Not As Dumb [FAKE, Ryo/Dee, M] [part 3 of 6]
Title: Not As Dumb, part 3 of 6
Author: bronze ribbons
Rating: M. I've deferred the explicit smut to part 4, but this one has a bit of skin, some kissing, and a lot of cussing. And handcuffs.
Wordcount: ~ 4,200 this part; 13,100 total so far, with at least three more chapters ahead.
Warnings: issues of consent, privacy, quality of life, and handling of bodily waste. (Put bluntly, this chapter includes discussions of rape, aging, and suicide/mercy killing. So sexy, I know, but the characters insisted; please know your triggers and boundaries before proceeding further.)
Disclaimer: Ryo and Dee belong to Sanami Matoh. Their beliefs and opinions do not always correspond to mine.
To the original prompter: I'm so sorry this is taking me so long to write! Part 4 is already partially drafted, and I have a good idea of where things are heading beyond that, but I'm a poky writer and the boys keep throwing me new curveballs; half of the warnings above weren't there a month ago, but the guys wouldn't shut up, even with kinky sex on the horizon. I hope you'll find it worth the wait.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
"Ack! What the fuck!?" Ryo glared at the remains of the medium-sized Coke he had nimbly dodged a second before. The cup of liquid now spattered across the sidewalk had been hurled from a car speeding by.
A man seated by a nearby display of produce grumbled, "Stupid kids. Someone's gonna get hurt one of these days. Can't think why the cops haven't locked them up yet."
Ryo forced himself simply to walk on, quelling the sudden, savage urge both to kick the cup and snarl at the man. He had remained at the precinct until the end of his shift after all. Only a few hours had elapsed since JJ's phone call, but Ryo felt as if he'd careened through a week's worth of emotions since their conversation. What he wanted now, more than anything, was to get home to Dee.
As he approached their apartment building, he saw his lover hunched by the half-moon window overlooking the street. When he reached their living room, he also glimpsed the overflowing ashtray at Dee's feet. Before Ryo could finish closing the door behind him, Dee burst out with, "I'm not gonna say 'I'm sorry' for watching your back."
A corner of Ryo's mouth twitched. "Been sitting on that all evening, huh?"
"Goddammit, Ryo, don't patronize me."
"Didn't mean to," Ryo said. He walked up and wrapped his arms around Dee. "In fact, I have a favor to ask."
"Yeah?"
Ryo pulled his handcuffs out of their case and held them towards Dee. "I want you to cuff me and take me," he calmly stated.
Dee stared at Ryo, speechless at the direct request. His fingers convulsed by his side; Ryo braced himself for a slap.
Dee finally managed, "You can't be serious."
"I swear I'm not kidding." Ryo held Dee's stare.
"You're that pissed off? Did you really spend your whole evening thinking up how to get back at me?"
"I'm not mad at all. At least, not at you." Ryo seized Dee's arm before Dee could storm past him. "You're the only one who can do this for me, you idiot."
That stopped Dee in his tracks. "You said it wasn't a turn-on. Were you lying?"
"It's not," Ryo insisted. "Though, if anyone could turn it into a turn-on for me, it'd be you."
Dee searched Ryo's face, which was pale and set. Early in their partnership, he had accused Ryo of having a split personality, and the way Ryo thoroughly compartmentalized sexual matters continued to astound him: Ryo habitually reacted to personal queries with blushing and stammering evasions, but he was generally unfazable when it came to coping with the NC-17 aspects of their cases. Obtaining statements from whores, reviewing the inventories of erotica boutiques, examining evidence contaminated with assorted secretions -- when Ryo handled such chores, he maintained a professional objectivity that Dee tended to find both impressive and maddening.
Given that they were off duty, "maddening" was winning out. As Dee fought down the urge to smack his partner, Alex Yoshizumi's "Does he ever stop?" echoed through his mind. "Can't you just chain yourself to a dummy and ride it 'til you're done?" he snarled.
Ryo quipped, "Our friends would say I'm already chained to a dummy."
"I'm not joking, Ryo. Don't use me like this, I'm not your fucking homework --"
"And I'm not yours." Ryo's voice was low and furious. "If you're going to use me as your excuse to bully the techs, then you can damn well help me practice keeping my cool when someone gets the jump on me."
"By roleplaying a rapist?" Dee spat out, incredulous. "You think I'm going to let anyone get you that way?"
"Dee, get real. You can't cover my back 24-7 --"
"I can damn well try --"
"And someday our luck's not gonna hold --"
"Over my dead body --"
"You jerk!" Ryo yelled. "That's exactly what I don't want to happen!"
Dee froze, stunned by Ryo's passionate declaration. Then he shook Ryo's hand off his arm -- the better to haul his partner close.
"Spill," he demanded. "What the fuck happened today?"
"Nothing new," Ryo said angrily. "Two pairs of unsolicited handcuffs not enough for you?"
"Don't distract me," Dee shot back. "Something's scared you, and now you want sex to make you forget about it."
Ryo jangled his cuffs. "If I wanted to shove it aside, would I ask you to use these?"
Dee blanched at the sound of metal on metal. "You're a sick bastard, Ryo. Why would you even need to practice something like this? If someone tries to cuff you, kill them. If someone actually manages to cuff you, I'll kill them as soon as I get there. If that someone also gets into your pants, I won't just kill them, I'll serve their nuts to the rats in Central Park."
