"Contradictions 8 - Claimed" Part 6
Aug. 29th, 2005 10:44 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
veronica_richThis is a continuation of a fic. See Part 1 for disclaimers, description, etc.
“Bill’s not around to worry about such things,” Will automatically replied, wondering if Jack’s special logic had somehow transmuted between them during sex. He smoothed dark, damp strands of thick hair back off Jack’s face and studied his expression. “I’m a grown man … as I’m sure you’re all too aware,” he added with a smirk that didn’t feel entirely foreign.
“With long, lovely legs,” Jack replied. It was such an unexpected compliment that Will didn’t have time to blush or protest, or do much more than try to stammer out his thanks. Before he could, however, Jack palmed his hip and added, “Bit heavy, but lovely nonetheless.”
Will took the hint and lifted his knee from Jack’s, rolling his hips away. “Grab your shirt, eh?” the pirate suggested, propping up on his elbow.
“Why?” he made the mistake of asking, reaching over the side of the pallet and fishing blindly until he snagged the linen in his fingertips.
“We’ve got t’ clean off with something.”
He stopped just short of handing Jack the shirt. “Uh … no, you don’t.” He pulled it back out of the man’s reach.
“It’ll wash,” Jack coaxed, leaning forward, arm up over Will’s side.
“No, let me go get-“ He was cut off by a sudden, hard kiss, Jack’s tongue pressing between his lips. Befuddled and interested, Will relaxed into it, forgetting what was happening until he felt Jack snatch the cloth from his hand. “Hey!” he protested, breaking the kiss.
“Sorry, love. All’s fair, and all that rot.” Jack offered a lopsided smile, running the edge of the soft, thin material beneath Will’s bollocks, cupping and wiping. “Get you first, though.”
“You’re so generous.” Sarcasm, Will discovered, wasn’t all that difficult, even after sex. He’d expected to feel … profound? High? Perplexed? Instead, his belly was warm and his head was clear but light, and Jack’s smile was the most beautiful thing on the entire ocean.
“’S a gift.” Now he was cleaning himself. “So,” he began, balling up the shirt and tossing it off the side of the bed again, glancing into Will’s eyes, “how are we, then?”
“By ‘we’ do you mean me?” When Jack didn’t answer, he continued in a lower voice. “Or do you mean us? You and me?” The pirate nodded, expression solemn. “I don’t know,” he confessed. “How are we supposed to be, Jack?”
The older man licked his lips and rested on his stomach, draping part of his weight on Will’s torso and left leg. “Are you angry wit’ me? You feel taken ‘vantage of?”
“What am I, some maiden guarding her virtue?” The words were humorous, but his tone wasn’t. “I’m not some easily swayed man-child impressed by a ship and a title; I would think you’d know that by now.”
“That isn’t what I meant, and you know it.”
In answer, Will caught Jack around the waist and rolled until the man was pressed beneath him into the single pillow. They stared at each other; the smith sensed a contest of wills (or of Will and Jack, at any rate, and he nearly snorted with it) as neither broke gaze. “We’re in this bed,” he finally said, “because we want to be, right? I mean, you do want me like this – I see you watching me when you think I’m caught up in something else.” Jack kept staring, not answering. “I remember the way you kissed me a few weeks ago,” Will whispered. “And how I walked out on it.”
“That is sort of a cause for concern,” Jack pointed out. He made no effort to move or throw Will off, kept his hands on the man’s shoulders.
Lowering his head, Will kissed Jack deeply, tenderly. His stomach leapt when Jack returned it, pushing up into him, then veered off his lips and moved along his jaw toward his neck, tickling with his moustache as he went. Will grinned stupidly, eyes closed and head tilted to give Jack access, and it was Jack’s turn to wrap a limber leg around the back of Will’s thighs.
When he finally pulled up and away a few minutes later, Will wasn’t coherent. He couldn’t recall ever feeling so heated, so deliciously naked and pliable, even when alone and jerking off. He was about to speak when a rapid knock at the door startled them both; he pushed himself up to get off the pallet and pull on his breeches as he called, “Wait! Coming!”
“Already did that, mate.”
“Captain Obvious,” Will smarted off. He forgot about Jack’s leg and, as such, ended up launching himself off the side of the pallet – onto his face and stomach on the boards, barely keeping from biting his tongue in half.
“Serves you right.” He heard Jack hanging over the edge, above him. “You all right, there?”
“I’ll live.”
Another knock came at the door. “What is it?” Jack asked Will.
“Late lunch, dinner, whatever. I told Maxi to bring some down after mess.”
