sonora_coneja (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
sonora_coneja) wrote2011-01-21 04:29 pm
sonora_coneja) wrote2011-01-21 04:29 pm
Past Lives - Templeton's Revenge, Part Two
Pairing: Hannibal/Face, Face/Lynch, H-BAMF(lite)
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: non-con
Summary: Part Two of a sequel for The Caribbean.
Basically my own sequel to a fic on the kink meme. Why? Because a comment asked me for more, and then... pirate!Hannibal would simply NOT get out of my head! Rather inconsiderate of him, if you take into account all the embarrassing little moments at work where he pops into mind and I start giggling... anyway, on to the sequel!
Part One is... here
The pirate captain John Smith has a daring plan to raid Port Royal and kill his old enemy, Governor Lynch. Templeton’s willing to help, even if it means leaving out some vital little piece of information about the governor’s interest in him...
The sun was setting by the time Templeton made it back through the gates of the fort. Almost time for supper, but he found his feet taking him elsewhere instead.
The library in the main administrative building was small and rudimentary, but Templeton had done the bulk of his work admist its shelves, back when he still served under the governor. He’d liked the place and ran his hands now along the spines of old volumes he’d spent long night hours reading by candlelight. The one gift the Quakers had given him, literacy, and he sincerely missed the books here.
But it was the window he stopped at, expensive handblown glass overlooking the wide harbor and the blue waters of the Caribbean beyond. Where the ship would be tomorrow night, cannon blazing, John rushing towards him...
“Templeton! Back safely from your constitutional, I see!”
He winced, Lynch’s voice sounding behind him and the young man turned around slowly. “Yes, sir, everything quite agreeable.”
“Good, good,” the magistrate said in that cool way of his, just a little too close now. “How are you adjusting to everything?”
“It is different, but good to be back,” Templeton lied, and smiled a smile he didn’t truly feel.
“I would think so. Pirates. Nasty creatures.”
“...indeed, sir.”
A kind of awkward pause hung between them for a minute, and then Lynch clapped him on the shoulder. “Come have supper with me, lad. Civilized conversation and everything.”
“Sir, I...”
“I will not accept no as an answer,” the governor said pointedly. Templeton only barely caught himself with a nod, and froze as a kiss was placed gently on his forehead. An arm was around his shoulders, pulling on him.
There was no way to resist, not without giving himself away.
So Templeton cast one last little glance backwards towards the window and the fading sunlight and then set his jaw. He’d set himself upon this course of action, and by hell, if this is what it was going to take to gain the man’s trust and get John his vengeance...
“Thank you, sir,” he said, forcing as much adoration into his voice as possible.
One of those hands tucked a wisp of hair back into its loose braid and Lynch was leading him away. “Good lad.”
He shivered.
For John.
+++++
Supper was an expansive affair, rich and terrifying.
Templeton didn’t taste any of it, barely registered the act of eating at all. Lynch was keeping up a running conversation, something he responded to automatically, remembering this man’s habits, his inclinations and preferences, but still. The entire thing was just exhausting.
“You look a bit tired, Templeton,” Lynch said smoothly, wiping his mouth and casually tossing the large white napkin on the table as he stood. “Are you feeling well?”
“Walking freely has not been an option of late,” he lied.
“I would imagine it so,” Lynch replied with an easy laugh, and there he was again, just a little too close, hand on his shoulder. He squeezed, just a little too hard. “Poor lad.”
Templeton looked back over his shoulder at the magistrate, at the night spreading its wings anew, the slaves lighting more lamps. Heart leaden, he stood up, wishing this could be otherwise, wondering if it had to be, and decided it didn’t matter. He could not afford to reveal himself now, which he would surely do, if he protested this too strongly. “Sir?”
Lynch smoothed that hand down his shoulder, all the way around his ribs, heavy and hard, thought only to his own pleasure and none to Templeton’s. So different from the way John touched him. Certainly, the pirate captain took what he wanted, but he always kept an eye to the younger man’s own satisfaction. Or perhaps it was giving into John’s desire that made Templeton so, so happy. But this, with Lynch?
He shied away from the touch when it reached a buttock. But Templeton found himself with nowhere to go, caught between the governor’s body and the back of his own chair. He cast about, but the slaves had vanished back into the woodwork of the ornate dining hall. Just himself, and Lynch, and the scattered silver on the long table.
“Sir?” he asked again, chest pounding.
The magistrate smiled, as if he found this amusing. He ran a long hand through his hair, loosening it from the long plait, playing with it as he had that first day, in the bath. “You smell divine, Templeton.”
“Thank...thank you, m’lord.”
“So beautiful, this face of yours,” he murmured, the blue in his eyes darkening in lust, and in desperation Templeton thought of HM with that bright gaze of his, like the ocean at dawn, or Baracus, so deep, the waters at night, and John’s own, the seas before the storm... “You know I desired you for myself, when you served me here before.”
“Yes, m’lord. I know that.”
“I restrained myself then. And if you stay now, you must come back to me fully...”
“M’lord?”
Lynch had him pinned now, hips and shoulders, his hardness pressing against Templeton’s groin. “You know what that means, do you not?”
Fear, very real fear, was coursing into his blood. “Aye, m’lord,” he said evenly, trying not to betray himself.
That hand jerked a little, knotting into blonde locks. “And what do I mean to you, Templeton? My patronage deserves payment, does it not?”
He smiled, coy, that teasing look that had any one of hs lovers on him and in him without so much as a word on either side. Revulsion held behind his teeth, he trailed a finger down between them, tugging a little on the heavy embroidered silk of the governor’s overcoat. “Let me show you, m’lord,” he purred, and pushed back a little, dropping to his knees.
Those hands tugged harder as Templeton forced reluctant fingers to undo the buttons of Lynch’s fly, opening him up slowly, taking him in hand and licking a hot stripe up the man’s swollen, red cock. Once, twice, and then he started swirling along the head, sucking lightly, remembering the tricks HM had taught him. Tricks that drove even John, the most steadfast of men, into an incoherent, pleading, needful thing.
But Lynch was nothing like John. He gasped and shuddered and braced himself against the back of the chair, so clearly affected, but he was nothing like John. The young man wanted to gag on the taste of him alone, spit and bite and gut the man with a butter knife, but he did not stop. He could not. Maybe, just maybe, he hoped, this could end here. He could feel how close he was, and sped up, sucking harder as he began bobbing proper, teeth just grazing...
Templeton was lost to a sensation of lifting out of himself, perhaps some momentary grace for a sinner such as himself to escape the agony of what was happening to him. Lynch’s hard, Lynch’s cock, Pike’s pistol, the stone of the floor... the entire world was hard and cold and careless, the governor fucking his mouth with an almost gleeful abandon. Breaking through his gag reflex with every roll of his hips, and Templeton wanted to retch. His knees ached, his jaw, and with deep shame he realized he was crying.
Pike leaned over a broad shoulder, nipping along what exposed skin there was, attention riveted on the obscenity unfolding at the business end of his firearm. He grinned at Templeton. “That madman, Henry Murdock, ever tell you what I did to him? What finally snapped that fevered mind of his?”
The younger man jerked at that, coming clean off the governor’s cock. “You pox-ridden bastard...” he hissed, momentary relief from the horrific pressure in his mouth even as he heard the slight snap of a trigger being drawn back...
And then, just a little louder, on the edge of his twisted senses, he recognized the slam of the dining hall’s heavy door.
“Lynch! You thrice-damned son of a bitch! Unhand him and face me!”
Lynch shoved away and slammed Templeton back into the chair, head bouncing off the thick wood with substantial recoil. The young man’s vision swam from the force of the blow, his ears rang, his body collapsed of its own volition, but he knew that voice, and, wiping a hand across his lips, he couldn’t help but smile up at the shocked governor. “Said he would come, did I not?”
Pike made a strangled sound behind the governor, and Templeton noted with not a little relief that the pistol had vanished. “Murdock,” he growled.
“Mi amigo, como estas?” came the bosun’s almost happy reply, drawling softly across the silence of the room. “May I kill him, captain?”
“If it pleases you, HM,” the captain ground out. “But that one’s mine.”
For a moment, nobody moved, air thick with unshed blood that they all knew, all had to know, was coming.
Then Lynch laughed, breaking the spell. He kicked out at Templeton’s shaking body even as he tucked himself back into his breeches. He slicked a hand back through his hair and that ironic little smirk was back as he walked nonchalantly over to the gigantic marble hearth, choosing a sword from the rack there, testing the heft of each in turn, the two of them conversing in the most casual of tones as he rifled through.
“You always were a miscreant, commander.”
“Aye, but you were always the criminal, ensign.” The rage in the captain's voice was barely contained.
“Not nice, Smith.”
"You bought your rank."
"Because I was not some gutter rat from Dublin..."
"Because you've nothing else to offer His Majesty but your family's money and the suffering of those around you."
"How has all that nobility turned out for... aha, here it is..."
Templeton couldn’t see anything, balled up on the floor as he was. With a groan, he tried to shift himself, body unresponsive, nothing working, and then a huge hand caught his head, cradling him. He reached out gratefully.
“Baracus,” he breathed out, reaching a hand back around that strong neck as he was lifted up onto his feet. “Good to see you.”
“And you,” the big black man murmured back, treating him like fine china, stroking a finger down his cheek. “You understand what’s goin’ on here?”
Templeton looked up.
HM and Pike were staring at one another across the table, a little ways down. Pike’s hand was on his pistol, the bosun’s playing along the hilt of his gurkha knife, a prize from some old adventure in the Mughal Hind, smiling that vicious smile of his.