Ryo shook the cuffs again. "If someone tries to cuff me, of course I'll try to fight them off. But if someone actually does cuff me, I don't want to freak out if I can help it. And if our luck runs out and you don't get there before -- before something nasty goes down -- wh-whatever happens, I don't fucking want them to be m-my first in that way." For the past couple of hours, Ryo had rehearsed in his head how he was going to answer Dee's objections without giving away Ronnie Darlington's threats or JJ's discovery of them. He was proud of how he'd managed to handle Dee so far, but it was starting to take its toll: even as he willed himself to stay calm, he could hear his voice tremble and sense the tears forming in the corners of his eyes. And Dee would turn tender on him --
"Oh, shit. Ryo--" Dee sat down heavily on the windowseat, pulling Ryo down with him. Ryo felt Dee's warm, beloved lips lapping up the moisture that had leaked onto his cheeks. Felt Dee's broad hands cradling his face; Dee's long legs wrapping around his own. Felt himself start to melt --
Ryo wrenched his focus back to the favor he'd asked. "I don't expect you to rape me," he quietly said. "I don't expect you to pretend-rape me, either." Dee stiffened at the words, but said nothing. Ryo continued, "I -- I just want to be prepared as I can for the worst. And if you take me now, then that's something I'll be able to hold onto -- it'll be something they can't use against me, because you'll have already done it to me, and it won't be something they can possibly do better than you, so their gloating won't get to me, because it won't be true--"
"Jesus Christ on a pole." Dee's voice rang with pained disbelief. "You did not come up with all that just today. How long have you been torturing yourself with what-might-be's?"
"Since you fainted when the first pair of handcuffs arrived." Ryo sat up, swiping away the last of the tears with his sleeve. He locked eyes with Dee, his voice low and dangerous once more. "About Anna -- what you told me before -- what were you leaving out? There had to be more, for it to knock you flat on your ass like that."
Dee flushed. "You're getting too good."
"I learned from the best."
Dee shook his head. "It doesn't take superpowers to pick up when you're being less than truthful."
"If that's true," Ryo said, "how is that only you and Diana ever call me on it?"
"Dude, Jim Campbell read you like a book the first time he met you."
Ryo made an exasperated noise and planted his hands on Dee's shoulders. "Do I need to invite Jim over, or are you going to get around to telling me what you don't want me to know about Anna?"
Dee muttered, "It'd be easier to explain it to Jim than to you."
"Fine." Ryo released Dee with a shove and stalked across the room.
Dee scrambled after him. "Where the hell do you think you're going?"
Ryo reached for the telephone. "Since you'd rather talk to Jim instead of me --"
"No, no, no. Goddammit, it's not that at all! It's just that I know you, and you're not going to take it well when you find out Anna looked like you!"
Ryo froze. Dee clapped a hand over his mouth as his brain belatedly registered what he'd blurted out.
Ryo placed the receiver back into its cradle with unnatural precision. His face even more pale than before, he walked back to the half-moon window. He moved two of the oversize cushions to the floor with the same, unnervingly deliberate care he'd used with the telephone handset. Then he knelt on the broad sill, staring down at the street.
Dee seated himself next to Ryo, his eyes fixed on his partner and his hands clenched.
Five, ten, fifteen cars crawled past their building before Ryo spoke. "Traffic isn't usually this jammed up on this block this time of night. Something must be wrong further up the street."
"It could be just some event letting out," Dee suggested. "Doesn't have to be something bad."
"It doesn't," Ryo conceded. He ran a finger along the diagonal edge of a windowpane. "I should try thinking that way about your former paramours, I suppose. They don't have anything to do with me other than sheer coincidence, right?"
"I've been telling you that for years," Dee said. "Now you're coming around to believing me?"
"Not really." Ryo admitted, his voice brittle. "The first time you kissed me -- were you thinking of Anna then?"
"Not one bit," Dee insisted. "And none of the other times, either. I honestly hadn't thought of her in years."
"I wasn't some stupid way of getting her at last? Or somehow getting back at her?"
Dee gritted his teeth. "You and she had nothing in common. Just a superficial physical resemblance. And maybe how you both weren't above using kids to do your dirty work."
"I never --"
"All those times you yelled for Bikky when you weren't ready?"
Ryo shut his mouth and shrank back into his corner of the windowseat, hugging his knees.
"Hey." His expression softening, Dee leaned towards Ryo, daring to place a hand on top of Ryo's right foot. "I didn't say that to guilt-trip you."
Ryo tightly said, "I know. But I still feel bad about it."
"What you should feel bad about is how ready you are to think the worst of me." Dee firmly pressed his right hand against Ryo's jaw, forcing the other man to meet his eyes. "There's no one else for me, dumbass. It's been you and only you, from the moment you showed up at the Badger's office."
"It so was not. You were just trying to get my goat, at the start."
"Another way you and Anna aren't alike," Dee said. "That girl was anything but uptight." His hands dropped away from Ryo as he turned his own gaze to the roof across the street. "It's probably why she's dead, too."
"Glad you aren't into that type," Ryo muttered.
Dee visibly flinched. Ryo hastily said, "Sorry, that was super-tasteless of me."
"Hah. It's something the guys would expect me to say." Dee rested his forehead against the windowpane. "Remember how JJ and Drake automatically blamed me when you TP'd their office?"
Ryo couldn't help smiling. "It's my bonus for putting up with you. Being your partner means I can almost get away with murder."
