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"Sorry I'm late," Garibaldi said, grabbing his chair and sitting down quickly. "I'd explain but you probably don't want the gritty details of a body cavity search on a Narn."

Sinclair laughed and put his drink down. Next to him, Ivanova adopted her best "nothing fazes me" expression. She looked stunning with her hair down. Garibaldi loved it when she did that. They both looked marvelous out of uniform, Sinclair even moreso now than in months past...

This was their monthly dinner together, something Sinclair had suggested as a way for them to get to know each other in less formal circumstances. These meetings were decidedly casual, in a casual restaurant, in casual clothes.

"They tell me that Narn have pouches," Ivanova said.

"Just the males," Garibaldi replied.

"I don't think I want to hear the rest," she agreed with a wry look. Sinclair sighed.

"That reminds me," he said in a low voice, looking at Garibaldi. "Franklin came to my office today." Ivanova looked curious; she'd wondered what that was all about, but had left before being privy to anything. "He thought I raped you." She fought not to choke on her drink.

"What?!" Garibaldi said.

"I haven't heard this story," Ivanova said. Sinclair looked at her and she had a brief moment of apprehension about whether or not she was allowed to talk about this. But the look in Sinclair's eyes was not a forbidding one. If anything, it was affectionate. "This have something to do with C&C yesterday?" Sinclair shook his head, smiling. The infamous public blowjob was going to go down in history as one of B5's greatest urban legends... never mind that it was true.

"It was, uh, something we did later," he said. "Last night." He glanced at Michael and was faintly surprised to see him unbuttoning his cuffs and pushing back the shirtsleeves. He leaned across the table to show Ivanova his wrists. The imprints of Sinclair's hands were clearly visible.

"Wow," Ivanova said, impressed.

"That's all I can show you in a public place," Garibaldi said with a trace of smugness.

"But surely Stephen's seen that kind of thing before," she said. Sinclair and Garibaldi exchanged a look.

"Actually, I should have realized Stephen would react that way," Sinclair admitted finally, to both of them. He met Susan's interrogative and intrigued gaze. "I was really rough with him. I made him go to medlab this morning because I was worried about infection."

Ivanova made a silent "oh" with her mouth.

"Yeah," Garibaldi said with a small grin. "That kind of night." He sighed. "No wonder Stephen was acting so screwy while I was there. I thought he just didn't approve of that kind of sex."

"I gather that you didn't talk to him about it," Sinclair mused. "You know how he figured out it was me? He ran a check on my dental pattern."

"That sneaky little--" Garibaldi muttered.

"Dental pattern," Ivanova said in a flat voice, glancing from one to the other. Sinclair met her eyes with that vaguely sheepish, apologetic look, and Garibaldi just smirked. Then her expression broke into an evil smile, and she leaned forward to put her chin in her hand, elbow on the table. "I definitely haven't heard this story."

"You know, you neglected to mention on your resume that you're a voyeur," Sinclair said with a smile.

Their waiter showed up, interrupting the flow of the conversation. The young man seemed conscious of committing this breach and apologized before getting down to business. He took their order and vanished purposefully.

"Damn straight," Ivanova said conspiratorially after the waiter had gone. "Two big, strapping men like you? Think I wouldn't pay money to watch?" Garibaldi was grinning broadly and Sinclair looked genuinely startled.

"God, I love women who blurt out things like that," Garibaldi said.

"You love men who do, too," Sinclair said, amused, and Garibaldi flushed slightly. Sinclair looked at Ivanova. "I meant to thank you for what you did in C&C yesterday."

"What did I do?"

"You made it a lot easier for Michael... the way you reacted. Don't think I didn't notice. I think you made it easier on the staff, too. One of the most difficult jobs of a second in command is smoothing out the kinks of the commanding officer's personality, pun intended. Of course, I don't expect that kind of thing to normally fall within your job description..."

"Jeff," she said gently. "It's okay. The whole thing is okay with me. Really. I was just caught off guard, is all."

"I promise I won't do it again," Sinclair said.

"Owr," Garibaldi protested weakly. Sinclair glanced at him, both eyebrows raised.

"Who said I didn't want you to do it again?" Ivanova demanded. "Didn't I just make it clear I liked to watch? Do it in the Zocalo for all I care. Hell, you can get up and do it right now if you want."

"Don't tempt me," Sinclair murmured, smiling, and Garibaldi tensed.

"God almighty," Ivanova sighed wistfully. "A couple of gorgeous, sexy exhibitionists, live and in person. I must have some good karma left over from my past life as a Buddhist monk."

"I'm not an exhibitionist," Garibaldi protested half-heartedly.

"You will be," Sinclair said wickedly. Garibaldi cleared his throat, still flushed.

"Mm. So. Franklin came to see you after I left medlab." Sinclair nodded, accepting the change in subject with some reluctance.

"In high dudgeon, I think is the term usually used," Sinclair said. He put his drink down. "He's angry about the roughness he's seen in our relationship. He doesn't think it's healthy."

"You didn't force me, for Chrissakes," Garibaldi said, trying to keep his voice down. "Dammit, I had to harass you to get you to let go that much."

"Yeah, and look what that got you," Sinclair said, amused. Giving his security chief a blowjob in the middle of C&C the day before had definitely altered their reputations, but whether for good or ill depended on who was asked.

"If I hadn't wanted you to do that, I could have stopped you," Michael said flatly. "I could kick your ass if I wanted to, Jeff. And don't think I wouldn't if you went over the line."

"Think you could, huh?" Sinclair answered with a gleam in his eye. "We might have to test that."

"Yeah, you and what Marine division?" Michael grinned. "So what'd you tell Stephen?"

"I told him it was none of his damn business and that I had no intention of submitting to another psych eval."

"Did he threaten to do that?" Ivanova asked, surprised.

"Maybe 'threaten' would be a strong word," Sinclair replied, "but yes." His anger was obvious in his bronze eyes. "I made it clear to him that the arrangement was consensual and that I would consult with him if I thought I needed to."

"I'm not sure if you owe him even that much," Susan said, looking fierce herself.

"I don't really want to talk about it right now," Sinclair sighed. "Can't we just eat and have fun?"

"Fine by me," Garibaldi said, stabbing a piece of shrimp toast with his fork. "As long as you stop embarrassing me."

"But you're so cute when you blush, Michael," Ivanova said, grinning.

"Isn't he, though?" Sinclair mused. "It goes beyond his face, too."

"Really?"

"Cut it out, you guys," Garibaldi said.

***

They talked into the evening, dancing gently around graphic descriptions of each other's sex lives in a curiously flirtatious friendliness. Sinclair had never seemed so relaxed to Ivanova, and she watched him and Garibaldi with utter fascination. They had that look of joy when their eyes met, a friendship many years old risen to a new plane. Her own friendship with them was comparatively recent, but deep for her. She sensed perhaps the depth was strange for them, too, from the wonder in Jeff's eyes when she spoke sometimes -- her brazen openness that they both drew out of her effortlessly. It was because they listened. They listened and heard her soul in her words and responded with rapture instead of shock. The acceptance was seductive.

They were interrupted by their waiter again, returning with their food.

"Sweet and sour chicken for you, chief. Kung pao beef for the Lieutenant Commander. And Commander Sinclair, your duck."

***

Sinclair came to her again that night, after dinner was long done. She was relaxed from it still, sedated by the wine and food. A book waited for her on the chair. She was just about halfway through and the Aiel were about to leave the Three Fold Land, but the door chimed and she sighed resignedly.

"Come," she said with a tired smile, wondering who would bother at this time of night. She should have known it would be him.

"I haven't come at a bad time, I hope?"

"No, not at all." She waved him in and he entered. He was still wearing that gorgeous black silk shirt from dinner, and she experienced a moment of pure appreciation for his maleness. "Is this business or pleasure?"

"Pleasure," he said in that warm voice, "with business arrangements." She raised an eyebrow and indicated for him to sit down. He smiled and accepted, taking up the end of the couch with calm, well-reined grace and power.

"Can I get you something to drink?" she asked. "More of Michael's favor-wrangled vodka from Earth?"

"Mmmm," Sinclair hummed, considering. "Yes, thank you. I don't know how Michael does it, but sometimes I think the little luxuries he gets for us keep me sane."

"I know they do me," she said, pouring the drink with a soft clink of glass on glass. She paused and then poured one for herself. "I can't believe Stephen thought you had raped Michael."

"I fully believe it in retrospect," Sinclair said, "I was just surprised. I expected Michael to explain, at least partially. He's a private person, but from the mood he was in when I left him this morning, I assumed he would be open with Franklin about what happened."

"Yes, but to argue with you about it later? After you made it clear that no one was forced?" She came over to the couch with their drinks.

"He was worried it was something to do with my experience in the war," Sinclair said. Ivanova snorted and handed him his glass.

"I wouldn't have thought that," she said. "And I haven't known you that much longer than he has. You would think that with as much exposure as he's had to aliens, he would realize that humans don't all make love to Ravel's 'Bolero,' between the bedsheets with the lights off and the door locked." She plopped down on the other end of the sofa and took a sip of her vodka.

"You haven't seen how Michael looks," Sinclair said with a rueful smile. "It goes beyond bruises on his wrists. Way beyond."

"You think I don't know that?" she said plainly, returning his smile. "You think I can't tell from the way you've been flinching all day? And the way Michael's walking? You bit the hell out of him, didn't you? Stephen probably thought you were a werewolf."

"Your attitude is a lot different from Stephen's," Sinclair remarked. She shrugged.

"Been there," she said. He grunted.

"Anyway, what I came to talk to you about..." He leaned back into the sofa a little more. "Something you said at dinner. About paying money to watch me and Michael." She looked startled and visibly debated replying except that Sinclair kept talking. "How does 'for free' sound?"

"Jeff..." She just looked at him for a long moment, amazed, waiting for him to interrupt, but he didn't. He just watched her expectantly, an intent gleam in his tiger eyes. "God, you're serious, aren't you?"

"Aren't you?" Sinclair said, amused. "I like to do it in public. You like to watch. That was clear from the way you behaved in C&C yesterday." Lord, was that only yesterday? "I'll tell you when... and where... and you can come watch."

"And watch you come," she muttered before she could stop herself. Sinclair grinned brilliantly.

"Yes," he said. "Although I hope Michael will be doing most of that. I think he secretly gets a thrill out of it."

"He does," she said, and was fascinated by Sinclair's expression. "I was watching him yesterday, you know. The entire idea completely blows his mind. I've never seen him so pleased with himself."

"Good," Sinclair murmured, half to himself. "I was hoping..." He sighed, shaking his head and leaving that thought uncompleted. He glanced up at Susan again. "Tomorrow at nineteen hundred, in the labyrinth. The Rodin sculpture."

She felt a warm flush at the hunger in his eyes, his desire to be observed, to have her there drinking in the sexuality of both men with the eagerness she knew was obvious in her demeanor. She nodded wordlessly, not trusting her voice. He smiled and finished his drink.

***

"This way."

"I'm still sore from the day before yesterday," Garibaldi said. It wasn't a very serious complaint, and Sinclair glanced back at him, amused.

"I'll be gentle this time, I promise," he said. He was leading Garibaldi through the hedge maze by one arm, the unbruised one.

"Christ, Jeff..."

"This isn't quite as public as C&C," Sinclair said wryly. They had arrived.

"It's still pretty damn public," Garibaldi said in a low voice. "And what is that anyway?" He meant the large bronze statue on a granite pedestal that occupied the end of the hedge path.

"Rodin," Sinclair answered. "We can talk about art history later." He had Michael up against the seated statue's leg. "And yes, it's still pretty damn public."

"Somebody could walk by here any second--" Garibaldi gasped as Sinclair startled nuzzling him, standing close against his body, one hand around his buttocks, the other on his chin, moving it aside to kiss his throat.

"You'd love that," Sinclair murmured wickedly. Michael groaned softly -- that mouth was like fire.

"Oh God, you drive me so fucking crazy, Jeff," he whispered. He leaned back against the bronze leg, arching his neck to let Sinclair kiss and nibble him. "God dammit." His cock was already thick, down inside his pants leg along his thigh. He gasped sharply when Jeff's hand found it, kneading slowly.

"Yeah, Michael," Sinclair breathed against Garibaldi's neck. "Get hard for me. You could come in your pants, too. I'd like that."

"Jesus, oh, what are you doing--"

Sinclair was unbuttoning Michael's shirt, wanting to get to other parts of him with his tongue.

"Getting you so horny you can't breathe," Sinclair murmured with a smile. He got the copper shirt open and slid his hands inside, spreading the clothes away from Michael's chest. "God, you're beautiful." When he kissed this time, it was a nipple he sucked into his mouth, and Garibaldi made a strangled noise of ecstasy. Jeff's hand was still on his cock, stroking the now rock-hard erection through his trousers.

"Dammit, I'm already so horny I can't stand it," Garibaldi moaned. "God, just thinking about you from the other day... in C&C... the way you came to my quarters that night. Fuck, I hardly think about anything else." Sinclair silenced him with a hard kiss on his mouth, and he whimpered.

***

It was nineteen hundred, and Ivanova was making her way through the labyrinth toward the place Sinclair had told her to come. She wasn't sure exactly how to approach them. Were they waiting for her? Was she preventing them from doing something by not being there on time? She snorted a laugh at the idea of anything stopping them from having at each other.

She was getting close to where she knew the statue was, and she could hear the quiet, unmistakable sounds of lovemaking -- a breathless purr, the rustle of clothes and hands. A rough, bass voice swore softly; Sinclair.

