I spoil you people rotten, you know that? Two updates in less than 18 hours? But, as I've said before, I ADORE THIS 'VERSE AND THIS STORY.

So you guys get a long chapter (nearly 4,000 words) with lots of emotions and fun business contained herein. I hope you enjoy it.

Many thanks to DetrimentalHabitsPt4 for your review to the last chapter! I know the rest of you didn't really have time, but...are you really going to complain about two updates in one day? (It's still the 16th where I am, so deal with it.)

Whatever misery that had flooded through him the night before was gone by sunrise to be replaced by pure anger. So Balthazar had been playing with him, messing with his head. That wasn't fair—he clearly had no idea how something like that could cause a band to tear itself to pieces. He wasn't a plaything for Balthazar to use once, grow bored with, and just discard.

So with that anger emboldening him (with just a hint of whiskey running through his system still), he waited until he heard Balthazar call a cab for the girl and the door closed firmly behind her. Once he was sure she was gone, he slammed his door open and stomped toward the kitchen, following the sounds of pots and pans and the scent of a freshly-lit menthol cigarette. Gearing himself up for one of his famous tantrums (Michael had nothing on Lu at full rage), he rounded the corner and half-shouted, "So what the almighty fuck was that about?!"

Balthazar froze. He wore a shirt this morning, for which Lu was grateful because he could be angry all he wanted—it still didn't stop Balthazar from being an attractive bastard. The singer straightened up and turned toward Lu. He looked his bandmate over for a split second before meeting his eyes. When he finally spoke, everything about his demeanor was ice-cold, tight, and controlled. "Rachel needed me to call her a cab. I certainly wasn't going to make her walk home."

"That's not what I meant, and you fucking know it!" Lu was still plenty angry, maybe even more so than before, but this anger, rooted in frustration, was less a welding torch and more a forest fire. Welding torches were contained, controlled, while still being enough to burn, but forest fires were out of control, and if there was one thing Lu couldn't afford to be right now, it was out of control. "Why did you even fucking bring her here?!"

Balthazar, who had gone back to poking at his eggs with a spatula, calmly set down the utensil, turned off the stove, and moved the pan to a cool burner. "I have a feeling this is going to take awhile," he said by way of explanation. He wiped his hands on the dish towel hanging from the handle of the oven door before turning back toward Lu. "Alright. First of all—and correct me if I'm wrong—but I was under the impression that my sex life was none of your business. I am right in thinking that, yes?" he added.

Lu gritted his teeth and gave one quick nod.

"Ah. That's what I thought. So since we've established the fact that that is the case, let me explain, even though you don't deserve an explanation.

"It's simple. Rachel was—is—attracted to me. To me, she is far from unattractive." Balthazar gave an exaggerated shrug. "Two reasonably attractive, attracted, and fully-consenting adults are able to have sex if they so choose, and we did."

Lu was still plenty furious, but the detached way that Balthazar was able to describe what had happened made his blood run a bit cooler. It sounded so clinical, like he didn't really care if it had happened or not.

"So since I've provided an explanation—something I absolutely did not need to do, I'll remind you—answer me this: why do you even care?"

He couldn't pinpoint what it was about that question that caused something inside him to snap, but it was the catalyst for pulling his fist back and swinging at the singer.

Balthazar saw it coming, he knew, but he did nothing to deflect it or even step out of the way. He accepted the punch even as it sent him reeling backwards, but he bounced back and before Lu could brace himself, he'd punched the strawberry blonde right back.

Finally a reaction he could gauge. For those two and a half seconds, there was something else besides the cool restraint on Balthazar's face. For that brief window of time, Lu could see his pain—both physical and emotional—and frustration, and that was what Lu needed. He needed to see how Balthazar really felt, and it only showed when he was swinging at him.

"You asshole!" he yelled once he'd regained his stability. Balthazar made no move to strike him again, and he wasn't about to hit him, either. "I'm not a fucking toy! You can't just fucking throw me away after you're done with me!"

Now Balthazar looked suitably like he'd been slapped in the face. "I didn't—" he started, but Lu cut him off.

"Yes, you fucking did! You just fucking left without waking me up, like you couldn't stand to be around me, you didn't say one fucking word at dinner, I didn't fucking see you at all until the fucking show"—he was aware that he was spewing more profanities than strictly necessary, but he couldn't scrounge up a single fuck to give—"and when you finally did show up, you didn't speak to me at all. You brought home some strange girl less than two days after we…" He hadn't meant for that to spill out, but there it was. "After we fucked, so what the fuck am I supposed to think? This is exactly why I fought against this so hard—you can't fuck people you work with and expect things to stay the same!"

