Moderation is a fatal thing.

conceit: what does it look like when the escape from the plantation doesn't yield an army of friends or allies that provide Thomas and James security in their post-canon return to Nassau? what if life is just as precarious post-canon as it always was? what happens when Thomas's answer isn't to tell James to put Flint away, damn the consequences, but that the story is more necessary than ever, that without it they have no chance to survive? what happens when Thomas loves Flint just as much as McGraw, when to him there is no difference? what if the worst of all worlds is that Thomas is too similar to Flint to save him?

includes: politics, violence, whump, separation anxiety, death of past selves, nostalgia for past selves, grief, canon-typical acts of manipulation to acquire power (though not of each other), worldbuilding

For a heartbeat, Thomas almost deliberates, but when the moment comes to speak in the man's defense, he lets it slide by, and James kills the man in cold blood. The man takes longer to die than the fight lasted, and then the two of them are suddenly in the moments afterward. The thronging crowd pulls back and away, and the muttering starts, but this is Nassau, and it is a simple truth that if you attack the wrong person, you die. Rules doubly true for a belligerent drunk, especially someone unliked, a fact Thomas can feel thrumming in the air. He is beginning to learn the unwritten law of Nassau, and beginning to understand why everyone he has met is so terrified that he has Flint at his back, that Flint is so utterly in love with him. He has begun to understand why it was so expedient to keep him locked away.

But there is a weary blinding rage at war with terror in Flint's eyes, and Thomas meets them, expression both gentle and cold. He lifts his jaw minisculely, chin up, and Flint steps back from the edge of panic, and into the reality of the formerly-Guthries' tavern, remembering to project menace at the exact moment when the crowd remembers to expect it.

They have no friends, no allies, nowhere else to be but here. Thomas tells himself that is why this is easy. Thomas sells himself the lie that this is easy, that he is not backing towards the edge of panic. Chin up. Shoulders back. But he finds the eye of the woman he's been told is Max, and holds it for a long moment.

Her gaze is assessing, and he spends the time asking himself if she knew. If she knew he was hidden away, if she kept him out of James's hands because, he had been willing to fight a war for Thomas's memory, what would he do to safeguard Thomas's life? This. This is the answer. A man dead on the floor, and she tilts her head to speak, clear over the packed tavern, to the tavern worker who has been shadowing her a half-step behind.

"Get him out of here." The tacit approval makes the shadow Flint casts even deeper, and the crowd pulls and mutters. Not unusual, but a story flaring back to life where it had been buried.

" And inform his captain he made a dangerous choice of enemy."

She holds their gaze, and after a moment, Flint nods.

The moment hangs in the air until Max looks away, indifferent to their approval, and continues her business. The man who attacked Thomas is hauled away, and the crowd around them settles, back into their places on the long benches when the two of them return to their seats.

Flint's not flexing his hands, but the panic is back in his eyes, and Thomas uses the pretense of the bench to gently brush his sleeve against him. Inaudible under the din of the tavern, Flint makes a noise of forestalled loss. Thomas knows he is still bleeding where the shattering glass caught him, and there's a terrified part of him that understands why James can't look at him.

It's the same part of him that barely stops himself from reaching for Flint's bloodied, murderous hand.

//nsfw

james says it between clenched teeth. thomas had hoped to settle the worst of james’s tension with light, easy lovemaking, but he sees now in james’s implied question lines of james’s body of wanting to wipe away the tension of having to be in control constantly, of the rigors and watching eyes and guesswork of hiding this, hiding himself, from the navy.

“i cannot make my words less gentle, james, but i can not speak. as for the rest, if you promise to stop me if anything at all happens that you do not want, i will be less than gentle with you. will you tell me?”

james’s voice is begging, but sure. “i am.”

and so thomas, affecting an air of carelessness that immediately smooths lines from james’s brow, tugs the ribbon from james’s queue and fists  hand in his hair, pulling his face up, his neck bent unnaturally to look up at thomas where he stands.

“will you do what i ask of– will you do what i tell you?” he catches himself, corrects himself.