Carefully rounding a corner brought them into view. Michael, with his shirt spread open, stood pressed back against the Rodin masterpiece by Sinclair's extraordinary passion, being kissed so deeply that Susan felt her own thighs tremble at the sight of it. She realized with a start that Sinclair had his hand inside Michael's trousers. Michael's fly was unzipped and spread, Sinclair's hand gripping something long and hard, stroking...

She felt her knees go weak and wished she had something to hold onto besides tall bushes. Her own instincts flashed through her with an instant's worth of uncontrollable need, and the shock held her still long enough for the insanity to pass. Oh God, they were beautiful men. Michael leaned his head back, eyes closed, silent -- but the expression on his face told her something much more naked than any sound he could have made. It was even more open than the way he had looked in C&C -- he had been fighting it then, nervous, trying to let go but not able to. Now she saw what she knew was the private honesty of absolute trust. Michael surrendered himself to Jeff in moments like this. Surrendered to his strength, his love, the implicit promise of protection from anything and everything that could harm him.

Sinclair was sinking to his knees, not quickly, but letting his mouth trail kisses down Michael's chest and stomach, savoring the taste of his skin, its warmth. There was so much love in it that Susan felt an ache in her chest. Sinclair played with Michael's cock for a moment, licking the head, nipping the underside, and Michael shuddered visibly, groaning. Then Jeff took it in his mouth -- quick as a mongoose -- and had to grab Michael's thighs in his large hands to keep the other man upright against the statue as all self-control fled Michael's body. Michael writhed against him shamelessly, nothing like the way he had acted in C&C, where he had been tense and still.

"Oh God," Michael groaned, the first real words Susan had heard from either of them. "Oh God yeah. Oh my God. God, I love you, Jeff." He had one hand in Jeff's thick hair, caressing. His other hand sought Jeff's shoulder restlessly, and Sinclair lifted one hand to grasp it tightly, giving Michael something to hold on to.

There was a moment, when Michael raised his head and caught sight of her watching them, that made Susan's heart stop in her chest. His expression was easy to identify -- shock. But a kind of shock that made her blood hot in her veins and made her heartbeat loud inside her own head. She caught a glimpse of overwhelming ecstasy in his face before he arched his head back, eyes shut tight, slumping luxuriously against Rodin's work with a pure contentment like nothing she had ever seen.

They were complete in this moment together, the three of them, a closeness possible in this for her that she could never have with them separately. She savored it, even while Michael was panting softly and Jeff was growling deep in his chest, knowing that this new layer of their friendship would make everything in the coming months bearable. There was a storm brewing. Even now.

"Oh God, Jeff," Michael whispered breathlessly. "Soon. Oh, damn, it's gonna be soon--"

It was easier to watch both of them this time, as she was not standing so close, and she was able to take in the sight of Sinclair pushing forward to hold Michael deep in his mouth, nose pressed warmly into Michael's groin. It made Michael shudder and groan. His legs were shaking, hips bucking lightly, a reflex he couldn't control.

And then he was panting quickly, the orgasm blazing toward him -- she could see it in his face. He met her eyes again unexpectedly, clear cerulean flame, at the very instant of his release. He shared it with her, the split-second when his soul was vulnerable, the sudden flash of his own joy that made his mouth twist in a fiery grin and he barked a laugh. Complete and absolute relish washed through his eyes, held in his expression for a moment of utter sensuality. She couldn't look away, knowing that she must also somehow be naked to him in her surprise and hunger, knowing that he was coming into Sinclair's throat with every soft grunt and panting gasp he made.

And Sinclair swallowing... she was distantly aware of that, too. He was devouring Michael's come with a ravenousness she had seen him use on sumptuous food... caviar and smoked salmon. He hummed low -- exactly the same sound she had heard at the party Londo had thrown and he had eaten creme brulee for the first time in his life. The association brought a wave of amusement mixed with her pleasure, and she smiled. Michael returned it, possibly aware of what she was thinking, and then Jeff was sitting back, gazing up at Michael and licking his mouth like an extremely satisfied cat.

Sinclair stood up after another moment, drawing the waistband of Michael's boxers up to cover him gently. He stood close, holding his lover affectionately.

"Like that?" Jeff asked softly, grinning.

"Damn stupid question," Michael gulped, still recovering from the intensity of his climax. Sinclair kissed him slowly, sliding arms around him.

Susan withdrew back around the edge of the bushes, grinning to herself as she walked quietly away. That moment was for them, and she felt out of place. But she was satisfied, and astonished that Jeff had extended the invitation in the first place.

//Hell, in a lot of ways, it's better than actually having sex,// she thought starkly. It was the pleasure of having the need filled, the delight in being recognized and welcomed as a voyeur. And she couldn't help but smile in the face of the love and passion in these two men. Magnificent.

***

"Good morning, Lieutenant Commander."

Ivanova glanced sideways as Sinclair came to stand next to her. He leaned forward a little, hands on the console, to peer out of the observation windows at a Minbari freighter that was angling in toward the docking bay. He was fascinated by Minbari ships, she had noticed.

"Morning, sir," she said. He had sounded relaxed and pleasant. He was the only commanding officer she had ever known who could use someone's full rank in a casual greeting and not make it sound awkward or forced. Words just flowed from him like part of his being, as if the language had been invented just for him.

"Kha'hann class," he said, still observing the Minbari ship. "New, if I'm not mistaken."

"It's always seemed curious to me that you like looking at Minbari ships so much," she said.

"There's an elegance about them," he said. "Their warcruisers have a hypnotic grace, like huge, deadly angel fish." He glanced at her. "It's just refreshing to get a chance to look at something besides our own maintenance loaders."

"I can think of more graceful things to look at than giant spacegoing fish," she said, amused. Their eyes met for a moment, and he smiled.

"You left early last night," he said quietly.

"I felt like a third wheel," she said under her breath, hoping no one else on deck could hear them.

"You weren't," he said, still smiling. "Michael enjoyed it. I suppose that wasn't quite as obvious to you as it was to me. Don't feel unwelcome. Believe me, I wouldn't have extended the offer otherwise."

"Michael didn't know I was going to be there, did he?" she asked.

"No. I let it be a surprise."

"You're really wicked, you know that?" she said, unable to repress a small grin. He chuckled quietly.

"Of course I do. And I think this would work best if we never let on to him that I drop hints to you. Let him think you're following us. In fact, feel free to do that. If we really want to be alone we'll go to our quarters."

"Think that would turn him on?" she said mischievously.

"Yes. And I wouldn't exactly be averse to it myself."

"You're really wicked."

"Thank you. Thursday night, twenty hundred, in the cobra bay at the end of the catwalk?"

"How in the hell are you going to get him there?" she asked after recovering from the startlement of the offer.

"Wouldn't you like to know," Sinclair replied with a smile.

***

Thursday came and went, and one of the mechs in the bay told his friend what he had seen, and by the next weekend it was all over the station in a hundred different variations. Sinclair was keeping a personal log of the variants he had heard, and managed to track the one about the novelty condom back to Londo.

Ivanova had kept herself in the shadows for that one, and was pretty sure Michael hadn't seen her. Sinclair confirmed that for her later.

"He referred to it in the context of being alone with me in the cobra bay," Sinclair told her, leaning back in his desk chair. He smiled. "Although I had to quietly point out that we were being observed by one of the fighter mechanics. He responded... very well... to that."

"And you?" she inquired pointedly, keeping her voice down even though they were alone in his office. That smile again, his amber eyes darkly reflective.

"I could feel your stare," he admitted in a rough voice, thinking back to it. "I saw the look on your face when we left." A small grin flashed across his features. "I'm glad you're enjoying this as much as we are." She glanced away for a moment, hiding a smile of her own, her arms folded, and Sinclair made a mental note not to push too far. She needed the space of the voyeurism.

"I noticed you, mm, cleaned up after Michael."

"We're trying to be publicly lewd, not uncouth," Sinclair said with a slight shrug. His mouth twitched. "I don't think I could get it all, though. Some of it dripped through the grating on the catwalk."

Ivanova laughed -- she couldn't help it. She had a mental image of a bay mech experiencing this substance falling from the sky onto the top of his hazard helmet.

"You're really something, Jeff," she said as the laughter faded, remaining in her belly as a pleasant warmth. Sinclair's smile was just as warm, making her feel oddly safe. "You and Michael both. It's like..."

"Something out of a dream?" Sinclair offered gently and her expression froze for a moment like someone caught at something. Then her mouth closed with a wry smile. "For me, too. You don't know how much. I've looked all my life for something like this... it's like... being rewarded only I don't know what I did to finally earn it."

"In moments like that, I think we're best off if we just grab it and run," Ivanova said. "Just take it and don't worry about why, Jeff. It's so good to see both of you this happy."

"It's good to see you happy, too," Sinclair replied with that affectionate gleam in his eyes. She looked caught off guard, then a little amazed.

"Thanks," she said, with more emotion than she had intended, and not knowing what else to say.

***

4 Weeks Later:

"Mornin', Chief."

"Morning, Zack. Any leads yet on Jacoby yet?"

"Nope, not yet. The club was a dead end and the girl's family still won't testify."

"Dammit." Garibaldi sat down in his desk chair. He stared up at one of the security monitors -- the one that held a cell view of one of the suspects in the case in question. "I suppose he's still keeping his mouth shut."

"I dunno, Chief. I'm starting to think that he really doesn't know anything."

"Oh, that's fucking bull," Garibaldi said angrily, getting up to pace the room as Zack watched. "He knows. But I don't get why he's holding out on us. He's not afraid of being kacked, and he's got no loyalty to his employer, so what's the deal? Some kind of payoff or an ace in the hole? Gotta be. I want answers out of him, Zack. I mean it."

"I'll try again," Zack said. "I think we got some leverage on him with that shipment we busted yesterday."

"Yeah, try that," Garibaldi said shortly. Zack watched the Chief pace a little more, frowning slightly. "Before I get a shock stick and ask him myself," he muttered.

"Will do, Chief."

***

"Is it me, or is Mr. Garibaldi a little crankier than usual?"

Sinclair glanced at his second, who stood close to him to give him a report and to exchange this small bit of semi-rhetoric.

"I see you've finally noticed our Security Chief's mood," Sinclair mused, glancing over the report and marking it with his signature.

"Finally?" she said, taking the pad from him. "What, has this been going on for a while?"

"About a week." Sinclair sighed, settling his shoulders and gazed out the forward deck window. "He's been... well, demanding." She heard the smile.

"I have noticed that he likes to beg," she muttered and Sinclair chuckled softly.

"I don't know if it's that, or..." He trailed off, another one of those thoughts he started and didn't finish. She used to wonder if that happened because he wasn't willing to share the privacy that the words might have led him to publicize. More often lately, it seemed to her that he was hiding the ends of the sentences from himself as much as from her, not quite looking straight into the eyes of a truth too big to wrap his mind around, or a truth too profound to bear without hurting something.

"You've known him longer, and I get the impression this kind of thing isn't new for him," she ventured.

"He has a strong sense of justice, and some of his professional duties lately have been frustrating for him on that front. He's tenacious. Once he's got his mind on something, he doesn't let go of it easily. He's probably got some scent in his nose and he's gone to ground with it."

"If it smells anything like that cologne you've got on, I don't blame him," she said, and was amused by his startled, sidelong glance at her, one eyebrow raised. Then he smiled, one of those completely genuine expressions of pleasure and delight.

"Why thank you," he said. The console chirped oddly and he looked down at it. "That's strange."

"What?"

"A private message for me." He touched a control to transfer it to his desk station. Ivanova watched him go to the other side of C&C and sit down to take it. His expression hovered between indignation and laughter, and it was the novelty of the look on his face that finally drew her over there.

"You look like you want to slap somebody," she commented under her breath.

"That brazen son of a bitch," Sinclair muttered, sounding caught between burning curiosity and outrage. He still looked ready to laugh, and Ivanova wondered if that impression were accurately reflective of his mood, seeing the glitter in his eyes. Finally he looked up at her. "Read it yourself," he said. It was a dare. She came up the step at his shoulder to see the decrypted message:

20:00. Today. Red Seventeen, across from
Total Equipment Importers.
Civvies, no uniform stuff.
Don't be fuckin' late, Jeff.
- Mike

"So?" Ivanova said. Sinclair made a noise that she had never heard a man actually make, but had heard described to her secondhand -- a gruff, dismissive snort of exasperation, affront, scorn and wrath all mixed together.

"Knew better than to say it to my face, didn't he?" Sinclair growled softly. Upstart! He ground his teeth, unaware of Ivanova's mild puzzlement at the intensity of his reaction.

"I don't get it," she said at last. He raised his eyes to her, amazed, and glanced around C&C. He jerked his head, and she followed him with a nod as he got up and went back into his office.

Sinclair had already paced halfway across his office by the time she entered the room behind him. "I'm missing something, aren't I?" she said. "Isn't this the kind of thing you guys have been doing for the last month?" Sinclair turned around, grace and majesty obvious in his body for just a moment. There were many such moments in his life for casual observers to witness.

"I make the rules," Sinclair said, with an intriguing pride that hovered just this side of arrogance. How did he do that? The smile in his eyes was careful, cautioning. "I tell him what to do. When. Not the other way around. He's mine, Susan. What he's doing, it's..." He shivered suddenly, the thrill of an unknown future. "It's playing with fire."