"Luce," Balthazar began again, a desperate edge to his voice, but Lu interrupted again. The bassist was on a roll and he wasn't about to be stopped now, even with the throbbing at his temple where Balthazar's fist had connected.

"No, I can't fucking do this! You have no fucking idea what you do to me, do you? I can't fucking think when you're around! I can't stop thinking about you!" Shit! That wasn't supposed to slip out, either. Too late to take it back now, though. He barreled on without letting Balthazar digest much. "I can handle a lot of bullshit, Balthazar! I can deal with losing my job and getting my bike jacked and getting kicked out of two different homes, but I cannot fucking deal with people treating me like I'm not even a fucking person! So whatever sick psychological game you're trying to play with me, just fucking stop!"

There. It was all out now. He'd said his piece (and a bit more that he hadn't intended to say) and Hurricane Lucifer had blown over. He knew it was possible they were only in the eye of the storm, especially after he heard what Balthazar had to say in response, but he'd calmed down a bit now that he'd finally said what he needed to say.

Balthazar waited a full five seconds before speaking. "Are you done?" he asked finally, tentatively.

"For the moment."

The singer nodded. "Alright." Lu couldn't read the expression on his face, but he hoped he was about to get a damn good explanation. "I'm sorry, Luce," Balthazar said softly. "I'd be lying if I said I had no idea that what I was doing was a bit dickish of me, but I had no idea that you… thought I was using you. That was so far from my intention that it makes me ill, and I can only apologize again for what was obviously a horrible case of miscommunication."

"Rachel?" Lu asked sharply.

A hint of a smile played across the singer's face for a moment. "Never let it be said that I'm completely above petty games. She was an attempt to make you jealous."

"It fucking worked," Lu muttered.

"Obviously, or I have a feeling we wouldn't be having this conversation. At least, not now."

"I meant to talk to you about this yesterday, you know."

"But you didn't."

"You didn't even look at me."

Balthazar was quiet for a long moment. "I don't have an explanation for that."

"I don't want an explanation, I want—" Lu realized what he was saying and stopped before he said I want you. No, he was sick of being the emotional, needy wreck. He was done with it.

The blonde somehow seemed to know what he'd intended to say, and he shook his head, half-smiling. "I understand," he murmured. He'd stepped closer without Lu noticing, but now that he was here, he was able to reach out and cradle the back of Lu's neck. For a second, he looked to be debating whether or not to say something, but he obviously decided against it because he was pulling the bassist closer to him and gently, easily brushing his lips against Lu's.

It was just like their first kiss—and that thought, their first kiss, was enough to cause his heart to clench with something he couldn't name but wasn't altogether unpleasant. The kiss was light, unhurried, just lips and hands sliding across shoulders and down backs and carding through hair. Even after Balthazar stepped closer, his chest and shirt sliding against Lu's bare torso—oh, right, he hadn't put on clothes; he'd gone on his tirade in just his boxers—neither of them seemed willing to deepen the kiss.

But then Balthazar let out a tiny, pleasured sigh and every shred of control Lu had slipped away from him all at once. He traced the seam of Balthazar's lips with his tongue and he felt the singer's heart rate pick up through his shirt, but it wasn't until he'd twisted his fingers through Lu's hair and fisted that he finally spread his lips. He groaned against Lu's mouth and pulled on his hair, and Lu's knees went weak. He managed to get them leaning against the wall right by the doorway (there was no door, just a doorway) before his legs gave out and in doing so, wedged his knee between Balthazar's thighs. To his complete surprise, the older man let out another groan before rutting against his leg, the hardness in his jeans apparent already.

Part of him wanted to make a smart-ass comment, but he knew that would involve moving his mouth from Balthazar's and he was unwilling to do that at the moment, so he settled for filing that tidbit away for later. He pressed closer to the singer, thoroughly enjoying the way his free hand, the one that wasn't tangled in his hair, never stopped moving, touching every inch of exposed skin he could reach.

"Jesus, Luce," Balthazar muttered, pulling away for a half a second to strip off that ridiculous customary V-neck of his that, nevertheless, fit him well. Once he'd pressed himself back to the strawberry blonde, it was only a few moments before Lu started tugging him by the belt loops back down the hall. He paused against the bedroom door, biting gently at Balthazar's lips before dipping his head and locking his mouth on the spot right below the singer's left ear.

He hadn't noticed before, but Rachel had managed to mark him, a faint but visible trail of bruises from his neck halfway down his chest. A wave of disgust washed over him—disgust and distress. "Mine," he murmured before he could stop himself, biting down and sucking at Balthazar's neck.

