The Island (22 page)

“Would you have let him die?” Shaw asked curiously.

Zev didn’t answer that. “When my superiors ask why I’m not plotting atrocities with terrorists, I can just blame the whole fucking mess on you, of course.” He shrugged his narrow shoulders. “And I expect I will. I just wonder who you’re going to blame.”

Shaw didn’t know how to answer.

“But, for what it’s worth, I’m glad you did what you did,” Zev said.

“Are you really?”

“Of course,” Zev said. “You saved me from having to make the decision.”

Shaw smiled slightly and watched the black ocean.

* * * *

Shaw woke up when the door to his cabin opened.

“Are you awake?” Lee whispered.

Shaw sighed. “Yeah. What’s up?”

Lee crossed to the bunk. “Couldn’t sleep. Can I stay with you?”

I’m not your savior
, Shaw wanted to say.
You cried when we fucked, remember
? But it was less than two days until Sydney, and he was the closest thing to a friend that Lee had. He needed someone, Shaw supposed, to tell him it was okay now.

“Yeah,” Shaw said, shifting across to make some room in the narrow bunk.

Lee slid in beside him with a sigh, his arms going around Shaw’s body. He rested his head on Shaw’s chest and sighed again. “Thanks.”

“It’s okay,” Shaw said. His fingers found the scars and welts on Lee’s back and brushed over them gently. “Just try and get some sleep, okay?”

“Okay,” Lee whispered.

Shaw thought about what Zev had said earlier on deck. He was wrong. Shaw hadn’t been thinking with his cock. It had always been more than that. From the moment he’d seen Lee, Shaw had wanted to rescue him. He’d fought the instinct as far as he could, but in the end, it hadn’t made any difference. He’d fucked everything up, but he was relieved as well. He’d spent so long pretending to be somebody else, somebody ruthless and cold, that he was afraid he’d forgotten how to be anything else. Lee had shown him there was still a scrap of human decency left in him after all. It wouldn’t save his career, but it was good to know.

“I had an iPod,” Lee said.

Shaw frowned slightly in the darkness. “What?”

“I had an iPod in my pack,” Lee said. “Vornis took it. I thought of it a lot, you know. I really wanted it back. Out of everything, I thought that was the worst thing he could do—take my fucking iPod. Do you think that’s weird?”

“I don’t know,” Shaw said. He stroked the soft hair at the nape of Lee’s neck. It would be curls soon, Shaw thought. What a shame he’d never see that. “What sort of music do you like?”

“Everything,” Lee murmured. “I just missed it. I thought it would be better if I had somewhere to go in my head. I needed it, yeah? I needed to go somewhere apart from the sedatives, I mean. I think they were sedatives. I never saw them prepare the syringe.”

Shaw stroked his hair.

“What if it was something else?” Lee asked. “What if it was something worse? What if it was heroin?”

“Heroin isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” Shaw said, which might have been the wrong track to take with a DEA agent. “I mean, if they made you an addict, Lee, you’d know by now, wouldn’t you? Come on, you know you would.”

“I guess,” Lee said.

“Anyway,” Shaw said, “I’ll bet the DEA has access to the best rehab programs in the world, if it comes to that. Right? I mean, given the undercover work you guys do.”

“I guess,” Lee murmured.

“Of course they do,” Shaw said. Lee should have been more worried about disease than addiction, Shaw thought. And maybe that was something Shaw should have given some thought to before fucking him, protection or not. But it had been an act of trust in the good people at Durex, and Shaw had put his trust in a lot less before. It was meant to have been an act of trust between him and Lee as well, but so much for that.

Shaw couldn’t resent it. What had he expected, exactly? That he’d magic Lee off the island and
ta-da
, he’d be a real boy? Shaw was too old and too clever to believe in fairy tales. The real miracle was that they were both still alive. Shaw had no right to hope for anything more than that.

He knew it would hurt when he had to let Lee go.

Lee exhaled slowly. “Thanks for looking after me.”

“That’s okay.” Shaw tried to disguise the waver in his voice. “You just sleep now, okay?”

“Okay.” Lee sighed.

The sound of Lee’s breathing, the drone of the engines, the swell of the ocean; it all conspired against Shaw in the end. He slept.

* * * *

Shaw woke up with Lee’s mouth around his cock.

“Fuck!” It was still the middle of the night. Shaw reached out, searching for the light switch. “What are you doing, Lee?”

Lee didn’t answer. Shaw had forgotten how good that hot mouth felt around his cock. That tongue that knew all the tricks. Those clever fingers that teased his balls.

