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There's a comfortable distance between them; Arthur is hyper-aware of it. Every turn they make, every time they sidestep another pedestrian, they return to that foot of distance. It's a solid thing and Arthur is aware of it in the background of all his thoughts. Their footsteps are synchronized in the quiet of the night, only occasionally drowned out by the conversation of periodic passers-by.
It's cool, the air pleasant on his skin after the close heat of the bar. He's at a very low-level buzz after a few beers and some pleasant company with their chemist Christine, their extractor Amin, and Eames. Eames, who walks beside him now as they return to their hotel, which is just close enough to make a cab ride unnecessary.
The silence is pleasingly full, not quite heavy enough to tip the delicate balance of... whatever it is they have going. Arthur isn't sure what he'll say when they get back to the hotel; likely it'll be as it always is. He'll say his polite good night and return to his room, but nights like this make him think that another ending is possible. Unlikely, but possible.
And it's because he's so hyperaware of that space, of the steady clop-clop of their steps that he hears it when other steps fall in with theirs. It's quiet, deliberately timed with theirs but designed to be quieter so that they shouldn't notice, but he does. They're in sneakers, he's sure. And another second of careful listening tells him there are two of them.
Eames hears them too he knows, by the infinitesimal turn of his head towards Arthur, perceived in Arthur's peripheral vision. They're down a quiet road now, no other pedestrians at this time of night, no late night shops or bars for blocks. It's just the four of them, and Arthur is relieved that Eames and he have only had the few drinks.
He hears the change of step a scant half a moment before he turns. He sees the dull black of the gun and moves, knocking it out of that hand before he even has a chance to assess the man holding it. It flies with a clatter some half a dozen feet a way and the man reacts, a little too impulsive, obviously not trained to kill, probably just a thug with a keen sense of self-defense.
Eames is moving at the same time, but Arthur can't track everything at once, and is simply confident in the knowledge that Eames is there so the other thug isn't likely to be a problem for Arthur.
It's quick and it's brutal, the assault that comes, but Arthur combats every move. The man tries to knock him off balance but Arthur's martial arts training has him dancing out of range. The man is fast, and he turns and catches Arthur under the jaw with a fist like a sack of marbles. Arthur barely feels it, too charged with adrenaline to register his pain as he ducks, slips under and comes with an upper cut digging into the man's ribs, backed with every pound of Arthur's weight compounded by his momentum. The man grunts, doubles over and Arthur attempts to take the advantage and bring up his knee to crush the man's face.
But he misses when the man twists out of range, and a foot comes out of nowhere to sweep at Arthur's feet. Arthur spasms a jump into the air, narrowly missing the attack, but lands awkwardly on the man’s ankle that's supposed to be out of range by now, and he stumbles. Somehow he takes a fist to the face and it's the sound more than the feeling that sickens him.
He punches blindly, but his instincts are sound and it lands with a crunch that bruises the fuck out of his hand but surely broke some facial bones. It's satisfying in a visceral way that Arthur feels deep down in his gut. The man is not recovering from that one soon, he's sure, and when he clears his vision enough to take stock, he sees the man cradling his face feebly, knees trying and failing to gain purchase underneath himself to raise him up.
After a vicious kick to the man's middle that has him weakly trying to curl in upon himself, Arthur looks over to see how Eames is faring, and sees the second thug on his back on the ground, Eames straddled over him with a forearm holding him down by the throat.
He walks over and aims a full-body kick to the man's ribs, and the man twists in agony, whimpering and dribbling spit out of his mouth.
Eames looks up at Arthur, lip split, eyes intense and dark, chest heaving. He has a faint reddish patch on his cheekbone that looks like it will bloom to a full bruise by morning and blood is dripping freely down his chin. He looks flushed with the kind of puffiness that only comes from a rush of testosterone; he’s the very image of a brawler, feral and fierce. God he's gorgeous, Arthur thinks, and that's just fucking ridiculous, isn't it?
Arthur is thrumming with adrenaline now and his nose feels numb and swollen. He can sense some wetness on his face that may be spit, may be blood. He licks over his teeth and can definitely taste it, metallic and bright and it only adds potency to this itching agitation.