"Oh, God," the blonde nearly whimpered, tilting his head back to expose more of his neck. "Yours… Oh, God, Luce, yeah…" He moaned obscenely, grinding his hips against Lu's and dragging his nails across Lu's back.

She'd managed to mark him. Lu kept his eyes shut tightly as he scraped his teeth over Balthazar's skin, as though he could somehow undo last night and all the things she'd done to him. He tried to remind himself that this possessiveness toward Balthazar was moronic, that they'd already established this was only sex, that he'd probably find someone else to fuck tomorrow night or the next week, but he couldn't care less. This was how it would go—they'd have their trysts and then Balthazar would go out and fuck someone else and Lu would still end up in his bed at some point, and he couldn't do anything but think, At least I'll have him at all.

But the way Balthazar was responding, keeping up a steady stream of sound that was so unlike their first encounter (he'd been nearly silent until the end, such a change from the vocal man in front of him now), and clinging to Lu like his life depended on it—it was enough to keep the bassist's thoughts from straying too far for too long. As he reached the spot where his neck met his shoulder and sank his teeth in, he fumbled to unbutton and unzip Balthazar's jeans. One of the singer's hands dropped from his shoulder to help since it appeared Lu was unable to multitask right now, and after a few frantic moments, his jeans dropped in a pool of denim.

Everything started moving faster after that. They stumbled into Balthazar's bedroom, the shorter man pulling Lu along until they fell onto the bed. For a second, they laid there side by side, mouths meeting again and hands running over chests and down sides and across backs. Lu had obviously seen the singer shirtless on a fairly frequent basis, but aside from Wednesday night, he hadn't been able to explore his body like he wanted. (Even that night, they'd both been in such a rush that there hadn't been much time for it.) But now that it was midmorning and he wasn't in as much of a hurry to get laid, he wanted to take his time and memorize the feel of every inch of him.

As though they'd had the same thought, Balthazar shifted to allow Lu to hover above him, one knee between the singer's until he groaned and shifted again until his legs were on either side of Lu's frame. The strawberry blonde turned his attention back to Balthazar's chest, licking a line down his body from his collarbone to his navel, pausing just long enough to bite down on one nipple, and then the other. Balthazar whimpered again, his grip on Lu's hair tightening when the bassist started working his way back up, running his tongue over the toned abdominal muscles that had him drooling, even if he'd never admit it out loud. Lu didn't typically go for men with chiseled muscles (he preferred the softer ones, like Gabe who had a bit of pudge around the middle but was altogether on the slighter side), but Balthazar somehow managed to have a muscular torso while still staying slender. Lu had no idea how it was possible, but it was enough to turn him into mush if he wasn't careful.

But Balthazar was clearly losing control as well, if the increasingly louder and near-pornographic moans coming out of his mouth were any indication. "Oh, God, come on," he breathed, nearly pleaded, tugging sharply on Lu's hair.

"What do you want?" the strawberry blonde whispered, running his lips over his ear as he did so.

"Fuck me, Luce, please. Need you so bloody much…"

Lu's breath caught in his chest. Oh. He hadn't expected… He shook his head to clear it. "You want me to top?"

Balthazar yanked him by the hair until they were almost nose-to-nose. "Yes," he hissed. "I bloody want your cock inside me. Or are you backing out now?"

"I was just making sure," Lu breathed, unable to keep the small smile off his face. "Lube's in the drawer?"

"And the condoms," Balthazar reminded him.

He fished out the lubricant and a condom while Balthazar pulled off his boxers. Lu slathered a generous amount of lube over his fingertips before he caught the other man's mouth in a kiss to distract him. As gently as he was able, he slipped his first finger inside him.

Balthazar's eyes flew open. "Oh, God!" he gasped, chest heaving.

"Been awhile?" Lu asked. He couldn't keep the lightly teasing tone out of his voice.

It took the blonde a moment to respond. "That implies it's happened before."

Lu froze. The full meaning of Balthazar's words sank in after a second. "You never…?"

Balthazar fixed him with a look that was somehow both haughty and sarcastic. "If what you're asking is if this is the first time I've let anyone fuck me instead of the other way around, the answer is yes."

"You need to tell me shit like that," Lu said. It was overwhelming, realizing that for a man who'd done pretty much everything, there was one thing he hadn't done yet and he was trusting Lu to make it good.

"You need to hurry the fuck up," Balthazar said venomously.

"Can't. It's gonna hurt. The more I rush this, the less ready you'll be." He nipped lightly at Balthazar's neck. "I don't want to hurt you."

The singer sighed. "Come on, love. Just get on with it. I'll be fine."

Lu knew he was in a hurry, but he wasn't going to rush this. Not when he had this golden opportunity. No, he intended to drag it out nice and slow, something he wished his first male partner had done for him.

