Disclaimer: Yana Toboso owns Kuroshitsuji/Black Butler. I own nothing but the situation. Did I have a hand in the canon, these two would have had more subtext. Yes, I needed more subtext.
Author's Notes: So this was one of those 2am self indulgent I feel like writing shippy fic no one will ever read. Warnings for heavily implied buttseks and a broken plate. It's about time I wrote for this pairing since I've been shipping it like FedEx. Still debating if this is a oneshot or a multichapter. Stay tuned.

What If

He tasted like fire and smoke and sulfur and sweat. He tasted at times like stolen evenings and mornings greeted with a single tempestuous kiss before parting punctuated with the promise of more. But mostly, he tasted of sin. Then again, what did one expect a demon to taste of but sin?

Were one to dare ask Claude Faustus when it all changed, even he couldn't find an answer. It happened so quickly, suffice to say. One minute, the blades were flying in a furious twister of gold and silver, the next he found himself trapped within a raven's kiss. What followed after was a blur. But it was everything and nothing, ice and fire, rage and passion. And so it had been ever since that day. Somehow, they would find an excuse to escape the lords they served and steal a few moments. The place and time didn't matter. It was pure, simple, electrifying need that fueled them. But it was always that final kiss that brought him back from his high.

There was no denying it weighed heavily on his mind, peeping in from time to time like a child unbidden.

"What if." he used to ask himself, like that night where he'd first grasped the raven in his arms.

"What if." he once murmured as he stood by his bedroom window and watched that figure steal into the night he seemed to disappear into at will.

"What if." He'd whispered once against his lover's chest as it rose and fell with each heaving breath, the taint of their sweat and passion causing the finest sheen over that pale skin.

What if a demon could feel more than these primeval fires of hate?

Affection? Was it really so alien a term?

No denying there was indeed an unspoken attraction toward the other demon. After all, who could resist? He cut such a suave figure, there was no denying that. Coupled with that silver tongue, it was hardly a mystery why he had more than his fair share of admirers. But there was something more under that. There was something beyond the way his scarlet eyes teased in the candlelight, more than the pant and gasp that spilled from those lips with each thrust, more than the way those nails raked across Claude's back when he reached their crescendo.

"Claude." that silken voice taunted once before sending out a flurry of silver knives.

"Claude."he once gasped, hissing from pain at a sudden heated thrust as he was forced into his back.

"Claude."that same voice whispered before he leaned in for an unexpectedly tender kiss.

What if?

""""""

And for the first time in years, Claude Faustus, head butler of the House of Trancy broke a plate. The sound caused Timber to look up, Thompson to turn and Canterbury to reach for the broom and dustpan. Their boss had fallen into another one of his reveries and sure enough, there the butler stood before the small pile of broken china. A single glance was all that served as an order before he set the plates back into the china cabinet and strode into the garden without so much as a word. That look spoke volumes, also hinting a violent end to whoever mentioned that one instance of imperfection ever again.

"Claude's acting weird." Canterbury murmured to his siblings as he took out the dustpan.

"Definitely weird" agreed Timber, sweeping up the mess.

"Weirder than usual." Thompson continued as he emptied the shards into the trash bin./p

Claude heard nothing of these accusations, of course. He was far too preoccupied by the what ifs plaguing his mind at that moment to care. What if, his mind suggested in that strangely nagging tone. And this is a large what if but bear with me. What if you'd found love, Claude?

It was that revelation that caused him to drop that plate. After all, it was nothing but foolish sentiment, this love business. It was what kept Alois locked to his side, ever compliant and willing. Demons needed nothing of love.

And yet...

What if?