It'll End in Tears #22: "And Here Thy Hunters Stand"
Have I mentioned recently that I'm not dead?
Title: "And Here Thy Hunters Stand"
Disclaimer: Being a bloke who likes to slash pretty men doesn't make me RTD, I don't work for the BBC, and as much as I might like to, I don't own Jack or Ianto or any part of Torchwood. I do, however, order pizza under that name on principle.
Pairings: Overall: Ianto/Andy, Jack/Ianto, Jack/Ianto/Andy, with occasional guest cameos.
Rating: Series ranges from relatively safe to hard NC-17. This installment is in the NC-17 range for language, smut, and kink (masturbation, imagined D/s).
Notes/Summary: Part #22 of the " It'll End In Tears" cluster, and #20 on the un_love_you prompt table. Covers the same timeframe as #21. Thanks to sanginmychains and resourceress for giving this the sweet, sweet beta-fu. This one's been a long time coming, not least because the time between mid-July and early September this year basically kicked my ass. Thank you all for being patient with me.
Thursday
Ianto stares past the ghost of his face in the glass. Cardiff’s streets whiz past, speckled in lights as Jack drives them away from Andy’s flat in Roath. Jack’s reflection bobs in and out of sight, blue and faint, a pale smudge hovering in the background. The only sounds are the engine and thrum of the road.
He rests his head against the glass and closes his eyes, but it makes him queasy. Jack is not a gentle driver.
When the SUV’s engine stops he sits up and rubs his face a little. It seems like one of them should say something, but Jack is watching him in the darkness of the passenger compartment with an expression he can’t even begin to read. That’s reason enough for Ianto to pull the door handle and slide barefoot onto the pavement.
Jack follows him up, and it’s Jack’s keys that get them in, what with Ianto’s being in one of the bin bags in the back of the SUV with his clothes and everything else. It’s Jack who turns on the lights and locks the door and checks the blinds while Ianto makes for the bedroom with Jack’s coat clutched tight around his body. When Jack finds him there, standing in the dark, Ianto finds he isn’t sure where, or even if to start.
“One in eighty bloody thousand and it had to be him,” he says eventually, without looking up. “We never really addressed the Retcon thing much beyond hypotheticals about spontaneous assimilation and long-term denial. Maybe that’s why it’s so effective. Even in a potential trigger scenario, people have a real talent for self-deception. Apparently.” Ianto lets out a mirthless laugh and toys with the cuff of Jack’s coat. The tightness in his throat and chest feels like iron bands. The palms of his hands ache, and when he finally meets Jack’s eyes, they’re unreadable and far away.
With shaking hands, Ianto unbuttons the coat and curses the awkwardness of the buttons. He feels like he’s using someone else’s hands. When he starts to shrug free, Jack reaches out to lift it off his shoulders. Ianto gives him a tight half smile in thanks and pulls a dresser drawer open. He pulls the first t-shirt he finds on over his head and smoothes it down before opening up a second drawer for some underwear.
Jack just watches.
Ianto steps into his shorts and tugs them up, then grabs a pair of jeans out of the hamper and puts them on. He’s dressing too fast and he knows it, but Jack won’t stop watching him with that horrible blank expression. With a sigh of resignation he pushes past Jack and makes a beeline for the bathroom. He needs to wash his hands and his face and -
“How long did you know, Ianto?”
He freezes. Jack knows him too well and can read his tells; he can probably see the guilt plastered all over Ianto’s face from a hundred paces. The nausea from the SUV returns with a vengeance as Jack crosses his arms and leans against the doorframe, cornering him in the bathroom.
“What did you think would happen?” Jack asks coolly, the anger and hurt already bleeding to the fore. “Were you hoping I’d welcome him into the fold? ‘Gee, Andy, looks like you’re just too clever to be in the dark about Torchwood forever! Good job!’ We’ve already got a cop on the team in case you hadn’t noticed.”
“How could I not? You certainly like to give that matter your full attention,” Ianto snaps before he can stop himself. “How’s your little campaign to give Gwen Cooper her normal life while making it painfully clear to the world at large that you’re just dying to nail her to the nearest workstation? Any progress I should know about?”
