Work Text:
It took months of dating before Joe got a glimpse of a moon drunk Nicky. Months of careful handling, of Nicky's grip gentle on his skin; Nicky's teeth soft on his shoulders, his neck. Months of love, and care, and under all of it the knowledge that Nicky was tucking away some element of himself like a shameful secret under the floorboards.
Not the wolf. Nicky had been upfront about that from the moment they met. He had explained, careful and patient, that the wolf was part of him, but not him, and he would keep it away from Joe for his own safety. That his bite wouldn't do anything more to Joe than anyone else's would, even if the moon was full. He wasn't ashamed of his wolf, anymore than Joe was ashamed of his beard. No, he was ashamed of what he couldn't blame on the wolf. Joe just couldn't find the words to tell him not to be.
In the end, it was Joe's fault. He was well aware that Nicky needed space over the days of the full moon, needed privacy for the change and space from the fear he might harm someone. But Joe needed his laptop, and didn't keep track of the days as well as he should have, and had a key that he had blanket permission for 25 days of the lunar cycle to use.
Really, it could have been worse, Joe had thought as Nicky pressed him against the door; teeth scraping Joe's throat, one hand fisted in his hair to keep Joe's head at exactly the angle Nicky wanted, the other clutching hard enough to bruise at the softest point of his waist. It could've been the actual full moon Joe interrupted, not just the day before.
Joe still squirms to think of the way Nicky caught his wrist as he tried to make space between them to say something, just to hold it high above his head, and kicked his feet apart to keep him off balance. The way Nicky had rutted against his thigh, licking the sweat from Joe's neck before digging his teeth in again.
His subsequent moan had broken the spell.
Nicky had dropped him like he was scalding, scrambling backwards while Joe found his footing again, staring at him like a nightmare come true. He'd slammed his bedroom door closed so hard a picture had fallen from the wall, shattering the glass of the frame across the hallway, shards at Joe's feet as he panted for breath and tried to find a single word to say to salvage the situation.
There hadn't been any, at the time, but he's hopeful they'll come eventually. All he'd managed to do then was scoop up his laptop and what remained of his dignity, and get the fuck out of Nicky's house.
Can we talk?
Joe's text stays unread for an entire day after the full moon, not that he's checking.
It feels like the first time in weeks Joe's taken a full breath when Nicky finally texts him back.
Tomorrow.
Nicky won't hear his apologies. Joe had stood to speak as soon as Nicky walked into the cafe—their cafe, where they'd taken to meeting in the early days of their relationship, where they'd gotten to know each other and like each other— and Nicky had shaken his head, sharply, before heading to the counter to order for them both.
Shame stills Joe's tongue when Nicky sits down; sticks it to the roof of his mouth like toffee, sweet and cloying. Nicky smiles when the waitress hands over their drinks and Joe swallows hard against his nerves.
'Nicky, I—,' courage abandons him. 'How… how was the change?'
It's not quite polite, given the circumstances. Joe's only even allowed to ask such a personal question because of what they've been to each other—are to each other—but he can't help it.
'… Difficult,' says Nicky, eventually. He adds a cube of brown sugar to his espresso and stirs it carefully.
He only likes sugar in the early days after the moon, Joe knows.
'I'm sorry,' Joe whispers. Nicky shakes his head.
'Not in the way you're thinking.'
Joe tilts his head, tries to meet Nicky's eyes.
'In what way?'
'The wolf wanted you,' Nicky says, more to the surface of his espresso than to Joe.
'You know what it wants?'
Joe had always been under the impression that to be the wolf during the full moon was to be a wolf. Nothing of the human side present at all.
Nicky shrugs, uncomfortable, his too-big t-shirt bunching awkwardly against his neck. The wolf lingers for a while; makes his skin sensitive, his sense of taste, of smell. Makes him sharper, but hurts him too, Joe thinks. Not tucked away the way it usually was, away from the full moon, when Nicky could shift at will.
'Like remembering a dream. Shapes, sensations. Desires.'
Joe takes a sharp breath, and tries to smother the heat that rises in him at the thought of Nicky desiring him, even when lost to himself.
'I'm sorry,' Joe says again, reaching out for Nicky's hand before thinking better of it, clumsily grabbing at his tea instead.
'I'm sorry,' Nicky says, miserable, his head low, his shoulders high, 'you must have been terrified.'
