A/N: Entanglement is a multi-chapter fic of the events taking place after Brand New Day. You definitely need to read those three one shots (King of Hearts, Defeated and Brand New Day) before reading this.
Warnings: Angst, language, sex
Pairings: 2x3, 1x2x3, past 1x4, past 1x5
Entanglement
Chapter Two
Everyone liked Heero, and the fact that Duo had spent the last month avoiding him had finally been noticed by someone other than Trowa and Allison, Duo's secretary.
Duo had gone out of his way to avoid the new Junior Partner - he even skipped the catered Friday lunches that he had enjoyed for years - and he turned down every one of Vandy's attempts to gather the "boys" together to go out drinking. Although, in all fairness, that had less to do with the prospect of Heero being there and more to do with Vandy's presence.
He knew that Trowa and Heero worked out together, every morning and every time they walked into the office together, smirking or talking or just comfortably silent, he resented Heero a little bit more.
Duo knew Trowa enjoyed those mornings spent with Heero - Duo had never been comfortable working out with anyone, even Trowa, who seemed to thrive with Heero's company in the gym - but Duo wasn't entirely sure how much more of this he could take.
He could see them getting closer, could see the way Trowa leaned in to Heero and the lust in Heero's eyes and he knew this was a losing battle, but he had no idea what to do about it.
Duo found Heero attractive - he would have to be blind not to - and he had definitely enjoyed their crazy night of sex, and had had a hell of a lot of fun showing Heero the town that night six weeks ago. But that didn't mean he wanted him to become a permanent fixture in his and Trowa's lives. He didn't want to be in a threesome. He didn't want to share Trowa with Heero - with anyone.
But he also didn't want to become possessive and jealous, so he found himself avoiding Trowa too, putting distance between them at home and at work and he felt alone and deeply unsettled. He had no idea where to go from here, no plan for the future, and no real idea of what he even wanted anymore.
When Thomas Darlian called Duo into his office, he half expected a tongue lashing from his boss. Darlian had made it clear that he valued Heero and he wanted him happy - and he had expected Duo to show him the ropes, to make him happy and keep him that way. Duo had no doubt that by this point Darlian had noticed that Duo didn't speak to Heero at all.
But when Duo walked into Darlian's office he saw Heero Yuy sitting on the couch and he bit back a curse.
Had Heero tattled on him? Complained about Duo not being a team player?
But no - Heero didn't seem like the type, and the look of polite neutrality on his face didn't seem to indicate that he knew what this meeting was about anymore than Duo did.
"Duo!" Darlian smiled broadly and Duo was instantly on edge.
That smile had been the same expression Darlian had worn when he told Duo he was promoting Relena to senior partner. It was also the expression he wore whenever he forced Duo to take cases Duo didn't want.
Shit. No good could come from this.
"Please, sit."
Duo gingerly sat on the opposite end of the couch from Heero, the only seat that meant he didn't have to look directly at him. It was distracting enough to remember what Heero looked like naked - having to stare at the way he filled out a charcoal suit was more than Duo could handle.
"So. Duo, you remember the Youth Services International case?"
"Yes," Duo said cautiously.
YSI was a national, private juvenile detention organization. Duo had come across several former and current incarcerated boys and their parents, who had wanted to start a class action lawsuit. Duo had brought it to Darlian, who had assigned the case to Relena after she had pitched a fit. It had been one of the few times Duo had considered quitting MLG. He had worked his ass off to get the case for them and it was something he felt very strongly about - he had resented Relena and the way she had played her father ever since.
"The trial starts in two weeks and Relena, as you are aware, is in London and can no longer serve as council."
Duo tried not to look too enthusiastic. He hadn't even thought about the fact that Relena's cases would be impacted by her absence like this.
Then he looked over at Heero and had to frown. Why the hell was he here?
"Zechs Merquise has been hired to represent YSI," Darlian said, looking at Heero as well.
Heero arched an eyebrow.
"I wasn't aware," he said.
Darlian nodded.
"Yes, and you know how he thinks. I know he was your mentor at Z&P."
Heero's lips turned downwards for a moment but then he nodded.
"Yes. In a manner of speaking."
"Good. Because I need you on this case, with Duo."
"Thomas, I can handle Merquise on my own," Duo said, the thought of having to work with Heero driving him close to insubordination.
"Perhaps, but Heero knows how he works and this is a very important case - it's going to attract national coverage. I want Heero involved."
