Chapter Text
Eddie, despite himself, likes Buck’s house.
It is not an easy thing to admit, given the standoffish way he treated the entire process of Buck moving out. It had still been awkward between them, then, stilted in a way that reminded Eddie of those days spent with Shannon right before she had disappeared with a note and the scent of violets and milk powder.
Admittedly, Buck had tried reaching out to him with awkward, aborted gestures. Pictures of the houses he was looking at, jokes about what he was going to leave for Eddie to ‘deal’ with. Eddie, characteristically, had walked around his outstretched hand without a word.
The house that Buck eventually ended up staying in, then, was as much a surprise to Eddie as it was to everyone else, though perhaps it shouldn’t have been. Eddie, after all, knew more than almost anyone else that Buck, despite the way he presented himself and despite the ways that people treated him sometimes, was more often than not capable enough to find what he wanted and brave enough to go after it.
So it wasn't a surprise, really, that Buck had found a house perfect for him. That he had found a place with airy kitchens and big windows and a lush backyard and a goddamned hot tub. A place that he filled with pictures of his family and open doors and a huge TV screen that Christopher monopolized on sight. That was as big and beautiful as the man himself, built for a family, bright with hope.
A place that Eddie was being pulled into, pressed against a hallway wall as Angel crowded against him, mouth hot again on his. She pulls his hand against her back, and he goes on instinct, draws his fingers against the zipper of her dress and pulling down, knuckles brushing against smooth skin and mouth open, drinking, wanting.
His shoulders are pressed against wallpaper and foundation, and it almost feels like it’s Buck bracing him there, holding him up, anchoring him as slender fingers dance down his neck (a scratch, and his tongue twists as he gasps, and she swallows another moan-), pops his buttons open one by one.
But no, Buck isn’t behind him, because he blinks and Buck is silhouetted against the dark of the doorway, kicking the door shut, stepping inside. A breath, a moan, and Eddie keeps his eyes on Buck as his shirt falls to the floor, as her dress falls beside it, a shimmer of silky fabric that brushes against his ankle. She isn’t wearing a bra, and her nipples press pebble-hard against his pecs, dragging slightly and drawing moans out of the both of them as they press closer to each other.
Eddie’s eyes flutter, flickering to Angel’s bare shoulders and the framed painting of clownfish on the walls and back, back, always back to Buck. There’s a hunger to his eyes that makes Eddie move in a way he didn’t know he could, like he’s putting on a show. A show for--
Dating is like a performance, he’d once said-- except usually, the audience is the other person, his family, the world. This time, it’s just Buck, and his eyes are the safest thing in the world.
It’s just Buck, and the brand Eddie feels from his eyes doesn’t hurt. It just makes him want-- need to do anything, to keep those eyes on him. Eddie presses harder into Angel’s mouth, letting the edge of his teeth catch on her tongue, drawing out a moan. He hums in response, stares Buck in the eyes, and pushes her towards not the guestroom, but the main bedroom.
The light flickers on when they enter, and Eddie has a faint impression of grumbling at Buck’s stupid sensor lights, mumbling why would you voluntarily fill your house with robots to sun-warm laughter. But then slender hands are spinning him around, and the backs of his knees hit the edge of Buck’s stupid king-sized bedframe.
Angel crawls to straddle him, pressing the hot wet center of her to his crotch and making him hitch his hips up, grasping either side of her hips as he does. She bites his lip hard on a moan, and suddenly they’re rutting against each other, urgent and impatient and almost like teenagers if it weren’t for the experienced fluidity of their movements.
He can feel the crotch of his pants getting wet, hot even through the cotton of her underwear and the denim of his jeans, and for a moment he can’t tell who’s soaking through more, or if her slick is mixing with his precome, the two of them mixing together at the front of his jeans. The thought of it makes him move faster against her, the rhythm of them growing into something neither of them can stop.
Then, Eddie gasps out a whine as his lips are wrenched away, his head snapping backwards as thick fingers pull his taut in his hair. Angel’s lips fall against his jaw, smearing lipstick and spit in a line across his cheek.
Buck’s eyes on Eddie’s are dilated, and there’s something in his smile, in the way he swallows before speaking, that Eddie doesn’t have the wherewithal to parse.
“Get your pants off,” he says, almost gentle. “It’s gonna be over too soon if you keep going like this, and I want you to have a good time, not get off as quick as possible.”
