Jack rolled over and reached for Ianto but he wasn't there. Pulling his boxers on he padded out into Ianto's flat. Something was bugging Ianto and he wasn't getting to the bottom of anything in bed by himself. He followed his nose to the kitchen, Ianto stirring a bubbling tomato mix, was wearing an apron.

'What are you doing?'

Ianto tasted the sauce and added salt. 'Making dinner.'

Jack looked at the clock and frowned. 'It's two pm.'

'We cant stay in bed all day and this needs time to cook. I don't have room service.'

'We could have stayed at the hotel.'

'Jack we barely left the bed all week as it was and we had to go back to work at some point.'

'I've got money tucked away, we don't have to go to work.'

Ianto rolled his eyes. 'Some of us do.' He tasted his sauce again. 'Besides, we probably need to talk about something.'

'And you are making?'

'Lasagne.'

'So this something, it's a bit big then.'

Ianto nodded. 'It could be.'

'Does it have anything to do with your emails.'

Ianto turned towards Jack. 'Are you reading my emails again?' He sighed. 'Jesus Jack, you could look at least slightly guilty.'

'You're the one with a Becky, Ianto.'

'So that whole speech of yours about while you were gone someone else didn't matter thing was just bollocks.'

Jack sighed, they were fighting again, he didn't understand how easily they were able to turn things into a fight. They had just spent a week in a hotel room, ordering room service and making love every which way they could think of. Everything had seemed like it was back on track, only now the train was being derailed again. Maybe he shouldn't have read Ianto's emails after all. He never seemed to like what he found when he did. 'Well is there a coffee going for this fight we seem to be having?'

Ianto pointed to the kitchen bench and stirred his sauce. He hadn't expected to hear from Becky, he was glad she was happy but it had been a reminder that perhaps he and Jack still had things to discuss.

'So this Becky then.'

Ianto closed his eyes a moment, wondering how much of this conversation he could have with his back to Jack. 'We went to school together in Westport, I had such a crush on her when I was all of sixteen.'

Jack sipped his coffee. 'Go on.'

'It was just before the wedding, I'd just found out you had chosen to leave. You weren't taken. Gwen had hidden the CCTV footage and I was.' Ianto stopped stirring the sauce and turned the heat down. 'I was very angry and upset and confused and I don't want to talk about it.'

'Yet it's obviously bothering you.'

'Of course it bothers me Jack. Half the time I don't know what this is, sometimes most of the time. And then I get so, I don't, I can't.' Ianto took a deep breath. 'I get so turned around I don't know where I'm going. I need to know where I'm going Jack. I can only deal with so much disorder at a time.'

Jack nodded. 'I had gathered that Ianto. So you bumped into Becky.'

'Yes, I bumped into her, we met up for a drink, we talked.' Ianto brushed his hands though his hair. He wasn't explaining this well, he didn't know how to say what he wanted to say, what he needed to say. 'She'd broken up with her boyfriend, I'd lost Lisa, you. We had a few drinks and.'

'One thing led to another and you slept with her.'

'I was confused, this. I didn't know what was going on and if you were coming back. I didn't. Was it just you or is it something.' Ianto sighed. 'God I get so mixed up.'

Jack set the coffee cup back down on the table and looked at Ianto. He looked wretched. 'And what did it tell you Ianto, about yourself.'

Ianto stood there for what felt like a lifetime before he spoke, his voice soft in the stillness. 'That I hated you for leaving me.'

Jack didn't know what Ianto needed.

'That isn't the worst part.'

Jack just looked at Ianto, his eyebrows raised in silent enquiry.

'I might have, maybe, called the, wrong name, out.' Ianto looked down at his toes. 'In the heat of.'

Jack looked away, he could see how upset Ianto was, the man didn't need Jack smiling at the picture he painted. He looked up at Ianto. 'What name.'

'Yours.'

This time Jack decided Ianto needed a hug. 'I really don't blame you for trying to get back an idea of yourself. Sometimes, someone from the past, they represent possibilities, the road not taken. Trust me, of all the people out there I get that.'

'What if I don't?'

Jack just held him. He was slightly jealous Ianto had looked for comfort in his past. And yet he also understood some of why. 'Just, no more surprises.'

Ianto breathed Jack in and shook his head. 'No more surprises.'

'Oh, and Ianto.'

'Yes Jack?'

'Do you usually cook naked?'

'I'm wearing an apron.'

Jack grinned as he pulled on the apron string. 'Not for much longer.'

'I'll just turn the sauce off, it can wait.'

Jack kissed Ianto on the shoulder. 'Good, because I can't.'

Ianto hung his apron up and followed Jack back to bed. He hoped this would lay the ghost of girlfriends past firmly to rest.