"And you're gonna burn him bad, aren't you?" Ivanova said shrewdly, folding her arms. He returned her cagey smile.

"Ohh, you'd better believe it."

***

Red Seventeen smelled of commerce, of cash and wanting and every known world brought together in a nexus of desire and effort. Incense from the Centauri homeworld, porcelain cloud dragons from Minbar, tinned delicacies and clothes and religious necessities from two dozen worlds and a thousand minds.

Ivanova, dressed all in mufti, lounged casually against a pylon next to a large hanging rug. Total Equipment Importers was a large company, and their branch on Babylon 5 was a significant point of trade for their overall commodities. It was one of their rugs she was beside, one of several occupying the space outside and around the region of the TEI outlet. She was nursing a drink and watching the crowds go by, not an uncommon reason for loitering, and she knew she wouldn't be bothered as long as she didn't cause trouble and wasn't riff raff. One of the TEI reps was lounging in a chair near her, also watching the shoppers, and keeping an eye on her and the goods outside the store.

Sinclair had invited her along. Another of those gruff dares that issued from his throat from time to time. She sensed a certain need in him to regain control of the situation by demanding (it really had seemed like a demand) her presence, and concealing it from Garibaldi.

***

Sinclair strode through Red Seventeen like a man looking for someone to throw against the wall. He was noticed by people as he went by, although remained mostly unaware of the attention. It wasn't that he was recognized, at least not as the Commander of the station. His face was not that well known outside of the Earthforce personnel and the Dockworkers Guild, and he was out of uniform. But he was a tall, well-built, good looking man with a strength and will in his bearing.

He was coming up on Total Equipment Importers. He knew where it was -- he came there sometimes himself because they could get damn near anything if they didn't already have it. Only Michael could compete in that category. Michael...

He stopped, making the mistake of looking across the way at the TEI outlet, catching Susan's eye where she stood half-shadowed with a drink in one hand, and thinking only much later that it was the kind of mistake people make on purpose, even if they don't know it at the time.

Michael grabbed him and dragged him back out of the flow of foot traffic. It was easy to forget how powerful a man Michael was when motivated to use that strength. Sinclair felt himself hit the wall with his back, heard the grunt that came out of him, but he knew only fury, twisting both hands into Michael's jacket with a snarl as the blue eyes pinned him to the wall.

"So I'm here, Mike," he said. "You've been a total bastard for a little more than a week now and I see I waited a little too long to do something about it."

"Shut up, Jeff," Michael growled, cerulean eyes flashing, hands pushing him harder back against the bulkhead. They were of a height, and Michael could possibly enforce this if he chose to. They were out of the way of both light and shoppers, a containment door shadowed in the recess of the wall beside them. "You take all the time, get to have so much of the fun. What if I want to take, huh? What if I wake up on that particular side of bed for once? Can I have it?"

"Pushing me again, aren't you?" Sinclair breathed. His heart was racing, expectation rising in him like hellfire along his nerves. "You son of a--"

Michael kissed him, hot as the dreams he'd had last night. Holy Jesus, it was making him weak in the knees. He moaned without meaning to, the sound drawn out of him by that delight. One of Michael's hands was inside his jacket, rubbing slowly over a nipple until he was gasping to breathe. Michael drew back from him then, eyes still sharp as razors.

"Jeff, I need this. I need it bad. Please. Show me I can make you crazy. Let me do this."

Sinclair would have refused any other man. He had refused this demand many times in his life, from other lovers, both casual and not. But this raw ache was Michael's ache. This love was Michael's, his own extraordinary passion reflected back at him like nothing he had ever known. Sinclair swallowed hard.

"Do it," he rasped finally. The flare of eagerness in Michael's face was edged, the kind of look that made Sinclair's gut knot into a ball.

"You should see how you look," Michael said, standing close against his thighs and groin, pulling his shirt open a button at a time. "Like you want to fuckin' rip my throat out but you want to see how this ends first." He grinned, running fingers through the dark, coarse hair on Jeff's chest. "You know what? I love knowing that this--" He reached down and grabbed between Sinclair's legs roughly, making the man start. " -- is mine. What's the matter, Jeff? That feel good? You want it? Want me to go down on you?" He tickled up the length of Jeff's cock through the tight trousers and Sinclair twisted against him to press into his palm hungrily. "Fuck, you do, don't you?" Michael whispered, enthralled by the pure, primal response. "You smell so damn good. Bet you taste good, too. You always do."

Sinclair kept down the snarl that wanted expression from deep inside his belly. Michael kissed him again and it seared him, taking some of his will with it and leaving delicious, sweet rage behind. And love. Love like a blinding sun in his mind and heart. He kept his hands clenched into Michael's jacket to stop them from taking control of this, and the tongue on his throat and nipples only made his fists grip tighter.

Michael opened his trousers, working the belt and fly open quickly to get a hand inside. It was a relief to be free of the constriction -- he was so ready he almost came when Michael grabbed him, fondling his balls roughly. It shocked him, to be that aroused by this. Surrender had never offered quite that intense an appeal for him. He might grant it out of trust in a relationship, sometimes out of a need for the differences of it on a psychological level. But he never got as hard, or felt as good, as when he was dominant. Oh, but it had never been Michael until now.

"Michael, oh God, I... please. Please. Yes."

Michael pushed his pants down around his thighs, baring his hardness to the shadows and coolness of the corner where they traded a particularly subtle and cherished possession.

"Yeah, gotcha now, Jeff."

He was consumed in the next instant by the sensitive, voracious mouth that had pleasured him so much in the past weeks. It was not the first time Michael had sucked him off, not by any means. But this. This...

"Oh, God damn, Michael. God damn. Yeah, ooohhh, yeah that's so fucking good." He bucked slowly, sensuously, giving in to an instinctive reflex that seemed to triple the pleasure of the act. He resisted the urge to look over across the corridor at Susan. He knew he was right in her line of sight. "Aahaaa, yes! Ooh yes. Yes. Jesus, Michael, you're so good at this, I don't think I can wait... Michael I can't wait oh please, fuck, I'm gonna... I'm..."

He was almost silent as he came, grunting softly, watching Michael swallow it down greedily with each long jet.

It was over relatively quickly, Michael's satisfaction obvious but there was still desire lurking in his expression when he got to his feet, licking his lips.

"You look more satisfied than I feel," Michael said wryly. Sinclair, panting lightly, smiled at him craftily. He saw the truth in Michael's eyes now, wondering if Michael knew it himself.

"That remains to be seen," Sinclair said, finally letting go of his jacket and grabbing him by the hips to pull him close. "Not here. Later. Maybe a couple of days later. We'll talk about this again." Michael swallowed and nodded. But he didn't look ready to give up the pleasure he'd found in having Jeff to himself like that, making the rules.

"I figured," he admitted.

"I'm a little surprised the TEI rep didn't stop us."

"He was probably enjoying it."

***

Sinclair watched Garibaldi squirm for two days, refusing to initiate any sexual contact and being gently unresponsive to Michael's expressed desires. Michael's irritability didn't go away, even though that difficult case he and Zack had been working on was finally busted open and solved.

He summoned Michael to his quarters finally, on the night of the second day. He was deliberately a little more domineering in the request than he would usually have been, and observed the flare of defiance that met him out of Garibaldi's bright stare over the comm terminal. Interesting.

***

"Come in, Michael," Sinclair said as the door opened. He saw Michael swallow hard at the sight of him -- he was wearing a heavy gray shirt that showed off his broad shoulders and hinted at the rest of his musculature. "You nervous about what you did the other day?" He was leaning against the edge of the kitchen counter, sipping on a small shot of vodka. The alcohol would take the edge off of this for him... he hoped.

"Yeah, I... I guess I am," Garibaldi admitted, meeting Sinclair's eyes candidly and holding a stance that wavered between challenging and compliant. The boldness that had made him take Jeff two days ago was still there, in full force. Perhaps even worse now for that taste of power.

//Gonna test you, Mike. Let's see if I'm right.//

"Good," Sinclair said, smiling and narrowing his eyes. He put the vodka down and approached his lover quickly. He took Michael around the waist eagerly, holding the man close and kissing hard. He discovered he was even hungrier for Michael's touch than he had expected, and lost himself to the passion of the moment, kissing lustily down Michael's neck.

He was still startled when Michael grabbed him suddenly, moving to take his mouth aggressively, biting at his lip and sucking hard on his tongue to bite that, too. Michael started to push... hands against his chest and taking them both across the floor to shove him up against the counter's edge. Michael's mouth was fierce, taking his breath from him and then biting down his jaw and throat while hands reached under the edge of the gray shirt to find Sinclair's belt and undo it swiftly.

Sinclair growled but didn't stop him, and Michael had one strong, warm hand down in his pants before he could take another breath, fondling him arrogantly, desperately. Garibaldi withdrew from kissing him abruptly, pulling back to look at him, panting, blue eyes bright with need and fury.

"Mmm, I was right," Sinclair muttered. "You do need it." He groaned softly as Michael's hand jerked out of his pants, like letting go of something white hot.

"What?" Michael asked reflexively. The confusion in his eyes was wrenching. "Jeff, I'm sorry, I know I'm not supposed to--"

"I've been thinking about this for a couple of days," Jeff said soothingly, taking hold of his neck and jaw gently. Michael flinched at the touch. "About what you did. You need something from me, don't you? You want to take me, Michael? You want to fuck me? You want to be on top?"

Garibaldi's eyes widened.

"I... I just... needed..." He gulped hard, his fingers clenching slowly into Jeff's shirt. "Shit, I thought you were going to kill me, the way you looked in Red Seventeen. But it felt so fucking good, oh Jeff, God, it drove me crazy until it hurt to keep it down and I had to do something."

"I don't want you to hurt, Michael," Sinclair purred. "Answer me. Do you need to fuck me?" Michael heaved a deep, shivering sigh, bowing his head.

"Oh Jesus, yeah, I want to. Keep dreaming about it. Thinkin' about how you'd look. Can't think you'd keep still for it, though..."

"I wouldn't," Sinclair admitted. "I can't. But you'll have it anyway, Michael. I promise. I want to give this to you. But you'll have to tie me down."

The blue eyes that lifted to regard him were intent this time, absent of fear but the nervousness ran too deep to dispel easily.

"Really? Tie you down, huh?"

"It's hard for me," Jeff whispered roughly. "To let someone..." Bronze eyes flickered with old memories and the terror of trust wrongly placed. "It's been a long time. But I want you, Mike. I want you to do it. On my belly. Best way."

"Oh God, when?" Michael rasped. The hope in his voice pierced Sinclair to the heart.

"Tonight. Now. I already have what we'll need."

"Jeff..."

"What's the matter, Michael?" Sinclair asked dangerously, smiling. He was enjoying the rush of adrenaline he'd created by submitting himself to Michael's desire. "Scared? You'd damn well better be. I'm not an easy man to fuck."

Michael started to laugh, which surprised him a little. It was a laugh of controlled terror, love, something like awe buried far, far down.

"I wouldn't want you if you were," Garibaldi said. He grabbed Jeff's open trousers playfully, the grip firm and unyielding. "First thing we gotta do it get you in the shower. Make you hate me a little more before I get my cock into you."

Sinclair growled, a genuine expression of threat, and Garibaldi raised a finger. "Ah, I don't wanna hear it. You promised."

Fury made him lose himself, and Sinclair shoved forward, his hands clenched into Michael's shirt, snarling with the idea in his head that he was going to get Michael down on the floor and show him how bad an idea it was to be careless with this.

He didn't get more than two steps. Garibaldi pushed back even harder, roughly bumping him up against the edge of the counter and holding him there, eyes blazing. Sinclair held his breath, motionless for a few seconds in pure, delicious shock at the flood of pleasure and excitement that coursed through him in response to Michael's force. They stared at each other for a moment. "Get in the fuckin' shower, Jeff."

It wasn't surrender that finally made Sinclair obey. It was burning curiosity. He went first, back into the lavatory, pulling his gray shirt off as he went. Michael came up against his back unexpectedly, embracing him, chin on his shoulder. "You are so fucking sexy, Jeff," Michael whispered. For a moment, they were equals, and Sinclair turned in his arms to kiss him. Michael took his face when they parted, taking in the sensation of rough whiskers under his fingers and the glitter of apprehension in Jeff's eyes. "I have to give you a word, don't I?" he mused. He smiled faintly. "How about 'kingfisher.' You look like one sometimes right before you pounce on me." Jeff looked pleased at the choice but didn't speak.

Sinclair turned away then, still amused, fighting down the raging urge in his belly to throw Michael down on the bed and ravish him. The shower was waiting. In the bathroom, he started to take his trousers off, and again felt Michael behind him, taking over the act to drag them down his legs, underwear and all. "Fuck, you look good," Michael muttered softly, hesitating to rub one hand up the back of his muscular thigh.

Jeff turned to look down at Michael where he knelt, lifting one arm for a better view of the man and fully aware of how much the pose showed off his body.

"I already took a shower before I asked you here," he said.

"Well, you're gonna take another one," Michael said, matching the mildly petulant tone and standing up to give him a slight push toward the shower. "Now get in there. I'll be in in a second."

Jeff growled at him again but complied, turning the water on and climbing in to let the hot spray take the edge away from his trembling.

When Michael joined him, he was startled again -- Michael had adopted the suddenness and aggression that were usually his own prerogative. He wasn't given any time to adjust to his surprise as Michael got in close to him, grabbing his buttocks to spread them apart for the hot deluge from the shower to run between them, over his sensitive hole. He gasped -- as much in outrage as pleasure -- at the unexpected exposure.

