A/N: So I am still new to this fandom and still watching shows that I haven't seen yet. And by watching I mean deftly skipping around to avoid heartache that I have cunningly sussed out by reading fanfic. And yet, I can't skip ALL of the season finales. (Wry smiley face.) So I found myself watching the ones at the end of season 7 (Borderland, Patriot Down, Rule Fifty-One, and ultimately, The Spider and the Fly) where Abby is asked to go to Mexico to teach a class on forensics in cold cases and then of course finds out Gibbs is the one who shot Pedro Hernandez and then Paloma Reynosa has her goon kidnap Gibbs right out of his serape on the beach. Yeah, you know the ones. And I am always struck by the moments when Gibbs shows (and the way Harmon plays) vulnerability. He is almost always struck dumb. Often he looks blank, almost childlike, when he walks away without answering or trying to give any information at all. And at the same time, I am also fascinated by the ways that Tony/MW is on the show. In these eps, Tony has great moments but his interactions with Gibbs are minimal.
I guess I figure that just cause we didn't see them, doesn't mean they didn't happen. And that these two men depend on each other.
This is a one shot. And it is preslash bordering on slash, so if that isn't your thing, please stop reading now. I am finishing the next chapter in Falling currently. I don't know why this story intruded, or why I wrote it, or why I feel like apologizing! Writing is weird sometimes. Happy Sunday!
Later, gators,
Squares July 13, 2014
Twice in one month. Tony was back in Gibbs' basement tonight, just a few weeks after the case that led to Tony's obsession with that reporter. Rule 10. Never let it get personal. Easiest one to break. Some cases, some people, almost dare you to.
And now, it was all unravelling. Twenty years. Twenty damn years since he pulled the trigger on top of a ridge in Mexico. An event, well planned and executed. No one the wiser. Unravelling. For weeks his father had been staying with him. And then, Mike Franks' return and irascible presence in the house. And now Leon insisting on moving them to a safe house. Every day worse than the one before it. Yesterday. Today. Now.
Jethro felt as if the bullet had continued to travel through the atmosphere since that day so long ago, speeding along to strike its next target. It's ultimate target? Him. His career. Fuck his career, the people he cared for. Their lives. Maybe bullets are like boomerangs, always coming back to the person who threw them. Boomerang Bullets. What was he thinking?
Gibbs rubbed the back of his neck, hard. Blinked. He wasn't concentrating. Couldn't concentrate.
Abby.
Jesus. Abby is the one who found the evidence. In Mexico. Rule 40. If it seems like someone is out to get you, they probably are. The improbability of Abby standing next to that truck, a 20 year old wreck of a truck, in a dusty town in Mexico—she was probably carrying a black lace umbrella or some shit like that. Damn, his mind was wandering again—looking for 20 year old evidence was a flashing neon sign reading "Rule 40".
Gibbs stared, unseeing, at the wood in his hands until the stiffness in his knees intruded. Standing on concrete always did that to him. He put the raw wood down on the bench and reached for the inlay he was working on for the boat.
That Tony was coming down the stairs before he sensed the other man in the house, should have alarmed him. Given the day he'd just had, it didn't even register. With a feeling like resignation, he looked over to acknowledge his senior agent.
Was Tony here to demand the answers he hadn't demanded earlier today or this week? Not even when the plane doors opened in Mexico and Gibbs climbed in to join him and Ziva? If so Tony'd be disappointed. Gibbs didn't have answers to give.
Was he here to bring him an update? It was too late at night. Tony would have called.
Was he here seeking solace himself? Somehow Gibbs didn't think so.
He turned, just his head. His body faced the workbench, his hands in front of him bracing the inlay, and he felt the tension in his muscles, so familiar. Go forward. Don't stop, not for anything.
The odor of concrete, of woodshavings, the metallic tang of the sheetrock screws in a pile near the mason jar of bourbon...the smell of his basement was disrupted by the warm drift of air from upstairs, the scent of nighttime Tony: the hint of expensive aftershave, sweat, the office.
Tony didn't wear cologne, Gibbs thought irrelevantly. What was wrong with him, he couldn't concentrate. It surprised him, that Tony didn't wear cologne. Gibbs figured probably his father wore it, or maybe it was just that Tony was not what he pretended to be, not as flashy or as scattered or as silly as he played.
Gibbs attention returned and he wondered how long he had been looking at Tony, if he had lost time, if Tony had noticed.