'Ah—'
Nicky looks up at the little noise Joe can't quite restrain. Whatever he sees in Joe's face makes his eyes widen.
'Not… terrified, no,' says Joe, slowly. He can feel himself flushing. Nicky's nostrils flare; he lifts his chin and Joe shifts in his seat. 'I was upset to have intruded on you like that, and I'm sorry for it, really, but I wasn't terrified.'
'… I see.'
Joe takes a sip of his tea, mostly to distract himself from the memory of the last time Nicky looked at him like that. And what happened bare seconds later.
'Did I hurt you?' Nicky's voice is less fraught, which is nice, but Joe still hears worry in it. It makes him feel guilty all over again.
(He feels even guiltier that Nicky has clearly spent days tearing himself apart over this, while Joe pressed on the bruises Nicky left on his waist, his wrist, his collarbone, and got himself off to the memory.)
'Not in the way you're thinking,' says Joe.
Nicky's eyes darken.
'What ways am I thinking?'
'Ways I didn't want.'
Nicky's hand flexes around his espresso cup before he carefully lets go of it. He sits back in his seat, head tilted up, mouth ever so slightly open. He's too polite to sniff the air audibly, but Joe knows he's dragging his breath over his tongue; tasting the air around him. His eyes get darker still.
'Is that so?'
It's not really a question. Joe doesn't bother answering, just shifts in his seat again, eyes fixed on Nicky's mouth, breath caught in his throat.
'Maybe we should move this conversation elsewhere.' Nicky says, before he looks away at last. Joe gasps quietly, feeling like a tangible weight has lifted from him with the loss of Nicky's direct attention. He must say something, agree in some way, because Nicky's already at his side, hand at his elbow to help him up from the table. Nicky leads him away with a hand at the small of his back, and Joe couldn't tell you a word he might have said if you paid him.
They don't speak on the walk back. Nicky's house is closer than Joe's flat, and they head there by some mutual silent agreement.
It isn't till Nicky shuts the front door behind himself that he speaks again.
'You liked it,' he says, his voice low and heavy. 'I thought I hurt you, scared you, but you liked it.'
It takes Joe a second to gather the nerve to face him. Nicky's back is against the door, and he's looking at Joe with an expression Joe's never seen him wear before.
'I did,' Joe says. Something in him wants to step back, away from Nicky. Not out of fear. There's anticipation building in him. A desire to run. To be chased. 'I liked it, Nicky. I liked it a lot. I'm sorry.'
Nicky shakes his head, and pushes off of the door, stepping forward a pace.
Joe steps back. There isn't far to go in Nicky's little hallway.
'Don't be sorry,' Nicky says, taking another step. Joe can't help but step back too, getting closer to the wall. Nicky's eyelashes flutter as he scents the air again.
'I'm sorry for intruding,' Joe says, hot under his clothes. It feels like there's no air between them.
'You shouldn't have,' Nicky agrees.
Step, step.
'I'm sorry for not pushing you away,' Joe says.
Step, step.
'You should have tried.'
Step, step.
'I'm sorry I wasn't here when the wolf wanted me.'
Step, step—Joe's back hits the wall.
Nicky's on him in an instant, pressing him harder against the wall, slotting his knee between Joe's and pressing up with his thigh. Joe shudders and clutches at his shoulders.
'The wolf can't have you,' Nicky growls, before catching Joe by the jaw and lifting his face into a bruising kiss.
Kissing Nicky has been great since the first time Joe tried it, careful and sweet on their first date, just a soft touch of lips outside of Joe's building before Nicky drove home. Every kiss after that has been sweet, passionate, deep, thrilling to Joe's toes, but fundamentally gentle.
This is nothing like that. Nicky kisses like he's staking a claim; Joe has to open his jaw wide to keep up, to let Nicky's tongue in. Nicky pulls away just enough to bite Joe's lip and start again, hands sliding up Joe's sides, under his arms, pushing them up above his head till Nicky can hold him there by the wrists, bodies pressed together from collarbone to ankle.
Joe's so hard he feels dizzy with it, gasping for breath between kisses. He can feel Nicky's cock against his thigh, thick and hard in his stupid ugly cargo pants that Joe can't help but love because it's Nicky wearing them.
'Please,' Joe groans as Nicky moves on to kissing and biting at his neck. 'Please, please—'
He doesn't even know what he's begging for.
