Oliver is unsure exactly how long it is that they sleep for, but he guesses it to be an hour; perhaps two. Stirring, he's aware that the iron rumble of carriage wheels over the stones outside has finally faded, not to grow in volume once again until dawn, yet he doesn't feel as though he has slept a full night away. Two o'clock? He's just begun to listen, out of habit, for the vibrating strike of the clock in his hall to answer his question, so that he can drift off once more, when the sudden recollection of where he is banishes the notion entirely and replaces it with a flame as hot as the fireplace.

He realizes what it is that's awoken him when he feels a wet kiss at the nape of his neck. He's lying on his side, with Jack close behind him, his arm draped loosely over his hip, the hollows and angles of their bodies tessellating them together rather than clashing. Still stunned by the earlier turn of events, the surge of desire that had driven him half out of his mind and the strength of his coming, he nevertheless cannot fight down the pleasure that stirs.

"Jack," he says. He feels uncertain of whether he actually speaks, or whether he simply shapes the word.

"Wotcher," Jack says, his lips brushing Oliver's skin and producing a gentle shiver. He shifts nearer, stroking the warm hair between Oliver's legs, and Oliver feels a stiff length press against his buttocks and move back and forth a time or two. Touch in such an area is vaguely unnerving, but, ever a slave to the sexual search for novelty where the strange is erotic as a result of its strangeness, his own groin betrays him with a first distinct twitch. "Felt that," Jack comments, against his ear.

"I'm not surprised," Oliver answers. He's audible this time.

"You was quite lusty this evening." Jack's fingers curl around Oliver's length and begin to move, wickedly slowly, using his touch as he does his words. "In fact, I reckon I could see another cock-stand on you in a couple of minutes. What do you think?"

"I don't think that I'll need very much encouragement." It's both arousing and peculiarly easy to talk like this, merely listening to Jack's voice and feeling the movements of his hands. The fire alternately rises and dances. Oliver fancies that he grows in accordance, the flame in his blood rising as that of the wood does. The light of day will turn him back into a coward, and, knowing it, he stubbornly allows himself to relish this a little longer. The feeling of his cock engorging in Jack's hand is indescribable.

"You have the finest prick," Jack says. He thrusts shallowly, penetrating the crook of Oliver's thighs at the end of each stroke.

"Thank you."

"And I ain't got any objections to your arse, either."

"So I can guess," Oliver says, softly. He feels the other man pause, and adds, "I wasn't asking you to stop, Jack."

"No, but you was wondering where we was going to end up tonight."

"Yes," Oliver admits.

Jack rests his chin upon his shoulder, stroking him in a rhythm that's enough to keep him stiff and give pleasure, but not enough to set him on the journey towards the edge. "I ain't going to say I wouldn't like to. I also ain't about to fuck any arse what ain't begging to be fucked. I know when a feller's interested and ready for it, and I know when he wants to run a mile."

"Not quite that far."

"Well, the other side of the bed, then."

He's never laughed during sexual congress before, Oliver thinks, with amazement; not in the same way. He could never have imagined being stripped and practically rutting with Jack, and still being teased by him as he might seated like gentlemen at his table, or during a fleeting encounter on the street. It seems nothing short of miraculous, that this can happen, and that it still does nothing to diminish either his erection, or the fierce longing that he feels inside. He lays his hand over Jack's, feeling the motions on his cock from the other side, sharing it.

"The last time we laid in the same bed," he says, "Fagin told you to look after me."

Jack nips lightly at his skin. "Going to look after you tonight, and all."

"I'm confident of that," Oliver answers softly. Then, after a brief hesitation, "But I'm still curious."

"Killed a tomcat was what curiosity did - as the Irish'd say it."