The easiness of his voice, edged with a kind of teasing that is so familiar it makes Eddie’s teeth ache, sparks something hot and humiliating in Eddie. Buck is teasing him. Buck wants the best for him. Buck is stepping into his life and making it better for Eddie, regardless of his protests. His mouth opens, then snaps shut, because he can feel something more pathetic than a whine rising from his throat.
Buck looks at him, Eddie looks back, and it feels like a call or a quiet kitchen or a bedroom floor for just a moment, like it’s still just them.
And then Buck’s grin tilts a few degrees. “And ‘sides, I think I was promised a show.”
Angel barks out a burst of startled laughter, voice a little hoarse when she speaks. “Wouldn’t want to deprive you of that, would we?”
Then, the wet bite of her lips moves from his jaw to his neck, and Buck tilts Eddie’s head to the side to give her more room, fingers twisting in his hair and making Eddie bite his lip harder, harder, trying not to make a noise. His eyes are still on Buck, and there are teeth and tongue and hot breath on his neck, pressing into the thinnest parts of his skin.
Eddie has never liked people marking his neck, for any number of reasons: how visible it was. The way people looked at him afterwards, the kind of easy humor that always made his stomach roil. The presumptuousness of it, like a definitive statement that they were something to each other, something that Eddie could never quite find peace with. And, above all, the vulnerability of being under someone’s thumb, under something sharp that he couldn’t pretend to control.
But Buck’s hand is still in his hair, tight and twisted and mean if it were not for the fact that the hand was Buck’s. Buck’s hand is in his hair, and Buck was watching him with bright blue eyes, and if Eddie couldn’t trust something sharp at his neck when Buck was the one putting it there, then he might as well slice his carotid open himself.
“Can you keep your head there for me?” Buck murmurs to him, still half-teasing, the same tone he uses when he asks if Eddie can handle another weight on the rack. The almost casual tone of it affects Eddie more than anything else, the thought that Buck sees this as normal, as just another way that he’s helping Eddie.
Eddie gasps out something like an affirmative, and Buck’s body shifts, tilts forward, and for a moment Eddie almost thinks he’s going to kiss him on the forehead, and every single nerve in his body sparks in response. But he doesn’t, and Eddie barely has time to feel disappointed by that before Buck lets go of his hair, eliciting something that couldn’t possibly be a whine from him.
Buck hums, eyes tracking down the messy imprints in Eddie’s hair from his fingers, down his blown-wide eyes and bitten lips and the woman working a mark into the side of his neck. “Sounds like he wants to keep a hand in his hair,” he says to Angel, who detaches from Eddie’s neck with a slick sound.
“Mm, sounds like he wants your hand in his hair,” she returns easily. And Eddie can’t help but shiver, tracking Buck’s hand, watching the way it clenches briefly and mourn its loss. For all the ways that Buck so often chooses to wear his heart on his sleeve, Eddie has always found him more difficult to decipher when he decides to hide away. But at least Eddie knows-- right now, Buck is hiding away.
But to decipher why Buck is hiding might mean cracking open Eddie himself, and Eddie couldn’t do that in a shadowed kitchen with only Buck at his side, let alone in a room with someone else. So Eddie, still in perfect sync with Buck, always, twists his grip on Angel’s hips, tumbles her into a gasping heap on the bed as he licks a stripe up one of her tits.
Her startled laughter breaks into a moan, high and shuddering. Eddie knows how to do this, reaching up to flick the nub of her untouched tit with his other hand as he presses her into Buck’s unreasonably comfortable mattress. He sucks lightly on her breast, draws a teasing circle with his teeth that never press down too hard.
Her tits are heavy in his hands, like Shannon’s had been for that small while after she’d given birth, when she’d been too sensitive to let him near her nipples in the brief moments they had while he was back from training. He’d liked to press his face to them, soft and full, and marvel at the fact that they existed, because it meant that his son existed.
There is no such magic here, but he continues to bite at them, laving his tongue over the smooth, unmarked skin before sucking blooms of violet-blue to the sound of her moans. It’s harder, without the hand in his hair, and from the edge of his vision he can see Buck walking over to-- the dresser across the bed, pushing himself up to sit on top of it, long legs crossed one over the other. His eyes are intent on Eddie, on Angel, and there’s a focus in his gaze that reminds Eddie of drills and clipboards.