But it was nearly torturous, listening to Balthazar's dizzy moans as he gradually adjusted to the feeling of being filled. He was able to keep a slow pace of languid finger-fucking and easy touches by reminding himself that he did not want to hurt him and that rushing this, going too fast, was a sure way to do that. Even after he had three fingers sliding almost easily inside him, spreading his fingers every time he withdrew them, he was still worried about hurting him even though Balthazar was just this side of insensible with pleasure.

"Oh, God, come on, love," Balthazar breathed, heavy-lidded blue eyes peering up at him. His pupils were wide and Lu imagined he could see himself in them. "Come on, love, I want you."

Lu let out a groan and the two of them pushed down his boxers. As quickly as he could, he tore open the condom wrapper with his teeth, rolled it on, and reached for the lube again. He coated his dick with more lubricant before tossing it to the side. "If you want me to stop, just say so. I promise I'll stop," he breathed.

"I want you to shut up and fuck me," Balthazar growled, but under the barked order was something that sounded suspiciously like a plea.

"Alright," Lu murmured. He aligned himself with the singer's stretched-out hole and looked up so he could watch his face. Their eyes locked, Balthazar's hand ran through his hair reassuringly, and slowly, Lu slid inside him.

Oh, he was so glad he'd decided to keep his eyes open for this. Balthazar's face shifted smoothly from trembling but self-assured, to stunned, to nearly enraptured, and his expression once Lu was completely inside him was nothing short of heavenly.

"Oh, Luce, yes-yes-yes, bloody move!"

"Am I hurting you?"

"I don't bloody care—it feels better that way."

With a sound that was half a sigh and half a groan, Lu slowly pulled out before snapping his hips back in.

Balthazar cried out, his body arching off the bed. "Yes, yes, yes! Oh, Luce, come on, give it to me!"

He'd been trying to hold back for as long as he could. He'd wanted to make absolutely sure Balthazar was ready, but apparently he was if the tightening fist in his hair and the pleading commands were any indication. Knowing he was Balthazar's first in this experience was a heady thought, but it wasn't over yet and he wanted Balthazar to be completely satisfied by the end of this. But he'd asked for it… Lu swallowed quickly and thrust into him again, ears burning with the sounds of the singer losing himself to this pleasure. He was still hanging onto his last scrap of restraint, dying to fuck into him harder, to feel that scorching heat envelop him completely, but he knew once he did that, he'd be lost. He just wanted Balthazar to enjoy this.

And then the blonde wrapped his legs around Lu's waist, squeezing his sides as he whimpered, "Harder, love, please…" and Lu had lost his all his self control because he hitched Balthazar higher and rocked into him harder, faster, and the singer cried out again, a gasp that could have been Lu's new nickname. He wrapped one hand around Balthazar's cock, unable to suppress a moan as Balthazar suddenly clenched down on him, and he thrust into him even harder, pumping the singer's cock in time to his thrusts.

"Oh, yes, Luce, just like that, feels so good, so bloody good, never bloody knew, come on, love, faster—fuck me, love—harder, yes, yes, Luce, oh, Luce, yes!" Sooner than he imagined possible, Balthazar's grip on his hair sent stars blinking across his vision and the blonde's other hand, twisted in the sheets, was coming up to his shoulders again and he was moaning unintelligibly but it didn't matter because three sloppy thrusts and as many firm pumps of his cock later, Balthazar was coming, half on the bed and clinging to the taller man, and that—how fucking gorgeous he looked as he climaxed—was what finally sent Lu spiraling over the edge as well, pinning the singer to his chest as he came, too.

Balthazar kept his arms wrapped tight around Lu until the aftershocks subsided and their heart rates went back down. Almost reluctantly, he pulled himself off Lu's lap and settled back onto the mattress, their sweat lightly covering his chest. He laughed dizzily. "Oh, Lord, I'm gonna feel that for awhile."

Lu was almost tempted to laugh, too. "Yeah. I don't recommend walking for a few hours."

"I don't think I could." Still grinning, although he winced slightly as he moved, he wiggled his way under the duvet.

"You feeling okay?"

"A little sore, but considering the shag you just gave me, that's hardly surprising. Finish making me breakfast. I'm not getting out of bed for another twelve hours."

This time, Lu actually did laugh. "Yeah, alright." He peeled the condom off, threw it away (pointedly ignoring the other obviously-used condom and wrapper in the trash), slid his boxers back on, and slunk back out to the kitchen. He was certainly glad Balthazar had had the foresight to turn off the eggs.

It would have been a shame to be interrupted by a house fire.

Ehehehe...more smut for you! YOU'RE WELCOME.