Jack’s eyebrows shoot up. “Excuse me?”
“I’m not blind, Jack, and I’m not stupid.” Ianto’s hands close into fists. He’s found his rhythm, now, and his rage, and a bundle of hurt that suddenly feels all too applicable. After all, Gwen remembered too. Jack should have known. Jack could have stopped all of this. “If you weren’t so in love with the idea that her outside relationships make her better than the rest of us, you’d be having her with your morning coffee. As it stands, you do a fine job taking your frustrations out on me.”
“That’s funny. I don’t seem to remember you complaining.”
“Why would I?” Ianto scoffed. “Aside from the part where I’m a consolation prize -“
“If I wanted Gwen,” Jack growls and pushes Ianto hard up against the tile of his bathroom wall. “I would damn well have her. Oh, and I’ll bet you can hardly imagine all the ways I’d have her.”
Ianto snorts. “You are so fucking full of yourself.”
“Is that a challenge?”
“No, it’s not. Unlike some people in this room, I don’t need to destroy someone else for my own validation.” Ianto shoves his way out of Jack’s grip and storms out of the bathroom to the kitchen. He grabs a glass out of the dish drainer and puts it under the tap. It’s only when he fills his glass that he realizes Jack hasn’t followed him. “What’s wrong?” he shouts and steps out to look down the hall where he finds Jack looking gobsmacked. “Too close for comfort?”
Jack chews his lip and glares at the carpet. “Is that what you really think? About me? Us? That I’m using you? That I like to hurt the people I care about?”
Ianto opens his mouth and closes it again, unsure of what to say.
“Sometimes I wonder if you really want to know who I am,” Jack says. “I feel like you’ve made up a million stories about me, and none of them are good. And sometimes, I think you’d rather believe those stories than me.”
“Of course I do,” Ianto says. “You don’t exactly make it easy, Jack. You hide things from us, spy on us. You drop hints and tell impossible stories to keep us off-balance. Some days I don’t think you could give a straight answer if you tried. I fill in the blanks as best I can, even though I know I’m probably wrong more than I’m right, but what else am I supposed to do? You want to know if that’s what I think about ‘us’ but half the time I’m left wondering if you even exist. Nevermind the fact that when you came back you…well, you’re different. We’re different -”
“You want to go back to the way it was?” Jack asks, surprised.
“No,” Ianto tells him with a shake of his head. “God no. I just think sometimes you forget that you don’t have to keep every single bloody thing about your life a secret. I’m not fucking you because you’re dashing and mysterious. I’m fucking you because I like what I see, and because after everything you’re still willing to give me a second look.”
Jack snorts. “So I’m interesting because I’m both pretty and stupid. Thanks a lot.”
“You’ve missed out stubborn,” Ianto says and rolls his eyes. “But no, I don’t think you’re stupid. If anyone in this room is winning for stupid, it’s me.”
“Well, you’re not exactly speaking from the moral high ground at the moment,” Jack points out, mostly without rancor. “This is twice now you’ve hidden things from me. Not just from me, but from Torchwood, too. Care to explain why we’re not past the lying and backstabbing phase of our personal and professional relationships?”
Ianto sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “It wasn’t my intention to keep you out of the loop, Jack, but you’d have Retconned him straight out of the gate if you knew he was presenting symptoms. Just little doses, to reprogram him, but you know how risky that is. I was looking for an alternative, or hoping I could prove he was processing without remembering.” He puts his glass down and leans back against the wall with his thumbs in his pockets. “Who knows? Maybe this is how it was all supposed to end.”
“Don’t cheapen this with platitudes, Ianto.”
Ianto shoots a glare at Jack. “Well how else could it have fucking gone in the long run? If not now, when, right? If this is what happens when I try to be a human being, what does that make me? What does that say about us, Jack?” He slams his fists into the plaster and storms into the living room. The tears burn his eyes as he cries. He hates that he’s weeping - that he always seems to break down like this, like a bloody child - but when Jack embraces him, Ianto leans into him for comfort anyway.
“I’m a bastard. A bastard and a fool and I could have gotten Andy killed tonight.”