Eames stands and looks like he's about to speak and Arthur feels a desperate need to stop him. He can't let Eames speak because he'll say something that'll ruin this; he'll say something that makes sense, and Arthur doesn't want things to make sense. He wants... something. Something else.
So he steps forward, grips Eames by the back of the neck and pulls him in for a kiss, bloody, painful, bright and perfect. It's open-mouthed from the start, all tongues and teeth and blood. But if the kiss was meant to slake his lust, it’s backfired because Arthur’s urgency ratchets up several notches. Eames licks back, his tongue hot and hungry, his breath as heavy and desperate as Arthur's.
Eames pulls away and Arthur is instantly angry, beyond angry. Eames can't ruin this, can't fucking speak and bring reality back. Arthur wants to rage and punch and bite and wrestle.
But Eames is saying, "My room, Arthur. We're around the corner," in a voice that is as adamant as it is longing.
Arthur doesn’t know how long it takes to walk back; he only knows that it’s fast, and that the one-foot distance has reduced to a scant inch. But neither of them dare to touch during the walk, because if it starts it’ll end right here, with them fucking on the pavement.
In the hallway on the way to Eames’s room, Arthur finally allows himself to close the distance, allows his hand to find its way under the back of Eames’s suit jacket to feel the dip of his spine at his lower back over the sweaty cotton of his shirt, and before he can even enjoy the warmth of it, Arthur finds himself slammed against the wall, tongue tangled with Eames’s and the hot heavy weight of him pressing him hard.
He pushes back, driving Eames back towards the opposite wall and the noise is loud, much too loud for this time of night when the other guests are surely safe and warm in their beds.
“Key,” Arthur manages when he can pull away from Eames long enough to say anything at all. And Eames frantically fumbles in his pockets while still pressing viciously against Arthur’s mouth.
When Eames finally finds the key card and attempts to slot it in with shaking fingers, Arthur presses behind him, pushing Eames into the door, impeding his efforts while he ruts his clothed erection into Eames’s ass. Arthur doesn’t even fucking care that they haven’t actually entered the hotel room yet, doesn’t care that they haven’t determined how any of this is going to go, Eames’s ass is just so firm and perfect and Arthur is beyond thoughts, beyond design or plan, his body needs friction so he ruts.
The door opens and they tumble in, clawing at each other and trying desperately to maintain contact but instead are just crashing and bouncing off each other. Their mouths are open and licking but what they’re doing can’t be called kissing.
Eames leans into Arthur until he bangs against the wall, Eames’s hips pressed so hard against his own that his dick feels crushed. He tries to push Eames’s jacket off his shoulders but is hindered when Eames lifts his hand to Arthur’s face. For a surreal moment thinks Eames is going to tenderly stroke it, but instead Eames clamps his hand over Arthur’s mouth and grips his cheekbones with astonishing strength. He knows now that the earlier punch to his face must have clipped both his nose and his cheek because he can feel the bruise under Eames’s thumb. And it hurts, yes, but it ignites something akin to bloodlust deep inside him. He wants to fight and he wants to fuck and he honestly can’t untangle one from the other at this moment.
Eames uses his grip to forcibly turn Arthur’s face to one side, and Arthur resists because he can, but when his face is turned, his neck bared, Eames leans in and sinks his teeth over the back of Arthur’s jaw. Arthur can feel his skin dent almost to the point of breaking before he twists out of it and uses his whole weight to lever off the wall and drive Eames back towards the bed.
On the way he succeeds in wrenching Eames’s jacket down, trapping his arms momentarily before Eames throws the jacket to the floor. They tear at each other’s clothes and somehow, without finesse or any dexterity to speak of, they strip down to their skins through sheer force of will.
Arthur pushes Eames back on the bed and remarkably, he goes, but not without wrapping his arms around Arthur and wrenching him down with every ounce of strength he has. The power of that embrace is perfect, squeezing the breath out of Arthur.