Uncharacteristically, Tony hadn't said a word yet. Maybe it hadn't been long. Or maybe Tony had been standing there, staring at him in a silence as marked as his own. Either way. Didn't matter.
Gibbs flicked his eyes over Tony's body. His clothes, his smell...he came right from work, many hours after Gibbs himself.
Gibbs repeated the words he had said to Tony those weeks ago, when Tony came looking for something Gibbs wasn't sure he had.
"You okay?"
Instead of answering—or maybe, Gibbs thought later, Tony did answer, in his own way—Tony said, "You limp."
Gibbs was, he'd admit it, astonished. But he only let his voice convey impatience, dismissal. He didn't want to be astonished. Or comforted. Or questioned.
"What?" Gibbs bit the word off.
Tony didn't seem to have heard him, just dropped the bag he was holding at the foot of the stairs and stalked forward.
Tony, this time of night, in his basement, was usually tired. Oh always graceful, athlete that he was, but often weary. This Tony, though, was another matter. Gibbs was used to seeing this Tony when he was on the chase, or the prowl. Predatory. Focused and intent, despite the fact that he wasn't looking at Gibbs. As the younger man paced toward him, Gibbs squelched the urge to lean back to keep distance. He kept his back rigid but rotated to keep Tony in his sights. Tony passed him and leaned on the workbench, settling himself next to Gibbs.
Tony was talking and Gibbs realized that he hadn't noticed when Tony had started. Tony's voice was smooth and casual, as if he wasn't saying anything important. Gibbs tuned in.
"...wondered. Sometimes it's worse than others. Don't get me wrong. I know the value of a good limp, of training your body to ignore it, to walk through the pain. I'm not sure anyone else has noticed. No one has said anything to me anyway."
"What? What limp?"
Tony made a face. You know what limp.
So maybe he was stiff when he first got up after sitting too long. A sniper's life was not easy on the knees.
Tony didn't move his hips but swivelled to reach behind him, grabbed one of the lengths of wood Gibbs kept propped in the corner. He handed it to Gibbs and looked back at him in challenge.
"DiNozzo…"
"It's a cane, Boss." And before Gibbs could react to the implication that he was old and decrepit, Tony attacked, striking out with his right fist.
The moves were automatic, the cane—fuck, not a cane, the dowellstaffstickpole—spun and knocked Tony's arm where it swung toward him. Tony didn't cry out, obviously expecting the maneuver, and resumed his resting place against the bench, rubbing the sting out of his forearm.
"The hell, DiNozzo. You come by to attack me in my own basement?" Gibbs tossed the length of wood aside.
"Just making a point, Gibbs. The limp, and its compensating features...in this case, the cane...make you stronger, in a way."
As Gibbs turned to meet Tony's eyes, a little too close for comfort, he was aware suddenly of what a big guy Tony was, recognized his awareness of this as intentional on Tony's part. A version of rule 40. If you notice, someone wanted you to notice. Tony was damn good interrogator in his own right and just because he often used humor didn't mean he always did. He could personify menace if he so chose. Is that what this was, an interrogation?
Tony's face gave nothing away. He was waiting for an answer.
Gibbs had no intention of answering, tipped his head back a little, knew his own eyes were hard. "Why are you here, Tony?"
And Tony smiled suddenly, warmth and humor present in his stance, in the lines of his face. Normal Tony, but also special, since Gibbs so rarely had it turned so solidly on him. He felt the impact, like a bullet. Was this a boomerang bullet too?
Gibbs raised his eyebrow in question and demand. Well?
Tony took a breath, let it out. He looked down and the smile faded. "I'm only going to say this next part once, and fast, cause I don't talk about this. You don't talk about this. But I came here tonight to make an offer and I can't make it until I say this first part so just listen, okay?"
Gibbs would have stopped him, the way he had stopped Abby from talking about Mexico, but Tony's reference to himself...maybe this was about Tony and not Gibbs. And Gibbs was in no state to refuse any of his people anything. So he gave a short nod. Waited.
"We carry our pain around with us, you and me. We never let it go. We never did. We never healed, at least not all the way." And now Gibbs did tense, to speak or to move, to stop Tony. He wasn't going there and he sure as hell wasn't going to talk about it but Tony turned, flipped his whole body, fast and precise so that the two men were chest to chest and Gibbs could feel Tony's breath against his face, could smell it, not bad, not minty, no alcohol, just Tony, and Gibbs wondered if Tony could smell the bourbon—
"Instead we made the pain part of us, a kind of armor and it drives us and protects us and it is ours."