"I've still a few more lives left to use up than you have," Oliver says. Suddenly restless, he shifts, pushing his rigid cock, which is beginning to ask for more, a little more strongly into the hand caressing it. To his disappointment, it gives him only a squeeze before withdrawing completely. The bed frame creaks a little, and he feels the give of the mattress behind him. Half on his back, he watches the other man cross the room to a cupboard from which he retrieves a bottle of lamp oil. As he walks back to the bed, Oliver's eye is drawn almost involuntarily to the bob of his cock before him; the tremble of his balls. Only when in the role of an observer, he realizes, is one reminded of the boldness and impudence of an erect penis. To not look is simply impossible, and the desire that it gives him to touch his own equally impossible to resist. Jack swats his hand away as he clambers back on beside him.

"You gave up all rights to that prick when you got on my bed. It ain't spunking tonight without my being involved."

"Too much longer, and it's going to be taking matters into its own hands, let alone mine."

"You need to learn some patience. Like I've bloody had to. But I ain't an unreasonable man." Gripping him once more, he begins to slide slowly up and down. "That good?"

Oliver allows a sigh of relief to escape. "Very," he says. Jack's hands fit him beautifully, he thinks. The heightened stimulation of a touch not his own, combined with the owner's knowing of exactly what will be good to Oliver, simply because it's good to him, is the most intense and remarkable thing that he's ever experienced. He feels the rhythm break as Jack reaches to uncork the bottle, the distinctive smell immediately noticeable, but not intolerable.

"Well, this'll be better," he says, exposing Oliver's glans. He lets greasy fluid drip over the flushed skin before taking hold of him again, and no more than half a dozen strokes pass before Oliver is shuddering from head to toe.

His own natural secretions already have him slick, but the addition of the thick, glutinous oil increases the sensations tenfold. His abdomen clenches; his thighs shake. "Oh, God," he says, "oh, God, yes!" He reaches back, grasping at Jack's hip, trying to anchor himself. The pleasure is so intense that it trembles on the border between pleasure and an agony that is almost sweet in itself.

Jack dribbles more oil over his fingers, and sets the bottle aside before slipping them into Oliver's cleft. He strokes up and down, each stroke ending in an exquisite pressure behind his balls. At length, the movements seem to grow more deliberate, and a fingertip drags slowly over his anus before returning to and circling it. Oliver waits to see what will come about, and Jack pushes with the pad of his finger, suggesting. Oliver quivers. The suspense of it is powerful beyond belief; the anticipation. Jack nudges him with his hips, hand caught between them.

"Well?"

"All right," Oliver hears himself saying. He feels dazed, wondering what he can be about, yet a part of him wants to experience this, just to go some little way towards understanding the corresponding part of Jack. The need to do what he must to be close to him tonight is strong.

"In the arsehole?" Jack says, coarsely. Not for a moment does he intend to allow Oliver to pretend that he's doing anything other than what he is. "You want me to put my fingers in your arse? You certain of that, Oliver?"

Another press of Oliver's perineum, one that sends deep tingles through him. "Yes," he says. "Do it. I want it."

"No, you don't." Jack leans over Oliver's shoulder to brush his jaw with a swift kiss. "But it's going to be as good for you as I can make it, mate."

It seems unbelievable that what is to happen will indeed happen. In direct violation of his anatomical knowledge, Oliver's brain seems to insist that the action will not work; that it's simply impossible. Jack's little circles begin to combine with pressure, making a gentle but insistent demand for him to yield. The oil on his skin makes it too simple, and a fingertip makes a sudden slippery advance, wrenching a gasp from him. There's no pain, but panic wells up instead as he battles not to reject something that seems wholly foreign, as if it simply ought not to be there. "Easy," Jack says, "settle down. Let it in," and a moment later, his whole finger slides the rest of the way and rests quietly within.

It's difficult to speak, and beyond consideration to move. Oliver finds that he can only lie very still indeed, his heart thumping madly. He tries to make himself relax around it, but however he wills it, he can't seem to make his body obey. Jack fondles his cock with his free hand, but although Oliver is still aware of pleasure, he can't lose himself in it; whenever he tries, he only homes in on that tiny pressure within him once again. His mind is fighting against it a good deal more vehemently than his body is; he recognizes that. He has to try to see it in a different light.

