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They find what they are looking for in the third pawnshop they visit, which is also, predictably, when things go wrong.
The background to the case is this: a spate of robberies targeting wealthy widows, a small fortune in jewellery missing. According to Wang Zhi, one of Madam Cui’s girls has recently been spotted sporting an exquisitely delicate new jade hairpin, claiming a lover procured it for her from a pawnshop in the eastern part of the city.
So, Tang Fan draws up a list, enlists Sui Zhou in the endeavour, and goes looking. For the occasion, he raids Qing Ge’s wardrobe. She helps him comb his hair all sleek and twist it up, pinning it with a pretty jade comb. His robe is a soft pink silk. She pats a faint blush onto his cheek, dabs his lip with colour.
It is, perhaps, overkill. Sui Zhou seems to think so, anyway. At least that’s what Tang Fan takes his pointed look to mean when he emerges from Qing Ge’s rooms. But the robberies were done by someone highly skilled, and whoever now has their hands on the loot is likely to be suspicious and probably dangerous. It’s best if they can keep a low profile this way, gather information, work backwards to find the true thief - or gang of thieves - before they strike again.
In the first shop Tang Fan plays a new bride. Blinking, shy as Sui Zhou does his best enamoured, if stoic, husband act. No luck.
In the second shop they try, the owner greets them warmly, sits them down and calls his daughter to serve them tea. Tang Fan doesn't like the way the daughter looks at Sui Zhou. The way her eyes go wide, the way she smiles all slow and... predatory. In Qing Ge’s silks it’s easy to let himself feel different, pull on a different character along with the costume. Tang Fan becomes a little bolder, planting a hand on Sui Zhou's broad chest and pouting, the flicker of jealousy in the daughter's eyes more than worth the way Sui Zhou shifts in alarm under Tang Fan's hand.
Despite this little victory, the rest of the visit is pointless. Even with Sui Zhou’s purse in his hand they find no hint of stolen jewellery. As they leave Sui Zhou accuses him of having too much fun, but Tang Fan can hear the smile in his voice even as he says it.
Walking from one shop to the next and if Tang Fan stands a little closer to Sui Zhou than usual, if he presses into the warmth of Sui Zhou’s hand on the back of his arm, who can blame him. Sometimes he feels it so much, the way he catches Sui Zhou looking at him from the corner of his eye. It makes him feel strange. Fragile. Sometimes light on his feet with it, like a paper lantern with a candle inside, floating upwards and upwards. Like his insides are warm with it, the flickering light obvious to anyone who so much as glances at him.
The madam of the third pawnshop they visit must see it. When she brings out the third case of her wares, fine silver bracelets this time, pretty but nothing of note, Tang Fan puts on his best brat and pouts and whines, “Guangchuan, it’s just— I want something special. Don’t you think I’m special?”
Sui Zhou meets Tang Fan’s eyes, half exasperated, half charmed, and nods, serious. Sui Zhou does not put on acts easily, but this one is convincing. He looks like he would buy Tang Fan every shiny thing in the whole shop if he wanted them.
The madam looks from one to the other, considers the size of Sui Zhou’s purse and his official uniform, considers the far-gone look on his face, the resigned affection of a man so deeply in love that while the flaws of his pretty new lover are clear, he is nevertheless willing to spend a ridiculous amount of money on jewellery for her. She narrows her eyes. “Well…” she says, whispering conspiratorially, “I do have something a little more special, if Sui-furen is sure none of these can tempt you…”
Tang Fan brightens, nods enthusiastically, clasps Sui Zhou’s hand in a show of eagerness. Sui Zhou nods too, after a beat, just once, and squeezes Tang Fan’s hand when the woman’s back is turned to fetch another heavy box from the back room. Tang Fan bites his lip, forgetting about the colour Qing Ge put there, tries not to let the thrill of hearing Sui-furen show on his face.
And then the woman comes back with another box and she opens it to reveal the delicate white jade hairpin of carved twin dragons, unmistakably part of the loot that this whole misadventure has been in search of. Tang Fan turns it over in his hands, admiring it. It’s very fine, heavier than he would have thought, the stone warming with the heat of his hands. There's something else in the box as well. Lots of somethings, in fact. Fine gold filigree brooches, warm amber and mutton-fat jade pendants studded with pearls. Tang Fan recognises the unmistakable workmanship of the Imperial factory.
Tang Fan can't quite suppress his gasp. He exchanges a startled look with Sui Zhou. There's more going on here than fencing stolen goods. A bloom of anxiety twists in his stomach. The pawn shop woman is watching them with a sharp eye.