John had stripped out of his dark, plain jacket, down to loose blouse, sash swaying slightly against one tensed thigh, naked cutlass in hand glinting wickedly in the candlelight. The pirate captain was between Lynch and the exit, poised to strike. Intent as he was, his eyes still flickered over to rest on the former secretary. Just a second. And then his gaze darted back to the governor, darkening considerably. Weapon chosen, Lynch’s hand twisted under the gold filigree of his handguard.
Everything was still. Nothing moving. The battle not yet joined.
Something swelled up inside of Templeton at the scene, and Baracus’ hands closed down around him. His men, coming for him, protecting him, and the Virginian sighed as dark lips pressed against his pulse point, reassuring, wonderful.
Then Pike snorted. Loudly. Watching them. “Disgusting...” he began, but never got a chance to finish.
Not as, in seeming perfect synch, HM launched himself over the table with a roar and John lunged and everything just exploded around them.
Templeton had seen John fight before. ‘Twas a sight to behold. The man was all lean muscle and flowing form when he fought, hair falling around his shoulders and a fell smile on his face.
But this wasn’t like their sparring sessions. Wasn’t like the raid they’d gone on a month or so back. Not even like the time John killed some poxy pickpocket in Tortuga, easy as breathing. Before, Templeton realized, John had been casual, relaxed, in his element.
Playing.
None of that was present now.
Bloodlust, not passion, was fueling those fine limbs and driving all action. Harder, stronger, the grace muted under the force of his fury. Templeton watched, breathless, Baracus tugging him swiftly out of the way as the two men went at it, hammer and tongs, across the wide floor of the dining hall. Lynch knew what he was doing, younger than John, but rusty and fighting out of desperation.
John brought his worn, well-oiled cutlass sharp across, Lynch leaping back only just in time, a red line drawn out of his chest and he screamed. The governor hurtled a chair at John, who almost caught it in the leg, and slashed again at table height as Lynch scrambled upwards. Snarling, losing precious seconds, the pirate captain leapt up after him, taking a blow himself across the bicep. It didn’t slow him down in the slightest.
Dishes and candelabras went flying, food scattered, candle wax splattered to the far walls, as the two men threw themselves at one another. Blades flashed, almost too quick to follow, form disintegrating as both men sought some final killing blow.
HM popped up next to where Baracus was holding Templeton back against the wall, a set of keys in his hand, blood dripping heedlessly from his curved knife onto his own loose trousers.
Pike’s prone form lay crumpled on the ground at the end of the table.
The bosun smiled as he kissed Templeton lightly, some of that softness reemerging, the need to kill sated for the time being. The Virginian heard the earrings jingle together, and traced the line of the other man’s ear. “What did he do you, love?”
“Killed my dog,” HM said, quite seriously, and tossed Baracus the keys. “Can you get to the magazine, amigo? The crew’s gonna be floodin’ town the moment we blow it.”
Baracus inspected the keys, and held one up, a heavy one that Templeton recognized as well. The key to the slave pens. Their eyes met, the words not even needing to be spoken aloud. “Magazine my second priority,” he growled, and took off at a dead run.
HM wrikled his brow. “His mother...” Templeton began, and a roar brought them both back to the fight.
John had hurtled Lynch from the table, the governor’s sword scattering away on the hard floor, blood streaking in slow, dark spurts from some concealed wound on his side. The captain hopped down, left arm hanging useless, expressionless as he strode towards the wounded man.
The governor was dragging himself backwards on his hands, hate and something akin to fear in his eyes, still smiling. “Killing me will not redeem you, Smith.”
“Perhaps not.” He laughed, hard and horrible, an edge to the sound that chilled Templeton to his core. How could it not? It was primal, vicious... “But sending you to hell will be a tremendous pleasure.”
Then...
HM’s ears pricked, and he shoved away from the wall, rushing at some subtle signal Templeton, in his malaise or his inexperience with such things as this, had not noticed. His knife didn’t arch, taking the most direct path, all the madman’s weight bearing down as he took one more step and leapt...
Just as Pike’s body surged upward with a strength not usually given to dead men, his own wicked dagger driving straight up...
The mercenary and the bosun struck at almost the exact same moment, HM burying the gurkha to the hilt into the man’s neck, and Pike swiping the tip of his own blade clean across John’s exposed hip as he passed...
The captain fell to the ground, sword still in hand, and Lynch stumbled to his feet. Took one look at the murderous expression on HM’s face, dripping knife held up over his captain’s fallen body.
“Coward!” the bosun shrieked in a near inhuman voice as the governor fled as fast as he could, tearing out of the room with a surprising burst of speed, through the guards that were beginning to gather, roused from the outer walls by the sound of the fight, no doubt, and was gone.
He didn’t have to think about it. He wasn’t capable.
Not seeing John go down like that.
Templeton found his feet and found himself up, running, after Lynch, some kind of red slamming down over his vision. Like the governor before him, he tore through the guards, seizing a musket from a startled man as he went.
Feet pounding down the hall, he knew there were only one way Lynch could go from here. Down, into the kitchens. Then where? Deeper into the administrative and living quarters? No. Not that.
Across the moonstreaked expanse of the main parade ground of the fort, towards the barracks and the magazine, towards the people who could help him...that was the way he was going.
Templeton knew it in his gut, and slammed up against the nearest window, breaking out the glass with the butt of his flint-lock and waited.
He was shaking from the adrenalin and the shock and the smell of blood clinging to him like never before, something, everything in him howling at the thought of injury to his man, the man he loved...and that realization right there was almost enough to startle him out of the glorious ease of that red haze enveloping him.
But there he was, a single lone figure, limping out of the ground floor, thin yelling reaching his ears, three stories up. It was dark, it was far, his hands wouldn’t steady themselves, sweat was dripping in his eyes and he could hear the clank of armor behind him.
And the pox take all of that.
He had to kill this man. Kill this man for John, in case John wasn’t...
Templeton sighted along the barrel, led the target, careful, one chance to kill Lynch and save them all.
He breathed out one breath. Squeezed the trigger.
The shot rang out.
One breath.
Lynch fell.
One breath.
The guards were on him, Templeton not knowing whether he was laughing or sobbing as he fought his way away from the wall and the shattered window, using the spent long gun as a staff, then a club, swinging wildly, falling, slipping under, lashing out blind, rage flooding...
Until a familiar hand caught him. “All’s to right. They’ve fled. They’ve fled. Everything is at rights. You did so well, love...”
He shuddered to a stop, everything lifting away, even the things that should have been there. Somehow, he was bleeding, his shirt in tatters, pain radiating out from a place he couldn’t quite identify.
More talking.
“...ind Baracus, blow the magazi...”
He couldn’t quite hear it, the world still reverberating with the violence of the evening, exhilarating and exhausting and Templeton wanted nothing more than to fall away into sleep, right there, right then.
But there was warm skin against his, and warm arms around him, lifting him away. He stumbled along, trusting to that, listening to that heart beat, fingers digging, trying to reach it until a kiss was pressed to his forehead and more nonsense murmured. At some point, there were flashes of light and rushes of air, noise from Hell reaching to up Heaven itself. The world was floating, swaying, moving like the world should move and he might have been screaming.
Another kiss.
Templeton opened his eyes. Soft gold light from the lampss, the pre-dawn sun, the faint sound of wake breaking behind them, the smell of long-spent gunpowder and sweat and blood.
“Hell’s breath, captain,” he said, shifting out of the bunk where he’d been laid, HM and Baracus curled into one another, close to him and warm.
The Virginian peered with bleary eyes across the dim cabin to where John was sitting crosslegged against the bulkhead, naked, pale chestnut hair splayed free across his shoulders, unconcerned as the ship’s cook stitched closed a nasty gash on his thigh. Templeton's heart tightened, knowing the captain would be the last of the crew to be fixed up from the night's fighting.
But the cook was almost done. John was already sporting a stained white bandage on his left arm, face washed, steel eyes tight, pipe resting comfortably between his lips. Was that a little smile there? Satisfaction? Relief? Happiness?
Didn't matter.
He’d never looked so beautiful, and the younger man felt the breath catch in his throat as he looked at him.
“Go back to sleep, Templeton,” the captain ordered softly with a nod. “I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
Templeton laid obediently down, but he couldn’t sleep. Not yet. Not until the cook was finished and off to his own rest. Not until John laid down next to him and pulled him close, letting the younger man nuzzle into his shoulder..
“I love you, John.”
“And I you, my lad.”
A hand fingered his hair, brushed his lips, and Templeton sighed.
Home at last.
+++++
The evening sun was streaming weakly into John’s airy little cabin by the time Templeton awoke. The Virginian lay there for a moment or two, relishing the slight movement of the ship around him, the softness of the sheets and the pallet beneath him, watching the light play around the dark beams of the roof, before he felt the need to go find John, explain himself.
He pushed out of bed, a fresh set of clothes laid out. His own, well-fitted and of good material, just as he liked and just as the captain indulged him in. Padding over on bare feet, Templeton pulled on the breeches and tied the belt, eschewing the blouse or boots or anything else. Barefoot, he threw the doors open and stepped out onto the ship’s upper deck.
It was mostly vacant out here, still and quiet, the only sound the creak of the spars and the snap of sails in the billowing wind. His naked feet made nary a sound on smooth plank. HM, leaning on the wheel, tipped his wide-brimmed hat up and nodded to Templeton as he passed. No words were spoken. Seemed right, not to interrupt the contemplative mood of the ship as she plied the evening seas.
Templeton moved over to the edge, watching the water slide by the hull, smooth and easy. Peaceful, here, and the man felt a tremendous swell of gratitude, one he had not known before now, that he was alive.
A glorious feeling.
A strong, calloused hand closed down over his, and Templeton looked up at its owner. Baracus’ dark eyes met his own. “Been waiting for you to wake.”
Templeton grasped the black man’s shoulder firmly, remembering with some embarrassment the how his friend had help him last night, caught him, after... he swallowed. “Is John angry with me?”