It almost makes him laugh, except that nothing about this is funny, really.
“You’re both still dressed,” Buck says, and it’s a comment the same way I’m worried about you is a comment, which is to say that it is more of a declaration of intent. Eddie would have followed that, even if it weren’t for Angel’s fingers pulling down his jeans, his boxers, until he’s kicking them to the ground, cock hard and already a little wet at the tip. Her fingers dance over the length of him as they come back up, and Eddie’s hip hitches forward instinctively, uselessly, as they continue upwards, leaving him lost for a moment before her fingers find their place in his hair, pushing him downwards.
If he’s not looking, he can still pretend that it’s Buck pushing him, Buck’s voice guiding his lips to scrape the divots at either side of her waist, the whorl of dark ink dancing down one of her sides, down to the full weight of her hips, the soft give of them under his fingers.
Buck laughs, and it’s all easy comfort except for the way it’s at him, making Eddie’s hips twitch into nothing. “Aw, look,” he says, all boyishness. “Poor Eddie, you really wanted a hand on your cock, huh? Already desperate, Eds?”
“Should I give him a treat first?” Angel answers for Eddie, laughter also caught in her voice. It’s playful, a little condescending in a way that should make Eddie tense except it’s Buck, so it just makes him wet instead.
“Nah,” Buck says, and Eddie can read the smile off his face in pitch darkness, without a glance. “Eddie likes deserving his treats, right?”
Eddie whimpers, nods, nails scraping lightly against his scalp as he does. Angel huffs out another laugh, twisting his face down. His fingers press down on either side of her, and he could leave marks so easily except he doesn’t know if he wants to--
“Hold her tighter,” Buck’s voice doesn’t have to be loud, in his own bedroom, and there’s a rasp in it that feels like the drag of a harness, the pull of a rope. There’s nobody Eddie trusts more with a winch. Eddie tightens his fingers, digs, in, and is rewarded with the pale lilac bloom of future bruises on the generous give of her skin, her soft gasped out “yes, there--” and, more important than that, the puff of Buck’s almost-laugh, the knowledge that Eddie is giving him what he wants.
Eddie moves downwards, mouths along the line of her inner thigh, following the sound of her breath hitching, the muscles underneath his lips twitching. Her knees tighten across his shoulders, and for a moment he wishes they were stronger, thicker, lined with more tattoos.
Still, there's an easy familiarity to this part, and he flicks his tongue over the cling of her panties, the part where they're the wettest. Above him, she moans shakily, hand tightening in his hair. He leans into it, closes his eyes, tries to ignore the desire to turn around and watch Buck's expression. If Buck still thinks he's doing a good job.
And because Buck always knows exactly what he needs-- “That’s good, Eddie. Keep going like that. Make her feel good.”
Eddie can’t help the shudder of his breath at that, the exhale hot and stuttering over the wet slick of her still-covered pussy. She twitches underneath him, unable to move too far out of his grasp but still asserting herself, fingers pulling through his hair in a sting sweet enough to make him moan out loud, press forward to press his open mouth, his nose, into the musk and powder smell of her.
“What are you waiting for, Eddie?” Buck teases, almost like he’s just shooting the shit at the station loft. The illusion of it, that Buck is utterly unaffected while Eddie is falling apart, makes something in his mind go molten and hazy, a shiver of humiliation turning into something hotter, pebbling his skin.
He drags his fingers down the sides of her hips, bringing her panties down with them. Her hips tilt up to help, and they bring her cunt, wet and slick, directly into contact with his mouth. He moans into the taste of her, dragging his tongue flat over the length of her to lap at where she’s dripping and hot.
She makes a high, soft sigh, and the fingers in his hair drag him forward, until his nose is pressed into her pubic hair, his mouth held firmly against her folds. He licks into her, flicking at the swell of her clit with the catch of his lips as he presses his open mouth to her hole, pushing his tongue into her without hesitation. It draws a long, drawn-out moan from her, and he presses his fingers into the swells of her thighs, chases those noises.
“That’s good,” Buck’s voice is the clearest thing in the room, ringing bright through the slick sound of Eddie’s tongue and the noises Angel was making. Or maybe that was just Eddie, who listens for Buck in every moment, finds him first in every room.
