The Agency, Volume II Page 6

  Another surprise in a surprising night—Rowan comes first, violent waves of orgasm rocking through him, tearing something from his throat in Elvish before he collapses forward onto the bed, Jason still above him, and right behind. Mere seconds later Jason feels a supernova kindled in his head, and stardust erupts from his body, an entire universe formed inside the Elf, who tightens his muscles to hold them together just a moment longer.

  Long minutes of silence pass, the only sound, breath. The candles burn, distantly the CD still plays, an occasional strain of melody reaching the bedroom; the air conditioner clicks on. The hour changes from two to three.

  Jason shifts himself sideways to avoid suffocating the Elf, and flops down on the bed, his legs quivering and his back aching. His head, too, aches and spins. He's never felt so wonderful in his life.

  He starts to draw Rowan closer, but the Elf pulls away, sitting up with a grimace. Before Jason can have a chance to feel rejected, Rowan says, "I'll be right back," and climbs painfully out of the bed. He vanishes to the bathroom, where Jason hears water running, and when he returns he has a warm, damp rag in each hand.

  Rowan rejoins him in the bed, coaxing his legs apart, and begins to swab gently at Jason's skin, cleaning off the evidence of their pleasure.

  "Do you always do this?" Jason manages, though he can't quite tell which language it comes out in, his mind is so addled.

  The Elf nods. "It is customary, a way of honoring the one you have been with, to see to their comfort afterward. If this were my place I'd have warm tea and cool water beside the bed as well, and if I were with a human, some form of food."

  "I'll remember that for next time. Now, you. Lay back."

  Rowan looks like he wants to protest that this is his job, but then he nods, breathing out slowly, and hands the second rag to Jason. He lies back willingly and allows the vampire to administer to him the same as he had done, the warmth soothing his swollen and raw flesh. He does insist, however, on being the one to return the rags to the bathroom and comes back with a towel to apply to the bed so that neither of them will have to sleep in a damp spot.

  Then, he folds himself into Jason's waiting arms, and pulls the blankets up around them both.

  "Thank you," Rowan says into the darkness, kissing Jason where neck meets shoulder.

  Jason lifts his chin and touches lips to lips, stroking the Elf's face, which is once again wet with tears. "You're welcome, my love. And thank you."

  Jason kisses his tears away, for the first time of many to come, and as they drift together into the sea of sleep, listening to each other breathe, they are both smiling.

  Watching Him

  You are watching him again.

  You can't seem to stop; you hate the cliché, but he has become a new drug for you, one that shoots into your veins, one that you swallow in dose after dose, one that you would sell everything you own, even your body, to possess more of. Ironic, really, given everything you've suffered, that here in your freedom you would willingly be collared and chained, if the hands binding you were his alone.

  You have never felt this way, and it is terrifying and exhilarating and ridiculous, knowing that mortals know how to do something you don’t. They negotiate monogamous relationships every day—of course, they don't do it very well in your observation, but then, neither do you.

  He doesn't ask about Sara, but if he did you would tell him, and he wouldn't object even if he wanted to. He knows that there are conditions to your coupling, the biggest being the lack of the word "couple." Neither of you have made any promises; it's still too new to think farther ahead than the next night, the next kiss. You don't think you could give him more than that just yet, if ever—the thought is too huge and frightening, too counter to the life you once knew.

  But you watch him, and in that moment if no other, you belong to no one else.

  *****

  He is cleaning his favorite gun. You are pretty sure it has a name, but you don't ask. Secretly you call it Vera.

  You watch his hands, closing around the barrel the way they've closed around you, stroking with the rag, and you can feel his fingers and palm, their strength, their gentleness. Those fingers have been everywhere on your body, and inside, and you know their taste, the way his knuckles feel against your teeth, the extraordinary length of his lifeline. You've seen him filing his nails, keeping them neat and short for work, but also for you, no ragged edges to injure you when he slides one, then two, into your body.

  Four hundred years living in the forest, making love with dozens of your own kind over the decades, a master of your art, and now you are turned on by a gun. Every time you see it, every time he's armed, your body aches. You think of how he holds it, how easily an instrument of death becomes part of his arm, how he stands when he fires.

  You think of the time he was showing you his arsenal down at the range and you watched him checking bullets and sights, and how he shot so many holes in the target its head fell off, and how you were so hard by then that you could barely breathe. You said nothing, but went to your knees beneath the counter and reached inside his jeans, taking his gorgeous cock into your mouth and sucking hard while he continued to fire. The clip emptied just as he did, the last round striking the target as he filled your mouth, and he dropped the gun with a snarl and put his hands in your hair. Your head banged backwards on the table leg and the concrete floor hurt your knees, and you savored every second of it.

