Peter wants to run.
Hell, screw that, he wants to fight.
He wants to go back out there and finish what he'd started, teach his idiot cousins a real lesson about listening when their betters speak.
What children, what suicidal fools to want to take this new, hesitant thing and ruin it, to risk slipping out into the streets in the dark to cause havoc when they bring nothing but danger on themselves and their pack...
He'd tried to be diplomatic.
Tried to leverage what power he has as Talia's still-kind-of enforcer and intimidate them into compliance, when reason and diplomacy didn't work.
Diplomacy.
That was always Calvin's schtick, not his.
As good a fighter as his brother was, as good a warrior, he'd always preferred words and reason to broken bones and bloodshed.
Peter didn't see the appeal, especially when even Calvin's honeyed tongue couldn't persuade their more moronic family members to think about what they were doing.
Then suddenly it had been six on one and it was his time to do what he did best.
He'd known it would happen, of course he had.
He'd gone looking for them almost as soon as the broadcast was over.
Most of them, the older wolves and their kids, they were all smart enough to wait for Talia to come back, but Daniel and Mackenzie, Alan and Brody and Eric and Bella, they were young and stupid and hot-blooded, flush and fat with the safety they'd lived in for the last few years. Stupid with it, that's what they were, and sure enough he'd caught them already grouped up and ready to go, their first 'field trip' into Town since the wars.
No way in hell was he going to let that happen
Little bastards had tried to gang up on him too, but Vinny had joined in the fun and he'd gotten the chance to really kick some tail.
Then Stiles had shown up, and Peter's ashamed to admit that half the reason he wants to turn around and dive right back into the fight is to show off.
It's just instincts.
That's what he tells himself, but it's a limp excuse.
He thinks something may have broken last night when he'd dragged Stiles out to the cemetery, when he'd finally spilled his painful secrets and felt like he could breathe again for the first time since his bond mark had come in when he was fourteen. The wretched, burning hate is gone, replaced by a wariness and a melancholy that is bone-deep and painful, like pressing on a bruise. He wonders if this is what it feels like to give up, to accept the inevitable, and then wonders if he cares either way.
Still, the kid had shown some spunk out there, Peter will give him that, tossing Brody across the yard the way he did. He can smell the Spark on Stiles' skin, the little crackle that Emissaries have, and he hopes it fades because he can hardly bear the scent of it, used up fireworks smoldering in the dark.
He's nervous too though, sharp like lemon vodka as he commands Peter to sit down and take his shirt off, and he practically vibrates out of his own skin before he manages it.
This is a test.
For who he doesn't know, him or Stiles or maybe both, but it's a test that either of them could fail. He's smelled the arousal on the kid before, smelled it again tonight, and he's smelled his fear too, seen the cringing whenever he's gotten too close with his clothes off before.
Sex would be easy in a way, for him at least, far easier than attempting any real emotional connection, but Stiles is still scared of him and he's just a fucking kid. It's not going to happen, no matter what he wants, and Peter has to wonder... what exactly is that? Stiles has asked him, but he hasn't spit the question back, no matter how much it's eating him alive inside to know.
So he takes off his shirt, watches close, but Stiles just crouches to take a look at the claw marks on his side and goes to the sink to wet a rag. While he's got his back turned Peter shimmies out of his pants, because the cuts disappear beneath his waistband and because he can be a dick sometimes, and mostly (more than anything) because he needs to know.
He needs to know what Stiles will do, how far he'll sink, what kinds of things he'll sacrifice to get what he wants, and Peter's hands are nearly shaking with the fear of finding out as he sits back down. He grips the edges of the chair beneath his thighs hard enough to make the wood creak, and clenches his jaw shut tight when Stiles turns back around again, goes a little pale and goggle-eyed when he finds him sitting there in his boxers.
"Are you teasing me?" he asks, a little hard, a little angry. "Or testing me?"
Peter growls, feels like he's been caught out, but he holds his bonded's gaze, refuses to be the first one to look away.
"I won't touch you," he says, mouth a grim line. "I get it, ok, you're hot. Just because I'm a horny teenager doesn't mean..."
Suddenly Peter finds himself only inches away, standing over the kid and breathing him in, leaning in close enough to feel the heat coming off him. He doesn't know what he's trying to prove, what he's trying to accomplish, but he knows that he does want to touch, does want to be close, even if it's not like that.
"I'm not ready for this," Stiles says quietly, licking his lips, and Peter has to admire his courage, the firm certainty of his words. "And I'm not scared of you either."
It's not defiance.
Not a declaration of Stiles' own bravery.
No, it's an admission of trust, a quiet reassurance that he doesn't really think Peter will hurt him, and he doesn't realize how much he needed that until his shoulders sag with relief and he collapses against his soul bonded in a mockery of a wounded hug.
"I don't know what you want Peter," Stiles chokes, and what he says in reply he'd never, ever meant to admit to.
Perhaps it's a reward.
Perhaps it's just broken succor.
"I'm afraid of you."
For a long, painful moment everything is silent and he wants to take it back, then Stiles hands light gently on his ribs, flat and warm and unmoving, just there.
"That's ok."
XXX
They're not hugging.
They're not quite close enough for that, and Peter's arms are hanging loosely by his sides, but it's as close to it as they've ever gotten and maybe as close as they ever will.
Stiles stands as still as he can, just breathes, pressing his palms to Peter's broad, strong torso, skin hot beneath his palms. The werewolf is trembling, just as still as he is, but it's a fearful, prey reaction and more than anything Stile just wants to promise him anything he might ask for.