He chases that as he eats Angel out in earnest, swirling his tongue and sucking on her clit, her legs around him shaking as she hisses out “yes” and “there” and “more.” He’s good at this, he knows, remembering the first time with Shannon, the pride he felt when she’d seemed almost startled at the breadth of her own pleasure. Ana’s soft, shaky breaths, lying soft and pliant like a doll in a way that he could pretend was right, was comforting. The way Marisol laughed, and how that almost felt right, but crumbled if he focused his eyes.
This is better, because he doesn't have to pretend or wonder if it means anything. Because she’s moving against him like she doesn’t really care that it’s him, and something about that winds hot and spark-bright against his bones. It’s better, because--
“Look how wet she is for you-- isn’t it rude not to take what she’s giving you?”
Well. There’s no point not being honest about it now. It’s better because Buck is here.
Buck’s always a yapper, which Eddie is always fond of but is even better here, because he needs the sound of his voice if he can’t be looking at him. His voice is soft, a rasp to it at moments before it tilts back to normal, and Eddie can't help imagining him swallowing, the bob of his throat as he watches Eddie mouth a woman open, hitching her thighs higher so he can have a better look. Still, the words--
“Yeah, that’s it-- look at how much she liked that. Go even deeper, Eddie, you want to give her a good time, yeah? Show her how sweet you can be under her.”
Every word is a shot of adrenaline injected straight into his bloodstream, making his head fuzzy hand his fingers tighten. He’s still rutting into the mattress, slower, indulgent. He can hear Buck laugh a little about it, and the embarrassment only makes him harder, his dick dragging wet and ruining the sheets. His jaw is a bit sore, his breaths shallow from how deeply he’s pressed to her, but none of that matters when she’s falling apart, when Buck is proud of him because of it.
Soon enough, Angel is trembling over him, voice going strained as her legs go tight, as her cunt twitches and gushes into his mouth, Eddie drinking her down obediently as she rides out her orgasm. Her fingers loosen in his hair, and he turns his head just so he can catch a glimpse of Buck behind them. The shape of him still takes up so much space in Eddie’s eyes, his legs spread and his face tilted forwards like he’s watching a documentary instead of Eddie falling apart. His eyes are dilated, thin rings of blue barely visible. Despite the tone he’s been putting on, there’s a bulge at the front of his pants, an intentness in his expression that makes Eddie bite back a request that he doesn’t know how to say out loud.
He looks -- turned on, and Eddie can’t help but wonder at the sight of it, the expression new to him and instantly addictive. He wonders -- was this what Buck had intended all along, when he'd asked Eddie to come? Did he look around the club and sweep his eyes through throngs of beautiful bodies, searching for the one that'll look the most beautiful with their hands in Eddie's hair?
There was something about that idea, about Buck choosing someone for Eddie -- not for Eddie’s sake, but for Buck’s, so Buck can watch Eddie moaning and unraveling against someone that he picked out -- that makes sparks skitter up his spine. He lets himself imagine it from Buck’s perspective: assessing every person he bumped into, watching out for gazes that lingered on Eddie, picturing how they would look pressed up against him, how he would watch--
Eddie groans, hips rutting into the mattress involuntarily.
“Oh, look at you, you like that, huh, you’re as wet as she is.” Buck murmurs, and Eddie can see now the way he licks his lips beforehand, leaving them pink and slick. He must be referring to the wave of Angel’s orgasm, the way she’s twitching against him, but it almost sounds like he knows, and he can’t help the way he ruts his hips into the mattress at that. He moves in a way that hitches his ass up, exposed to Buck, puts on a show for Buck like it really is just for him. Because Buck only sounds a little raspy, but he looks like he wants to--
Eddie’s vision swims as Angel pulls him up, Buck’s eyes disappearing into her smooth skin as the lengths of their bodies slide together. Eddie moans at the way his cock smears against the (Buck’s!) mattress, catching at her sensitive folds and making her twitch against him as she tastes herself on his tongue.
His arms press over either side of her, her fingers dragging down to his back and biting into muscle in a sweet sting. And when they pull away, both panting, she’s grinning, hitching a long leg over the back of his thighs and pulling him forward so he smears a line of precome against the divot of her hip, making him gasp into her mouth.
He can’t see Buck anymore, and that’s disappointing, but he can still hear Buck as he asks Angel: “So? Good enough for him to get his reward?”