“Ah.” Sitting up on the pallet, Jack adopted his best order-bark tone. “LEAVE IT AND GO AWAY!” he bellowed.
“Rats, sir!” came the muffled protest.
“They won’t eat much!” called out Jack.
For some reason, Will found that the funniest thing in the world. He dropped his face into the cloth that had padded his fall and started to laugh, before he realized it was his discarded shirt. Making a startled sound, he pushed himself to his knees in record time, reaching up with the heel of his hand to rub at his still-clean face.
“Listen, mate, you think that’s unpleasant, maybe we shouldn’ be goin’ any further with this.” Jack was up out of bed behind him, sinuous and light-footed, a clear laugh in his voice. Before Will could retort, he felt the man bend over and drop a kiss into his hair. “I’ll get it,” he murmured. “Get back in bed.”
“Shouldn’t I be saying that?” Will scrambled to his feet. “You’re the one with all the bruises.”
He looked up just in time to see Jack approaching the barred door, hips swaying and backside bobbing pleasantly. Slender legs knelt after he’d stuck his head out the door to check for people, and he dragged the tray inside before locking the entrance again. He picked up the tray and turned, carrying it to the bed, inhaling noticeably. “Smells like some good soup for a change,” he rumbled. “Here.”
Jack handed the tray to Will and climbed past him onto the pallet, turning to sit with his legs crossed before him. “Put it down and have a sit, love.” His eyes, younger and unfettered by smudged kohl, watched as Will obeyed, legs stretched out before him. The eyes traced Will’s torso and glanced to his back, Jack frowning. “Seems ye’ve your own share o’ bruises, too. Th’ sea is a harsh mistress who exacts her pound o’ flesh from ever’one.”
“Actually,” Will informed him, uncovering the tray and using the edge of the cloth to pick up a biscuit, wondering just how dirty his hands were, “yours look worse, the way you hit the water on your back and all.”
“Aye, but I don’t have your pale skin t’ show them off so well.” He pressed a forefinger gently to a spot on the back of Will’s hip, and the smith winced. “See? Plenty more like that.” He lightly stroked around the spot, and Will paused, mid-bite, letting the warmth of the contact of Jack’s skin seep in and comfort him.
They finished the mostly liquid meal, weak of meat to settle easier on their digestive systems. Each took a turn dressing just enough to head out and relieve himself; Jack went first, so when Will returned after managing to successfully avoid any crewmen, he found the pirate tucked into the newly-straightened covers on his pallet. He was propped on one arm, eyes following the smith around the small room as Will banked the fire and put a few things away.
Finally, he stopped by the bed. “Could move to me cabin now,” Jack suggested.
Will shook his head. “I’m not taking a chance of you catching ill from some lingering cold. We’ll stay here where it’s warmer.” He undid his breeches, feeling shy again, but fascinated by the latent hunger in Jack’s expression as he pushed the material away and stepped out of it. Jack lifted the cover in silent invitation.
When Will climbed in, Jack dropped the blanket over him and used the arm to draw him close. They were on their sides, almost nose to nose, and Jack dropped his eyelids to half-mast, his fingers trailing along Will’s spine, his lips curved into what resembled contentment. “Cat that ate the cream,” Will whispered.
“Not yet.” Jack’s smile widened into a full grin.
“Such promises.”
“Nothin’ I don’t plan to deliver.” The knowledge rippled along Will’s skin, delicious frission. He wasn’t sure what to say; then again, he wasn’t sure speech was necessary.
They held each other silently, studying one another’s eyes and faces, until Will felt quite outside himself with warmth and pleasure. “Jack … you’re beautiful …” he finally ventured, hesitant, not sure how the words would sound until they spilled forth. “I mean, you know, as a man can be-“
“Shh.” Jack pressed two fingers to Will’s parted lips. “Ye don’t have t’ qualify yourself.”
“I don’t want you to think you’re a substitute for someone,” he rushed into his explanation. “Like … Elizabeth.”
“Generally, ‘s not a good idea to bring talk of one’s old lovers into th’ bed of a new one.”
Will nearly apologized, nearly explained she’d never been his lover, but caught the glint in Jack’s sleepy eyes. “Sorry,” he said anyway, not sounding as contrite as he could.
Jack chuckled softly at that. “I’m not lookin’ for false declarations of amnesia,” he explained, shaking his head.
Something occurred to Will. “How is this going to affect everything else?” He lifted his eyes toward the ceiling and the deck above. “Up there – out there?”
“What do ye mean?”