“yes,” james says, and when he shifts slightly and thomas’s hand is at his scalp, tight, he chokes out a noise, a gasp cut through with a groan. it goes through thomas like fire. there is an aura of command that james’s breathless attention lends his words that thomas doesn’t know how to control, but he sees something almost like calm in the set of james’s shoulders, and thomas is beginning to see that this is absolutely something james has needed. whether he knows how to give it to him remains to be seen, but james has promised to stop him if it becomes too much. that has to be enough. abruptly, it isn’t.

“you are to tell me if i do something you do not want.”

james’s sigh is audible, an almost-annoyance cut through it, but thomas is getting a grasp of this now, and when he tightens his hand in james’s hair again and james hisses and grabs at his thighs as if to steady himself, thomas’s words come easily to him.

“i will touch your ankle and you will be still.” it is something james has told him in the past, a weakness in his ankle that drives him near to panic if it’s prodded. he hears james’s breath catch in his throat, and he doesn’t let go of his hair any, in fact he pulls james’s head back further, and james does so, willingly. he feels james’s breath struggling in his throat, catching, releasing, catching, struggling. he prepares to let go, if james cannot do this. he will not do this if james is not able to keep them both safe from hurting him. but after a long moment, james speaks.

“no. no, thomas, i don’t want that.” it’s bitten out, but clear, and thomas’s “of course. thank you,” is hard on its heels. he stoops, presses a kiss to the base of his throat, too gentle for their charade, but whispers a warmer “thank you” in james’s ear as he stands. there is no interruption in the charade, but there is the pink of being praised on the tips of james’s ears.

“you are to stand, and you are to listen.” he has to untangle his hand fom james’s hair as james rockets to a stand, and thomas catches james’s eyes flicker to thomas’s desk. james leads, thomas follows.

“walk over to the desk, and bend.”

james, shocked that thomas, who has always had a preference for their private rooms over the study, for the spaciousness of their bed over the frantic trysts james felt most at ease in, would ask this, hesitates. thomas’s voice is sharp as a whip, soft as silk.

“do i need to ask you twice?”

“no, sir,” james says, and there is a moment where they freeze. it is a moment where thomas considers disbanding the charade, moving to terrain more familiar, but there is only momentary embarrassment hot in james’s eyes, no shame, no worry, and so he finds he is comfortable nodding, watching james walk to the desk and bend, hands folded neatly behind his back, even with his torso pressed against the surface. thomas had pictured james walking around to the side where thomas normally sat, but as he watches james bend over the other one, he realizes with a rush of heat that james has likely pictured this, and it is with an eye for the tension of the charade that he approaches james slowly, watches him shift at his proximity.

he takes too long, and james, clearly almost thrown out the moment, says “thomas, i didn’t ask you to make a show of me, i said to fuck me hard. stop making an operetta of this, for god’s sake.” and thomas has to stop a laugh.

“yes, yes, sorry, of course, james.” and he fetches the slick that he’s stored in a piece on the shelf, and comes back. when he reaches around james to unbutton his trousers, though, the charade comes slamming back when he tsks chidingly at james’s shift and james’s throat clicks as he swallows. minding his pacing, thomas unbuttons his trousers, reaches under his vest to pull his shirt free, and bares him to the air in one push. james’s punched-out groan is encouragement as thomas frees himself from his trousers, slicking one finger gently into james before withdrawing, asking briefly, “more?” only to check with james’s head shake, his forehead pressed into the desk surface. thomas slicks himself, lines himself up, and presses in, stopping when james’s breath hitches, letting him adjust before continuing, bit by bit, gently inch by inch until he is fully seated in james. he finds as he goes that one of his hands comes to hold james’s wrists together as james struggles with the focus to keep them locked behind him, and the way james’s shoulder’s slump as he applies the slightest pressure reaches him even through the haze of james’s tightness around him. he presses down as he seats himself the last way, and a moan rips out of james like a tear in fabric. thomas hesistates, but james’s begging, inarticulate noise is enough to bring him fully to a dedication to his task.