Shaw pushed him away with one hand at the same moment his other one found the switch. “No,” he said firmly. “No, we’re not doing this again.”

Lee blinked in the sudden light. “Why not?”

Holy shit! When had Lee slipped out of his clothes? The light gleamed on his naked body.

“Jesus, Lee, because you
cried
!” Shaw hitched his sweatpants up again. “You’re not ready for this.”

“Will you hold me, then?” Lee asked him. “Will you please just hold me?”

“Yeah, okay,” Shaw said. There wasn’t much room to maneuver in the narrow bunk, but he ended up on his back with Lee lying in the crook of his arm. And, unless he was imagining it, Lee’s cock poking into his hip.

Shaw closed his eyes and tried to ignore it. He could feel Lee’s breath against his throat. The closeness felt good. It felt comfortable. He hoped Lee would fall asleep again.

“I got scared last time,” Lee said quietly in the darkness.

“That’s normal,” Shaw told him, even if he had no idea.

“It felt good,” Lee said. “That’s what scared me.”

Shaw stroked the back of his head. “You’ll be okay.”

He wondered how long it would take before Lee was healed. He wondered if it was even possible. Even once the fear was gone, what then? Would he feel sick every time sex felt good? A part of him would always be the victim, terrified of the pain and afraid that accepting pleasure meant he’d asked for it. And he had the physical scars as well. Would every potential new partner ask him about them? And what could he say?

Shaw wished he’d been the one to cut Vornis’s throat instead of leaving it for Zev. He wished Vornis had been conscious. He could have really made it hurt. He could have made it last for hours. And he would have told him that painting was a forgery as well, just to see the look on the bastard’s face.

Maybe he was a monster after all.

Lee drew his hand down Shaw’s chest gently, spreading his fingers wide.

“Don’t,” Shaw murmured. “Just sleep. Can you reach the light?”

Lee didn’t move.

“When you got stung by the jellyfish, how long before you got back in the ocean?” Lee asked him quietly.

Shaw tried to remember. “It was a long time ago. I was in hospital for two days. Maybe a week?”

“That’s brave,” Lee said. “Will you help me do that?”

“It’s different,” Shaw said, closing his eyes as Lee’s fingers caught his nipple gently. The jolt of pleasure shot straight to his balls, and he hissed. Now, now was the time to get some space between them. Right now, before it went further, but Shaw didn’t move.

“Did you like it the first time you went back in?” Lee asked him. His mouth was close to Shaw’s ear now. Shaw could feel his hot breath.

“I was terrified.” Shaw remembered.

“Did it still feel good?” Lee asked him.

“I don’t know,” Shaw said. “It probably did, but I was too scared to realize. I kept thinking it would happen again, any second now. I had to force myself to stay in the water.” He felt Lee’s tongue against his ear and jerked his head away. “But it’s different.”

“I think it would be okay,” Lee said, “if you were on top. I think I like it when you’re in charge. You know what’s right for me. I got scared when I had to be in control before.”

“That’s why it’s wrong,” Shaw said.

Lee slid his hand farther down, tracing his fingertips over Shaw’s abdomen. “I trust you. When’s that going to happen for me again?”

“I don’t want to hurt you,” Shaw said. He should have kicked him out when he’d first turned up, but Lee had needed this closeness. Why couldn’t they just leave it at that? Why couldn’t Lee just sleep?

“Can’t we pretend there’s a camera?” Lee asked. “Can’t we pretend someone’s watching? I liked it when I got to look up at you. It made me feel safe.”

“You are safe,” Shaw told him. “We don’t have to pretend anymore.”

Lee shifted suddenly, rolling onto his back and pulling Shaw on top of him. “Please. Just jerk off if you want.” He drew his legs up and spread his knees.

Shaw pushed off him and straightened up, and then he was in exactly the same position that had become so familiar to them both: on his knees between Lee’s spread thighs, looking down at Lee’s erect cock. He felt the same hunger he always had, and none of the caution. He didn’t have to pretend here. And he didn’t have to resist.

And he didn’t even care that Lee had manipulated him into it.

Shaw shifted back, looked Lee in the eye, and bent forward. Lee squirmed as he felt Shaw’s warm breath on his cock. His whole body undulated in need before Shaw even flicked out his tongue to claim the droplet of clear fluid already glistening on the head.

“Oh, Jesus,” Lee whispered. His hands clenched into fists at his sides.

Shaw licked him again. He tasted good. He drew the head slowly into his mouth, loving the small sounds of pleasure that Lee made. There was no pain in this and no fear yet. This was good. Lee’s cock was so smooth, so hard. It felt almost velvety under Shaw’s tongue. The skin was so soft and sensitive, but the flesh was rigid and straining underneath.