They need to go. Now they know where the loot is, now they have the fence, they can go. Tang Fan turns to look at Sui Zhou, tries to make this clear without words. He can make an offer so low as to be insulting, and then the woman will throw them out of the store, disgusted, and they can go and figure out their next move.
“How much?” Sui Zhou asks, voice low and soft, plucking the jade hair pin that Tang Fan had almost forgotten about from his grip. His fingers brush Tang Fan's as he does so and Tang Fan swallows.
The woman names some exorbitant price. Sui Zhou doesn’t blink. He places an eye-watering amount of taels on the table as a deposit and promises to come back with the rest later. The woman smiles slowly and bows in thanks.
“Guangchuan—” Tang Fan starts, startled, as Sui Zhou takes the hairpin and slips it into his robes. They hadn’t planned this - Tang Fan hadn’t actually intended for him to buy anything.
Sui Zhou looks right at him, says calmly, with a straight face, “Didn’t you say you deserved something special?” And guides a dazed Tang Fan out of the shop onto the busy street.
Sui Zhou keeps walking, Tang Fan at his side, and it takes a minute or two for Tang Fan to register that they’re heading back to his house. “You—” he starts, and closes his mouth when he can’t think of how to finish. Tang Fan looks at him, and is that the hint of a smile? The bastard, he’s enjoying this.
Until Sui Zhou glances behind them and the smile slides off his face, replaced with something more serious. “We’re being followed.”
They quicken the pace, Tang Fan taking two steps to keep up with Sui Zhou’s strides, anxiety trickling like a piece of ice down his spine. Sui Zhou jerks him abruptly into an alleyway, but then there are men at the other end blocking their exit as well as the men following them, and they’re trapped.
Sui Zhou grits his teeth, pushes Tang Fan towards the wall and assumes a fighting stance. Thankfully, the men don’t seem to be armed. There are about six of them, approaching from all sides now. Tang Fan shrinks back against the wall and watches as Sui Zhou neatly dispatches two of them, one after the other.
Tang Fan has seen him fight before, and he makes it look easy, moves so fluidly, never hesitating. If it wasn’t happening right there, in front of Tang Fan, if fists weren’t flying so close to his actual face, Tang Fan would stand back and admire him. As it is, he still can’t take his eyes off Sui Zhou, which turns out to be quite a major mistake.
Sui Zhou delivers a brutal uppercut to one of his opponents, who stumbles back and knocks into Tang Fan, and Tang Fan is caught off guard and falls back himself, into the wall behind him, and the fall snaps his head back hard into the wall.
His vision dissolves into bright spots of light and the world sickens and tilts and blinks out around him before he even hits the ground.
The next thing he knows Tang Fan is on his hands and knees retching onto the ground, the world a confusing tumble around him. Pain ricochets around his skull. He squeezes his eyes closed and the world tips away again and his stomach lurches, he’s already on the floor but he’s still so unsteady and he can’t tell what’s happening in front of him - is Sui Zhou still fighting? Is someone going to hit him again? Or worse?
Tang Fan finds there is something cold and solid under his cheek. He thinks it might be the ground, that he is slumped over, cheek pressed to the dirt, though he can’t remember how he got down here. He doesn’t try to get up. When he reaches a hand to the back of his head it comes away bloody. He hopes Qing Ge won’t be angry that he’s ruined her nice silks.
Time does something funny - it’s like Tang Fan has forgotten to pay attention to it. He’s not sure how long he lies there, drooling on the ground. He tries to open his eyes again but that doesn’t help, the confusion of light and sounds refusing to solidify into anything recognisable. Maybe it’s hours, maybe it’s just a few moments before there are hands on his shoulders pulling him up, making his head spin again when he had just gotten it to quiet down.
“Runqing, Tang Fan,” says a familiar voice, Sui Zhou’s voice, and Tang Fan tries to swat him away. He’s come to get him out of bed, but Tang Fan doesn’t want to wake up. Something is wrong and he needs to go back to sleep so he can wake up and it will be right again.
“Leave me alone, I don’t want to,” Tang Fan says, or at least he thinks he does, his tongue feels strange and clumsy in his mouth. He squints his eyes open and four different versions of Sui Zhou’s concerned face waver and converge into one solid-looking figure. He looks ruffled, breathing hard, a bruise forming high on his cheekbone and a frantic expression on his face.
