Chapter Text
London, 1989
It’s just like love, but it's not. In the winter, falling ash can be mistaken for snow. Oh, he knows better than to presume, though. He’s been around humanity long enough. He’s gone full-time. Rogue, they might say. He prefers freelance. A foreign reporter embedded in mankind. No, a food writer.
He knows it’s not love. But he’s in a forgetting kind of mood, because it’s a week and a half into June and he’s still cold. Was cold even before he came to this miserable gray country on Wednesday afternoon. He wants to be warm.
And the man with his fingers inside of him, he’s a furnace. He’s all lit up inside with monstrous want, a combustion engine of craving, pretending to run only lukewarm. It’s such obvious bullshit it almost cracks him up. Or maybe people fall for it, like they fall for him. But he’s not people. He sees it. Smells it, breathes it. His creator gave him three mouths, and all were made for tasting. He knows hunger.
“You’re a monster,” he says fondly, as Hob sips his tea.
“Is that supposed to be a compliment? Is it in America? Mawns-ter,” he mimics. His phone rings and he puts down his tea. “Hold on a mo’.”
The Corinthian smiles widely. This is progress. The first time he’d said it, Hob had frowned and asked if this was some kind of kink thing, and the Corinthian had seen the hurt behind his eyes and thought, Oh, you’ve done something, Robert. You’ve been naughty. He hadn’t been sure until then, but under his stupid little grins and easy affection, Hob is smuggling an oily mass of guilt. It’s sexy. It’s a bit of a pet project to see if he can get him to cough it up. Like a hairball. A good old fashioned bezoar.
To his supreme disappointment, Hob isn’t one of those men that gets confessional after sex, boneless and loose-lipped. He’s tried to fuck the secrets out of him. Or rather, tried to have Hob fuck his secrets into him. If anything, he’s most honest in the moments before, devouring and hungry, and then the moment he comes, he reins it all back in, as if his greed isn’t what makes him gorgeous in the first place.
It doesn’t matter what he’s hiding. Hob can give him what he needs. Not love, but heat. Hob is hot as a cattle-brand, and it pulls him back from thinking too much of cold, of snow, and skin the color of it. The color of white ash, distant, floating up above a pyre, and drifting miles away to fall again. He’d catch it on his tongue still, if it came back to him. He’d kneel, once more, and take it like holy sacrament.
He’s not guilty, per se. He just can’t stop remembering. Gets boring, thinking of the same thing, over and over, the moment the last taste of a life fades from his tongue, sweet and rich.
It’s how he’d picked Hob up. Talking about the taste of life. Some throwaway line he wasn’t paying attention to until he saw Hob’s reaction to it, the way he’d turned his face away but kept his eyes right on him, like he was thinking of running and had just realized he could not. Hob wasn’t his type, and he didn’t truly know why he’d approached him, just sniffed up to him with a hunter’s instincts, watching the man throw back whisky like he planned to drown.
“Where’d you hear that?” Hob had asked him, glass-eyed and flushed.
“Nowhere,” he’d said, although he almost certainly had. He’d let his knees fall open and brush against Hob’s. “It’s just true, isn’t it? Life is so rich. Don’t you think?”
Hob had looked at him like he was staked to the spot, and something like blood within the Corinthian had quickened with the chase.
“That,” Hob had eventually said, sweet and slow as honey in January, “happens to be exactly what I think.”
Then he’d abruptly taken him back to his hotel room, pushed him against the door and kissed him hard, and he’d tasted it for the first time then, on his lips, the grief and the desire, shining clear through the whisky, and it had burned so good. Hob had run his warm hands up and down his body, suddenly slipped one into the inside breast pocket of his sport coat, and snatched out his dagger. Low and casual and much more sober than he’d seemed downstairs, he’d said, “Fixed blade knives longer than three inches are illegal here, you know.”
“My bad,” he’d said, smiling into Hob’s mouth.
“Americans,” Hob had said, light and derisive, like the Corinthian had only made a comment about the wrong kind of football. But his eyes had gone all dark, and the Corinthian had watched as the man he’d picked up at the bar walked away with his dagger and locked it in the hotel safe. (“Don’t want to scare housekeeping, do we.”) Oh, he was curious now. He’d let Hob bully him over to the bed, wondering what he’d do.
What he did, it turned out, was bend the Corinthian over this too-soft bed and eat his ass until he almost wept, then fuck him so good that he actually did, inexplicable little red tears he’d wiped away under his glasses before they could be seen. Surprise and delight, he’d figured, at the sheer ferocity of it. Hob softened it with praise he didn’t need, calling him good boy and my pretty blond slut, and tenderly kissed him after, right on his hole.
