Word Count ~ 3700
ILLINOIS
The LaSalle news outlets are going mad. Everyone's saying there's a storm a-comin' toward Illinois, a real big one. Stay indoors, they're saying.
Brendan really hates been told what to do.
"Let me get this right. You're wantin' to go for a walk?"
"Yup."
"In a storm warnin'?"
"Yup."
"'Ave you lost it?" Steven asks and Brendan gives him a cheeky smile, bites his bottom lip, and Steven rolls his eyes. "Never had it to begin with, did you?"
The heat is tremendous, air thick like globbing syrup, humidity so dense his t-shirt starts to cling to him the very second he steps out the door. The sky is gun-metal grey and the clouds make a low, impenetrable roof across the land. It's like they're shut tight inside a darkening box, trapped, and it makes Brendan itch all over.
"Wow - " He turns and sees Steven staring up at the sky in awe. He'll never tire of that look. Showing Steven the world, showing him freedom and excitement and fear, it's exhilarating in a way nothing else comes close to.
"Come on." Brendan takes his hand and pulls and Steven comes, just like that.
The first spots of rain hit him whilst they're crossing the dusty wasteland close to the river, nothing but flat as far as the eye can see, landscape dotted with scattered trees and the ink-black, imposing structure of the Illinois Railroad bridge spanning the length of the water's surface.
Brendan grips Steven's fingers through his own and they pick up speed, hurtle towards it through the sparse, grey-brown undergrowth, sky so dark now that the plants become twisted, grabbing silhouettes on the horizon, arthritic fingers clinging at his jeans as he spins and throws Steven forward with his arm like a whip, sweeps forward to wrap his arms around his middle and haul him off his feet and spin them both until Steven shrieks and laughs.
The drizzle turns into a shower and they're soaked with sweat and rain-water and Steven throws his arms out and turns his face up against the spray. He stands against the navy sky like an offering to the Heavens themselves and lightning bolts behind him, a streak of pure white, and the air charges thick with electricity. Steven looks back at him, eyes going wide and diamond-bright and he smiles in delight.
Brendan feels power hum through his skin like the sky's opened up into him. The hairs on his body stand up with static. He bows his head against the onslaught of water and watches it shine and sluice off him in waves and he looks up through it, into Steven's eager, feverish gaze, and flicks his head in a wordless gesture.
Steven turns over his shoulder and back again, gives him a slow half-smile, and then takes off in a sprint across the plains.
Brendan gives him four quick heartbeats head start and tears after him.
He gets close, stretches out a hand and tries to get a grip on Steven's shoulder. He dodges to the left, ducks Brendan's next lunge towards him whippet-quick just like Brendan taught him. They square off, Steven's smile like cut-glass, sharp and deadly, and Brendan feints right. Steven falls for it, steps left, and Brendan gets his wrist and loses it instantly, grip slippy from the rain. Steven laughs out clear like a ringing bell and blows him a kiss before he bolts away again and Brendan picks the up the chase, blood pumping and focus narrowed on his prey.
Steven disappears under the shadow of the bridge supports, ducks behind a steel beam and Brendan swings around it, tries to grab him but the slippery little bastard wriggles free of him again, smirks at him like a real challenge and runs to the next beam, jumps and hurls himself against it and grabs it half-way up, turning his momentum into a quick climb up the latticework. Brendan can run faster but Steven's the better climber, weighs less and so agile it should be a sin.
He watches and appreciates the view for a second and then he's hurtling after him, makes up for speed with sheer strength as he levers himself up, gets a solid grip and a firm foothold where Steven slips and Brendan's heart hammers the whole time with terror. If Steven falls -
It doesn't happen, though.
Brendan sees him haul his body up to the top and roll out of sight and he follows him five seconds later, gets a hand around one metal, criss-crossing piece of barrier and pulls up over the lip of the bridge, gets to his feet on the slippery surface. He's suffocating on the smell of hot, melting wood and pine, wet grass and deep, rich earth. It's a heady mixture and his head swims with it.
Steven leans against the opposite barriers, sprawled out across a diagonal-slanted bar, one leg bent at the knee and foot planted on the metal, and Brendan's going to fuck him right up against that support. Steven knows it, too; Brendan can see it in the way he's no longer smiling. He's looking at Brendan the way he looks with a knife in his hand; he looks at Brendan like he might want to cut him just to touch his blood.
Thunder crashes and rumbles, closer than before, and Brendan stalks over the shaking rails, sure as the sky's pouring, and plants both his hands beside Steven's head, swings one leg over his body to stand astride him and the barrier he's half laid across, boxes him in from top to bottom. Steven watches him through his lashes, mouth parted, eyes dark.