“Runqing, we have to go,” he says, cradling the base of Tang Fan’s skull and pulling him up. His head spins again and he feels very high up, and also like someone has replaced his legs with freshly cooked noodles.
Tang Fan’s face is very close to Sui Zhou’s face, and Tang Fan looks at him because he finds looking anywhere else makes him feel ill. Or more ill than he already feels. Tang Fan wants to move his mouth up to kiss him, to rub his face along the rough skin of his cheek. Sui Zhou glances at him and he looks very worried, and something about this is very funny to Tang Fan, and despite the jolts of pain rebounding around his skull making it impossible to follow a train of thought to its conclusion.
Sui Zhou pulls him close to his chest, scoops his legs up with his other arm and then he’s carrying Tang Fan entirely in his arms and they start to move forward in clumsy steps. Tang Fan closes his eyes and lets his head loll into the comforting presence of Sui Zhou’s chest when the sky spinning above him gets too distracting.
It takes a surprisingly short amount of time to make it back home. Or a very long time. One of the two. Tang Fan isn’t quite sure which.
And then he must have closed his eyes for a second - just a second - because suddenly he’s aware he’s lying down in his own bed and Dong’er is sitting beside him, shaking him by the shoulders and wailing, “Tang-dage, Tang-dage!”
Tang Fan looks around, the disconcerting feeling of being in a place that should be familiar but not knowing how he got there making wrong seep in through the walls. “Dong’er,” he manages, over the sound of his ringing head, “what are you doing here? Where’s Sui-dage?”
Dong’er looks distressed. “Gone to fetch Pei-daifu,” she says, and then, “Sui-dage said I mustn’t let you fall asleep, Tang-dage. He’ll be back soon, he said. But you can’t fall asleep!”
Tang Fan shushes her. She’s speaking so loudly. Why is she speaking so loudly? He takes a second to think, head still ringing, thoughts scrambled. He challenges Dong’er to recite as much of One Hundred Family Surnames as she can remember in a whisper and clings on to the trembling thread of her voice until he hears the front door slam open and Sui Zhou come back, a harried Lao Pei at his heels.
“Sui-dage!” Dong’er cries and Tang Fan groans and tries to roll over, forgetting the tender spot at the back of his skull, flinching when he accidentally puts weight on it.
Pei Huai takes Dong’er’s spot by the bed. Then there’s a lot of prodding and Pei Huai making him blink his eyes open and focus on various things while he peers at Tang Fan’s pupils and tests his reflexes, all the while carrying on the most banal conversation possible, as if Tang Fan were just dropping by his surgery on the way to Aunt Dong’s noodles instead of lying helpless on a bed barely able to move.
Finally, he proclaims, “I don’t think there’ll be any permanent damage. But it’s a nasty bump.” He turns to Sui Zhou, ignoring Tang Fan's indignant squawk at 'permanent damage'. “Let him rest but stay close by, and don’t let him sleep too long or too deeply tonight.”
Sui Zhou nods.
Tang Fan wants to complain that he is right here, thank you very much, and can be addressed directly, but his head hurts and instead all he can manage is a vague grumble as he throws an arm over his eyes and drops out of consciousness.
He blinks awake from a tangled dream, Sui Zhou’s hand on his shoulder, shaking him gently. “Runqing,” he’s saying softly, in that warm voice of his, “Pei Huai said not to let you sleep too long.”
The room is dark now, just one lantern left burning, throwing out a honeyed light, casting strange shadows. Sui Zhou is seated by his bed, alone, and the house is quiet. It feels like the middle of the night. With just Sui Zhou here and the one lantern it’s easier; his eyes don’t complain so much, the stabbing pain in his brow is cushioned.
“Pei-daifu left you something for the pain,” Sui Zhou says, like he can read Tang Fan’s mind. Tang Fan manages to prop himself up on one elbow as Sui Zhou brings the cup to his lips. The tea is lukewarm and bitter, he pulls a face, but finishes the last dregs under Sui Zhou’s watchful eye.
“Dong’er?” Tang Fan asks when it’s done. “She was here before - is she alright? I didn’t—”
“I sent her to bed,” Sui Zhou says, “she’ll be fine when her Tang-dage makes a full recovery.”
Tang Fan makes a noise of protest. It seems unfair for Sui Zhou to pin Dong’er’s wellbeing to Tang Fan’s health, as if he didn’t feel guilty enough already, but this seems like a very difficult thought to express, and he shoves it to the back of his mind. Instead he tries a pout. “But Sui-daren,” he says slowly, “you’ve seen how skinny I am. I’m so weak and frail…”
“Wake up in the morning,” Sui Zhou says, firm, hiding his amusement, “and I’ll make youtiao. And those steamed buns you like.”
