A/N: You're all spectacular human beings. Here, have some smut.
John bounced down the stairs the next morning as though he had solidly slept his each and every worry quite away.
Sherlock, who hadn't slept at all, glared at him from the living-room table. John said a cheerful 'good morning, Sherlock', ignoring the glare completely until he had ventured out of the kitchen, balancing a stack of toast and two mugs of tea. "Didn't sleep, then?" the doctor asked, placing one of the mugs of tea in front of Sherlock and sitting down opposite him, careful to position the toast halfway between the two of them so that the invitation was clear.
"No," Sherlock said sharply, absorbing himself in Lestrade's case file so that he wouldn't have to explain why he had not slept. He had had a few thoughts about the case, but they had been mostly obscured by the memories of John's lips on his, of how it had felt as if simply pressing their mouths together was somehow more erotic, more desperate, than if they had opened their mouths and tangled their tongues together. Not that the thought of tangling their tongues together didn't create its own problems.
Perhaps it was unsurprising that pretending to seduce and be seduced by John had taken the absent-minded attraction at the back of Sherlock's mind and blown it up into the want he had been struggling with all night. He had tried to sleep, hoping that his mind would work through the surface issues around his flatmate while he did so and allow him to focus on the case when he awoke, but when he'd caught his almost-asleep body shoving a pillow between its legs and thrusting against it for a third time – even after he'd given in and masturbated to thoughts of John fucking him against the kitchen counter – he'd given up on the endeavour. He hadn't soiled his sheets since he was fifteen and he wasn't about to start now.
He glanced up at his flatmate, sitting calmly at the other end of the living-room table and munching on toast with strawberry jam. He'd worried briefly whether he would ever be able to look John in the eye again, but there was a clear separation somehow between the John who had so effectively seduced him last night and the John that was bright-eyed over his breakfast this morning. A part of Sherlock wanted to find the seam that held the two apart and tap at it until it broke, until breakfast- John was just as mind-blowingly sexy as actively seducing-John. A more sensible part of him was glad there was a distinction, or he'd never be able to keep himself from jumping the doctor at inappropriate times of day.
"Did you have any ideas about the case, then?" John asked, shaking the crumbs off his fingers and beaming at him. Sherlock delicately picked up the second piece of toast before John could eat it, despite the fact that it was smothered with ginger marmalade, which John didn't usually eat himself unless he was trying to convince Sherlock to eat with him.
He smiled tightly around a mouthful of ginger and bread. "Several," he replied once his mouth was empty. "But only one I believe to be worth pursuing."
John waited for Sherlock to continue, but he did not. He wasn't quite sure whether he ought to pursue the idea that he had had, not in the way he was thinking. "Are you going to tell me what it is?"
"Not yet, John," Sherlock said with a brightness he did not feel, dropping the last crust of toast back onto the plate and pushing himself out of his chair, "it can certainly wait until you come back from the surgery. I may need your help again."
He made sure to emphasise the may so that John wouldn't be surprised if he turned around later and said he didn't need him anymore; he had been wavering between options all morning since the idea had occurred to him.
One corner of John's thin lips turned up amusedly. "Tease," he declared wryly. Sherlock shot him a stunning smile that apparently turned flirtatious on him again, because the doctor's own smile betrayed a flash of the idle, sultry heat Sherlock had received the previous night. It was lucky he was still holding onto the back of his chair, because his knees threatened to buckle.
Once John had left the flat, Sherlock threw himself down on the sofa and steepled his hands beneath his chin. The idea, the one that actually related to the case, seemed a fairly good and solid one. But the easiest way in which to assess its plausibility was to carry on what he and John had started the night before, and after his incredible reaction to that he wasn't sure it was at all advisable.
He'd been working on the assumption that the woman had ceded control right from the start of the exchange. And yet he, Sherlock, had retained it when initiating the role-play because it had seemed sensible – he had read the statement when John had not, he knew what they were about to do when John, without being told, did not. He'd kept control of the situation almost without realising it. And then John had snatched that control away from him.
What if the murderer wasn't usually submissive? Hadn't intended to be the one who ended up tied to the bed, but had been so blindsided by the victim's domination in that first kiss that everything else had followed in a blur of lost control?
