invading into his mouth, as possessive as it ever and always was, with its unmistakable message that he was staking a claim. He bit down firmly on Kurt's lower lip, tugging it a little and sucking hard on it before thrusting his tongue in again and again as if making up for the movement that his hips could no longer produce. Kurt held one hand at the back of Blaine's neck, the other frantically working his cock over, so close so close so - oh God Blaine's hand came down to join his and he -
Heat ignited and shot through him as he went over, his legs tightening so convulsively around Blaine that they drew the other man's member fully back into Kurt's body and the sudden movement coupled with heated kissing and the sticky warmth of Kurt's orgasm over their stomachs and joined hands seemed to pull Blaine with him, the heat of his seed flooding inside of Kurt while they traded delirious groans into each other's mouths. Blaine's hips snapped and jerked as best they could, clasped as they were in the iron grip of Kurt's legs.
They pitched and arched with the lightning of their shared moment, still joined at lower body and hand and mouth as they began to come down, sweat cooling and drying on their skin and desperate, unnameable emotions beginning to twist Kurt's heart.
“I don't know whether to depart from London more often or never leave you again,” Blaine mumbled into Kurt's neck as he slumped over, apparently unwilling to pull himself entirely free just yet. “I loathe to be parted from you for even a moment, yet the possibility of another reunion such as this nearly tempts me to take you again, were I not already spent.” He lifted his head a bit to wink and brush his fingertips over Kurt's swollen mouth. Impulsively, Kurt let his tongue dart out to lick over Blaine's hand, tasting the salt of sweat and traces of his own semen there. A broken moan stumbled from Blaine's lips, his head dropping with a sigh to rest on Kurt's chest - and, impossibly, it felt as if Blaine were beginning to stir within him again.
“God, if you could only see yourself. You're the most ethereal, sensual creature alive, Kurt Hummel.” Kisses were trailed up Kurt's chest and neck until their lips met once more, slower and less desperately urgent than the ones that had begun their evening. “A man could be tempted into such sins and delights with but a look from you.”
As Blaine's sweet words tangled Kurt hopelessly into something he thought achingly might be very like love, Lizzie and Gabriel got to their feet on the stairwell and began to steal away, suddenly feeling oddly as though things had gotten much too intimate for them to intrude upon any longer.
...Chapter Seven...
Media: Fic
Author: GlassParade
Rating: PG-13 to NC-17
Pairing: Kurt Hummel and Blaine Anderson
Genre: AU, Historical Romance
Spoilers: This is fully AU. No show spoilers, but I do try to keep characterizations somewhat consistent with show canon. Characters who are not from Glee are actual historical figures and the depictions of them are based loosely on those in the BBC miniseries 'Desperate Romantics'.
Word Count: 23,000+
Summary: In Victorian England, Kurt Hummel is a struggling artist and contemporary of the Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, an organization of painters, poets, and critics who strive to turn the art establishment of England on its very head. His mentor, one Dante Gabriel Rossetti, has grown tired of Kurt's reluctance to grow as an artist, and so enter Blaine Anderson, an artists' model of Bohemian disposition and eye-catching good looks. Can he, using rather unorthodox methods, succeed where Rossetti has not?
Additional Notes: I wanted to write something that was wholly un-angsty, a bit historical, but not as involved as 'Velvet Petals' or its upcoming sequel. And so I thought I'd spend hiatus on this bit of fluff. Love to aubreyli and gameboycolor for always being willing to read sneak previews and make me feel like I might be okay at this stuff.
In the greenhouse studio, Rossetti slumped into his favorite chair and sighed loudly.
Lizzie ignored him, her tongue flicking out to lick at her lips as she squinted at the sketchbook she held. She was concentrating very hard on the fruit bowl before her, working on her perspective.
He tried again, heaving an even larger sigh and making conspicuous amounts of noise shifting about.
Nothing. Lizzie sketched on, frowning at the blameless green pear sitting in her bowl. She reached out and twitched it over an infinitesimal distance to the left. Nibbling at her lower lip, she picked up her charcoal stick and resumed working, not paying a single whit of attention to him.
