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Erik prides himself on being the best.
In all his years as a thief, working his way from dirty street corners, spare change and picked pockets, to scaling high-rises in the dead of night and slipping in and out of windows unseen and silent a shadow, he’s always considered himself elite.
Untouchable.
Never once has he been caught. Never has he faltered, or left a job without his prize. His name is spoken with reverence in the most secret circles of the underground, a King amongst criminals. The police know him only as ‘The Shadow.” There is no image for their files, no fingerprints, only a whispered suggestion and a missing jewel, an empty safe to prove he was ever there.
Erik is the best of the best.
Which doesn’t explain why he’s currently lying on the plush-carpeted penthouse floor of the man he’s suppose to be robbing, a lump on his skull and stars dancing a merry circle around his head.
It had started off so well. He had navigated the security guard and the so-called "high tech" alarm system will little to no effort at all. The penthouse suite was exactly as advertised in the blueprints, and the Cezanne came out of its frame and into the plastic, protective cylinder smooth, like butter.
A flawless job, really. At least until he tries to make his getaway through the bedroom.
The bedroom was supposed to be empty. The entire apartment was suppose to be empty, but when he passes the massive king-size bed as he moves toward the window and freedom on mute footsteps, something catches his eye from amidst the silk sheets; a flash of white catching the moonlight as it slips through a crack in the heavy damask curtains.
When he glances over he expects to see the sheets turned down, or a pillow askew, the light colour of fine linen standing out against the darkness of the room. What he sees instead in a man sprawled across the bed, asleep, and entirely nude.
The man is all perfect creamy skin and dark hair, sprawled on his stomach, his arms tucked beneath his pillow like a child. Erik’s eyes snag on the smooth arrow of his spine, and the way the muscles of his shoulders and arms stand in sharp relief, flexed and tucked beneath his head. His ass is a perfect curve, lush and round and seemingly on display and Erik wants to devour him. Wants to cover every inch of his body and bite that pert backside and lick the dimples in the small of his back.
The man sighs in his sleep and Erik is paralyzed, is unable to move as the man rubs his face against his pillow and arches like a cat, turns slowly over onto his back, one arm still tucked under his pillow, the other slung across the subtle curve of his waist where his body flows into sharp hipbones. His face is as lovely as his body, though cast in shadow, his chest broad, his nipples small and hard in the cool night air. Unwilling and completely mesmerized, Erik’s eyes drift to his cock, lying heavy against one thick thigh, down to the strangely graceful feet moving restlessly against the sheets.
When Erik looks back at the man’s face, his eyes are open and he’s staring directly at Erik who remains frozen in midstride on his way to the window, a 250 million dollar painting slung across his back.
“Oh,” the man says softly, and the sound of his voice in the silence of the room is shocking, and sparks through Erik like an explosion, like dynamite. He startles and steps abruptly to the side, turns at a sharp right angle and collides with the tall marble pillar that frames the right side of the window.
And promptly knocks himself unconscious.
***
When he comes to, the man is crouched next to him on the floor, a tiny pair of black boxers concealing what is left of his modesty. Erik isn’t sure whether he’s disappointed or relieved. A lamp has been lit on the far side of the room, and the man’s face hovers above him in soft focus. He has eyes that are ridiculously blue even in the low light of the room, and a full bottom lip that he sucks into his mouth in a way he doesn’t seem to realize is completely distracting.
With an abrupt movement, the man clomps something hard and cold over his head.
“Ow!” Erik shouts, indignant. The man rolls his eyes and keeps his hand firmly on the ice pack, holding it tightly against the lump on Erik’s head.
“Excuse me for not tenderly nursing the man who is robbing me back to health.”
He has a British accent that rasps around the contours of his mouth, still scratched from disuse in the early morning hour.
“You’re not Warren Worthington,” Erik says, unintelligibly and cringes. He’s not sure what happened to the smooth conman, the effortless art thief from before, 'the Shadow' that escaped the police time and again. He feels small and childlike lying on the carpet of this penthouse suite, a bump on the head and a beautiful man playing nursemaid kneeling at his side.
The man smiles, begrudgingly,
“No, I most assuredly am not.”
Erik slowly sits up and takes the ice pack from the man, presses it against his head and swallows down a swell of nausea as the room spins.
“Are you sleeping with him?”
What is he even saying? He needs to get out of here. He needs to go. This man has seen his face, could possibly have memorized every detail of his features. Who knows how long Erik has been unconscious. Maybe he’s already called the police. Holy crap does this guy look fantastic when he smiles.