Duo nodded. Heero was Darlian's big draw, it seemed - the ace he had stolen away from Z&P. Duo wasn't used to feeling second best and he fought back his anger.
At least he was on the case.
"So you want me to brief Heero on the case?" Duo guessed. He tried to sound neutral but enough of his disappointment must have come through because Heero frowned at him.
"No. Duo, you're lead council on this."
"Oh."
"Duo, this case is the kind of thing that secures a promotion to Senior Partner," Darlian continued. "I want you and Heero on the front page of the New York Times so that I can shove it down Tsubarov's throat at our next golf game - I want him to see that I've got the best team in New York."
Duo frowned at that. He and Trowa had only ever had the chance to work together on a few cases, but they had been a great team. Duo wasn't entirely comfortable with the idea of he and Heero being the best team in New York.
"Gina and Allison have copies of the case for you - take the day to familiarize yourself and come up with a gameplan. I want to hear it first thing tomorrow."
Duo resisted the urge to check his watch. It had been four thirty when Darlian called him in - he was sure that it was nearly five by now.
"Will do," Duo said and stood.
Heero followed him out of the office.
"You and Trowa had plans tonight, didn't you?" Heero asked as they walked away from the office.
"What?"
"Trowa said you two were going out tonight? Some concert?"
"Oh shit." Trowa had been looking forward to this for months - the New York Philharmonic had a Beethoven Piano Concertos concert and Duo had had to trade several favors to get them seats for tonight's performance.
While Duo was not the classical music aficionado that Trowa was, he had actually been looking forward to tonight - Trowa looked incredible in a tux and he was always horny as hell after classical music and ready to reward Duo for sitting through the torture of a concert he didn't care about. Things had been strained enough between them that this night had been Duo's one hope of getting them back on track - but now he was going to have to cancel those plans and spend the night with Heero.
He sighed, and then he scowled.
How much did Trowa and Heero talk? He could imagine that Trowa appreciated the workout company, but he wasn't chatty at the best of times. Were they spending time together outside of the gym?
As they approached Duo and Trowa's offices Duo spotted Trowa packing up his work for the night.
"I'll grab the files from Gina. Do you want to meet in my office or yours?" Heero asked him, clearly giving him a few minutes alone with Trowa.
Duo appreciated that, but he was also annoyed at the thoughtfulness.
"Yours is bigger," Duo pointed out.
"Yours has better chairs," Heero argued.
Duo smirked.
"That it does. Bring some coffee with you. We can call in take out in a few hours… but this is going to be a very late night."
Heero nodded and then walked away, down the hall towards his office, leaving Duo alone to disappoint Trowa yet again.
"Hey." He leaned against Trowa's open door.
Trowa looked up and smiled, just slightly, and Duo felt like a complete asshole. Things had been so damned awkward between them, but Trowa was clearly trying to - to do something to keep this from becoming a complete disaster.
"Ready to go? We should have plenty of time to run home and change and grab -"
"I can't."
Trowa arched an eyebrow, the smile leaving his face.
"Darlian just assigned the Youth Services International case to Heero and I. He wants a game plan by tomorrow morning."
Trowa nodded, taking it in stride. He set his bags down.
"I'll pull up the research and -"
"No," Duo interrupted him and shook his head. Over the years, whenever he or Trowa had had to pull an all-nighter they had always stayed and helped each other out. But Duo didn't want that, not tonight, not with Heero.
Part of him was confident that the three of them would be able to tackle this case with ease, but a larger part of him was convinced that Trowa and Heero would just become even closer, would bond together and start finishing each other's sentences and Duo absolutely could not handle feeling like more of an outsider than he already did.
"You should still go to the concert. You've been looking forward to this."
"I've been looking forward to going to it with you," Trowa corrected. "If you can't go, there's no -"
"Trowa. Go. Enjoy yourself. You know I don't care about the music anyway - this way you don't have to worry about me sitting there beside you fidgeting all night."
Trowa frowned and Duo sensed he had said the wrong thing, but he didn't know what it was.
Duo sighed.
"Trowa, I don't -"
"Don't worry about it, Duo," Trowa said, his voice tired and his eyes sad.
Duo swallowed hard. He hated fighting with Trowa, hated even more the way that he always felt in the wrong, as though he was the cause of Trowa's pain and anger and frustration and he knew that in this case he was, to an extent. He wished Trowa would just come out and say it - would just fight back instead of telling him not to worry and looking like Duo had just kicked a puppy.