When John had kissed him like that it had left Sherlock helpless with breathless lust. In the killer, perhaps, the reaction had been more like shock, at the man for dominating her so thoroughly and at her own body for reacting to it the way it must have done. And it was not such a huge step for such shock to turn into anger, and anger into a hatred that would have fermented through the night like Chinese black tea until it was overwhelming. It was, then, not such a huge leap of reasoning that if her intentions towards him had been less than pleasant to start with then her anger could easily have caused her to leap on him the instant he released her hands.
Sherlock hadn't exactly been unaware of his own likings for being dominated. He just hadn't expected them to be pulled to the front of his mind at that precise moment. John was a soldier, and he had unconsciously dominated Sherlock from very early on in their acquaintance. He had noticed Sherlock's haphazard eating and sleeping habits and gently took control of them, until he only had to hint that Sherlock ought to eat something and he would. Sometimes he felt like he ought to be annoyed at this, but he did have to admit that he functioned a lot better under John's instruction.
The immediately obvious way to explore this theory was to continue last night's role-play. John had proven to be particularly comfortable in the persona of the victim – Montgomery, Sherlock remembered from the file, somebody Montgomery – and if John's behaviour didn't elicit the same reactions in him, didn't seem as though they would make the murderer feel the same, then he would dismiss the theory and move on. Perhaps another theory would make itself apparent as they progressed.
And yet – surely the first experiment should have been enough to show Sherlock the dangers of inviting sexual behaviour from John when he didn't mean it. Asking for more would surely ensure that he could never sleep again without the memories and wishes and fantasies springing up behind his eyelids.
But what if John did mean it? Sherlock hadn't intended them to actually kiss the previous night, he'd assumed it would make John uncomfortable and thought that simply talking through it with the doctor exuding Montgomery's general air would be sufficient. Apparently kissing Sherlock didn't make John uncomfortable. And perhaps it was only the violent nature of the kiss, but he had definitely been panting a little when they parted. What if John wanted him but was afraid that Sherlock would turn him down? He hadn't exactly made an effort to show his friend his sensual side before now; in fact, he had been careful to hide it, hoping that the supposedly heterosexual doctor wouldn't notice how many of Sherlock's sexual impulses were directed at him. And he'd been so preoccupied with that that he hadn't thought to examine John's reactions to him.
Sherlock sat up, stretching out the cricks in his neck from where the sofa wasn't quite long enough, and grinned at the skull on the mantelpiece. Why not? He would push this as far as it would go. And then, hopefully, John would push it further.
John returned in the evening, just as boredom was threatening to drive Sherlock right out of his own skull. Sherlock returned his perfunctory greeting from where he had printed out the case file and spread it out over the living-room floor; predictably, John stopped dead and stared. "Was it really necessary to rearrange all the furniture?" he asked, sounding resigned.
Sherlock looked up, affecting surprise. "Did I?" he asked absent-mindedly. He knew that he had, of course. The coffee-table hadn't fit all of the case file, and he couldn't see it properly with the sofa in the way. John tilted his head as if to say you know you did. Sherlock shrugged. "It works better this way, we should keep it like this."
"I can't see the telly from the sofa," John protested, but he wandered into the kitchen and Sherlock could hear the kettle click on and the clatter of mugs coming down from the cupboard. "It's going back before Top Gear."
Sherlock tried to think when Top Gear started. He was fairly sure it wasn't even on that night. "Fine," he said airily, and settled back to analysing the new witness statements from Montgomery's neighbours and a few other people Donovan had managed to track down from the bar. None of them had seen as much as the barman, although a middle-aged woman on an apparently dismal blind date had seen them leave together, Montgomery not-so-subtly squeezing the woman's arse on their way out the door.
John sighed as he came out of the kitchen, crouching beside Sherlock until his knees cracked. Sherlock looked around and smiled at him, taking the cup of tea when it was offered to him. "Are those new witness statements?" the doctor asked, sitting back on his heels and taking an innocent sip of his tea. Sherlock grinned at him.
"Oh, yes," he said happily. "Nothing particularly helpful, though."
His flatmate hummed in disappointment. "You said before I left this morning that you might need my help again?"
Sherlock considered it one more time before nodding matter-of-factly. "I have a theory about their motivation, but to make sure I'll need to explore more of how they might have interacted that night."
John watched him for a moment, his blue eyes narrowed. "Are you saying you want to role-play S&M sex with me?"
"You make it sound so perverted," Sherlock quipped, not daring to hold his breath in case John noticed. "Only if you're comfortable, John, I understand that it's not something… but I really think it would help me solve this case."
