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Even after nearly two months of living with somebody, it was still weird for John to open the door to his apartment and smell supper cooking.
Well okay, so it was a good kind of weird.
The truth was, he wasn't sure how Matt Farrell had ended up living in John's spare bedroom, the one with the two kid's beds he'd never bothered to replace. He knew he must have offered at some point, but the details were a little hazy, considering how nuts things had been after the Fire Sale. He vaguely remembered joking about how he wanted to keep Matt close so he could keep him away from his daughter. It was the kind of crack that made him cringe later when he remembered it.
However it had happened, now that he was here the kid was surprisingly good company, and John was glad to have him around the place. Matt was still fighting with his insurance company for the settlement on his apartment, and until then he was pretty much broke. At first, Matt kept a tally of how much he was costing John in extra food and rent and showed it to him, promising he would pay him back. That lasted less than a week, until John growled at him to quit worrying about it, because Christ, Matt had saved John's life and Lucy's when he got in that fucking car, and John figured that was worth a few burgers.
Matt had stared at him then, and John had gotten up from the couch and pretended he had something he needed to do in the kitchen, and they hadn't talked about it since. Mission accomplished, John guessed, although the kid had decided to earn his keep another way, and as a result the apartment was now so clean John figured he could probably eat off the toilet seat. Fair enough.
The cooking was a pretty new thing. John guessed Matt hadn't been any better of a cook than he himself was, because his first few attempts ranged from questionable to one step below dog food. And then about a week ago, John had come home to beef stroganoff that actually tasted like beef stroganoff, and after he'd inhaled about half the plate, he asked Matt what the hell had happened to turn him into Julia Child overnight.
Matt had shrugged. “I looked up a few recipes online – found this site where they give step-by-step instructions to the clueless. Turns out it wasn't as hard as I was making it out to be.”
“So what's the menu for tomorrow, chef?”
And without skipping a beat, Matt went right into a perfect Julia Child impersonation, “Well, I thought I would prepare a divine mac and cheese prepared in the traditional style, finishing with my signature dessert: Twinkie à la mode.”
When John had finished laughing, he'd told Matt he was an asshole. “But since you can cook, I might have to keep you anyway,” and Matt had looked up at him from under his eyelashes and John had felt something half-remembered and strangely good twist his insides, and they'd both looked away at the same time, John staring at the remaining noodles on his plate as though they could tell him the future.
John was on his way home from work, fighting the traffic on the Brooklyn Bridge and cursing under his breath, when it suddenly hit him that he was looking forward to coming home. He'd spent a lot of years learning to be satisfied with his own company, and he was finally at the point where he didn't hate his empty apartment, but he'd never really liked it, either. He'd forgotten what it was like to have someone to talk to, to wash dishes with, to sit around the house with.
He reminded himself it probably wouldn't be much longer before Matt heard back on the settlement from his insurance company. And then, for about five incredibly stupid seconds, John thought about how he could convince Matt to stick around, even after that happened.
Try not to be even more pathetic than you already are, huh? he asked himself. He swerved abruptly to change lanes, and the Volvo behind him honked at his effrontery.
“Yeah, yeah,” John growled. “Take a fucking number.”
On John's days off, they went through their physio routines together, John encouraging Matt while he stretched and went through the series of exercises the doctor had prescribed. There had been some squawking on the FBI's part when it came to footing the kid's bills, until John had threatened to go to MSNBC with the story on how one of the guys the media had crowned the “Heroes of the Fourth” couldn't get proper medical care for the wound he'd suffered while becoming a fucking hero.
John sat with his hands wrapped around Matt's good leg, supporting him while he did his lifts with the injured one. He watched the sweat break out on the kid's brow and resisted the urge to offer they call it quits for the day. “Okay?” he murmured.
Matt looked up at him, gaze unreadable, then nodded. “I'll live. It's gotta be done, right?”
“Yeah,” John said. “Gonna be worse if you don't.”
Matt paused, letting his leg relax for a moment. “You've been shot before, haven't you?”
“Yeah,” John said again. “And I didn't always do what I was supposed to do, and I paid for it. Your body doesn't bounce back when you don't take care of it.”
“Coulda fooled me,” Matt mumbled, and John's head snapped up. Matt wasn't looking at him, and there was an extra flush in his cheeks that hadn't been there a few seconds ago.
Trust me, John wanted to say, I'm a fucking wreck, but the words stuck in his throat. After a few awkward moments, Matt started back up again, and John firmed his grip on Matt's healthy leg and cleared his mind of everything but counting off Matt's reps.
Matt wasn't tall, but his feet stuck out over the end of Jack's old bed anyway. John'd come home to find him sacked out on top of the covers and snuffling softly, lying flat on his belly with his hands clutching the pillow like a life preserver. His face was turned to the side, and as John watched, he frowned and murmured something incoherent, and his bad leg twitched.
And it occurred to John that he'd just spent far too long watching another guy sleep.