“Yeah,” Jack says softly into his hair. “You could have.”
“I suppose I should be grateful for your forbearance.”
Jack says nothing, and Ianto can feel him tense just a little. He looks up, worried that he’s said something else to make this worse. Instead, Jack kisses him on the forehead, just above his right temple. Ianto closes his eyes.
“So,” Jack murmurs against his ear, “on a scale of one to ten for worst break-up -“
Ianto lets out a sharp, bitter little laugh. “This isn’t a break-up, Jack. Break-ups are where people throw dishes and shout ‘I hate you, you bitch’ and storm out and feel shit about it after. I’m not sure there’s a word for this.”
“Discipline,” Jack offers. “Collateral damage.”
“Rubbish,” Ianto adds as he steps away and wipes his eyes.
“Take tomorrow off,” Jack tells him, and reaches out to touch his shoulder. “Saturday, too, if you need it. I’ll bring you dinner if the weevils don’t get me first. Get some rest. I’ll take care of things.”
Ianto gives Jack a little nod of assent and lets himself be pulled into a close hug. He notices that strange, faint trace of toothpaste again when they kiss, but Ianto’s not sure he’s quite ready to ask about that after everything else tonight. “Bring me my keys and things back, too. Just because they happened to be on the scene doesn’t make them evidence.”
“Do they have to be clean?” Jack asks and gives Ianto a filthy grin. Ianto groans.
“I swear, you think of nothing but sex.”
“You love it.”
“There are rewards,” Ianto admits, “but if you ruin my wallet by having sex with it, there will be consequences. Now get out of my flat.”
Jack gives Ianto’s hand a squeeze and then leaves. Ianto locks the door behind him and looks around the living room. His eyes search the room for any traces of Andy, but Ianto is too fastidious; not even the bedding will smell like him.
Ianto goes to his sofa, where it all began. He sinks down heavily into the cushions and sobs.
Friday
He sleeps through the morning and well into the afternoon. He doesn’t entirely intend to keep rolling over and closing his eyes, but he’s tired. Furthermore, he’s entitled. By the time he rolls off of the sofa (which he doesn’t remember falling asleep on, but doesn’t really have any urge to leave other than to have a piss around 10 AM) he’s muzzy and stiff all over.
Ah yes. This would be why I have a bed.
The light in his bathroom looks a little bit surreal as he goes through a stripped-down version of his morning routine. The sting of hot water against his skin is enough to make him moan. He squirts a bit of shampoo into his palm and lathers it up a little in his hands before scrubbing his hair and scalp with his fingers. He doesn’t rush. The day is his, after all. He rinses the suds out and massages conditioner into its place.
I’m washing the last of him off my skin, Ianto realizes with a jolt, and looks down at the drain as if it might somehow show him something worth hanging on to. When it doesn’t, he rinses the conditioner out of his hair and tries not to think about the number of times he’d sent Andy here to clean himself up, or the way he’d always wanted to press Andy against the tiles and...
Ianto closes his eyes and rests his back against the shower wall. His throat’s gone all tight again and he’s angry and hurt, but he can imagine Andy’s skin, slick and wet under the pelt of the shower’s spray. He licks the inside of his forearm and imagines that it’s Andy’s back, and that he’s pressing against him.
With one eye open, Ianto grabs for the conditioner. He slicks up his fist and closes his eyes again, and imagines the way he’d push and slide against Andy’s arse while pinning him against the gleaming ceramic of his shower. Mine he’d say. All mine. My whore. My beautiful fucktoy. And then Andy, bless him, would say Yours and Yes and Please while Ianto bit hard into his shoulder or opened him up with his fingers.
“Oh god,” he groans, and squeezes as he imagines pushing himself inside. He can feel the clutch of Andy’s muscles as they tense and then slowly relax around him, accepting his cock. When Ianto is sure he’s ready, he eases out just slightly, and then pushes in deeper. The sounds Andy makes are pure lust and pure submission as Ianto fucks him. He can feel it when Andy starts humping the tile in a desperate bid for satisfaction, and the way he tightens when he’s getting close.
Not yet, not yet, I’m not done with you.