Dee didn't look up. "No 'almost' about it," he softly said. "If that's what you end up having to do--"
"It'll be self-defense, if it gets to that point," Ryo reminded him, frowning. "It's not like you to forget that, Dee."
"Funny," Dee said mirthlessly. "Ted was saying the same thing earlier today. And JJ agreed with him. Said my game was off."
Ryo's frown deepened. "That is not like JJ. You running a fever?" He moved behind Dee, pulling his partner back so he could slide a hand onto Dee's forehead.
"I wish," Dee muttered. "The flu, I know how to deal with."
"Hmm. You don't feel off to me," Ryo said, dropping his hand to Dee's shoulder. "But something's definitely wrong when even JJ… Maybe we should take that vacation now?"
"Unbelievable." Dee pressed his own hand to his forehead. "Weeks and weeks of telling you to take time off, and getting nowhere, and now you're willing?"
Ryo shrugged. "You're always trying to lure me away from work. That's par for the course. Me and JJ being on the same page is way more disturbing. I don't like that at all."
"Man, you sure know how to hold a grudge," Dee said. A beat later, he added, "It's so cute when you go all possessive."
"Bite me." Ryo lightly socked Dee in the shoulder. "So. Maybe it's time we tried England again?"
Dee shuddered violently. "God, no. Bad enough seeing ghosts here --"
"What!? Dee, there are no such things as --"
"I know you don't think so, but I saw what I saw! Anna showed up next to you when you pulled out those goddamn cuffs! And that's when I realized how much she looked like you --" Dee choked on the words, and his face was chalk white as he continued, "She was wearing the friggin' cuffs, her shirt was soaked with blood --"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Whoa, buddy. Easy…" Ryo eased them both into lying down, lightly sandwiching Dee between the seat-cushion and himself. "No wonder you went into shock. You take things so hard, Dee. There's nothing you could've --"
"You moron, it's not about her at all," Dee bellowed. "It's seeing what you'd look like if you got yourself killed!"
Annoyed, Ryo gave Dee a hard shake. "For God's sake, get a grip. I'm not a girl, and I'm not about to let anyone turn me into a figment of your imagination."
"You haven't believed a word I've said, have you. Damn it, Ryo --"
"I believe that you believe you saw Anna's ghost."
Dee's expression turned sulky. "Now you're just humoring me."
"A bit," Ryo admitted. He reached for his handcuffs once more and slapped them into Dee's palm. "And now I'm not."
"Ryo --"
"We are going to practice," Ryo informed Dee, "because I have got to know that you can keep your shit together even if something bad goes down. There's too much going on -- I can't afford any extra distractions, and you've got me dead worried about you going out of your head if you see me cuffed or chained. Or worse." He nailed Dee with a point-blank stare as he added, "I like to think I'll still be me no matter what happens -- even if I end up as, ah, 'damaged goods' -- but you're not convincing me you can handle it."
"You cold, conniving son of bitch," Dee breathed. "Do I need to buy you a ring and swear 'for better or worse' in front of a judge?"
"Like that guarantees anything," Ryo retorted.
"As God is my witness, you will never get rid of me. Even if I get stuck cleaning out your colostomy bags or changing your Depends because you can't stay out of trouble."
Ryo shuddered. "Believe me, I hope it never comes to that. If it gets to that point, I'll seriously consider shooting myself."
"Don't you dare," Dee said, outraged. "Don't you ever even fucking think of leaving me like that."
Ryo softly said, "What if I someday get hurt so bad we can never have sex again? What if I permanently lose control of my hands, or my gut, or if my brain gets too scrambled to remember your name or who you are? What happens when I become flabby and decrepit, if we're lucky enough to live that long? Would you really, truly want to be saddled with any of that?"
"Are you saying you're going to dump my ass if any of those things happen to me?"
"No!" Ryo looked both insulted and horrified. "Of course I wouldn't!"
"If I begged you to shoot me -- to let me stop being a burden to you -- would you?"
"Jesus, no! I'd take care of you no matter what! After I got done smacking you to Queens and back for thinking I wouldn't want to!"
"Then, for the love of God, give me the same damn credit!" Dee roared. "If it was just about sex and hearts and flowers, you wouldn't be worth what you put me through!"
"I could say the same of you!" Ryo shouted back. "Loving you is already a complete pain in my ass!"
An evil glint appeared in Dee's eyes. "Why, Ryo, if you haven't gotten used to man-on-man by now, we need to be having much more sex."
Ryo tapped the handcuffs, an answering glint in his eyes. "I'm willing to get to work if you are. And don't give me that crap about how you don't mix work and play -- I can't even begin to count all the times you've tried to pounce me in the office just this week."
Dee grimaced and turned his head, casting his gaze around the apartment. Combining his digs with his former neighbor's had been one of the smartest moves he'd ever come up with. Ryo could be generous to a fault -- look at all he'd done for Bikky and for Carol, just for starters -- but he also had the weirdest territorial issues of anyone Dee had ever met, and they tended to surface whenever he was confronted with something new, even when the something new was something Ryo actually wanted. During their second night as lovers -- their first in Ryo's former apartment -- Dee had offered to fetch some water for them both, but instead of responding with gratitude, Ryo had bitched at Dee for usurping the role of the host. On the eve of their joining the SCIU, Ryo had made a point of making Dee ask to stay the night -- a formality he had also demanded whenever a vacation or conference was imminent, as well as on the night of Carol's high school graduation, and sometimes prior to replacing a major appliance or furnishing.
