Harvey wakes Mike up with a mouth around his cock. Really, he can't help himself. He'd lain awake, staring down at his Sub, until he could no longer resist the opportunity to see what sounds he would make without a gag in his mouth.

"Fucking hell. Harvey." Mike lifts his heels up along the mattress and lets his knees fall open. Harvey hums in approval and settles more comfortably between his thighs. He flicks his tongue along the swelling tip of Mike's bobbing erection and grins when Mike hisses and throws an arm over his red flushed face.

"Don't hide your face from me," he says, lifting off. Mike drops his arm but refuses to look at him. Harvey frowns, moves up over his body and kisses him on the corner of the mouth. He stacks up all the pillows at the head of the bed and urges Mike to recline onto them.

"I want to see your face, and I want you to watch. We don't have anything to hide or be ashamed of."

"I'm not ashamed," he says in a whisper. Harvey strokes his cock with one hand teasingly. "It's just, overwhelming."

Harvey kisses him, deeper this time, and slides back down to suck again at the tip of his cock. He glances up at Mike who is looking at him half lidded and with that little O of the lips that always makes Harvey want to come in a Sub's mouth - but, that's for another time. Mike's hand is laying against his stomach, the fingers moving unsurely against his belly.

"You can," Harvey encourages. Mike smiles and gently runs his fingers through Harvey's hair with pleasurable concentration as if exploring new territory, but when Harvey swallows him again, this time with purpose, Mike cries out and his fingers dig into his scalp. He pulls at his hair painfully and Harvey loves it so much that he's rubbing himself off against his thousand dollar egyptian cotton sheets.

"Fuck!" Mike lifts his hips off the mattress and presses his cock deep down Harvey's throat as he comes. Harvey licks him clean then sits back on his heels with a grin, admiring his hard work and completely blissed out Sub.

"Do most Doms -" Mike starts, but he has to take a few deep shuttering breaths before he can continue. "Do most Doms like doing that?"

"Doing what?"

"Sucking cock."

Harvey runs his hands along Mike's sweat dampened chest. "There's no formula. I like to look and feel and taste my Subs. And I won't pretend I haven't wanted to taste you in particular for a long long time."

"You've only known me for three weeks."

"Hmm. Then, I've been waiting to taste a Sub like you for longer."

"Like me? What am I like?"

Harvey thinks about this. "I don't know. Inexplicably irresistible."

Mike smiles and Harvey enjoys the naturally serene look of comfort and peace that he hasn't had the pleasure to observe in him before. Knowing that it was he who put him there, and not the drugs, makes it all that much better.

"I thought you might have a thing for short hair. Ethan said you did." He's smiling.

"It's a new development. When did you talk to Ethan?"

Mike clams up and turns his head away. Harvey gently touches his chin to direct him back again. He keeps petting his chest to keep him oriented.

"I said, when did you talk to Ethan?"

"Yesterday. No. The day before."

"Before he left the apartment without permission?"

Mike nods.

"What did you talk about?"

"Do we really have to talk about this?" He stretches and Harvey admires fondly the faint marks on his wrists from the night before. "It isn't important."

"It's important to me."

Mike sighs. "He just gave me some friendly advice, okay?"

"Friendly advice? Mike, he left the apartment without telling me. He wasn't supposed to leave the couch!"

Mike wrinkles up his nose. "God, Harvey. Controlling much?"

"If I'm scening with a Sub I expect them to stay where I put them. I'm a Dom, Mike. Me controlling you during a scene is the whole point."

Mike swallows and runs his hand over Harvey's thigh. "I know that. I do. It's just all really new for me."

Harvey bends down and kisses him long and deep and until both their lips are swollen and hot.

"Ethan left because he hoped he'd convinced me to give you what he thought you really wanted," Mike whispers against his lips.

"What a smart boy. But I think you would have come to me anyway."

He nods. "Eventually."

They lay together for nearly an hour just touching, kissing, and watching the sun light up the New York skyline.

"I was thinking," Harvey finally says when he hears a little rumble in Mike's stomach, "that because of that bit of snark you left on your checklist yesterday about housework, you get to make breakfast. I might have a cleaning service, but that shouldn't exclude me the opportunity to watch you cooking naked."