Because now that he knows that Andy’s close, Ianto can do what he likes. He can grab Andy’s hips and plow into him hard and desperate, make him cry out like a man possessed. Mine, he’d say again, and with the means to make it true by claiming him and taking his pleasure out on Andy’s willing body. Ianto knows Andy will wait on that edge until he says, until he gives instruction and permission to -
“Come. Oh god, oh god come,” he shouts as he spasms into his hand, eyes closed tight, and jerks furiously into the shower’s spray. He’s shaking, and his breath comes in shuddering gasps.
Ianto grits his teeth in disgust as he rinses himself clean, and then turns the shower head to rinse away what's left of the evidence.
So much for good boys, he thinks as he turns off the taps.
Saturday
Ianto goes to work Saturday in spite of Jack’s insistence that he doesn’t need to.
“You’re already whining about the coffee,” Ianto points out, “and there’s no way I’m waiting for someone to get desperate enough to try the machine.”
Really, he’s glad to be at work. He’s also glad to have his wallet and keys and telephone, all apparently unmolested. He teasingly gives Jack a new packet of bleach wipes, “because I’m sure you depleted your supply while I was out.”
Jack laughs and kisses him on the mouth for it, even though Tosh is already at her workstation and could probably see them if she tried. Ianto doesn’t much mind. Things feel normal. Well, as normal as Torchwood ever gets. It’s only when he goes upstairs that he notices the out-of-date What’s On pamphlets and thinks of Andy’s teasing.
Ianto spends the afternoon figuring out how to get new ones. Not just for the Millennium Centre, but for St. Fagans, Cardiff Castle, Margam Country Park, and everything else within easy driving distance of Cardiff except for Castell Coch, which he’d prefer not to think about, and if Andy has to forget about it, why can't he? When he finishes, he checks the specifications on the incinerator, and wonders if there’s anything Owen might need to burn. The old pamphlets, he thinks, will have to go.
Wednesday
They’re in an alley between two warehouses when Ianto finally asks about the toothpaste.
“What toothpaste?” Jack asks, still focused on his wrist strap as he tries to pinpoint the weevil they’ve been tracking for an hour.
“Thursday night,” Ianto tells him. “When you left my flat, you tasted of toothpaste.”
Jack shrugs. “No idea.”
Ianto would press the issue, but the clatter of garbage bins confirms the weevil’s location, and Jack tears off in that direction. Ianto runs after him, spray and stun-gun at the ready. Oral hygiene, and questions pertaining to same, can wait.
Thursday
“I’ve got something of yours,” Jack calls down to him from the catwalk. Ianto looks up at him, surprised. There’d been no sound in the Hub for the last hour, and Ianto had assumed that Jack had better things to do than watch him clear away files and coffee mugs.
“If it’s in your trousers -”
Jack grins. “Excellent guess, actually.”
“-tell it I’m working,” Ianto finishes with a smirk. He’s hiding hurt, of course, and a little bit of anger. Thursdays weren’t Jack days. Well, with Andy around, at least. Jack really ought to know better. Then again, Jack is Jack. Propriety isn’t his strong suit.
Still, Ianto looks on with amusement as Jack clambers down the metal steps from the hothouse level.
“It’ll only take a minute,” Jack says. “Indulge me. I think you’re going to want it.”
Ianto rolls his eyes and sets his tray down, then crosses his arms and leans against the post of Gwen’s workstation. “Should I take off my jacket? Loosen my tie?”
“Tempting,” Jack says with a chuckle as he hops off of the final step and onto the floor. “But unnecessary. Give me your hand.”
Bemused, Ianto complies. “I swear, Jack, your games get more and more baroque as -”
Jack presses something into Ianto’s palm and squeezes his hand. “This is yours. There’s no sense in me keeping it, or Torchwood keeping it. I mean, technically we could, but I don’t think that’s fair.” Jack releases his hand, pats his shoulder, and walks toward his office, leaving Ianto to look down in surprise at what he’s been given.
It’s a dark brown leather strap with snap fasteners.