"Mike..." But there was nothing beyond that, and Garibaldi let go long enough to soap his hands thoroughly while Sinclair watched, water dripping off of his chin, eyes vaguely hunted. He bared his teeth for a moment when Michael grabbed him again, blue eyes meeting golden eyes only inches apart. Sinclair shifted his weight anxiously but there was nowhere to go. Michael's hand slid between his buttocks, fingers stroking across his anus.

The contact touched something deep inside Sinclair that panicked for a moment, and he suppressed most of the sudden, wild flinch that made him back into the shower wall with a hard grunt, eyes wide. "Kingfisher," Michael reminded him softly, pulling him away from the wall. Sinclair nodded, his jaw clenched, gulping to breathe. "I'm going to get to know this part of your body very intimately, Jeff," he said. "And so are you. I can see it's been neglected. That's a damn shame. You're sensitive there."

"That's partly why I don't let people fuck me," Jeff rasped.

"Or touch you, huh? Not even that? Why? Cause it feels good? Huh, Jeff?" He had gotten his hand down there again, and touched, gently stroking.

Jeff's reaction would haunt him for years -- an aborted attempt to flee, side by side with fury so violent he was never sure why it didn't result in one of them getting seriously injured. Sinclair pushed him -- the kind of force that one resists at one's peril -- and the shower door yielded to Michael's back.

Sinclair was somewhere else, responding to something much more elemental than a timidity about being touched. The strength was overwhelming, an animal growl resonating in Jeff's throat that was not loving. This was not a game.

When Jeff finally stopped, Jeff was holding him pinned to the wall with a hand clamped around his throat. Garibaldi had his own hand on Jeff's shoulder, keeping him at bay, the other hand around one bulging biceps. Garibaldi's thigh and flank ached from impact with something -- he couldn't remember what. Water from both their bodies soaked into the carpet slowly, and Sinclair was breathing hard, trembling.

Garibaldi realized he had spoken his own word, the one Jeff had given him weeks ago when they had started their relationship that first night. That was why Jeff had gone still, hand around his neck, even though there wasn't yet anything rational in the flashing, jasper eyes. In the next breath, Sinclair let go and stepped back from him awkwardly, unsure whether to be apologetic or not.

"We're definitely going to tie you down," Garibaldi said hoarsely, rubbing at his neck to make sure nothing was permanently damaged. Sinclair's eyes lifted from where they had been studying the floor. He breathed through an open mouth, looking very much like a lion in that moment. "I'm glad to see that word works."

"I told you I would be difficult," Jeff said. Sinclair would have bitten him then, if something to bite had been in reach -- Garibaldi saw it in the amber stare, Jeff's mouth halfway open. Michael was quiet for a moment, taking in Jeff's quivering body, the hunger and anxiety in his eyes.

"We don't have to do this, Jeff. If you can't--"

"I didn't say my word, did I?" Jeff asked. Michael hesitated, then closed his mouth.

"No. No you didn't."

"I want this, Michael. I really do. It's just... difficult. You make me feel so good..." He closed his eyes briefly. "I trust you. If I didn't I wouldn't let you tie me up." That dangerous smile came back, gentle this time. "Let's finish that shower, then I'll show you what I have for you to restrain me."

***

They were laughing when they got out of the shower, grabbing and kissing each other friskily. Their temporary compromise had included Jeff washing himself, while Michael played with his nipples and teased softly at his cock, which was now almost fully erect. Garibaldi had an inventive and colorful vocabulary, as Sinclair discovered after provoking him into talking dirty.

"I love you for this, Jeff," he said seriously, helping the other man dry off with a large towel. Tiger eyes met his. "I want you so fucking bad."

"I know," was all Jeff said for a moment. Then he folded the towel. "The stuff's in the bedroom."

Sinclair led him to the dresser, where he had tucked away quite a few interesting things, two lengths of bright link chain among them. It was the pair of black leather wrist restraints that made Garibaldi come up for a closer look. He took one of the wide bands, closing it experimentally and examining the dual buckles and the D ring.

"These're really nice. Where did you get 'em?"

If Jeff were at all put off by his casual attitude, it didn't show.

"I've had them for a couple of years," Sinclair said. Garibaldi looked at him curiously. Sinclair smiled faintly. "Never used them. Didn't even have a lover at the time."

"Then why..."

"Happened to see them in a shop," Sinclair murmured, attaching a snap clip to each end of the chains. "I just... wanted them. Wasn't even sure why... or who would end up wearing them."

"They're really gorgeous," Garibaldi said quietly, appreciatively. "You have good taste." He noticed the snap clip that lay on the dresser, with it's long snake of chain attached. It was a quick-release. "Panic clips?" he mused. Jeff's golden eyes flicked up to look at him. He snapped the last one on the chain.

"Only you will be able to reach them," Jeff said after a moment. "But if I want out..."

"I understand," Michael said seriously.

There was another long moment of silence, Jeff's tension palpable, Michael's reined excitement making the room feel very warm. Then Sinclair extended his left wrist.

"Go ahead."

It was so strange, looking up into those fiery, earthy eyes and being the one to strap the leather on. It should have been the other way around... should have been Michael getting this treatment. He shuddered -- he would welcome it. "It'd be better if you turned them with this inside--"

"I know how to do this, Jeff," Michael said gently, smiling as he adjusted the tension of one of the buckles. He glanced up, always wary of reminding Jeff that there had been other men. But Jeff only nodded after a moment, standing tensely. "Relax so I can leave some slack."

Sinclair let out a slow, rumbling sigh. It was all he could do to stand still. Michael seemed satisfied with the fit, able to just barely get a finger between the leather and Jeff's flesh. The D ring was on the inside when he was done, and he jerked on it to check the give. "Even like this, I half-expect you to break them," he murmured, putting the other one on Jeff's right wrist.

"They're load tested to five hundred pounds," Jeff said. Michael laughed.

"You sound disappointed."

"Believe me, it'll be better for you if I can't get out of them," Jeff replied with a vicious smile.

Garibaldi took one of the lengths of chain from the dresser, still holding Jeff's wrist. He clipped it to the D ring on the leather band, glancing up to see how it was being received. Jeff's body was a steel cable wound taut, quivering, eyes burning with the clarity of awareness for their situation. Michael stroked his palm. Gathering the second, unattached chain in his hand, Garibaldi looked over at the bed for a moment.

"Well," Michael murmured. "I don't have you by the balls yet, but this is a good start." He jerked sharply on the chain, pulling Sinclair's wrist toward him. Sinclair resisted it savagely, bending his arm to flex biceps and hold the tension on the chain, muscles standing out beneath darkly haired flesh. The D ring was on the inside of his wrist, and the chain cut into his skin across the leather band as it was pulled tight between him and Michael's grip.

There was a moment, frozen out of time, when their eyes met again, and they briefly glimpsed a life that could have been theirs, Garibaldi the dominant one, Jeff surrendering to him, body and soul.

But Michael held a lion on a leash now, and had no illusions about the fact that it was at the lion's discretion that any surrender would be made. Sinclair smiled slowly, a challenge, a threat.

Michael backed away carefully, exerting a gentle, steady pull on the chain, holding Jeff's eyes intently. The tension held for a moment, Sinclair's heart fighting him, and then the body obeyed a stronger command from within the love that was held between them. Jeff let himself be drawn to the bed.

Sinclair wanted to roar, to run away. So much in him howled to refuse this, to hold fast when Michael pulled him onto the bed. The word Michael had given him hovered in his throat, a soft growl the only sound that emerged. But to quit now, wasn't that a surrender, too? He had refused domination by other men in the past, and felt no shame in it. To refuse Michael somehow seemed immoral, a betrayal of their trust in each other.

He was kneeling on the bed. Michael was behind him now. A warm hand pressed into his shoulder blade, urging him down onto his belly. He glanced back, panic rising in his chest.

"I love you, Jeff," Michael whispered.

He went down on his hands and knees, head bowed for a moment. Michael had let the chain go slack, the links draped heavily across the bedcovers with a soft noise. He took a long breath, quieting the rage, steadying himself. "Only when you're ready."

"I won't ever be," Sinclair replied bluntly. "You have to make me."

Michael's heat was at his back suddenly, that hand pushing him down again, harder than before. He choked back a growl as he was pinned to the bed on his stomach, male warmth resting across his back and shoulders. Michael reached down over him with the clip and hooked it onto the bedframe, down near the floor. It pulled the chain almost taut, and a shudder ripped through him as Michael paused to draw a hand up his arm, stroking. "Hurry," Sinclair said softly. Michael heard the warning, and took Sinclair's free hand to clip the loose chain to the D ring.

More blind panic gripped him as Garibaldi put weight down on him to keep him still. He couldn't help but fight it. Michael's hand clamped around his forearm to hold it down, Sinclair's fingers spread like talons in a futile resistance.

"Fuck you, be still," Michael growled.

"Mike..." He gulped the rest down, feeling himself lose the battle inch by inch. He was breathing too hard, on the edge of hysteria. He wondered if Michael knew, if he understood.

For an instant he was on a Minbari cruiser, harsh light on him in a darkened room, forced to kneel with his hands spread above him, bound to a bar. His answer to every question had been the same, and for that he had been given pain.

"Mike," he groaned.

The clip locked, making him one with the prison the bed had become, a sweet, violent resignation. His breath froze, and Michael looked up at him, seeing the naked, raw truth in Jeff's eyes. Oh yes. Michael understood.

"Shh," was the soft reply, light kisses on his shoulders burning him, his body remembering the marks the Minbari had given him even though his skin had been unblemished when he had been returned to his ship... except for one scar that he didn't talk about, not even to Michael. The fiery memories faded in another breath, eased by warm hands that began massaging down his back.

Garibaldi drew his hands down Jeff's spine, openly admiring the man's body. Powerful muscles stood out as large hands closed around the chains and pulled, testing. "God damn, Jeff, you're the most gorgeous man I've ever seen. I never got to look at you like this... God, it makes me hard just to see you waiting for me."

"Michael, oh..." Garibaldi touched the base of his spine, massaging.

"You keep saying that," Michael teased quietly. "You must want me pretty bad." He rubbed Jeff's ass lightly. "Lift up for a second -- let me put a pillow under you." Sinclair obeyed silently, feeling the cool linen engulf his thick cock comfortably. He'd lost something of his erection, distracted by the power manipulation, by memories of less pleasurable times.

He flinched when Michael's mouth planted a sensuous kiss on his lower back, sucking hard on the skin for a moment to bring blood out of the capillaries and leave a red mark. "You're too tense, Jeff. Gonna have to relax you." He was biting now, letting Sinclair feel the edge of his teeth, moving down over the muscular roundness of one buttock. Jeff growled with each nip, sighing roughly. Oh, this was a marvelous boundary, the quiet realm between resistance and complete pleasure. Michael grinned. "You've got such a sweet ass, Jeff. It looks so good in your uniform. Damn, you look good enough to eat." Michael chuckled.

"Urh?" Sinclair grunted after this registered in his brain. He twisted, trying to look but unable to see what was going on. He had to feel it... feel Michael's hands spreading his ass open, warm breath there. A sharp wave of astonishment pierced his belly and spread outward with adrenaline fire, making him pant hard through his mouth and nostrils as he tried to look over his shoulder. "Michael, what are you... what..." A flicker of disgust, unbidden, touched the surprise, along with curiosity intense like a knife, fear of this new thing. "Mike..."

It must have been Michael's tongue that touched him -- something hot and wet and obscenely supple -- probing softly at his asshole. He let out a yell at the spectacular intensity of the sensation, the newness of it, pulling tight on both chains that held him.

Michael laughed in his throat, withdrawing his tongue for a moment to kiss lightly. The scent was unquestionably Jeff's -- a strong, clean, musky maleness that made him want to bite here, too. He explored with his tonguetip again, across velvet, puckered skin. Jeff made an impossible noise, some kind of strangled yowl.

"Ahhh, you like it," Michael grinned. "Don't lie."

"Sweet mother of fucking God, Michael," Sinclair panted. His hands were white-knuckled around the link chain, muscles in his arms and back bulging. "Oh fuck, I never felt anything like that. Oh God. Oh my God."

"Shh," Garibaldi whispered, still grinning broadly. He was teasing around the hole, flicking his tongue quickly, wetly. "You're supposed to relax."

"Ha! HA!" Sinclair belted out. "Relax? While you're... when you're... oh God, your tongue, my God it's... oh, Michael..."

***

He couldn't remember when he'd gone boneless, helplessly letting Michael's exquisite mouth pleasure him. He was nearly limp, purring, his once-soft cock now rock hard beneath him in the pillow. He'd only heard Michael's voice once since that initial moment of shock -- commanding him to spread his legs wider.

He gasped softly as the tonguetip went firm suddenly and pushed gently past the initial muscular resistance of his hole. The moment of tension passed just as easily as the muscle relaxed a little more, Michael's attention on him patient and steady.

"Michael..." He sighed, rumbling, and drew another breath that brought heat into his chest with it. "Michael, I need you."

"Shut up, Jeff," Garibaldi said lazily. "You're not ready yet."

"Michael, dammit, I need it." When had that become so urgent? Sinclair felt the trembling start deep within him, every breath an effort of desperation. "Please. I need you. Stop teasing. Oh God." It flamed in him like the panic that had torn his soul when he'd first been chained to the bed. He wanted to get up, to do something, even though he wouldn't have been able to coerce what he wanted.