“Hey,” John said, reaching down to shake the kid's shoulder gently, reasoning he should wake him up because it wasn't that late and he might be sick. “Hey, wake up.”
“Mmmppphhh,” Matt said, and then his eye cracked open and he raised his head. “John? What time 'sit?” He rolled over slowly, stretching and yawning as he did, and John looked away from the flash of lightly furred belly that was revealed just above his waistband.
“Six-thirty,” John answered, resisting the urge to lay a hand on Matt's forehead to check for a fever. He'd been wanting to touch Matt a lot lately, though he'd been doing a pretty good job of not following through.
Matt groaned and sat up, passing a hand over his face. “Oh, shit, I'm sorry. I must have slept the whole afternoon away. I didn't cook anything.”
“You feeling all right?” John asked.
Matt hesitated just long enough for John to realize he was cooking up a story. “Yeah, I went a little heavy on the physio this afternoon, I guess. Knocked me out.”
John opened his mouth, and then closed it. I know when you're lying, kid, he wanted to say, but what the hell good would that do? They both knew it. “Yeah, okay, sure. So, what do you want on your pizza?”
Matt looked up at him then, surprise and gratitude and maybe a couple of other things John didn't want to understand shining in his eyes, and John tore his gaze away before he did something incredibly dumb – even for him.
They went on like that for a few days, until John started staying at the office late to get ahead on his paperwork, then realized he was repeating a pattern from twenty years ago when things had started to go south with his marriage.
Fuck that shit.
He came home spoiling for a fight, but when he opened the door and Matt looked up from his laptop, a big stupid welcoming grin on his face, all the anger left him like the air from a popped balloon.
“Hi honey, I'm home,” he said, and Matt laughed.
“I tried spinach lasagna tonight – I think it turned out okay, but you might have a differing opinion. There's a chunk of it in the fridge for you, bottom shelf.”
“What, no Caesar salad?”
Matt smirked. “That's on the top shelf, smartass.” He took a deep breath, let it out, then looked away, and John's heart nose dived for his shoes. “I, uh, I got the call from the insurance company this afternoon. It'll take a few days for them to deposit the check, but they've approved the settlement.”
John's jaw clenched around the completely embarrassing reaction that was trying to claw its way up his throat. “That's, uh, that's great,” he rasped finally. “Congratulations.”
“Yeah, I'll finally be out of your hair,” Matt said, then shot him a mischievous look. “Metaphorically, of course.”
“Har de har har,” John muttered. Matt grinned, and John headed for the kitchen to put some distance between them before he put his hands somewhere they shouldn't be. Of course, the kid followed him, pulling utensils out of the drawer and setting the tiny kitchen table for one while John threw the lasagna in the microwave. It was all so easy, like they'd been doing it for years. John felt his gut churn, right before he heard himself start talking again.
“There's no – I mean, don't break your neck trying to find the first place that comes up. You can take your time, find a good apartment.” Okay, John said to himself, you can stop talking anytime.
Matt nodded jerkily. “Right, that's great, thanks. I was thinking I'd stay in New York, so maybe you might – that is, if you wouldn't mind letting me know which neighborhoods to avoid, that kind of thing.”
“Yeah, sure, I'd, uh – I could do that.” John was still reeling from the news that Matt wasn't planning to go back to Camden when the phone rang, cutting through his jumbled thoughts. He strode over to the doorway and picked it up. “McClane.”
There was a brief pause on the other end. “Oh, I'm sorry, I'm looking for a Matt Farrell.”
“Who's this?” John demanded. He'd gotten an unlisted number a long time ago, but some media hounds always found a way to track you down. One of these days he'd have to spring for that call display feature, or quit answering the phone altogether.
“Uh,” the guy said, “this is Chad.”
“Just a sec,” John said, and punched the hold button. “You know a guy named Chad?”
Matt's face went through an impressive number of expressions before settling on one that was halfway between fear and anger. “Tell him I'm not home, will you?”
John nodded, then punched the button again. “He just stepped out. Can I take a message?”
The guy snorted in a way that instantly pissed John off, and said, “Yeah. Tell him I said he's a fucking coward.”
“Now wait a goddamned minute –” John began, but he was already talking to a dial tone. “Dick,” he muttered, slamming down the receiver. He turned toward Matt, intending to ask what the hell was going on, when the microwave beeped insistently.
“Lasagna's ready,” Matt said, too brightly. John took a step toward him, but Matt turned pleading eyes on him that stopped him cold.
John cleared his throat, then nodded. “Yeah,” he ground out. “I'm pretty hungry.”
Matt smiled weakly in thanks, then turned and walked out of the kitchen. John sat down at the table alone and made himself pick up his fork.
He did his best to concentrate on his plate rather than the now-empty kitchen, but the first bite still tasted like cardboard in his mouth.