---
Prev (Pt #21) (Warnings: language, smut, and kink [porn, masturbation, imagined D/s])
-
Next (Pt #23) (Warnings: language & smut)
Title: "And Here Thy Hunters Stand"
Disclaimer: Being a bloke who likes to slash pretty men doesn't make me RTD, I don't work for the BBC, and as much as I might like to, I don't own Jack or Ianto or any part of Torchwood. I do, however, order pizza under that name on principle.
Pairings: Overall: Ianto/Andy, Jack/Ianto, Jack/Ianto/Andy, with occasional guest cameos.
Rating: Series ranges from relatively safe to hard NC-17. This installment is in the NC-17 range for language, smut, and kink (masturbation, imagined D/s).
Notes/Summary: Part #22 of the " It'll End In Tears" cluster, and #20 on the un_love_you prompt table. Covers the same timeframe as #21. Thanks to sanginmychains and resourceress for giving this the sweet, sweet beta-fu. This one's been a long time coming, not least because the time between mid-July and early September this year basically kicked my ass. Thank you all for being patient with me.
Thursday
Ianto stares past the ghost of his face in the glass. Cardiff’s streets whiz past, speckled in lights as Jack drives them away from Andy’s flat in Roath. Jack’s reflection bobs in and out of sight, blue and faint, a pale smudge hovering in the background. The only sounds are the engine and thrum of the road.
He rests his head against the glass and closes his eyes, but it makes him queasy. Jack is not a gentle driver.
When the SUV’s engine stops he sits up and rubs his face a little. It seems like one of them should say something, but Jack is watching him in the darkness of the passenger compartment with an expression he can’t even begin to read. That’s reason enough for Ianto to pull the door handle and slide barefoot onto the pavement.
Jack follows him up, and it’s Jack’s keys that get them in, what with Ianto’s being in one of the bin bags in the back of the SUV with his clothes and everything else. It’s Jack who turns on the lights and locks the door and checks the blinds while Ianto makes for the bedroom with Jack’s coat clutched tight around his body. When Jack finds him there, standing in the dark, Ianto finds he isn’t sure where, or even if to start.
“One in eighty bloody thousand and it had to be him,” he says eventually, without looking up. “We never really addressed the Retcon thing much beyond hypotheticals about spontaneous assimilation and long-term denial. Maybe that’s why it’s so effective. Even in a potential trigger scenario, people have a real talent for self-deception. Apparently.” Ianto lets out a mirthless laugh and toys with the cuff of Jack’s coat. The tightness in his throat and chest feels like iron bands. The palms of his hands ache, and when he finally meets Jack’s eyes, they’re unreadable and far away.
With shaking hands, Ianto unbuttons the coat and curses the awkwardness of the buttons. He feels like he’s using someone else’s hands. When he starts to shrug free, Jack reaches out to lift it off his shoulders. Ianto gives him a tight half smile in thanks and pulls a dresser drawer open. He pulls the first t-shirt he finds on over his head and smoothes it down before opening up a second drawer for some underwear.
Jack just watches.
Ianto steps into his shorts and tugs them up, then grabs a pair of jeans out of the hamper and puts them on. He’s dressing too fast and he knows it, but Jack won’t stop watching him with that horrible blank expression. With a sigh of resignation he pushes past Jack and makes a beeline for the bathroom. He needs to wash his hands and his face and -
“How long did you know, Ianto?”
He freezes. Jack knows him too well and can read his tells; he can probably see the guilt plastered all over Ianto’s face from a hundred paces. The nausea from the SUV returns with a vengeance as Jack crosses his arms and leans against the doorframe, cornering him in the bathroom.
“What did you think would happen?” Jack asks coolly, the anger and hurt already bleeding to the fore. “Were you hoping I’d welcome him into the fold? ‘Gee, Andy, looks like you’re just too clever to be in the dark about Torchwood forever! Good job!’ We’ve already got a cop on the team in case you hadn’t noticed.”
“How could I not? You certainly like to give that matter your full attention,” Ianto snaps before he can stop himself. “How’s your little campaign to give Gwen Cooper her normal life while making it painfully clear to the world at large that you’re just dying to nail her to the nearest workstation? Any progress I should know about?”
Jack’s eyebrows shoot up. “Excuse me?”