Clearly, more drastic measures would be required.
Five seconds later, an outcry rang through the studio and Lizzie brought her sketchbook swinging down hard on Rossetti's head where it was abruptly burrowed beneath her skirts. “Gabriel! What has gotten into you?”
“I'm bored,” he whined, emerging with an aggrieved expression on his face while he rubbed his aching head. “I want to go out, Lizzie. We've not been to the Gardens in ever so long, we've been holed up in here working and not having any fun at all.”
“Well, I thought last night was rather a lot of fun myself,” she retorted, but relented when she saw his pout. Leaning down, she kissed him fondly and cupped his cheek. “Poor Gabriel. All work and no play, hm?” She tilted her head up and looked thoughtful, considering their options. “You have gotten paid for that last commission you did, and I have a bit of money from Papa...I suppose we could afford it. Why not?”
“Excellent!” Rossetti hopped to his feet and snatched up his greatcoat. “Let's be off, before you change your mind.”
Setting her book and charcoal carefully aside, Lizzie got up and thumped the dust from her skirts. “Do you know, we've not seen Kurt in a rather long time,” she mused, moving to wash her hands. “Perhaps we ought to stop by and coax him to come out with us.”
Rossetti rolled his eyes. “Must we?”
“It would be nice.” Casting a reproachful glance over her shoulder, Lizzie dried her hands and picked up her hat, fitting it carefully over her hair. “He is our friend and your student. It behooves us to see him from time to time, and drag him out if he's being a bit of a hermit.” A smile brightened her face. “Perhaps he's working and that's why we've not seen him! We should see what he's working on, Gabriel, we really should.”
“More likely he's holed up in his rooms rocking back and forth whilst sobbing in despair over his virginity,” Gabriel grumbled, still wishing to go directly to the pleasure gardens. Lizzie reached over and flicked her fingers at the brim of his hat, knocking it askew.
“For that, you can stand him drinks at the Gardens,” she chided, swinging a cloak over her shoulders against the chill of the night. “It's unkind thing to say, for shame, Gabriel.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Yet I do not hear you denying that it is a legitimate possibility.”
Lizzie's face went as red as her hair. “It's still unkind!”
They bickered cheerily on the long walk to Kurt's lodgings, a distance of perhaps a mile or so from Rossetti's greenhouse studio. The imposing building Kurt lived in had actually belonged to his father before he passed on, and while Kurt had inherited it, he couldn't afford to keep all of it for his own use, so he'd made an arrangement that turned it into a sort of rooming house on the lower two floors. He, in turn, got to keep the third floor garret for his own use on the strict proviso that the woman who ran the lodgings below never bothered him for any reason. This she was happy to do, since it afforded her an excellent income with no bother from the actual landlord, who took only as much as he needed to get by, and only rarely at that. She didn't think much of the guests he received, but it wasn't her place to say anything, so she never did.
Thus it was that Lizzie and Rossetti found themselves let into the house by the taciturn matron, who gestured them up the stairs with nary a word before disappearing back into her own little set of rooms. They'd been here a number of times before, and so felt comfortable with simply skipping up the numerous steps to Kurt's garret to let themselves in. All of the Brotherhood were accustomed to barging in on each other at all hours for any reason they could think of. They were, after all, a Brotherhood.
The steps were steep and the climb an exhausting one - the sort of climb that made one long to turn back at the halfway point, except that it was the halfway point, so the trip oughtn't be wasted. Gabriel muttered grumpy curses under his breath as they trudged endlessly upwards, ignoring Lizzie's chiding glances.
As the pair made their way up the last rickety stretch of stairs, they became aware of voices in the studio. One was absolutely Kurt; the other Gabriel recognized as Blaine Anderson. Really? he thought, amused. It was something of a late hour for anything but close friends. Could it actually be that against all odds, Hummel had indeed forged some sort of connection with the model and was working on something?