The doctor laughed. "You manipulative bastard," he said easily. "You can stop pouting like that, I'll do it." He chuckled a bit more as Sherlock dropped the subtle wide eyed expression he had adopted, then groaned. "Oh, God, I'm going to regret this, aren't I?"
Sherlock tried to look affronted. It wasn't terribly difficult. "Of course not, my dear John." The doctor's eyes narrowed again. Sherlock only ever called him my dear John when he was completely high on the thrill of a case, and John had apparently come to associate the endearment with impending danger. Not that that ever put him off. "If you're uncomfortable at any point, just say so and we'll stop. I'm sure every bit of this activity will be enlightening." If not always to the case, he didn't add.
John smiled resignedly. "Are you going to tell me what your theory is, then?" he asked, rather densely in Sherlock's opinion.
"If you know what I'm trying to find out, then you'll influence it one way or the other," Sherlock sighed. "Just act like you think Montgomery would. Just like you did last night."
And then suddenly John sat back slightly, leant one arm against the sofa, and grinned, and it wasn't John's grin but Montgomery's, the one he had had last night right before he had leaned forward and taken Sherlock's breath away. Sherlock huffed in a sharp breath before pushing that memory out of his mind and adopting the sly, predatory smile he had taken on as the killer's. "Where would you like to start?" John growled.
Sherlock's spine tingled. "From the beginning," he breathed lowly, leaning forwards for the merest of moments before standing up gracefully. John, who had rocked forwards slightly as though to meet Sherlock in the middle, looked up at him with an amused little half-smile. Sherlock quirked a flirtatious eyebrow at him before wandering over to the table by the window and perching his bottom against the edge. He took a sip of tea. "Won't you join me at the bar, Mister Montgomery?"
He turned to his laptop and brought up the barman's witness statement and the one from the woman who had seen him leave for reference, unplugging the computer so that he could take it with him when they adjourned to Sherlock's bedroom. Stewart, he read from Lestrade's case summary. Stewart Montgomery.
John chuckled, his voice that low and seductive rumble it had been last night, and followed Sherlock, leaning casually across him to put down his own mug of tea on the table and glance down at the summary. Sherlock closed his eyes and breathed in the smell of John's hair. Raspberries, he thought, and wondered what kind of product the doctor put in it because his shampoo wasn't fruit-flavoured. "Stewart, please," John said as he pulled back, evidently having read the name on the screen.
Sherlock smiled slowly. "Stewart," he repeated, smiling with just a little more than his usual hint of teeth. John returned the smile and twisted his body slightly to pick up his tea again, still very much inside Sherlock's 'personal space'.
"What should we do about kissing?" John asked softly, leaning helplessly forwards again, his eyes flickering down to Sherlock's lips. "I probably should have checked last time, but I thought it would be helpful for you if I just did it – then I realised I should have asked, so I kept my mouth shut. Would you…" he paused, cleared his throat gently, leaned even closer. "Would you like to kiss properly this time? Or just keep it as we did it last night?"
Sherlock swallowed involuntarily. "I think it would be more helpful to do it properly," he said, cursing inwardly at the breathy quality to his voice. "As long as you're comfortable."
John's smile widened into something slightly dark, reminiscent of some kind of massive predator. "Oh, I'm very comfortable," he reassured him, and then he leaned that last bit forwards and kissed him.
Sherlock was expecting it this time, and yet it still caught him slightly by surprise. John's body boxed his in against the table, his legs on either side of Sherlock's, his arms on the table beside his waist, his lips pressing commandingly against Sherlock's. He shuddered and gasped at the feel of it, John's strong chest warm against him, the tiny rasp of stubble against his chin, and his mouth opened slightly of its own accord. John's lips curled into a slight smile against his, a smug little noise bubbling up in his throat, and he tilted his head slightly to fit their mouths together easier.
Sherlock's hands clamped down onto John's back, tugging him closer, one hand travelling up to brush into the hair at the nape of the doctor's neck. John had implied he would use tongue this time, hadn't he? Or had proper kissing meant that there was something else John would do this time that he had not last time, another element to kissing to which Sherlock had been hitherto unexposed? He tried opening his own mouth further, inviting John's tongue into him, but the doctor did not take the bait, remaining resolutely tight-lipped.
It took a moment or two for Sherlock to realise what he was doing. John was taking control again. Because Sherlock expected John to try to overwhelm him, he was steadily refusing to do just that, keeping control of the kiss firmly away from him.