“I’m not blind, Jack, and I’m not stupid.” Ianto’s hands close into fists. He’s found his rhythm, now, and his rage, and a bundle of hurt that suddenly feels all too applicable. After all, Gwen remembered too. Jack should have known. Jack could have stopped all of this. “If you weren’t so in love with the idea that her outside relationships make her better than the rest of us, you’d be having her with your morning coffee. As it stands, you do a fine job taking your frustrations out on me.”
“That’s funny. I don’t seem to remember you complaining.”
“Why would I?” Ianto scoffed. “Aside from the part where I’m a consolation prize -“
“If I wanted Gwen,” Jack growls and pushes Ianto hard up against the tile of his bathroom wall. “I would damn well have her. Oh, and I’ll bet you can hardly imagine all the ways I’d have her.”
Ianto snorts. “You are so fucking full of yourself.”
“Is that a challenge?”
“No, it’s not. Unlike some people in this room, I don’t need to destroy someone else for my own validation.” Ianto shoves his way out of Jack’s grip and storms out of the bathroom to the kitchen. He grabs a glass out of the dish drainer and puts it under the tap. It’s only when he fills his glass that he realizes Jack hasn’t followed him. “What’s wrong?” he shouts and steps out to look down the hall where he finds Jack looking gobsmacked. “Too close for comfort?”
Jack chews his lip and glares at the carpet. “Is that what you really think? About me? Us? That I’m using you? That I like to hurt the people I care about?”
Ianto opens his mouth and closes it again, unsure of what to say.
“Sometimes I wonder if you really want to know who I am,” Jack says. “I feel like you’ve made up a million stories about me, and none of them are good. And sometimes, I think you’d rather believe those stories than me.”
“Of course I do,” Ianto says. “You don’t exactly make it easy, Jack. You hide things from us, spy on us. You drop hints and tell impossible stories to keep us off-balance. Some days I don’t think you could give a straight answer if you tried. I fill in the blanks as best I can, even though I know I’m probably wrong more than I’m right, but what else am I supposed to do? You want to know if that’s what I think about ‘us’ but half the time I’m left wondering if you even exist. Nevermind the fact that when you came back you…well, you’re different. We’re different -”
“You want to go back to the way it was?” Jack asks, surprised.
“No,” Ianto tells him with a shake of his head. “God no. I just think sometimes you forget that you don’t have to keep every single bloody thing about your life a secret. I’m not fucking you because you’re dashing and mysterious. I’m fucking you because I like what I see, and because after everything you’re still willing to give me a second look.”
Jack snorts. “So I’m interesting because I’m both pretty and stupid. Thanks a lot.”
“You’ve missed out stubborn,” Ianto says and rolls his eyes. “But no, I don’t think you’re stupid. If anyone in this room is winning for stupid, it’s me.”
“Well, you’re not exactly speaking from the moral high ground at the moment,” Jack points out, mostly without rancor. “This is twice now you’ve hidden things from me. Not just from me, but from Torchwood, too. Care to explain why we’re not past the lying and backstabbing phase of our personal and professional relationships?”
Ianto sighs and pinches the bridge of his nose. “It wasn’t my intention to keep you out of the loop, Jack, but you’d have Retconned him straight out of the gate if you knew he was presenting symptoms. Just little doses, to reprogram him, but you know how risky that is. I was looking for an alternative, or hoping I could prove he was processing without remembering.” He puts his glass down and leans back against the wall with his thumbs in his pockets. “Who knows? Maybe this is how it was all supposed to end.”
“Don’t cheapen this with platitudes, Ianto.”
Ianto shoots a glare at Jack. “Well how else could it have fucking gone in the long run? If not now, when, right? If this is what happens when I try to be a human being, what does that make me? What does that say about us, Jack?” He slams his fists into the plaster and storms into the living room. The tears burn his eyes as he cries. He hates that he’s weeping - that he always seems to break down like this, like a bloody child - but when Jack embraces him, Ianto leans into him for comfort anyway.
“I’m a bastard. A bastard and a fool and I could have gotten Andy killed tonight.”
“Yeah,” Jack says softly into his hair. “You could have.”