Jack was waiting for Ianto, he needed to bury himself so deeply in his lover that he would know, no more doubts, exactly whose bed he should be in. He didn't want to loose Ianto and knowing Becky was no longer a threat. He pulled Ianto into a kiss as they lay against each other, his hands running possessively over Ianto. Once again he had been faced with the consequences of his absence in the life of this gentle man. He had never enjoyed jealousy in others, and he wasn't pleased to find it in himself. So he kissed Ianto like he never wanted to let him go, saying with his lips in a kiss what he didn't have the courage to say with words.

He kissed his way to Ianto's ear, having realised since getting back, just how responsive Ianto was to having his earlobes nibbled. He wondered what else he had missed in trying to ignore emotion in his relationship with Ianto. And just how close he had been to never finding out. Ianto moaned as every move Jack made was designed to tease and seduce the Welshman. Kissing his way around Ianto's body until he had nibbled and licked and kissed his way to Ianto's balls. Taking them gently into his mouth as Ianto lay there panting and just trying to hold on.

Ianto thought his head was going to fly off as pleasure exploded around his body. Then Jack slipped a lubricated finger into his arse and he thought he might cum just like that. He tried to hold onto the bed, his only island in a sea of sensations that poured pleasure over every nerve ending. He felt his fears drift away as Jack fingered him with one hand, stroked his cock with the other and licked and sucked his balls. An armada of pleasure invaded his body and Jack was the Captain.

He cried out again as Jack added a second finger to the exploration of his arse and he felt his cock throb and his balls tighten. He held his breath as Jack stopped, sighing again when a hot, moist mouth wrapped itself around the head of his cock and swallowed him down. Fingers still stroking his arse as his balls jerked and he came. Jack licked his lips as he moved to kneel between Ianto's thighs and swap his fingers for his cock. Moving slowly, confidently Jack filled Ianto as he looked into the Welshman's blue eyes. He wanted to watch him, he wanted him to know who possessed him. For there to be no confusion who his lover was as Jack slowly, carefully and completely filled Ianto with everything he had to offer him. He wanted to fill the spaces around Ianto Jones until there was no Ianto without Jack. He watched Ianto's cock growing hard again as he moved in and out of him.

He leaned forward, his lips finding Ianto's, his tongue stroking and exploring as he slid deeper inside Ianto. This was where he wanted to be. His cock buried up to the balls inside Ianto. Hands on Ianto's body and joined at the mouth as they kissed. He began to rock back when he caught the glimmer of something in Ianto's eyes that made him pause. He groaned softly as he felt Ianto tighten himself around his cock then relax, the first time he couldn't be sure it wasn't an accident. But when he did it again and again Jack began struggling to keep taking his time. When he started rocking his hips Jack couldn't resist matching the pace Ianto was setting him.

'Ianto Jones.' He moaned as Ianto encouraged him, crying out softly as Jack moved harder, pulling out and sliding back in. Taking long deep thrusts that made his balls slap against Ianto's arse. Pleasure flooding his body as he moaned and panted, begging Jack to fuck him harder.

Jack changed positions, he rolled Ianto onto his side and lay alongside him, his cock seeking Ianto's arse, hungry to bury himself in the tightness of Ianto. Lying behind him he could reach around and caress his lover, lean over to kiss, and he had unrestricted access to Ianto's ears. Teeth tugging at the earlobe as he thrust deeply into Ianto. Encouraged by the small moans that grew bigger Jack stroked and fucked him until Ianto was crying out as he came.

He tried to catch his breathe as Jack just held him, not moving, just holding him. Whatever was possessing Jack he was certainly not one to complain. He suspected he had tapped into some sort of possessiveness previously not experienced in their still undefined relationship. He felt Jack moving again and he felt his own erection growing. This time Jack rolled them so Ianto lay on his stomach and Jack lay between his spread legs. Ianto felt Jack's hands on his hips, holding him so he couldn't move as Jack took his time and set his own pace.

Jack dominated Ianto as he fought his inner demons, needing to find the release only Ianto could give him, seeking perhaps absolution for leaving Ianto behind. For feeling jealous when he had never given voice to what he was feeling for the man gripping his cock with his arse. They needed to define their relationship only he didn't want to think. He wanted to feel. In Ianto he felt alive where previously he had been so numb he had stopped seeing what was right in front of him. He didn't want to go backwards again. He had taken so many steps away from himself he had gotten lost. Ianto was the flame guiding him home. Right here, right now, this was the only place he wanted to be. He finally let himself go as this time, when Ianto cried out in his orgasm, he let himself join him.

He disposed of the condom and pulled Ianto into his arms and kissed him lightly on the lips. A whisper of a kiss filled with unspoken promises Jack still couldn't bring himself to say out loud. He wondered if he would ever find the courage to say what Ianto needed to hear. If he would ever be able to fully give himself to Ianto, no more secrets between them. No more unspoken promises whispered in sleeping ears. He wondered if they would ever be able to move two steps forward, and not take any back.