Less than a week later, Matt was gone to a bachelor apartment in the East Village that probably cost a fortune, though he claimed it was rent controlled and a really great bargain he couldn't pass up, blah blah blah. John figured the truth was more like Matt was trying to get away from either the mysterious Chad or John or both of them, and John couldn't really blame him. After all, he hadn't been the most congenial host since that night. He'd told himself he was going to have to learn how to live without company again, and he might as well start as soon as possible, before he did something dumb like get too attached to Matt. So he pulled extra shifts and went for longer runs in the morning, and when he was home he kept to himself as much as possible. He told himself being alone wasn't anything new, and it would be easy to get used to it again.
He came home the night Matt moved out to a hollow feeling in his chest and a note with Matt's new phone number and address, along with an awkwardly worded thank you and a P.S.:
I left a casserole in the fridge for you, should last you a couple of days. I don't know what the hell you're going to eat after that, but I hope it's not a constant stream of burgers and pizza. That crap'll kill you.
And that was so funny John had to sit on his couch and laugh until he rolled his head back and stared up at the ceiling, suddenly feeling old and worn out and totally fucking fed up with everything, most of all himself.
John figured he would be the first one to break down and pick up the phone, but Matt actually called first, late one night when John was lying in bed, lazily stroking himself and trying not to think of anyone in particular.
“Hey.” Matt's voice was low and rough, and John flattened his palm against his cock as it twitched traitorously.
“How's the apartment?” he managed. There, that sounded normal.
“It's good, it's real good. Not as big as my place in Camden, but then there aren't any French mercenaries trying to blow it up, so I figure it's an acceptable trade-off.”
John grunted. “In the East Village, you never know. You might be living above a hotbed of revolutionaries.”
“Or performance artists.”
“Same thing,” John muttered, knowing it would make Matt chuckle: the curmudgeon at play.
Matt didn't chuckle; the phone line was silent for a few seconds, and then he said, “Listen, would you –”
“What?” John's fingers curled loosely around his length, and shit, he was going straight to hell.
Matt cleared his throat. “Would you let me pay you back something of what I owe you?”
John's heart clenched. “No,” he gritted.
“I mean, I had to have cost you a few hundred bucks in food alone –”
“Matt, no,” John said, and wonderful, now he sounded like he was pleading. Clenching his jaw, he added, more gruffly, “We already settled this.”
Matt blew out a breath. “Yeah. Okay. Well, then, at least let me take you out to dinner,” he added. The last words came in such a rush they ran together: takeyououttodinner.
John closed his eyes and squeezed his dick. “You, uh –”
“Or you could, y'know, come to my new place and let me cook for you,” Matt blurted, and Jesus, Jesus, was this what John was trying not to hope it was?
“I'd like that better,” John heard himself say, his own voice gone low and throaty, and he could practically hear Matt swallow on the other end of the line.
“Oh, okay, uh, good. That's – yeah.” John could tell that Matt was grinning around his words, and he felt something inside him loosen and shift. “How's Saturday?”
“I can do Saturday.”
“Good, well, uh, seven? That too early?”
“Seven's great. See you then.”
“Yeah. See you,” Matt said softly, and hung up.
John dropped the receiver back in its cradle, wrapped his hand around his cock again and started stroking himself ruthlessly. The orgasm took him by surprise a couple of minutes later, slamming into him faster than any guy his age had a right to expect. It was so great he didn't even start to feel guilty about it until the morning, which he guessed was something, anyway.
The call came on a Tuesday, and by Saturday John had convinced himself he was crazy, that no way was Matt gay or bi or whatever they were calling it nowadays, and even if he was, there was no fucking way he'd want to jump John's old, tired bones. He'd looked up his vital stats in the FBI file; by now the kid was a month or so shy of his twenty-eighth birthday, which was close enough to half John's age as to make no difference. No, it was just dinner, a thank you for putting up with him for all those weeks, nothing more.
That didn't stop him from bringing a change of clothes and a razor with him to the station on Saturday and taking a shower in the locker room after his shift.
He was just heading out the door when the desk sergeant called to him. “Hey, McClane, hold up.”
John kept walking. “I'm off the clock, Zematis.”
“You got a visitor,” Zematis replied, and John stopped and turned.
“I what?” John demanded, frowning.
Zematis spread his massive hands. “She says she's family. Looks too Westchester country club to be one of your family, though.”
“Thanks,” John muttered. For a split second he wondered if it was Holly, but he'd just talked to her a couple of weeks ago, and he knew she'd be in Tokyo on that business trip she'd mentioned. Besides, she wouldn't just fly across the country and turn up at the station unannounced. “You ever think she might be a reporter?”
“Yeah, I did,” Zematis drawled. “That's why I had Wilson put her in Interrogation Room One instead of sticking her at your desk unattended.”
“You're a peach. She got a name?”
“Said it was Elizabeth Farrell-Williams.”
John nodded, not letting his face register the fuckload of shock that he was feeling, and headed down the hall. When he opened the door to the interrogation room, a woman about his age stood up and faced him. He could see the resemblance around the nose and eyes, but where Matt was dark and kind of a mess, she was blond and perfectly put together, in a tailored wool suit that probably cost as much as John made in a month.