He had Garibaldi's attention now, though.

"You begging me, Jeff?" he asked softly, wickedly. Sinclair was silent for a moment, panting, gulping to breathe, hips writhing shamelessly as Michael continued to torment his lover with a hot tongue. "You begging for my cock? Huh?"

"Michael, you bastard, please, I need you so bad. Needed you for so long and never said anything. Do it, Mike. You want to take this? Here I am, helpless under you. Dammit, I want to bite you, oh..."

"Well you can't," Michael chuckled viciously. "You can't bite me. Yeah, you look so fucking sweet, Jeff. I don't think you're ready for me, but you beg so well."

The delicately kept rage exploded, and the metal and leather served its purpose for the first time.

"FUCK YOU!" Sinclair screamed, twisting savagely in the bonds that wouldn't release him, not for anything short of that small word that Michael had given him. "FUCK YOU, MICHAEL! You think you can take me? You think you can take this? You have to chain me to the motherfucking bed! I should bite the hell out of you for teasing me like this! Fuck! Rrrraaauugghh! Do it you bastard! GOD DAMN YOU!"

That voice like thunder in the room, a bellow of fury, made Garibaldi's own hunger sear him. He grabbed the lubricant where he had brought it onto the bed with him, stroking some onto his cock quickly with two fingers.

"Fuck if I won't then," Michael snarled at him. "Hold still, God damn it. You're in for the screwing of your life."

Sinclair found out how strong Michael really was when his ankle was seized in a vise grip and Michael's other hand came down in the middle of his back. Michael said nothing further, gave him no commands... just forced him into the necessary position. "Feel that, Jeff?" he taunted. "Feel my cock getting ready? It's a little bigger than my tongue." He laughed and Sinclair swore at him violently. "You know, I don't resist nearly this much when you fuck me."

It had been twelve years... but Sinclair's body still remembered this fantastic invasion. Michael's cock nudged him open even as they struggled on the bed, Sinclair trying to withdraw to refuse it. "Ooooohhh yeah, you're tight," Michael hissed. "Been a long time, huh, Jeff?" Sinclair was pulling hard on one of the chains, his hand clenched around it, teeth bared in a snarl.

"If I get out of these, Michael, I'm gonna--"

The words became a clear, penetrating howl as Michael pushed deeper, making Sinclair's tightness yield to him. "Oh God, Mike! Oh God, I can't... oh please, Michael, don't..."

"I have to make you, don't I?" Michael whispered, bent over him. Sinclair's rectum was clamped hard around his cock, the trembling heat of it making him crazy. "Fuck, you're sweet." Muscles were knotted all across Jeff's shoulders and arms. He'd never seen such blatant, magnificent maleness. "How deep can I get? You gonna let me?" Jeff gasped as he sheathed another inch of himself, the lubricant making it slick and tight.

"Oh God, Mike, please... please..."

"Yeah, take it, Jeff. Hurts a little, doesn't it? Been a long time? Come on, open up for me, let me have this Jeff, oh, damn you're gorgeous."

"I want you, Michael," Sinclair gasped. "I need this. Take it hard, Mike, please!"

Michael grabbed Jeff's hips tight and buried himself in the man's tight warmth with a rough sigh of satisfaction. God it felt so good, leaning over his lover's back, impaling him.

"Yeah, you're mine," Michael growled, understanding in that moment the truth of his own desire to possess Jeff the way he himself was owned.

"HA! OH YES!" Sinclair yelled, pushing back against him. "MICHAEL, GOD! YEAH! AAAHHHH!"

"Like that, Jeff?" he whispered eagerly. Sinclair's wildness made his own desire flame bright in his belly. "Like my cock? Oh yeah, mmmmm..."

"GOD DAMMIT, MIKE!" He wasn't rational after that, his body responding with a feral honesty to the power and ferocity of Michael's fucking, writhing under Michael's strength, urged on by Michael's elated laughter.

***

If Sinclair hadn't been tied down, he would have been a living fury. He was more than two handsful as it was, overwhelmed by his own passions and Michael's love and fierceness.

Sometime deep in the lovemaking, when they were both hot and sweating, Michael's hands slick against Jeff's skin, Jeff let out a low groan that Michael knew from his dreams.

"Oh, I heard that, Jeff Sinclair," Michael growled. "Come on. Soak that pillow with your come."

"Hhhhuuurrrrrrr, Michaelllll..." Sinclair's breath left him in a deep sigh of anticipation. "Gonna do it." His ass clenched hard around Michael's cock, a ripple of pleasure, and Michael cried out.

"Yeah, ah! Damn, that's good! Think I'm gonna come with you, Jeff, ooohhhh, yes!" He heard Sinclair's yell, a bright, steel roar, felt contractions deep in Jeff's body, milking him. "Fuck yes!" His own voice joined Sinclair's in blessed release.

When Michael came down from the rush of the climax, he realized Jeff was shaking, whispering something too soft to understand. During the lovemaking, Jeff had risen up on his knees again, and now rested with his head bowed, shoulders trembling.

"Jeff?" Michael murmured. He pulled out carefully, and Sinclair's breath caught at the loss. Michael leaned over him to release him from the bonds. Jeff's hands were both closed tightly around the chain, and Michael couldn't persuade him to let go. "Come on, it's all right. Let me have them." He had to unbuckle the leather restraints instead, and coax his lover to open his hands one at a time. "Jeff?"

Michael moved around to Jeff's side, kneeling on the bed to look at Sinclair's profile where the man still rested on hands and knees, eyes closed, breathing hard. "You okay?" He was massaging one of Jeff's hands, kneading out the deep, white imprints of the chain links, encouraging blood to flow.

He saw something drip onto the bedcovers beneath Jeff's strong chin. He reached under Jeff's face to touch gently, wiping tears away. "Jeff, shhh... did I hurt you?"

Sinclair looked at him then, cheeks wet, and came up off the bed to take his face in both hands intently. Sinclair got close to him, looking into his eyes. There was a flicker of something like pain, then love, over the handsome features.

Then a kiss... a slow, tender kiss that made Michael completely forget everything that had happened in the last hour. This was better. This sweet, intense love that no one but Jeff had ever shown him. The kiss deepened carefully, soft, soft warmth in it, Jeff's soul trying to touch his.

Michael wanted to cry, too, when Jeff stopped, pulling back a little to look at him, dark eyes still moist, but calm.

"You didn't hurt me, Michael. I don't think you can." He grunted softly and shivered all over; a delayed wave of sensation from his orgasm. "Oh sweet mother of God..." He let out a shuddering breath and kissed Michael again, more passionately but only for a few moments before breaking away again. "Was that what you needed, Michael?" he asked quietly.

"Jeff..." Michael's throat hurt. "Jeff, you scare the fuckin' hell outta me sometimes... and I love it. I don't really understand what it cost you to do this... but nobody ever cried when I made love to them before." Another tear streaked down Sinclair's face and the man ducked his head as Michael rubbed it away, mixing it with the sweat in Jeff's skin.

"You're so intense," Jeff whispered. Smoldering, brass eyes raised again. "So fucking intense, Mike. You don't know..."

"Don't talk now," Michael murmured. "You look like you'd better lie down."

"Yeah, I--" Sinclair rubbed at his eyes. "I think so."

He stretched out -- on his back -- letting Michael rub and kiss his palms.

Sinclair was quiet for a long while, breathing slowly, eyes open but gazing up at nothing. He was beautiful even in full repose like this, his strength at rest, muscles lax in the wake of savage use. Michael's attention to his hands became meditative, a concentrated Zen of affection and worship.

Sinclair's voice spilled into the room again, deep and velvety.

"Te beh'ronn. Te ju'uniswa kheroon."

"What?"

"It was something they said when I was captive on the Minbari ship at the Battle of the Line," Sinclair said quietly. "When I was being tortured. It's the only thing I can remember about being there. I dream about it sometimes. I didn't understand... but I've learned some Vik since then."

"What does it mean?"

Sinclair was quiet for a moment, and Michael wasn't sure he would answer.

"It means, 'He doesn't scream. He endures like a warrior.'"

More silence, and Michael rubbed Sinclair's hands. He avoided the scar. Jeff didn't like being touched there.

"This reminded you, didn't it? Of being there?"

Sinclair inhaled deeply, still staring up at the ceiling. He let the breath out slowly, calmly.

"No," Sinclair said quietly, firmly. "Being there reminded me of this."

Michael kissed him.

***

Sinclair allowed himself a full day to absorb the implications of what had happened. There was a strange calm in the wake of it, starting that morning when he had awakened alone but sweetly relaxed. Michael had gone back to his quarters rather than staying the night, and in retrospect, that had been wise. He wasn't sure what might have happened if Michael had been there for him that morning, but for as long as he was by himself, he experienced an extremely sensuous, distant, building fire in his gut, starting to spread outward into his chest and up his spine.

He could have spent the day anticipating some kind of climax to this sensation, but instead savored the process. There was so much pleasure in the contemplation of the feeling. Throughout the day, on his shift in C&C, he could close his eyes briefly and be completely aroused within the confines of his own mind, feeling his body slowly respond. He was sometimes interrupted, but the disturbance brought no anger to boil. It was welcome, as a part of his sensual being, and he entered into the day's activities with a calm sense of grace and gratification that he had seldom had in the years since the war.

Ivanova, in contrast, had spent her entire day completely out of sync -- with herself, and apparently everything else she encountered over the course of her duty shift. It started with a stubborn tangle in her hair and ended with a docking contract violation that resulted in station security having to subdue some hostile passengers from a liner that had sent half of their baggage to a neighboring sector in a loading mixup.

She needed some balance, some sense of closure to her day that wasn't aggravating. So she went looking for Jeff in his quarters.

"Yes?" came his warm voice over the intercom.

"It's me, Jeff," she answered. "I hope I'm not, uh, interrupting anything."

The door swung open and she entered warily. Sinclair was the kind of man who might have damn near anything waiting for her inside. He'd already demonstrated that he wasn't shy.

"Hi," he said warmly, obviously pleased to see her. "Have a seat." He gestured and she obeyed, taking up the couch. He was lounging in a chair, wearing a loose, copper shirt that was open at the collar, the top two buttons undone. "Can I get you something to drink?" He was poised to get up, but she waved at him.

"No, thanks." She realized her back hurt and she shifted a little. "Just had a hell of a day and felt like talking."

"You look terrible," he said, smiling. "Why don't you take off your shoes and lie down there? We can talk just as well that way."

"That's a fantastic idea," she sighed, obeying him without thinking about it. She settled her arms behind her head, watching him as she got comfortable. He was doing something with his hands, a dark blue hand towel in his lap. Even as she watched, he leaned forward to put the towel on the table before him, and she could see that there were a small number of fine implements on it. He sat back in the chair, rubbing his thumbpad over each nail in a slow, considered motion, almost ritualized. He seemed only half aware of it, but she couldn't shake the intense sensation of deliberateness in his manner. "You looked really relaxed today," she observed. "You still look it. I was used to seeing you pretty excitable lately, all things considered."

He didn't look at her for a moment, smiling softly and rubbing at the edges of his fingernails.

"I shared more of myself with Michael last night than I'm used to," he said quietly. "More than I thought I could." The words burned her, but he sounded at ease with it.

"I guess that worked out pretty well if you're still speaking to him," Ivanova said, and he glanced up. "You are still speaking to him?"

"Of course," Sinclair said, still in that warm, amused voice. It was penetratingly sensual, easy -- the voice of a man who was in total control. "You're very perceptive."

"Voyeurs usually are," she said, returning his smile. "Do you mind if I ask you a personal question?"

"Never," he said.

"Is Michael a screamer? When you two are out in public, he looks like he wants to but he's too shy."

"Yes, he is," Sinclair said, looking very satisfied to be discussing it. "Actually, he's pretty vocal all through it and not just when he comes. I like to talk when I fuck."

"Coherently?" Susan wondered, feeling something hot clench in her gut at his tone of voice. She hadn't expected him to talk about himself.

"Usually," he conceded. "Although I can get riled up enough that I stop making sense and just yell."

"That doesn't happen much, I guess."

"Michael did it to me last night," he said. It was so odd, the way he answered her, volunteering information with a calm, amused directness that made her groin hot.

"Can I ask you another question? What were you doing?" She gestured toward the blue towel and its row of tools. He smiled again, that sensuous, secretive look.

"Trimming my fingernails," he said, tracing the outside of one nail again with his thumb.

"How long have you been at that?" she asked, with a dawning grin of comprehension.

"About two hours, I suppose," he said. "I don't really keep track. It's a sort of... personal reflection time." He examined one of his nails studiously.

"And are you doing that for the reason I think you are?"

"That's a bit of a secret," he replied mischievously.

"You must have been hell when you were twenty," she said, looking at him where she lay stretched out on her back. Sinclair laughed, a sonorous, rich sound.

"I didn't hit my stride until after thirty-five," he said. "Got to know myself well enough that I knew what I wanted and could go after it aggressively. Since I turned forty this year, it seems to have taken on a bit more depth. I have more control, more patience." His voice was velvet over stone, dark, amber eyes smoldering. "But I never lost the urgency. It's sort of... quickened over the years."

"I can see it when you're with Michael," she said. "How much you want him." She paused, still feeling out the boundaries of her relationship with these two men. "I hope he's a good lover for you."