'Something' of course could be either getting plowed regularly or actually painting, it made no difference to Gabriel which it was. Either one would surely make Hummel a much easier person to know, he decided. Now he had to know what was going on. He grabbed Lizzie's hand and picked up his pace, suddenly eager to eavesdrop rather than barge in.
Just as they approached the door, the two artists heard a loud crash and outcry from the studio. Lizzie clutched at Rossetti's arm. "Gabriel! That sounded like Kurt!"
It had indeed. "Shh." Gabriel waved her quiet, though he too felt some alarm. That had sounded like rather a violent sort of encounter. Was Anderson in fact some sort of brigand? The floppy haired Bohemian hadn't really struck him as such but, as Rossetti was frequently informed, it wasn't as if he himself had any room to judge another person's character.
Lizzie was tugging at his arm, a pleading look on her face as she pointed up towards the door. Clearly she wanted him to do something, and really, he wasn't entirely opposed to the idea. He wanted to help his protegé if he were in trouble, especially since he would have rather indirectly caused said trouble by introducing Hummel to Anderson. On the other hand, he was only human. Human, with a strong sense of self-preservation. Rossetti paused, considering what precisely to do.
In the end, curiosity and concern won out, and he pressed his finger to his lips, glancing at Lizzie, who nodded. They began to make their way up the stairs again, avoiding the creaky step near the top. To their surprise, the studio door was open the tiniest crack, and to their alarm, the commotion inside of it was getting louder and more urgent. Leaning carefully, Gabriel and Lizzie peered cautiously through the crack in the door - only to be utterly startled by the sight that greeted them.
It certainly wasn't an assault, or if it was...Hummel wasn't objecting. Not in the slightest.
All the air left Kurt's lungs in a rush as Blaine tackled him against the wall of the studio, pinning his wrists against the peeling, faded floral wallpaper. He claimed Kurt's mouth in a brutal, desperate kiss that pulled needy whines from Kurt's throat. "Clothing, why do we have to wear clothing," he muttered between kisses, his own breath coming in heaving groans. "It just...gets...in the...way..."
Kurt pulled his wrists from Blaine's grip so that he could tug his lover's cravat and collar loose. "Mustn't shock...society," he mumbled, yanking the blue silk free and beginning to tear at the buttons of Blaine's shirt. "Would be...scandal."
"God, I don't care, I don't care, I just want to fuck you senseless," Blaine groaned, pressing up hard so that Kurt couldn't miss the hot swelling of his erect cock against Kurt's thigh, even through their trousers. He yanked Kurt's waistcoat and braces right off and tossed them aside. "Four days in Cornwall with my family, might as well have been four days in Purgatory."
“I missed you,” Kurt gasped, and immediately wished that he had refrained. It wasn't that he hadn't missed Blaine - he had, like an abruptly vanished limb or a sudden loss of sight - but he was trying not to get too close, trying to not let his heart fall into Blaine's hands. He could not afford to; they had begun work on Apollo And His Lyre in earnest, Kurt had laid down the first layers of paint while Blaine was gone, and each brushstroke was a tick of the clock closer to what Kurt was sure would have to be the end.
Once the painting was done, there would be no reason for them to spend time together. Blaine would surely depart his life as mercurially as he had entered it, leaving Kurt Hummel a whole new person as an artist and a man...but without Blaine. He could hardly bear to contemplate the thought.
Kurt shoved aside the stormclouds in his mind and tore Blaine's shirt away, fusing their mouths back together in a kiss as desperate as it was incendiary. He let his fingers slide through Blaine's curls, gripping tight until a moan spilled from Blaine's lips into Kurt's, broken and helpless.
“Need you, now,” he mumbled, ripping at the fly of Kurt's trousers and yanking them down and off so quickly that Kurt hardly had time to kick off the slippers on his feet. They fumbled and grasped and pulled at each other's clothing until it was scattered around the studio like discarded flowers and nothing came between them at all, flushed skin to flushed skin, Blaine's fingers digging into Kurt's buttocks while his knuckles scraped against the wall.