My adorable, insane, infuriating control freak, Dee thought fondly. He hadn't intended to wait six years before bringing up the subject of living together, but every time he'd worked up the nerve to raise the possibility, something or someone had set off one of Ryo's myriad, mystifying triggers over boundaries. Dragging Ryo out of his comfort zones was often fun and sometimes simply necessary, but Dee himself hadn't been sure that co-habitation would be the right move for them: after years at the orphanage, and then in the scuzzy, overcrowded dives he'd shared with his academy classmates, Dee had loved having a bedroom and a bathroom that were all his, and his alone. He had relished the freedom of not having to put his things away each time he used them, and Ryo had grudgingly tolerated the habit both as a host and as a guest, but Dee had not been able to delude himself about the potential for disaster: to live together would escalate their mutual impatience with each other's hang-ups, and he'd seen the ugly aftermath of twenty-year marriages imploding over differences as petty as the proper way to squeeze toothpaste out of a tube.
So it had been a godsend, being able to add a second bathroom and two more bedrooms to his flat. They usually slept in Ryo's bedroom, but there was a separate room designated as Dee's, where he happily left his magazines, newspapers, clothes, beverage containers, and other clutter strewn about for weeks on end. Ryo left that room and "Dee's bathroom" completely out of his cleaning routines, and Dee returned the favor by respecting the other bathroom's status as a Ryo-only zone: it doubled as the guest bathroom when they had company, but the rest of the time, it was Ryo's exclusive space, to where he retreated when he wanted to sulk or brood -- and when he wanted to clean himself out before having sex, which was his preference whenever he could hold off Dee and his own hormones long enough to do so.
Dee's gaze flew back to Ryo, an idea blossoming in his mind that both repelled and frightened him. He curled his fingers around a cuff and stared hard into Ryo's eyes. "If I do what you say you want, are you sure you aren't going to hold it against me?
"Cross my heart," Ryo began. Dee pressed his fingers to Ryo's lips before he could continue.
"Don't say the rest," Dee whispered. He replaced his fingers with his mouth as he unknotted Ryo's tie and proceeded to undo the buttons of his shirt.
"Ngghhhhmmmm," Ryo sighed, closing his eyes in pleasure as the kisses clouded his senses. He obligingly slipped his arms out of the shirt as Dee tugged at its sleeves.
"Ryo." The tension in Dee's voice jolted him back to full awareness, as did the sensation of cool metal against his bare skin: Dee was slowly running the handcuffs up and down Ryo's right bicep, watching his partner closely. "Ryo, I will do this for you, but the instant you tell me to stop, we're stopping."
Ryo's chin rose. "No, let's do this right. No stopping unless I actually say 'pantyhose.'"
"No matter what?" Dee sounded even more tense than before. "What if I come up with something that you would consider a violation?"
Ryo didn't look away. "I asked for this," he said, his voice even. "Do your worst. Though you get to do the explaining if you're about to invite someone to watch or help."
Dee recoiled at the very thought. "Fuck. That never crossed my mind. And hell will freeze over before I share you like that."
Ryo shrugged. "That's what I thought. Still, what do you want to bet that our mystery sender has friends? I don't like to think about being outnumbered, but --"
"I could just not let you out of my sight," Dee growled.
"How will that help me if something happens to you?" Ryo demanded. "If you keep insisting that won't happen, I'll get Diana to plant another kiss on you, Mr. Always Alert."
"You are the most unromantic son of a bitch ever." Dee yanked up Ryo's left wrist and snapped a cuff around it.
The click sounded unnaturally loud in the room; Dee exhaled angrily as he pushed Ryo and himself onto their feet.
"Gonna fight me?" he said, almost hopefully.
"No," Ryo said. "Let's say I already fought back. I'm drugged or at gunpoint. That's how someone who isn't you would get cuffs on me in the first place."
"I'm really not liking how much you've thought about this," Dee said, steering him into the hallway.
Ryo said, "You're always hassling me about my non-existent guard. This is me not getting defensive about it, for a change."
They'd reached the entrance of Ryo's bathroom. Dee jerked his head toward the toilet as he said, his voice rough, "So. You're gonna let me strip you, clean you out, and then shove anything else I want up your hole? I'll be right here in this room with you, and I'll be looking at everything that comes out of you -- every last little clump and clot of shit you've never wanted me to see -- and you won't be able to make me go away or turn my head or find something else to do. You don't even like it when I see you blow your nose, so how are you going to sit on that can in front of me and not have a stroke?"
As he spoke, Dee watched the color drain out of Ryo's face, his lover's dark eyes widening in dismay. I knew it, Dee thought. Your imagination's not shabby, partner, but I can out-deprave you any day of the week. Dee tightened his embrace and continued, "Tell me to stop, Ryo. Please. Now. I couldn't take it if you ended up hating me for this. You don't have to prove that you'd let me do anything to you."
Ryo's throat was so dry that it took him several tries before he could force out, "This never crossed my mind."
Dee would have ordinarily rejoiced in the concession, but he too was trembling. "Aren't you glad I'm not your enemy?"
Ryo nodded, still looking more than a little ill. "Very, very glad."
"Good," Dee said, reaching toward the handcuff case on Ryo's belt.
Before he could extract the key from it, however, Ryo twisted away. "No," he said, stumbling ahead into the bathroom. "We need to do this."