Mike finds it surprisingly easy to walk around Harvey's kitchen bare assed, even occasionally bending down to get things from the bottom shelf. When he finds the mixing bowl he stands up and smiles back at Harvey who is sitting at the counter with his coffee and newspaper. He's practically humming like some fucking Disney princess while pouring milk and cracking eggs into Harvey's weird organic pancake batter.

There's definitely something different about this morning. It could be any number of things - the fact that it's Saturday, the fact that he now has minimal experience being gawked at naked by Harvey, or maybe it has something to do with the subspace - well, Harvey would definitely say that were true.

Whichever it is, while it lasts Mike plans to enjoy the easy feeling of submitting and getting the reward of approval in return.

"So what's your big Saturday plan? More housework and a bit of sex on the side?" Mike licks some batter off his fingers and raises his eyebrows suggestively.

"You might not care now, but in a few days you'll resent me if I make you polish my furniture all day ."

Mike shrugs. "I thought this was supposed to be an exercise in submission?"

Harvey nods. "You're right. But you've done enough for now. I thought a reward would be in order."

"A reward? Like a dog treat?"

Harvey laughs. "I'm going to have to paddle that snark out of you one of these days."

The suggestion is enough to make Mike's hands tremble. He sets down the wooden spoon that suddenly looks a lot more naughty.

Harvey sits in silence while Mike finishes the pancakes and serves them in little oblong not-so-perfect piles. A couple are burnt, but he puts those on his own plate. He sets out two forks and a bottle of syrup. "I'm not a chef or anything, so I hope this is adequate, your highness." He makes a little bow with a flourish of the wrist. If housework is in his future he might as well commit himself to the Cinderella act.

Harvey looks at him over his paper and when Mike comes around to sit on the stool he whips out a hand and strikes him hard against the ass.

"Shit!" Mike stares at him open mouthed.

"Warning number one."

He rubs the hot spot blossoming and sits down gingerly. "Yes, sir." Mike keeps his hands over his lap to try hiding his exposed cock.

"I'd have started spanking you earlier if I'd known it would win me some respect." Mike blushes as Harvey runs a hand up his thigh and nudges aside his hand to cup his erection. He sets down his paper and leans over to kiss and bite the sensitive skin behind Mike's ear. "Remember what I said about embarrassment? Don't cover yourself from me." Mike gulps and nods, his breathing already speeding up under Harvey's confident caress, but before it has time to go any further Harvey releases him and picks up his fork. He looks at the two plates with a frown and then switches them. "I like them better burnt anyway."

"I'm taking you out," Harvey says while they lay together on the leather couch watching a movie on his pay-per-view. Mike hasn't really bothered to notice that the sun is starting to set. Harvey let him get dressed after breakfast so he's been at leisure to forget about the alarming new dynamics between them. At least for the afternoon.

Mike is laying between Harvey's legs and resting against his broad chest. They were both so comfortable that Mike startles a little and shifts as if a cloud of peace has lifted. Harvey holds Mike against him with one arm and uses the other to continue playing with his hair.

"Where?"

"That's entirely up to you."

"What do you mean? Like, I guess I could go for some Chinese?"

Harvey laughs. "I meant, would you like to go out as my Sub, or my associate?"

Mike turns his head away and after a minute he sits up and rubs his face. "Seriously? After submitting to you for two days you're already pressuring me to come out?"

Harvey looks hurt, but he buries it quickly. "I don't want you to compromise yourself, Mike. It's just... there's a club I know - The Underground. It's really only popular with the college scene so no one we know would be there. We could go, get a drink. I don't want you to feel you have to stay closeted up in this apartment."

"Closeted?" Mike stares at Harvey who looks as serious as steel. "You know what, if you want to take me out, you can do it as my boss." Mike raises his eyebrows. "And if in the future you have a problem with me being closeted you can just go back in time and not hire me under the full disclosure that my submissiveness never be public."

Harvey swallows and nods. "Fine. Get ready and we'll go in an hour. Chinese."