A laugh against his hair (too high, too light--) as Angel replies, still a little hoarse. “Gold star, I think it’s time to let him come, I’m starting to feel bad for him.”
“Mm, that’s good, I think he wants it now, too.” The sound of footsteps, and gentle fingers dancing down his neck. Eddie shivers, and he likes Buck’s voice better like this: close enough to touch, to be touched. “Let me get you--”
The slide of wood, and Eddie turns his face towards Buck, watches him pull out a line of foil packets, a bottle of lube in a pale pink bottle. It’s like he’s handing over drinks at a party, conscientious and sweet the way he always is. But instead it’s his bedroom, and the two people having sex on his bed, one of whom is his best friend.
Angel watches him too, something more assessing in her eyes. “You wanna prep him?” she asks suddenly, innocently, in a way that makes Eddie jolt slightly.
“Oh- I don’t--” for the first time all night, Buck’s expression stutters, eyes going round and blinking with something Eddie is too lost to parse. Buck meets Eddie’s gaze over Angel’s head, and Eddie tries not to let anything show, tries to pretend that he hasn’t already been flayed open for Buck to reach into.
Buck swallows. “Uh-- no,” he smiles, and Eddie watches as he pulls something over his face, the way his fingers clench once, tight, before going loose and easy again. “I said that I’m just the audience tonight, remember?”
Angel hums, soft and a little amused. “If you say so, best friend.”
He opens his mouth like he’s about to say something, and she plucks the condom out of his fingers before he does. Eddie, for his own sake, doesn't wonder what he was going to say. Doesn’t imagine how Buck would prep him, steady hands rolling the condom down his leaking cock, slicking him up with lube with the same intensity that he puts towards engine maintenance or pulling people out of fires or saving Eddie’s life.
Buck keeps standing there for a few moments after, watching them, brows furrowed and something unrecognizable flashing through his eyes. Then, like he's being brought out of a trance, he begins to walk back towards where he was sitting. As he passes, their arms brush, cloth against skin, and both of them startle, stare.
The sound of foil ripping distracts Eddie, as do long fingers finally, finally grasping his dick firmly. He groans, tilting his hip forwards, and Angel meets his eyes and smirks as she slowly rolls the condom down him, easily familiarity in every movement.
“You really are sensitive,” she murmurs, like it’s a secret between the two of them. Eddie opens his mouth to answer, a soft sound falling from him instead when she squeezes lube onto her fingers, slides them down him once, twice, pressing firm at his base and dripping down his balls. She grins at him. “You wanna give your guy a show?”
And-- he might not be Buck’s, not in the way that he’ll be terrified to realize that he wants once all this is over, but Buck is and has always been his. Eddie, half-drunk despite the stretch of time between that last drink and this moment, nods.
Angel smirks, like she’d already predicted his answer, and swings her legs over him, twisting so that their positions are reversed. He’s leaning against the (Buck’s) headboard, legs spread in front of him, Angel straddling him. This way, he has direct line of sight to Buck, to the way his eyes widen, darken, the light press of his teeth against the plush bow of his lower lip, the way his palm presses into the front of his pants, the visible arousal of him. Eddie can watch him now, and Eddie wants.
“Oh,” falls from Buck’s lips, soft and a little startled, at their new position, at whatever look is on Eddie’s face.
Angel turns her head to look at him. “Thought this might be easier for you,” she says, and Eddie almost loses track of her words as she begins sinking down on him, hands on his shoulders and legs on either side of his waist. “To - oh - make sure that he’s having a good time, and all.”
She’s soft and open after coming, loose from fucking herself on his tongue. Eddie’s cock, neglected all this time but for the firm mattress beneath him, twitches as it’s sucked into her, his hands coming to her waist and gripping them in an attempt to tether himself, to stop himself from fucking up into her immediately.
He watches Buck, the slow sweep of awe over his expression, like he’s seeing something unimaginably beautiful, and it only pours more molten gold into him, the feeling lighting him up from his groin and down every limb, making him fuzzy with pleasure.
“Fuck,” Buck mutters. He swallows, and the bob of his throat is exactly what Eddie had pictured. “Yeah-- that’s, that’s good. God, you look beautiful.”
The words could be for Angel, but they carry themselves to Eddie anyways, branding onto his heart. Angel fully seats herself, and finally, finally, Eddie swivels his hip upwards, punches into her with his hands still on her waist, hot and wet and slick with Buck’s stupid pink lube.