He whimpered at the realisation, his body relaxing, surrendering to John's command.
And John pulled away. "There you are," he said softly, pressing a rough and sloppy kiss on Sherlock's cheekbone, more teeth than tongue, his face settling in the groove of Sherlock's shoulder as his head was pushed away. It was a tiny bit patronising, and Sherlock felt a jolt of irritation that reminded him – not that he had forgotten – that this was not how John would normally kiss, that he was pretending to be someone else, pretending Sherlock was someone else. He hitched his seductive smile back onto his face as John pulled back again to look him in the eyes. "God, you're beautiful," the doctor rumbled, and Sherlock affected a shy look.
John's hand fixed itself into his hair and tugged their lips together again; this time his tongue probed out almost straightaway, nudging against Sherlock's lips until he parted them quickly to let it in. He was trapped by it, by John's body and his mouth, unable to move but not wanting to, clutching helplessly at the short greying hair and revelling in the warmth of John's skull underneath. John was good at this. Sherlock had kissed a fair few people in his time, but most of them had only done it as an intermediary step, a means to an end. John kissed as though he had all the time in the world, as though he had no further intention, no expectations, as though he could make Sherlock come from this alone.
Actually, John had started up a subtle rocking, grinding motion with his crotch against Sherlock's, so he probably could come from this alone, in time. He would have been embarrassed about the state of his trousers if he could not feel that John was also half-hard. Simple physical stimulation, he told himself. Perfectly natural bodily response.
Finally, when Sherlock was panting heavily through his nose against John's cheek, his flatmate broke the kiss, sucking briefly on his neck instead. Sherlock could feel him trying to catch his breath, his thin, swollen lips resting against Sherlock's skin. "Well," John murmured into his neck, his tongue darting out to lick the beginnings of sweat away, "this is certainly the point at which I would suggest we move to somewhere more private."
Sherlock chuckled into his hair. "I think that would be wise," he agreed, his low, seductive voice ruined slightly by the fact that he hadn't quite managed to catch his own breath. "That is, assuming you still can move somewhere private without embarrassing yourself."
John laughed, leaning his forehead on Sherlock's collarbone and looking down at him. The jeans he had worn to work were his nice ones, a deep indigo denim that clung appealingly to the curve of his arse and thighs, the front of which was bulging slightly with the weight of John's budding erection. He reached down and adjusted it with a self-conscious little chuckle. Sherlock laughed, a carefree, too-loud noise that made the doctor start slightly. John reached up to touch the lock of hair that fell over his forehead, much the same way as one might stroke back a woman's fringe. Sherlock smiled shyly. "Shall we go, then?" he asked, one hand drifting back to the laptop behind him.
"I think we definitely should, yes," John replied, pressing another hard, closed-mouthed kiss to his lips.
They went back to the front door first – Sherlock tried not to be impressed that John had not needed to be told his reasons for the move – and grabbed their coats from the hook by the door. John held Sherlock's out for him to slip into, and then grabbed a handful of his arse and squeezed it, hard.
Sherlock gasped and pretended to look affronted, but when John relaxed his grip he didn't remove his hand, and it was difficult to keep up the expression when John was touching him in such an intimate place. After a moment he gave it up entirely in favour of a wry smile. "Sorry," John said brightly, letting go of Sherlock's bottom to shrug on his own coat and not sounding in the least apologetic. "Couldn't resist. I imagine whatever dress you might have been wearing would display your arse to great effect."
"You lecherous man," Sherlock teased in return. Once the doctor had fastened his coat properly, he shot him one last seductive smile and turned on his heel back to the bedroom.
John jumped on him, knocking him into the wall and slamming their lips together again. Sherlock's head narrowly missed the coat-hooks on the wall as John's tongue pushed insistently into his mouth as though conducting a strip-search at a prison. He moaned, relaxing against the wall, his hands seeking the soft static of John's hair once more.
"This – mmph! – this isn't really any more private than the bar," Sherlock gasped in the tiny moments when John's lips were far enough from his that he could draw breath and speak. "And it wasn't in the statements."
The doctor grinned cheekily. "I know it wasn't," he replied and licked a long, messy stripe up Sherlock's cheek. "But I bet he wanted it to be."
Sherlock waited until he turned around before wiping the saliva off his cheek with his palm. He personally wouldn't mind if John decided to give every inch of his body a tongue-bath like an attentive mother cat, but he didn't think that it would have gone down too well with the murderer, especially not in front of the entire bar. John did not miss the movement. He wondered whether Montgomery would have.