"Oh God, he is," Sinclair sighed, leaning his head back to rest on the chair cushion. "He's so good. I've had the strongest orgasms of my life with him. And he makes me do things I didn't think I had the guts to do."

"Like giving him a blow in the middle of C&C?" she chuckled. His deep voice answered with a laugh of his own.

"That felt so good," he confessed softly. "Felt so good to do it in front of all those people. God almighty, what a rush." He exhaled shakily. "Didn't know I could want anything so bad... or love him so much for letting me." He glanced up at the clock, and then started putting the manicuring tools away, folding them up in the towel to put them aside.

"You expecting someone?" she asked. He chuckled.

"I asked Michael to come at nineteen hundred," he said. "I need to ask him a question, and then perhaps tell him something."

"Oh," she said, sitting up. "I should go--"

"No," he said thoughtfully, putting out his hand to make her lie back down even though he was too far away to actually touch her. "I'd like you to stay." The door chimed into the pause, and Sinclair hummed, smiling. "Mmmmm. Love his timing. Come."

The door opened a second time and Garibaldi came through it. He took in Sinclair's pose nervously, then started when he realized Ivanova was also in the room, watching him from where she was lying on the couch.

"You, uh, wanted to talk to me, Jeff?" he asked. He was standing, shifting his weight as if he wanted to be somewhere else but was held by the sheer force of Sinclair's personality. Sinclair adjusted himself in the chair again, raising his head from the cushion to look at Michael speculatively, resting his chin in his hand.

"Tell me something, Michael," he purred. "Have you ever had an enema?"

Garibaldi's mouth opened, but nothing came out. He looked at Susan, who was looking at Jeff with both eyebrows raised.

"Wha... well..." He breathed a hard laugh, then blushed hard, all the way down his neck. Ivanova grinned, remembering what Jeff had said about that blush spreading beyond Michael's face. "Uh, that's a pretty damn personal question," he finally said defensively.

"You're going to go all shy on me now after telling me last night you like to fantasize about being fucked by a horse?" Sinclair said. Michael's flush deepened, if that were possible.

"Christ," he muttered, looking away. He had both hands in his pockets, which only made his growing erection all the more apparent.

"Answer the question," Sinclair demanded quietly, still smiling.

"I... well. Shit. Yes, dammit. Yes, I have. Fuck." The admission made him tremble. Susan was just looking at him with that predatory, gray-eyed Russian fierceness that made him feel stark naked. His cock throbbed hard and stiffened even more. She smiled faintly.

"Good," Sinclair replied thoughtfully. He took a deep breath and let it out meditatively. "On Saturday, you're going to give yourself one, no later than twelve hundred hours." Ivanova resisted the urge to let her own mouth drop open.

"Well, that's going to be a little tough," Michael said self-righteously, "because I don't own the stuff to do that."

Sinclair leaned forward to take a gray, durapoly case that rested closed and latched on the table in front of him. Ivanova had noticed it when she'd come in, but had eventually assumed it had something to do with his manicuring. Sinclair catapulted the case at Michael, who caught it awkwardly.

"You do now," Sinclair said firmly.

"You... you are a... a..." Michael couldn't even finish the invective, so red he looked like the embarrassment should burn him. After another moment he put the molded box on the floor next to him, looking piqued.

"God you're cute when you blush," Susan said from the couch, and both men looked at her. Sinclair was smiling indulgently and Michael looked ready to storm out of the room. Michael's erection was very obvious now, and he shifted his weight again, visibly wanting to adjust it in his pants.

"God dammit, Jeff," he muttered. "Will you... can I sit down?"

"No," Sinclair said. "And if you're not careful, I'm going to make you do that enema right now instead of on Saturday."

"You wouldn't," Michael said, dread flattening the tone.

Sinclair looked at him, putting full attention on him for the first time since he'd arrived. Susan couldn't see Jeff's expression, but she saw Michael's sudden, hard swallow. Sinclair stood up, his hand clenching for a moment before he could force it open again. Sinclair paced around behind Michael slowly, taking him in with a closed, feral intensity, dropping his gaze to the gray case on the floor to study it for a long breath. Then Sinclair stopped at Michael's back, lifting his tiger eyes to study the profile of Michael's still, clenched jaw. He just looked for a moment, chin hovering over Michael's shoulder, breathing slowly while Michael stared straight ahead and tried not to flinch.

"Is that... a dare, Michael?"

Susan saw the shudder that rippled through Michael's body -- a wave of panic, arousal, astonishment, elation, all together in that one moment. But his answer was very clear.

"No," Michael breathed, lifting both hands. "No fucking way, Jeff."

"I don't know, Michael," Sinclair mused, turning his head to touch his mouth and nose to Michael's neck, taking in the scent of his lover. "You look turned on to me. Aren't you? Hm?" He opened his mouth to scrape his teeth over Michael's tender skin, putting his hands on Michael's shoulders. "But you don't have to worry. I'm going to make you wait. You're not going to come until I say so. That'll be on Saturday. Until then, I'm not going to touch you, and you're not going to touch yourself. Understand?"

"I..." Michael swallowed again, trying to listen and comprehend what was being said to him. Jeff's mouth was making him insane. "Yeah. I understand."

"You'll come here on Saturday night," Sinclair continued, putting his arms around Michael's body to hold him and nuzzle. "Nineteen hundred hours. Take a shower first. Wear that emerald shirt I gave you last year. And black trousers. Clear?"

"Clear," Michael whispered, leaning his head back on Sinclair's shoulder. "Rrrrr, Jeff, you feel so good. Can't you touch me? Please?"

"Saturday," Jeff promised. "You can go on back to your quarters now." He kissed softly and let go of Michael, who finally reached down to push his cock to one side so it wouldn't press into his belly so hard. He deliberately avoided meeting Susan's eyes, and started to turn to leave. Sinclair kicked lightly at the box on the floor. "Don't forget that."

Michael shot him a hot, vicious look before snatching the case up in both hands and stalking out the door with it.

"It's too bad you can't bottle that and sell it," Susan said in the silence after Michael left. Sinclair looked at her, standing there with that primal, masculine heat that made her own mating instincts tingle. "Too damn bad," she sighed.

Sinclair chuckled quietly, conscious of her appreciation, of the blaze of her own sexual response to him. He came back around the furniture, toward her, and she held her breath as he got very close, kneeling down next to her where she lay on his couch.

"How close would you like to get to the source?" he asked, a gentle seriousness in his voice, his amber eyes warm on her. She swallowed, feeling the heat from his body even though he didn't touch her. She was afraid to move, either to get up, or reach out for him, terrified of the implications of either.

"Jeff..."

He spared her having to hurt him with words, and sat back on his heels, his body language changing completely.

"I'm sorry," he said. "I shouldn't push you like that. You're comfortable with where you are in this relationship and I don't mean to make you uneasy with either of us."

"But you're not comfortable, are you?" she said, sitting up after deciding she could do so without totally losing her composure. Sinclair was rubbing at his eyes tiredly. He let his hand drop to his thigh and sighed heavily, keeping his eyes down on the floor in front of him.

"It doesn't keep me awake at night," he said wryly. "But there's something there. Every once in a while I feel like I have to explore it a little to see what it is." He made a self-deprecating noise and glanced up at her. "Maybe it's a thing men do."

"Testing the way the wind's blowing," she smiled. "Women do it, too. I just... haven't felt the need with you." He nodded, smiling.

"You just like to watch," he murmured, grinning. "And you flirt like hell, dammit." They both laughed. "But you know something? I like that."

"So do I," she admitted, folding her legs under her to sit cross-legged on the sofa. "Jeff... I love you, you know. I just... was never good at saying it. Whenever I tell people that, they leave. Or they die."

"I have no intention of leaving," he said, smiling. There was really no point in discussing the other thing.

"I know," she sighed. "I think I would like to get some practice saying it, though. If that's okay with you."

"I'd be honored," he said sincerely. "I suppose I'm not very good at it, either. I love you, too." He waited, just looking at her, smiling gently with that distant heat in his eyes.

"Exactly how much do you like to show off, Jeff?" she asked quietly, returning his smile slowly. His lips parted hungrily, his attention suddenly on her very hot.

"More than I've told you," he replied in a low voice. "More than anybody really knows, I think." She looked mischievous suddenly, and nodded her chin at him, somehow suggesting the removal of his clothes with the gesture.

"Let me see," she said, matching his soft, fiery tone. Something opened in his expression, a brief moment of exquisite, clear relish and astonishment. He turned around suddenly on his knees and lifted the table up onto its edge with a grunt, shoving it out of the way to clear a space on the floor by the couch. She watched his hands and his face, seeing the greatest measure of his masculinity there. He couldn't help but be graceful, his desire deliciously obvious as he let go of the table and glanced at her.

"I love to watch a man pleasure himself," Susan said in a sultry voice, lying back down on her side to stare at him. Sinclair exhaled a long breath -- a soft growl -- and he smiled at her lustfully.

"Do you indeed?" he purred, turning slowly on his knees to present himself for her appraisal. He grabbed his own shirt at his stomach and pulled it slowly out of his trousers, starting with the lowest button to begin opening it. "You've seen some of me before, watched me get frisky with Michael. But you don't get a really good look, do you?" He shrugged out of his shirt and threw it into the chair behind him.

"Not like this," she admitted, breathless at his gorgeous, broad shoulders and darkly haired chest.

"Not for you, huh?" he grinned. "Not just for you to see? Go on. Look all you want, Susan." He ran his hands back over his short hair and stretched, his fingers laced behind his neck. It made every muscle in his upper body flex and she felt a wash of heat up through her groin and belly at the sight.

"Ho, God, Jeff," she groaned. "Christ, you're some kind of genetic miracle, you know that?"

"I think I just push all your personal buttons," he said sensually.

"I'd rather watch you push your own buttons," she grinned. "And find out if Michael's obsession with you has anything to do with his horse fantasy."

"Oh, I think perhaps it does," Sinclair said plainly, rubbing his palm over his groin. She licked her lips when his hand came to rest on his belt, and he unbuckled his trousers, pulling the zipper down over the length of that hard cock in his underwear. "Want this, Susan? Want to get a good look at me?"

"Hell, yes, Jeff," she whispered, her gaze captive to the movements of his hands as he dug them down into his trousers to fondle himself. "Come on, Jeff, show me." He breathed a laugh and gave her what she wanted by shoving his clothes down his thighs to bare himself to her hungry stare.

"Definitely my pleasure," he growled, closing one hand tightly around his balls to play with them roughly, leaving his cock naked for her to leer at him.

"Poor thing," Susan teased him softly. "Michael gets you so hot."

"You get me hot, too," he hissed. "Dammit, you think I have this just because of Michael? Susan, you are the most magnificent woman I have ever met in my life. God, every instinct I have wants to put you over my desk and screw you blind."

"Fortunately, men are more than just instincts," Susan said wryly. "And one of the things I love about you is your golden tongue." Sinclair laughed richly, playing with himself sensuously.

"Getting a little warm in here for you?" he teased. Susan was flushed, a feverish glitter in her pale eyes. "You have a fiery heart. You always manage to keep your composure when you're watching Michael and me, and you've instilled new respect in me for the concept of self-discipline." He grinned at the flicker of longing on her face. "Yeah, thought so." He finally brought his other hand to his cock, brushing his palm up the shaft and over the crown. It provoked an involuntary shudder in him, and a blaze of desire in Susan's face. "Does it hurt to keep your hands out of your own pants, Susan? Does it burn?" He saw her hand clench into the sofa cushion.

"Jeff, I... I don't know if..."

"Do it," Sinclair growled. He grabbed his shaft, rubbing his thumb into the wet slit at the tip. "Do it, Susan. God, the look on your face is like having a dagger in my gut. You could hardly want it more. Please, oh..." His eyes closed for a moment as his own pleasure flamed closer. When he looked at her again, his teeth were bared, and his hand began to stroke up and down his thick, hard cock. When he laughed this time, it was low and strained. "Oh, Christ, I'm closer than I thought."

There was another pause, as long as a breath, and then Susan's hands flashed down to her own trousers to get the belt and zipper open. Only one hand disappeared inside, but he heard her soft cry when she touched her sex, and saw the raw pleasure in her face.

"Dammit, Jeff," she gasped, "God, you're beautiful. How much do you come, Jeff? You always give it to Michael and I never get to see."

"I come a lot," Sinclair growled. "And I love that... I love making a mess. I'm gonna do it all over the floor... show you..."

"Oh yeah, Jeff, come on!" She was as desperate as he was -- he saw that truth in her body and her eyes, her hand buried deep in her own clothes, her hips writhing slowly. He was seeing the tearing of that iron control, the cool restraint and shyness that had stopped her from indulging the urge that he and Michael inflamed. He saw her hand still for a moment, and a shudder rippled through her. "Gonna wait for you," she rasped, her free hand gripped white-knuckled into the sofa.

"Not long, you're not," he hissed. "God, oh yes! Raauugh, fuck, I'm gonna come for you, Susan!"

"Oh, don't cover yourself so much, Jeff," Susan pleaded. "Let me see that horse cock." Sinclair opened his hand from around the shaft, holding his cock close to his belly for a moment, obscuring just the head so she could look at him. A horse indeed. It was the biggest cock she'd ever seen, filling his large hand comfortably, thick and long enough that it would hurt to be fucked too roughly by him. Michael had never seemed to complain, being nothing but demanding in the encounters she had witnessed. "God, you're big," she breathed lustily.