"If I don't see you at home I'll bring an extra suit in for you tomorrow," Trowa said and picked up his bags again. "And don't get Chinese for dinner - you know you always regret it four hours after you eat it."
"Tro -"
"Duo. It's fine." Trowa kissed him on the lips, his mouth closed and it was practically platonic.
Duo watched him leave and had to fight back the urge to run after him, to push him against the wall and kiss him until Trowa dropped his bags and clutched Duo against his body.
It had been months since they had kissed like that, and Duo was starting to wonder if they had irrevocably broken their marriage.
"Everything ok?"
Heero stood in the doorway, case files tucked under his arms and two coffee mugs in his hands.
"Yeah. Just fucking dandy," Duo snapped and then sighed and shook his head. "No. It's not but it's nothing - nothing to do with this case. Thanks." He took one of the mugs from Heero and led the way out of Trowa's office, closing the door behind him.
Duo had arranged his office so that two chairs were across from his desk, but had also set up two arm chairs and a coffee table by the windows. He and Trowa ate lunch there together often, and it was where Duo usually liked to work if he had an intern or an associate helping him.
Heero sat down in the chair that Trowa usually occupied and started to spread out the case information.
With a sigh, Duo told himself to get his head out of his ass and focus.
He picked up the file that Allison had left on his desk and joined Heero.
"How do you want to do this?" Heero asked, and Duo masked his surprise.
"Um. Why don't you take the witness statements and I'll look over the research and the data?"
Heero nodded in agreement and started to flip through the paperwork.
Duo watched him, momentarily mesmerized by his long, elegant fingers.
It reminded him of that night, of the way Heero had coated those fingers with lube and used them to prepare Duo, the feel of them entering him, pressing against his prostate and driving him to orgasm from that alone before even replacing his fingers with his cock.
Duo drew in a deep breath and turned back to his work. Now was not the time to be thinking about Heero Yuy's damned talented fingers. Never was the time to be thinking about them.
-o-
It was after ten when Georgetown walked by the open door of Duo's office.
"Oh - I didn't realize you were still here," she said and offered Heero a shy smile.
Duo rolled his eyes.
"We are," he said.
"Is there anything I can do to help?" She stepped into the office and Duo sighed in relief and reached for a highlighter. "I mean - have you eaten? I could get food for you?"
Heero smirked at Duo's scowl.
"Sure," Heero said and stood up.
He had taken off his jacket hours ago and had rolled up the sleeves of his pale blue button up, and his forearms flexed as he pulled out his wallet and handed several twenty dollar bills to Georgetown.
"Thai or Chinese?" She asked.
"Thai please," Duo said, remembering Trowa's warning. "Chicken Pad Thai."
Heero held up two fingers and Georgetown scurried off.
Duo sighed.
"And here I was thinking we could actually put her to work," he grumbled.
Heero chuckled.
"Your face - you were so hopeful when you reached for that highlighter."
Duo shook his head.
"I should have known. Georgetown."
"Hm. Where are Yale and Harvard?" Heero mused.
"That's a good question," Duo stood. He hadn't even thought to call in the help of the interns before. "Let's find them."
The cubicles were empty, but desk lights and half-empty coffee cups were on several desks, indicating that most of the interns were still somewhere in the office. The copy room, site of late night poker games back in Duo's intern days, was empty except for NYU, who was actually asleep on top of one of the copy machines, clutching it like a blanket or teddy bear.
Duo and Heero shared a smirk over that but left him.
Yale and Harvard, as it turned out, were in the research library, half-naked and quickly working their way towards full nudity when Duo and Heero walked in.
"Now they've got the right idea," Heero murmured in Duo's ear, his body close enough that all Duo needed to do was take a half step back to be pressed against him.
Duo did take that step back, bumping into Heero and walking both of them out of the library before Yale and Harvard could notice them. He wasn't quite sure why he didn't want to interrupt their extracurricular activities - perhaps it had something to do with the way he and Trowa had spent their last night as interns together.
"Do they?" Duo asked him once they were back in the hall and headed to his office again.
"Of course I wouldn't push you up against a shelf of legal documents. I'd probably go for the table."
Duo glared at him.
"You're not going to give up, are you?"
Heero shrugged.
"Would you?"
Duo considered that.
"I probably wouldn't have stepped into the elevator in the first place," Duo admitted, referring to that night four months ago now.