  Ever since, the gun gets you hot. Since technically weapons aren't allowed in the base, that means you only see it when he's in uniform, but the coat already turned you on unspeakably—the swagger, the badass professionalism, the testosterone you can practically taste, it all sends your senses into orbit and turns you into a gibbering idiot.

  He knows it, and he likes it. You're pretty sure he goes out of his way to carry Vera when he knows you'll be with him, just so you'll end up on your knees in an alley somewhere or in the locker room bent over a bench. He can be an evil bastard sometimes.

  You love him for it.

  *****

  He is feeding. You really shouldn't want him right now. It's against the very nature of your kind to crave death, to smell blood and connect that to sex. Yet here you are.

  His eyes turn silver, and they glow, slitted halfway shut as he drinks. You got him a special glass to keep in your quarters, opaque, so that he doesn't have to feel so uncomfortable. He objected strongly to your staring at first.

  You are starting to understand that you are not like the rest of your kind anymore. They—those who have survived—are creatures of light and air and sun. You are nocturnal now. You used to keep your shift centered between the two extremes where you could get a few hours' daylight and a few to see him, but now that you are lovers, you have given up the day completely. You know you should miss it. You know you should feel confined in this unnatural indoor life, yet here you are.

  He takes about a pint per day. You keep one in your fridge now. He keeps fruit in his.

  He lowers the glass, meets your eyes. Still silver, still alight, preternatural fire burning in their depths. His lower lip is stained, a tiny smear of blood waiting to be wiped away.

  You take the glass from him with one hand and pull his mouth to yours with the other. You suck the blood from his lip, the coppery salt-sweetness traveling right to your dick, and he growls deep in his throat and shoves you onto the floor. That wildness and darkness you see in his eyes infects you. You pull and twist your way into each other's clothes, both of you still hungry, hardness rubbing against hardness until he flips you onto your stomach and pins you with his weight.

  You push back against him, your hips meeting his, and he plunges into you painfully, barely taking a second to spit into his hand first. You have felt pain like this, but never wanted it so badly—he fucks you and you fuck back, the force of your bodies meeting ripping cries from your throat. You will bleed from this, you know, and before the night is done you will taste your own blood in his mouth.
The thought makes you come even harder.

  No, you are not like the others anymore.

  *****

  He is playing, and he is sweating, and you think you might melt into the bleachers.

  There are still plenty of surprises between you; this was one of them. You would never have pegged him as the team sport type. You wonder if there are any vampires in the NBA.

  He steals the ball from Carlos and sails it in a flawless arc from the three-point line. Carlos curses in Spanish, but he's grinning.

  Another thing: it's Shirts Versus Skins, and he is always Skins, because Beck has to play for the opposing team. That way the unfair advantage of having a vampire center is offset by each team having its own. Beck went topless once, but after she had to punch out one of the Admins for an overly personal foul, she declared she was, from there on out, Shirts only.

  God, that tattoo. You stare, but in this situation nobody notices; everyone is staring at someone. From here you can see the black lines of the dragon undulating as his corded forearms and hard biceps block a jump shot. He should look odd, being so pale, but what on a human would seem pasty and undercooked on an immortal is almost too beautiful to be real. You catch sight of his other tattoo, the symbol of infinity on his wrist, one you've run your tongue around a hundred times already.

  Over the squeak of shoes on the floor and the grunts and shouts of the other players you can hear him laughing, and your toes curl.

  You're going to fuck him in the locker room. As he looks up for just a second, you can see that he's aware of this fact.

  You can already feel your nails digging into his bare shoulders, taste the sweat you'll lick off the back of his neck. You know that when you flick your tongue against the back of his earlobe he'll claw at the tile wall of the shower stall, and you'll bite down on his wet skin while your hands peel the soaked black cotton down over his ass.

  Another surprise was that he was perfectly happy to take or be taken. You had figured it would require persuasion and time to get him beneath you, but the first time it had been his idea—in fact, the first time had been after a basketball game, probably in the same exact position you'll have him in in about half an hour.

  Then, as tonight, you had flattened the length of your body against his, letting his sweat soak into your skin, and he had rocked his hips against your erection in that way he does that's almost like dancing and very much like fucking. You hadn't kissed, you hadn't bothered with any preamble—that had surprised him. Sex being your art and your craft, he is used to a lot of reverent foreplay or at least a bit of banter.

  You trailed your mouth down his back, snaking over his spine, your fingers kneading your favorite place on the male body, the smooth skin to either side below the navel, just over the hipbones. You straightened, and he made a helpless gesture toward the hook on the door, where his jacket hung, with its prize stashed in the inside pocket.

  Tonight it's in your pocket: travel-sized for your convenience. You have to appreciate the ingenuity of the human race—Elves, of course, have their own lube, but it has a short shelf life and has to be made from scratch in small batches. If you were ever to return to your own people you'd take a case of your favorite brand with you and make a killing selling it to the other rethla.

