Crime and Passion 9/10
Chapter Nine
If it had been up to Brendon, he probably wouldn’t have spent as much time sleeping as he had been doing. As far as he knew, they’d been staying with Andy, Joe and the Butcher for about three days and Brendon had spent most of that time unconscious. Granted, he wasn’t the only one. Pete, Patrick and Ryan had reportedly been sleeping a lot, too and Brendon was glad. They all kind of needed it. He was jealous though. Chances were the three of them had seen worse things in their line of work. After what Brendon had been through, sleeping was a terrifying prospect.
Every time he shut his eyes, phantom gunshots jerked them open again until he was so exhausted he slipped into sleep that was plagued with nightmares. He didn’t wake up screaming, thank God, but there was always cold sweat involved, and rattling breaths in his chest that dissolved into whimpers when he exhaled. He was miserable and wished his body weren’t still recovering so that he could just . . . try and stay awake. He didn’t usually have a problem with that. One cup of coffee could keep him going for hours.
On the fourth day, Brendon actually managed to stay awake for eight straight hours. It was more boring than he’d expected. He spent most of that time with Patrick, whose eyes were no longer ringed with dark circles, talking or playing games or something, anything, to pass the time. Pete haunted the rooms, careful not to step on anyone’s toes since he wasn’t exactly popular with anyone. As far as Brendon knew, Ryan was the only one who would willingly talk to Pete without acting any differently toward him than before.
Andy, Joe and the Butcher were everywhere and nowhere. Butcher was usually around whenever the pain got bad with a pill or an aspirin (he was slowly weaning Brendon off of the pain meds). Joe was usually around with food of some kind, and some form of entertainment. Andy took care of everything else, spoke in hushed voices with Patrick often and Ryan sometimes. He’d tried talking to Brendon once, asked him if he had anywhere that they could help him get to. Brendon’s terse answer in the negative had been enough to make him back off.
“Well, don’t worry about it, you can stay here.”
It wasn’t that Brendon didn’t have family. But for one thing they were all in Vegas where fuck only knew what was going on. The Ways were possibly still at large and if they weren’t, Flowers probably was and even if he wasn’t, the feds had to be looking everywhere for them all. He didn’t want to put anyone in danger if he could help it. For another, much as he didn’t think his parents would turn him away if he did go to them for help, he just didn’t want to. He didn’t want for them to tell him to his face that they’d known this would happen, he didn’t want to hear that he was being punished for his lifestyle choices, he couldn’t deal with it.
He tried hard not to think about it, but in the many lulls of the day, the hours between extended naps or the quiet minutes between moves on a checker board, he couldn’t help it.
The only thing that really served to distract Brendon from this was Ryan’s constant presence. Ryan didn’t necessarily have to say anything, but Brendon could feel him watching all the time. It wasn’t all that different from before, except that the eyes on the back of his neck felt different. Brendon remembered, every time he looked over at Ryan, what he’d said about needing to save Brendon for some reason other than duty. It was entirely possible that Ryan really did care. Hell, Brendon knew it now. After everything it was pretty obvious that Ryan gave a shit.
Over the last three days Ryan hadn’t left Brendon’s side more than he could help it. Usually he was just in the same room but a couple of times he’d taken a seat close enough to Brendon to touch and more than a few times Brendon had woken up to see Ryan either watching him sleep or sleeping himself in that chair by his bed. They talked a little. When Patrick was busy or sleeping and Brendon and Ryan were both awake they kept each other company. It was awkward at first, but by the fourth day it was easy.
Maybe it was too easy because it had taken exactly three days, most of which Brendon had spent asleep, for him to fall for Ryan fucking Ross. He didn’t even know how it had happened, it just had and all of a sudden he was excited to talk to Ryan and there was something warm that expanded inside of him whenever he woke up and the first thing he saw was Ryan. It was ridiculous and maybe a little pathetic and probably not actually all that sudden. Brendon had been attracted to Ryan since that first week of knowing him. Sure he was skinny and androgynous and not exactly Brendon’s usual type, but there was something there that Brendon couldn’t put his finger on, something that had drawn him in from the beginning and that had only gotten stronger since he’d been rescued.