"Really?" Heero looked disbelieving.
"Yeah. I mean - if it had been you and Trowa and me standing out there watching?" Duo shook his head. "No way I would have had the balls to get in there."
"Yet you decided to have a threesome with a complete stranger to celebrate your anniversary?"
Duo sighed. They had arrived back at his office and he gestured for Heero to sit again.
"Well, yeah." He threw himself into his chair. "I've only been with three - well, now four - guys. Trowa is a lot more experienced than I am and it was… I don't know, I guess it started as a running joke or a tease or something and then we just decided to do it."
"And now you regret it?"
"Every damn day," Duo bit out.
Heero's face betrayed the hurt he felt at Duo's words and Duo actually felt guilty.
"It's not - hell, man, it's not even your fault. I just… it was amazing - obviously. You know that. You were there. But now it's… it's out there. And seeing you every day at work - seeing you and Trowa walk into work together every day…" Duo realized he had say way too much.
"It wasn't my intention to ruin your life," Heero said, and his words sounded almost rehearsed. "If I'd known you two were married… I still would have done it," he admitted and shook his head. "Even now, if I had the chance to do it again, I would."
Duo sighed.
"Yeah, that's the problem - because you're right here every damn day and I can't even look at your fingers without remembering how they felt inside of me and I just want to -"
"Food's here!" Georgetown called out as she walked into the office.
"Thanks," Duo growled, earning a chuckle from Heero and a confused look from Georgetown before she scurried out.
"You were saying something about what you wanted to do to me? Or maybe what you wanted me to do to you?" Heero prompted once they were alone again.
Duo just stared at him.
"How are you possibly this confident?"
Heero shrugged.
"It's mostly a bluff, at least where you're concerned. But at this point - what have I got to lose? I already spend every day thinking of reasons to walk by your office and Trowa's office, just so I can look at you. I think of dozens of reasons to ask you out for drinks and I never do because I know I've made a mess of your lives and I don't know how to fix that and the hell if I even want to. That night was the most incredible night of my life, Duo. And that night you and Trowa took me out - it was torture. Your cologne makes me hard. Hearing you or Trowa laugh reminds me of that night. Four months ago I was the best lawyer I knew and my entire life was on track - but then you chose me and I haven't known what the hell I'm doing a single day since then."
Heero looked angry, his eyes wide and intense and a frown pulling his dark eyebrows together.
Duo swallowed. He hadn't really considered what this situation was like for Heero.
"Heero -"
The other man shook his head.
"Don't. You have the perfect life and I got this little taste of it. I'm just a greedy bastard who wants more."
It's not perfect, Duo wanted to say. It hadn't been - not since that night, and maybe, now that Duo started to really think about it, not even before then.
Trowa was, beyond a doubt, the love of Duo's life, his other half and the one man he wanted to grow old with. Except, after that night, after a month of working in the same office as Heero and hearing what a hard ass he was to the interns, how he actually took the time to talk to Vandy about the Rangers, seeing the way he made Trowa smile or even chuckle - after all of that it was hard to think that Duo and Trowa were perfect, were complete and whole. It was hard because Heero wasn't the only one who had gotten a taste of something he wanted more of.
It was four a.m. when they finally had a strategy, and it was a damn good one. As they walked to the elevator together, exhausted and a little manic because of it, Duo bumped his shoulder against Heero's.
"You're pretty handy with a highlighter, Harvard."
Heero snorted.
"You've got a way with a legal pad that's going to keep me up at night, Yale," he returned and Duo chuckled.
"But seriously, I think we've got a good position on this - it's not going to be an easy case but -"
"It's going to be a damn good one. I'm looking forward to seeing you in court," Heero said. "Any chance you do something ridiculously sexy with your hair?"
"What? Like Tro?" Duo shook his head and then sighed. "Nah, he's got the market on Sex Me, Your Honor hair. I just wear my best three piece suit and look really, really handsome."
"How is that different than any other day?" Heero asked.
Duo looked at him.
"It's four am, we both look and feel like shit and you still have the energy to try to flirt with me?"
Heero smirked, the expression sleepy and Duo had to take a step backwards so that he didn't give in to the urge to kiss him.
Duo shook his head.
"I'll see you in five hours," he said when they stepped out of the elevator on the ground floor.
"I'm looking forward to it," Heero said.
"Yeah. Me too," Duo admitted.