“Turn,” came the order, and Kurt obeyed, knowing to place his palms flat against the wall and breathe deeply to calm his racing heart. The pop of a cork from a glass vial sent shivers of anticipation rattling down his spine seconds before Blaine's oil-slick fingers began to press deep and slow into the most private area of Kurt's body. Kurt tipped his head back to give voice to a low, guttural groan that seemed to wind its way up from the very tips of his toes.
There was a delicious ache and burn to the slow prelude of stretching that was nearly as pleasurable as what it preceded - almost, for as nimble and clever as Blaine's fingers were, Kurt had found that they did not compare at all to being utterly and completely filled by the thick bulk of his cock. This was a delight they'd slowly worked up to in the weeks they'd spent together, each tantalizing step more of a tease than the last as it burned away the shredding fibers of Kurt's uncertainty. But worth it, so entirely and unregrettably worth it.
The first time Blaine had seated himself fully inside of Kurt in this way had rendered both of them breathless and still as they tried to comprehend the closeness and intimacy of the moment. They had stared at each other, wide-eyed in mutual surprise - until Blaine had begun to rock his hips, to slowly move inside of Kurt, and they both began to fall to pieces together. It had been a moment that branded itself indelibly on Kurt's mind, heart, and possibly even his very soul.
Tonight, however, was proving to be a far less contemplative exercise. “Do you know how secure that wall sconce is?” Blaine asked urgently, his breath hot against the back of Kurt's neck as he worked his fingers into his lover with care.
Blinking dazedly, Kurt peered up at the sconce in question. “I have...oh...” He swallowed and squirmed as Blaine's fingertips brushed against a particularly pleasurable spot inside his body, and his concentration crumbled quite to bits for a moment. “I have...no idea...”
“Best if you don't grab onto it, then,” came the advice as Blaine spun him back around and pressed a quick hard kiss to Kurt's lips before seizing his thighs in an iron grip. “On three, then - one, two...”
At three, Kurt braced his back against the wall, ignoring the bits of peeling paper that dug into his skin in favor of enjoying the sensation of being hoisted up so that he could wrap his legs around Blaine's waist. “Are you quite ready for this?” Blaine queried, a broad grin on his face and mischief in his eyes as his slippery cock nudged insouciantly against its desired point of entry. “It is, ah, a lot to take in.”
Kurt groaned again, this time more in aggravation at the joke than pleasure, but he tightened his arms around Blaine's neck all the same. “Blaine, this is not a time for jokes.”
“No, it's not,” Blaine agreed, his voice suddenly gone husky and dark, and before Kurt could say anything more, he was being lowered gently down onto the hot thickness of Blaine's erection, the fat head easing slowly into his greedy, eager, wanting body that swallowed it in inch by gratifyingly filling inch.
Neither man was aware of the presence of Lizzie and Gabriel in the hallway, their curious eyes pinned to the tableau unfolding in the studio. Lizzie in particular was wide-eyed in avaricious interest, her breath coming a bit harshly as she pressed up against Gabriel's side. “Never did I know that it could be like this for two men,” she whispered breathlessly, hips shifting against Gabriel's leg.
“Something you've thought about often, then?” Rossetti arched an eyebrow at his companion, observing how the creamy swell of her bosom lifted with her quickening breaths, how her green eyes grew dark as her pupils widened. This was a Lizzie he hadn't seen before, but the more amoral and sensualistic side of his nature was appreciative of it indeed. Carefully, as quietly as he could - not that Kurt or Blaine would have noticed if he'd made an unholy racket, so absorbed were they in each other, their gasps and moans accompanied by the staccato thump of Kurt's back against the wall - he guided Lizzie to stand so that she had an unimpeded view through the cracked open doorway. A lovely, miniscule gasp escaped her parted lips at whatever she saw there, and then another as Gabriel pressed up against her back, twitched a fold of her skirts up, and slid his hand underneath.
Her hair caught him in the face as she whipped her head around to gaze at him, startled. “What are you doing?”
“Shh. The house matron never comes up here if she can help it, you saw the size of her.” Before Lizzie could object to the slur on the poor woman's figure, Gabriel slipped his fingers into the open seam of her knickers, smirking in satisfaction to find her already damp. She stirred against his probing hand as he whispered into her ear. “If you can stand to keep quiet and still, this can be managed and no one besides us need ever know.”