“You're John McClane,” she said. It wasn't a question. She stuck out her hand, almost a challenge, as her assessing gaze flicked over him. Her manicure was expensive, and so was her watch. John took her hand and tried to paste on his best friendly cop smile, though it had been a while since he'd used it so he couldn't be sure it was convincing.
“And you're Matt's mom. Nice to meet you.” He didn't ask any of the questions that were clamoring for his attention, figuring she would fill in the blanks soon enough.
She didn't disappoint. “I apologize for disturbing you at your place of work, Mister McClane, but I thought our first meeting would be best held without my son present.”
Okay, that meant Matt's mother expected to see John again sometime, though John had no idea why she'd think that, especially since Matt had moved out.
Unless Matt hadn't told her.
John cleared his throat. “Well, I'm headed to an appointment, but I can certainly spare you a few minutes,” he said, trying to sound magnanimous. “What's on your mind?”
Matt's mother studied him for a moment before answering. “First of all, you're not what I expected. I was given to understand that Matthew usually prefers men closer to his own age.”
So there were a few questions answered right there – Matt liked guys, she thought the two of them were fucking, and it sounded like Matt's mother only knew anything important about her son through second-hand sources. John decided not to correct her assumptions; after all, he was hardly the best candidate to be helping somebody else with their parenting skills. “Yeah, well, I'm not as broken down as I look,” John lied.
She charged ahead without worrying about trying to make up to him; John got the impression that was her regular M.O. “I don't know how much Matthew has told you about his family.”
John didn't think 'dick all' was an appropriate response, but he took a gamble. “I know he's been having some trouble with Chad lately.”
Her chin rose. “Then you're aware that he's refusing to go to his own brother's wedding.”
“You don't think he has a good enough reason?” John countered, keeping his voice neutral, and he knew he'd hit a nerve when her chin went even higher. It had been a long time since he'd been undercover, but it was nice to know he could still bullshit his way through situations where he knew next to nothing about what was going down.
“Matthew and Chad used to be the best of friends when they were younger,” Matt's mother said icily. “But even the best of friends can drift apart. Matthew needs to grow up.”
John felt the tug of anger at her flippant summation and resisted it, though he let it show a little by folding his arms and lowering his own chin. “Your son saved my life and my daughter's, Mrs. Farrell-Williams. I'd say he's done all the growing up he needs to do.”
That got a flicker of reaction; the woman frowned slightly, as though she was assimilating new information. Jesus, had Matt not told her anything about what had happened three months ago? After a couple of seconds, the look faded behind the coolly detached mask again. “I don't want to take up too much of your time. I only want to give you this –” she dug a small white envelope out of her purse and handed it to him “– to give to Matthew. Perhaps you can convince him to do the right thing.” She waved her hand. “Of course, you're invited as well.”
“Thanks,” John muttered.
“Please don't think I'm being flippant. I'm trying to be more – tolerant – of Matthew's preferences. It's a big step.”
“I'm sure it is,” John said evenly, not even caring that she was drawing all the wrong conclusions about his relationship with Matt. At this point, he didn't give a shit what this woman believed about anything.
She continued on, apparently oblivious to John's disdain, “That's largely Chad's doing, by the way, but then he's always been a very sensitive boy.”
“Yeah, well, thanks for the invitation.” John said. He'd never even met this Chad and he wanted to push his face in. “I can't guarantee Matt'll be there, but I'll let him know you stopped by.”
Matt's mother seemed to finally catch the chill in the air, because she nodded curtly. “Thank you. I'll see myself out.”
John stepped back, allowing her to make a graceful exit, then shook his head to clear it.
Well, at least dinner wouldn't be dull, he reflected.
Any convictions that this wasn't a date flew out the window when Matt answered the door with a grin on his face that John could best describe as a perfect blend of anticipation, joy and terror. He recognized that look; he'd seen it in the mirror the night he'd taken Joyce O'Brien to the senior prom.
Yeah, that would be the prom he'd gone to four years before Matt was born. Shit.
They went through the awkward front-door shenanigans – greetings, handing over the wine, the you-shouldn't-haves and can-I-take-your-coats – and then John followed Matt into the kitchen – or really, the part of the apartment's big common room with the tile and the appliances – where he hauled what looked like a prime rib roast out of the oven.
“Can I do something?” John asked, looking around. “Set the table, toss a salad?”
“Already done,” Matt said. The line of his back was ramrod straight as he basted the roast, and John had a sudden urge to run his hand down Matt's spine.
What the hell, John thought, and then he took a step forward and did just that. Matt jerked and twisted his head around to stare at John, his eyes wide. From there, it didn't take much to close the distance between them, to lean forward and capture Matt's mouth with his own.
He hadn't kissed another guy since the Seventies, but then it wasn't like he needed different skill sets for kissing men and women. Keeping it brief, he pulled back and was met by Matt's dazed-looking blue gaze.