“I am,” the big man rumbled. “You lucky the captain came when the fool told ‘im what you said about that Pike...”
“Your family?” Templeton asked, not wanting to think about what very well could have happened to him, had John not shown up in the miraculous manner that he had. “Are they out?”
Baracus nodded, taciturn as always.
“That’s good.”
“Aye...”
“Is John mad at me?”
Those dark chocolate eyes flashed up to the bow of the ship. “He waitin’ for you to wake as well.” And then, with a swiftness belied by that massive frame of his, Baracus was away, back over to the helm, where HM must have been teasing him about mermaids or the fountain of youth, because the black man ruffled the bosun’s hair and drew him in for a kiss. Quickest way to silence the man, a kiss like that. Templeton watched them for a moment, then turned his attention to the bowsprint.
Where John was.
It seemed almost too quiet, the crew probably turning in early or drinking quietly after a hard day’s sail. John had sunk what few military vessels to be found at Port Royal, but the fleet was larger than that, Templeton knew, and the captain would have pressed as fast as possible away. Only a skeleton shift would be left for the night.
Nothing to bother them, then. Although John had spoken true when first they’d met - out here, there were no judgements.
His feet carried him easily along the softly rolling deck, towards the sight of that strong, proud, scarred back, naked in the failing day. John, one boot tipped up, staring out at the sunset, pipe in hand. A firm thing, Templeton thought, in a world of uncertainty and fear, and reached out to touch, fingering the warm skin below the bandage. He dipped his thumb beneath the edge of John’s sash, playing with the brilliant scarlet silk tied loosely around the captain’s breeches.
A long, dark stain was running down the material, and he realized with a start that the man was wearing the same pair from last night’s adventure. “Bloody hell, captain...” he breathed. But John didn’t turn, didn’t even lean into the contact. No recognition at all. “John, please speak to me.”
There was a puff of fragrant smoke, something like a growl. “Baracus tells me Lynch had his eye on you before.”
“That is what the governor told me as well.”
John hunched forward a little more. “Were you aware of this?”
“...yes.”
“Hell and damnation, lad! Why did you not tell me?”
Templeton’s mind raced for an answer that would be more pleasing that the truth, but there was nothing. Nothing else to use. Not now. Not after that. “It was your plan, I could not...”
“There could have been a different plan, Templeton. One that did not...” A hand slammed down on the wooden rail of the bow. “You are never to do that, Templeton Peck! Never! You are not my slave to be sold, bartering your flesh like you were some kind of common whore!”
Whore. Lynch had called him the same. “Shall I go then?” he asked, withdrawing his hand.
The pirate didn’t respond but to take another long drag on his pipe, and Templeton felt the peace inside of him shatter. Of course. John would not want him now, having failed the captain in such a gross and base manner. No place on this ship for a man who was not obedient, who was not devoted, and he had proven himself a failure in both categories. And Templeton began to back away, thinking of what he could do. Disembark at the next port? Find work with his letters, as he had planned to do before? Find passage to New Orleans or Boston? Find...
“Templeton!”
He froze, and John was leaning on the rail, pipe still pressed lightly to his lips, considering something with hooded eyes.
“Captain?”
“He believed you, did he not? About why you were back, how you’d come to be there again? Played on his interests?”
Templeton bit down on the edge of bitterness cutting through him. “Bastards are said to be born liars, Master Smith, and I suppose that I am both...”
And whatever he was expecting didn’t happen because, because John was laughing. He tapped the remainder of the tobacco from his pipe, into the sea, and pushed off. Towards Templeton. “Aye, lad, that you are. But that shot was honest enough. A hundred yards in the dark...” and he was upon the younger man, whose mind was swimming in confusion as steely hands closed down around his shoulders. “Killed your first man in grand style, my lad.”
“You... you will send me away, will you not, captain?”
“For what?”
“For... for disobeying you, betraying you... with...”
“’Twas Lynch, not you. You betrayed nothing but yourself, not holding yourself in higher esteem,” the pirate said in a surprisingly soft voice that hardened almost instantly, and he began pressing Templeton back into the ship, away from the edge. “But an order? Not then, but now. If you ever walk again into such a trap, thinking to spring it using your body, I will have you flogged until your meat falls from your bones.”
His back contacted solid wood, and Templeton barely registered it, the heat off John’s body enfolding him now. A hand splayed out on his chest and shoved him back with heavy force.
“You are mine, Templeton, body and soul, and I’ll not have you give either away. No man of mine...”
A shiver ran through his very bones, and the younger man recalled their first kiss. So like this it had been, John trapping him against a wall, mesmerizing with words and body both, an unstoppable force of nature, and he wondered, hoped, this would be like that.
But now, instead of going for his lips, as he had then, John attacked his neck. Kissing and sucking and nipping, one hand on his chest and the other slipping into his breeches, taking him fully in hand, instantly hard and leaking it seemed, pinned, held fast as it got more aggressive, deeper, and Templeton groaned as teeth broke skin and John fisted him roughly. A sharp flash of pain, and the younger man felt a swell of something he’d never known before, something he couldn’t identify, a sensation of being claimed, and he let himself melt into it. John whispered a hot “mine” across hot skin and Templeton was spilling himself into that strong hand, screaming his pleasure, loving this man, wondering at him, all the raw power within, and he was momentarily lost to John and John alone.
A tongue was soothing the raw skin of his neck, John holding him as the last of his tremors ebbed. Uncoordinated from the force of his orgasm, Templeton only just managed to reach and grab that fine hair, pulling his captain into a long, searing kiss, tasting smoke and the copper of his own blood flecked on strong lips.
“You must listen to me, love,” John murmured, pulling back a little, creating a space to speak in. “You must learn.”
Templeton nodded, mute, and dug a hand into that sash, feeling the wetness against his skin with a sudden wave of shame. The pirate captain must have noticed, for he rubbed a shoulder, and his expression changed entirely. “Templeton?”
“I promised HM and Baracus I would not...”
John laughed again, and wrapped his undamaged arm around his waist, pulling him along the deck, back towards the cabin where a slim figure was already lighting lamps against encroaching night.
“Ah, yes, your accord. Shall we go see what we can do to make an honest man of you?”
Templeton smiled, and let himself be led away. “With that, at least, captain.”
+++++
Templeton was trembling as John led his across the dark deck. No more guidance than a simple touch on the neck, and not even that, truly. The captain didn't wish to lose the silky feel of the lad's skin under his fingers, rubbing softly over the mark, his mark, higher up than any collar could hide. This man was his, by god. He'd not have another mistake like Lynch.
By my side or in my bed he thought to himself, and flung his cabin doors wide.
HM looked up from the last lamp he was lighting. Baracus had clearly been leaning against a wall, watching the bosun with something soft and earnest in his gaze. His eyes, too, were drawn. Both of them looked relieved at seeing the smile on Templeton's feature. HM, just that afternoon, had begged him to be lenient on the lad.
"I could never hurt him, Henry."
"He needs to understand, captain, his place here..."
And what fine advice that had been. John had always found him to be the wisest of men under the madness. But for now, the bosun just replaced the glass over the lamp, and came towards the door.
Flickering light seemed to be everywhere and nowhere, warming them all through. The bosun had an affinity for love-making in such conditions, but John believed that the man’s love of light came from his year of imprisonment without it. The captain was again reminded of how he’d found his Henry in the darkness, madness already clouding his quick wit, body reeking in the dark hellhole that devil Pike had caused him to fall into.
But that mercenary was dead now, and there was a little twisted smile on teh bosun’s lips, the one he displayed when pleased, and John smiled back, thumbing lightly over the mark on Templeton’s neck one last time, rejoicing in the lad’s involuntary shudder, before HM moved in cuddling in to Templeton’s warm side.
“Missed you, my friend,” the Virginian said softly, leaning into the touch, then turning into him, neck sliding in John’s grasp as he moved, ever so slightly, their bodies hard and close together. “Missed you...”
“And you, amigo,” the bosun replied as he touched the reddened patch of skin high above Templeton’s collar. A finger ran across the already closing wound. “He is yours now, is he not, captain?”
Was that a touch of envy? Sadness? “I can refresh yours at your leisure, Henry,” John replied, tugging the open laces of his bosun’s shirt away from a white line on the tan of his shoulder and pressing an open mouth kiss to the old mark, many times renewed. He let his teeth scrape it and HM moaned. “Any time you so desire.”
HM giggled a little, like he did sometimes when nervous or aroused, and he bucked up against Templeton, sliding up in one smooth motion to claim that gorgeous mouth for his own. The lad melted at the first light touch of Henry’s tongue, flicking, then thrusting in hard, the kiss deep and long and sweet, sweet as HM’s kisses always were.
John moved aside, letting the two younger men explore, and dropped a hand to stroke himself lazily. His Henry with his Templeton. He loved the two of them together, like this, grinding slowly, heat building, falling into each other, all softness and need, each so passionate and so gentle with the other...
Another hand closed over his own, nudging him aside, and John groaned, letting that touch in. He reached down to feel the arm around him, hard muscle behind his fingertips. He loved this man’s strength, his loyalty, and he slid a loose sleeve up that ebony skin, practically glowing in the lamplight. “Beautiful together, are they not, Baracus?”
“Yes, captain.” His voice was thick with lust
John suppressed a laugh - ah, to be young again - gave him a nod. “Go take your turn.”
Baracus chuckled, heavy and low and stepped towards the entwined pair, pulling away Henry’s blouse, already falling off a shoulder as Templeton’s clever fingers pushed it open under the force of the kiss.
“Crazy fool,” the big man muttered affectionately and tossed the garment away.
The bosun pulled reluctantly off at the lad. Templeton whined a little as HM moved around to hold him still, licking a line up his neck. Careful not to touch John’s mark, the pirate captain noticed with pride. The black man, for his part, cupped that chin in both hands in response, demanding his own kiss, harder than Henry, replacing easy grace with brute force.