In part, Brendon wanted to blame some misplaced sense of thanks for this. He knew that wasn’t accurate, though. This was all about Brendon and Ryan and yeah, maybe Ryan’s saving him had something to do with it, but it wasn’t the reason.
Brendon sighed, watching as Patrick studied the checker board carefully. He was so, so utterly fucked.
_._
The problem with setting up a routine so quickly was that usually it changed just as fast. Two days of managing to stay awake for longer periods of time and two days with all aspirin instead of aspirin and pain meds and Brendon was getting a little complacent. He was sitting with Ryan on the sofa in the den, leaning carefully and lightly against him (because they were friendly but physical openness wasn’t part of it yet, not exactly) when his new routine was upset.
“I think we can get you on your way to Chicago by tomorrow,” Andy said, walking into the den.
Brendon and Ryan both looked up just as Patrick and Pete walked in from somewhere else.
“Yeah?” Ryan said, sitting up a little straighter and jostling Brendon in the process.
Andy nodded. “I talked to some of the people we’ve got out there and someone’s supposed to be passing through here sometime tomorrow afternoon. They’ll drive you all the way to Chicago, take you straight to Tom and then you guys can arrange for whatever you need to do after that.”
Ryan nodded and Brendon looked at him, feeling shell-shocked and maybe a little abandoned. He couldn’t really say why except that it had been him and Ryan for over a month. Brendon didn’t think of himself as belonging to anyone but there was a part of him that had begun to think of himself as Ryan’s anyway. Ryan’s . . . something. Ryan’s person to not be left behind at the very least.
“Okay,” Ryan said. “That sounds good.”
Andy smiled and then looked at Brendon who blinked back at him. “I told you not to worry,” he said, misinterpreting Brendon’s expression. “We’ll figure something out for you soon.”
Brendon forced himself to nod but he couldn’t really help but imagine himself stuck here forever. It wouldn’t be bad or anything. Brendon got along with Joe and he liked Andy and the Butcher but this wasn’t the kind of life Brendon wanted. He wanted to be with people who honestly cared about him. And somewhere in the last few days those people had been narrowed down to Patrick and Ryan (and Pete, probably, but Brendon wasn’t ready to think about that yet).
Ryan looked over at him and Brendon stood up abruptly.
“I’m tired,” he said, before retreating to his room.
He’d barely flopped onto his bed, ready to sulk and have a mental freak out when his door opened and Ryan walked in after one short knock.
“You okay?” he asked.
Brendon shrugged and looked away. “I’m fine,” he said, before sighing and turning to glare at Ryan. “You’re seriously just going to leave?”
“You knew I was going back to Chicago,” Ryan said, his voice hitting that monotone it got whenever he was hesitant about something.
This was true. Brendon had known for days that the plan was to get Ryan to Chicago but he’d been thinking it would take a while, not what felt like a handful of hours.
“Are you really leaving tomorrow?” Brendon asked, not sure what to say.
Ryan shrugged and looked away. “Yeah. I want to get back. I miss it. I miss my friends.”
It was silly but that hurt a little and Brendon nodded, feeling more like a burden than he’d felt in a while. Ryan had been forced to watch him, to keep him safe, had lost his job because of him and now that none of that was a factor, he was free to go back to his life. He could forget Brendon had ever existed if he wanted to. He probably would.
“Okay,” Brendon said simply, turning his back to Ryan. “You should let Pete and Patrick know. I’ll talk to you later.”
He closed his eyes and listened for the door to open and close again but it didn’t. Instead Ryan took in audible breath and said, “Brendon. Why don’t you come with me?”
Brendon flipped over onto his back and sat up. “What?”
Ryan shrugged but looked dead serious and said, “I mean it. You could come with me, if you want. Unless you’ve got plans or somewhere else to go.”
That was a pretty ridiculous statement. Obviously Brendon didn’t. He opened his mouth to say yes and then hesitated. It was kind of a big step. Even if he didn’t want Ryan to leave, he wasn’t sure if he was willing to go with him. That was kind of permanent. And how did Brendon know Ryan wasn’t just doing it out of obligation?