Part 4
Author: bronze ribbons
Rating: M. I've deferred the explicit smut to part 4, but this one has a bit of skin, some kissing, and a lot of cussing. And handcuffs.
Wordcount: ~ 4,200 this part; 13,100 total so far, with at least three more chapters ahead.
Warnings: issues of consent, privacy, quality of life, and handling of bodily waste. (Put bluntly, this chapter includes discussions of rape, aging, and suicide/mercy killing. So sexy, I know, but the characters insisted; please know your triggers and boundaries before proceeding further.)
Disclaimer: Ryo and Dee belong to Sanami Matoh. Their beliefs and opinions do not always correspond to mine.
To the original prompter: I'm so sorry this is taking me so long to write! Part 4 is already partially drafted, and I have a good idea of where things are heading beyond that, but I'm a poky writer and the boys keep throwing me new curveballs; half of the warnings above weren't there a month ago, but the guys wouldn't shut up, even with kinky sex on the horizon. I hope you'll find it worth the wait.
Part 1
Part 2
Part 3
"Ack! What the fuck!?" Ryo glared at the remains of the medium-sized Coke he had nimbly dodged a second before. The cup of liquid now spattered across the sidewalk had been hurled from a car speeding by.
A man seated by a nearby display of produce grumbled, "Stupid kids. Someone's gonna get hurt one of these days. Can't think why the cops haven't locked them up yet."
Ryo forced himself simply to walk on, quelling the sudden, savage urge both to kick the cup and snarl at the man. He had remained at the precinct until the end of his shift after all. Only a few hours had elapsed since JJ's phone call, but Ryo felt as if he'd careened through a week's worth of emotions since their conversation. What he wanted now, more than anything, was to get home to Dee.
As he approached their apartment building, he saw his lover hunched by the half-moon window overlooking the street. When he reached their living room, he also glimpsed the overflowing ashtray at Dee's feet. Before Ryo could finish closing the door behind him, Dee burst out with, "I'm not gonna say 'I'm sorry' for watching your back."
A corner of Ryo's mouth twitched. "Been sitting on that all evening, huh?"
"Goddammit, Ryo, don't patronize me."
"Didn't mean to," Ryo said. He walked up and wrapped his arms around Dee. "In fact, I have a favor to ask."
"Yeah?"
Ryo pulled his handcuffs out of their case and held them towards Dee. "I want you to cuff me and take me," he calmly stated.
Dee stared at Ryo, speechless at the direct request. His fingers convulsed by his side; Ryo braced himself for a slap.
Dee finally managed, "You can't be serious."
"I swear I'm not kidding." Ryo held Dee's stare.
"You're that pissed off? Did you really spend your whole evening thinking up how to get back at me?"
"I'm not mad at all. At least, not at you." Ryo seized Dee's arm before Dee could storm past him. "You're the only one who can do this for me, you idiot."
That stopped Dee in his tracks. "You said it wasn't a turn-on. Were you lying?"
"It's not," Ryo insisted. "Though, if anyone could turn it into a turn-on for me, it'd be you."
Dee searched Ryo's face, which was pale and set. Early in their partnership, he had accused Ryo of having a split personality, and the way Ryo thoroughly compartmentalized sexual matters continued to astound him: Ryo habitually reacted to personal queries with blushing and stammering evasions, but he was generally unfazable when it came to coping with the NC-17 aspects of their cases. Obtaining statements from whores, reviewing the inventories of erotica boutiques, examining evidence contaminated with assorted secretions -- when Ryo handled such chores, he maintained a professional objectivity that Dee tended to find both impressive and maddening.
Given that they were off duty, "maddening" was winning out. As Dee fought down the urge to smack his partner, Alex Yoshizumi's "Does he ever stop?" echoed through his mind. "Can't you just chain yourself to a dummy and ride it 'til you're done?" he snarled.
Ryo quipped, "Our friends would say I'm already chained to a dummy."
"I'm not joking, Ryo. Don't use me like this, I'm not your fucking homework --"
"And I'm not yours." Ryo's voice was low and furious. "If you're going to use me as your excuse to bully the techs, then you can damn well help me practice keeping my cool when someone gets the jump on me."
"By roleplaying a rapist?" Dee spat out, incredulous. "You think I'm going to let anyone get you that way?"
"Dee, get real. You can't cover my back 24-7 --"
"I can damn well try --"
"And someday our luck's not gonna hold --"
"Over my dead body --"
"You jerk!" Ryo yelled. "That's exactly what I don't want to happen!"
Dee froze, stunned by Ryo's passionate declaration. Then he shook Ryo's hand off his arm -- the better to haul his partner close.
"Spill," he demanded. "What the fuck happened today?"
"Nothing new," Ryo said angrily. "Two pairs of unsolicited handcuffs not enough for you?"
"Don't distract me," Dee shot back. "Something's scared you, and now you want sex to make you forget about it."
Ryo jangled his cuffs. "If I wanted to shove it aside, would I ask you to use these?"
Dee blanched at the sound of metal on metal. "You're a sick bastard, Ryo. Why would you even need to practice something like this? If someone tries to cuff you, kill them. If someone actually manages to cuff you, I'll kill them as soon as I get there. If that someone also gets into your pants, I won't just kill them, I'll serve their nuts to the rats in Central Park."