John smiled a little wider.
Beautiful.
The pirate captain watched with satisfaction for a few moments more, letting his lads reacquainting themselves with each other. Watching the heat of passion build between them.
Remaining clothes were ripped away, HM’s gurkha was tossed aside, skin taking on a hot sheen in the low light of the room. Control clearly slipping, Templeton was losing himself in the sensation of both men, caught between their mouths and their bodies and all that desire. His hands flailed to hold onto something, one settling on Baracus’ hard chest, the other snaking up behind to fist into HM’s hair.
Already aroused from the marking and the sight of his lads together and the anticipation of that tight, perfect arse, John thought he could get no harder. But then Templeton started moaning, low, needy little moans, that demanded immediate attention. Aalready painfully tight breeches became unbearable.
No more. It was time.
“Enough,” he growled.
And the tone of the room immediately shifted.
The bosun looked up from where he was teasing Templeton’s earlobe with gentle teeth. He was off in an instant, untangling himself from the lad’s body, coming over to John’s side.
Templeton whined again at the loss, but Baracus caught the younger man, chest to back, dropping his big hands to the trace the edge of the lad’s hips, moving to circle that proud, erect shaft. Obscured mostly from John’s view, a finger was slipped into his lad, slicked with the contents of one of those little bottles of oil Templeon had taken to leaving everywhere. He loved his comforts so...
The sound of Templeton’s breach, the look of esctasy on his face was beautiful, and that wondrous body jerked and shivered in response. Release too close. John frowned, and Baracus’ free hand closed down around the base of the lad’s cock.
“Stay, Temp. Wait. He comin’ for you,” John heard the big man say. The lad bit his lip and nodded, arching back into Baracus’ strong form, both of them panting as the black man stroked slowly, opening him up, stretching him wide enough to be taken by John’s not inconsiderable girth. Just enough. He’d already told Baracus he wanted the lad tight tonight...
Henry, clad now in nothing but his earrings and hard himself, pushed John back into the nearest chair and knelt gracefully between his knees. With a kiss to his still-clothed thigh, the bosun lifted his captain’s legs up, left then right, and slowly pulled off his boots. John sighed at the feel of the leather gliding over his skin. Then HM moved up, smoothed his hands along the top of John’s breeches, mouthed his shaft through the damp fabric, humming happily.
And through it all, John held Templeton’s gaze, waiting for the moment that always came. When the lust on the lad’s face tipped into the glory of sheer utter need ... oh, yes. There it was. Begging for John to be buried in him to the hilt, the lad begging to be shown, begging to be shown who he belonged to.
Ready. So ready..
“Henry,” the pirate captain warned with a light growl, tugging on that pierced ear softly.
“Right away, sir,” came the reply and a wink and the soft movement and John hissed his relief, cock springing free to slap against his belly. HM caught him again with that talented mouth, coating him with slick saliva. Just enough.
The captain stood, allowing HM to pull his breeches completely off as the man sucked him down. He stepped out of them and away, letting his hand come away from the bosun’s head in a fond caress.
Baracus released Templeton at almost the exact same moment, and the young man practically fell forward into John’s embrace, both hands grabbing for biceps and smiling up at him, that beautiful face shining in the flickering light. John caught him in stride and rammed him hard against the wall of the cabin, shaking the floor, biting at his mark on his lad’s neck.
“Mine,” he growled.
“Yes m’lord,” the younger man breathed, barely coherent. His eyes were black to the rim, . Strong legs came up to wrap around his waist as the pirate began ravishing that glorious mouth, plundering it for all it was worth.
The pirate drug his nails up a thigh, knee to hip, taking that weight. Tumbling them both about to collapse onto the partially inset bunk, Templeton spread out underneath him, clinging to him, John’s leg bumped against Baracus’ ribs.
He glanced over and was rewarded with HM’s little smile. The bosun was astride the big man, rutting against him eagerly as Baracus attempted to line the madman up for a proper fuck. He looked equal parts exasperated and aroused. John knew that pain well...
But his attention was pulled back to the task at hand by another delicious moan, and he smiled down at the lad under him.
“John, John, god...” the lad was begging, writhing beneath him, running his hands through the pirate’s loose hair, legs moving, cock trapped between them. “John, fuck me, please...”
“Presently,” John murmured back, pushing up enough to reach a hand between them. He gave the lad’s cock one hard tug, ghosted over his balls, back, and then pushed a finger inside experimentally. Baracus had done a good job, as he did with all things, and Templeton’s hips snapped up as John hit his prostate.
“I need...I need...”
“What you need, love?” Slick enough, John decided, and kissed the bridge of that fine nose as he pushed up on the back of the lad’s knees. “Show me, show me...”
Trembling hands caught those knees, and Templeton, biting his lip, spread himself wide, everything on display. “Inside... please...”
John groaned, loving the sound of his lad’s plea, and kissed him once more, as he fitted his cockhead against that slick entrance.
“Like this?”And John thrust hard, sheathing himself in that willing body, drawing a throaty scream from the younger man, a thrill running through his entire being at sinking into that clenching heat once more.
“Yes! Oh yes, please, captain...” and there was a sob in that cry that had nothing to do with pain.
John found his pace just this side of brutal. He couldn’t help it. He had no idea what it was about this lad that drove him out of his mind. No idea why his body craved him, why his heart yearned for him, where the intense desire to possess came from like never before.
But it didn’t matter. A mystery for another day, another time. Right now, the only thing that did matter was this, right here, sinking into the rhythm they both desired, both desperately needed.
John was not gentle, too far gone already to be so, but his lad didn’t seem to mind, thrusting down against every upward snap, taking his cock deeper and deeper, every deeper. Templeton’s eyes were closed, his mouth moving soundlessly, his knees held up against his chest as the pirate took him, hard and fast, lips working against his neck, both of them flying now.
“Mine...”
“...y-yours...”
The lad’s skin tasted of blood and gunpowder from the previous night’s fighting, sweat, of spray off the ocean. Exactly the way a pirate should taste, John decided, and the thought alone very nearly sent him over the edge. Dim, he heard HM and Baracus scream their pleasure as one, reaching climax together. One more good thrust, and Templeton cried out.
Shuddered.
Came.
Orgasm tightened Templeton’s body down around John’s cock as his cock shot pearly white fluid, covering them both, and then John was flooding out into him, roaring, the dark room turning all to white, running fast with the wind, everything silence and heartbeat and breath and the creak of the ship.
At some point, a strong set of hands pulled him down to the soft sheets of the bed to lay on his side and another soothed the taught muscles of his back. He reached out instinctively, and felt the warm expanse of Templeton fall into him. The four of them settled around one another as the force of climax ebbed from tired bodies. His lads, content once more. HM’s raging mind would be calmed now and Baracus sated, both of them turned into each other now, and Templeton...
Templeton did not do anything but roll onto his back and before John could stop him, he was up and away and through the cabin doors. HM started to say something and Baracus reached for him, but John brushed them off, following the lad with a feral growl.
“My boy, what the hell are you on about?!” the captain thundered, the door banging behind him, echoing off the deck. But the younger man didn’t turn, did not look back, striding naked towards the bow where they’d stood together only a short time before. Gripping the rail, knuckles white. “Answer me, Peck!”
When the answer finally came, it was slow, hesitant.
“Yours?”
John leaned his lean, long body against the rail next to that lad, loving the sight of him out here, in the cool breeze, stars overhead. “Always.” The pirate captain kissed a cheek, tasting salt not kicked up by the passage of their ship. Tears. He frowned. Wasn’t right, not from one of his men.
“All this, tonight. Too much, captain... why?”
“You are home here, with us, with me. Do you not see that?”
“I was not gone but a week. Less,” he whispered.
“A day is too long. An hour unbearable,” John growled, holding the lad close. “At my side...”
“... or in your bed,” Templeton finished.
“It was a good kill, lad. One of the best.”
“It was nothing...”
“You killed that bastard. For me, when I could not. No less than that, Templeton. It was everything.” John was watching him keenly for any indication, any sign. He had no idea what was going on in the lad’s pretty head, no way of knowing what the right answer was, the words that would pull the young man back into his arms where he belonged. “You took your revenge and brought me mine. Fitting for a pirate in my crew. My man...”
Templeton’s head drooped, shoulders sagged, soft and almost sad. “I... I think I love you, John Smith. You would not be cruel and... and lie about...just for...”
John’s head swam at the words, at the fear so nakedly on display, at the depth of that emotion. Never before had he heard that so uttered, for him... and he felt his heart swell. “I could never. You are mine, and I yours.”
Templeton nodded, and made a sound halfway between laughing and crying that turned to real mirth as the captain grabbed him and wrestled him playfully away from the edge, back into a tight embrace. Right where he belonged. “Come back to bed, now, love.”
HM and Baracus were waiting, as John had known they would be, just a little ways away. Not quite out of earshot. The big black man put an arm around Templeton, who was starting to shiver a little as the winds were picking up. HM tweaked a nipple, causing the lad to jump a little against John’s chest.
The captain smiled.
His boys.
“Careful with that, Henry. Wouldn’t want to damage the lad, now would we?”
But HM had an intense look on his face, clearly deep in thought. “If Templeton’s a pirate now as you say, sir, he needs a piercing, yes?”
“By your logic, fool,” BA grunted, and John laughed as Templeton.
HM brushed the lad’s pec one more time, thumbed that nipple, kissed it lightly, and grinned wickedly. “I think I know right where it should go.”
“Any objections, Templeton? I assure you, it’s quite pleasurable.” John murmured in one perfect ear, and the lad started laughing an embarrassed little laugh, obviously intrigued by the idea, and the pirate captain felt himself getting hard again.
Ah yes, his boys, indeed.
“Can we do it tonight?”