No woman would do such a thing to him or with him, he thinks. This is a secret that he will share with Jack alone. Something sinful. Something private. Something intensely intimate.

Little by little, agonizingly slowly, he feels his muscles begin to loosen.

"Good," Jack says. His voice has dropped an octave. "You let me explore a bit." Smoothly, he slides his finger in and out, accustoming Oliver to the movement. After perhaps half a dozen times, it progresses into a circular motion that presses inquiringly against the walls of his rectum. "Two, now," Jack warns, and Oliver feels nerve endings burn and spark as the finger draws out and then slides back again in the company of a second, stretching him. Jack takes his hand and brings it to his cock.

"You look after your prick," he says, "while I look after this lovely arse, and we'll get to something good."

Oliver can imagine what it is that Jack intends: that penile stimulation while simultaneously being penetrated will help to forge the connections in his mind between the latter action and pleasure. He listens to the heavy sound of Jack's breathing and tries to concentrate on touching himself. Jack's fingers probe softly in him, seeking, until they skim what he immediately guesses by the sudden intense, almost urinary urge to be his prostate. His cock twitches, and Jack bites at his ear.

"There you are," he says, rather huskily. "That's nice, ain't it? Some more?"

Oliver feels himself torn into two pieces. One is the familiar excitement as his trembling hand strokes his cock up and down; the other, the sharp almost-hurt that flickers through him whenever Jack finds that small, swollen bump. It's as though he's unsure which to concentrate on and can't accommodate both. "Yes," he says, hesitatingly, "a little more."

The twin pleasures are excruciating, but something around the outskirts of his thoughts interferes with them whenever they come. Being stretched as he is is uncomfortable, rather than the closeness that he had hoped for; distracting.

I can't spend like this. The thought alone begins to blunt the edge of his arousal.

Jack's fingers draw half out of him and then return even slipperier, simply gliding within this time, stroking and working him with a new depth of purpose. Rough kisses scatter over his shoulder and are pressed to his neck. "Oliver," he hears Jack saying, "Oliver," as if his name alone is glorious, and then the other man moves and his fingers are all but gone, only spreading Oliver's buttocks and holding them apart for his warm, firm cock to nestle in between. The tip finds his anus and rubs against it for a few seconds, then positions itself, and he recognizes, as a man, what is to come: the push forward; the demand for entry. And, one final time, he balks. Once again, he is a coward.

"No," he says, "no. I can't. I'm sorry," and pulls away, out of the warm curve of Jack's arm and away from his seeking thrust. Hurriedly, he lifts himself into a sitting position, as if that's the way to ensure safety. His heart is pounding with something other than excitement. "I'm sorry, Jack," he says again, and shuts his eyes for a moment, despising himself for the sense of relief that he feels. "I wanted to try. Truly, I did. But -"

"I was right and you was wrong?"

Oliver lifts his head, forcing himself to meet Jack's gaze again. The other man has turned onto his back and is propping himself up partway with his elbows, his cock stiff upon his abdomen. He's breathing hard from his thwarted activity, and, yet, about his mouth plays what could be the start of a grin. "I said you wasn't ready for it," he adds, for explanation.

"But I wanted to be," Oliver says, unsteadily but forcefully. "I wanted -" He breaks off, searching fruitlessly for the words with which to express himself. "I wanted to try to understand you," he finishes, at last. "At least a little."

Jack looks at him so intently, and for such a time, that Oliver begins to fancy himself a specimen under the microscope. He could not be more carefully observed if he were. He comes to the sudden realization that it's very seldom that anyone can be entirely certain of what is going on behind Jack's eyes. And then this hint of trickster nature is forgotten, and Jack is leaning back on the fat feather pillow behind him, making himself comfortable. He holds out a hand.