Nicky does though. Nicky always knows what Joe wants, even before he does.
Joe keens as Nicky lets go of his wrists with one hand, the other keeping them firmly in place above Joe's head. With his free hand, Nicky undoes the button and fly of Joe's jeans and palms his cock once, making Joe cry out, before he grabs at Joe's ass, groping at him until he has a firm grip. Joe pushes back into him, and Nicky squeezes hard before he pushes forward with his hand in time with shoving his thigh higher between Joe's legs.
It should be humiliating. Nicky coaxes Joe into riding his thigh, rock hard cock still in his boxers, leaking so much Joe can see the stain spreading across the grey fabric; sticking and dragging across Nicky's trousers with every thrust. It's not though, it's so good he can barely catch his breath. Nicky's teeth are sharp against his collarbone and Joe's so turned on he's almost crying with it, grinding helplessly into Nicky's thigh, tugging against Nicky's grip on his wrists just to feel the strength in his hand.
'You would have let me fuck you, wouldn't you?' Nicky asks in a voice like silk over gravel. 'You would have let me have you that day, up against the door, where anyone could have heard you.'
Joe moans, high and loud, hips moving faster. Nicky's never spoken to him like this before. Nicky licks a strip up his throat and tucks his nose into Joe's hair, his breath hot on Joe's ear, and Joe burns with it.
'You would have let me hold you down and fuck you, and you would have loved it—'
Joe comes, mouth open, choking on a scream. Nicky swears, harsh and loud, and drops Joe's wrists to grab his hips, fucking hard against Joe's body, Joe's cock trapped between them. It's too much, Joe's still coming in thick wet pulses through his boxers, so sensitive he's shaking with it, but if Nicky stops he thinks he might die.
Nicky bites Joe's shoulder when he comes, panting heavily around a mouthful of Joe's jumper, bruising the skin below. Joe raises a trembling hand and strokes Nicky's hair back from his face.
Nicky hasn't even unbuttoned his trousers. Joe's spent cock twitches against Nicky's thigh.
'I would have,' Joe whispers into the heavy, hot air between them.
Nicky shudders, and kisses the blooming bruise on Joe's neck.
There's a shredded t-shirt in Nicky's bed. Joe finds it while Nicky's clattering about in the kitchen. He'd deposited Joe in bed after a gentle but thorough shower for them both. Joe's head was still swimming a little with how hard he'd come, and how quickly, but he'd sobered up a little when Nicky had carefully kissed every bruise he could find on Joe's body.
('I liked it,' he had murmured into Nicky's hair, holding him close under the spray, looking for reassurance even as he tried to reassure Nicky. 'Too much, maybe.'
'Me too.' )
Joe tugs the scraps of fabric out from under Nicky's pillow, running them between his fingers and trying to picture what t-shirt it could have been. It was grey, and there's the remains of a thin collar and a short sleeve, but Nicky buys the clothes he likes in duplicates, so that's hardly a help. He has lots of grey t-shirts.
'I wasn't kidding when I said the wolf wanted you,' says Nicky from the doorway. Joe jumps a little, his concentration broken unexpectedly.
'The wolf…?' Joe looks between the scraps of fabric and Nicky, who sighs and places two mugs on the bedside table next to Joe. He's still a little loopy and distracted, but not so distracted that he can't admire the muscles of Nicky's bare back. They hadn't really bothered to dress after their shared shower, just shorts and the promise of a warm bed.
'I was wearing that when you… when we—,' he breaks off, huffing a little laugh.
Joe shuffles along a little, and pats the mattress next to himself. Nicky hesitates, and Joe's breath catches, that tiny pause stretching endlessly, before he finally sits down and turns his body towards Joe.
'It smelled like you,' he says, not quite a whisper, but almost as quiet, like it's a secret just for Joe. Nicky's bedside lamps are draped in soft red and orange fabric, giving the room a warm glow. His eyes are dark in the dim light; the shadows soften the sharp edges of his face. 'The wolf wanted it. You. You can see now why I would worry I hurt you, yes?'
Joe traces the rough edge of the scraps of t-shirt. It makes sense now, how destroyed it is. Long claws, sharp teeth; the soft cotton didn't stand a chance.