“Hmm, how could I say no to that?” Tang Fan mumbles, smiling, even as he closes his eyes again.
The next time Tang Fan wakes the lantern has burnt even lower. Sui Zhou is still there, a comforting presence at his side. His hand is on Tang Fan's arm, pressing lightly through the blanket, it must be this that woke him up. The room is quiet, the world is quiet. Tang Fan's head is blurry with sleep, but at least the pain has calmed down to a gentle throb.
"Runqing," Sui Zhou says, looking at him with an expression Tang Fan can't read.
"Mm," Tang Fan hums, burrowing deeper into the blanket, "I'm here, Guangchuan. It's alright. Everything is okay."
Sui Zhou sighs. He doesn't speak, doesn't move his hand from Tang Fan's arm over the blanket. Tang Fan is half asleep, loose and warm with it. This close Tang Fan can the knuckles on Sui Zhou's are red and swollen, the skin broken in places where a particularly vicious blow must have connected with a particularly tenacious surface. He covers Sui Zhou's bruised hand with one of his own, meaning to comfort him, running his fingers lightly over Sui Zhou's skin, the back of his hand, relishing the feel of the coarse hair that starts at his wrist. Guangchuan takes such good care of his little wife, Tang Fan thinks nonsensically, or does he mumble it out loud to himself? He's too tired to tell.
He has touched Sui Zhou before - he must have, here and there, fingers brushing as he passed him a pair of chopsticks, or slapping him out of the way as Tang Fan concentrates on some important document or other. But this feels different and Tang Fan isn't sure why - something about the quiet of the night, the world made just for them, the way Tang Fan feels cozy and warm and perhaps how his brain just lightly scrambled.
He must drift off into sleep again because the next time Tang Fan opens his eyes, Sui Zhou is dozing up right in his seat next to the bed. He looks tired, dark smudges under his eyes, but the worried expression from earlier has been smoothed out, in his sleep his face is clear, his head has nodded down onto his chest and he's blowing out soft breaths of air, and something about his sleeping face is so endearing, Tang Fan can't bear it.
Tang Fan's hand is still covering Sui Zhou's hand resting on his arm, the heat of his skin sinking deep through the blankets. Tang Fan must have fallen asleep like that and Sui Zhou didn't pull away. Without thinking, Tang Fan brings Sui Zhou's hand to his lips, presses a light kiss to his fingers.
When Sui Zhou wakes he doesn't stir, just snaps from sleep to wakefulness in a second, silent, eyes opening, head coming up. It's without the violence of when he wakes from a nightmare, though it seems like it takes him a second to process his hand in Tang Fan's, Tang Fan's breath ghosting his fingers.
"Runqing," he says softly, barely audible, and doesn't pull his hand away. Tang Fan tightens his grip, tries to convey the whole mess of feeling in his chest without words, the lightness of it, the ease. Sui Zhou winces a little but doesn't pull away and Tang Fan's stomach drops for a second before he remembers the state of Sui Zhou's knuckles and he drops his hand. Sui Zhou doesn't move away.
Tang Fan swallows, audible in the silence. "Come to bed, Guangchuan," he says the words into Sui Zhou's skin, "come to bed. You can wake me again in the morning. It will be alright. I promise."
Sui Zhou stays still for what seems like a long time. Then he stands, and for a horrible second Tang Fan thinks he is going to turn around and walk out. Instead he reaches for his belt and shrugs off his outer robes and crawls over Tang Fan to lie down on the bed behind him. Tang Fan turns over to face him and Sui Zhou pull him close, tucks him into his chest, head in the hollow of his neck so Tang Fan breathes in the heady, masculine scent of him, one of his hands cradling the Tang Fan's neck, so gentle it makes him feel like he might cry.
They don't talk. Tang Fan closes his eyes and sleeps once more.
In the morning Tang Fan wakes sprawled on Sui Zhou's chest. He knows immediately that Sui Zhou is awake - one of his hands is ghosting lightly up and down Tang Fan's back, tracing a line from the nape of his neck to the bottom of his spine. Tang Fan is still dressed in Qing Ge's borrowed silks, in the tumbled mess of the events of last night he must have forgotten to take them off. Not that he was in any state to try, he supposes.