“Now you can relax,” John murmured.
Matt blinked away his stupor, then snorted a laugh. “Are you kidding me?” he said. “After that, relaxation is not exactly uppermost in my mind.”
John chuckled, then stepped back. He thought for a moment about the envelope stuck in his jacket pocket, then reasoned he couldn't just drop a bomb like that – not before dinner.
There was one problem with this plan: dinner turned into dessert, then dessert was followed by washing up, and somehow Matt ended up with soap on his nose, which John insisted on drying off by rubbing the damp dish towel all over his face, which resulted in a laughing, grab-assing wrestling match, which ended with Matt backed up against the counter while John kissed him again, taking his sweet time on the second go-round, exploring every part of Matt's mouth as they pressed against each other from knees to chest and fuck, this was incredible.
“C'mon,” Matt said, pushing back against him, one hand kneading John's shoulder, the other insistent at the back of his neck, “Harder. I'm not gonna break.”
“I get much harder, I'm gonna embarrass myself here,” John panted against Matt's mouth.
Matt chuckled. “I thought you old guys had more stamina.”
John bit Matt's earlobe, making him groan. “You're gonna pay for that crack.”
“Oh, fuck, yes please,” Matt agreed, letting his head fall back. His hands scrabbled blindly at John's jacket, shoving it off his shoulders and onto the floor.
John lifted his head. “Hey, I paid eight bucks to get that dry cleaned.”
“I'll pay you back,” Matt growled, trying to haul him in again.
“Hold on a minute,” John muttered, pulling back and yanking the jacket off the floor. As he did, the white envelope tumbled from his pocket and onto the floor.
“I don't believe you,” Matt huffed. “Way to kill the mood, McClane.”
John bent to retrieve the envelope and sighed. “I think it's about to get a lot deader,” he murmured. Holding it out to Matt, he said, “I, uh, I should have given this to you earlier, but I didn't want to mess up dinner.”
Matt frowned as he took it. “Unless it contains details about a meteorite striking the earth in the next hour, I think it can probably wait. Although come to think of it, if the Earth was about to go up in flames, I'd definitely want to jump your bones.”
When Matt tried to follow through by reaching for him, John evaded his grasp and shook his head. “It's from your mother. She stopped by the station just before I left to come here.”
Matt's frown turned into a scowl. “Uh, whoa, that does not compute, sorry. My mother came to see you?”
“Yeah. She seems to be under the assumption you're still living with me. And she thinks we're, uh –” It sounded kind of bizarre to say your mother thinks we're fucking; John stumbled over the words. He settled for an expressive hand gesture.
“Hunh,” Matt said, clearly unimpressed by this news.
“You're taking this well.”
Matt waved a hand, then walked the short distance to the couch and flopped down on it. “My mother likes simple definitions. I knew 'bisexual' was never going to cut it with her – too wishy-washy – so I settled on telling her I was gay a couple of years ago. Now she thinks I'm fucking every guy I strike up a conversation with at a bus stop; I figured when I told her you'd taken me in she'd jump to that conclusion, but there was no point in getting into it with her.”
John sat down beside him on the couch, deliberately keeping his hands to himself. “I got the impression you don't tell her a lot.”
Matt snorted. “Yeah, well, that was her choice, not mine,” he muttered. Before John could question this cryptic statement – or decide if it was any of his damned business – Matt turned to him and said, “Look, I'm sorry. I'll talk to her, tell her I've moved. She won't bug you any more.”
John rested his arm on the back of the couch. “I didn't mind.”
“Yeah, well, I do,” Matt said darkly. “She's got no business –”
“She does, though,” John interrupted. “It's pretty clear you don't see eye to eye on things, but she's still your mom. On some level, she wanted to scope out the new boyfriend, make sure he wasn't an ax murderer.”
Matt cocked his head. “Too bad she was wrong. I mean, about the boyfriend part, not the ax murderer part. Not that you're an ax murderer,” he added hastily, “just that it's not too bad you're not, and Christ, will you please hit me with a rock so I stop talking?”
“I can do better than that,” John murmured, leaning in to kiss Matt, letting his arm drop from the back of the couch to Matt's shoulders and pull him in. Matt joined in eagerly, snaking his hands around John's ribs and pressing against him.
“You're right about one thing, though,” John said, pulling back and looking into Matt's eyes. “I'm too damned old to be anyone's boyfriend, kid.”
Matt blinked at him, a little dazed and obviously needing a few moments to process human speech. “Uh, okay,” he said slowly, “I'm not sure what that means. Is that your way of saying you don't want to go steady?”
“It's my way of saying,” John gritted, “that I'm less than five years from retirement and most of the time I wish I was retired yesterday. It's my way of saying that I have boots older than you.”
“You want to fuck with your boots on, that's cool,” Matt said, leaning in to nuzzle John's neck. “I'm good with kinks as long as they don't involve live animals. After all, I gotta have some standards.”