“Jack, you and I don’t agree all the time. My God, look at the silent treatment we’ve given each other all these weeks; I don’t want the person I’m-“ He fumbled for the right word, still blushing, “I’m with, telling me to pipe down and not take me seriously.”
Jack studied him for half a moment, then nodded solemnly. “I understand.”
“Now I know you’re the captain, and you run things, and I have to take your orders the rest of the time. I just don’t want to in bed.”
“Some of my nocturnal demands could be quite pleasant,” the pirate teased.
“You know what I mean. I want to be your equal, here.”
“Think you’ve already proven ye are, mate.”
“Would you take me seriously?” Annoyance began to creep past Will’s feel-good haze.
“Look, love.” Jack shifted and sighed, pressing closer. “You ask anyone who’s ever sailed under Jack Sparrow’s colors, they’ll tell ye I’ve never taken anyone from th’ crew. Not ‘til now.” He shushed Will’s interruption. “My reason is, could be damn hard for me t’ give orders to someone I’m swivin’, who isn’ a whore. So why would I break that tradition just for someone I don’t trust to keep actin’ like a capable sailor?” He shook his head, raising his eyebrows. “I did not get me reputation on abusin’ boys; ask anyone, they’ll tell ye I much prefer to ‘abuse’ grown folk.”
But Will was fixed on an earlier comment. “You’ve never slept with anyone from a crew of yours?”
He yawned and shook his head. “Will, I don’t even bring me dalliances back ‘board Pearl. I’ve kept them firmly on land or taken it to ‘nother vessel.” He leaned in and blew a hot, sultry breath across Will’s lips, black eyes fixed on the smith’s. “I plan to keep treatin’ ye just as ye deserve to be treated – same as any other crew members has t’ earn and keep, savvy?”
Will closed the gap and kissed him. “I savvy,” he whispered against those full lips.
“Bloody good.” Jack yawned into the second kiss. “Think we may be needin’ some shuteye. Least I do. Old men do not keep goin’ without quality rest.” That said, Jack shifted to his back and turned on his other side, sticking close. When Will angled his arm around Jack’s waist, the man wriggled back into him, sliding his hand over the back of Will’s on his stomach. A few minutes later, a tired, deliciously aching Will giddily drifted off to the sounds of Jack’s light snores and the captain’s knobby fingers squeezing between his own knuckles to hold on.
*****
On to Part 7 ...
“Bill’s not around to worry about such things,” Will automatically replied, wondering if Jack’s special logic had somehow transmuted between them during sex. He smoothed dark, damp strands of thick hair back off Jack’s face and studied his expression. “I’m a grown man … as I’m sure you’re all too aware,” he added with a smirk that didn’t feel entirely foreign.
“With long, lovely legs,” Jack replied. It was such an unexpected compliment that Will didn’t have time to blush or protest, or do much more than try to stammer out his thanks. Before he could, however, Jack palmed his hip and added, “Bit heavy, but lovely nonetheless.”
Will took the hint and lifted his knee from Jack’s, rolling his hips away. “Grab your shirt, eh?” the pirate suggested, propping up on his elbow.
“Why?” he made the mistake of asking, reaching over the side of the pallet and fishing blindly until he snagged the linen in his fingertips.
“We’ve got t’ clean off with something.”
He stopped just short of handing Jack the shirt. “Uh … no, you don’t.” He pulled it back out of the man’s reach.
“It’ll wash,” Jack coaxed, leaning forward, arm up over Will’s side.
“No, let me go get-“ He was cut off by a sudden, hard kiss, Jack’s tongue pressing between his lips. Befuddled and interested, Will relaxed into it, forgetting what was happening until he felt Jack snatch the cloth from his hand. “Hey!” he protested, breaking the kiss.
“Sorry, love. All’s fair, and all that rot.” Jack offered a lopsided smile, running the edge of the soft, thin material beneath Will’s bollocks, cupping and wiping. “Get you first, though.”
“You’re so generous.” Sarcasm, Will discovered, wasn’t all that difficult, even after sex. He’d expected to feel … profound? High? Perplexed? Instead, his belly was warm and his head was clear but light, and Jack’s smile was the most beautiful thing on the entire ocean.
“’S a gift.” Now he was cleaning himself. “So,” he began, balling up the shirt and tossing it off the side of the bed again, glancing into Will’s eyes, “how are we, then?”
“By ‘we’ do you mean me?” When Jack didn’t answer, he continued in a lower voice. “Or do you mean us? You and me?” The pirate nodded, expression solemn. “I don’t know,” he confessed. “How are we supposed to be, Jack?”