He could tell that Lizzie's mind was warring between propriety and desire, the fear of being caught conflicting with her rising arousal. He also knew that since his fingers were already slipping against the folds of her womanhood, against the nub that never failed to elicit sweet cries of ecstasy, that the battle for sexual gratification was already won, it was merely a matter of letting it play out. “No one comes up here, Lizzie. It's one of Hummel's favorite things about the place...no one bothers him, no one will bother us...I can do all I like to you while you watch and we shall not be disturbed.” He flexed his fingers against her and she leaned back, biting her lip. “You need only remain silent, remain quite still...”
When Lizzie relaxed and turned her head back to peep through the cracked door once again, he knew she'd come to the same conclusion and he was free to pleasure her while she kept up her surreptitious spying on Kurt and Blaine. Dropping silently to his knees, Rossetti crawled beneath her skirts and spread open the cream colored linen of her knickers, exposing the thatch of ginger curls nestled between her pale thighs.
In another moment he had his mouth upon her and his tongue at work. Overhead, quiet sighs whimpered out of Lizzie's throat, muffled by the hand she was holding over her lips - and he knew she continued to watch even as he licked and sucked at the tart, wet warmth of her center and set her legs a-tremble.
All unknowing of what lay just outside his door, in the studio Kurt's world was focused with an iron concentration on the arm wrapped around his waist, the cock that stretched and filled and thrust within him. Blaine was pressing scorching, wet kisses to his neck even as he pushed hard into Kurt, hums of pleasure vibrating warm against Kurt's skin. Between them, Kurt's hard member was jostled and slapped occasionally against Blaine's abdomen. Droplets of his seed that were slowly leaking from the tip would drip free to stick to Blaine's skin, glittering in the firelight as they dried in sticky streaks there.
As amazingly satisfying as every sensation washing through his body felt, Kurt still felt achingly close yet so far away from climax, for he dared not wrap his hand around his straining cock - dared not let go his grip on Blaine's neck as his lover pounded into him. He loved this, loved the feeling of being possessed and used and held close and of passively taking Blaine apart piece by piece, but he wanted to touch himself so badly, wanted Blaine to watch him touching himself while being fucked on Blaine's cock.
Kurt bit his lip. He felt so close, so hard and wanting but it was just - there - out of reach - but Blaine felt so good and when he threw back his head, blowing out a breath to shift his black curls away from where they dipped over his dark honeyed eyes, Kurt felt that he could live quite blissfully for a very long time in the wanton, melting into pleasure expression on his face, in the heated music of his desirous growl, in the fine sheen of sweat gleaming on his brow.
He wished he could draw Blaine in this moment.
“Hold tight,” Blaine's voice rasped harshly in his ear, and with no more warning than that Kurt was peeled away from the wall and swung about to have his backside perched on the nearby table at which they so frequently ate. In fact a sturdy pottery mug and the remnants of Kurt's dinner still sat upon its surface, only to be swept out of the way by Blaine's arm just before Kurt found himself laid out and Blaine, who had never pulled himself free, hitched Kurt's knees over his shoulders and shoved his hips forward to drive himself far, far more deeply into Kurt than their angle against the wall had allowed, tearing a noisy shout of agonized pleasure from Kurt's mouth before he even knew what was happening.
“Wanted...wanted to see you...touch...” Blaine gasped, eyes pleading as he gazed down at Kurt. “Please...”
His goal suddenly within reach thanks to his clever, considerate, salacious lover, Kurt wasted no time in sucking all of his fingers wet and slick and wrapping them around his cock, a sigh of happy relief wafting out of his lungs as he pulled at the velvety heft. Blaine seemed to not know where to look, his eyes darting between Kurt's stroking hand and Kurt's face in equal time as he almost helplessly drilled his hips in relentless rhythm into Kurt's body, over and over, the head of his cock brushing and nudging against the little spot that caused Kurt to writhe in bliss, driving him ever closer to the edge.