"And so ready," he groaned achingly, still holding himself for her to appreciate. His hand slid down the length, teasing, so she could see the swollen head. There was bright moisture at the tip she wanted to taste, his fingers and palm moving up from the veined shaft so she could drink in the ruddy heat of it.

"Close, Jeff," she warned softly, her hand moving in her pants again slowly, cautiously. "Come on, go ahead."

"Oh, fuck, yes," he hissed, kneading his balls sensuously to bring a sweet edge to the climax that waited in his belly. "Fuck, I'm gonna... gonna... ohhh..." His cock had already spilled a little, a gentle, pearly trickle dripping over his knuckles where he gripped himself hard and stroked for the release that threatened so lusciously.

"Come on, Jeff. Do it on the carpet, shoot it all the way over here."

"Yeah, take it Susan! Oh, fuck, here I come, OH YES!" He gave a rough yell, his big cock exploding across the floor with long, thick jets. It was the real sight of his orgasm bursting from him that brought Susan over the edge, and a cry tore from her throat as she held his eyes, and they both whimpered and gulped for breath in the fire of a mutual bliss.

Sinclair gave a rough, sharp groan as the climax abandoned him before he was completely sated. It was, unfortunately, typical of his sexual response and he had grown accustomed to it, even if it left him wanting. He shook his head to clear his senses, glancing up when Susan moaned softly, sounding a good deal more satisfied than he was. She had rolled lazily onto her back, one arm flung over her eyes tiredly.

Sinclair hitched up his trousers with his left hand as he stood, zipping his fly partway so he could go into the lavatory and clean up -- and give her a little bit of privacy. He started to turn away.

"Jeff," she said. He glanced back, visibly surprised. "Come here." She sat up on the couch, then got to her feet to meet him as he came close. He was trying to suppress his desire. He could still fuck her... still wanted to.

Susan took his right hand, seeing the threat of his need in his dark, amber stare. There was a moment of delicious astonishment in his face as she brought his hand to her mouth, holding his eyes as she licked at his knuckles, tasting the thick semen on his fingers.

He made a rough sound, a grunt, and twisted his grip to seize her hand quickly and pull her against him. He bowed his head, nostrils open bestially to briefly savor the scent of her sex on her hand before he lunged for her fingers with his mouth, sucking them. He took as much as he could of her taste, wishing he could plunge his tongue into her sex and pleasure her properly. He would have to settle for this. At least for now.

He let go finally, licking his lips, enjoying her shocked look.

"I should go clean up," he murmured, smiling. She let him leave this time, and he went into the lavatory to wash his hands. He pushed his trousers down again to clean up the bit of semen that had remained on his cock. His erection had gone down somewhat and he decided to relieve himself as long as he was in the bathroom.

He had to concentrate a little to relax enough for it, standing over the toilet. At some point during the process, he became aware he was being watched, and glanced back to see Susan observing him. She was leaning against the doorway, her arms folded.

"You're more of a voyeur than I thought," Sinclair said, amused.

"Oh, it's not sexual," she said. "I've just always been fascinated by all that plumbing men have. And by the fact that no woman has ever been clocked at peeing for a full minute uninterrupted." He chuckled, trying to pay attention to what he was doing.

"Men don't always do that, you know," he said.

"How are you planning on cleaning up that wonderful mess you made in the other room?" she wondered. "That stuff stains."

"It's Earthforce industrial carpet," he said wryly. "I don't think it will be very impressed by my bodily fluids."

"You know this from experience?"

"Don't you?"

"I should sock you for that."

Sinclair laughed, finishing his business and zipping his trousers up. He went past her into the living room, snatching up his shirt. He felt her follow, hovering behind him without getting too close, like a wild animal.

"Do you want to stay here tonight?" he offered quietly, smiling as he looked sidelong at her and buttoned his shirt. She shook her head.

"I want to, which means it's a bad idea. I don't trust either of us."

"I understand," he said. //Yet would that really be so bad?//

"I love you, Jeff," she said gently. "Goodnight."

***

Saturday night:

The good pair of black trousers that Garibaldi owned were a little snug around the crotch. He had been prepared to get rid of them before becoming Jeff's lover -- and Jeff had demanded that he keep them. He was wearing them now... and that bright emerald, silk shirt that Jeff had bought for him, a gift from when they were just friends. He wondered if, even then, Jeff had bought the shirt for him out of a desire to admire him. The idea sent a shiver up his back... that Jeff might have spent several months watching him in that shirt, and Michael not having a clue that Jeff lusted after him.

The night he'd left Jeff's quarters with the enema equipment had seemed to last an eternity. He'd gone back to his own quarters with the damn box shoved under his arm, mentally repeating over and over that it was //just a box, just an ordinary, durapoly, lab equipment box and nobody knows what's in it, not even that telepath you just passed back there.//

When he'd gotten to his quarters, he'd been shaking.

//That fucking bastard. That fucking... sweet... gorgeous...// Upon checking it, he'd found what he expected to inside the durapoly case. //Yeah... that's everything I need, all right. Son of a bitch.// He'd closed it again and put it on the dresser, a visible reminder of what was to come. He'd had to look at that box every morning and night for the next four days. And then Saturday had arrived.

It wasn't the sort of thing one forgot how to do... sort of like riding a motorcycle or tying your shoes. Even though it had been a long time... he still had the ritual. It was oddly comforting... always had been, especially when he was by himself.

//God, did the week go by so fast?// he had asked himself, lying in bed after doing as Jeff had commanded. He had felt so relaxed and warm inside. It was wise to give a few hours for this kind of thing to completely settle itself. He'd chuckled, wondering if Jeff had taken advice on that a long time ago, or if he had learned the hard way.

And the few hours remaining had given him precious time to himself to think about what was in store for him that night. There were lots of good, solid reasons for an enema... even reasons that had nothing directly to do with sex. He'd rolled onto his stomach with a deep sigh, going limp on the bed to just doze lightly. There was a slow burn in his groin, something ready to start quivering in his thighs and calves. //Just relax,// he told himself calmly. //Whatever it is Jeff's going to do, I can wait to be told about it.//

//Oh yeah. Sure. Just lie here for... what? Seven more hours until I have to go to Jeff's quarters? Right. I'm gonna just lie here and veg and be completely unconcerned about the fact that Jeff told me to give myself a fucking enema, for which I can think of exactly three reasons considering how horny and fucking despotic Jeff's been for the past week, and any one of those three things will just about blow my fuckin' mind if he tries them on me tonight...//

He had shuddered, understanding the truth of that deduction. Jeff was going to try at least one of those things on him. Maybe all three. He wasn't sure he could take that. God damn. Which one could he take? Which ones wouldn't he give his right arm to have done to him?

//Yeah, Mikey, be fair now. Don't you want Jeff to blow your mind, huh? Isn't that what you love about him? What you keep trying to get him to do?//

***

Now he was walking through the station, feeling pretty God damn conspicuous in the clothes that Jeff had told him to wear. He was aware of the looks he was getting from people, but steadfastly refused to look back, trying to keep his mind on what he was about and trying not the let the hot flush creep up past his neck.

He reached Jeff's quarters and rang for entry, still feeling ridiculous. Why should he, though? Just because he was dressed in a way that showed off every line of his male body, and was now at his commander's quarters during off-hours...

//Open the fuckin' door, Jeff,// he growled silently, still pretending not to see the other officers walking past him in the corridor, staring. //There might be somebody on the station who doesn't know yet,// he added sarcastically. Finally the door opened, and he stepped inside quickly, relieved.

The door closed, shutting him off from the rest of the station, from the eyes of others. There were candles all over the place, flickering in the corners, on the table, in the kitchen, flames moving in the almost imperceptible breeze created by the climate control system. Jeff's scent was strong here -- perhaps he was sensitive to it now. But there was an undertone to it... some kind of additional smell. Incense? He blinked. Jeff was more eccentric than he thought.

A flash of dark movement at the doorway into the bedroom caught his eye and he had a few seconds to see Jeff coming toward him, dressed all in black. His next breath held terror, and Jeff grabbed him and pulled him around, putting him down hard on the floor to lean down close, legs around him. Jeff was breathing hard, his scent immediate and intense, his mouth just a heartbeat away.

"You are so much mine, Michael Alfredo Garibaldi," Jeff rumbled, the voice pure heat, "and tonight you're going to find out just how much that is."

The mouth descended, devouring him, taking his soul away along with his breath. Michael heard himself whimper, his cock hard and hot in his trousers just in these few seconds. His hips rose away from the floor, needing contact, and he realized Jeff had one knee between his thighs. He wrapped his own thighs around it, pushing his crotch back against Jeff's knee to rub his balls. Sinclair broke away from him, chuckling. "Been hungry these past few days, Michael?" he growled. He made no effort to stop Michael's shameless rubbing against him.

"Oh God, Jeff, I want you," Michael rasped.

"The first thing I'm going to make you do," Sinclair murmured, "is wear this." He showed Michael a curious object -- five bright metal rings connected by a strip of leather, one of the rings larger than the others.

"Oh no. You're not putting that fucking thing on me," Michael growled, struggling savagely against Sinclair's body and rising up off the floor. Sinclair put a hand around his throat and slammed him back down, looming over him, nostrils flaring.

"Yes. Yes I am." Sinclair's amusement was wicked. "And I see you know what it is. Somebody make you wear one before, Michael? Hm?" Michael was staring at the cock rings in Jeff's hand, eyes wide. Five rings? Five?

"No, I..."

"Good," Jeff growled, shifting swiftly to start unbuckling Michael's trousers with one hand, his other holding Michael down in the middle of the chest. "I get to make you. I think I like that."

"You fuckin' son of a bitch, I told you I'm not wearin' that fuckin' thing!" Michael snarled, and twisted violently beneath him.

They struggled for a good five or six minutes, Sinclair growling at him, eyes bright with excitement that Michael was a difficult man to master. He laughed when he finally got Michael's pants open and discovered a cock so hard it probably hurt.

"Yeah, you're ready for this," Sinclair hissed, shoving Michael's trousers down, using his weight on Michael's legs to keep them still, one hand still on Michael's chest. He couldn't do it without both hands free. "Be still, Michael."

"God dammit..." Michael whispered, but he obeyed, trembling. He felt cool metal rings slide down over his hard cock one at a time, each one meticulously placed. "Jeff, I'm scared, I--"

"Shh," Jeff whispered, slipping the largest ring down around his balls snugly. "I won't let anything happen to you, Michael." He glanced up to see Michael swallow hard, eyes closing for a moment. The cock rings were large enough to put on even over Michael's erection. But they wouldn't stay loose for long.

Sinclair had a remote control for the cock rings -- they were adjustable, and could be very finely tuned. It let him have total discretion over how much and how little Michael would feel. He showed Michael the control; a small, black pad in his hand with textured buttons. Michael's eyes widened.

"Jeff..."

Sinclair touched a button, and the ring around his balls tightened firmly. Michael inhaled deeply, sweat breaking out on his face. Sinclair reached down, still looking in his eyes, feeling the fit of the ring around Michael's cock and balls. It seemed good. "Oh, sweet God, Jeff."

"A little tight?" Sinclair asked softly, smiling. "Good." He stroked Michael's balls gently for a few moments, trying to relax him. "I think you like it. Ready for another one? Shh, it's all right." The second ring closed slowly, tight on the base of his cock, constricting slightly, and Michael made a soft noise. It didn't hurt, not exactly, but the sensation of being trapped was intense. The tightness would hold his erection, and the only way out of the thing was for Jeff to release the rings... or for him to come. And coming with the thing on was going to be pretty fucking difficult...

"You son of a... son of a bitch," Michael panted, pale eyes bright with fear and excitement.

"That's a sweet hard on you've got, Mike," Jeff murmured, leaning down to kiss him sensuously. "Mmmmm." He tightened the last three rings all at once, relishing the hard shudder that rippled through Michael's body under him as he kissed. Michael groaned softly, reaching up to grab onto Jeff's shoulders.

When the grip on his shoulders intensified, Sinclair let go of Michael's mouth, seeing and feeling Michael fighting down a panic attack, shaking and gulping for breath. Sinclair could feel his heart racing, saw the terror in his eyes.

"Shh, it's all right. You're okay," Sinclair crooned softly. "Slow down, take a deep breath. Just relax. It's all right." He rubbed Michael's chest slowly, massaging as the panic eased and Michael closed his eyes, swallowing repeatedly. Sinclair was quiet, waiting.

"I didn't think I could do that," Michael managed after a moment, blue eyes opening again to find Sinclair's guilelessly.

"I'm proud of you," Jeff murmured, smiling. "You have more strength than you know. And you trust me. I'm glad." He was stroking Michael's cock between the metal rings, feeling the erection straining in their unrelenting grip. "Getting used to it?" Michael gasped a laugh.

"Not fucking likely. But if you're asking me if I'm going to freak again, the answer is 'I don't think so.' Oh, that feels good, Jeff..." Sinclair tickled his balls lightly in answer, then kissed him again lovingly.

"Did you do what I said with that enema equipment?"

"Yeah," Michael said, his voice quieter than he'd expected. The admission made butterflies quiver in his belly. "At ten-thirty this morning."

"Good boy," Sinclair purred.

"What... what are you..."

"Shhh," Sinclair whispered, putting a finger across his lips. "If I violate you, you have to use your word, but until then I'm going to do what I want, and you're going to do what I say. And right now, you're going to be quiet until I say you can speak again. That means no talking, no whimpering, no groaning, purring or yelling. Understand?"