he thrusts once first, slowly, a full unseating and reseating, a final act of caution, of distribution of slick, but then he leans his weight into james’s back his arms, stands wide and leans the weight of his height into james as he begins to fuck into him, fast, rough, and with the knowledge imparted to him by years of kind, if fleeting, lovers. he keeps their advice, their words in mind as he decides on an angle, presses james into the desk and affects a callousness that he does not feel, fucking deep into him in a way that likely still partly burns, fucking up against his prostate every time he shifts his stance, moving the hand braced on the table down to james’s still uniform-clad hips to pull him back to thomas with every forward stroke. james’s voice is loud, then quiets, and a bonelessness seeps through him as thomas fucks him, a low noise in his throat that builds as thomas intensifies the pace, leans more into him, presses into him with his entire weight.

the first time the desk shifts, james’s neck flushes and he bucks, and thomas, aflame as he is, realizes that it is in part the disarray that they are creating that causes this in james. he chooses then to be less careful about the state of the study, shifting the desk with every stroke, pushing aside the chairs, pressing james into the lacquer of the table while pulling him to thomas, james no doubt able to feel the scrape of his uniform’s buttons into the polish of the surface. their movements cant james’s hips as thomas unintentionally brings himself closer between james’s legs, partially supporting him, and the new position lines up with james’s prostate, and a low babble of “christ, thomas, don’t stop, this is– fuck, don’t stop thomas please,”

and thomas, as james begins to truly shake in earnest and as he begins to feel the warmth of abandon beginning to crest, leans his body down into james’s, pinning him onto the desk, and murmurs into the shell of his ear.

“you should see how beautiful you are like this. it’s a wonder i don’t have you painted, spread out like this as you are.”

and james chokes, and tenses, and shakes, and thomas’s hand, newly free, strokes james the last few paces to orgasm, a trembling twenty seconds of unending praise, of james’s beauty, his voice.

and when he finally says, “christ, james, and how wonderfully you yield,” james cries out and shakes over the edge under him, and thomas only then, as his own resolve fails and he chases the cresting wave of his own release, peppers james’s neck and upper back with kisses and gentle bites, unformed praise and repeated beautiful until he, at the last moment, removes himself and spills onto the desk. he had thought of james’s comfort, but as the boneless heat seeps into him, he meets james’s eyes, who is looking between him and the come on his desk wordlessly, partly just shocked. after several breaths, thomas speaks.

there was a sandbar island not too far from nassau. it was a tricky bit of ocean, thomas had learned through conversation, mostly because of the amount of ocean you had to cross before the water got shallow enough for the necessity of taking a rowboat to become clear. but as he lounges with james, who had stripped to the waist in the heat of the day with the long stretches of rowing that they had done, he thinks, about how much it’s worth it. it feels like the good of the last ten years to him. the stretch of physical labor under his skin, not enough to tax him but enough for him to remember he’s alive, warm sun on his skin, distance, alertness, and the ability to enjoy peace simply because of the fact that it will end. he feels not like a pale imitation of a lord hamilton, he feels like the best of what he’s been this past ten years. and as he stretches, cooling his palms in the water, he watches as james’s eyes scan him appreciatively, and he knows that james reads the ease in him. there’s a hunger in james’s eyes that he seems happy to let be for now, but it lends a sort of playfulness to the peace that they have. thomas has a sketchpad, and james has a half-whittled thing, and together they are sitting trying to make something out of nothing. thomas’s charcoal pencil breaks early, and he stretches out in the rowboat as it rocks gently. the sky is enormous and blue, a deeper blue than in savannah and taller, too, than any sky he had ever been under. james is whittling thoughtfully, but his foot taps a happy rhythm on the bottom of the boat that thomas starts to whistle along to, a half-tuneless thing that meanders along with the scrape of the knife. james finishes what he’s doing and tucks both wood and knife away, and then just looks at thomas. he reaches out, tugs on thomas’s hand.