John laughed in spite of himself. “Geez, you are such an asshole,” he muttered, absently stroking the nape of Matt's neck to soften the blow.
Matt slid his hands up John's chest. “Yeah, we're perfect for one another,” he murmured, popping a button on John's shirt with a deft twist of his fingers. “We done talking now?”
John swallowed. He still wasn't sure if this was a good idea, and he wanted to know more about what the hell was going on with Matt and his family, but the kid was right: it wasn't like they had to exchange class rings. Nothing said this had to be the romance of the century.
“Yeah,” John said, fitting his palm over the bulge in Matt's jeans and watching him shudder and groan, “I've said all I want to say.”
John woke up when something warm and friendly poked him in the thigh. Rolling to his side carefully and opening his eyes a slit to reveal the gray October morning light, he realized he'd slept the whole night at Matt's. Insofar as he'd had a game plan, that hadn't been part of it, but – well, Matt had kind of worn him out.
Matt stirred, mumbled an apology, and shifted away, taking his hard-on with him. John lay on his back staring at the ceiling, wondering what the fuck he was supposed to do now. He could get up and leave, though that seemed a little ridiculous after spending the whole night – or he could stick around. Either option had the potential to be awkward.
Matt flopped back toward him again, throwing his arm over John's chest as he did. “You workin' t'day?” Matt slurred, words muffled by virtue of half his face being mashed into the pillow.
John thought about lying for about half a second, then ruled against it. “No.”
“Good. I'll cook you breakfast later,” Matt said. He shifted again, trying to get comfortable, punched his pillow to puff it up, then lay still again.
Matt's arm was a firm, solid weight on his chest, but suddenly John felt lighter, his lungs free to breathe in as much air as he liked. Before he could think too hard about what the hell that meant, he was asleep again.
“So,” Matt said, “you want to go to a wedding?”
John didn't answer right away, mainly because he'd just come his brains out and was kind of slow at processing language right now. Also, he was covered in sweat, his heart was still racing, and he was wondering how he could possibly be having this much sex at his age without the aid of little blue pills.
They'd been doing this – whatever this was – for about a month now. Usually, Matt invited John over for dinner, or came over to John's and cooked something, and they ended up in bed, or in the shower, or against the wall, or (one really memorable time) on the dining room table. John was starting to associate sex with food so strongly that sometimes he got a hard on while eating his lunch at the station, which was not all that conducive to effective police work.
He tried to tell himself it was just sex – and hey, the sex was not 'just' anything, it was great, fucking spectacular – but it was getting harder to convince himself of that. He wasn't built for casual relationships, never had been. The problem was, there wasn't any reason to believe the kid wanted anything more, and really, why should he? John's warranty had expired a long time ago, and Matt still had his pick of the latest models.
A gentle tap on the side of John's skull interrupted his reverie. “Uh, Earth to John?”
“Sorry,” John murmured. “What was the question again?”
Matt propped himself up on an elbow and smirked at him. “Brain a little fried, there?”
“Yeah, yeah, you're a stud,” John grumbled, and Matt laughed and kissed him.
“I asked you if you want to go to a wedding.”
John frowned. “Your brother's?”
“Yeah, it's next weekend, over in Philadelphia. I thought we could hole up in a nice hotel room with a jacuzzi and fancy bathrobes, my treat.” Matt was trying to look cool, but John could tell he was nervous about something.
“You sure you want to go? I got the impression from your mother that you and Chad didn't get along so well.”
Matt let out a short and totally unconvincing laugh. “Well, no time like the present to bury the hatchet, huh?” He trailed a finger down John's chest. “C'mon, the food's going to be great, and there'll probably be dancing to Lawrence Welk tunes. Right up your alley.”
“You're a laugh riot,” John muttered. He wiped a hand over his face. “Listen, I'm not a big fan of family drama. My dance card's kind of full on that already.”
“I know,” Matt said, “and I wouldn't – look, I wouldn't do that to you, all right? My family – they don't do drama; it's beneath them. I've always been the loose cannon. But with you along, I think I might –”
Matt trailed off abruptly and shook his head.
“You might what?” John asked.
Matt looked away. “No, look, you're not responsible for my hangups, all right? I'm not going to blackmail you into going by telling you I can't do it without you: the thing is, I can, and I think that whole insanity with the Fire Sale helped me to get there, so you've done enough for me already.”
“Matt,” John said slowly, “why do you want me to come to this?”
Matt raised his gaze to John's again. “Because it'll be easier with you there,” he said. “And I kind of got used to having you at my back in dangerous situations.”
John was surprised to hear himself laugh at that. “Okay,” he said, “let's go to a wedding.”
Matt grinned and kissed him soundly. “Thanks,” he murmured against John's mouth, and the look in his eyes gave John ideas he had no business having. That didn't stop him from kissing back until Matt was as breathless and desperate for oxygen as John had been a few minutes ago.