Ryo shook the cuffs again. "If someone tries to cuff me, of course I'll try to fight them off. But if someone actually does cuff me, I don't want to freak out if I can help it. And if our luck runs out and you don't get there before -- before something nasty goes down -- wh-whatever happens, I don't fucking want them to be m-my first in that way." For the past couple of hours, Ryo had rehearsed in his head how he was going to answer Dee's objections without giving away Ronnie Darlington's threats or JJ's discovery of them. He was proud of how he'd managed to handle Dee so far, but it was starting to take its toll: even as he willed himself to stay calm, he could hear his voice tremble and sense the tears forming in the corners of his eyes. And Dee would turn tender on him --
"Oh, shit. Ryo--" Dee sat down heavily on the windowseat, pulling Ryo down with him. Ryo felt Dee's warm, beloved lips lapping up the moisture that had leaked onto his cheeks. Felt Dee's broad hands cradling his face; Dee's long legs wrapping around his own. Felt himself start to melt --
Ryo wrenched his focus back to the favor he'd asked. "I don't expect you to rape me," he quietly said. "I don't expect you to pretend-rape me, either." Dee stiffened at the words, but said nothing. Ryo continued, "I -- I just want to be prepared as I can for the worst. And if you take me now, then that's something I'll be able to hold onto -- it'll be something they can't use against me, because you'll have already done it to me, and it won't be something they can possibly do better than you, so their gloating won't get to me, because it won't be true--"
"Jesus Christ on a pole." Dee's voice rang with pained disbelief. "You did not come up with all that just today. How long have you been torturing yourself with what-might-be's?"
"Since you fainted when the first pair of handcuffs arrived." Ryo sat up, swiping away the last of the tears with his sleeve. He locked eyes with Dee, his voice low and dangerous once more. "About Anna -- what you told me before -- what were you leaving out? There had to be more, for it to knock you flat on your ass like that."
Dee flushed. "You're getting too good."
"I learned from the best."
Dee shook his head. "It doesn't take superpowers to pick up when you're being less than truthful."
"If that's true," Ryo said, "how is that only you and Diana ever call me on it?"
"Dude, Jim Campbell read you like a book the first time he met you."
Ryo made an exasperated noise and planted his hands on Dee's shoulders. "Do I need to invite Jim over, or are you going to get around to telling me what you don't want me to know about Anna?"
Dee muttered, "It'd be easier to explain it to Jim than to you."
"Fine." Ryo released Dee with a shove and stalked across the room.
Dee scrambled after him. "Where the hell do you think you're going?"
Ryo reached for the telephone. "Since you'd rather talk to Jim instead of me --"
"No, no, no. Goddammit, it's not that at all! It's just that I know you, and you're not going to take it well when you find out Anna looked like you!"
Ryo froze. Dee clapped a hand over his mouth as his brain belatedly registered what he'd blurted out.
Ryo placed the receiver back into its cradle with unnatural precision. His face even more pale than before, he walked back to the half-moon window. He moved two of the oversize cushions to the floor with the same, unnervingly deliberate care he'd used with the telephone handset. Then he knelt on the broad sill, staring down at the street.
Dee seated himself next to Ryo, his eyes fixed on his partner and his hands clenched.
Five, ten, fifteen cars crawled past their building before Ryo spoke. "Traffic isn't usually this jammed up on this block this time of night. Something must be wrong further up the street."
"It could be just some event letting out," Dee suggested. "Doesn't have to be something bad."
"It doesn't," Ryo conceded. He ran a finger along the diagonal edge of a windowpane. "I should try thinking that way about your former paramours, I suppose. They don't have anything to do with me other than sheer coincidence, right?"
"I've been telling you that for years," Dee said. "Now you're coming around to believing me?"
"Not really." Ryo admitted, his voice brittle. "The first time you kissed me -- were you thinking of Anna then?"
"Not one bit," Dee insisted. "And none of the other times, either. I honestly hadn't thought of her in years."
"I wasn't some stupid way of getting her at last? Or somehow getting back at her?"
Dee gritted his teeth. "You and she had nothing in common. Just a superficial physical resemblance. And maybe how you both weren't above using kids to do your dirty work."
"I never --"
"All those times you yelled for Bikky when you weren't ready?"
Ryo shut his mouth and shrank back into his corner of the windowseat, hugging his knees.
"Hey." His expression softening, Dee leaned towards Ryo, daring to place a hand on top of Ryo's right foot. "I didn't say that to guilt-trip you."
Ryo tightly said, "I know. But I still feel bad about it."
"What you should feel bad about is how ready you are to think the worst of me." Dee firmly pressed his right hand against Ryo's jaw, forcing the other man to meet his eyes. "There's no one else for me, dumbass. It's been you and only you, from the moment you showed up at the Badger's office."
"It so was not. You were just trying to get my goat, at the start."
"Another way you and Anna aren't alike," Dee said. "That girl was anything but uptight." His hands dropped away from Ryo as he turned his own gaze to the roof across the street. "It's probably why she's dead, too."
"Glad you aren't into that type," Ryo muttered.
Dee visibly flinched. Ryo hastily said, "Sorry, that was super-tasteless of me."
"Hah. It's something the guys would expect me to say." Dee rested his forehead against the windowpane. "Remember how JJ and Drake automatically blamed me when you TP'd their office?"
Ryo couldn't help smiling. "It's my bonus for putting up with you. Being your partner means I can almost get away with murder."