Tony's words were measured and his voice deepened further when he said this. Truth. And truly, something Gibbs would not have expected the younger man to admit or share.
Tony nodded slowly at Gibbs' silence, a small smile still on his face, as if to confirm Gibbs thoughts, as if he knew what Gibbs was thinking. He even looked away, down, a little coy, the same smile playing on his lips seemed to say: Who knew DiNozzo could be insightful and self-aware?
If Tony weren't so close, if not for the weight of his words, Gibbs would have relaxed.
But Tony's eyes were on his and Gibbs couldn't have looked away if he wanted to.
Tony whispered. "But you are stuck, aren't you, Boss?"
Gibbs found himself answering, also quiet, because Tony seemed to know what he was feeling, that he couldn't concentrate. That he was worried about protecting them all. She threatened his father. "Yeah."
Tony nodded again, breathing out, and this time his smile was approving and Gibbs squelched the unfamiliar gladness that sparked in his chest at this approval.
"Let me help you with that?"
Tony's eyes held his and the hope, the possibility that Gibbs could salvage this FUBAR situation, had Gibbs asking, "How?"
Tony breathed out, as if relieved, and stepped back. Gibbs felt his own relief at the release from Tony's unusual proximity, and then almost amusement as Tony paced the basement looking at the long worktables set up to hold his boat as it was constructed. At the moment, though, the boat was in pieces and there was a lot of open space on the flat surfaces making up most of the middle of the room.
Gibbs drew air deeply, but silently—no need to let Tony know he had affected Gibbs so strongly—into his lungs as he watched Tony move things from one table to another and then wrestle one of the seven foot sections free of the others to stand alone in the far corner of the room. One of the legs snagged on something in the floor, probably part of a drain, and Tony looked up to glare at Gibbs, "A little help here?"
Gibbs smirked but crossed the room. Once he helped Tony get the table where he wanted it, he faced Gibbs across the table.
"What are we doing here, Tony?"
Tony seemed hesitant to answer. "You said I could help, right, Boss?"
Gibbs didn't second guess himself, but he could hear the doubt is his own slow drawl, "Yeeeah. Why? Is it gonna hurt?"
"No. That's the hard part. You'd like it better if it did."
Now Gibbs was definitely worried. "You'd better tell me, Tony."
"You know I was a Phys Ed major, right, Gibbs?"
"Yeah…"
"Well, I don't know if you ever looked at my transcript, but OSU has one of the best programs in the country and is a feeder to the top pre-med schools in the world and I was top of my class, could have gone myself if I had wanted to. I graduated with a 3.8 grade point average in my classes for my major, including Kinesiology and Anatomy and Physiology."
Gibbs nodded. He knew Tony was smart.
"People think that pain and pleasure, confusion and hatred and ambition and jealousy and all the other things we feel live in the brain, in the heart, and even," he smiled at Gibbs, "in the gut. But they don't really mean that. They really believe the first thing. Mind over matter. Like we can think ourselves out of any problem, that we can push pain away just with the force of our mind and will."
Jethro was interested despite himself. Tony had better control than anyone he knew; his skills undercover were unparalleled. How else did he do that if he didn't intend it, strategize and plan for it?
"But you have it right, Gibbs, it is in your gut, and the pain that you and I push away—that anyone pushes away—is still in our body. These emotions, they stay in our body, and your pain is bigger than most. You are never really relaxed, Jethro." Gibbs didn't miss the deliberate way that Tony said his given name but didn't care, the younger man long since having earned the right to use it when they were alone, "Never. Because you are using your body to carry emotions you never look at. And who am I to judge? I do it too. But it is there, in your posture, in the way you move, and it is part of you, part of what makes you a scary son of a bitch," small grin from Tony, eyes lit up with the zeal of an expert and the glee of a brother son of a bitch, "at the same time that it is also part of what makes us all follow you. The pain lives in your body and it won't be ignored."
"So that's why I limp?" Gibbs went back to Tony's original, baffling, assertion.
Again, an approving smile. "If you actually dealt with your pain, healed, probably your knees wouldn't hurt quite so bad, and you wouldn't limp. If I did the same—fat fucking chance—" Tony grinned, unrepentant, "then I wouldn't keep throwing my back out. But I'm not going to and you aren't either. But you are stuck and that means you have two options. Push on the feelings, deal with them...and I think we are agreed that you aren't going to do that...or push on where you are holding them."