John hadn't even seen the house before he'd figured out Matt's family was richer than Rockefeller, because their fucking driveway was about as long as the Hudson Parkway. When they finally rounded the final winding turn, John wasn't at all surprised by the half acre of house that hove into view in front of them.
“Jesus Christ, Matt,” he muttered, just because it needed saying. His suit was five years out of style, but he sent up a silent prayer of thanks that at least it still fit. Sort of.
“Yeah, I know,” Matt said. “Conspicuous consumption at its most heinous.” The contempt in his voice was obvious.
When John had been a kid, his father had been an asshole who made his mother cry and tried to drink his paycheck on a regular basis. Later, John had learned the man had watched too many buddies die on Guadalcanal to ever be anything but fucked up, and he might not have understood him, but he could forgive him. He couldn't help but wonder what had happened between Matt and his family that made it so hard to bridge that distance.
“Still time to run,” Matt said, shooting a glance at John as they drove up to the house.
“Hey, you promised me Lawrence Welk, and you're gonna deliver, hack boy,” John said, and Matt burst out laughing and squeezed John's knee as they came to a stop on the perfectly manicured lawn beside a sports car that probably cost more than John's condo.
Matt's mother was as calm and collected as she'd been at the station, though she greeted Matt with more warmth than John would have expected, hugging him and welcoming John with a nod and something actually resembling a smile. Matt was obviously a little surprised by it too, because he stared at John over her shoulder, his eyebrows raised nearly to the top of his forehead. “It's good to see you,” she said softly, but when she stepped back the mask was fully in place. “Well, I have approximately a dozen last-minute emergencies to deal with before the bride walks down the aisle, so I hope you'll excuse me.” Matt nodded, still seemingly dazed, and she hurried off, in that way upper-class women have of looking like they weren't hurrying at all.
“I thought the mother of the bride was the one who lost her mind getting ready for the wedding.”
“Yeah, well, from what she told me last week when I called her, Chad's fiancée's mother is dead, so,” Matt said. He snagged a champagne glass from a passing waiter and took a healthy swig, then made a face. “Jeez, I hate this stuff. I wonder if they have beer.”
“Am I gonna have to pour you into the car after the reception?”
Matt shook his head. “Nah, I'm planning to pace myself. Gotta stay sharp.” He took another sip, then winced again and placed the half-full glass on a chair. “I wonder if Ken's around,” he mused, turning slowly and staring at the milling throng of impeccably-dressed guests.
“Ken?”
“My stepdad.” Matt waved a hand. “The man we have to thank for all this splendor.”
John frowned as it hit him once again just how little he knew about Matt, about his past and his family. Over the last few weeks, Matt had managed to find out tons of shit about John, but every question John had asked had been rebuffed or deflected, until he'd gotten the hint and quit asking. “You gotta tell me the story of your life sometime, kid,” he said.
Matt chuckled as he continued to scan the crowd. “Well, there's a problem with that: other than the parts with you in it, it's pretty fucking boring.”
“Yeah, I doubt that,” John muttered, and then he noticed Matt had frozen in place and was staring at something – or someone. “You find him?”
“Uh, no,” Matt murmured. “I found his son.”
“His – what, Chad's your stepbrother?”
“Yeah,” Matt said, his voice faint. He suddenly wrapped his arms around himself as though he'd caught a chill, even though the room was easily over seventy degrees. “Shit, he's still beautiful. It's so fucking unfair. I was hoping he'd gone bald, gotten fat, grown a cheesy mustache. Something, geez.”
“Wait a minute,” John said, trying to keep up and failing miserably. “How long has it been since you've seen this guy?”
“Uh, let me see,” Matt said, pondering. “Ten years?”
“You haven't seen him in that long?”
“Mm-hm,” Matt grunted, clearly distracted. “I moved out the minute I got my high school diploma, and Chad left for college not long after that. Oh, crap, he's seen us.”
John watched as a tall and yeah, gorgeous guy with dark blond hair and a perfectly tailored tux detached himself from the crowd and made a beeline for them. “Talking to him was sort of inevitable today, wasn't it?”
“Yeah, but I was kind of shooting for thirty seconds in the receiving line. Okay, calm, you're calm, you can do this, it'll be fine,” Matt babbled, obviously to himself, and then Chad was there, wordlessly dragging Matt into a bear hug.
John might not know much about Matt Farrell's past, but he'd long since guessed that manly bear hugs were even less Matt's thing than they were John's. He had confirmation of this as Matt clearly stiffened in Chad's hold, his arms hanging limply at his sides. Finally, his right hand came up and patted Chad's back a couple of times, less a gesture of affection than a request to back the fuck off. Chad obviously got the message, because he released Matt almost immediately and drew back to look at him. “It's been way too long, man,” he said, his voice rough with emotion.
“Hey, uh, congratulations,” Matt managed, and John didn't fail to notice Matt wasn't agreeing with the statement. “From what Mom tells me, it sounds like she's a great lady.”