“I don’t. I’ll think about it,” he said.
Ryan blinked and then his features went blank and he nodded. “Okay.”
He left this time, closing the door behind him. Brendon stared at his hands for a long time and spent the rest of the night considering his options.
_._
Brendon wasn’t sure what he was doing wasn’t an absolute suicide mission, but he couldn’t help it. It had been hours, hours he’d spent thinking about whether or not uprooting himself to another state entirely was a good idea, let alone doing so with someone he’d only known for a short time. Ryan and Brendon had nothing tying them together other than the last month’s worth of experiences and Brendon wasn’t sure that would be enough for . . . anything.
Chances were, he reasoned, Ryan would get tired of Brendon after a couple of days and just ditch him. And then Brendon would be back at square one only worse. He’d have to find a job and a place to stay and he wasn’t feeling up to actually dealing with people on his own, not yet. His last boss had been involved with the mafia, after all, one of his best friends was dead and her best friend had fled the country after fucking Brendon over. He had trust issues, not to mention the nightmares, the lack of sleep and the post-traumatic stress.
He couldn’t survive on his own. At least here he was guaranteed people who were sympathetic, along with a place to stay and three meals a day.
Which wasn’t to say he’d actually made a decision. His mind had been going nonstop and at some point he’d decided it would be a good idea to creep into Ryan’s room and . . . what? Seduce him? Watch him sleep? Brendon wasn’t even sure until he found himself kneeling next to the small bed.
Ryan slept on his stomach, his face turned toward Brendon, lips parted in sleep. The sight of him was too tempting to resist and Brendon, who was impulsive by nature even when he tried not to be, couldn’t keep his hand from reaching out to brush along the edge of Ryan’s jaw and trail up, over his ear and to the locks of hair falling across his forehead. Ryan’s eyelids fluttered and Brendon’s stomach seized up, but when Ryan saw him he didn’t punch him or so much as move a muscle, so Brendon let his fingers keep moving, over the bridge of Ryan’s nose, across his cheekbones to the dip between his chin and bottom lip.
“What are you doing?” Ryan asked when Brendon halted the sweep of his fingers over his face.
“Um,” Brendon said softly. “I’m not sure. But you’re leaving tomorrow and I want to do this so you should either punch me and tell me to fuck off or kiss me back.”
“So you’re not-”
“Nope,” Brendon said, placing a finger over Ryan’s lips. “Talking wasn’t an option.”
He leaned forward, angled his head just slightly, and kissed Ryan. It was his first kiss in a long time, possibly even since Audrey. Brendon didn’t get around much, didn’t actually want to, but he figured that no matter how long it had been he’d remember if he’d ever had a kiss like this. At first it was just a bold press of lips to lips, Ryan’s soft and moist from where he must have licked them when Brendon wasn’t looking. And then Brendon swept his tongue out, barely brushing it over Ryan’s bottom lip, and the kiss changed. Ryan made a small sound in his throat and surged up, crushing their lips harder together and meeting the next sweep of Brendon’s tongue with a lick of his own.
It wasn’t that this kiss was any different from other kisses, but the way Brendon felt, that was new. One flick of a tongue over his upper lip, one slide over the roof of his mouth, and his skin erupted in goosebumps and he could already feel arousal pooling low in his belly, his dick twitching in his borrowed pajama bottoms. Usually kisses could last for hours and Brendon would be hard after making out, but not painfully so. He wasn’t entirely sure that hours of kissing Ryan wouldn’t result in multiple orgasms. And that was very, very new.
They pulled apart, Ryan with a gasp, Brendon with a whine, and then Ryan was sitting up and tugging Brendon onto the bed with him. He ended up mostly in Ryan’s lap, his arms tangled around the other man’s waist. Ryan reached up with the hand that wasn’t splayed across the small of Brendon’s back and brushed his fingers over cheekbones decorated with barely-there bruises and healing cuts. Brendon shivered and leaned briefly into the touch before surging forward and capturing Ryan’s lips with his again.