“Anything you want, love. Anything you want.”
Rating: NC-17
Warnings: non-con
Summary: Part Two of a sequel for The Caribbean.
Basically my own sequel to a fic on the kink meme. Why? Because a comment asked me for more, and then... pirate!Hannibal would simply NOT get out of my head! Rather inconsiderate of him, if you take into account all the embarrassing little moments at work where he pops into mind and I start giggling... anyway, on to the sequel!
Part One is... here
The pirate captain John Smith has a daring plan to raid Port Royal and kill his old enemy, Governor Lynch. Templeton’s willing to help, even if it means leaving out some vital little piece of information about the governor’s interest in him...
The sun was setting by the time Templeton made it back through the gates of the fort. Almost time for supper, but he found his feet taking him elsewhere instead.
The library in the main administrative building was small and rudimentary, but Templeton had done the bulk of his work admist its shelves, back when he still served under the governor. He’d liked the place and ran his hands now along the spines of old volumes he’d spent long night hours reading by candlelight. The one gift the Quakers had given him, literacy, and he sincerely missed the books here.
But it was the window he stopped at, expensive handblown glass overlooking the wide harbor and the blue waters of the Caribbean beyond. Where the ship would be tomorrow night, cannon blazing, John rushing towards him...
“Templeton! Back safely from your constitutional, I see!”
He winced, Lynch’s voice sounding behind him and the young man turned around slowly. “Yes, sir, everything quite agreeable.”
“Good, good,” the magistrate said in that cool way of his, just a little too close now. “How are you adjusting to everything?”
“It is different, but good to be back,” Templeton lied, and smiled a smile he didn’t truly feel.
“I would think so. Pirates. Nasty creatures.”
“...indeed, sir.”
A kind of awkward pause hung between them for a minute, and then Lynch clapped him on the shoulder. “Come have supper with me, lad. Civilized conversation and everything.”
“Sir, I...”
“I will not accept no as an answer,” the governor said pointedly. Templeton only barely caught himself with a nod, and froze as a kiss was placed gently on his forehead. An arm was around his shoulders, pulling on him.
There was no way to resist, not without giving himself away.
So Templeton cast one last little glance backwards towards the window and the fading sunlight and then set his jaw. He’d set himself upon this course of action, and by hell, if this is what it was going to take to gain the man’s trust and get John his vengeance...
“Thank you, sir,” he said, forcing as much adoration into his voice as possible.
One of those hands tucked a wisp of hair back into its loose braid and Lynch was leading him away. “Good lad.”
He shivered.
For John.
+++++
Supper was an expansive affair, rich and terrifying.
Templeton didn’t taste any of it, barely registered the act of eating at all. Lynch was keeping up a running conversation, something he responded to automatically, remembering this man’s habits, his inclinations and preferences, but still. The entire thing was just exhausting.
“You look a bit tired, Templeton,” Lynch said smoothly, wiping his mouth and casually tossing the large white napkin on the table as he stood. “Are you feeling well?”
“Walking freely has not been an option of late,” he lied.
“I would imagine it so,” Lynch replied with an easy laugh, and there he was again, just a little too close, hand on his shoulder. He squeezed, just a little too hard. “Poor lad.”
Templeton looked back over his shoulder at the magistrate, at the night spreading its wings anew, the slaves lighting more lamps. Heart leaden, he stood up, wishing this could be otherwise, wondering if it had to be, and decided it didn’t matter. He could not afford to reveal himself now, which he would surely do, if he protested this too strongly. “Sir?”
Lynch smoothed that hand down his shoulder, all the way around his ribs, heavy and hard, thought only to his own pleasure and none to Templeton’s. So different from the way John touched him. Certainly, the pirate captain took what he wanted, but he always kept an eye to the younger man’s own satisfaction. Or perhaps it was giving into John’s desire that made Templeton so, so happy. But this, with Lynch?
He shied away from the touch when it reached a buttock. But Templeton found himself with nowhere to go, caught between the governor’s body and the back of his own chair. He cast about, but the slaves had vanished back into the woodwork of the ornate dining hall. Just himself, and Lynch, and the scattered silver on the long table.
“Sir?” he asked again, chest pounding.
The magistrate smiled, as if he found this amusing. He ran a long hand through his hair, loosening it from the long plait, playing with it as he had that first day, in the bath. “You smell divine, Templeton.”
“Thank...thank you, m’lord.”
“So beautiful, this face of yours,” he murmured, the blue in his eyes darkening in lust, and in desperation Templeton thought of HM with that bright gaze of his, like the ocean at dawn, or Baracus, so deep, the waters at night, and John’s own, the seas before the storm... “You know I desired you for myself, when you served me here before.”
“Yes, m’lord. I know that.”
“I restrained myself then. And if you stay now, you must come back to me fully...”
“M’lord?”
Lynch had him pinned now, hips and shoulders, his hardness pressing against Templeton’s groin. “You know what that means, do you not?”
Fear, very real fear, was coursing into his blood. “Aye, m’lord,” he said evenly, trying not to betray himself.
That hand jerked a little, knotting into blonde locks. “And what do I mean to you, Templeton? My patronage deserves payment, does it not?”
He smiled, coy, that teasing look that had any one of hs lovers on him and in him without so much as a word on either side. Revulsion held behind his teeth, he trailed a finger down between them, tugging a little on the heavy embroidered silk of the governor’s overcoat. “Let me show you, m’lord,” he purred, and pushed back a little, dropping to his knees.
Those hands tugged harder as Templeton forced reluctant fingers to undo the buttons of Lynch’s fly, opening him up slowly, taking him in hand and licking a hot stripe up the man’s swollen, red cock. Once, twice, and then he started swirling along the head, sucking lightly, remembering the tricks HM had taught him. Tricks that drove even John, the most steadfast of men, into an incoherent, pleading, needful thing.
But Lynch was nothing like John. He gasped and shuddered and braced himself against the back of the chair, so clearly affected, but he was nothing like John. The young man wanted to gag on the taste of him alone, spit and bite and gut the man with a butter knife, but he did not stop. He could not. Maybe, just maybe, he hoped, this could end here. He could feel how close he was, and sped up, sucking harder as he began bobbing proper, teeth just grazing...
Templeton was lost to a sensation of lifting out of himself, perhaps some momentary grace for a sinner such as himself to escape the agony of what was happening to him. Lynch’s hard, Lynch’s cock, Pike’s pistol, the stone of the floor... the entire world was hard and cold and careless, the governor fucking his mouth with an almost gleeful abandon. Breaking through his gag reflex with every roll of his hips, and Templeton wanted to retch. His knees ached, his jaw, and with deep shame he realized he was crying.
Pike leaned over a broad shoulder, nipping along what exposed skin there was, attention riveted on the obscenity unfolding at the business end of his firearm. He grinned at Templeton. “That madman, Henry Murdock, ever tell you what I did to him? What finally snapped that fevered mind of his?”
The younger man jerked at that, coming clean off the governor’s cock. “You pox-ridden bastard...” he hissed, momentary relief from the horrific pressure in his mouth even as he heard the slight snap of a trigger being drawn back...
And then, just a little louder, on the edge of his twisted senses, he recognized the slam of the dining hall’s heavy door.
“Lynch! You thrice-damned son of a bitch! Unhand him and face me!”
Lynch shoved away and slammed Templeton back into the chair, head bouncing off the thick wood with substantial recoil. The young man’s vision swam from the force of the blow, his ears rang, his body collapsed of its own volition, but he knew that voice, and, wiping a hand across his lips, he couldn’t help but smile up at the shocked governor. “Said he would come, did I not?”
Pike made a strangled sound behind the governor, and Templeton noted with not a little relief that the pistol had vanished. “Murdock,” he growled.
“Mi amigo, como estas?” came the bosun’s almost happy reply, drawling softly across the silence of the room. “May I kill him, captain?”
“If it pleases you, HM,” the captain ground out. “But that one’s mine.”
For a moment, nobody moved, air thick with unshed blood that they all knew, all had to know, was coming.
Then Lynch laughed, breaking the spell. He kicked out at Templeton’s shaking body even as he tucked himself back into his breeches. He slicked a hand back through his hair and that ironic little smirk was back as he walked nonchalantly over to the gigantic marble hearth, choosing a sword from the rack there, testing the heft of each in turn, the two of them conversing in the most casual of tones as he rifled through.
“You always were a miscreant, commander.”
“Aye, but you were always the criminal, ensign.” The rage in the captain's voice was barely contained.
“Not nice, Smith.”
"You bought your rank."
"Because I was not some gutter rat from Dublin..."
"Because you've nothing else to offer His Majesty but your family's money and the suffering of those around you."
"How has all that nobility turned out for... aha, here it is..."
Templeton couldn’t see anything, balled up on the floor as he was. With a groan, he tried to shift himself, body unresponsive, nothing working, and then a huge hand caught his head, cradling him. He reached out gratefully.
“Baracus,” he breathed out, reaching a hand back around that strong neck as he was lifted up onto his feet. “Good to see you.”
“And you,” the big black man murmured back, treating him like fine china, stroking a finger down his cheek. “You understand what’s goin’ on here?”
Templeton looked up.
HM and Pike were staring at one another across the table, a little ways down. Pike’s hand was on his pistol, the bosun’s playing along the hilt of his gurkha knife, a prize from some old adventure in the Mughal Hind, smiling that vicious smile of his.
John had stripped out of his dark, plain jacket, down to loose blouse, sash swaying slightly against one tensed thigh, naked cutlass in hand glinting wickedly in the candlelight. The pirate captain was between Lynch and the exit, poised to strike. Intent as he was, his eyes still flickered over to rest on the former secretary. Just a second. And then his gaze darted back to the governor, darkening considerably. Weapon chosen, Lynch’s hand twisted under the gold filigree of his handguard.