John's hand asserted itself into the small of his back and remained there as they crossed the living room, pausing briefly to snatch the laptop from the table, and the army doctor courteously opened the door to Sherlock's bedroom. He had not bothered to open the curtains when he had given up on sleep that morning, but he had remade the bed when he had decided to continue this exercise with John, so the room was in soft yellow half-light, one corner of the bedspread turned down invitingly, a brand new roll of bondage tape on the bedside table. John didn't spare the room more than a cursory glance before he had Sherlock up against the doorframe, yanking at the coat he had just slid up Sherlock's arms and stroking his finger over the sliver of delicate collarbone that he exposed. Sherlock shuddered at his touch and moved his own hands to the buttons on his coat, easing John's away before they ripped something, throwing the laptop carefully onto the bed.
He resisted the urge to pick up his coat when it hit the floor in a heavy puddle of dark fabric, instead focussing on opening John's coat, with its button and zipper mechanism that seemed so ridiculously complicated. John chuckled at his difficulty.
"My clothes not fancy enough for you?" he teased, dipping back in for kiss after biting, domineering kiss. Sherlock grunted in frustration. John reached up and grabbed his hands. "Shh. Let me do it."
Sherlock let him go, flushing slightly at John's fondly patronising look. For a moment, he toyed with taking off his shirt as well, but decided against it. The less realistic they could make this pretence, the less likely Sherlock was to forget that they were pretending and say or do something he might regret. He sat down on the bed, picking up his laptop and tapping out the things he had noticed so far: things John had done that had made him annoyed, patronised, things that had made him shiver with unrestrained lust.
He stopped when John's jacket hit the floor, expecting the doctor to join him on the bed, but John merely raised one eyebrow suggestively and pulled his oatmeal jumper over his head as well, giving it a jaunty wiggle before dropping it on the ground alongside his jacket and Sherlock's coat. Sherlock gave him a mockingly resigned smile as he put aside the laptop, as though he had expected John to be childish about undressing. John grinned back.
They had not thought to put shoes on as a part of the act, and so John crawled over him onto the middle of the bed without hesitation, the predatory smile firmly back on his face. Sherlock whimpered and fell onto his back as John reached his chest, letting a deep chuckle form in the doctor's stomach at the submission. And then John was kissing him again, dropping his body so that it pressed Sherlock into the bed, constricting his breathing, and this was so much better when horizontal that Sherlock was dizzy with it, his hands coming up automatically to find a grip on the doctor's beautifully firm buttocks –
"I don't think so," John told him, reaching back for Sherlock's hands and replacing them above his head. "I think you should keep these here."
Sherlock's eyes flickered – deliberately, though he did not think it looked it – to the bedside table, where the black bondage tape sat innocuously against the lamp. John followed the look and laughed, temporarily collapsing so that his face was buried in Sherlock's neck. "You bought that especially for this?"
He wondered what John would do if he said not especially for this, or I might find other uses for it, or something else that indicated he would be interested in using it recreationally himself, but instead he shrugged. "I thought it might come in handy," he admitted wryly. John blinked, then laughed again and snatched the tape from the table, testing it between his fingers.
"Don't we need… I mean, is it going to stick to your skin?" he asked, already eyeing Sherlock's wrists as though he was imagining them bound with the stuff.
Sherlock raised a languid eyebrow. "It's better quality than the stuff they actually used. This will only stick to itself, not to your skin. My skin," he corrected himself. John grinned, his eyes gleaming at the correction.
"Well then," he said darkly. The tape ripped away from the roll with an ominous noise; Sherlock's stomach swooped in anticipation. "Like this?" John asked, stretching out in order to hold Sherlock's arms against the two corners of the bed.
This had the consequence of pushing John's weight harder into Sherlock and his face into Sherlock's neck; Sherlock laughed. "Yes, like that. Maybe one at a time, though."
John snorted and let one hand go in order to sit on Sherlock's chest and strap the other to the railing of his headboard. Sherlock found himself almost face-to-face with John's groin and breathed in sharply; John was completely hard, straining against his jeans. He wanted to reach out the hand that John wasn't using and touch it, stroke it, see what noises the doctor might make. He forced himself to breathe out again. Perhaps it was a good thing that John was tying his hands to the headboard.