They kissed deeply, tongues moving inside of each other’s mouths while their hands tugged at clothing. Ryan got Brendon’s shirt off first but Brendon had pulled Ryan’s off seconds later and then they were pressed together, skin rubbing against skin while Ryan’s lips moved over Brendon’s jaw to his throat. Brendon let his head fall back and sighed. Ryan kissed and licked the skin of Brendon’s throat, his teeth hesitantly scraping over the juncture between neck and shoulder. Brendon shivered and pulled him closer. Ryan’s lips parted and he sucked lightly at the skin of his shoulder before leaning up and pressing his lips to Brendon’s again.
Brendon was more turned on than he could ever remember being and he rolled his hips into Ryan’s. Their cocks brushed and then pressed together through the fabric of their pants and Brendon groaned into Ryan’s mouth. Fingertips brushed low over Brendon’s abdomen and he pulled out of the kiss to bite his lip and shake his head.
“Wait,” he whispered, pressing a quick kiss to the corner of Ryan’s mouth. “I want to blow you.”
Ryan exhaled gustily, a wash of hot air over Brendon’s jaw, but he moved his hand around to Brendon’s bare back again and hung on when Brendon kissed the long line of his throat. Brendon felt Ryan’s fingernails scraping over his shoulder blades as he licked over the other man’s Adam’s Apple and then kissed wetly down to the base of his throat where he suckled lightly. When he closed his teeth gently over Ryan’s collarbone, he was met with a small, breathy sound.
“You can bite,” Ryan said, voice deeper than Brendon had ever heard it.
And Brendon did. He bit down firmly, sucked the skin between his teeth and smiled when Ryan’s hips ground up into his restlessly. He soothed the spot with his tongue and then moved down, dragging his tongue along Ryan’s chest, pausing to roll one nipple between his teeth and slip his hand between Ryan’s legs at the same time. He palmed Ryan’s cock, hard and heavy, through his pajama pants and smiled against his stomach when Ryan whined and bucked his hips into Brendon’s grip.
It had been a while since he’d done this. Before Audrey had been his less than memorable attempt at a relationship with a local college student and before that had been no one, actually. A few kisses and fumbling hands in the backseat of a car but nothing remotely close to actual sex. Brendon was a little nervous as he hooked his fingers in the waistband of Ryan’s pants and underwear and tugged both off. He was good enough at giving head (his boyfriend had delayed breaking them up two weeks just for the blowjobs) but it had been a while.
Brendon pressed his lips to Ryan’s stomach, dipped his tongue into his navel and trailed down to bite lightly at his hip. And then, when he couldn’t drag it out any longer he wrapped his lips around the head of Ryan’s cock. Ryan inhaled sharply and audibly and then jerked when Brendon teased the underside with his tongue and sucked lightly. Brendon curled one hand around Ryan’s hip and wrapped the other around the base of Ryan’s cock before sliding his lips down and sucking back up.
Ryan’s dick was hard and heavy nestled against Brendon’s tongue and fuck but Brendon had forgotten how much he loved to do this. He pulled off, swirled his head around the tip and then ducked back down to envelope Ryan’s cock in his mouth. One of Ryan’s hands came down gently on the back of Brendon’s head, long fingers sifting through his hair and eliciting a purr that made Ryan’s hips twitch up. He was trying to be careful, Brendon could tell. He wasn’t pushing down or pushing his hips up and although it was considerate, Brendon wanted to drive him to that point, wanted Ryan to be a moaning, writhing mess with no control left.
He slid down farther this time and sucked up with a slow drag of lips and tongue. Ryan’s breath hitched and his grip tightened when Brendon did it again. When Brendon pulled off to suck lightly at the head, keeping his hand tight and mobile around the base of Ryan’s cock, he was answered with a moan, deep and guttural. The sound went straight to Brendon’s cock, made him harder (if that was even possible) and he groaned encouragement back. He bobbed his head back down, taking Ryan in as far as he could go.
It had been a while since Brendon had tried this and he definitely wasn’t prepared for it after being so out of practice. The tip of Ryan’s cock tapped the back of Brendon’s throat and he didn’t gag, but it was a near thing. Ryan’s fingers were tugging at Brendon’s hair and his breaths were more groans that exhalations of air. Brendon sucked sharply around Ryan’s cock.