She yelps, then moans, her hips beginning to work with him, the two of them finding a rhythm. It’s rough, her still oversensitive and him so fucking close, and it feels a little like earlier, frotting into each other, except this time Buck doesn't come over and stop them, doesn’t pull Eddie’s hair.
It feels like a loss, but Buck is still watching him, his voice a metronome against the slapping of their hips.
“Yes-- like that-- dig your nails in, kiss him-- look how desperate he is, do you think he’ll manage to hold back? Give you another orgasm before he just can’t stop himself?” Eddie’s cock jumps, and he’s so close, he’s shaking his head, and Buck is leaning forward like he wants to pounce. But Eddie’s already being consumed, at Buck’s request, and Angel is tilting her body and making a punched-out sound as he hits something sweet inside her, chasing it as Eddie fucks into her blindly, drunk with arousal.
“Fuck,” Buck’s voice scratches down his back like Angel’s nails did, dragging sharp sensation down every nerve ending. “I don’t think-- I think you need to clench down on him, if you don’t want him to come too soon. You need to come first-- he deserves to feel you come on his cock--”
And oh, somehow that’s the thing. The sound of Buck saying that he deserves it, deserves to feel this good-- it makes Eddie’s mouth open in something silent and pleading. Something Angel swallows from his mouth, mercifully, as she clenches down on him as instructed, and her hand is going down too, circling his base and squeezing, and it’s too late-- it’s not-- he can’t--
Eddie doesn’t come, or maybe he does, the rush of being so close then not rushing through him as hot as an actual orgasm. He can feel tears jump behind his eyes, and he forces them down, letting his body shake and a whine escape the edges of his lips instead.
Buck’s lips fall open. “Did he-- did he come?”
Angel loosens her fingers around his base, detaches her mouth and begins riding him again, slower, more intent, drawing out every sensation while Eddie feels hazy and half-gone. “No,” Eddie hears her say, from somewhere just outside of himself. “But he looks like he likes this better, doesn’t he?”
“Y-yeah,” Buck says, and he’s squeezing his clothed dick while he watches Eddie now, and if Eddie could speak he might be begging him to pull his cock out, to show Eddie the full length of it and maybe bury it in his convulsing throat. “Fuck, I didn’t-- I didn’t know he could--”
His throat clicks, and Eddie needs him to keep talking. If he’s not touching Eddie, not covering him with his bulk or his mouth or his cock, then at least let Eddie have his voice, his eyes, the unwavering certainty of his attention.
Angel’s laugh is breathless, and her movements are getting unsteady again, Eddie’s fingers clenching instinctively to keep her upright, his hips still moving to meet hers. “Glad--” Eddie shifts forward to press his mouth to her neck, to keep any more embarrassing noises from escaping. He’s getting closer too, again, faster this time, like his body is trying so hard to prevent anyone from stopping its climax a second time. She moans. “Glad to show you somethin’ new-- oh--”
Eddie moves from her neck to her tits again, laving over a nipple as he watches Buck follow his movements, and she’s getting hotter around him, moving faster, and--
She slams her hips down, and Eddie gasps as her pussy flutters around him, Angel gyrating against him as a litany of moans fall from her lips. Eddie moans around the bud between his lips, too, and meets Buck’s eyes, hoping, begging.
“Yeah,” Buck croaks out. “Yeah, Eddie, you can come now.”
Eddie can’t help the way his eyes roll back, his entire body going taut as he releases inside the condom, drawn-out like it’s making up for lost time. His entire body feels loose, wobbly, and he pants against the sweaty dip between Angel’s breasts as he slowly stops moving his hips.
After a few moments, he feels Angel shift in his grasp, and he removes his fingers from her sides, not looking to see if they’ve left any marks. She pushes off of him, only a little off-center as she slides free and twists to sit at the edge of the bed.
The sound of their breathing is loud, three-fold, in the room, and then Angel lets out a breathy laugh.
“Man,” she says, slowly getting up. “That was-- nice,” her eyes twinkle in Buck’s direction. “Thanks for the invite.”
Buck’s mouth opens, then he frowns as she begins to move towards her clothes.
“Aren’t you gonna…stick around?”
Angel laughs as she picks up her panties, sliding them onto her legs, making Eddie the only completely naked one in the room. “I think you’ve got the rest covered,” she says, breezy. “There’s too much tension in this room for me to fall asleep in.”