Mike stands and walks past him into his room where he shuts his door a little too loudly. When he comes out into the hall an hour later Harvey is waiting by the door in one of his more casual but no less intimidating suits. Mike pockets his keys before reaching for the door.

"Mike." He turns slightly and finds Harvey immediately up against him and his lips almost too rough as he fights entrance into Mike's mouth, demanding supplication with a firm grip around his chin. Harvey kisses him until he's hard and panting.

"What was that for?"

"I'll promise not to push the issue of your public image, and I'll pretend to take you out as my associate, but I do have the right to remind you that you're more than that to me."

Mike nods. "I know, Harvey."

Harvey holds the door open and leads him down the hallway and into the building's elevator.

"So how was your weekend? Uneventful?" Mike looks over at Kyle who is stretching and yawning. It's barely ten minutes into Monday morning and Kyle usually never wants to talk to him, or anybody. He's usually looking dead in his cubicle with two cups of coffee sitting in front of him.

Mike shrugs. "Yeah, I guess so."

Harvey and Mike had woken up from a sleep that hadn't included subspace, much to Harvey's disappointment. A disappointment that would become more and more worthwhile to Mike if blow-jobs were going to be the consolation prize. Honestly, it wasn't exactly something to get upset about. Mike averaged one joint of Subspace a week or less, and he was pretty sure Harvey was going to do better than that, even if it didn't happen every scene. However, Mike was starting to get a bit upset with Harvey for batting his hand away whenever he went for his cock. Eventually Mike was going to need to do some actual work in this relationship - wasn't he?

"I know, that's always the way when something weird happens."

Mike snaps out of his memory and looks over at Kyle curiously. "What do you mean, weird?"

"What? Didn't you hear? It was all over the news."

Mike shrugs as one of the other associates looks from their cubicle, ready to join in on the explanation.

"Well there's this little club in the East Village. The Underground?"

Mike narrows his eyes curiously. "Yeah, what about it?"

"You've been there? Cool, no one I know has." He's smiling.

"No. No I haven't been there, but I've heard of it."

"Well, some Dom came in Saturday night and paid a bundle to arrange a huge orgy. Like seven or eight Subs all to himself."

Mike nods. It was a little weird, definitely, but not unheard of. His parents generation loved doing shit like that, and when he was in high school it was the thing junior year to start orgies in back bedrooms during parties. Doms would make bets to see who could have the most Subs join in.

"Anyway, they found all the Subs dead a few hours later."

Mike drops the paper he'd been holding and hides his shaking hand under the desk.

"All of them?" His voice loses its dominant control, but they probably won't distinguish it from regular disbelief. Mike looks at the associate to his other side and cringes at the grin on his face - that strange look of uncomfortable curiosity that people show when gossiping about really heinous things that seem completely outside their own realm of reality. Mike gulps.

"And the Dom?"

"He offed himself too."

Mike nods. "And nobody pulled a panic trigger? What about the safety camera?"

Kyle shakes his head. "Crazy right? It was poison or something. They haven't gotten the test results back, but it was pretty much over before anyone knew something was wrong. But the shit he did first is still pretty radical. Though, apparently not off limits. The details are all over the internet if you know where to look."

Mike turns away and looks at his reflection in the computer screen. He couldn't really tell but he must be losing color fast judging by the tingling heat in his cheeks and sick feeling in his stomach.

"I think I heard the security tape has leaked too."

"Yeah, okay. Thanks for telling me," Mike says before turning on his computer screen and mindlessly scrolling through his weekend emails. Kyle says something that Mike doesn't catch, laughs, and plops down behind his cubicle wall.

No less than a half hour later Mike's phone buzzes. It's Harvey.

Did you hear?

Yeah.

This is me texting first when I want to check on you.

Mike grins despite the cold sweat that hasn't quite dissipated. He's starting to feel more and more ridiculous for freaking out over something that really has nothing to do with him. After all, bad things happen, it's not the first story like this, and even if he had gone to the club with Harvey, it still wouldn't have put him at risk.

Thanks. I'm okay.

I don't believe you.

I'm okay until the end of the day. Can we talk later?

There's no answer for a long time.