Under the shelter of Lizzie's skirts in the hallway, Rossetti now had two fingers stroking lazily into his lover as his tongue kept up its task, pressing and brushing over the slippery little nub that he held gently captive in his lips. Her muffled cries were still covered by the rhythmic slap of skin on skin and the guttural groans from the men in the studio, yet still were audible to Gabriel even under layers of petticoat and skirt. Lizzie's arousal at the sight of Kurt and Blaine copulating was in its turn arousing Rossetti, and his own erection strained tight against the fastenings of his trousers. He rubbed his free hand over it to ease it a bit, not caring to take himself out and stroke to climax - he wanted to take Lizzie directly home after this, hang having a night out, he needed to bury himself inside of her for many hours as they could possibly stand.
A strong, slender hand shot down and pressed his face into the wet warmth of Lizzie's center as she gasped sharply and bent nearly double. Sweet creamy liquid flooded over his tongue and his hair was gripped tightly while her inner walls contracted around his questing fingers. Tiny gasps that descended in intensity spilled in hiccups from her mouth until at last, Lizzie pulled away and slumped quietly to the floor. Gabriel licked his fingers clean and smiled at her, lifting an inquisitive eyebrow. “So. You enjoyed that?”
“Not as much as they are,” came the breathless reply, and indeed, it sounded as though things were reaching a much more intense and desperate climax inside of the studio.
On the table, Kurt pulled his legs free and scissored them around Blaine's waist, arresting the other man's movement in its tracks. Blaine almost whined in frustration. “Kurt...!”
“Kiss me, oh God, kiss me,” Kurt babbled, his hand stroking his cock with increasing speed. He was so close now and he just wanted -
Blaine's tongue came invading into his mouth, as possessive as it ever and always was, with its unmistakable message that he was staking a claim. He bit down firmly on Kurt's lower lip, tugging it a little and sucking hard on it before thrusting his tongue in again and again as if making up for the movement that his hips could no longer produce. Kurt held one hand at the back of Blaine's neck, the other frantically working his cock over, so close so close so - oh God Blaine's hand came down to join his and he -
Heat ignited and shot through him as he went over, his legs tightening so convulsively around Blaine that they drew the other man's member fully back into Kurt's body and the sudden movement coupled with heated kissing and the sticky warmth of Kurt's orgasm over their stomachs and joined hands seemed to pull Blaine with him, the heat of his seed flooding inside of Kurt while they traded delirious groans into each other's mouths. Blaine's hips snapped and jerked as best they could, clasped as they were in the iron grip of Kurt's legs.
They pitched and arched with the lightning of their shared moment, still joined at lower body and hand and mouth as they began to come down, sweat cooling and drying on their skin and desperate, unnameable emotions beginning to twist Kurt's heart.
“I don't know whether to depart from London more often or never leave you again,” Blaine mumbled into Kurt's neck as he slumped over, apparently unwilling to pull himself entirely free just yet. “I loathe to be parted from you for even a moment, yet the possibility of another reunion such as this nearly tempts me to take you again, were I not already spent.” He lifted his head a bit to wink and brush his fingertips over Kurt's swollen mouth. Impulsively, Kurt let his tongue dart out to lick over Blaine's hand, tasting the salt of sweat and traces of his own semen there. A broken moan stumbled from Blaine's lips, his head dropping with a sigh to rest on Kurt's chest - and, impossibly, it felt as if Blaine were beginning to stir within him again.
“God, if you could only see yourself. You're the most ethereal, sensual creature alive, Kurt Hummel.” Kisses were trailed up Kurt's chest and neck until their lips met once more, slower and less desperately urgent than the ones that had begun their evening. “A man could be tempted into such sins and delights with but a look from you.”
As Blaine's sweet words tangled Kurt hopelessly into something he thought achingly might be very like love, Lizzie and Gabriel got to their feet on the stairwell and began to steal away, suddenly feeling oddly as though things had gotten much too intimate for them to intrude upon any longer.
...Chapter Seven...