“I suppose I should be grateful for your forbearance.”
Jack says nothing, and Ianto can feel him tense just a little. He looks up, worried that he’s said something else to make this worse. Instead, Jack kisses him on the forehead, just above his right temple. Ianto closes his eyes.
“So,” Jack murmurs against his ear, “on a scale of one to ten for worst break-up -“
Ianto lets out a sharp, bitter little laugh. “This isn’t a break-up, Jack. Break-ups are where people throw dishes and shout ‘I hate you, you bitch’ and storm out and feel shit about it after. I’m not sure there’s a word for this.”
“Discipline,” Jack offers. “Collateral damage.”
“Rubbish,” Ianto adds as he steps away and wipes his eyes.
“Take tomorrow off,” Jack tells him, and reaches out to touch his shoulder. “Saturday, too, if you need it. I’ll bring you dinner if the weevils don’t get me first. Get some rest. I’ll take care of things.”
Ianto gives Jack a little nod of assent and lets himself be pulled into a close hug. He notices that strange, faint trace of toothpaste again when they kiss, but Ianto’s not sure he’s quite ready to ask about that after everything else tonight. “Bring me my keys and things back, too. Just because they happened to be on the scene doesn’t make them evidence.”
“Do they have to be clean?” Jack asks and gives Ianto a filthy grin. Ianto groans.
“I swear, you think of nothing but sex.”
“You love it.”
“There are rewards,” Ianto admits, “but if you ruin my wallet by having sex with it, there will be consequences. Now get out of my flat.”
Jack gives Ianto’s hand a squeeze and then leaves. Ianto locks the door behind him and looks around the living room. His eyes search the room for any traces of Andy, but Ianto is too fastidious; not even the bedding will smell like him.
Ianto goes to his sofa, where it all began. He sinks down heavily into the cushions and sobs.
Friday
He sleeps through the morning and well into the afternoon. He doesn’t entirely intend to keep rolling over and closing his eyes, but he’s tired. Furthermore, he’s entitled. By the time he rolls off of the sofa (which he doesn’t remember falling asleep on, but doesn’t really have any urge to leave other than to have a piss around 10 AM) he’s muzzy and stiff all over.
Ah yes. This would be why I have a bed.
The light in his bathroom looks a little bit surreal as he goes through a stripped-down version of his morning routine. The sting of hot water against his skin is enough to make him moan. He squirts a bit of shampoo into his palm and lathers it up a little in his hands before scrubbing his hair and scalp with his fingers. He doesn’t rush. The day is his, after all. He rinses the suds out and massages conditioner into its place.
I’m washing the last of him off my skin, Ianto realizes with a jolt, and looks down at the drain as if it might somehow show him something worth hanging on to. When it doesn’t, he rinses the conditioner out of his hair and tries not to think about the number of times he’d sent Andy here to clean himself up, or the way he’d always wanted to press Andy against the tiles and...
Ianto closes his eyes and rests his back against the shower wall. His throat’s gone all tight again and he’s angry and hurt, but he can imagine Andy’s skin, slick and wet under the pelt of the shower’s spray. He licks the inside of his forearm and imagines that it’s Andy’s back, and that he’s pressing against him.
With one eye open, Ianto grabs for the conditioner. He slicks up his fist and closes his eyes again, and imagines the way he’d push and slide against Andy’s arse while pinning him against the gleaming ceramic of his shower. Mine he’d say. All mine. My whore. My beautiful fucktoy. And then Andy, bless him, would say Yours and Yes and Please while Ianto bit hard into his shoulder or opened him up with his fingers.
“Oh god,” he groans, and squeezes as he imagines pushing himself inside. He can feel the clutch of Andy’s muscles as they tense and then slowly relax around him, accepting his cock. When Ianto is sure he’s ready, he eases out just slightly, and then pushes in deeper. The sounds Andy makes are pure lust and pure submission as Ianto fucks him. He can feel it when Andy starts humping the tile in a desperate bid for satisfaction, and the way he tightens when he’s getting close.
Not yet, not yet, I’m not done with you.