The older man licked his lips and rested on his stomach, draping part of his weight on Will’s torso and left leg. “Are you angry wit’ me? You feel taken ‘vantage of?”
“What am I, some maiden guarding her virtue?” The words were humorous, but his tone wasn’t. “I’m not some easily swayed man-child impressed by a ship and a title; I would think you’d know that by now.”
“That isn’t what I meant, and you know it.”
In answer, Will caught Jack around the waist and rolled until the man was pressed beneath him into the single pillow. They stared at each other; the smith sensed a contest of wills (or of Will and Jack, at any rate, and he nearly snorted with it) as neither broke gaze. “We’re in this bed,” he finally said, “because we want to be, right? I mean, you do want me like this – I see you watching me when you think I’m caught up in something else.” Jack kept staring, not answering. “I remember the way you kissed me a few weeks ago,” Will whispered. “And how I walked out on it.”
“That is sort of a cause for concern,” Jack pointed out. He made no effort to move or throw Will off, kept his hands on the man’s shoulders.
Lowering his head, Will kissed Jack deeply, tenderly. His stomach leapt when Jack returned it, pushing up into him, then veered off his lips and moved along his jaw toward his neck, tickling with his moustache as he went. Will grinned stupidly, eyes closed and head tilted to give Jack access, and it was Jack’s turn to wrap a limber leg around the back of Will’s thighs.
When he finally pulled up and away a few minutes later, Will wasn’t coherent. He couldn’t recall ever feeling so heated, so deliciously naked and pliable, even when alone and jerking off. He was about to speak when a rapid knock at the door startled them both; he pushed himself up to get off the pallet and pull on his breeches as he called, “Wait! Coming!”
“Already did that, mate.”
“Captain Obvious,” Will smarted off. He forgot about Jack’s leg and, as such, ended up launching himself off the side of the pallet – onto his face and stomach on the boards, barely keeping from biting his tongue in half.
“Serves you right.” He heard Jack hanging over the edge, above him. “You all right, there?”
“I’ll live.”
Another knock came at the door. “What is it?” Jack asked Will.
“Late lunch, dinner, whatever. I told Maxi to bring some down after mess.”
“Ah.” Sitting up on the pallet, Jack adopted his best order-bark tone. “LEAVE IT AND GO AWAY!” he bellowed.
“Rats, sir!” came the muffled protest.
“They won’t eat much!” called out Jack.
For some reason, Will found that the funniest thing in the world. He dropped his face into the cloth that had padded his fall and started to laugh, before he realized it was his discarded shirt. Making a startled sound, he pushed himself to his knees in record time, reaching up with the heel of his hand to rub at his still-clean face.
“Listen, mate, you think that’s unpleasant, maybe we shouldn’ be goin’ any further with this.” Jack was up out of bed behind him, sinuous and light-footed, a clear laugh in his voice. Before Will could retort, he felt the man bend over and drop a kiss into his hair. “I’ll get it,” he murmured. “Get back in bed.”
“Shouldn’t I be saying that?” Will scrambled to his feet. “You’re the one with all the bruises.”
He looked up just in time to see Jack approaching the barred door, hips swaying and backside bobbing pleasantly. Slender legs knelt after he’d stuck his head out the door to check for people, and he dragged the tray inside before locking the entrance again. He picked up the tray and turned, carrying it to the bed, inhaling noticeably. “Smells like some good soup for a change,” he rumbled. “Here.”
Jack handed the tray to Will and climbed past him onto the pallet, turning to sit with his legs crossed before him. “Put it down and have a sit, love.” His eyes, younger and unfettered by smudged kohl, watched as Will obeyed, legs stretched out before him. The eyes traced Will’s torso and glanced to his back, Jack frowning. “Seems ye’ve your own share o’ bruises, too. Th’ sea is a harsh mistress who exacts her pound o’ flesh from ever’one.”
“Actually,” Will informed him, uncovering the tray and using the edge of the cloth to pick up a biscuit, wondering just how dirty his hands were, “yours look worse, the way you hit the water on your back and all.”
“Aye, but I don’t have your pale skin t’ show them off so well.” He pressed a forefinger gently to a spot on the back of Will’s hip, and the smith winced. “See? Plenty more like that.” He lightly stroked around the spot, and Will paused, mid-bite, letting the warmth of the contact of Jack’s skin seep in and comfort him.