The heat of Eames’s bare skin underneath him inflames Arthur’s desire, makes him want to consume, to pound that flesh until it’s pliant and workable, beat it until all that stiff muscle yields under his hands. He sees a nasty contusion starting to bloom below Eames’s collar bone, and he runs his thumb over it for a moment before steadily increasing the pressure, digging in until Eames jerks his shoulder to get away. Arthur’s eyes drift back to Eames’s and he sees an odd mix: anger, heat, want.
They kiss at last, something less painful than their previous crushing press of flesh on flesh but no less hungry for that. Eames bites on Arthur’s lip and it’s not a love nip; he chews on it, reopening the cut where Arthur’s teeth must have sunk into his lip, and sucking on the blood that flows once more. Arthur can taste it, and it feels so intensely personal sharing that taste with Eames. Arthur reaches out his own tongue to lick across Eames’s top lip, feeling along the curve of it, pressing into its yielding softness.
But it’s all too slow, the grind of his cock against Eames’s is good but it’s not enough. The crush of Eames’s arms around Arthur’s back just reminds him how much he needs to feel the squeeze of Eames’s ass around his cock. One of Eames’s hands has already drifted down to clutch at Arthur’s asscheek, and his fingers feel like they’re digging for purchase in his flesh. Maybe Eames wants in there, and he can, but not yet.
Dredging far back into his own mouth, Arthur gathers as much viscous spit as he can and smears it onto Eames’s hole before shoving two fingers up into that tight heat. Eames grunts and flinches, frowning at Arthur but he can feel the muscle relaxing around him and Eames pressing against him slightly, as much as he can with Arthur’s full weight on top of him. It’s not lube and it’s not quite enough and Arthur can feel the friction on his fingers, so he can’t imagine what it feels like for Eames. He pulls them out and drools more spit on them, bringing his hand back down to push up inside him again.
It’s better this time and the hard clutch of muscle on Arthur’s fingers is a tight band sliding over Arthur’s knuckles. Arthur imagines it gripping his dick and he can’t wait any longer. He brings his hand up once more, licking over his palm, dribbling as much spit as he can all over his fingers and rubs it onto his cock.
Arthur drops to support himself on one elbow, lines up his cock and presses, taking the barest second to check Eames’s face for a hint of protestation. Seeing none, he pushes in, holding his cock with his hand to keep it from bending against the resistance. Eames’s jaw drops open in a gasp the moment Arthur breaches him, and he turns his head to bite into Arthur’s arm. There will be crooked teeth marks there tomorrow.
He crowds in, the friction a burning pressure on his erection but just slippery enough to ease him in. Arthur shudders at how his dick feels choked by that collar of muscle and his vision swims as he bears in. The strain of keeping the entry slow is making his arms shake, sweat breaking out on his upper lip. He wants to slam in, to fuck Eames into oblivion but first he needs to get inside.
Eames’s meaty hand grasps Arthur’s head, pulling him in, inescapable as gravity. So he falls to that mouth, then slides past it, buries his face where Eames’s neck meets his shoulder and bites in. He feels the same on his own neck and it satisfies his sense of form, this mobius strip of not-quite-kissing. His lip bleeds on Eames’s skin and the tang of it with the salty skin and the smell of Eames -- sweat-musk and arousal -- is making Arthur lose his mind.
With one arm holding himself up and the other clamped down on Eames’s shoulder for leverage, Arthur begins to drive in, small grunts accompanying each thrust. The spit won’t last long as a lubricant, but with Eames so tight around him and the blood thrumming through his veins, Arthur won’t last long anyway. He pounds in, withdrawing only enough to put some force behind each punch, bottoming out every time. The slaps and the grunts and Eames’s long growling moans fill Arthur’s ears and he fucks like he’s in heat, reduced to mindless lust.
He’s just breaking into a fresh sweat when his fury reaches its tipping point, his whole body tenses and he comes, erupting in jerking spurts in Eames’s ass. It’s only after he crests the peak and the last of his come is feebly dribbling out of him that he feels Eames’s heels digging into his back, probably hard enough to bruise.