“Brendon,” Ryan warned, tapping him restlessly on the shoulder once.
Brendon just smiled and sucked again and then again until Ryan’s hips arched off the bed and he came with a sound that dragged along Brendon’s insides. Brendon swallowed and let Ryan’s cock slip out his mouth. He pressed a kiss to Ryan’s hip and then felt himself being dragged upward.
“You’re coming with me,” Ryan said against his lips. “To Chicago. You’re coming with me.”
“How do you figure?” Brendon asked, groaning when Ryan bit down on his bottom lip and tugged lightly.
“Because,” he said back, pulling away and looking Brendon in the eye. “It’s crazy and reckless and right up my alley to take you with me.”
Brendon laughed and kissed Ryan’s chin. “You’ll hate me in two weeks. You’ll leave me on a street corner in some shitty part of town.”
“Or maybe,” Ryan said, licking into his mouth. “You’ll hate me and run away with somebody else.”
Ryan’s hand slid down Brendon’s stomach, calloused fingers dragging over the sensitive skin of his abs. Brendon inhaled sharply when that hand slipped under the waistband of his pants and those fingers closed around his cock.
“This is fucked up,” he breathed, tipping his head back and thrusting into the circle of Ryan’s fist.
“We’re fucked up,” Ryan told him, tightening his grip and jerking Brendon off faster.
“Mmmm, that’s . . . kind of perfect,” Brendon grated out.
Ryan leaned up and smiled against the skin of Brendon’s throat before parting his lips and licking at the skin there. There was a part of Brendon that realized the angle had to be awkward for Ryan but he wasn’t stopping and Brendon wasn’t going to ask him to. He was so close already, could feel his orgasm building and he was going to be done embarrassingly fast but he couldn’t bring himself to care. His hips jerked, moving in time with the quickening pace of Ryan’s fist. It was all hot, tight friction and Ryan was moaning encouragement into Brendon’s ear, a litany of come on, so hot, want to fuck you. Ryan slid his thumb over the head, jerked down and then back up and Brendon’s orgasm hit.
He bit his lip around a high-pitched noise, felt Ryan’s hand coaxing him through the orgasm, felt Ryan’s mouth sucking sharply on the skin of his neck. Brendon shook and forgot, for a moment, how to breathe. When he came down, Ryan was pulling his hand from Brendon’s pants and leaning up on his elbows to kiss the underside of Brendon’s jaw. Brendon tipped his head down and kissed Ryan slowly, moving his tongue in the other man’s mouth and moaning when Ryan suckled lightly.
“I don’t know,” Brendon said breathlessly when they pulled away. “This is all so sudden.”
Ryan snorted. “You’re the one who crawled into bed with me,” he pointed out.
Brendon shrugged and moved from Ryan’s lap, hesitating a moment before sliding down to lie next to him. “I only realized three days ago that you’re actually kind of loveable, Ross,” he said, tilting his head and smiling crookedly at Ryan. “That’s the very definition of sudden.”
Ryan turned his head and raised his eyebrows. “Yeah well, I had maybe a week on you,” he shot back and Brendon chuckled.
They stared at each other for a few moments and then Brendon blew out a breath and wormed closer. He nestled into the curve of Ryan’s body, tucking his head against the taller man’s shoulder, smiling when Ryan pulled him in tighter.
“Is it nice in Chicago?” Brendon asked.
Ryan played with the hairs on the back of Brendon’s neck and nodded. “Yeah, you’ll like it.”
There was no guarantee Brendon wasn’t making a huge mistake, but he was post-coital and Ryan was a good cuddler. There wasn’t much Brendon would have been willing to say no to at that moment, and besides, why not take a chance? It wasn’t like things could go any worse for him than they already had. He closed his eyes and tapped a finger against Ryan’s sternum.
“Okay,” he said.
Ryan was quiet for a moment and then he whispered, “Okay.”
_._
It was hot. Not that Brendon wasn’t used to the heat after growing up in Vegas, but there was some kind of heat wave going on in this part of the country and he was dying. He was glad when they pulled into a small gas station just off of I-80 in the middle of Iowa because he needed some ice or something. And possibly something sweet.