They finished the mostly liquid meal, weak of meat to settle easier on their digestive systems. Each took a turn dressing just enough to head out and relieve himself; Jack went first, so when Will returned after managing to successfully avoid any crewmen, he found the pirate tucked into the newly-straightened covers on his pallet. He was propped on one arm, eyes following the smith around the small room as Will banked the fire and put a few things away.
Finally, he stopped by the bed. “Could move to me cabin now,” Jack suggested.
Will shook his head. “I’m not taking a chance of you catching ill from some lingering cold. We’ll stay here where it’s warmer.” He undid his breeches, feeling shy again, but fascinated by the latent hunger in Jack’s expression as he pushed the material away and stepped out of it. Jack lifted the cover in silent invitation.
When Will climbed in, Jack dropped the blanket over him and used the arm to draw him close. They were on their sides, almost nose to nose, and Jack dropped his eyelids to half-mast, his fingers trailing along Will’s spine, his lips curved into what resembled contentment. “Cat that ate the cream,” Will whispered.
“Not yet.” Jack’s smile widened into a full grin.
“Such promises.”
“Nothin’ I don’t plan to deliver.” The knowledge rippled along Will’s skin, delicious frission. He wasn’t sure what to say; then again, he wasn’t sure speech was necessary.
They held each other silently, studying one another’s eyes and faces, until Will felt quite outside himself with warmth and pleasure. “Jack … you’re beautiful …” he finally ventured, hesitant, not sure how the words would sound until they spilled forth. “I mean, you know, as a man can be-“
“Shh.” Jack pressed two fingers to Will’s parted lips. “Ye don’t have t’ qualify yourself.”
“I don’t want you to think you’re a substitute for someone,” he rushed into his explanation. “Like … Elizabeth.”
“Generally, ‘s not a good idea to bring talk of one’s old lovers into th’ bed of a new one.”
Will nearly apologized, nearly explained she’d never been his lover, but caught the glint in Jack’s sleepy eyes. “Sorry,” he said anyway, not sounding as contrite as he could.
Jack chuckled softly at that. “I’m not lookin’ for false declarations of amnesia,” he explained, shaking his head.
Something occurred to Will. “How is this going to affect everything else?” He lifted his eyes toward the ceiling and the deck above. “Up there – out there?”
“What do ye mean?”
“Jack, you and I don’t agree all the time. My God, look at the silent treatment we’ve given each other all these weeks; I don’t want the person I’m-“ He fumbled for the right word, still blushing, “I’m with, telling me to pipe down and not take me seriously.”
Jack studied him for half a moment, then nodded solemnly. “I understand.”
“Now I know you’re the captain, and you run things, and I have to take your orders the rest of the time. I just don’t want to in bed.”
“Some of my nocturnal demands could be quite pleasant,” the pirate teased.
“You know what I mean. I want to be your equal, here.”
“Think you’ve already proven ye are, mate.”
“Would you take me seriously?” Annoyance began to creep past Will’s feel-good haze.
“Look, love.” Jack shifted and sighed, pressing closer. “You ask anyone who’s ever sailed under Jack Sparrow’s colors, they’ll tell ye I’ve never taken anyone from th’ crew. Not ‘til now.” He shushed Will’s interruption. “My reason is, could be damn hard for me t’ give orders to someone I’m swivin’, who isn’ a whore. So why would I break that tradition just for someone I don’t trust to keep actin’ like a capable sailor?” He shook his head, raising his eyebrows. “I did not get me reputation on abusin’ boys; ask anyone, they’ll tell ye I much prefer to ‘abuse’ grown folk.”
But Will was fixed on an earlier comment. “You’ve never slept with anyone from a crew of yours?”
He yawned and shook his head. “Will, I don’t even bring me dalliances back ‘board Pearl. I’ve kept them firmly on land or taken it to ‘nother vessel.” He leaned in and blew a hot, sultry breath across Will’s lips, black eyes fixed on the smith’s. “I plan to keep treatin’ ye just as ye deserve to be treated – same as any other crew members has t’ earn and keep, savvy?”
Will closed the gap and kissed him. “I savvy,” he whispered against those full lips.
“Bloody good.” Jack yawned into the second kiss. “Think we may be needin’ some shuteye. Least I do. Old men do not keep goin’ without quality rest.” That said, Jack shifted to his back and turned on his other side, sticking close. When Will angled his arm around Jack’s waist, the man wriggled back into him, sliding his hand over the back of Will’s on his stomach. A few minutes later, a tired, deliciously aching Will giddily drifted off to the sounds of Jack’s light snores and the captain’s knobby fingers squeezing between his own knuckles to hold on.
*****
On to Part 7 ...