Gibbs checked, "In my gut?"
"Yeah. And your knees and neck and back and feet and hands and—"
"I got it, DiNozzo. So how—"
Tony turned and walked back toward the stairs, reaching underneath to grab the undersized futon mattress that was Gibbs recent concession to the toll that sleeping under the boat was taking on his body. He hefted the mattress across the room to drape it on the table.
Tony held his hands up, wiggled his fingers, "Magic, Jethro."
The other shoe dropped. "You...are going to give me a massage?"
"If it's okay."
Gibbs had never had a massage—other than the ones that were part of physical therapy and they mostly hurt like a fucker. He shrugged. "Okay. You think this is going to help?"
And now, it seemed, Tony was backpedalling. "Do you trust me?"
Again, Gibbs shrugged, "Always have. Trusted you with my life enough times. Don't know that this is anywhere close to that."
Tony's face was serious. "Uh...this might be harder than that."
"What? Why?"
"Because—that's what I was trying to tell you—the pain is actually in your body. I'm going to move it around and it will settle other places and you are going to have to trust me that whatever happens, it's okay. That this is just between you, me, and the boat."
Again, a little dip of fear in his stomach. He did trust Tony and his brain told him he was a Marine, he could take any pain Tony could dish out, but Tony knew that and was still warning him.
He took a deep breath. Swallowed. Let Tony see that he understood. "Okay. I trust you."
His gut had been churning for weeks and with it came tension headaches and a terrible fear that he wasn't going to be able to hold it all together, that the web of contingency and safety he had woven into his life and around the people in it, would dissolve and unravel. And they would all fall. Leaving him standing, alone, the only survivor.
If this could help center him, help him get his shit together, it was worth a try. And he did trust Tony.
Tony waited while he thought this through, green eyes steady on his.
"Okay, Tony. What do I do?"
Tony turned away and retrieved the duffle bag he had brought downstairs. A few minutes later, a sheet was draped over the table and clamped in place. Tony tossed Gibbs a towel from the bag.
"Take everything off. Lay down on the table, on your stomach, and you can use the towel to cover up if you want. I'm going to go change upstairs." Gibbs watched Tony disappear up the stairs.
One minute later, he pulled himself up onto the table and tried not to think about the fact that he was naked in his basement. He didn't have to wait long for Tony's return.
"I locked the front door." Tony met his eyes from across the room, and he flicked on the shop light, turned off the overheads. The basement was much too dim for him to work in now, but Jethro figured this was a different kind of work. He watched as Tony retrieved a bottle of oil and a small towel and approached where he lay. Jethro was stretched out face down as instructed, his head turned to the side. Tony was wearing worn jeans and an equally threadbare white t-shirt that strained against the muscles of his upper arms. "Ready?"
As he answered, Jethro could feel the rasp in his voice, vocal chords tense with the unknown. "Guess so."
Tony moved forward, to his side. Always at his side. He looked down and Jethro felt vulnerable where he lay, below and in front of the other man, and naked to boot, towel draped awkwardly over his ass. Jethro had found it difficult to get into a comfortable position on his stomach and had to try several times, adjusting his junk so that everything felt okay.
Tony reached out and with a rough finger stroked Jethro's eyelids closed. Guess he wants me to close my eyes. Both eyes closed at the first touch of Tony's finger but the younger man still took the time to stroke both eyelids.
With his eyes closed, Jethro felt even more vulnerable, and if not for Tony's hands quickly pressing his shoulders down firmly, he would have called the whole thing off.
"Shhhh." Warm palms rested against his shoulder blades. Jethro repressed a shudder at the pleasure in the touch, any human touch, as well as in this sign that Tony knew what he was doing, knew him, and wouldn't let anything bad happen.
Long moments passed and Tony just rested his hands on Jethro's back, heat soaking into his shoulder blades. Jethro wondered if Tony was ever going to give him the massage, but didn't say anything.
The hands didn't move. Tony's voice replaced the worry.
"Let go, Jethro. You aren't in control here. In fact, you won't be able to control much. Remember that you trust me. I'm on your six. Always. Remember that. You don't have to answer..."
Tony's hands moved slowly—Jethro could feel the slick slide of warm oil on skin so Tony must've rubbed some on his hands—down his back, over the towel, down his legs. Not much pressure, nothing like a massage as Jethro imagined it, just warmth, and his words.