This was their second day on the road. They were traveling in a beat-up old van with faulty air-conditioning, uncomfortable seats and a radio that could never seem to decide when it wanted to work and when it didn’t. This was the furthest away from Vegas that Brendon had ever been, though, and the excitement was usually enough to keep him from minding the conditions too much. But the heat was a killer, more than enough to put Brendon in a frame of mind that was beginning to hate road trips. Ryan seemed to be handling it marginally better. He’d been lent a book by Christine, one of their travel companions, and couldn’t seem to put it down.
“Okay, everybody out and back in five,” Nate said, putting the van in park and getting out to fill the gas tank.
Christine, Brendon and Ryan all followed him out, the three of them walking into the blessedly air conditioned convenience store. Christine and Brendon headed straight for the snack food. She lifted her blonde hair off of the back of her neck and squinted at the potato chips.
“I need salt,” she said. “Sodium. Oh God, Sour Cream and Onion.”
Brendon chuckled at the small sound of excitement she made, already feeling better now that he wasn’t stuck outside in the hot van.
“I should get Nate something,” she said thoughtfully, tapping her fingers on her hip.
Brendon liked Christine and Nate both. They weren’t that much older than Brendon was and they were friendly and funny. Ryan seemed to like them, too, and there could have been worse people to travel halfway across the country with. Apparently both Nate and Christine were frequent roommates with Tom, though Christine was going to continue on to New York after they stopped in Chicago. They’d explained a little of what it would be like for the first couple of months in the city. It was going to involve a lot of hiding and staying off the radar completely, but Brendon thought he could handle that.
It would be a nice change.
Brendon was debating between Twinkies and Twix the next aisle over when he felt something sharp and cold touch the back of his neck.
“Here,” Ryan said, dragging the mystery object away and handing it to him. “I got you something.”
It was a Cherry Icee and the first sip was absolute heaven. Ryan grinned when Brendon sighed happily and tilted his head in the direction of the payphone outside.
“I’m going to make a call. Meet you in the van.”
Brendon nodded and when Ryan rested a hand against the small of his back on the way out, he grinned and leaned into the touch. Brendon decided on the Twix and a bag of pretzels to share with Ryan. He was halfway to the register when a small rack of postcards caught his eye. Brendon bit his lip and then grabbed one. He wasn’t sure how mailing people worked when they were staying with Andy and his friends, but he felt like they probably had a system for that worked out.
“Hey,” Brendon said when they got back to the van, leaning forward to talk to Nate. “Say, hypothetically, I wanted to send somebody a postcard-”
“Yes,” Nate said with a small grin. “Yes you can send your friends a postcard.”
He was still trying to figure out what to write when Ryan slid in next to him.
“Nick and Tyson said Carden’s so happy about how the Ways were brought down he barely cares that we disappeared,” he said, sitting as closely as he could without the body heat getting too overpowering. “Mikey’s got every good lawyer in the state trying to get them out of it, but I guess when they went after Flowers they got sloppy. Tyson said Carden can’t stop smiling, but I find that hard to believe.”
Brendon snorted but breathed out a small sigh of relief. A part of him had been terrified that there was some kind of crazy manhunt going on, that his face was all over walls and lampposts in big cities. It was nice to know they were barely news at all. That was something Brendon could write about. In code, maybe. Just in case. Ryan glanced down at the postcard in his lap.
“Pete?”
“And Patrick. I’m trying to think of something to say that isn’t ‘wish you were here’.”
Ryan laughed and Brendon hid his smile behind a sip of his Icee. Ryan’s laugh was dry and quiet and Brendon loved it, loved that he could cause it. Christine climbed into the van and tossed Nate a bag of trail mix, tapping the dashboard and saying, “And we’re off again!” Nate started the van and turned the back onto the road that would take them to the highway.
The radio chose that stretch of road to work; Nate turned it up and he and Christine started singing. Brendon laughed along and when he glanced sideways Ryan was staring at him.
“What?” he asked.
Ryan shook his head and reached out to steal a sip of his Icee. When he handed it back, he left his hand on the seat between them and found Brendon’s fingers with his. They didn’t let go for another seventy miles.
Epilogue