"Did she have her feet tied down, too?" John asked. Sherlock forced his eyes up to his friend's face; thankfully, John did not look down at him until he had lifted his gaze from his crotch. Sherlock shook his head. "All right, then."
He grinned briefly at the doctor, who grinned back, moving into his former position with his body stretched out along the length of Sherlock's. Sherlock spread his legs further so that John could slot neatly between them, sucking and nipping none-too-gently on his neck. "No marks," Sherlock whispered, tilting his neck away slightly. John hummed in something that sounded like disappointment, licking at the spot he had been biting, then he kissed it gently and wriggled, shifting his body ever-so-slightly until their groins aligned and John's erection was pressing against his own.
Sherlock inhaled sharply, his hips thrusting up automatically. John smiled, and then he was biting at his lower lip, thrusting his tongue harshly between Sherlock's own teeth. Then he pulled away.
"Now, if I had someone like you so completely at my mercy," the doctor purred, sliding his chest down Sherlock's body. The friction as he slid across Sherlock's groin made him whimper helplessly. "I would start here."
Sherlock struggled to catch his breath as John's eyes fixed on his crotch where his cock was struggling for attention. He didn't comment on the fact that this was not supposed to be for their sexual pleasure, probably because he was in the same state. "You don't know what she was like," he reminded him breathlessly.
John blinked. "I suppose not," he said, sounding surprised. "I was imagining her to be like you." He glanced from Sherlock's face to his erection and back again. "I'd still start here. If I had someone tied up I'd want to make them beg for me." Sherlock groaned as John dipped his head and nuzzled his nose over the bulge in his trousers. "People think that getting a blowjob makes you powerful, but it doesn't. It makes the other person powerful. The things you can do to a person with your mouth are more powerful than anything you could do by forcing them to pleasure you."
"Thank you, John," Sherlock said shortly, every muscle in his thighs struggling with the effort of keeping his hips still. John's words were flooding him with ideas of the things John could do to him with his mouth and it was increasingly difficult to concentrate on the role-play. "I have given and received a blowjob before."
That made the doctor hesitate for a moment, his face freezing before he forced himself to relax, to act as though the information did not bother him. Sherlock caught himself before he smirked. "Why does everyone assume I'm a virgin?" he asked in mock-outrage.
John laughed, but it sounded forced. "You just… don't seem to be interested in sex at all," he said, shrugging lightly. He rested his chin on the sensitive spot just beneath the head of Sherlock's penis, grinning as Sherlock made a strangled noise and shifted his hips restlessly.
"I'm not," he replied unevenly. "Usually. But sex is a biological imperative. Some experts think it's more important to us than food." John made an exaggerated expression of interest and folded his arms beneath his chin, stroking firmly up the length of Sherlock's cock as he did so. Sherlock made an impatient noise. "The purpose of this exercise was not to examine my sexual history."
John smiled again. "Partly because I didn't know you had a sexual history." The expression made it perfectly clear that he was teasing on purpose, and Sherlock realised quite suddenly that his irritated outburst had been only one step away from begging. I'd want to make them beg for me. Just like their first kiss of the evening, John was deliberately deviating from the 'script' of the role-play in order to make sure that Sherlock had the same reactions to his actions as the murderer would have, if this were not scripted at all. He really didn't give John's manipulation skills enough credit, and he definitely wasn't going to examine the way that sent an almost painful throb of arousal to his groin.
"All right," John said finally, lifting his head from Sherlock's groin. "I'd wait until you were an absolute mess, and then I'd think about fucking you."
Sherlock sighed as his flatmate lifted himself onto his hands and knees and crawled over him again. He reached out for him automatically, his arms wrenching slightly as the tape prevented him from moving. John's kiss this time was gentler, lazier, as though he had all the time in the world. It was more intimate, somehow, and Sherlock tried to end it as subtly as he could without John noticing that it was making him uneasy. He didn't want to kiss John like that - properly, like it meant something, like he and John should really kiss - until it did mean something. Assuming, of course, that John would ever want it to mean something.
He tilted his hips up until their erections were aligned again, earning a tiny hitch of breath from the doctor. Surely John's response to all of this was more than just physical stimulation?
John breathed out slowly against his lips. "Now," he murmured, stretching his torso languidly until Sherlock heard a crunch from his bad shoulder and winced. "I would take you."
Sherlock's entire body flushed hot at the suggestion, but he managed to keep his body still. "Show me," he murmured back before he had time to wonder whether it would be smarter to call the game off at this point. Surely pretending to actually shag each other wouldn't add anything to Sherlock's already considerable discoveries about the case?