Dee didn't look up. "No 'almost' about it," he softly said. "If that's what you end up having to do--"
"It'll be self-defense, if it gets to that point," Ryo reminded him, frowning. "It's not like you to forget that, Dee."
"Funny," Dee said mirthlessly. "Ted was saying the same thing earlier today. And JJ agreed with him. Said my game was off."
Ryo's frown deepened. "That is not like JJ. You running a fever?" He moved behind Dee, pulling his partner back so he could slide a hand onto Dee's forehead.
"I wish," Dee muttered. "The flu, I know how to deal with."
"Hmm. You don't feel off to me," Ryo said, dropping his hand to Dee's shoulder. "But something's definitely wrong when even JJ… Maybe we should take that vacation now?"
"Unbelievable." Dee pressed his own hand to his forehead. "Weeks and weeks of telling you to take time off, and getting nowhere, and now you're willing?"
Ryo shrugged. "You're always trying to lure me away from work. That's par for the course. Me and JJ being on the same page is way more disturbing. I don't like that at all."
"Man, you sure know how to hold a grudge," Dee said. A beat later, he added, "It's so cute when you go all possessive."
"Bite me." Ryo lightly socked Dee in the shoulder. "So. Maybe it's time we tried England again?"
Dee shuddered violently. "God, no. Bad enough seeing ghosts here --"
"What!? Dee, there are no such things as --"
"I know you don't think so, but I saw what I saw! Anna showed up next to you when you pulled out those goddamn cuffs! And that's when I realized how much she looked like you --" Dee choked on the words, and his face was chalk white as he continued, "She was wearing the friggin' cuffs, her shirt was soaked with blood --"
"Whoa, whoa, whoa. Whoa, buddy. Easy…" Ryo eased them both into lying down, lightly sandwiching Dee between the seat-cushion and himself. "No wonder you went into shock. You take things so hard, Dee. There's nothing you could've --"
"You moron, it's not about her at all," Dee bellowed. "It's seeing what you'd look like if you got yourself killed!"
Annoyed, Ryo gave Dee a hard shake. "For God's sake, get a grip. I'm not a girl, and I'm not about to let anyone turn me into a figment of your imagination."
"You haven't believed a word I've said, have you. Damn it, Ryo --"
"I believe that you believe you saw Anna's ghost."
Dee's expression turned sulky. "Now you're just humoring me."
"A bit," Ryo admitted. He reached for his handcuffs once more and slapped them into Dee's palm. "And now I'm not."
"Ryo --"
"We are going to practice," Ryo informed Dee, "because I have got to know that you can keep your shit together even if something bad goes down. There's too much going on -- I can't afford any extra distractions, and you've got me dead worried about you going out of your head if you see me cuffed or chained. Or worse." He nailed Dee with a point-blank stare as he added, "I like to think I'll still be me no matter what happens -- even if I end up as, ah, 'damaged goods' -- but you're not convincing me you can handle it."
"You cold, conniving son of bitch," Dee breathed. "Do I need to buy you a ring and swear 'for better or worse' in front of a judge?"
"Like that guarantees anything," Ryo retorted.
"As God is my witness, you will never get rid of me. Even if I get stuck cleaning out your colostomy bags or changing your Depends because you can't stay out of trouble."
Ryo shuddered. "Believe me, I hope it never comes to that. If it gets to that point, I'll seriously consider shooting myself."
"Don't you dare," Dee said, outraged. "Don't you ever even fucking think of leaving me like that."
Ryo softly said, "What if I someday get hurt so bad we can never have sex again? What if I permanently lose control of my hands, or my gut, or if my brain gets too scrambled to remember your name or who you are? What happens when I become flabby and decrepit, if we're lucky enough to live that long? Would you really, truly want to be saddled with any of that?"
"Are you saying you're going to dump my ass if any of those things happen to me?"
"No!" Ryo looked both insulted and horrified. "Of course I wouldn't!"
"If I begged you to shoot me -- to let me stop being a burden to you -- would you?"
"Jesus, no! I'd take care of you no matter what! After I got done smacking you to Queens and back for thinking I wouldn't want to!"
"Then, for the love of God, give me the same damn credit!" Dee roared. "If it was just about sex and hearts and flowers, you wouldn't be worth what you put me through!"
"I could say the same of you!" Ryo shouted back. "Loving you is already a complete pain in my ass!"
An evil glint appeared in Dee's eyes. "Why, Ryo, if you haven't gotten used to man-on-man by now, we need to be having much more sex."
Ryo tapped the handcuffs, an answering glint in his eyes. "I'm willing to get to work if you are. And don't give me that crap about how you don't mix work and play -- I can't even begin to count all the times you've tried to pounce me in the office just this week."
Dee grimaced and turned his head, casting his gaze around the apartment. Combining his digs with his former neighbor's had been one of the smartest moves he'd ever come up with. Ryo could be generous to a fault -- look at all he'd done for Bikky and for Carol, just for starters -- but he also had the weirdest territorial issues of anyone Dee had ever met, and they tended to surface whenever he was confronted with something new, even when the something new was something Ryo actually wanted. During their second night as lovers -- their first in Ryo's former apartment -- Dee had offered to fetch some water for them both, but instead of responding with gratitude, Ryo had bitched at Dee for usurping the role of the host. On the eve of their joining the SCIU, Ryo had made a point of making Dee ask to stay the night -- a formality he had also demanded whenever a vacation or conference was imminent, as well as on the night of Carol's high school graduation, and sometimes prior to replacing a major appliance or furnishing.