His whole life, maybe, Joe has hungered for love, for intimacy—for someone to want him the way he wanted the world; the way he wanted to consume the things he desired and keep them in himself. The way he wanted to eat, and be eaten, by a passion so big it would fill up the empty spaces inside him. His whole life, people have told him he's too much. He asked for things he shouldn't, and wanted what no one was willing to give him.
Joe holds the shredded fabric in his hands, his knuckles white around it, and burns.
'The wolf wanted me?'
He doesn't know what he'll do if that's really all it is.
Nicky's eyes flicker in the light; the animal reflection of the wolf present even when the moon is waning.
'I wanted you.'
Joe sucks in a breath. Nicky moves closer, reaching up to touch gentle fingertips to Joe's jaw.
'I still do.'
Joe throws the scraps away and reaches for Nicky with both hands, lunging across the bed for him and knocking him flat on his back.
'Next time,' Joe gasps out between wet drugging kisses, 'I'll be there next time. You can have me. I want you to.'
'I might hurt you,' Nicky says, chasing Joe's lips for another kiss almost as soon as the last one ends.
'I don't care.'
'I do.'
Joe stops kissing him and sits upright, although it's a wrench to do so, and worse still not to give in when Nicky tries to follow him up, eyes trained on Joe's lips. On his back with Joe's knees on either side of his hips, Nicky looks debauched; delicious. Joe ducks down and kisses him again once, twice, feels Nicky squeeze his thighs, a hand on either leg, and sits up again.
'You won't hurt me,' says Joe, reaching down to cup Nicky's face in his hands. 'Not in the way you're afraid of. If you really don't want me there I won't be, but I'd like to be. I would've stayed last time, if I thought it's what you wanted.'
'I wanted it too much,' says Nicky, staring up at Joe unblinking. 'I wanted you so badly I almost didn't let you leave.'
Joe smiles, leans down to rub the tip of his nose against Nicky's.
'But you did,' he says, lips so close to Nicky's they brush with every other word; a fleeting kiss that Nicky cranes his neck to try and deepen. 'That's how I know you won't hurt me, puppy.'
'Joe,' moans Nicky, hands flexing on Joe's thighs. He sounds like a wounded thing; like it pains him to have even that bare inch between their mouths. His eyes are closed. 'Please.'
He knows, but he can't help but push, not with Nicky writhing underneath him like this.
'Please what?'
Nicky's eyes open. Joe sees them only for a flash before Nicky snarls and twists, flipping Joe onto his back, making him gasp with the sudden violence of the motion.
The wolf is still so very close, only a couple of days after the full moon. Joe can almost see it, in Nicky's eyes; the set of his jaw. He sees it, and tilts his chin up to bare his throat to its teeth.
It's Nicky's lips that press against his skin; Nicky's hands that touch him; Nicky's strength that flips him onto his belly.
Joe rolls his hips luxuriously against the mattress, groaning at the not-nearly-enough pressure against his cock. Nicky swats at his hip, and grabs his shorts (Nicky's shorts, really. His own clothes are still in the washing machine) by the waistband, dragging them roughly down to below the curve of Joe's ass.
'You can't blame the wolf now, Nicky,' Joe says, hiding his sharp grin in the pillows. 'It's all you.'
'I told you,' Nicky replies, pausing to bite Joe's ass cheek, making him yelp and then laugh. 'The wolf can't have you. You're mine.'
Joe's reply freezes in his throat when Nicky spreads him open and blows gently on his hole, making him shiver and twitch, held in place by the barest tips of Nicky's fingers.
'I don't like to share,' says Nicky.
Joe has to drag a pillow into his arms to bury his scream in when Nicky licks into him. He kisses Joe's hole in the same consuming, sloppy way he kissed Joe against the door; all tongue and teeth and hunger. Joe feels stuck between the too-little contact of the mattress under him and the overwhelming feeling of Nicky eating him out. His cock throbs and he whimpers helplessly when Nicky works his thumb in beside his tongue, hooking Joe open, cupping his huge hand so his palm can press down hard on the space between Joe's balls and his hole.
It's so much. Pleasure crackles through Joe's nerves, makes him writhe under Nicky's touch like a wild thing. He can feel every movement of Nicky's tongue, the stretch of his thumb where Nicky's working him open; the filthy and delicious slide of spit down and around Nicky's hand where it cups him, where his fingertips brush Joe's balls.