He’d snapped his hips away at that, indignant, and Hob had laughed, sweating and golden in the lamplight, rogue strands of slicked-back black hair fucked loose and free as the Corinthian felt. “Stay,” he’d said. “And I’ll fuck you again in the morning.”
He decided he could spare one day before getting on with his reason for coming across the pond.
That had been Wednesday night.
Today’s Sunday.
Hob is relentless. He keeps working the Corinthian apart, over and over, with frankly astonishing skill and a single-minded ruthlessness that makes him think the man is trying to drown in him, instead of whisky. It does things, to a guy’s ego, to be a vice. He can’t help but linger. And he’d like to work Hob apart too, because he’s interesting. He fucks rough, a little mean, and then he acts light as a linen suit when they’re not fucking, even as he thumbs restlessly through the daily paper and makes calls with worse-bowed shoulders than Atlas. He’s all knots pretending to be smooth. When he sleeps, and the Corinthian lies in the darkness, he finds himself trying to unpick them. He’s never met a man he’s wanted so badly to solve, the slow way.
Hob’s still on his call, leaned against the headboard with a half-eaten full English and coffee spread out on a tray next to him, and the Corinthian spread open on his fingers. The coffee is for him specially, which would be oppressively kind if it not balanced out by the way Hob is roughly scissoring into him while talking about labor strikes. The Corinthian’s cock is leaking precome onto Hob’s lap.
He’s partial to vacations, he’s realized.
Hob hangs up, finally, after nearly an hour, and casually turns his attention back to the Corinthian. He smiles. “Thanks for keeping my fingers warm.”
“That was rude,” he says, grinding himself down. “I thought you Brits were supposed to be polite.”
“No,” says Hob, “This is rude.” He abruptly pulls out his fingers and the Corinthian winces.
“Come on,” he says. “No fair.”
Hob flips them and he lets it happen. He hooks his ankles over Hob’s shoulders, and Hob presses the head of his cock against his hole. “I don’t think you want fair, or polite.” He presses in a little further. “Are you gonna ask nicely for my prick?”
“No.”
“Good, then I won’t have to give it nicely,” says Hob, and sinks all the way into him in one fast stroke, like he’s trying to wind him. He gasps. Satisfied, Hob starts fucking, excruciatingly slow.
He looks at the safe just past Hob’s shoulder. It would open for him easy, he knows. He’s been looking at it every day since Thursday, coming to the same decision each time. One more night, he tells himself. He’s enjoying this borrowed warmth, the heat of Hob’s body and his gaze and his want. He wonders if it’s because Dream is cold in Fawney Rig, if it seeps through him and into all his creations like damp rot. He’d come back to London to find out, stopped at the Savoy for the only good bourbon in London, and gotten immediately distracted by Hob, drinking in a rumpled gray suit and looking for all of Queen and Country like a dull businessman, but feeling like something else. Something else enough to sidle up to and start a conversation. He idly wonders if the residents of the Dreaming are all bundled up. Suckers, he thinks, missing out on this. Warming up under the skin of a mortal, all hot thumping blood and desperation. It’s so much better than a sweater. So much better than a fireplace. One more night, and he’ll do it tomorrow.
Hob smacks his thigh mid-thrust. “I’m over here.”
“Fuck me faster, then.” He gives a grin he knows to be extremely charming.
“Knew you weren’t looking at me,” says Hob triumphantly, like he’s figured out a little riddle, and the Corinthian remembers he’s still wearing his shades, and Hob can’t see what he’s looking at, can’t see his eyes at all, or he wouldn’t be fucking him. He wonders if he should kill Hob right now with his bare hands and get his dagger back after. Then Hob smacks his thigh again, harder. “Turn over,” he says, grinning. “Since you’re not appreciating the view.”
It rankles him. That’s fine. No, it’s good. It’ll make it sweeter later.
He rolls over, arches his back and puts his ass up high and hears Hob’s pleased little sigh at the sight. It’s novel, to be devoured a little before he does the devouring. Hob presses back in and places a proprietary hand on the back of his neck, thumb stroking along his jaw as he pushes him further down into the mattress. His view becomes lost to white hotel linens. The dishes next to his face are rattling on the tray with each thrust. Hob’s hand flexes and squeezes a little, and he moans without meaning to.