"Caught me," he states, simple matter of fact. "Now what?"
The rain misses them here under the cover of the long straight bar fifteen feet above; cuts in two streams and surrounds them like a shimmering curtain. Brendan leans into Steven's space, rests some of his weight on his warm body, ever-so-slight press, chest to chest, stomach to stomach. He considers Steven silently, looks him over, inhales the scent of him, water and arousal.
"Gonna get my dick in you, Steven," he promises in a low growl. "Fuck you, nice and deep, right out here."
Steven's chest rises and falls against his own and Brendan senses he wants to hear more, wants to hear Brendan tell him exactly how he's going to make him scream.
Brendan makes space between them, notices how Steven arches after contact ever so slightly, almost unconsciously, and trails a finger down from his collarbone to his waistband, flicks his button and reaches inside, gets a firm hand around the half-hard width of him and strokes him lazy until Steven's eyelids drop half-mast.
"Gonna get these fingers inside you," he says, gives the head of Steven's dick a slow rub with his index and middle finger and goes on, "and I'm gonna find that spot that makes you moan - " Steven does, he fucking moans, " - and rub you all loose, make some room in there, carve myself a space, yeah?"
"Fuck, yeah - yeah, Bren - "
"Mmmhmm," Brendan hums, lips close in a slight brush, enough to make Steven's eyes flutter.
He tugs on the waistband of Steven's jeans and boxers and wriggles them down enough for him to get his hand down, underneath Steven's balls, velvety roll of them in his palm, and further until he can rub against Steven's hole, feel the muscles give under his fingertips, satisfying as fuck the way Steven's body responds and opens up to him like a flower under the sun, like nature itself. "Feel good?"
"Always," Steven says and he's suddenly lit up with another strike of lightning, eyes reflecting white light like sun-caught marbles. He's all open-mouthed, head tipped back, lazy like he's just that content here against this bridge with Brendan's fingers pushing their way up into him.
Brendan works him until his muscles start to tense, until he starts to shift forward against Brendan's hand, and then he crooks his fingers up, gets the swollen gland right under his fingertips and applies pressure, back and forth motion, rubs him until he's pawing at Brendan's shoulders and making stammering, mewling little noises of desperation.
He's too fascinated to stop, though; can't stop watching Steven's face just melt with all that focus on the most sensitive part of him, can't stop watching his muscles strain and tremble and all because of what he's doing. It never gets old, having this kind of power over Steven's body. Steven puts himself in Brendan's hands willingly, fucking eagerly, and Brendan moulds and shapes him into whatever animal he chooses.
"Brendan - Brendan, please - tell me what you're gonna do next - " Steven begs and he can't refuse Steven anything when he begs so nicely.
"Gonna turn you over, get that pretty arse of your's up so I can see it, hold you open, maybe get my tongue in there, wet you up a bit - "
" - Jesus - "
"Not even close, Steven," Brendan chuckles, his voice pitched so low it's a rumble, can hardly hear it over another deep, earth-shattering roll of thunder. "Does that sound good? Let you ride my face for a bit?"
"Sounds amazin' - why the fuck are you still talkin'?" Steven asks, half-joking, half-fucking-nigh-on-keening with desperation.
Brendan gives him a squeeze, tight iron-fisted grip, and says, "like the sound of my own voice, you cheeky fucker."
"Don't I know it," Steven breathes, head thrown back and air stuttering out of him.
Brendan grins at him, bares his teeth, sharp and wolfish. He takes his hands off Steven's body and grips one shoulder to pull him away from the support, over onto his stomach and back against it in one fluid movement. He sees Steven brace underneath him, get his arms folded and one knee against the metal under himself to hold his weight, and Brendan slides down to sit straddling the bar, another vertical support at his back to stop him from hitting the floor.
He gets his palms flat on Steven's arse cheeks, kneads at the flesh, spreads him open and watches goosebumps break out all across his skin. He purses his lips and blows cool air against Steven's hole and hears him whisper above, fuck, and then Brendan gets in close, presses his kiss-pouted lips against him and moves with the arching roll of Steven's hips as he grinds back. Brendan holds his hip, slides a hand around to his front, presses his lower stomach and urges Steven to ride him just like he promised; never breaks his promises to his boy, he'd rather die.
Steven gets with it quickly and Brendan relaxes his tongue, makes it soft and sloppy, sucks and licks and lets Steven find his own pleasure until he's begging for Brendan's tongue inside him and Brendan obliges that, too, pushes the tip against the loosening ring of muscle and wriggles his way in, slicks him up with his spit, lets it gather and drip down against Steven's balls, spreads it with one hand as he rolls them in a palm.