And this, Shaw knew, was something Vornis would never have done for Lee. Jerked him off, maybe, just to make him hate himself for coming, but Vornis would never have taken Lee’s cock gently into his mouth.

Shaw circled his fingers around Lee’s shaft, feeling it twitch under his touch. He slowly fed it into his mouth. He’d owed Lee this since the blowjob in the shower, but it wasn’t just about reciprocity. Shaw wanted this as much as Lee did. He wanted to give Lee this. He needed to. Needed to give Lee something that nobody else on the island had. Needed not to be a monster.

Stop it. It’s not about you. Focus.

Shaw worked his tongue around the head of Lee’s cock.

“Oh, oh Jesus,” Lee whispered again, his hips trembling. “I’m gonna come!”

Shaw lifted his head quickly, and Lee squirmed with disappointment. “Not yet.”

“Please,” Lee whispered, still holding his fists at his sides.

That was interesting, Shaw thought as he drew Lee’s cock into his mouth again. He really had given Shaw all the control. Shaw circled the base of Lee’s cock with his fingers to prevent him from coming and ran his tongue along the thick vein on the underside of Lee’s shaft. Lee trembled and writhed.

“Please,” he whispered again.

Shaw moved away again. He leaned forward and ran his tongue along Lee’s bottom lip. Lee jerked forward, opening his mouth and trying to follow Shaw’s face as he moved back again. He was panting.

“Do you still want me to fuck you, Lee?” Shaw asked him. He rolled his hips, bringing his cock into contact with Lee’s through the thin material of his sweatpants.

“Yes,” Lee breathed. “Please, yes.”

Shaw shucked his sweatpants off and reached for a condom. This time he wouldn’t let Lee prepare himself. He was in charge here, and not because he was stronger but because Lee wanted it that way, and that was reason enough. They could both worry about the psychology later.

“Lie back,” Shaw said. He squirted lube onto his fingers and reached down between Lee’s buttocks.

And there was that look again. Fear flashed in Lee’s eyes as Shaw’s fingers found his anus and pressed gently against the entrance.

“We’re going to do this,” Shaw said firmly. He hoped it wasn’t the wrong path to take and was relieved when Lee clenched his jaw and nodded.

Lee drew a shaking breath as Shaw slipped a finger inside him.

“You’re okay,” Shaw said, and it wasn’t a question.

Lee nodded.

Shaw withdrew his finger and then pushed back inside with two. He twisted them slowly in the tight heat, looking for that sweet spot. Lee shuddered as he found it, rocking his hips.

Shaw scissored his fingers, stretching Lee slowly as he watched his face. The fear was still there, but it was only weak. There was discomfort now, but pleasure as well. And there was trust. Lee hadn’t been kidding about that. Shaw bet it was the only thing keeping him from panicking.

Shaw withdrew his fingers and notched his cock against Lee’s tight hole. Lee’s cock was still hard. He still wanted this. Shaw hesitated for a moment. He opened his mouth to speak, and nothing came. Relax? Let it happen? You can handle it? There was nothing he could say that didn’t sound like coercion or, worse, that wouldn’t sound like an echo of a hundred different things Lee had been told on the island, so Shaw held Lee’s gaze and didn’t say anything.

Lee gasped as Shaw entered him, and his fists unclenched as his hands fluttered anxiously.

“You’re okay,” Shaw told him again. He withdrew slightly and pushed again, feeling Lee open up underneath him.

Shaw hoped he was doing the right thing. Jesus, it was too late now for regrets, they were already fucking. Shaw had trained his conscience well. It didn’t make itself heard until he was already on the home stretch. He wasn’t the good guy Lee believed he was.

He heard Lee’s shaky intake of breath.

“You’re okay,” Shaw told him, willing him to believe it. He pushed forward again, and then he was all the way in. “Look at me, Lee.”

Lee opened his eyes. There were no tears yet, but Lee blinked rapidly as though he was trying to hold them at bay.

Shaw leaned forward and kissed him. Lee’s mouth opened slightly. Too fucking passive, Shaw thought. He tilted his hips. Lee gasped, and Shaw pushed his tongue into his mouth. He found Lee’s tongue and teased it until Lee was groaning underneath him. He wriggled, and Shaw moved his mouth to his throat. He mapped Lee’s skin with his lips and his teeth, gently sucking and nipping until every one of Lee’s breaths was a tiny gasp instead, and Lee was arching his back toward him.