Michael nodded, licking his lips. Christ, how could he possibly obey that? "Then let's get these clothes off you, hm?" Sinclair stripped the trousers and shoes off roughly. Boxers and socks went with them. "Up on your knees, Mike," he coaxed, helping Michael up. That voice could make him give up all will.

Garibaldi swallowed hard as Jeff unbuttoned his emerald shirt and spread it open, looking at him, at his hard, aching cock caged by that series of cock rings and the leather strip that held them together. "God, you're beautiful," Sinclair whispered, stroking light fingers over his nipples. Michael gasped but didn't make any other sound, and Sinclair smiled.

"You're going to do something for me now, Michael," Sinclair told him. "I love the feel of your mouth on my cock. You have a very talented tongue, you know. Tell you what, though. You can bite and play with my cock through my clothes, but you can only make flesh to flesh contact with my balls. You're only allowed to use your mouth. You have to make me come like that. If you don't, we won't do anything else tonight, and I'll make you wait another week before I touch you again."

Michael grabbed onto the soft fabric of Sinclair's black sweatpants as the man stood up. Another week? Christ! He couldn't wait another whole week! Would Jeff make him go that whole time without masturbating again? Oh God!

//Better do what he says then, Mikey,// he told himself. //Better give the bastard a reason to shoot his load.//

Sinclair looked down at Michael where he knelt, waiting for Sinclair's permission. Jeff saw the blaze of terror and anxiety, heard the gulp of breath that didn't quite become a moan of frustration. Then something changed in Michael's face... an arresting, icy flash in the sapphire eyes as they narrowed and resolve formed there. Michael licked his lips slowly, consideringly, and Sinclair could hear his breaths shaking as they left him.

"All right, Michael," Sinclair grinned. "You obeyed. Go on."

Michael lunged at his groin, clamping teeth down around the hard length of Sinclair's cock through the soft sweats. Sinclair made a harsh, pleased noise. "Ooh yeah, Mike." Michael nipped slowly up the shaft, breathing warmly through the fabric. He kept no rhythm, making Jeff wait for each bite, taking a little too much skin sometimes and making Jeff cry out sharply. When he got to the head, he nuzzled the wide ridge and covered the bulge of the crown with his mouth, warming it with his breath.

He nuzzled and rubbed his way back down to Jeff's balls, feeling Jeff shudder as he teased with the presence of his teeth as if to nip again. He smiled to himself.

//Now who's ready, Jeff?// he thought, pulling the sweats down to discover that Jeff wasn't wearing any underwear. He managed to silence the laugh that struggled in his gut, and leaned forward to push his tongue between Jeff's balls, dividing them roughly with a wet lick and then opening his mouth wide to take them both inside, sucking gently.

"Mmmmmmmm," Sinclair sighed, holding still and covering Michael's hands on his thighs. "Oh yes. God you have a sweet mouth." He shivered again, unable to stop a gentle thrust against Michael's lips. Michael's tongue flickered softly against his balls in reply. It was maddening, sending flares of heat down into his toes. "Ahhh. Jesus, Michael! Oh God, you make me want to fuck you silly, you damn tease."

It was the sweetest thing Michael had ever done to him, that silent, eager licking and tickling. Even with the prohibitions Sinclair had given, Michael still made his knees weak, made him want to give up the plan he had made for them tonight and just make wild love to Michael right then on the floor.

Michael paused for a moment, Jeff's balls both deep in his mouth. He had to hold back another moan, the need an intense pressure in his belly somewhere, an ache in his chest. He was horribly aware of his own cock, constricted and rock hard in the Five Gates of Hell that Jeff had put on him. Oh, and he was so, so aware of Jeff's own steel cock right above his nose, dark, soft hair brushing his nostrils. The scent was marvelous -- the smell of male, of sex, desire, faintly of soap, too. The tip of Jeff's cock was wet, moisture almost ready to drip on his cheek. He started nuzzling Jeff's balls again when the urge to growl was suppressed, Jeff's rough, desperate sigh a sweet reward. Jeff was exquisitely sensitive here, more than he might truly know -- Michael began probing between them with his tongue again and felt the shiver that rippled up Jeff's legs.

"Guess what, Mike?" Sinclair whispered, breathing hard. "I think... I think you might actually do it... holy God, that's so good, oh..." He bared his teeth to let out a rough cry of relish and mastery. "Yeah, Michael! Please!"

Michael's control was astonishing. Sinclair could feel Michael's trembling hands on his legs, felt love and excitement in the tongue and lips on him. Michael loved to talk and groan and purr when he felt good -- Sinclair had entertained himself many times by provoking it. But not a sound came from Michael now except hard panting through his nose. Sinclair laughed, joyful and savage. "God damn, I don't believe this! Oh, I'm ready! God, just... just a little more, Michael..."

Michael had found one testicle more sensitive than the other, and focused on it, keeping the other pressed to the side with his cheek. Maybe it was the pressure... maybe it was something psychological about the sense of being devoured -- but Jeff Sinclair went crazy when he had a supple, tickling tongue on his balls. Sinclair gasped suddenly, deeply. "Oh, take my cock, Mike, quick!" Michael reacted in a flash, taking Jeff's big head and shaft barely a heartbeat before thick, wet heat exploded against the back of his throat. "Rraugh! YES! Ah! Yeah, swallow it, Mike! Come on, swallow, there you go. YEAH! EEERRAAAUUUGGGHHH!"

The climax left him too soon, as usual, and he groaned with loss. Michael sucked the last bit out of him hungrily, and then Jeff dropped to his knees, holding Michael's face. Michael licked his mouth, breathing hard, trembling. His imprisoned cock was hard and darkly ruddy, so erect it looked like it might force its way free of the metal rings. The pleasure and agitation in the handsome blue eyes made Sinclair smile. "You can make noise now if you want to, Michael."

Michael lunged for him again, taking his face in both hands and kissing brutally. Michael purred and whimpered, the sounds torn from him by lust and frustration.

"Jeff," he panted. "Oh God, Jeff." He could hardly stop kissing long enough to get the words out. "Whatever you're going to do to me tonight, you go all the way, you understand? Christ, I want it. I want you. Drive me insane, Jeff. Take me right to the edge until I feel it cut me."

The smoldering light in Jeff's eyes made his breath catch, and Sinclair got very close to him on the floor, reaching out between Michael's thighs to softly stroke tight, swollen balls where the larger cock ring constricted. The touch was electric and Michael flinched, gasping.

"I will," Sinclair purred in a voice like a sandfile wrapped in leather. "It's been on my mind, Michael." He reached further back behind Michael's balls, stroking a fingertip along the perineum. "To find your limits... make you show them to me." He found the velvety, puckered skin of Michael's asshole, caressing around the outside of it and making Michael groan softly.

Michael couldn't look away from those eyes, feeling the amber flame in them sear his heart. The touch on him was so private... Jeff's wrist brushing his balls, fingers fondling his ass. It made him ache... "Show me, Michael," Jeff whispered fiercely, and he felt a finger push for entry into his body, a firm, insistent nudge against dry flesh. It hurt -- a brief, stabbing pain that made him choke on a whimper. Then the finger forced him open, and the pain became a burning presence, hot and rough.

Michael leaned his head back, closing his eyes and fighting for control. He was allowed to make noise now, but this wasn't the kind of agony that demanded release in yelling. He clenched his jaw. "Yeah... that's it, Mike. Take it." He heard Jeff move, and realized Jeff's other hand was moving down between his legs, and the finger inside him withdrew carefully, for just a moment. "Not too much now," Jeff whispered. "How's this?"

Cool gel touched his asshole this time, borne on a second finger that added the slickness to the first, and suddenly two slippery fingers sought entry. The burning pain became a bright pleasure, and he gave a cry of ecstasy.

"Aw, God!" Michael gasped. "Yeah, Jeff, come on, lemme have it!"

"We have time," Jeff replied heatedly. "Don't rush me now. I'm going to take my time and enjoy you."

It was already almost unbearable, the sweet feeling of penetration, Jeff's fingers invading him with an intimacy that made him simultaneously crazy and obedient. He knew he'd do anything for it, anything to keep the pleasure and closeness that he'd found in trusting this magnificent man.

"This position isn't good for what I want to do," Sinclair murmured, smiling. Michael swallowed hard, wondering how he was going to take whatever Jeff had in mind when he was already half-mad with desire from the two fingers Jeff had inside him. Sinclair shifted as if to pull out, and Michael grabbed his wrist.

"Don't," he groaned. "Please. Not yet. You feel so good. Don't stop yet." Sinclair did not relent, holding Michael's eyes as he withdrew his fingers over Michael's tormented purr.

"You'll have me soon enough -- as much as you can stand," Sinclair whispered, using his other hand to stroke the very tip of Michael's straining cock where it was held by the rings. "Into the bedroom. Come on."

Sinclair had to help him to his feet -- his legs didn't want to obey. Jeff had always had that ability to make him surrender all will and aggression in the face of a promise. It frightened him sometimes... that anyone could have that kind of power over him, that he could allow the domination.

Jeff pushed him down on his back on the sheets. The covers had been turned back, and there was a large, dark towel on the bed. Michael felt it crease slightly under his buttocks, and Jeff straightened it with a sharp tug, smiling at him wickedly.

"You like my fingers in you, Mike?" he growled, getting on the bed between Michael's legs and grabbing his ankles to spread them apart. "It's a little more personal than my cock, isn't it?" He had brought the lubricant with him, and squeezed some more into his hand, rubbing his fingers together to spread the slickness evenly.

"Oh God, are you gonna do what I think you're gonna do?" Michael panted. Jeff was kneeling between his naked calves, still clothed, black boots on the bedcovers. Jeff smiled at him, still that terrifying, diamond-sharp grin that made Michael's soul whisper that something truly beyond the pale was about to occur.

"And what do you think I’m going to do?" Jeff wondered reasonably, the velvet tone suggesting a mercy that Michael knew he wasn't going to get. Sinclair's lube-slicked fingers touched his asshole again, two of them driving deep with hardly a pause, and Michael gasped. He could feel his own throbbing pulse against the larger cock ring around his balls, the sensation sending quick, warm flashes of pleasure up his spine.

"Oh God, Jeff," he panted. "Oh God. You are. You son of a bitch. Oh my God."

"I really can't imagine what you mean, Michael," Sinclair purred innocently. He put the tip of a third finger in place, and savored Michael's soft intake of breath at apprehending the finger's presence. He pushed it in, steadily, all the way to the base knuckle, and Michael made a soft, keening whimper. Sinclair licked his lips, feeling his own cock stir again gently in answer to the desperation in Michael's voice.

"Jeff... Jeff, careful... I don't know if I can..."

"This is where I'm going to ask a lot of you, Mike," Sinclair interrupted softly. "Prove to me that you don't have boundaries with me. I'm going right to the edge with you, Michael." He turned his hand carefully, three fingers spreading his lover open. He flexed them gently, relaxing the muscle that clenched around them, feeling softly for the round, firm prostate gland through the intestinal wall. Michael groaned at about the same moment that he realized he'd found it. Michael's engorged cock trembled, flaring as if seeking Jeff's mouth. Sinclair hummed quietly. "Let's see if we can't make that better," he mused, and used the remote control to loosen the rings around Michael's cock slightly, but tightening the one around his balls.

"Oh fuck, Jeff," Michael gasped, writhing once, sensuously. "Oh yeah. God, that fucking thing's tight... oh, Jesus it's sweet. God, you know what I love."

"I know what you love," Sinclair acknowledged softly, leaning down to take the tip of Michael's cock in his mouth, kissing wetly and letting his tongue probe briefly into the hole. Michael whimpered and pushed up against his mouth.

"Shit, you'll make me come if you do that," Michael groaned.

"I know," Jeff purred, amused. "Which is why I'm not going to." He took the ringed shaft of Michael's erection sideways in his mouth, just long enough to leave a damp reminder from his tongue, then straightened again to look into Michael's burning, cerulean eyes. "What's the matter, Mike? Afraid I'm not going to let you come? I have a private suspicion about you that I want to explore. About how much you want this."

"You want to stick four in me, don't you?" Michael rasped. "Huh?"

"Seems to me that you're the one who's so hungry for it," Sinclair observed, moving his three impaling fingers to see if Michael were relaxed enough. "Yeah, I think you're ready," he grinned. "Want me, Mike? See how much you can take? Hm?"

Sinclair withdrew just enough to put his little finger alongside the other three, the tip of it resting on the inside joint of his ring finger so he could ease it in. He reinserted the first three fingers up to where his fourth started, and then he knew he had to do this very slowly.

Michael didn't make a sound for several long seconds -- except to pant quickly -- as Jeff made him accept that fourth large finger. But when it was about halfway in, and started to threaten with the entire width of Sinclair's hand, Michael reached back and grabbed the headboard of the bed.

"Fuck," he gasped quietly, almost inaudibly. "Fuck, oh... fucking Christ, Jeff, that's so fucking big. God, I can feel it somewhere in my balls or something..."

"Don't talk, love," Jeff said soothingly.

"Jeff, look at me," Michael said in a low voice, and Sinclair glanced up to see Michael gazing straight at him. He was flushed, sweat gleaming on his face and throat, eyes bearing some kind of deadly serious intensity that Sinclair had never seen before. "Jeff, I've never let anyone do this before." He grunted and leaned his head back briefly, eyes closed, his rectal muscles rippling reflexively around Jeff's fingers. "You have no idea... no idea how fucking good this feels. I feel like I'm gonna come a