Steven gasps and moans and moves, becomes an utter mess under Brendan's tongue and hands, a half-puddled, shivering long line of muscle and bone and sensation. Brendan looks up the length of him to another fork of bright lightning, so close it's almost on top of them now, pressure in the air growing and sparking, skin crackling like static off the bridge beams.
"What now, Bren?" he calls out, broken and scraping gravel.
Brendan sucks one last kiss against him, makes it extra wet, extra sloppy. "Now I'm gonna fuck you, Steven."
"Make me come, please - I need - I'm fucking dyin' here - seriously, I can't - " Brendan doesn't find out what he can't because Steven's dissolved into pleading incoherence.
He's pretty sure there's no more sense to be had out of the boy, he's nearly as fucking wrecked himself just from the sheer desperation, the absolute, burning desire that grows out of control between them, more and more, like it's climbing to infinity. He thinks it can't get any more, any bigger, but then it does, it snarls and twists into an untameable beast and keeps on going, just gains momentum. He can't get enough of Steven, can't take his eyes off him and Steven can't breath without Brendan, can't function without Brendan to make him whole.
Nothing is ever enough so they carve a path through this country and try to satiate that need in other ways just to stop from devouring each other.
Brendan stands, gets a hand secured against the surface just above Steven's head, and uses his free hand to pop his jeans open and pull out his swollen, fucking painfully hard dick. He positions himself properly, rubs the head across Steven's entrance, pushes in and feels the muscles slip open and cling tight, swallow him up in heat.
"God, Steven - look at you - " he chokes out, watches Steven take him in, slow inch-by-inch. "Fucking easiest thing, hottest thing I'll ever see."
"Come on, Bren - fuck me - " Steven grinds out, looks back over his shoulder and scrabbles one hand over the top of Brendan's above him, pushes his fingers through Brendan's own and grips, knuckles white.
Brendan takes another moment - just to appreciate the sight: Steven's arse angled up, Brendan's dick buried deep. Steven's face, flushed and shining wet, water droplets clinging delicately in his eyelashes. He pulls out, gives Steven a smile, gets a wicked, burning-hot one in return, and punches back into his body so hard Steven cries out and slips up the girder several inches.
"Bloody, Jesus - just like that, Bren - " Steven stutters and pleads and Brendan holds his hip and gives it to him, fucks him sharp and precise, tries a few angles until Steven's spine curves into a perfect bow and he keens along to another heavy rumble of thunder, fucking harmony to Brendan's ears.
"Right there, Steven?"
Steven doesn't reply with words, just nods, drops his forehead to the metal and groans in affirmation, and Brendan keeps the position and nails him again and again, hits him where it feels fucking good, makes sure to focus the pressure, makes it hard enough. Steven's wild beneath him, gasping for breath and flexing his fingers, scratching against the solid supports and Brendan's own hand.
He's completely lost to Brendan, nothing but pliant, quivering flesh in Brendan's grip, nerves and pounding pulse and rushing blood. Steven responds so shockingly powerful to every stimulus; Brendan plays him like a familiar instrument and turns him into this every time and it never ceases to floor him how completely Steven gives himself over. It makes him strain in return, makes him reach out along that tangible connection that holds between them, unbreakable as the steel in this bridge, and let himself go in the knowledge that he'll never fall as long as that safety exists.
Lightning silently streaks, so close he has to shut his eyes against it, and he feels half-delirious with shockingly mounting pressure and exposure to the most violent elements. He feels his orgasm curling and winding through him like smoke tendrils, tight grip of Steven's muscles around him, dragging, hot friction and Steven's breathless, ragged moans. He's desperate to get closer and sprawls forward, moulds himself to Steven's back and buries his lips into the side of Steven's neck, licks and scrapes his teeth against his jaw, catches Steven's lips when he turns back and slides his tongue into that hot mouth, wet and slick.
"You close?" he asks roughly and Steven nods, gasps into Brendan's mouth and Brendan drags in painful, heaving breaths like the air is too thick to breath.
He worms his hand around Steven's hip and grips his dick and strokes him in time to his relentless, merciless thrusts. Steven's muscles flutter and tense around his cock and then he goes completely silent, stomach tensing against Brendan's forearm, so tight that it must ache. He seizes in Brendan's embrace, jerks and spills come over Brendan's fist, never ending fucking stream of it, on and on until he's whimpering and sobbing, oh, God, oh, God, and still shuddering, still coming, long and fucking hard and Brendan can't hold back anymore, can't survive Steven's ecstasy, dragged screaming over the edge himself and fucks Steven through it all, feels the sheer, brute force of rumbling thunder and simultaneous cracking lightning as it shakes the foundations of the bridge and send shockwaves through Brendan's body right along with the searing hot sing of his orgasm.