Everything was still. Nothing moving. The battle not yet joined.
Something swelled up inside of Templeton at the scene, and Baracus’ hands closed down around him. His men, coming for him, protecting him, and the Virginian sighed as dark lips pressed against his pulse point, reassuring, wonderful.
Then Pike snorted. Loudly. Watching them. “Disgusting...” he began, but never got a chance to finish.
Not as, in seeming perfect synch, HM launched himself over the table with a roar and John lunged and everything just exploded around them.
Templeton had seen John fight before. ‘Twas a sight to behold. The man was all lean muscle and flowing form when he fought, hair falling around his shoulders and a fell smile on his face.
But this wasn’t like their sparring sessions. Wasn’t like the raid they’d gone on a month or so back. Not even like the time John killed some poxy pickpocket in Tortuga, easy as breathing. Before, Templeton realized, John had been casual, relaxed, in his element.
Playing.
None of that was present now.
Bloodlust, not passion, was fueling those fine limbs and driving all action. Harder, stronger, the grace muted under the force of his fury. Templeton watched, breathless, Baracus tugging him swiftly out of the way as the two men went at it, hammer and tongs, across the wide floor of the dining hall. Lynch knew what he was doing, younger than John, but rusty and fighting out of desperation.
John brought his worn, well-oiled cutlass sharp across, Lynch leaping back only just in time, a red line drawn out of his chest and he screamed. The governor hurtled a chair at John, who almost caught it in the leg, and slashed again at table height as Lynch scrambled upwards. Snarling, losing precious seconds, the pirate captain leapt up after him, taking a blow himself across the bicep. It didn’t slow him down in the slightest.
Dishes and candelabras went flying, food scattered, candle wax splattered to the far walls, as the two men threw themselves at one another. Blades flashed, almost too quick to follow, form disintegrating as both men sought some final killing blow.
HM popped up next to where Baracus was holding Templeton back against the wall, a set of keys in his hand, blood dripping heedlessly from his curved knife onto his own loose trousers.
Pike’s prone form lay crumpled on the ground at the end of the table.
The bosun smiled as he kissed Templeton lightly, some of that softness reemerging, the need to kill sated for the time being. The Virginian heard the earrings jingle together, and traced the line of the other man’s ear. “What did he do you, love?”
“Killed my dog,” HM said, quite seriously, and tossed Baracus the keys. “Can you get to the magazine, amigo? The crew’s gonna be floodin’ town the moment we blow it.”
Baracus inspected the keys, and held one up, a heavy one that Templeton recognized as well. The key to the slave pens. Their eyes met, the words not even needing to be spoken aloud. “Magazine my second priority,” he growled, and took off at a dead run.
HM wrikled his brow. “His mother...” Templeton began, and a roar brought them both back to the fight.
John had hurtled Lynch from the table, the governor’s sword scattering away on the hard floor, blood streaking in slow, dark spurts from some concealed wound on his side. The captain hopped down, left arm hanging useless, expressionless as he strode towards the wounded man.
The governor was dragging himself backwards on his hands, hate and something akin to fear in his eyes, still smiling. “Killing me will not redeem you, Smith.”
“Perhaps not.” He laughed, hard and horrible, an edge to the sound that chilled Templeton to his core. How could it not? It was primal, vicious... “But sending you to hell will be a tremendous pleasure.”
Then...
HM’s ears pricked, and he shoved away from the wall, rushing at some subtle signal Templeton, in his malaise or his inexperience with such things as this, had not noticed. His knife didn’t arch, taking the most direct path, all the madman’s weight bearing down as he took one more step and leapt...
Just as Pike’s body surged upward with a strength not usually given to dead men, his own wicked dagger driving straight up...
The mercenary and the bosun struck at almost the exact same moment, HM burying the gurkha to the hilt into the man’s neck, and Pike swiping the tip of his own blade clean across John’s exposed hip as he passed...
The captain fell to the ground, sword still in hand, and Lynch stumbled to his feet. Took one look at the murderous expression on HM’s face, dripping knife held up over his captain’s fallen body.
“Coward!” the bosun shrieked in a near inhuman voice as the governor fled as fast as he could, tearing out of the room with a surprising burst of speed, through the guards that were beginning to gather, roused from the outer walls by the sound of the fight, no doubt, and was gone.
He didn’t have to think about it. He wasn’t capable.
Not seeing John go down like that.
Templeton found his feet and found himself up, running, after Lynch, some kind of red slamming down over his vision. Like the governor before him, he tore through the guards, seizing a musket from a startled man as he went.
Feet pounding down the hall, he knew there were only one way Lynch could go from here. Down, into the kitchens. Then where? Deeper into the administrative and living quarters? No. Not that.
Across the moonstreaked expanse of the main parade ground of the fort, towards the barracks and the magazine, towards the people who could help him...that was the way he was going.
Templeton knew it in his gut, and slammed up against the nearest window, breaking out the glass with the butt of his flint-lock and waited.
He was shaking from the adrenalin and the shock and the smell of blood clinging to him like never before, something, everything in him howling at the thought of injury to his man, the man he loved...and that realization right there was almost enough to startle him out of the glorious ease of that red haze enveloping him.
But there he was, a single lone figure, limping out of the ground floor, thin yelling reaching his ears, three stories up. It was dark, it was far, his hands wouldn’t steady themselves, sweat was dripping in his eyes and he could hear the clank of armor behind him.
And the pox take all of that.
He had to kill this man. Kill this man for John, in case John wasn’t...
Templeton sighted along the barrel, led the target, careful, one chance to kill Lynch and save them all.
He breathed out one breath. Squeezed the trigger.
The shot rang out.
One breath.
Lynch fell.
One breath.
The guards were on him, Templeton not knowing whether he was laughing or sobbing as he fought his way away from the wall and the shattered window, using the spent long gun as a staff, then a club, swinging wildly, falling, slipping under, lashing out blind, rage flooding...
Until a familiar hand caught him. “All’s to right. They’ve fled. They’ve fled. Everything is at rights. You did so well, love...”
He shuddered to a stop, everything lifting away, even the things that should have been there. Somehow, he was bleeding, his shirt in tatters, pain radiating out from a place he couldn’t quite identify.
More talking.
“...ind Baracus, blow the magazi...”
He couldn’t quite hear it, the world still reverberating with the violence of the evening, exhilarating and exhausting and Templeton wanted nothing more than to fall away into sleep, right there, right then.
But there was warm skin against his, and warm arms around him, lifting him away. He stumbled along, trusting to that, listening to that heart beat, fingers digging, trying to reach it until a kiss was pressed to his forehead and more nonsense murmured. At some point, there were flashes of light and rushes of air, noise from Hell reaching to up Heaven itself. The world was floating, swaying, moving like the world should move and he might have been screaming.
Another kiss.
Templeton opened his eyes. Soft gold light from the lampss, the pre-dawn sun, the faint sound of wake breaking behind them, the smell of long-spent gunpowder and sweat and blood.
“Hell’s breath, captain,” he said, shifting out of the bunk where he’d been laid, HM and Baracus curled into one another, close to him and warm.
The Virginian peered with bleary eyes across the dim cabin to where John was sitting crosslegged against the bulkhead, naked, pale chestnut hair splayed free across his shoulders, unconcerned as the ship’s cook stitched closed a nasty gash on his thigh. Templeton's heart tightened, knowing the captain would be the last of the crew to be fixed up from the night's fighting.
But the cook was almost done. John was already sporting a stained white bandage on his left arm, face washed, steel eyes tight, pipe resting comfortably between his lips. Was that a little smile there? Satisfaction? Relief? Happiness?
Didn't matter.
He’d never looked so beautiful, and the younger man felt the breath catch in his throat as he looked at him.
“Go back to sleep, Templeton,” the captain ordered softly with a nod. “I’ll be there in a few minutes.”
Templeton laid obediently down, but he couldn’t sleep. Not yet. Not until the cook was finished and off to his own rest. Not until John laid down next to him and pulled him close, letting the younger man nuzzle into his shoulder..
“I love you, John.”
“And I you, my lad.”
A hand fingered his hair, brushed his lips, and Templeton sighed.
Home at last.
+++++
The evening sun was streaming weakly into John’s airy little cabin by the time Templeton awoke. The Virginian lay there for a moment or two, relishing the slight movement of the ship around him, the softness of the sheets and the pallet beneath him, watching the light play around the dark beams of the roof, before he felt the need to go find John, explain himself.
He pushed out of bed, a fresh set of clothes laid out. His own, well-fitted and of good material, just as he liked and just as the captain indulged him in. Padding over on bare feet, Templeton pulled on the breeches and tied the belt, eschewing the blouse or boots or anything else. Barefoot, he threw the doors open and stepped out onto the ship’s upper deck.
It was mostly vacant out here, still and quiet, the only sound the creak of the spars and the snap of sails in the billowing wind. His naked feet made nary a sound on smooth plank. HM, leaning on the wheel, tipped his wide-brimmed hat up and nodded to Templeton as he passed. No words were spoken. Seemed right, not to interrupt the contemplative mood of the ship as she plied the evening seas.
Templeton moved over to the edge, watching the water slide by the hull, smooth and easy. Peaceful, here, and the man felt a tremendous swell of gratitude, one he had not known before now, that he was alive.
A glorious feeling.
A strong, calloused hand closed down over his, and Templeton looked up at its owner. Baracus’ dark eyes met his own. “Been waiting for you to wake.”
Templeton grasped the black man’s shoulder firmly, remembering with some embarrassment the how his friend had help him last night, caught him, after... he swallowed. “Is John angry with me?”
“I am,” the big man rumbled. “You lucky the captain came when the fool told ‘im what you said about that Pike...”
“Your family?” Templeton asked, not wanting to think about what very well could have happened to him, had John not shown up in the miraculous manner that he had. “Are they out?”