My adorable, insane, infuriating control freak, Dee thought fondly. He hadn't intended to wait six years before bringing up the subject of living together, but every time he'd worked up the nerve to raise the possibility, something or someone had set off one of Ryo's myriad, mystifying triggers over boundaries. Dragging Ryo out of his comfort zones was often fun and sometimes simply necessary, but Dee himself hadn't been sure that co-habitation would be the right move for them: after years at the orphanage, and then in the scuzzy, overcrowded dives he'd shared with his academy classmates, Dee had loved having a bedroom and a bathroom that were all his, and his alone. He had relished the freedom of not having to put his things away each time he used them, and Ryo had grudgingly tolerated the habit both as a host and as a guest, but Dee had not been able to delude himself about the potential for disaster: to live together would escalate their mutual impatience with each other's hang-ups, and he'd seen the ugly aftermath of twenty-year marriages imploding over differences as petty as the proper way to squeeze toothpaste out of a tube.
So it had been a godsend, being able to add a second bathroom and two more bedrooms to his flat. They usually slept in Ryo's bedroom, but there was a separate room designated as Dee's, where he happily left his magazines, newspapers, clothes, beverage containers, and other clutter strewn about for weeks on end. Ryo left that room and "Dee's bathroom" completely out of his cleaning routines, and Dee returned the favor by respecting the other bathroom's status as a Ryo-only zone: it doubled as the guest bathroom when they had company, but the rest of the time, it was Ryo's exclusive space, to where he retreated when he wanted to sulk or brood -- and when he wanted to clean himself out before having sex, which was his preference whenever he could hold off Dee and his own hormones long enough to do so.
Dee's gaze flew back to Ryo, an idea blossoming in his mind that both repelled and frightened him. He curled his fingers around a cuff and stared hard into Ryo's eyes. "If I do what you say you want, are you sure you aren't going to hold it against me?
"Cross my heart," Ryo began. Dee pressed his fingers to Ryo's lips before he could continue.
"Don't say the rest," Dee whispered. He replaced his fingers with his mouth as he unknotted Ryo's tie and proceeded to undo the buttons of his shirt.
"Ngghhhhmmmm," Ryo sighed, closing his eyes in pleasure as the kisses clouded his senses. He obligingly slipped his arms out of the shirt as Dee tugged at its sleeves.
"Ryo." The tension in Dee's voice jolted him back to full awareness, as did the sensation of cool metal against his bare skin: Dee was slowly running the handcuffs up and down Ryo's right bicep, watching his partner closely. "Ryo, I will do this for you, but the instant you tell me to stop, we're stopping."
Ryo's chin rose. "No, let's do this right. No stopping unless I actually say 'pantyhose.'"
"No matter what?" Dee sounded even more tense than before. "What if I come up with something that you would consider a violation?"
Ryo didn't look away. "I asked for this," he said, his voice even. "Do your worst. Though you get to do the explaining if you're about to invite someone to watch or help."
Dee recoiled at the very thought. "Fuck. That never crossed my mind. And hell will freeze over before I share you like that."
Ryo shrugged. "That's what I thought. Still, what do you want to bet that our mystery sender has friends? I don't like to think about being outnumbered, but --"
"I could just not let you out of my sight," Dee growled.
"How will that help me if something happens to you?" Ryo demanded. "If you keep insisting that won't happen, I'll get Diana to plant another kiss on you, Mr. Always Alert."
"You are the most unromantic son of a bitch ever." Dee yanked up Ryo's left wrist and snapped a cuff around it.
The click sounded unnaturally loud in the room; Dee exhaled angrily as he pushed Ryo and himself onto their feet.
"Gonna fight me?" he said, almost hopefully.
"No," Ryo said. "Let's say I already fought back. I'm drugged or at gunpoint. That's how someone who isn't you would get cuffs on me in the first place."
"I'm really not liking how much you've thought about this," Dee said, steering him into the hallway.
Ryo said, "You're always hassling me about my non-existent guard. This is me not getting defensive about it, for a change."
They'd reached the entrance of Ryo's bathroom. Dee jerked his head toward the toilet as he said, his voice rough, "So. You're gonna let me strip you, clean you out, and then shove anything else I want up your hole? I'll be right here in this room with you, and I'll be looking at everything that comes out of you -- every last little clump and clot of shit you've never wanted me to see -- and you won't be able to make me go away or turn my head or find something else to do. You don't even like it when I see you blow your nose, so how are you going to sit on that can in front of me and not have a stroke?"
As he spoke, Dee watched the color drain out of Ryo's face, his lover's dark eyes widening in dismay. I knew it, Dee thought. Your imagination's not shabby, partner, but I can out-deprave you any day of the week. Dee tightened his embrace and continued, "Tell me to stop, Ryo. Please. Now. I couldn't take it if you ended up hating me for this. You don't have to prove that you'd let me do anything to you."
Ryo's throat was so dry that it took him several tries before he could force out, "This never crossed my mind."
Dee would have ordinarily rejoiced in the concession, but he too was trembling. "Aren't you glad I'm not your enemy?"
Ryo nodded, still looking more than a little ill. "Very, very glad."
"Good," Dee said, reaching toward the handcuff case on Ryo's belt.
Before he could extract the key from it, however, Ryo twisted away. "No," he said, stumbling ahead into the bathroom. "We need to do this."
Part 4