Tang Fan tries not to stir, so Sui Zhou doesn't realise he's awake. When he does no doubt he will want to get up, ask questions, let the real world in. Tang Fan knows it must happen eventually, that there's something important on the edge of his mind, some problem he needs to solve niggling at him, but for the moment he stays still and listens to Sui Zhou's heart beating through his chest.
Something about his breathing must give him away. Sui Zhou's hand pauses on the small of his back. "Runqing. Are you awake?"
Tang Fan groans and nods into his skin, no point in hiding it now. He shifts up the bed so he's no longer resting on Sui Zhou's chest but lying next to him, facing him, their breath mingling.
"How do you feel?" Sui Zhou asks.
Tang Fan's head is throbbing now Pei Huai's tea is wearing off. The bright morning light is strong in his eyes. "I'm fine, Guangchuan. You took such good care of your new bride." Tang Fan says it with a pout, an echo of how he flirted with him in front of the pawnshop madam yesterday. But they are alone now, and Tang Fan isn't sure whether he is joking or not.
Sui Zhou doesn't say anything. He reaches a hand to Tang Fan's cheek and the gentleness of his calloused fingers make Tang Fan sigh. He brushes the back of Tang Fan's head and Tang Fan tries not to flinch as his fingers touch the knot of the wound and the mess of dried blood in his hair there. But then something else is happening. Sui Zhou moving closer, his hand a grounding, steadying presence as he presses their lips together in a sweet kiss that leaves Tang Fan almost as stunned as the head wound.
"I am glad to hear it," Sui Zhou says when he pulls away, and Tang Fan has to think for a long second to remember what he's replying to. "We should bathe."
"No, let's stay here."
"Didn't I promise to make youtiao?"
"...You did." Tang Fan had forgotten. The sleep-sodden memory floats to the top of his mind. "Send Dong'er for them. I won't hold it against you."
"Hm," Sui Zhou says, and kisses him again. "Bath."
When Tang Fan sits up his head rings like a bell. Sui Zhou steadies him as he gets to his feet but he manages to walk the rest of the way to the bath and sink into the warm water. Sui Zhou steps in behind him, washes the crust of dried blood from his hair with careful hands, combing out the tangles with a simple wooden lacquer comb. Tang Fan tries not to flinch when he brushes over the sensitive spot where a scab has formed. The rest of his scalp feels tender as well, but in a different way, tingling, making him want to press into Sui Zhou's touch and squirm away at the same time.
When it's done, Tang Fan sits in between Sui Zhou's legs, back pressed to his chest, watching as Sui Zhou's hand wanders its way across Tang Fan's chest, drawing a lazy circle around one nipple.
"About the case, Guangchuan, I was thinking..." Tang Fan closes his eyes and tips his head back against Sui Zhou's chest. He feels Sui Zhou's answering hum more as vibration through his skin. "That filigree from the third shop was from the imperial workshop, it means there's something else going on, we aren't seeing the full picture—" Sui Zhou's hand on his chest gets closer and closer, finally brushing over the nub and making Tang Fan gasp before moving away and starting to do the same to the other.
Something about this strikes Tang Fan as grossly unfair. He shifts around and settles himself in Sui Zhou's lap, legs spread to straddle his thighs, arms on Sui Zhou's shoulders. "We need to see Wang Zhi. He didn't mention anything about this before - which means he doesn't know, or he wasn't telling us the whole story. Either way..." Tang Fan trails off.
Like this it's very easy to lean in and press their mouths together in a soft kiss, loose and slow, breathing into it, darting his tongue out to lick at his skin.
Sui Zhou kisses back, just as lazily. "What was that you were saying?" he teases, very close to Tang Fan's mouth, as he settles one hand on Tang Fan's shoulder blades and the other on the curve of Tang Fan's ass below the water. Tang Fan can feel the shape of a smile on his lips as he leans in to kiss him again, his point forgotten. It should feel new, probably, but it doesn't. They've been dancing around each other all this time, flirting for so long that having Sui Zhou like this, his, is gloriously familiar in a way Tang Fan has never felt with anyone before in his life. It's not new, it's them.
They're both wearing trousers, a force of habit that had seemed presumptuous to question earlier, but Tang Fan is cursing now. Even through the material, the weight of Sui Zhou's hand feels incredible, heavy and wide. It must do something to his brain because Tang Fan breaks off the kiss to mumble into Sui Zhou's mouth, "You have very big hands."