"Just settle in. I'll know if you need something and if you want me to stop, just say so, but remember that you trust me. This isn't about making you feel good, it's about getting unstuck."
Tony's hands stroked down his calves and feet, firmly enough not to tickle. A brief pause and then freshly slick hands wrapped around his feet. Those strong hands contracted and squeezed and pulled. Tony did it again, starting with his heels and squeezing and pulling slowly, methodically down Jethro's feet to his toes. Again, from his ankles. Again, down his calves. One hand came to hold and press against the crook of one knee and the other pressed knuckles deep along and down the back of his calf.
Jethro almost groaned in relief, in pleasure. It felt so good. Again, down the other calf. For the first time, Jethro truly understood that this wasn't going to be an ordeal of pain. This was going to feel good. So good that he wasn't sure he'd know what do. The only time his body gave him unadulterated pleasure was when he had sex. Jesus, what if...
Tony's hands lifted deliberately but instead of the warm weight of them on the back of his knees again, Jethro felt them come to rest on his shoulders, kneading gently, just like massages on TV. Tony's breath whispered across his cheek and the younger man spoke, again showing he knew just what Jethro was thinking and again, Jethro repressed a shudder.
"It is going to feel good, Jethro. Get used to it. And like I said before, whatever happens, it's okay. You might cry or get hard. You certainly aren't going to be able to keep your body from reacting," Tony moved one hand to stretch and massage Jethro's available ear, along the shell to the lobe. Tony's touch was firm, almost clinical, and yet this felt so unbelievably good that Jethro's body jerked and then settled deeper into the cotton of the pad. He still felt it was a small success to not have moaned, despite the shudder. Tony's deep knowing laugh precipitated another shiver but neither man reacted in any other way.
"Let go." Tony breathed into his ear, and while Gibbs was sorry that the touch of the other man on his ear—who knew that your goddamned ear would be so sensitive? —was withdrawn, he was already looking forward to the next thing that Tony would do.
Gibbs hadn't needed an alarm clock in years, his internal clock unfailing in its accuracy. It failed now.
Tony went back to his legs, his ankles, his feet, stretching the tendons and long muscles. He didn't dig in, or force anything, just pressure and long slow pulls. And yet he also stroked tiny circles in any hollow place. Around his angles, below his toes, in the arch of his foot, the back of his knees. Jethro wanted to moan and thrash and scream already, it felt so good.
Jethro felt heat pooling in his belly, knew he was half hard, but he didn't feel horny or like screwing. It was just his body filling up with pleasure and then releasing it too. With his dick trapped below him, he didn't worry about Tony seeing, knowing, and just let the waves bring him up and then back down again.
Tony moved higher, to the backs of his thighs, and his back too, pressing down in large sweeps with the heel of his hand on the left side of his back, even as Tony's other hand searched for some sort of corresponding place on his right thigh. And when he did find it—Jethro stopped doubting Tony's skills within minutes of feeling the other man's hands on him—it wasn't like an electric shock, it was more like something snapping into place.
This Jethro was familiar with, he thought, from the many hours he had spent in physical therapy through the years. The sharp snap and the sore muscles, the pain that was almost pleasure as he worked his body back to full power.
He was wrong. Tony made the same moves, with tiny changes, over and over again, and the snap, the feeling of something falling into place, came again and again, closer together until there was no time between them and his body was humming with well-being and a deep sense of knowing itself.
His mind wandered and perseverated on the disasters of recent days, despite the ever-present wonder of Tony's hands. But this too was luxury. Hell, if he had to think about it, it was unbelievable that he could do so while feeling so good. Paloma Reynosa, Alejandro Riviera, Mike, the girls, his Dad, his team, Pacci, Kate, Shannon and Kelly.
Tony had taken his arm and was pulling it gently out from his body, stretching and then holding it firmly to stroke and press, all the way down to his fingers. Tony held and stroked and played with his wrist and hand for a long long time. And Jethro felt every bit of that touch throughout his body.
Time passed and Tony repeated the same work on his other side. The pause while Tony walked around the table, to get more oil, almost as good as the massage. His body, even without Tony's touch, felt good, so good. Centered and energized, and in that moment he realized he was fully hard now, and Tony's hands returning to the back of his leg, the left one this time, didn't help. Jethro felt the whine leave his throat, wished it was a grunt, felt anxiety creep in.
