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[homosexuals]

[tim's long gone. he'd packed his things in a huff, looking at him with red-rimmed eyes behind his glasses like hell was going to open beneath his feet and drag him down on the spot for taking care of danny fucking johnson himself. there are absolutely no regrets - not when the thought of losing tim on top of embry would have left him with absolutely nothing. the two people he's ever cared most for, gone. nothing left to live for. that dangerous thread starts and ends with them all in the same place. so danny had to go. embry had been right: there was something fucked up about him. serene, somehow, while he struggled in the end - like he was only half-heartedly resisting death and wanted to relish it instead as thick thumbs drove harder and harder into his windpipe.

maybe he'll have nightmares about it someday. for now, his nightmares begin and end with embry's lifeless body on the altar, tim's in the lake.

and then embry came back. he's not at liberty to question anything about it, too goddamn relieved and wondering if this is some nasty trick or a reward for what he'd done for rosie from the balfours. but there's too much happening around them now to worry about the how and the why - instead he just wants to fastforward to the part where embry is in his bed flushed with color and saturated in life again. fuck, he'd missed him more than he'd realized. he thinks back to the message he'd sent, to the funeral announcement and the eulogy and knows he might have made a fool of himself. but that's alright. a small price to pay to have the knock on his door, to drink him in at the threshold of his room before reaching for his arm and dragging him inside without a word.]

Get in here.

[it's not "get in here, because i can't be seen like this." it's not even "get in here before you make a scene," or "get in here and tell me why you broke our unspoken rules." it's get in here, let me tell you all the reasons i'd do it again and again and again in between kisses.

kisses like the one he tentatively presses against embry's forehead, hands coming up to lightly press at his cheeks, his jaw, like he's worried none of this is real and he'll wake up any minute. but his lips and his fingers prove otherwise, and there's a shaky groan at the realization that comes from somewhere deep in his chest.]

You don't have to do a goddamn thing. Just...be here. And don't ever fucking do that again.

[hymen]

[ he can't promise it. he can't promise that he'll never, ever die again, though he doesn't want to re-experience the fearful helplessness of it, the slow moments of imagining all the people he's leaving behind and disappointing in some way. but the allure of letting go, the quietly shining adrenaline pump of his final heartbeats... he relives that at night, his hair mussed and blue eyes blinking in the dark, ash's steady breath at his side. and he feels so fucking guilty for being enthralled by something that hurts ash so badly — that's always hurt him, because ash has accused him of holding onto a death wish for more than a decade now, since their army days, since embry was a reckless soldier that would be dead if not for captain colchester's watchful eye on the battlefield.

he wonders if hawk would understand, or if that would hurt him, too. he decides telling him would be like spitting his sacrifices in his face right now. hawk killed for him, after all. embry still can't unravel the magnitude of that decision, his throat already tight beneath the brush of hawk's lips. his hands wind at hawk's belt loops, nervous where he would normally be confidently moving to the zipper of his trousers, shameless about the purposes of their late night rendezvous. but he just holds him, his breath taut, his fingers curling erratically in the fabric of his clothes. ]

Tim is worth killing for. [ he meets hawk's gaze as he says it, wanting him to know that embry moore stands by every shitty thing he says. ] I don't know what you were thinking. Everyone knows I fucked Danny up first. I'm not gonna announce it to the whole fucking house, but I had it coming. Not just for this. But for every shitty thing I've ever done that you don't even know about.

[ he slips a hand to hawk's wrist, holding tight like he can't decide if he wants to tear away his touch or move closer. ]

I wish you didn't. Fuck, Hawk. [ he pushes in, their mouths catching in a messy, desperate tangle. ] I wish you fucking didn't,

[homosexuals]

He started it.

[it's inane and childish to put it like that, but it's the truth. embry didn't deserve death because he tried to even a score that danny put on the board - whatever he did, nothing warranted murder. it's funny considering hawk's never been much of an eye for an eye sort of man unless it's something he can collect in a semblance of a favor - a calling card he can return to when the time strikes right and the leverage he has is irrefutable. he's done it dozens of times in dc, usually on behalf of senator smith without anyone the wiser. he's a ruthless prick, but he'd do it again just like he'd gladly have carried out his original method of inviting danny out to the woods and pumping two shotgun blasts straight to the chest and letting him bleed out, abandoned for good.

wouldn't have worked either. what a shame.]

If it makes you feel better, I killed him for you both.

[the attempt on tim's life pushed him over the edge, no matter how many people insist it wasn't danny.]

Jesus, I don't wanna talk about him Embry.

[hawk presses his fingers back, palm sliding against the tousle of his hair and mussing it further before letting one slide to his neck. he leans in at the same time embry does, nipping his lower lip and keeping their foreheads pressed together and trying to breathe the same exhales that come from his mouth because it means he's alive and he's here and he's not splayed out on the cold stone slab of the chapel altar like a sacrificial lamb. there's a pause where he almost says something else, until he decides better and surges forward again, hips nudging against embry's to walk him back and back and back further into the room where he can take him apart and reassure himself that he's not going to be taken again.

fuck, when did he get so goddamn sentimental?]