Baracus nodded, taciturn as always.
“That’s good.”
“Aye...”
“Is John mad at me?”
Those dark chocolate eyes flashed up to the bow of the ship. “He waitin’ for you to wake as well.” And then, with a swiftness belied by that massive frame of his, Baracus was away, back over to the helm, where HM must have been teasing him about mermaids or the fountain of youth, because the black man ruffled the bosun’s hair and drew him in for a kiss. Quickest way to silence the man, a kiss like that. Templeton watched them for a moment, then turned his attention to the bowsprint.
Where John was.
It seemed almost too quiet, the crew probably turning in early or drinking quietly after a hard day’s sail. John had sunk what few military vessels to be found at Port Royal, but the fleet was larger than that, Templeton knew, and the captain would have pressed as fast as possible away. Only a skeleton shift would be left for the night.
Nothing to bother them, then. Although John had spoken true when first they’d met - out here, there were no judgements.
His feet carried him easily along the softly rolling deck, towards the sight of that strong, proud, scarred back, naked in the failing day. John, one boot tipped up, staring out at the sunset, pipe in hand. A firm thing, Templeton thought, in a world of uncertainty and fear, and reached out to touch, fingering the warm skin below the bandage. He dipped his thumb beneath the edge of John’s sash, playing with the brilliant scarlet silk tied loosely around the captain’s breeches.
A long, dark stain was running down the material, and he realized with a start that the man was wearing the same pair from last night’s adventure. “Bloody hell, captain...” he breathed. But John didn’t turn, didn’t even lean into the contact. No recognition at all. “John, please speak to me.”
There was a puff of fragrant smoke, something like a growl. “Baracus tells me Lynch had his eye on you before.”
“That is what the governor told me as well.”
John hunched forward a little more. “Were you aware of this?”
“...yes.”
“Hell and damnation, lad! Why did you not tell me?”
Templeton’s mind raced for an answer that would be more pleasing that the truth, but there was nothing. Nothing else to use. Not now. Not after that. “It was your plan, I could not...”
“There could have been a different plan, Templeton. One that did not...” A hand slammed down on the wooden rail of the bow. “You are never to do that, Templeton Peck! Never! You are not my slave to be sold, bartering your flesh like you were some kind of common whore!”
Whore. Lynch had called him the same. “Shall I go then?” he asked, withdrawing his hand.
The pirate didn’t respond but to take another long drag on his pipe, and Templeton felt the peace inside of him shatter. Of course. John would not want him now, having failed the captain in such a gross and base manner. No place on this ship for a man who was not obedient, who was not devoted, and he had proven himself a failure in both categories. And Templeton began to back away, thinking of what he could do. Disembark at the next port? Find work with his letters, as he had planned to do before? Find passage to New Orleans or Boston? Find...
“Templeton!”
He froze, and John was leaning on the rail, pipe still pressed lightly to his lips, considering something with hooded eyes.
“Captain?”
“He believed you, did he not? About why you were back, how you’d come to be there again? Played on his interests?”
Templeton bit down on the edge of bitterness cutting through him. “Bastards are said to be born liars, Master Smith, and I suppose that I am both...”
And whatever he was expecting didn’t happen because, because John was laughing. He tapped the remainder of the tobacco from his pipe, into the sea, and pushed off. Towards Templeton. “Aye, lad, that you are. But that shot was honest enough. A hundred yards in the dark...” and he was upon the younger man, whose mind was swimming in confusion as steely hands closed down around his shoulders. “Killed your first man in grand style, my lad.”
“You... you will send me away, will you not, captain?”
“For what?”
“For... for disobeying you, betraying you... with...”
“’Twas Lynch, not you. You betrayed nothing but yourself, not holding yourself in higher esteem,” the pirate said in a surprisingly soft voice that hardened almost instantly, and he began pressing Templeton back into the ship, away from the edge. “But an order? Not then, but now. If you ever walk again into such a trap, thinking to spring it using your body, I will have you flogged until your meat falls from your bones.”
His back contacted solid wood, and Templeton barely registered it, the heat off John’s body enfolding him now. A hand splayed out on his chest and shoved him back with heavy force.
“You are mine, Templeton, body and soul, and I’ll not have you give either away. No man of mine...”
A shiver ran through his very bones, and the younger man recalled their first kiss. So like this it had been, John trapping him against a wall, mesmerizing with words and body both, an unstoppable force of nature, and he wondered, hoped, this would be like that.
But now, instead of going for his lips, as he had then, John attacked his neck. Kissing and sucking and nipping, one hand on his chest and the other slipping into his breeches, taking him fully in hand, instantly hard and leaking it seemed, pinned, held fast as it got more aggressive, deeper, and Templeton groaned as teeth broke skin and John fisted him roughly. A sharp flash of pain, and the younger man felt a swell of something he’d never known before, something he couldn’t identify, a sensation of being claimed, and he let himself melt into it. John whispered a hot “mine” across hot skin and Templeton was spilling himself into that strong hand, screaming his pleasure, loving this man, wondering at him, all the raw power within, and he was momentarily lost to John and John alone.
A tongue was soothing the raw skin of his neck, John holding him as the last of his tremors ebbed. Uncoordinated from the force of his orgasm, Templeton only just managed to reach and grab that fine hair, pulling his captain into a long, searing kiss, tasting smoke and the copper of his own blood flecked on strong lips.
“You must listen to me, love,” John murmured, pulling back a little, creating a space to speak in. “You must learn.”
Templeton nodded, mute, and dug a hand into that sash, feeling the wetness against his skin with a sudden wave of shame. The pirate captain must have noticed, for he rubbed a shoulder, and his expression changed entirely. “Templeton?”
“I promised HM and Baracus I would not...”
John laughed again, and wrapped his undamaged arm around his waist, pulling him along the deck, back towards the cabin where a slim figure was already lighting lamps against encroaching night.
“Ah, yes, your accord. Shall we go see what we can do to make an honest man of you?”
Templeton smiled, and let himself be led away. “With that, at least, captain.”
+++++
Templeton was trembling as John led his across the dark deck. No more guidance than a simple touch on the neck, and not even that, truly. The captain didn't wish to lose the silky feel of the lad's skin under his fingers, rubbing softly over the mark, his mark, higher up than any collar could hide. This man was his, by god. He'd not have another mistake like Lynch.
By my side or in my bed he thought to himself, and flung his cabin doors wide.
HM looked up from the last lamp he was lighting. Baracus had clearly been leaning against a wall, watching the bosun with something soft and earnest in his gaze. His eyes, too, were drawn. Both of them looked relieved at seeing the smile on Templeton's feature. HM, just that afternoon, had begged him to be lenient on the lad.
"I could never hurt him, Henry."
"He needs to understand, captain, his place here..."
And what fine advice that had been. John had always found him to be the wisest of men under the madness. But for now, the bosun just replaced the glass over the lamp, and came towards the door.
Flickering light seemed to be everywhere and nowhere, warming them all through. The bosun had an affinity for love-making in such conditions, but John believed that the man’s love of light came from his year of imprisonment without it. The captain was again reminded of how he’d found his Henry in the darkness, madness already clouding his quick wit, body reeking in the dark hellhole that devil Pike had caused him to fall into.
But that mercenary was dead now, and there was a little twisted smile on teh bosun’s lips, the one he displayed when pleased, and John smiled back, thumbing lightly over the mark on Templeton’s neck one last time, rejoicing in the lad’s involuntary shudder, before HM moved in cuddling in to Templeton’s warm side.
“Missed you, my friend,” the Virginian said softly, leaning into the touch, then turning into him, neck sliding in John’s grasp as he moved, ever so slightly, their bodies hard and close together. “Missed you...”
“And you, amigo,” the bosun replied as he touched the reddened patch of skin high above Templeton’s collar. A finger ran across the already closing wound. “He is yours now, is he not, captain?”
Was that a touch of envy? Sadness? “I can refresh yours at your leisure, Henry,” John replied, tugging the open laces of his bosun’s shirt away from a white line on the tan of his shoulder and pressing an open mouth kiss to the old mark, many times renewed. He let his teeth scrape it and HM moaned. “Any time you so desire.”
HM giggled a little, like he did sometimes when nervous or aroused, and he bucked up against Templeton, sliding up in one smooth motion to claim that gorgeous mouth for his own. The lad melted at the first light touch of Henry’s tongue, flicking, then thrusting in hard, the kiss deep and long and sweet, sweet as HM’s kisses always were.
John moved aside, letting the two younger men explore, and dropped a hand to stroke himself lazily. His Henry with his Templeton. He loved the two of them together, like this, grinding slowly, heat building, falling into each other, all softness and need, each so passionate and so gentle with the other...
Another hand closed over his own, nudging him aside, and John groaned, letting that touch in. He reached down to feel the arm around him, hard muscle behind his fingertips. He loved this man’s strength, his loyalty, and he slid a loose sleeve up that ebony skin, practically glowing in the lamplight. “Beautiful together, are they not, Baracus?”
“Yes, captain.” His voice was thick with lust
John suppressed a laugh - ah, to be young again - gave him a nod. “Go take your turn.”
Baracus chuckled, heavy and low and stepped towards the entwined pair, pulling away Henry’s blouse, already falling off a shoulder as Templeton’s clever fingers pushed it open under the force of the kiss.
“Crazy fool,” the big man muttered affectionately and tossed the garment away.
The bosun pulled reluctantly off at the lad. Templeton whined a little as HM moved around to hold him still, licking a line up his neck. Careful not to touch John’s mark, the pirate captain noticed with pride. The black man, for his part, cupped that chin in both hands in response, demanding his own kiss, harder than Henry, replacing easy grace with brute force.
John smiled a little wider.
Beautiful.