james’s face in his hands is something he had thought he would have to die to experience again. he had dreamed of him, in the beginning, but when those dreams had faded he had let them go. the shock of sameness startled him, the way that, even after twelve years apart james could be so tender with him, cradle his hands like they aren’t broken, rough things, trail his mouth over thomas’s knuckles and fingertips like he had when he had first come back that first time from nassau and found thomas enamoured with his beard.

thomas can’t feel in large swathes of his hand. his ring finger is deadened, as well as patches of his palms, breaks and dislocations that never healed or healed badly, scars that ached and burned and tingled as james passed his mouth over them. james passed the rasp of his cheek over one of the ridges on his palms, and thomas gasped. his hands shook, still, denoting him truly, and james treated this indiscretion with reverence, mouthing at his wrists from where the weakness, the tremor, began. when he paused, chin fitted into thomas’s palm like a sparrow, asked him tenderly if he wanted james to stop, thomas thought for a moment of saying no, of letting james take him apart with only the oversensitive ridges of scars and dislocations of his hands, but some part of him that wasn’t ready, that was terrified, raw, and immensely angry still at the fact that those scars existed at all, rose up in him like bile, and he pulled james to him, kissed his eyebrow.

it’s an easy thing to quash the blinding rage that sweeps through thomas at the name. used to the intensity of his passions now, he positions himself casually, reassuring james with his posture. thomas doesn’t know why james fears for the man who ruined him, but thomas wasn’t here and silver was. that’s all thomas knows. and if james shakes apart at the mention of him, rage trapped in him like air in a balloon, and if he’s dead-man still when he sleeps except when he gasps awake with silver’s name on his lips, that is not for thomas to prise open. he can overmaster his rage, so he does. and when james sees the fire bank, he relaxes, conflict plain on his face as he’s faced with his own actions rather than the threat of thomas’s.

once, thomas would have been able to say something easily. once, he would not have had so much control over his anger. once, he had miranda to help him coax warmth back into the coldness james got when his exhaustion wore him down to the bone. once, thomas wasn’t alone in caring for james. and if thomas blamed silver, in part, for that, that was no problem of james’s. but as the moment stretched out and thomas searched for something, anything to say that wasn’t i don’t know what you want me to say, and failed.

“come sit down,” he says instead. “there’s tea.” he had fished out the last of their stores when he had worried after how long james had been taking. his hands were clumsy from the lapse in his ritual, but the joy of old habits returned had reminded him of miranda. and being reminded of miranda gave him the strength to not look away from james’s grief in spite of the dark tides of loss that they pulled at in himself.

it is still early enough that thomas feels no shame in admitting that he has trouble thinking of anything that isn’t james. miranda, in her infinite wisdom, had cleared their schedules as much as possible in preparation for the earl’s arrival, and, true, part of what had tipped him into recklessness that night was the unbalancing effect his father had on him. but james had seen this, recognized it, and kissed thomas again before telling him to call on him in three days when his father’s shadow had passed out of his mind. and thomas had paced, and sat, and read, and miranda had vanished as she was wont to do so as to trap him, in essence, alone with his thoughts. and think he did, paced until his knees protested at the stiffness of the heels of his shoes. paced barefoot in his bedroom, then, after he’d attempted to rest. and while he forced himself to confront that his carelessness had come from his father’s shadow, he was right to think that the sentiments behind them ran true and clear. he cared for james deeply, stopped pretending that it was some prurient love of the mind that had driven him to this, and stood and looked at himself in the mirror, forcing himself to look himself in the eye and say, out loud, i want to fuck james mcgraw. it was easier after that, and with the day that was left, he read books, made notes, and tried to ignore the heat that built under his skin with how he watched the clock, reread chapters, misspelled words. time couldn’t move fast enough, and when he slept, he awoke more eagerly watching the time than the night before.