Because now that he knows that Andy’s close, Ianto can do what he likes. He can grab Andy’s hips and plow into him hard and desperate, make him cry out like a man possessed. Mine, he’d say again, and with the means to make it true by claiming him and taking his pleasure out on Andy’s willing body. Ianto knows Andy will wait on that edge until he says, until he gives instruction and permission to -
“Come. Oh god, oh god come,” he shouts as he spasms into his hand, eyes closed tight, and jerks furiously into the shower’s spray. He’s shaking, and his breath comes in shuddering gasps.
Ianto grits his teeth in disgust as he rinses himself clean, and then turns the shower head to rinse away what's left of the evidence.
So much for good boys, he thinks as he turns off the taps.
Saturday
Ianto goes to work Saturday in spite of Jack’s insistence that he doesn’t need to.
“You’re already whining about the coffee,” Ianto points out, “and there’s no way I’m waiting for someone to get desperate enough to try the machine.”
Really, he’s glad to be at work. He’s also glad to have his wallet and keys and telephone, all apparently unmolested. He teasingly gives Jack a new packet of bleach wipes, “because I’m sure you depleted your supply while I was out.”
Jack laughs and kisses him on the mouth for it, even though Tosh is already at her workstation and could probably see them if she tried. Ianto doesn’t much mind. Things feel normal. Well, as normal as Torchwood ever gets. It’s only when he goes upstairs that he notices the out-of-date What’s On pamphlets and thinks of Andy’s teasing.
Ianto spends the afternoon figuring out how to get new ones. Not just for the Millennium Centre, but for St. Fagans, Cardiff Castle, Margam Country Park, and everything else within easy driving distance of Cardiff except for Castell Coch, which he’d prefer not to think about, and if Andy has to forget about it, why can't he? When he finishes, he checks the specifications on the incinerator, and wonders if there’s anything Owen might need to burn. The old pamphlets, he thinks, will have to go.
Wednesday
They’re in an alley between two warehouses when Ianto finally asks about the toothpaste.
“What toothpaste?” Jack asks, still focused on his wrist strap as he tries to pinpoint the weevil they’ve been tracking for an hour.
“Thursday night,” Ianto tells him. “When you left my flat, you tasted of toothpaste.”
Jack shrugs. “No idea.”
Ianto would press the issue, but the clatter of garbage bins confirms the weevil’s location, and Jack tears off in that direction. Ianto runs after him, spray and stun-gun at the ready. Oral hygiene, and questions pertaining to same, can wait.
Thursday
“I’ve got something of yours,” Jack calls down to him from the catwalk. Ianto looks up at him, surprised. There’d been no sound in the Hub for the last hour, and Ianto had assumed that Jack had better things to do than watch him clear away files and coffee mugs.
“If it’s in your trousers -”
Jack grins. “Excellent guess, actually.”
“-tell it I’m working,” Ianto finishes with a smirk. He’s hiding hurt, of course, and a little bit of anger. Thursdays weren’t Jack days. Well, with Andy around, at least. Jack really ought to know better. Then again, Jack is Jack. Propriety isn’t his strong suit.
Still, Ianto looks on with amusement as Jack clambers down the metal steps from the hothouse level.
“It’ll only take a minute,” Jack says. “Indulge me. I think you’re going to want it.”
Ianto rolls his eyes and sets his tray down, then crosses his arms and leans against the post of Gwen’s workstation. “Should I take off my jacket? Loosen my tie?”
“Tempting,” Jack says with a chuckle as he hops off of the final step and onto the floor. “But unnecessary. Give me your hand.”
Bemused, Ianto complies. “I swear, Jack, your games get more and more baroque as -”
Jack presses something into Ianto’s palm and squeezes his hand. “This is yours. There’s no sense in me keeping it, or Torchwood keeping it. I mean, technically we could, but I don’t think that’s fair.” Jack releases his hand, pats his shoulder, and walks toward his office, leaving Ianto to look down in surprise at what he’s been given.
It’s a dark brown leather strap with snap fasteners.
---
Prev (Pt #21) (Warnings: language, smut, and kink [porn, masturbation, imagined D/s])
-
Next (Pt #23) (Warnings: language & smut)