The man, oblivious to Erik’s inner turmoil, laughs
“What does it matter to you? Unless you came to steal both Warren’s painting as well as the secrets of his love life?”
Erik grumbles something and tries to stand, but wavers when he gets to his feet, his knees liquefying beneath him, the room tilting wildly on its axis. Before he can fall, the man is there, tucked under his arm, his hands steadying Erik’s waist and lowering him carefully to the bed,
“Easy there chap,” he murmurs, and when he eases back from Erik, keeping one stable hand on Erik’s shoulder, the other on his hip, he smirks and says, incongruously,
“The black cat suit was a nice touch.”
Erik frowns and tries to parse his words, and the man chuckles,
“For a burglar, you’re awfully adorable. I’m Charles,”
“Erik,” Erik replies before his brain can catch up with him, and that’s his real name, that’s his REAL NAME, and now he has to kill Charles, though Charles is so pretty and is smiling and saying how-do-you-do-Erik like a real English gentleman, and Erik can’t kill something so sweet and lovely, Erik just wants to sleep and wants Charles to pet his hair.
Charles voice sounds like a broken speaker or a muted piano chord, is coming from so very far away, and he’s saying something about sleep and Worthington and possible concussion but Erik is so comfortable and sleepy and Charles smells so good. The room is graying around the edges and Erik allows his eyelids to grow heavy, tucks himself in close to Charles’ body and drifts into sleep.
***
When he wakes again sunlight is spilling through the open curtains of Warren Worthington’s bedroom and lacerating Erik’s brain. He takes a moment to orient himself, and then sits up in a surge of frantic panic and adrenalin.
He’s still in Worthington’s apartment.
HE IS STILL IN WORTHINGTON’S APARTMENT.
His head is spinning and there are black spots floating across his vision, but he propels himself clumsily out of the tangle of 400 thread count sheets and onto shaking legs. His boots are gone, and so is his bag of tools--and most importantly, the painting.
“Looking for this?”
Erik spins and and when he sees Charles the previous night returns to him in a bright flood of downloaded images: Charles sprawled naked in the same bed he just crawled out of like a sweet, sensual painting of Cupid, or Ganymede, Charles placing ice against his head, Charles saying his name.
Charles saying his name.
His hand reaches reflexively for his knife, but it’s not at his hip where it usually sits. Gone too is the familiar heavy weight of his second blade at the back of his calf.
“Or maybe you’re looking for these,” Charles continues. He’s smiling and in one hand he brandishes Erik’s knives, gleaming in the early morning sunshine. In the other hand he holds up the canister with the Cezanne.
Erik awkwardly folds his arms across his chest, feels naked and exposed in thick black spandex, weaponless, completely wrong-footed, his head aching, his stomach protesting vertical movement.
Charles is lounging in the bedroom doorway with his captured prizes. He’s still in the tiny black shorts, as well as a large, heavy knit sweater that is torn in the neck and falling off one shoulder, heavy sleeves shoved up to his elbows. He looks sexy and sleep tousled and Erik has never been so conflicted. He doesn’t know whether he should punch Charles and run, or tackle him to the ground and kiss him senseless.
Maybe it’s time to retire, he thinks ruefully. This is it. The greatest thief in the world defeated by an accidental peepshow, a great ass and an impressive pair of blue eyes.
There are worse ways to go.
“What do you want from me?” He asks, reaching out for some kind of authority or menace, but his voice comes out cracked and dry from sleep. He clears his throat, licks his lips, ready to try again, and startles when Charles’ eyes zoom in on his tongue and his wet mouth.
Oh.
Oh.
Charles stretches to his full height, which isn’t much, and tightens his grip on Erik’s knives.
“First I want you to put Warren’s painting back just as you found it. He’s been kind enough to let me stay here for the week, and it wouldn’t do for his apartment to get robbed while I’m a guest.” His voice is full of a rich, professorial authority, but Erik refuses to be cowed like a petulant student,
“And if I don’t?”
Charles presses his lips together and looks suddenly unhappy,
“Than I will be forced to give the police the photos I took of your face while you were sleeping.”
Erik feels his entire body go rigid and tight. His automatic response is a jumbled mess of fight-run-kill, muscles coiling, red haze rising, preparing to protect his anonymity at any costs. He forces himself to unclench his hands, to loosen his jaw where his teeth are grinding together. He jerks himself into motion and stalks to where Charles stands looking apprehensive. Good. He should be nervous. Erik is a dangerous man, even with a throbbing bump on his head and wearing a cat suit in the unforgiving light of day.