Before either of them can react to that, she’s leaving Buck’s bedroom, her footsteps growing fainter. There’s a pause, presumably for her to put on her dress and pick up her purse, then they start up again, disappearing with the click of a door.
Eddie stares at Buck, throat still a little hoarse, and Buck stares back.
The air feels cold against his skin, and Eddie feels a swell of something in his throat, tight and humiliating. He looks down, the knowledge of what a terrible idea this all was suddenly the loudest thing in a silent room.
“Eddie,” Buck says, after a moment. Then-- he moves forward, feet padding across his floor in a sound that might forever be ruined for him. He pauses at the end of the bed, staring at Eddie.
Eddie doesn't know how he looks right now, a condom still sticky against his soft cock, sweat dripping down his back, his mouth still swollen and wet and tasting slightly of Angel’s come, his scalp stinging slightly. Buck looks at him, and Eddie wishes he wouldn’t, because maybe if he stopped Eddie would have enough time to shove everything that he’d suddenly realized that he wanted back into the box that he hadn’t realized he’d buried this entire time.
But Buck is Buck, and so he does not look away. Instead, his hand moves forward a little, stops in the air between them. His eyes ask a question, and Eddie is too tired not to answer.
“Please,” he murmurs, and something releases from Buck’s shoulder. He slowly gets on one knee, curling his fingers around Eddie’s thigh. Eddie is far too tired to go again, but it makes him shiver anyways, and Buck’s lashes flutter as he does, as if in response.
Slowly, so gently, he moves his other hand to Eddie’s cock, sliding the condom off. He hesitates, then rubs a thumb over the inside of Eddie’s thigh before standing back up. Eddie has to fight not to whine at the loss of touch.
But Buck hears him anyways. He looks at him, murmurs: “Don’t worry, I’ll be back soon.” before disappearing into the hall. Moments that feel like eternities later, he returns with a damp towel, a bottle of water. He hands the water to Eddie as he crouches again, running cool cloth over Eddie’s face first, a thumb over his cheek, before moving down his body.
His movements are slow and almost reverent, almost like a baptism. Eddie feels remade under his touch, the water bottle held loosely in his fingers, unopened. When he’s done, he looks up at Eddie.
“Drink your water,” he says. Eddie, still half outside of himself, hands the bottle to him instead. A question and an answer.
Buck tosses the towel in the hamper, unscrews the water bottle and holds it to his lips. Eddie tilts his head back, letting the cool water run down his throat. Baptism, communion. Sacrament at the foot of his Buck.
Afterwards, Buck puts the half-empty bottle at his bedside table, right beside the rest of the condoms and the lube, a little tableau of their lack of plausible deniability. Buck’s hands are shaking a little, when he turns back to Eddie. Somehow, that eases something inside of him. Suddenly, it all feels very simple.
“You can-” Buck begins, and Eddie interrupts him.
“Did you mean it?”
Buck doesn’t answer for a moment, just looks startled, like he’d expected Eddie to-- shut down, maybe. Run away. Lash out. Do any of the million things that he could to deny what just happened.
But--
“Did you think that I deserve it?”
Buck exhales, like Eddie had said something else entirely, like he hears him perfectly. His eyes are earnest, and so is his voice. “I always think you deserve everything.”
And Eddie hears him perfectly, too. He reaches out, holds the hands that pulled him where he’s always needed to go. “Come here, then,” he says, and also hears in himself something that has perhaps always been there. “Let me deserve you.”
A breath leaves Buck like he’s been punched, like he’s still surprised, despite everything. But he lets himself be pulled into bed. Towards Eddie.
“Eddie--” he murmurs, finally almost as close as Eddie would like him always. “If you-- you don’t have to-- I’m--”
“Thank you,” Eddie says. “For taking care of me.”
Buck’s eyes are more blue than black now, but they’re still intent on Eddie, still reading his every shift like he wants to be the first to know everything about him. That’s fine, Eddie wants to know everything about Buck, too. He waits, patiently, for his words to sink in.
Finally, the expression Eddie had hoped for breaks across his face, something that makes tears prickle at the edges of his eyes. This time, he lets them fall, because Buck’s hands are close enough to catch them, his lips close enough to press to Eddie’s.
Eddie is right-- Buck does kiss him like he loves him.