The pirate captain watched with satisfaction for a few moments more, letting his lads reacquainting themselves with each other. Watching the heat of passion build between them.
Remaining clothes were ripped away, HM’s gurkha was tossed aside, skin taking on a hot sheen in the low light of the room. Control clearly slipping, Templeton was losing himself in the sensation of both men, caught between their mouths and their bodies and all that desire. His hands flailed to hold onto something, one settling on Baracus’ hard chest, the other snaking up behind to fist into HM’s hair.
Already aroused from the marking and the sight of his lads together and the anticipation of that tight, perfect arse, John thought he could get no harder. But then Templeton started moaning, low, needy little moans, that demanded immediate attention. Aalready painfully tight breeches became unbearable.
No more. It was time.
“Enough,” he growled.
And the tone of the room immediately shifted.
The bosun looked up from where he was teasing Templeton’s earlobe with gentle teeth. He was off in an instant, untangling himself from the lad’s body, coming over to John’s side.
Templeton whined again at the loss, but Baracus caught the younger man, chest to back, dropping his big hands to the trace the edge of the lad’s hips, moving to circle that proud, erect shaft. Obscured mostly from John’s view, a finger was slipped into his lad, slicked with the contents of one of those little bottles of oil Templeon had taken to leaving everywhere. He loved his comforts so...
The sound of Templeton’s breach, the look of esctasy on his face was beautiful, and that wondrous body jerked and shivered in response. Release too close. John frowned, and Baracus’ free hand closed down around the base of the lad’s cock.
“Stay, Temp. Wait. He comin’ for you,” John heard the big man say. The lad bit his lip and nodded, arching back into Baracus’ strong form, both of them panting as the black man stroked slowly, opening him up, stretching him wide enough to be taken by John’s not inconsiderable girth. Just enough. He’d already told Baracus he wanted the lad tight tonight...
Henry, clad now in nothing but his earrings and hard himself, pushed John back into the nearest chair and knelt gracefully between his knees. With a kiss to his still-clothed thigh, the bosun lifted his captain’s legs up, left then right, and slowly pulled off his boots. John sighed at the feel of the leather gliding over his skin. Then HM moved up, smoothed his hands along the top of John’s breeches, mouthed his shaft through the damp fabric, humming happily.
And through it all, John held Templeton’s gaze, waiting for the moment that always came. When the lust on the lad’s face tipped into the glory of sheer utter need ... oh, yes. There it was. Begging for John to be buried in him to the hilt, the lad begging to be shown, begging to be shown who he belonged to.
Ready. So ready..
“Henry,” the pirate captain warned with a light growl, tugging on that pierced ear softly.
“Right away, sir,” came the reply and a wink and the soft movement and John hissed his relief, cock springing free to slap against his belly. HM caught him again with that talented mouth, coating him with slick saliva. Just enough.
The captain stood, allowing HM to pull his breeches completely off as the man sucked him down. He stepped out of them and away, letting his hand come away from the bosun’s head in a fond caress.
Baracus released Templeton at almost the exact same moment, and the young man practically fell forward into John’s embrace, both hands grabbing for biceps and smiling up at him, that beautiful face shining in the flickering light. John caught him in stride and rammed him hard against the wall of the cabin, shaking the floor, biting at his mark on his lad’s neck.
“Mine,” he growled.
“Yes m’lord,” the younger man breathed, barely coherent. His eyes were black to the rim, . Strong legs came up to wrap around his waist as the pirate began ravishing that glorious mouth, plundering it for all it was worth.
The pirate drug his nails up a thigh, knee to hip, taking that weight. Tumbling them both about to collapse onto the partially inset bunk, Templeton spread out underneath him, clinging to him, John’s leg bumped against Baracus’ ribs.
He glanced over and was rewarded with HM’s little smile. The bosun was astride the big man, rutting against him eagerly as Baracus attempted to line the madman up for a proper fuck. He looked equal parts exasperated and aroused. John knew that pain well...
But his attention was pulled back to the task at hand by another delicious moan, and he smiled down at the lad under him.
“John, John, god...” the lad was begging, writhing beneath him, running his hands through the pirate’s loose hair, legs moving, cock trapped between them. “John, fuck me, please...”
“Presently,” John murmured back, pushing up enough to reach a hand between them. He gave the lad’s cock one hard tug, ghosted over his balls, back, and then pushed a finger inside experimentally. Baracus had done a good job, as he did with all things, and Templeton’s hips snapped up as John hit his prostate.
“I need...I need...”
“What you need, love?” Slick enough, John decided, and kissed the bridge of that fine nose as he pushed up on the back of the lad’s knees. “Show me, show me...”
Trembling hands caught those knees, and Templeton, biting his lip, spread himself wide, everything on display. “Inside... please...”
John groaned, loving the sound of his lad’s plea, and kissed him once more, as he fitted his cockhead against that slick entrance.
“Like this?”And John thrust hard, sheathing himself in that willing body, drawing a throaty scream from the younger man, a thrill running through his entire being at sinking into that clenching heat once more.
“Yes! Oh yes, please, captain...” and there was a sob in that cry that had nothing to do with pain.
John found his pace just this side of brutal. He couldn’t help it. He had no idea what it was about this lad that drove him out of his mind. No idea why his body craved him, why his heart yearned for him, where the intense desire to possess came from like never before.
But it didn’t matter. A mystery for another day, another time. Right now, the only thing that did matter was this, right here, sinking into the rhythm they both desired, both desperately needed.
John was not gentle, too far gone already to be so, but his lad didn’t seem to mind, thrusting down against every upward snap, taking his cock deeper and deeper, every deeper. Templeton’s eyes were closed, his mouth moving soundlessly, his knees held up against his chest as the pirate took him, hard and fast, lips working against his neck, both of them flying now.
“Mine...”
“...y-yours...”
The lad’s skin tasted of blood and gunpowder from the previous night’s fighting, sweat, of spray off the ocean. Exactly the way a pirate should taste, John decided, and the thought alone very nearly sent him over the edge. Dim, he heard HM and Baracus scream their pleasure as one, reaching climax together. One more good thrust, and Templeton cried out.
Shuddered.
Came.
Orgasm tightened Templeton’s body down around John’s cock as his cock shot pearly white fluid, covering them both, and then John was flooding out into him, roaring, the dark room turning all to white, running fast with the wind, everything silence and heartbeat and breath and the creak of the ship.
At some point, a strong set of hands pulled him down to the soft sheets of the bed to lay on his side and another soothed the taught muscles of his back. He reached out instinctively, and felt the warm expanse of Templeton fall into him. The four of them settled around one another as the force of climax ebbed from tired bodies. His lads, content once more. HM’s raging mind would be calmed now and Baracus sated, both of them turned into each other now, and Templeton...
Templeton did not do anything but roll onto his back and before John could stop him, he was up and away and through the cabin doors. HM started to say something and Baracus reached for him, but John brushed them off, following the lad with a feral growl.
“My boy, what the hell are you on about?!” the captain thundered, the door banging behind him, echoing off the deck. But the younger man didn’t turn, did not look back, striding naked towards the bow where they’d stood together only a short time before. Gripping the rail, knuckles white. “Answer me, Peck!”
When the answer finally came, it was slow, hesitant.
“Yours?”
John leaned his lean, long body against the rail next to that lad, loving the sight of him out here, in the cool breeze, stars overhead. “Always.” The pirate captain kissed a cheek, tasting salt not kicked up by the passage of their ship. Tears. He frowned. Wasn’t right, not from one of his men.
“All this, tonight. Too much, captain... why?”
“You are home here, with us, with me. Do you not see that?”
“I was not gone but a week. Less,” he whispered.
“A day is too long. An hour unbearable,” John growled, holding the lad close. “At my side...”
“... or in your bed,” Templeton finished.
“It was a good kill, lad. One of the best.”
“It was nothing...”
“You killed that bastard. For me, when I could not. No less than that, Templeton. It was everything.” John was watching him keenly for any indication, any sign. He had no idea what was going on in the lad’s pretty head, no way of knowing what the right answer was, the words that would pull the young man back into his arms where he belonged. “You took your revenge and brought me mine. Fitting for a pirate in my crew. My man...”
Templeton’s head drooped, shoulders sagged, soft and almost sad. “I... I think I love you, John Smith. You would not be cruel and... and lie about...just for...”
John’s head swam at the words, at the fear so nakedly on display, at the depth of that emotion. Never before had he heard that so uttered, for him... and he felt his heart swell. “I could never. You are mine, and I yours.”
Templeton nodded, and made a sound halfway between laughing and crying that turned to real mirth as the captain grabbed him and wrestled him playfully away from the edge, back into a tight embrace. Right where he belonged. “Come back to bed, now, love.”
HM and Baracus were waiting, as John had known they would be, just a little ways away. Not quite out of earshot. The big black man put an arm around Templeton, who was starting to shiver a little as the winds were picking up. HM tweaked a nipple, causing the lad to jump a little against John’s chest.
The captain smiled.
His boys.
“Careful with that, Henry. Wouldn’t want to damage the lad, now would we?”
But HM had an intense look on his face, clearly deep in thought. “If Templeton’s a pirate now as you say, sir, he needs a piercing, yes?”
“By your logic, fool,” BA grunted, and John laughed as Templeton.
HM brushed the lad’s pec one more time, thumbed that nipple, kissed it lightly, and grinned wickedly. “I think I know right where it should go.”
“Any objections, Templeton? I assure you, it’s quite pleasurable.” John murmured in one perfect ear, and the lad started laughing an embarrassed little laugh, obviously intrigued by the idea, and the pirate captain felt himself getting hard again.
Ah yes, his boys, indeed.
“Can we do it tonight?”
“Anything you want, love. Anything you want.”
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i would love to see a special moment between murdock and baracus in this universe.
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*plot bunny sits outside bedroom window*
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Awesome.