He holds out a hand and Charles tentatively gives him the canister as though expecting him to bolt. Instead Erik pushes past him, ignoring the way Charles body is firm and compact and molds easily to his in the narrow doorway for a fleeting moment, and heads toward the study.
As he carefully remounts the painting inside the heavy gold frame, Charles perches on the desk and watches him, tapping the flat side of Erik’s knife against his leg.
“It’s a silly thing,” he says, and when Erik glances up at him, his eyes are fixed on the stretch of leather across Erik’s hands, protective gloves to keep the oil of his fingers from the canvas.
“What?” he asks, his voice emerging strangely quiet and intimate in the closed-in hush of the room.
“That something like two men playing cards could be worth so much fuss.”
Erik snorts,
“You don’t know much about art.”
“No,” Charles agrees easily, his voice thoughtful, “no I don’t.”
After Erik places the painting gently back on the wall, adjusting it here and there to make sure it’s level, he turns to see Charles watching him closely. He waits to see if he’s going to say anything, and when he doesn’t he asks, dryly,
“Anything else you needed? Maybe someone to do the dishes? Sweep the floor?”
“Come with me to an art show tonight,” Charles blurts, his cheeks blooming with a sudden furious blush, though he tilts his chin haughtily and stands his ground.
Erik, distracted by how vivid Charles eyes look, how lovely his face is when it’s red with involuntary embarrassment, asks,
“What?”
Charles places his hands on his hips. He’s obviously trying for authoritative, but it comes across as strangely soft and young as the sleeves of his sweater slip over his hands, one still awkwardly holding onto Erik’s weapons.
“There is this fundraiser tonight at some gallery, and Warren asked me to go in his place because he had to be in Dubai, and I don’t know anything about art, as you well know…” his rambling trails off, and Erik watches, amazed, as the blush spreads down his throat and over the tantalizing peek of his collarbone.
“What?” He asks again in a bit of a daze. He blames the lingering head wound. Charles huffs,
“Erik will you just come with me to this thing tonight? Come with me and I’ll give you all the photos I took. I promise.”
Erik snaps back to reality with the mention of the photos. Right. Charles could easily hand him over to the cops at any moment. And really, he could have done so already, could have had Erik carted off to jail while he was unconscious and tucked into the bed of the man he was robbing like a little child.
The callous part of him, the part that’s been worn down to a razor’s edge from years of impossible living and hard times is shouting at him to just kill Charles now and burn any evidence, and put this entire disaster behind him.
Instead he finds himself saying,
“Alright.”
***
Later that night he finds himself standing in front of the distinctive outline of the Guggenheim in his best suit. Trust Charles to refer to one of the preeminent centers of art and culture in the world as “some gallery.”
He doesn’t know what the hell he is doing here.
Part of him protests “the pictures! Blackmail!” but he knows in his heart of hearts that if he wanted to destroy those pictures or reclaim them from Charles it would be an easy, effortless thing. He’s still the greatest thief in the world, despite the minor setback from the night before.
He slips past the hulking, scowling security at the front door and pushes himself into the glittering crowd of art patrons, cataloging almost absent-mindedly the quality of diamonds, the authenticity of watches, how much this painting or that sculpture would get on the black market. Gone is the illicit thrill he used to get when planning a job, or scoping out the field. He no longer feels like a wolf in sheep’s clothing amidst this ignorant aristocracy. Instead he feels…tired.
The crowd shifts and breaks open, and he spots Charles. He’s wearing a three-piece suit that fits him perfectly, makes him look polished and proper and all Erik can think is that hidden under all those layers of expensive wool and silk are the gorgeous pale lines and curves of a man who sleeps in the nude and looks like the best kind of porn.
Charles has his hands in his pockets and is talking to an older man with a look of polite interest on his face that Erik can tell is forced even from across the room. As he moves closer, edging smoothly through the crowd, he can see the Charles’ face tighten, his smile falter as the man asks how his mother is doing.
Erik snags two glasses of wine off a passing waiter, sidles up next to Charles and offers him one of them,
“Sorry I’m late,” he says, and tries to ignore the thrill he gets when Charles’ smile goes from cracked and forced to something wide and genuine and lovely.
“Hello,” Charles replies, taking the glass of wine from him. He sounds a bit breathless; surprised, but happy, “I thought…I thought maybe you weren’t coming.”