It tears out of him and he rides it out blindly into Steven's loosening body, feels Steven's hole slick and slapping wetly as Brendan fills him with come and fucks it out of him until he's spent and weak, collapsing against Steven's back and pressing him into the support while they both breath and calm the hell down.
"Fuckin' hell, Brendan - " Steven eventually sighs and he wriggles under Brendan's weight, gets his jeans up and shifts onto his back with all the experience of someone who's used to tight spots, and they slide down the metal into a heap, Steven sprawled in Brendan's lap where he's kneeling, straddling the bar and propped up against the vertical support at his back. "It's always good but fuck me that was one of the best."
"Bridge gettin' points?"
"Abso-fucking-lutely. Only the Chevy beats this."
Ah, the Impala. He's still going to have to set aside some time to fuck Steven in that car one last time before they're forced to ditch it and find something new.
Brendan idly tucks his fingertips under Steven's soaking t-shirt and draws circles against the skin of his belly, touches the tattoo above his hip. Salcombe Harbour Hotel balcony, drunk on vintage Dom Perignon and sea-salt air and the taste of freedom. Steven had laid out for him on the grey-mesh lounger and Brendan had pressed those words into his skin with ink and needles and his own laving tongue. Go bás - 'til death.
Steven watches him through lazy, hooded eyes with his mouth turned up at the corners, real and genuine smile laced with a dark edge of possessive adoration, something they share together on that precarious knife-edge of insanity. He can almost see the word mine carving a bloodied path through his lips.
"All yours, baby," Brendan purrs and Steven smiles wider, eyes bright and fever-hot, pleased as fucking punch, cat that got the cream.
"And me?" Steven asks slowly, knowingly.
"All mine," Brendan tells him roughly, pitches his voice low and dangerous. "Anyone ever tries to take you away from me, I'll make 'em beg for death." Steven laughs, delighted; his lust for Brendan's chaotic, merciless brutality almost as insatiable as his lust for Brendan's body. His boy's not stable and Brendan fucking loves him. "Have I told you how much I fuckin' love you, lately?"
"Not since that post man yesterday afternoon."
"I fucking love you."
"Love you, too, Bren."
Steven raises his hand, holds it out, palm facing him and Brendan gets it, pushes their hands together and links their fingers. Steven pulls the joint appendages into his lap and strokes over Brendan's sore, grazed knuckles tenderly.
"Wanna head back?" Brendan asks softly but despite the damp he's actually pretty damn relaxed.
The lightning's passed on overhead, the rain a fine and gentle cascade. The breeze has picked up, air clearer, storm's suffocating weight dissipating. It's much cooler, much fresher.
"Nah," Steven says gracelessly, shuffles forward in Brendan's lap until they're pressed together, Steven's arms sliding around his neck and fingers pushing into Brendan's wet hair. "You look too good out 'ere - just wanna kiss you."
Brendan tips his head up, nuzzles his nose against Steven's jaw, scrape of stubble stinging, murmurs, "bring it," and Steven slides his lips across Brendan's, licks his way inside Brendan's mouth and kisses him slow and thorough to the sound of falling rain and the heady smell of wood and pine.
*/*/*
" - a mounting pile of dead bodies and no evidence, what exactly is being done to catch these killers?"
"We have our best teams across three states working around the clock to assure - "
"Nobody's assured, Police Commissioner. These men are rampaging through town after town, unchecked - "
Brendan trails his fingers across the back of Steven's neck, arms stretched out across the bench seat. He has one hand on the wheel, foot all the way to the floor, engine roaring with life beneath him. Cool air plays across his heated skin from the rolled down windows and he glances across to Steven and Steven looks back, lazy contentment easy on his features.
" - we are doing everything within our power to catch the perpetrators of these heinous crimes."
"With all due respect Police Commissioner: try telling that to Mrs West, her husband was brutally beaten to death, and Mrs Sullivan, who's husband's throat was slit - "
Steven scoffs. "We did 'em a favour if you ask me."
Brendan laughs. "I don't think they'd see it that way. Find some music, this guy's whinging is pissing me off."
Steven fiddles with the radio, red marker moving over the roll-over dial scale, real deal, that, no high-tech digital shit in this car, until he finds something clear.
" ~ everyone is lucky, everyone is so kind, on the road to Shambala ~ "