he had gathered, since james had told him this on the night his father (may he rot) had left, that james had intended for him to wait to call on him until the evening. so it was to no small amount of surprise that he opened the door when the bell rang at noon to see a dark-eyed, hand-fluttering mcgraw at his door. he had never in his life retreated into his private rooms so fast, and when mcgraw slammed him against the closed door the second it was closed, the low nonverbal yes he gave seemed only to encourage the lieutenant as he bit thomas’s lower lip, the two of them breathing together against each other’s mouths, kissing fitting together like thomas had known they would, and a sweetness built in thomas’s chest until he could no longer abide by the ferocity of mcgraw’s kisses and, fisting a hand in his hair, he pushed him back up against the neighboring wall, his head tilted up, his eyes blazing, teeth set, mouth already kiss-dark, and thomas, one hand in james’s hair, used his weight to pin james solidly to the wall as, with fingertips, he lifted his chin more to kiss him gently.

something in james seemed to break at that, or at least buckle, as though the dam had been left in neglect for far too long. his hands went, warm, to thomas’s hip and lower back, just resting, holding onto the fabric of thomas’s coat as though he would never let go. thomas kissed james with the tenderness and feeling that had nearly blinded him in the recent past, with the kisses he would have given him in salons, in discussion. a thousand gentle things, not deviod of heat, but sharpened by their sentiment. he didn’t mention the twitch of james’s hips towards him as he learned how to kiss him how he liked, tried not to get distracted by the million kisses he felt the urge to give in exchange for the deficit they hd run. he kissed james to learn how he liked to be kissed, hesitated shy of james’s mouth to see how james would reach for him, to hear the gasp as james found himself held just short of him. thomas indulged him every time, but found ways to make james whine as they got lost in this, in this exploration of the fact that they could do this, that james could bite thomas’s mouth on impulse and then go red abruptly and laugh, that thomas could laugh through kissing him back, that james could learn thomas revelled in their closeness and pull him closer still, for him to discover there were sounds to be wrenched from thomas and dedicate himself to the study of those, to the slick press of what he could draw from thomas. and thomas felt his hips, too, twitch against james’s, but if fucking had been all they had been after it would not have been such a trial to have gotten here. the stakes had been set in pursuit of this, the ability to kiss until late in the afternoon, when both their mouths were sore and neither of them wanted to do much but shuck their outer layers of clothes and sit together, argue about nassau and stoicism and marcus aurelius and steal kisses from each other’s mouths. and thomas, finding himself surprised that his smiles were what drew disbelieving huffs and gentle open-mouthed kisses from james, that his own disbelief that james could could be, in essence, all he is were what drew james gently into his lap, james’s hands gentle at his jaw and neck as he kissed him with gentleness and tender emotion, that had thomas clutching back at james, that what had been reviled his whole life as unmanly sentiment could be what drew james in, like a moth to a flame.

he says this, smirking, illuminated sidelong with the light of the fire, as a caution, as an admonition, and you think of kissing him then. there are ways you can protect yourself if it goes badly, horrific violent things that you are willing to do to protect yourself and miranda, but standing there by the fire your body screams with the impulse to kiss him, and do nothing. no twitch betrays you as you sigh, except the twin blue traitors at the front of your face. you manage to keep the longing out of them, but cannot stop the warmth. you say something, perhaps, maybe you don’t, but james, sharp chin and pressed creases, he understand your assent anyways. it takes too much out of you to keep yourself from succumbing to willing misinterpretation. to deny the warmth of your relationship is to be a fool, but to throw your lot on a shadow’s guess is worse than to proclaim your sodomizing in a paper. you could be more easily ruined by who the lieutenant is than what you do together. what you do together in whitehall might be just enough to get you both killed anyways. cromwell’s memory is not so well-buried as some might have you believe. so your body burns, and with the affected ease of long practice, hoping that in speaking of something where he has less knowledge of you the feeling raging through you will abate. you wonder how well your conversations would go, if you could punctuate our adorations for his turns of phrases with a kiss, if you could discuss your plans from his lap, whisper your ideas into the column of his throat. both of your teeth sit at the throat of politics, and sitting in the silence and the waiting to see if he will join you, you wonder how it would feel to shove his coat from his shoulders, pull his cravat from his neck and taste his skin, and not stop until he was crying beneath you. this is not the first time you have felt this way towards a man you cannot have. it will not be the last time. his eyes seem clear as crystal in the firelight, and even in a tangent he is enchanting. you try desperately to focus on the conversation rather than the want that screaming through you, just for the smallest concession, to sway in his direction for a moment, to make a passing joke at your interest, but to begin to enter his orbit is to guarantee a collision. you have nothing to lose but your life, your wife, and your wits. and if you were to waver, what would happen might not kill you, but it would have you rather you were dead.