Nicky leaves his thumb inside when he sits back on his heels, rubbing at Joe's rim and keeping him in place while he strokes his free hand over Joe's flanks; his thighs; his ass.
'Do you need more than that?' he asks, careless, like he's offering Joe milk with his coffee.
'Please, Nicky.' Joe's voice is a ruin. Nicky hushes him, and knocks his knees apart with his own. Joe moans, his back curving with the change in position. Nicky still hasn't moved his thumb.
There's the sound of Nicky spitting behind him, then the wet sound of him fisting his cock. He hisses at his own touch, and Joe moans again just at the thought of it, of Nicky's big cock slipping red and swollen through his fist; dripping down his fingers the way it does when he's truly turned on.
Joe's still picturing it when the head of Nicky's cock replaces his thumb at Joe's rim.
'Hold yourself open for me,' Nicky says, still in that mild tone of voice, and Joe's cock twitches so hard under him that he briefly worries he's coming already.
It's undignified, even a little bit humiliating, on his knees, holding himself open, at such an awkward angle his shoulders are pressed into the bed. It's the hottest thing he's ever experienced. He wants to hide himself. He never wants it to end. He wants Nicky to look at him forever.
Nicky fucks his cock into Joe inch by scalding inch, and Joe burns with arousal so hot he can't breathe through it.
It's rougher than they've fucked before. Nicky usually lingers over prepping Joe, aware that he's a little bigger than anyone Joe's ever been with before. Usually, by the time he's inside, Joe's so slick with lube and relaxed from at least one orgasm prior there's barely any resistance at all. Just a smooth slide and toe-curling pleasure.
Now, Joe's certainly relaxed, but Nicky feels bigger than ever. The tacky drag of spit gets him in, makes Joe slick enough to take him, but he feels every inch; every thrust, the heavy thick head of Nicky's cock seems to hit his sweet spot on every pass, making him gasp, making him choke. Nicky holds his hips and Joe wails into the pillow.
He's speaking, he knows he is, but Nicky works a hand around and under him to reach his cock and fist it in his stupid huge hands and Joe can't make heads nor tails of what he's saying. It might just be Nicky's name, over and over, as Nicky strokes his cock in time with his thrusts.
Nicky presses in deeper, and Joe can't hold himself open anymore, he claws at the mattress and feels like a livewire, like he's never been so aware of his skin, of his cock, of Nicky's mouth as Nicky kisses his way up Joe's spine vertebrae by vertebrae until he can close his teeth on the back of Joe's neck.
Joe is silent when he comes. Nicky's hand works him through it, Joe's come making the last strokes wet and smooth. Nicky's hips keep moving the whole time, fucking into him frantically as Nicky gives up on working Joe over and takes what he needs from Joe's very willing body. It almost feels like an afterthought when Nicky finally comes. Joe's so thoroughly claimed that it doesn't even feel necessary. Nicky's touch is burned into every inch of his body, inside and out, and Joe luxuriates in it, stretching to feel the bruises Nicky's mouth left, his tight grip.
It's the best Joe's ever felt.
Nicky presses soft kisses to Joe's shoulders as he carefully pulls out, and Joe hisses softly at the sensation. It burns, but not in a way he feels inclined to worry about. The burn of a truly good fuck, really.
Nicky's hands are soft when he helps Joe roll over, and his eyes are bright with worry. His sweet mouth twists downwards at the corner anxiously.
'Are you alright?'
Joe smiles, all dimples, and wraps his arms around Nicky's broad shoulders.
'I'm wonderful. We should do that more often.'
Nicky laughs, a single puff of sound and air, and tucks his nose in under Joe's ear again.
'Maybe next month. I feel like I need to sleep at least that long.'
Joe holds him tighter, and kisses his temple, his hair, every dear inch within reach, and whispers:
'I don't like to share either, puppy.'
Joe feels Nicky smile against his throat, and drags the duvet over both of them.
Coda: A conversation overheard
'Are you sure?'
'Completely.'
'What if I hurt you?'
'You won't.'
'What if you don't like it?'
'Don't be silly.'
'We don't have to do this if you don't want to.'
'Puppy. Do you want to?'
'What if I like it too much?'
'Didn't I just say don't be silly?'
'The wolf won't let you leave when the moon rises.'
'I'm working from home. Someone will need to walk you.'
…
'Don't bite me puppy, that's rude.'