If he were a man, he thinks, Hob could kill him with his bare hands, too. Hob’s clever. Notices things, but not enough. Entirely lacks the instinct to run. It’s all so hot.
Then Hob leans down, drapes himself over the Corinthian like an electric blanket turned up past high, and finally gets to fucking him fast like he’d demanded. The hand on his neck slides around the top of his head instead, stopping it from hitting the headboard with each thrust. It’s nice. He’s pretty sure Hob isn’t even aware he’s doing it. Wouldn’t choose to bruise his knuckles for him if he really thought about it. Right when he’s getting close, Hob circles a hand around his cock and starts pumping it. He’s barely holding himself up now, letting his weight crush down and panting into the Corinthian’s shoulder like an animal. He doesn’t think he’s ever fucked someone tender in his violence.
Hob hooks his chin over his shoulder and presses his lips to his ear, jolts him out of his thoughts and back into his body. “It’s been three days and you haven’t stabbed me yet,” he says, low and rough, “You waiting for an invitation in the mail?”
“Fuck,” says the Corinthian, shocked, as his orgasm slams into him. He comes hot into Hob’s fist, staring at white sheets and hearing nothing but he-knows-he-knows-he-knows chorusing through him.
He thinks he’s in love. No. It’s like love, but it’s not. He knows that. Hob is dead quiet above him. Waiting.
“You locked it up. I couldn’t,” he lies. Warm and reassuring. A little confused. Some men like danger, until it’s real. He doesn’t shift Hob off of him. Let him think he can be held down. But Hob rolls off on his own accord, to better look at him.
“Is that right,” he says, casually scratching his stubble. “I’d had a feeling it wouldn’t make much of a difference. You seemed cleverer than that.”
For once, the Corinthian can’t think of anything to say. Hob seems unalarmed and utterly comfortable with the silence, pulse twitching slow and steady in his neck.
“I hate it when my surprises are ruined,” he finally says, and Hob actually laughs.
“You want to,” says Hob, eyes deliciously dark and sharp, and there’s no point lying now, not when his quarry has looked right into his maw and smiled.
“Yes,” he says, and he watches as Hob’s neck as his pulse finally, gratifyingly speeds up.
Hob gets up, unlocks the safe, then turns back to him, naked and still half hard. “There you go, then.” He looks around the room. “Not here,” he says. “In the shower. Less mess.”
He walks into the bathroom. The shower goes on.
The Corinthian swipes some black pudding through ketchup and pops it in his mouth. Fuck, he thinks. Not tomorrow. The door of the safe is hanging open like another mouth, a hinged metal jaw. He thinks Hob is making some kind of point. He’s not sure what it is. It’s irrelevant. He takes his dagger out from the darkness of it and goes into the bathroom, smiling.
Hob is washing his hair, eyes shut, humming a little. The Corinthian is a perfect gentleman. He leers only a little, and waits for Hob to rinse before turning off the water and stepping inside. He’s wrapped a clean towel around his waist. He doesn’t normally bother with souvenirs when he travels. He’s gonna make an exception on this trip. He wants one from this.
Hob opens his eyes, looks at the towel, and at the dagger in his hand. He smiles crookedly and wraps a hand around his cock. “Fancy giving me a blowie first?”
“No,” he says, but brushes Hob’s hand away and starts jacking him off instead. One more, for the road.
“Oh, fuck, well, that’s also good.” All casual bravado. He sells it well. The Corinthian can’t wait to taste how deep it runs.
“How about this?” He presses the dagger lightly against Hob’s damp belly. He can be a tease too. He’d had Hob’s fingers inside him for almost an hour this morning. “This good, Hob?” Hob doesn’t squirm, but he sucks in a deep breath and the Corinthian watches in awe as tan, fragile skin briefly rises around the killing point of it.
“Do it when I’m coming,” says Hob, thick and needy, on the exhale.
“Fuck,” he says, blindsided again, feeling his cock twitch up against the towel. It’s just warmth, he reminds himself, and not even that for much longer. It’s past time to move along. Even if this particular deranged specimen of humanity feels like it was made in Los Alamos and stamped with his name. “We’ll see,” he says. He watches as Hob smiles at that, eyes sliding shut.
“Your hand’s almost as good as your mouth,” Hob adds.
“Yeah, well, I don’t do kneeling anymore.” No sense in keeping secrets when talking to a dead guy. “I only ever knelt for one.”
“Thought so,” says Hob, after a moment. “You seemed like the type.”
“What type?” he asks, not really listening. He’s occupied with the sight of Hob’s flushed cock in his fist, leaking precome that he’s thinking he wants to taste one more time. He smears a thumb through it.