I'm sorry I offered to take you there.

How could you have known? Don't be stupid.

You'll come by if you need me?

Yes. But I'll be fine. Really.

Mike drops his phone into one of his drawers where he doesn't have to stare at it all day and think about how much better he would feel if Harvey were here.

At lunch he realizes that he hasn't seen anything of Rachel and decides that at least she is an acceptable workplace distraction. He grabs the number for a pizza place that had been delivering menus the previous week and wanders over to her office. She's sitting behind her desk, her hair slightly disheveled, reading something on her computer with a look of pained concentration.

Mike knocks on the door frame. She startles.

"Mike. Hey. Come in." She quickly clicks out of something on her computer and smiles when she sees the pizza menu he's holding up.

"Hungry?"

She nods. "Yeah, sure."

Mike sits and takes out his phone.

"Actually, you know what. Can I rain check?" He looks up and frowns at her tired eyes and pale complexion. He hadn't noticed before, so intent on finding something normal to distract him.

"Rachel, are you alright?"

"It's so stupid. But that thing Saturday. I knew one of the girls who died."

"Oh my god."

Rachel tucks a piece of hair behind her ear and shakes her head. "No. I guess I didn't really know her at all. She was one of my roommate's friends in college. Elise. I must have only seen her a half dozen times. And it's not like we even had any meaningful conversations. All I remember was thinking she was a complete slut." She laughs. "Now it seems like such a terrible thing to have thought. I mean, some Subs need different things, you know?" She looks at Mike and then rolls her eyes. "Oh yeah, I forgot. You wouldn't know."

Mike tucks the menu and his phone back in his suit pocket. "No, I guess not." He rubs his hands together anxiously under the edge of her desk. "But still, I'm really sorry."

She nods slowly. "I was thinking about watching that video that's going around. Isn't that sick? What the fuck's wrong with me?"

Mike looks behind his shoulder to see Donna loitering around the corner of the receptionist table, looking in at them with concern. When he looks back at Rachel, she too has noticed and there's something desperate and needy in her eyes.

"There's nothing wrong with you. I was upset too."

"Really? Most Doms around here are just tutting their tongues and then gathering in the break rooms to compare how many Subs they've had at one time. As if this were such a great opportunity to relive their orgy memories."

"That's fucked up. I'm sorry."

"It's fine." She shakes her hair out and wipes at the moisture under her eyes. "I shouldn't have emotionally vomited on you. Professionalism is key, right?"

Mike shrugs. "Yeah, I guess."

When she looks over his shoulder Mike is pretty sure he knows who she's looking at.

"Hey, Rachel. I can tell her to come in here if you want."

"Why would I want that?"

"I just thought -"

"I'm fine. I can take care of myself."

He sighs. "Yeah. I know the feeling." Mike stands and brushes off his suit. "Thanks for telling me about - everything. But don't bottle things up too much. Trust me, it doesn't pay off in the end."

Out in the hall Donna stops him with a hand on his arm.

"Harvey might stop pacing his office if you walk by and let him see that you didn't faint dead away."

"Seriously? He really does think I'm Cinderella."

"What?"

"Nothing."

Mike spends the rest of the day feeling guiltily glad to have found Rachel in twice the state that he was, and for a much better reason. He buries himself in his work and at ten after six, just as Mike is thinking that he might actually get home before Harvey, he gets a text.

Emergency. I've tried everything but I can't get home until late.

Something in Mike's chest grinds to a halt. The phone buzzes again.

If you need me, text. I'm so sorry.

It's a little irrational to be upset. Especially after an entire day of feeling gradually more and more okay about the whole thing. But then, that was mostly because he'd been looking forward to going home to Harvey. It looks like the honeymoon weekend is over and it's time to face the fact that Harvey is a big busy mega-lawyer who won't have time to bend over backwards for Mike.

He runs a shaky hand through his hair and opens up a text box. He hasn't seen Trevor in a really long time. And if he can't be with Harvey, he damn well is going to be with someone.

Up for a drink?

Yeah. Same old same old?