Arthur doesn’t get a chance to come down from his high before Eames pushes him off and yanks Arthur’s hips up to get his knees underneath him. It’s graceless and awkward but Eames manages it through sheer brute force. Arthur crawls forward and Eames follows, though he still has one arm gripped around Arthur’s waist and he refuses to let his hard leaking cock part from where it’s pressed against the crack of Arthur’s ass. Arthur feels heavy and loose, barely enough strength or drive left to hold himself up, but that arm around his middle feels strong and supportive. He lets his head dangle forward and closes his eyes.
When Eames moves his hips away, Arthur misses the heat, but a moment later blunt fingers prod at his hole. Arthur has the dizzying realization that the slickness of it is from Eames collecting Arthur’s come from his own ass, pushing it inside Arthur to slick this new penetration. And it’s only now that Arthur comprehends what he’s done. Too late, he thinks of the dangers, the licking of blood, his bare cock in Eames’s hole, the come. Arthur has never been that stupid and now that he feels Eames pushing his cock up inside, he thinks he should stop it. But. Oh Christ that’s so good, and the damage has been done, and... oh, oh, oh Eames is fucking into him with abandon. Arthur feels like a ragdoll, that forearm digging into his waist, his body being yanked upwards in time with Eames’s thrusts.
Arthur presses the side of his face into the bed, hands balled up into fists and takes the pummeling like he’s weathering a storm. The fight has gone out of him and there’s a deeply satisfying sort of resignation in letting his body bear the brunt of Eames’s raging lust. Arthur’s grunts have lost their angry edge while Eames’s are reaching a new fevered pitch as he pounds in hard and fast.
It must be only a few dozen thrusts before Eames buries himself deep and grinds in, planting his seed way up inside, deep in Arthur’s gut. And it feels incredible: free and unfettered. Belatedly Arthur realizes it’s a sensation he’s never experienced before.
Eames lets his forehead rest briefly on Arthur’s spine before collapsing beside him, breathing hard. Arthur works his knees out from under himself and flops forward, face turned towards Eames. Eames is on his back, one arm thrown over his eyes, panting through his mouth. Arthur can’t tear his eyes away from Eames’s lips.
“Jesus Christ. Arthur.”
Arthur waits but no more words are forthcoming. “That was... intense,” Arthur says reluctantly, unprepared to turn his brain on when all he wants to do is curl up and sleep like the dead. “I’ve never...”
“Arthur, we don’t have to...”
“Let me finish. I’ve never done that before. I’m clean, though. Are you...”
“I’m clean,” Eames removes his arm from his face and turns to look at Arthur. “I can’t believe we just did that. Been wanting to ravage your arse for months. Years. But in all the times I’ve rubbed one out imagining how it would go, I certainly never pictured that.”
Arthur laughs, agog at the staggering number of ways in which Eames has insinuated himself as an exception to every one of Arthur’s rules. He can’t even begin to address half the things going on in his head so he just says, “Yeah. I. Yeah.”
Eames smiles and stretches his arms above his head. “Why don’t you take the first shower,” he says, like it’s the most natural thing in the world for Arthur not to return to his own room. Arthur raises an eyebrow and shifts off the bed.
“Arthur,” Eames says and Arthur responds with a hum. “We’ll talk about this tomorrow, yeah?” and he sounds unsure. Arthur’s never heard that tone from Eames before and he frowns.
“Sure, of course. We’ll need to... figure things out. But tomorrow,” Arthur glances at Eames as he turns to close the bathroom door, and sees that Eames has that arm across his eyes again. Arthur has no idea what that means, and realizes he has a whole new set of gestures to get used to with Eames now.
As he showers, Arthur is keenly aware of Eames’s presence outside the door and he feels the inevitability of correcting the distance. He smiles as he soaps up all his sore spots, sluicing off the detritus of the evening but holding onto the various aches that Eames has caused.
And with that thought something definite settles in him. He doesn’t know what just happened, he doesn’t know how Eames feels about it, he doesn’t even know what he’s going to say to Eames the next day. But one thing he knows is that whatever this is, he’s not finished with it. Not by a mile.
---End---