Maybe that's the whole problem.
God, he...
He's terrified.
Stiles isn't sure of what, exactly, that he would take Peter up on an offer, that he might think Peter was the kind of guy to... to take what he wanted, but that fear, admitting that fear, he thinks it's the greatest gift he might ever get from his bonded, let alone anyone else.
It's an apology and an explanation and it's warning and it's hope, and it's confusing as hell and probably not meant to any of those things but...
But it makes him feel better.
He gets it, he does.
Now that he knows about Sarah Stiles can understand a few of the things that he thinks Peter is probably scared of, and he can't really blame the guy for any of them.
He still isn't sure that this wasn't all a test, but if it was, he thinks they both passed. Now that the idea of sex has been put out there, as round-about as that conversation was, it's suddenly just this silly, ridiculous thing that they can both acknowledge they shouldn't have been worried about in the first place. He'd never really thought Peter would rape him, is more afraid that he'll run actually, but the reassurance is still nice, and he doesn't think he's the only one that needed to hear it out loud.
The way Peter had sighed, ragged and broken, the way he's leaning toward Stiles now, it...
He kind of does want to hug him.
"I won't if you say no," he says quietly, and Peter shivers, head ducked. "But if it's cool I'm gonna hug you now."
He doesn't say no.
Swallowing hard, Stiles slides his hands around slow, leans in and presses himself against Peter's chest, tucking his head underneath the werewolf's chin. He's stiff, nonresponsive, but he doesn't push away and he even presses his cheek against Stiles' forehead a little. He doesn't want to – he wants to crawl onto the couch and cuddle to be honest – but a short minute later he lets Peter go and presses the damp cloth gently against his side, to the claw marks that curve down over his hip to stop just above a neat, trilobal spiral inked onto his hip.
Peter scowls at him but takes the rag anyway, swiping roughly at the cuts that are already starting to heal. Stiles clears his throat, backs up a little, on the pretense of grabbing a towel to dry his hands, but the way Peter rolls his eyes says it's not all that subtle.
"Shut up," he mutters, balling up the towel and tossing it at his face, but Peter just snatches it easily out of the air.
"I was promised a cookie," he says, and Stiles blinks, surprised by the segue.
"Was not," he argues, because he can't think of anything else to say, though hey, as far as conversation changers go, it could be worse.
Very, very suddenly he gets a flash of what Peter is maybe-probably like under all this pain and anger and trauma, just a snarky, sarcastic shit, and for the first time, he kind of gets how they could possibly be right for each other.
"Was too," he says, as flat and serious as a judge. "I distinctly remember a cookie being mentioned – something about a job well done..."
"What was that mess all about anyway?"
Peter looks him up and down, a calculating glance in his eye.
"Make me cookies and I'll tell you what you want to know," he says simply, as if it's the obvious answer and not blatant bribery.
"Put some pants on and I'll make you cookies," Stiles counters back.
Peter snorts, rolls his eyes and makes a face before turning around and strolling away, but Stiles is pretty sure he can see the tension in the werewolf's shoulders ease.
XXX
Well...
That happened.
No taking it back now, but maybe if he slips coming back down the stairs and hits his head just right he could forget all of it ever happened.
Fat chance, the kid would probably just remind him every opportunity he...
Peter stops, leaning over his dresser with his claws out, and takes a deep breath.
That's not fair and he knows it – whatever shit he'd just gone through, Stiles had been right there in it with him, and maybe they hadn't been working through the exact same issues, but they'd both been working through something.
He feels better, and he loves and hates it at the same time.
Pulling on a pair of sweats and an old Berkeley t-shirt, because his skin is sensitive sometimes and he loves the soft, worn fabric, he trots back downstairs with something like forty-five percent commitment to not being a total asshole.
Except Stiles has actually pulled out flour and sugar and butter and eggs, and ok, maybe fifty-five.
Sixty at the most.
He's not a monster, but he's no saint either.
Besides, he's still kind of pissed that hadn't gotten so much as a crumb before.
It's not that he wanted to be catered to, not that he wanted another wife, but there's something fundamentally wrong about the fact that his sister's pack had feasted on roast beef and gravy and he hadn't gotten so much as a sniff. The rumors about the cookies were a step too far, especially once he'd found out that even god damned Eric had gotten one.
Not right.
But here Stiles is, standing barefoot in his kitchen, rooting around in his fridge, and that's... better.
He supposes they're... trying now.
Might as well.
He's painfully aware that Sarah would be kicking his ass six ways from Sunday if she were...
Fuck.
By now she'd have relegated Peter to the couch and would probably be having Stiles over for slumber parties every night, wrapping him right up around her finger while telling him all the most embarrassing stories about Peter that she could remember, probably some she'd made up.
Swallowing, Peter sits down at the dining table and watches Stiles move around the kitchen, quiet, thoughtful.
"Got any chocolate?" Stiles asks, and Peter jerks his chin.
"Freezer."
Surprise turns to glee as Stiles digs out the package of miniature Reese's cups, and he tosses them in Peter's direction, only to hand him a knife and a cutting board a minute later. Peter accepts them silently, tears open the bag and pops a piece of candy into his mouth before starting to chop. He pauses when Stiles' fingers sneak in under the knife, lets him steal out a piece for himself, and doesn't wonder what that means about them, about what's happening here.
Stiles goes back to the counter, half-turned, but his back is still mostly to Peter and that's the only reason he's able to say the words that come up out of his chest.
"I met her in a library at Berkeley. She dropped a book, and when I picked it up for her she dropped the rest of them on my head."