Erik steps a bit closer to him, luxuriating in the way his height gives him the advantage, forces Charles to tilt his head up to look him in the eye. Charles takes a moment to run his gaze up the line of Erik’s chest and over his shoulders before looking up and biting at his bottom lip in the way that already drives Erik crazy. Erik smirks, trailing his eyes over Charles in return,
“I thought I didn’t have a choice,” he jokes, and a shadow flickers over Charles’ face just as the old man Charles was speaking with clears his throat. Erik had forgotten he was even there, Charles having a certain ability to absorb every ounce of his attention. He bursts into their bubble now, scowling at them disapprovingly.
“Charles, are you going to introduce me to your…friend?” Charles startles, seems to realize how close he’s standing to Erik and blushes, shuffling back awkwardly.
“Oh yes, my apologies. Mr. Greyson, this is Erik.” Greyson looks Erik over, the heavy creases of his face drawing his expression further into displeasure.
“Hmm. Are you a fan of art, Erik?” Erik grins at him with all his teeth and steps purposefully closer to Charles. He slides a hand slowly around Charles’ waist and presses him close to his body.
“You could say that.”
Greyson leaves soon after that, for which Charles thanks Erik while laughing with relief in the wake of the old man’s slow departure. He’s replaced soon after with a bevy of society ladies who catch part of Erik’s idle comment on the exhibition and soon are pestering him with questions.
Erik has just finished explaining how Kandinsky was forced to leave his teaching position in Germany because of the Nazi Party when a vaguely familiar lady with an enormous bust pushes to the front of the group.
She certainly appears to want get familiar with Erik, leaning in close and brushing her breasts against his arm with purpose,
“Oh Charles,” she says, “Your friend is so knowledgeable.” Charles smiles smugly, enjoying Erik’s discomfort far too much, and replies,
“Yes, it’s Erik’s job to know these things,”
The lady strokes one well-manicured hand down Erik’s arm, and coos,
“Oh really? Are you in the art business?”
Erik mutters, “something like that,” and the ladies erupt into excited twitters. The one with the claws in his arm exclaims,
“Oh wonderful! Oh Erik, you must come over to my house one day to appraise my new Pollock! Such a shame when the old one was stolen—can you believe that?”
As the women moan and commiserate eagerly over the annoyance of having to replace one million dollar painting with another, Erik suddenly realizes why she looks so familiar.
He had sold that Pollock last year for a tidy sum. He remembers hanging a picture of this woman on his wall as he planned the job. He had thrown darts at it.
Charles seems to come to the same conclusion at the same time and presses his lips firmly together. Erik thinks he’s angry for a moment before Charles seizes his other arm and Erik can feel him shaking—and realizes he’s trying desperately not to laugh.
“Excuse us for a moment, won’t you Janice? Ladies?” He says to the assembled women who pout and flutter at them as they go, Charles hauling Erik through the crowd as quickly as he can before they burst through a door marked EXIT and find themselves in a dark, empty hallway.
The door is barely closed before Charles bursts into laughter, clutching Erik by his lapels and burrowing his face into his chest. Erik can’t help but laugh with him, the moment entirely surreal.
They sag against each other, bodies limp from amusement, and Erik’s hands fall to Charles hips. Charles rolls his head back and looks up at him, his eyes bright in the low light of the hallway, his mouth stretched wide with delight, his entire expression luminous. As natural and easy as if they’ve been doing this for years, Erik leans down and kisses him.
They remain motionless for a long moment, their lips only just touching, and then Charles is surging forward against him, pressing Erik back against the wall, opening his mouth and kissing him wildly, desperately. It sends a jolt of intense arousal from Erik’s heart right down to his cock, and he pulls Charles in against him, licks at his mouth and then bites at the wet swell of his lower lip.
He tries to get his hands up under Charles’ shirt, but his waistcoat is in the way, synching all his clothes frustratingly close to his body. Annoyed, Erik grabs him and manhandles him against the opposite wall in the narrow hallway, pins him there and attacks his throat with tongue and teeth as his fingers fly through the buttons of Charles' clothes easier and quicker than any safe he’s ever cracked.
When he parts the material to reveal smooth skin underneath, a surprising flex of muscle in his chest and stomach, a faint hint of freckles obvious even in the near-darkness, it is better than even his most elaborate imaginings after seeing Charles on display the night before.