"You okay?" Tony's voice grounded him, pulled him back. His tone was gently inquisitive, but the low rumble showed that the other man wasn't unaffected himself.
"Yeah." Gibbs cleared his throat a little. "Are you?"
Tony's hands rested on the back of his thighs and he paused while he answered. "Yeah. I haven't done this in a long time." His hands started moving again. Jethro realized that by doing the trick connecting his legs to his back, Tony had deftly avoided touching his backside. A small smile crept across his lips.
"What?" Miffed. "You think I'm rusty?" Insecure.
"You won't get any complaints from me. Hell, I'm afraid some fancy massage place will steal you away from NCIS."
"Oh, so...it's okay then?" Pleasure, tentative pride.
Gibbs felt a laugh bubble up from his gut. "Yeah. It's okay. Better than okay."
The heel of Tony's hand pressed hard at his back even as the other hand pulled and stretched his hamstring. Silence already broken, Gibbs didn't bother to keep from grunting now.
"I wasn't sure you trusted me this much." A smile in his voice but fishing. For what? A compliment? Gibbs didn't respond, waiting for more. "How much do you trust me?" Yeah, fishing but not for a compliment...for permission?
"Told you, Tony. I trust you." That was enough, but Jethro realized something. "More than anyone else."
"On the team?"
"Of anyone."
Jethro felt the towel removed, the cool air of the basement on his ass, and then the heat of Tony's hands, not on his ass, but along his side up to his lower back...yeah, definitely restricted territory.
Jethro figured Tony wanted to ask him again if it was okay, but he didn't.
More time, incalculable, like counting sand, and Jethro was reminded of how time passed while he worked on the boat, the burn of his muscles and the way that his mind emptied.
This was different though, and as Tony touched him, his mind seemed free to jump from thing to thing, the cabin, chopping wood, Kelly reading books to her dolls. Stephanie in the garden. Fornell in jail. Tony in jail. Ziva on the steps of this basement. The feel of Abby's hair against his lips when he kissed her. Running along the reservoir. Stocking the shelves in his father's store, music playing on the radio, the rumble of Jackson's laugh as he talked to customers. Tony slumped in the front seat of a car, hair slicked back, criminal dead at his back. The safe houses he had kept witnesses in. The bug in Vance's office. McGee's growing confidence. Tony's Mighty Mouse stapler.
Tony's hands were low on his hips, dug deeply but without pain, into his lower back muscles, lower, and something inside loosened just that much more, a tiny crack opened, and Jethro felt the pressure in his gut and in his throat ease, shift. He thought of Kelly and Shannon again. Felt wet slipping down the side of his nose.
Tony paused just long enough to wipe his face gently with a towel with one hand, the other resting dead center in his back, warm and reassuring. He moved to the other side of the table.
Tony worked his magic on Gibbs other arm, and then on his back, doing something with pressure and the heel of his hand passing in large circular sweeps. When Tony moved away to get more oil, Gibbs could feel the way his muscles continued to unwind because Tony had set them in motion. He felt vertigo swirl in his stomach, even as Tony's fingers pressed at the base of his neck, threaded into the hair at the base of his skull. Gibbs groaned in pleasure, pressing his face deeper into the cushion.
"What are you doing to me, Tony?" He hoped he didn't sound as vulnerable as he felt.
"Just letting the blood in, Boss."
"You really want to call me Boss right now, Tony? Seems to me that right now, you are the boss."
He could swear he could hear Tony smile. "You gonna remember that tomorrow?"
"Nope." And now he heard Tony laugh.
"How's it feel, having me be the boss, Boss?"
"Pretty damn good, Tony."
"Then roll over, Jethro." Shit. Gibbs had been pretty relaxed, and his hard-on had subsided, but at the command in that voice, the knowing in that voice, he felt his cock jump.
"Like it fine here, Tony."
Tony's hands rested on his shoulders and he felt the press of Tony's chest against his side as the other man leaned in to murmur in his ear.
"Nothing I haven't seen before, Jethro."
"That so?"
This laugh was low and dirty and didn't fucking help matters any. "Hell yeah. You didn't think I learned all of this in the classroom, did you, boss?"
Jethro stayed silent. Mostly because he didn't know what to say. He wanted more, something, but didn't know…
"Turn over."
Gibbs felt clumsy as he obeyed, the grace and precision of Tony's movement in stark contrast to his own struggles to turn and not fall off the table. He felt Tony's hands helping him, steadying him, and the drop of the towel, heavy on his lap, at least partially weighing down his erection.