"Come on," he says, "come here." When Oliver reaches for him in turn and allows himself to be drawn down, Jack takes him in his arms. He kisses his mouth, his face, and his throat. "We understand each other pretty well already, my old covey," he says, "and if we can't sort out a problem between us, something ain't right."

"What would be your suggestion?" Oliver says. He concentrates upon Jack pushing his fingers through his hair.

"Well, Oliver, you mightn't be ready for me, but I'm more than ready for you."

Oliver feels something akin to being punched again, in the sense of all of the breath being knocked out of him, but what clenches his stomach is not hurt, but rather a wave of hot, dark pleasure. That Jack is blatantly asking to be buggered is staggering, and more so is the knowledge that he wants it; that he has asked for it before.

"We can stop if you don't like it," Jack says. "I reckon you will."

"I should take you?" Oliver finds the voice to ask.

"What about it? I have to say, since you showed me this nice fat prick, I ain't been able to stop thinking about how it'd feel -"

"My God!" Oliver says, heatedly. His cock, far from being repulsed by all of this, is becoming so stiff again that it seems to twitch in its tautness with a life of its own. Jack reaches down and fondles it, rolling his skin back, tugging and teasing.

"Well, this is interested, if you ain't. Want to spunk in my arse, Oliver, while I do it on your chest again? Or in your hand. I ain't got any preferences."

"I don't know that I'll last that long."

"We ain't got no time to waste then, have we?" Jack takes up the bottle again and, grasping Oliver's hand with his other, douses his fingers thoroughly with the dark goldenish grease. Then he opens his thighs and thrusts it between them, guiding it swiftly to the creases of his anus.

From somewhere outside himself, Oliver has cause to marvel once again at how soft is the skin here. Professional and personal affairs alike have familiarized him with every inch of the human body, and this is among the most tender places. Perhaps it's his profession also that enables him to move carefully and unflinchingly about it as he imagines that many men who have loved women and cunts alone would struggle to. He can certainly understand the necessity here in the oil, and the memory of the heightened sense of touch and intense pleasure when Jack had used it on his cock makes him wonder whether, if the smell were more amenable, women might also enjoy such a thing, needed or not. With fingers trembling from his own arousal, he tries to work the substance smoothly around the private opening, daring to press in a little as the slow rotating squirm of Jack's hips confirm that how he is going about matters is very right indeed. His balls roll across Oliver's hand.

"You got a lovely touch," Jack tells him, in a low voice, "Wish I'd fucked a doctor sooner. Give me a couple, now," he adds, and, his chest tight, Oliver makes himself slip his fingers through the close-gripped ring of muscle to where it's warm and smooth.

Jack's pleased response gives him the confidence to enter further, seeking the little gland. The other man spreads his legs wider to admit Oliver between them, and Oliver sinks against him, using Jack's inner thigh to push at, his fingers buried in Jack's body, Jack with his own cock in hand, thrusting and rubbing and stroking in pleasure. For any man to be permitted to feel this way must be the greatest sin of all. Part of a woman is forever hidden from him behind a veil: as deeply as he might penetrate her body, he will never truly understand it. There is no veil tonight. Jack and he move together, bring their mouths together; perfect synchronicity, each meeting the other's desire almost before it can be expressed. This is what it is, Oliver thinks, to make love with another man.

His cock aches and throbs where it brushes Jack's skin, demanding fulfilment. He is reaching the level of consciousness where a new purpose of being comes upon him: to pleasure it, and nothing else. Rubbing is no longer enough; he wants to be engulfed. "I want to be inside, Jack," he says, brokenly. "God help me. God help me."

"About time, too," he hears Jack's breathless voice say. He moves beneath Oliver, bringing them into position, hooking his knees up and locking his ankles loosely at the small of his back. His hips wriggle judiciously as the crown of Oliver's cock taps against his skin. His head swimming, Oliver uses a hand to guide himself into place. He presses, feeling the slight resistance and afraid to hurt.

"Oliver, your arse might be virgin, but mine ain't! Just bloody push!"