“Heartbroken,” Hob gasps. The Corinthian flinches, looks up. Hob’s staring right at him like he knows. He doesn’t. He doesn’t know anything.
“Fuck you,” he says, and wraps an arm around Hob’s broad shoulders to pull him close and slips the blade between his ribs, sooner and meaner than he’d planned. Hob spasms in his grip. He jerks the dagger out.
“You have it wrong,” he says, stepping away after Hob is all done his muffled shouting into his chest. “Alright? I left. I’m the fucking heart breaker here.”
He shuts his eyes. He thinks of his freedom. How sweet it is.
The smell of blood overpowers the shampoo and conditioner still hanging in the fogged air. It grounds him. No more vetiver and lemongrass bullshit. Only the oldest smell. The best smell. The smell humanity tries to hide these days, along with shit and jizz. Avoiding looking at all their death and sex and foulness. It’s up to him to show them. He’s reminding humanity of their blood, their want, and loosing it for them. Inspiring them. Tasting all the bright things that aren’t his to have, so he can understand them better. He gets a fresh white hand towel and wipes his dagger clean.
Hob has sunk to the floor. His head is dropped between his legs and he’s huffing out breaths through gritted teeth. He’s tough. But his stubbornness won’t save him. Blood runs steadily beneath him over tile and down the drain. His breathing is speeding up. It won’t be long, now.
“Hey. Hey. Look at me,” he says, and touches his clammy cheek. He wants to see the life go out of him. Wants to be the last thing those mad, pretty eyes see before he finally gets to taste them, like grapes fresh off the vine. Hob slowly looks up. He’s gone all sallow like he should, but his gaze is bright and focused still. Something’s wrong. He drops his hand.
“C’mere, gorgeous,” slurs Hob, and the Corinthian reflexively steps back. “Sit with me. S’easier than looking up. Bit dizzy now. Gonna need a minute.”
“You need a lot more than a minute,” he says, wondering, too late, what exactly it is he saw in Hob. The desire, the grief, it was fresh enough to be steaming off him, like a fresh and gutted kill on the tundra, but underneath, there’d been more. Too much more. He didn’t just burn hot. He burned old. Older than any human had right to be.
The Corinthian doesn’t sit. He stares at the insane man, who is clearly not mortal, breathing more steadily now through a stab wound like it’s a badly stubbed toe. He blinks. He would accept that he has made a somewhat critical oversight.
“Hmm. Okay. Five more minutes,” murmurs Hob, belatedly. He sounds soft around the edges. Like a kid insisting he’s not tired. It’s not endearing.
He sighs. He’s getting cold again, half-naked in the bathroom. He chucks the blood-soaked towel into the corner in irritation and pulls Hob to his feet.
“Ow,” says Hob, as the Corinthian heaves him out of the shower.
“Don’t be a baby. You’ve been stabbed before.” He knows practice when he sees it.
Hob, high on the leftovers of hemorrhagic shock, yawns and chuckles weakly. “Might’ve done. But you did me real good.”
Should be a crime, how hot that is. “Oh, I’ve had some practice too.”
“Did you like my surprise then?” asks Hob, leaning heavy onto him.
Not when he knows what it means for him. There’s some supernatural middle-to-upper-management interference going on here, and he can’t take Hob’s eyes, because someone, somewhere, would be pissed off. He doesn’t punch up like that. Not when he’s out freelancing. He’s not an idiot. He was here to lie low, taste the sights, sniff around a bit. It’s a buzzkill.
“It was surprising,” he offers. He supposes forgetting the gnawing edges of boredom for the first time in decades is a fair enough consolation prize. He’s just more a fan of winning.
Hob digs in his heels when they reach the bed. “M’still bleeding?”
The Corinthian examines the wound. It’s already slowed down to congealing trickle. He sits Hob on the edge of the bed and puts the breakfast tray on the desk, then finds his white undershirt lying rumpled on the floor. He shakes it out, folds it thicker, and presses it to his chest. Hob puts a cool hand over his and smiles at him dopily.
“Hey. You’re putting me to bed.”
He takes his hand back. Shakes it out too, for emphasis. “It’s cold. We’re getting under the covers until you’re yourself again, Renfield.”
“Ha. Thought you were a vampire,” mutters Hob, into his pillow, already most of the way to sleeping.
He notices he’s covered in Hob’s blood worse than Hob. He gets into bed anyways. It’s petty. Of course it is. It’s exactly how he was made to be.