Gibbs realized that it hadn't even occurred to him to open his eyes.
Tony stood behind him and his hands moved skillfully over his chest and neck, soothing and calming him before moving on to his head and face.
It was incredibly intimate, Tony's calloused fingers on his ears and on his cheeks, stroking along his forehead and working gently along his nose. Tony's fingers stroked along his eyelids again and Jethro felt him move to his side. Tony's hand never left Jethro's body and even as he changed position, he drew a sweet and steady line down Jethro's throat and sternum, coming to rest just above his stomach. His gut.
"How do you feel?"
"Are you done?
"I don't know. How do you feel?"
"What time is it?"
"I don't know. How do you feel?"
"I feel...good."
"Good."
"Yeah. Good."
Tony laughed, relieved. "Okay. Good. That is, well, good."
Jethro felt silly laying there with his eyes closed. Tony placed his free hand over his eyes.
Jethro was irritated at Tony knowing him so well but his body was still so alive with the pleasure of the massage that it barely registered. Still.
"You like being in control, Tony."
"Does that surprise you?"
They weren't whispering but Tony was close and his bare hands still rested on Jethro's eyes and belly. Intimate, and their low voices were intimate too. Jethro turned his head to face where Tony must be standing or leaning. Didn't try to open his eyes.
"In a way. Why did you do this for me?"
"Why did you let me?"
"I asked you first."
"Because I could. Because you were stuck."
"Were?"
"Were. You aren't stuck any more."
Jethro thought about it, grunted in reluctant acknowledgment.
"We done?"
"You said you felt good."
"I do."
"How did it feel, letting me be the boss?"
"Okay."
"Will you let me be the boss a while longer?"
"Why?"
"Because I want you to."
Gibbs' gut was going crazy, wanting what Tony promised. What was going to happen next?
Gibbs waited, let his silence stand for assent.
Tony's breath ghosted over his face. The younger man was close, close. "I'm going to need the words, Jethro." Jethro could not stop the low moan, the involuntary bow of his body, so attuned to this man in these last hours as he was.
He breathed out his answer, could almost almost feel the brush of Tony's face against his. "Yes."
And then Tony's mouth was on his and his hand was on his cock, both so sweet and hot and pleasurable it truly felt like pain now and Jethro heard himself keening, high and helpless into Tony's mouth even as his stomach clenched and he pressed up up trying to get closer. And in one more minute he would have remembered that he wasn't bound, that his hands and arms could reach and grip too, but instead he let Tony drink from his mouth, pulling the response he wanted from where it trembled on the surface of Jethro's body, where Tony had drawn it, and the pressure and heat of Tony's hand coalesced…
In his experience, orgasms gripped him, caused his body to seize up, to buck and jerk, but now, tonight, after the hours spent with Tony's hands on him, in the moments before the pleasure peaked, he felt his body relax back and down, opening up as the lightning ribbons of heat and come pulsed through his body and spilled out, caught by the towel so conveniently draped across his stomach.
And in that moment, for the first time tonight, he felt Tony falter, his movements harsh and uncoordinated. Tony's mouth was suddenly grasping hard on Jethro's and his right hand came up to clutch at the back of Jethro's head and the side of his face. Tony was making sounds, almost whimpering himself, as he pressed harsh kisses into Jethro's skin.
This too, seemed to last forever, or an instant, but finally, mouths still occasionally pressing together, both of them seeking to draw out the connection, Jethro murmured, "You come too?"
Tony's forehead came to rest, hard, against Jethro's cheek and he admitted it into Jethro's neck. "I couldn't help it."
"I didn't want you to help it." Surprised to find it was true.
Tony lifted his head and Jethro opened his eyes. The basement was too dim to see much, but he didn't need to do anything. He just needed to see Tony's face.
"Take your time."
"Huh?"
He could see Tony's mouth quirk. "Take your time, getting up, you might be dizzy. And drink a lot of water. Flush the toxins out."
"You mean the bourbon?"
Tony smiled, but didn't answer. He rubbed Gibbs chest where his hand rested, one last time, and then straightened. Tony cleared his throat and said, in his normal voice, "I'm going to go change again. See you tomorrow." And he was gone.
Gibbs, relieved to not have to have a conversation while he was naked and Tony was fully clothed, just lay in the dark a while, thinking.