At the sound of his own words, Tang Fan feels impossibly foolish. He ducks his head, cheeks flushing. He doesn't know what it is about Sui Zhou that throws him so off-balance, but it does. Tang Fan has done this before, he's not some blushing virgin. But something about the permission implied by having Sui Zhou like this, his to touch, to explore, sends him dizzy. Tang Fan wants to touch him everywhere, earlobes, underarms, tip his head back and stroke the knot of his throat and then close his mouth over it.
"Is that so?" Sui Zhou says, and squeezes Tang Fan's ass so hard it makes him gasp and flinch away involuntarily. Sui Zhou's grip doesn't let him.
Tang Fan could say something else here, some witty comeback, he could, it's on the tip of his tongue, but he chooses not to. And it's definitely a conscious choice and not because his mind has been blissfully consumed by the man below him. Instead he whines into Sui Zhou's mouth and grinds down into Sui Zhou's hand on his ass, and rocks a little forward into his lap, fitting their bodies together chest to chest, trying to get some friction on his cock.
Sui Zhou squeezes his ass again, moves his hand up to slip a finger under the waistband of his trousers making Tang Fan shiver at the sensation. "Guangchuan, are you going to fuck me?"
"No," Sui Zhou says, after some consideration.
Tang Fan makes an affronted noise.
"Not now. I want to take my time with you."
He says it using the same voice as he says everything else. Tang Fan melts.
Sui Zhou pulls at the ties of Tang Fan's trousers and gets his hand on Tang Fan's cock, puts the other one back on his ass, now bare, and Tang Fan whines at the sensation, at being held so securely, as Sui Zhou pulls on Tang Fan's cock with a lazy grip. Tang Fan grips at his hair and presses their foreheads together and watches- watches his cock in Sui Zhou's hand, his big hand as Sui Zhou drives him slowly insane.
The pace he sets is slow, gentle. Tang Fan tries to thrust into it but his thighs are already aching from being spread over Sui Zhou's lap for so long and he can't keep it up, in the end he settles back down and takes what Sui Zhou gives him. His hand is rough with callouses, strong, it feels good, so good, Sui Zhou feels good.
Tang Fan has never taken his time with this before - either on his own or with someone else. It's always been a race, a sprint to the inevitable finish. But this is different, Sui Zhou seems to be luxuriating in it, experimenting with a twist of the wrist, the light scrape of a nail, his thumb rubbing over the leaking head, teasing. Sui Zhou is learning exactly what Tang Fan likes with the same amount of care and attention as he does everything else. It's an act with the deliberate promise of more, and the thought is so heady combined with the steady drag of Sui Zhou's hand that Tang Fan has to close his eyes and bite his lip to keep from crying out.
His attempt at composure is useless in the end. When he finally comes, Tang Fan is a mess, clinging onto Sui Zhou's hair, whimpering, shaking apart, panting wet into the hollow of his neck. And then Tang Fan raises his head just in time to see Sui Zhou raising his hand to his lips and licking Tang Fan's spend from his fingers, meeting Tang Fan's eyes as he does so.
Sui Zhou swallows and Tang Fan whimpers at the sight of it, and then he's pulling Sui Zhou towards him with the grip of his hands in his hair and kissing him properly, hungry, bruising, their teeth clacking together. Tang Fan can feel the hard outline of Sui Zhou's cock pressing up through his trousers and he scrambles clumsily at the fastenings to free it.
He moans once he has it in his hand. Sui Zhou is thick and hot and Tang Fan can feel the flutter of his heartbeat against the skin of his palm. All thoughts of technique are lost and Tang Fan jerks him clumsy, overwhelmed with him and all the possibilities unfolding in his mind. Tang Fan wants to suck on it, want to feel it inside him, wants Sui Zhou to fuck him through the mattress of his - their? - bed so hard he can't see straight.
It doesn't take long before Sui Zhou is coming, pulsing in Tang Fan's hand making no noise but a gasp and sigh into Tang Fan’s mouth. Tang Fan wonders what it will take to make him moan.
In the afterglow, after a blissful minute or two with Sui Zhou's strong arms around him, breathing in the smell of his skin, something in Tang Fan's mind clicks. Tang Fan gasps and starts to climb out of the bath too fast, Sui Zhou has to steady him and help him down. "I knew it, I knew, there's something wrong, Guangchuan, we have to see Wang Zhi, it's about the case, it's important—"
Sui Zhou follows close behind Tang Fan to the bedroom, pulling him back to plant a quick kiss on his lips as they go, cutting Tang Fan off mid-sentence. Tang Fan stops talking. Sui Zhou says, impossibly fond, "Alright. We'll get breakfast on the way."