tw: bedlam

he dreams, faintly, that he’s warm. he’s too drained as he is to sustain images, but there’s a smell under his tongue, a taste that pulls him, sense-first through a memory that is but half-formed. the sensations fo the memory are half-overwhelming, almost enough to wake him, but it’s in that the dream feels written in another language, a language he knew how to read once, but no longer can. he follows it, tugs on the thread like theseus emerging from the labyrinth, and it pulls him through images he can almost see, of rooms filled with a light that doesn’t scorch him, carriage rides in rain that don’t drown him, rooms and floors and almost-names that he can’t reach but that carry him through almost-memory like the hook in the lip of a fish.

tw: parental trauma

thomas is asleep in james’s apartment, tucked up with him in his narrow bed. it was more than enough for one, and even in waking it had seemed accommodating enough, but with the cold of the apartment’s air against his back as he and james are twined together, the hardness of the mattress under his shoulder unlike much he’d experienced since boarding school, his mind is cruel to him, and by extension, cruel to james.

it begins, as it often does, with his father. he is hosting a gala in the main hall when his father arrives, and when miranda is torn away from him, it’s just the earl’s shadow, sized like it was when he was still growing and his father loomed over him, and between his father and himself, the figure of james. and when thomas tries to move to protect james, throw his body between him and the earl, he finds his arms tied to a post as his father’s words land like lashes he can almost remember.

my son is self-righteous. he needs to be taught a lesson. only by punishment can we ensure his good behavior.

everyones trans modern au nonsense time

thomas eases gently out of james, the strap making a wet noise as it slides out of james’s body, and it’s the matter of a moment for thomas to loosen the straps of the harness around his hips and shimmy out of it, and cuddle, still fully clothed, around a gently trembling james. it had been a stress-fuck, a moment of lightness and needed relief after a hellish week, and thomas isn’t exactly surprised that this happened. james had needed to keep his shirt on, and that, more than anything else, had been the indicator that foreshadowed this.

thomas gives james a moment, letting him decide for himself whether he needs to ask a change of address of thomas, and when james just sighs and settles back against him, the rasp of his freshly re-shorn head (difficult week having predicated the discarding of a winter’s worth of growth) against thomas’s own clean-shaven face (shaved in solidarity and out of frustration towards a perpetually-patchy scruff), thomas wends his arms around him and curls around him.

“names aren’t how i know who you are. you know who you are.” he presses a kiss to the back of james’s head, and he shivers. “forgetting sometimes isn’t shameful.”

I LOGGED INTO THIS ACCOUNT SPECIFICALLY TO SAY HEY THIS IS FUCKING BEAUTIFUL IM SHRIEKING

james is lying spread beneath him, fists bunched in the sheets, his back trembling, hair loose and sweat-dark and calves flexing against thomas’s knees as thomas tongues him open, gently, and with more care than he’s ever done anything in his life. james is an intoxicant, and the taste of him is of flesh and heat and, faintly, of soap. james rocks back against his mouth as he spreads him open, laves against him, closes his eyes and lets himself meditate on the feeling of james under his tongue and around him, the choked noises james is biting into his forearm, the twitch of his perineum where thomas’s thumb rests gently where he’s spreading james to better access him. the faint dusting of hair is the same here as across the rest of james, and it’s familiar under his hands now, increasingly familiar under his tongue. he spears james, once, twice, three times, and james cries out, gently, and begs him, please, thomas, god, your hands, please, jesus, and thomas pulls himself back, touches james’s flank gently, and james flips, pulling a trembling leg up so not to kick him, and thomas tugs the other ankle over so that he, once again, is kneeling between james’s thighs. james’s cock is bobbing, leaving wet dots across james’s belly, and there’s a purpling bite mark that james left on his own forearm, and his eyes are wide and wet and dark, and it takes everything thomas has to stand and find the slick rather than take james in hand, watch him shake apart under him.