  He moves so fast, almost a blur of motion, though you know both he and Beck are deliberately taking their time, to keep it fun for the others. He has the ball again, and slams it into the hoop, the motion looking so effortless that everyone in the crowd is struck dumb. You smile: that's my boy.

  You can feel his stomach against your palms, and you imagine running your hands around his waist, parting his legs with your knee, your fingers traveling up to tease his nipples, pinching one hard. He sucks in a tortured breath. Your other hand moves down to his dick, so hard it has to be painful, and you bestow a single upward stroke, bringing a soft whimper to his lips.

  This is why you took your time after the game, waiting for the others to shower and leave; you hung out in the gym talking to Carlos and Sara, though the latter was giving you knowing looks. She misses very little, including the way you bite your lip when your lover sinks a free throw.

  You pin him to the wall and enter him slowly, luxuriating in the heat, the way he surrounds you. His eyes are closed, lips parted slightly, concentrating, waiting, letting you fill him up an inch at a time, barely breathing. You love the way he smells, sweat and exertion hitting you along with the underlying scent of the ageless, and you breathe him in deeply each time you move. You rock together, your head lying against the back of his neck, your hands on his hips, his hands on the wall.

  Everything echoes in the locker room. Especially the sound of tile falling from cracked grout and shattering on the floor.

  *****

  He is Chopin's 20th Nocturne in C Sharp Minor, and you are in tears.

  He moves with the slow-dancing flames of the candles that cast their golden light over his skin, the instrument a living creature writhing beneath his touch just as you do. His whole body sways in time with his right arm, his left fingers precise in their patterns yet still so graceful, you find yourself swaying along with him, longing rising up in you and pouring from your eyes.

  You have never asked before—the only time you've ever heard him play was when you were coming back from a coma. Finally, you worked up the nerve, and he looked away, fighting with himself.

  You backtracked; if he didn't want to…

  He did. He said it was time.

  You have spent the day here, far below ground, in his apartment, making love and talking, watching Eddie Izzard on DVD and then retiring once again to the bedroom, kisses dissolving into each other, bodies moving in perfect concert, as if you have been lovers for years instead of months. You find deliverance in each other, fingers entwined, lips speaking a language common to every race, immortal or otherwise. When you have rested, the sweat cooled, your heartbeat slowed, you ask.

  You recognize the piece at first, but within minutes he has turned it on itself, doubling back and then departing the road laid down by its author. It becomes infinitely sadder, yet containing the memory of joy, and you can hear the influence of his ancestors woven into its strains. His eyes are closed, and you are crying, not because of the beauty of the music itself, but because of what you are seeing. He is unshielded, holding nothing back, and completely at peace as you have never known him—and he is letting you see it, letting you into the most intimate part of him. You are privileged, and you know it, and you weep.

  You reach out your heart to him, as you do when you touch, and a smile flickers on his lips; you feel yourself drawn in, feel something within you open and ease, some deep down pain you didn't know was still there pulled up and out and spun into the music like a gossamer web of past, present, and future.

  He is healing you.

  Your hand comes up to cover your mouth, magic you had never thought possible moving through you, and you can feel it, feel love, dark and melodic and so old, kissing every cell of your body, every spark of your soul.

  At last he lowers the violin and smiles.

  When his lips touch yours, you understand, at last, that this is forever.

  Umbrella

  Sara lets herself into Rowan's quarters, sure he's there--she sensed his familiar energy beyond the door as she was coming down the hall.

  For a rarity, he's not waiting for her on the couch; he always knows she's on her way long before she arrives, and is usually in the living room reading or having a drink and pouring her one as well...that is, when he's home. These days it's a crapshoot whether he'll be in his own quarters or Jason's.

  She can hear water running. He's in the shower. In fact, she can hear him singing, and she stifles a quiet laugh. She recognizes the song, she thinks, but she can't place it over the sound of the shower drowning out his voice. It's something she's heard on the radio recently, she's sure of it.

  "Hey," she calls. "It's just me--don’t get out, I’ll just leave you a n
ote.”

  She knows where most everything is here, probably better than in her own quarters, as Rowan is fastidious and a thousand times more organized than she could ever hope to be. She finds a pad of Post-Its in his desk drawer and starts to scrawl out a message using one of the lovely silver pens he orders special from...somewhere. He is a creature of odd enthusiasms: body care products, fruit, writing instruments, vampires.

  But then, who doesn't love vampires?

  The water switches off, and she hurries: he wouldn't mind her being here, but she doesn't want to be the kind of friend who just shows up whenever.

  "Need to switch our session tomorrow," she pens. "8 instead of 6? Call me. Sara."

  She sticks the note to his computer monitor where she knows he'll see it.

  As she turns around, she shrieks.