It might, something terribly masochistic inside of him insisted. He could feel John smile against his cheek, his body still shifting, his hips undulating in tiny thrusts against Sherlock's.
"Like this," the doctor almost whispered, shifting back up onto his knees, running his hands down Sherlock's body before replacing one beside his head and using the other to hold Sherlock's hips steady as he thrust firmly forwards, his erection rubbing the fabric of Sherlock's pants against the cleft of his arse, nudging his perineum and his testicles. Sherlock cried out softly as though John had actually entered his body, his legs wrapping around John's waist and holding on, his own hips lifting to meet the doctor's as they kept thrusting, setting up a slow, hard rhythm. John's hand left his hip, cupping the curve of his jaw briefly before it settled back beside his head to hold him up.
John grunted quietly with every harsh thrust. His eyes were screwed tightly shut as though to look at Sherlock would distract him from his rhythm, would make him falter or forget or finish. Sherlock shut his own eyes and bit his lip, trying not to focus on the pleasure their movements was stirring and swelling in his own body but on the act, the exercise, the reason they were there at all – but looking back at John's face he wasn't sure the doctor was remembering it either, lost in the feeling of rubbing their groins together in increasingly quick motions.
He wanted the use of his hands, because he was sure that just a few touches to the parts of his cock that John's rocking wasn't reaching would cause him to come, but he didn't want to come because that would be embarrassing, because this was only meant to be pretend. He wanted John's lips on his again, wanted their chests rubbing together, wanted John closer and harder and more.
"John," he started, still not sure whether he would beg for the doctor to free his hands or kiss him.
Abruptly, John's eyes flew open and he ceased the rocking of his hips, looking shocked, as though he had forgotten Sherlock was there at all. "Fuck," he swore quietly. Sherlock tried to arrange his face into a calm and neutral expression – at least tried to arrange it away from one that betrayed how close he had been to orgasm – as the doctor sat back on his heels and drew a deep breath. "I'm so sorry, Sherlock, I just got… carried away."
Sherlock tried to smile unaffectedly. "Quite understandable, John," he said lightly. "The situation was… affecting."
John almost laughed again. "Yes," he commented, his eyes flickering involuntarily to the state of Sherlock's crotch. "Yes, it was. Did you, um – did you get everything you needed from it? Your theory, was it…"
"Oh, yes," Sherlock confirmed, forcing a bright tone of voice. "Yes, you did brilliantly. I believe my theory is not only plausible but almost definitely correct." John smiled at him. There was a heartbeat's awkward pause in which Sherlock considered throwing the entire façade away and begging the doctor to finish him off. Then he cleared his throat briskly. "If you could just cut my hands free, John, I'll write up my findings and send some enquiries to a few contacts."
The ex-army medic flushed and hurried to cut the tape around Sherlock's hands. "Do they feel all right?" he asked, rubbing his wrists gently. Sherlock could feel indentations in his skin where he had struggled against the tape. "Circulation okay?"
He smiled. "They're fine, thank you, John."
John nodded, picking up their outer layers of clothing from the floor as Sherlock picked up the laptop and started typing. "Right," he said, not nearly as awkward as Sherlock had feared he might be but not entirely comfortable either. "I'll just… go and start dinner, then. Chicken all right with you?"
Sherlock made an appreciative noise; to ease the awkwardness a little, he looked up at his friend and smiled warmly. "Thank you," he said sincerely. From John's returning smile, he knew the doctor could tell he meant it for more than the offer to cook.
He tried to focus on his conclusions once John had left the room, but his cock was still throbbing and images of John above him kept flashing behind his eyelids. He shifted irritably, knowing that he really ought to have foreseen this problem. Perhaps he ought to…
His hand made its way between his legs and pushed restlessly at his erection, meaning to only stroke once in the hopes that it would calm down, but that one stroke set off a burst of relieved pleasure and he could not refrain from rubbing himself again, and then again, the pleasure building until he threw his head back hard enough to bruise it against the wall and came with a bitten-off moan.
Sighing, Sherlock tipped the computer off his lap and stared resignedly at the growing damp patch on the surface of his trousers. He would have to change them before he went back into the living-room.
John was not as bright as he was, but he was not stupid enough to miss that.
A/N: Whew. Next chapter probably won't be as long, smutty, or fast, but I still think I've proved that I can write quickly when I'm inspired.