Mike agrees and tosses the phone back in the drawer. After a few more emails he grabs his briefcase and heads out. He glances at Harvey's office, feeling a cold flush of disappointment to find it empty and dark.

He meets Trevor at a bar near his old apartment and feels joyously normal and carefree like he hasn't in a long time. The music is loud but the crowds are louder. Trevor looks good and tells him that he estimates a month or less before he gets Jenny back. Mike tells him about his new job, but lies through his teeth about most of it.

"Jenny told me you moved."

"Yeah, it's no big deal. Just closer to this new office."

Trevor nods and takes another sip of his beer.

"Bummer. I liked that dump."

Mike shrugs. "Grown up life and all that. It had to happen eventually."

"So let's go there. I want to see it."

Mike shakes his head. "Not now. Another time."

"No, come on! Show me the address at least. I have the right to know where my best friend lives. We'll walk there together. Remember how much we used to like walking around New York at night and checking out the crazies."

Mike laughs and checks his watch. "Yeah, okay."

They finish another two beers each before they finally make their way out. Mike laughs like it's the funniest shit he's ever seen when Trevor stumbles into a Sub in a too short skirt and eight inch heels. She wobbles like a bad clown on stilts.

They reminisce about the streets they used to frequent as kids and the one electronic store they pass that Trevor shoplifted a video game from. Mike smiles like a fool, not thinking of Harvey once until Trevor stops and pulls him into a short alley next to a little Italian restaurant a few blocks from Harvey's building. He pulls a joint of Subspace from his shirt pocket and smiles.

"I'm not selling, I swear. Just buying. But this is really good stuff. Way better than the shit I sold." He twirls it between his fingers. "Share it with me? It won't be so much that we can't make it home. I'll take a cab."

Mike shakes his head. "No. It's okay."

"Come on man, you have to get a hit now and again. We used to smoke together all the time in high school." He sniffs it then holds it up to Mike's nose. It smells so good Mike moans despite himself. "It's just a little bit."

Mike stares at the appealing little joint and thinks about how good he'll feel and how mad he still is at Harvey for abandoning him. He checks his watch. It's after midnight. He can take a shower in the morning before work and Harvey will never know the difference. He shrugs. "Okay, fine. Why not."

Trevor smiles, flicks open the lighter in his pocket, and lights the end. It glows red in the dark alley, lighting up the concentrated look on his face as he inhales. Mike takes his turn and sighs luxuriously at the divine feeling rushing through his body. Not as good as what Harvey makes him feel, that's for sure, but really good nonetheless. The fragrant smoke billows between them as they smoke chest to chest.

"You'll always be my best friend. You know that right?" Trevor's eyes have drooped and he's talking in that lazy sentimental way he does when he's too drunk, or too high, or both.

Mike and Trevor have to lean on each other as they make their way to the apartment. Mike's hard and all he can think about now is Harvey and getting off.

At the front of the building Trevor whistles. "Damn." Mike shrugs and fumbles in his pocket for his key. "Now you know where it is, as if you'll remember."

"I have you to remember for me."

Mike smiles and shakes his head as Trevor and the doorman work together to flag down a cab. The ride up the elevator feels like forever, but the cold metal doors against his hot forehead make up for it. By the time he has his front door open Mike is thinking obsessively about jacking off to memories of Harvey's mouth on him. He's even thinking about how good it would feel to finally touch Harvey's cock.

He fumbles with the lock to his own door when a light turns on in the living room.

"Where the fuck have you been?"

Mike jumps and drops his keys. "Shit, Harvey."

"Why didn't you answer your phone?" He sounds pissed, but Mike can't really tell in this state.

"Uhm?" He feels around his suit pocket and then remembers the drawer. "Oh yeah. I think I left it at the office." He keeps his head tilted down as he picks up the keys and tries again to open the door. "Sorry. Were you worried or something?"

"Worried. I thought you were hurt. It's one thirty in the morning on a Monday."

"I saw Trevor. We stay out late sometimes." He opens the door and throws his suitcase in. He's about to go when Harvey grabs him around the back of the neck and twirls him around. He looks into Mike's eyes with more venom than he's ever seen.

"I can't fucking believe it. You're high!"