Oliver inches forth, expecting the gentle slide, a gradual opening of the channel to admit him, but upon the slippery pop of the crown through the tight entrance, the rest of his cock is simply drawn in the rest of the way without opposition. Almost instantly, he sheaths himself in Jack's body, unable to prevent the escape of a moan. Jack wraps his arms about his back, pulling him close with soft words, obscene words. Oliver thrusts slowly into warm muscles that clench and squeeze about his cock as though fucking him in return, trying to coax his spend from him. Jack guides him through it, the new angles and the right rhythm, telling him all the while what he wants from him. Faster. Deeper. "You're a nice fucker," he says, panting his pleasure over Oliver's skin, and, after a time, "Turn me over!"

"Onto your stomach?" Oliver can't bear this; no-one could. He feels mad with it.

"Like this." Jack heaves upwards, and then Oliver is abruptly out of him and he's climbing to his hands and knees and presenting himself. His thighs are trembling. Oliver has been the one to make him this way. "Good and hard. That'll do it for the both of us."

Positioning himself behind Jack, Oliver clutches briefly for anchor on his hips before sliding in to the hilt. It seems to be even easier this time, as though they were formed to do this, to fit together. As he moves again, the tingling tension that is born on the underside of his glans and runs the entire length of his shaft returns. The dirtiness and unnaturalness of the act that he's committing fades to nothing. He wants to thrust forever, to send the tight wave of pleasure higher and higher. Jack sways beneath his hands, and Oliver is dimly aware that his friend is taking hold of his own cock and using their momentum to fuck it into his hand. He feels that he could die. Jack's tight, silky muscles, his wicked mouth and his even more devious mind, have been put into the world to be both Oliver's bane and his joy.

He loves it. Loves him.

"Jack -" he says, "Jack - I can't hold on! I have to!"

"I ain't going to break," he hears Jack answer.

"Tell me if I hurt!" Oliver's voice sounds harsh and desperate in his own ears.

"Oliver!"

For the first time in his life, Oliver lets himself loose. He slams into Jack so hard that the other man almost lurches off balance, plunging himself into the core of him. In and out, over and over again, he rejoins their bodies with a slap of skin against skin, each repetition of the act seeming to succeed the last in heat and ecstasy. He can see Jack frigging himself furiously, his full, swollen cock drooling through his fingers, little droplets of it thrown off onto the sheet. Oliver's hair rasps against the other man's buttocks as he drives deeper, and the sound that Jack makes in response is almost a snarl.

"Go on, Oliver! Go on, go on!"

Never has Oliver felt this wanted and this welcomed. Jack's hips swivel back and forth to meet every thrust, fucking with him rather than submitting to his actions, accepting everything Oliver has and then demanding more. He gives and he takes, and Jack does the same. There are no more subtleties or complexities. He only wants to fuck. He begins to shudder, the unmistakable sensations arising around his anus and his balls.

"I'm coming!" he says, raggedly, and almost instantly feels Jack spasm and the bone-deep groan that vibrates through him as he spends; sends thick ribbons of sperm fountaining over his fist and the sheets. Even as Oliver watches, slack-jawed and dizzy with lust, his hips moving with their own volition, he starts to erupt; from the pit of his stomach, from the base of his spine, from the depths of his balls. He feels himself spurt inside Jack, filling him, shock blending with the sweetest, strongest pleasure that he could ever conceive of. His sweaty hips adhere themselves to Jack's buttocks as his cock pulses and pumps deep within. Even after the last drop has been milked from it, it continues to pulse, as if attempting to catch its breath.

He never wants to leave, but, eventually, his cock grows too soft, and he can't help but slip out.

Jack comes to lie on top of him again, something he seems to take great delight in doing. Oliver's wet groin cradles his as their hands slide slowly over one another's skin. The ripe smell of fucking is heavy in the air.

"You going to stay a bit longer?" Jack asks.

"I could," Oliver says.

Opposite the bed, the fire pops and crackles, smoking a little as the logs shift and the flame licks at damp moss.