when he stands, his own legs are unsteady, and his hands tremble as he lifts the jellied oil from the table by the closet. james has wiped his eyes by the time he gets back, and is palming himself, desperation standing out in his corded forearms, in the tremble of his shoulders, and thomas cascades over him, stopping his shy of his mouth, but james answers his question by bringing his previously occupied hand up to crush thomas’s mouth to him, his whole body shaking as he chases thomas’s tongue, and thomas could do this forever, no matter what the tension and heat in his own body say to the contrary, but he’s got james so close, and when he fumbles behind himself for the tin of oil, james lets go of his mouth with a breathed yes, god. and thomas smiles and kisses him briefly before seating himself again where he was, opening the tin with hands damp with james’s sweat and his own, scooping a not-insignificant amount of oil onto two fingers. james makes as if to turn himself over, and thomas stops him.

like this. please.

james looks indecisive. the sheets–

nothing will happen. something eases behind james’s eyes, some fear he hadn’t realized he was holding. he nods.

yes, then. he says. god, yes, i want to see you.

and the oil on thomas’s fingers, having partially melted on the heat of thomas’s hand, chooses that moment to drip down onto the sheets, no doubt to leave the sort of mark that james had worried over. james’s eyes, however, just laugh as james’s lips quirk, the expression morphing as thomas grabs, not looking, with his free hand for a discarded pillow. james’s eyes are dark as he lifts his hips and when thomas, instead of staying back between his thighs, leans over james as he moves his slick hand back and under him, james’s voice is half a growl as he says, what in my life did i do to be worth this, and thomas, feeling the spit-slicked muscle of james’s entrance under his fingertip, leans up to kiss and silence him as he pushes a finger up and into james, and crooks it hard, and presses.

james gasps, and moans, noises falling against and into thomas’s mouth, as his hands grasp at thomas’s neck and hair as if to find a way to silence himself, but thomas focuses on kissing him with the same rythm as that first one, then after some time two fingers find deep within james. there are punched sounds escaping from james’s mouth, and when thomas pauses, pulls back to get more slick so that he might continue, james clutches him to him, gasping, no, no, fuck, more, don’t stop, thomas, god, and thomas says against his mouth, i have to, any more than this would hurt without, and james, gd james clutches him tighter and says, just let it. just let it.

thomas won’t. he can’t. so he kisses james, deeply, breathes him in, and then sits back, biting james’s mouth warningly as he grabs at him, and pulls his hand free from inside james. it’s a matter of moments to get more slick from the open jar, and when thomas spreads james open, slicking with two fingers briefly before immediately spreading him openwith three, james makes a noise in his chest halfway between a cry and a moan, and thomas, only halfway up his chest, doesn’t catch it in time with his mouth before it rings out, open, in the bedroom. james’s thighs are trembling, his cock is wet and twitching against thomas’s stomach, and thomas can’t encapsulate the heat in the tenderness that courses through him like fire, like venom, as james gasps to hear his own sound writ loud in the room. reaching james’s face, he finds his hand held sealed over his mouth, and when thomas kisses the hand james turns his face, shaking his head, so thomas moves, obligingly, questioningly, to the base where his neck meets his collarbone, and when he kisses there, gently, james trembles from his crown to his feet, and nods briefly, his eyes screwed shut.

and so thomas nudges james’s ankles and calves up over his thighs as he continues to fuck into him gently, then deeper and more rapidly, and as he presses kisses along james’s collarbone, the hollow of his throat, and the flesh right above it, he’s murmuring gentle things and praises, and when, after blindly finding with his other hand the tin of slick, his hand closes on james’s cock, james’s body wrenches, and sobbing into his hand, he comes.