He gets hands and mouth on Charles immediately, fingers skimming around and up the soft skin of his back, teeth grazing the sharp line of his collarbone and Charles gasps and writhes in his arms. While looking is its own delight, it’s infinitely more pleasurable to actually touch and taste, to hear the stifled moan Charles gives when Erik lifts him nearly off his toes in order to suck at one of his nipples.
Charles is panting gorgeously, and melting within Erik’s all-encompassing embrace, and when his fingers run through Erik’s hair, when his tugs at him and pleads with Erik to kiss him, Erik can only obey.
“Erik,” Charles says, the name tangled into the kiss, “Erik—Erik wait—“ he says the words directly against Erik’s mouth and Erik kisses him once more, firmly, before pulling back, giving him enough space to speak and breath, but refusing to let go completely.
Charles face is flushed. His hair is falling out of it’s perfect style and his eyes are nearly black in the darkness, but Erik can see some apprehension in his face, and so he leans back a little more to give Charles space, even though his body is aching at the distance.
Charles’s eyes are searching Erik’s face and he’s chewing on his lip in a way Erik is quickly discovering means he’s thinking, his mind worrying over something incessantly.
“Charles, what—“ Erik begins, just as Charles blurts,
“I lied.” Erik freezes, pulls back farther so that his hands are only lightly resting on the bare skin of Charles’s hips under his open shirt. Charles fingers remain clutched in Erik’s jacket as though he’s afraid to let him go. He swallows visibly, and licks his lips,“there aren’t any pictures.”
It’s so incongruous that Erik has to take a minute to figure out what the hell he’s talking about, and while he tries to clear his head of the lingering hazy fog of lust, Charles rambles on,
“There were never any pictures of you, I just said that because you were robbing me Erik, really, and I needed some leverage, but that was only at first, and now—well I don’t want you to be doing this because you think you have to—“ he pauses, and his expression shifts to absolutely horrified,
“Oh god,” he says, his voice rising in volume to a slightly hysterical pitch, “I’m blackmailing you to have sex with me. I’m essentially raping you—“ he pushes at Erik, tries to get him to back away, tries to twist himself out of Erik’s arms, and Erik has to grab him, has to snatch up his flailing wrists and hold him tight against the wall to get him to stop and listen.
“Charles!” he shouts, and Charles finally stops and looks up at him, his eyes wide and worried. Erik laughs, breathlessly and thumps his forehead against Charles’ shoulder.
“You’re ridiculous,” he says, voice muffled by the material of Charles’ shirt. He tilts his head back and Charles looks confused and slightly offended, and so he says, “I tried to rob you, and somehow saw you completely naked, and now you’re worried about taking advantage of me…”
Charles still looks a bit confused, and he turns his wrists restlessly under Erik’s palms, so Erik shakes his head and kisses him solidly, waits until Charles kisses him back tentatively, and then eagerly, and then deliciously enthusiastic, before he pulls back to growl,
“I don’t give a shit about the pictures. I came here for you.”
Charles reaction to that is so enthusiastic that it takes every ounce of Erik’s self-restraint not to fuck him in the hallway. He wants to make him moan so loudly that the assembled elite blush to hear him a wall away while sipping their expensive wine.
Instead he propels Charles down the hall and out a back exit, detaches from him long enough to hail a cab and shove him into the back seat. Charles starts direct the driver to Worthington’s address, but Erik stops him with a light hand on his mouth, gives the cabbie the street and number to a house he’s only ever kept secret and anonymous. Charles looks at him with a raised eyebrow, curious, but Erik only kisses him, pushes him down onto the peeling vinyl of the cab’s backseat and ignores the way the driver shouts at them to knock it off.
For the first time in a long, long time he fucks someone in his own bed, and the smell of Charles mixing in with his own scent buried deep in the sheets drives him crazy. Charles hooks his legs around Erik’s waist and pulls him in close, groaning into Erik’s mouth with every thrust of his hips, and after Erik has blissfully bled out into oblivion with an orgasm that seems impossibly long, he jerks Charles off until his eyes roll back in his head, his back arched beautifully has he comes all over Erik’s fingers.
After they’ve cleaned up and kissed and kissed on clean sheets, Charles falls asleep and Erik takes a moment to study him in the moonlight from the open window. He’s just as lovely as he was the night before, lovelier because his hair is a mess, and there is a dark mark on his throat in the shape of Erik’s mouth, and he’s fallen asleep with a smile on his face.
Looking at him Erik thinks that of all the items he could have stolen from Warren Worthington’s apartment, the precious jewels, and the million dollar art work and the stocks and bonds, he picked the very best one.