Chad didn't answer right away, his gaze directed elsewhere. “She is, she totally is. One of the greatest. Her grandfather is State Senator Chambers.”
Matt blinked at him.
“You remember him, he was the president of our country club.”
Matt's face lit up in the expression John knew all too well: it was the I'm about to fuck with you face. “Right, yeah, I remember now. We used to golf together all the time. Had to quit, though – he kept hogging all the balls.”
Chad made a face that suggested he'd been sucking on a lemon.
Matt clapped his hands together. “I'm sorry, where are my manners? This is John McClane. John, my stepbrother, Chad Williams.” John stuck out his hand and waited for it to be crushed – the guy had mitts like a sasquatch – but Chad's handshake was just the other side of diffident, like he was condescending to mingle with the hoi polloi. Briefly, John wondered just how badly this goddamned suit fit.
“Elizabeth told me you might be bringing someone,” Chad said, turning back to Matt. John's hands clenched into fists, but he held himself back from commenting on the other man's blatant display of rudeness; it helped that when he glanced at Matt, his eyes were glittering, showing he hadn't missed the snub either. “I have to say I didn't really believe it.”
“Yeah, well, I've been out for a long time,” Matt said coldly, and John watched Chad twitch slightly at that. “Also, it helps that I don't give a shit what anyone at the country club says about me behind my back.”
Chad snorted. “That's an oversimplification. Eventually a man wants children, a family. He wants someone who he knows will be there for him.” John noticed their exchange had the sound of a longstanding and painful argument; Christ knew he'd had enough of those in his life to recognize one when he saw it.
“Not this man,” Matt was saying. “I've never thought my genetic material was special enough that I had to contribute to the overpopulation of the planet. Family? Well, I think we both know that isn't all it's cracked up to be.” He paused, raising his chin. “And as for someone to be there, John's been there for me more than anyone I've ever known.”
John wondered if the look on his face was any different than the stunned expression on Chad's. “Well, I – yeah. That's good. I'm –” he glanced at John “– I'm glad for you.” He turned back to Matt. “I guess it has been a hell of a long time. You've changed.”
Matt stared at him for a moment, then burst out laughing, as though he'd just surprised himself, too. “You know what? I think I have.” He looked at John, and John could practically see the weight he'd been carrying around – hell, for months, probably from whenever Chad had first called – finally lift from him.
Christ, the kid was beautiful, and John couldn't look away if his life depended on it. It was like the Fourth all over again, John standing like a tool outside the ambulance, looking for an excuse to hang around until Matt's morphine kicked in all the way and he started drooling, because suddenly he realized he didn't want to lose this. And when it had turned out that he had an excuse to keep Matt close, he'd jumped on it like a starving dog on a bone.
His stomach churned. Fuck, he was in trouble here – had been right from the beginning, if he was being honest – and he didn't know what the hell to do about it.
And then Matt turned that smile on him, and leaned forward and kissed him right in front of Chad and God and the whole country club, and as John tasted Matt's grin he realized maybe they were both in trouble, and that wasn't such a bad thing. After all, they were pretty good at handling trouble.
Three hours later, John was back in the hotel room in a Jacuzzi half the size of his entire bathroom back home. Matt climbed in beside him, beer in hand.
“Oh thank Christ, finally,” Matt said, sliding down and resting his head against the side of the tub.
“We're gonna be in trouble with your mom,” John drawled. “I don't think it was good etiquette to sneak out before the bride and groom left the reception.”
Matt grinned. “We stayed for the first dance and the cake cutting. I think we fulfilled our social duty.”
John barked a laugh. “I never thought I'd hear you talk about your 'social duty.'”
“Yeah, it's not really me, is it? Of course, when you were growing up people still wore starched shirts and fedoras and shit,” Matt retorted, a smartass twinkle in his eyes. “Kids said 'please' and 'thank you' and respected their elders. What was that like?”
“I don't remember that part of it much. Mainly we stayed busy trying to keep the saber-toothed tigers away from the cave.”
Matt snorted. “Nice comeback.” He took a long swig of his beer and gazed up at the ceiling; John could pick out the trace of sadness in his eyes.
“You were more than stepbrothers, weren't you?” John asked softly.
Matt stiffened, and he turned his head, glancing over at John. “Uh, it's kind of complicated, but yeah.” John waited, just watching Matt, and finally Matt continued. “My real dad left before I was born, and Mom raised me on her own. I gotta hand it to her, she did just fine, but we were never what you'd call comfortable, and she hated not having money, totally hated it. Her parents were pretty well off, but they disowned her when she got knocked up with me. I've still never met them. By the time she got the job as Ken's secretary – yeah, cliché, I know – she'd been working low-paying jobs for over a decade and she was pretty fed up. Ken was a good-looking widower who made her parents look like trailer trash; it was a match made in heaven.”
“How old were you?”
“Fifteen. Chad was sixteen, and everything I thought I hated: rich, captain of the swim team and the debate club, popular, conservative, like some kind of Junior League wet dream.” Matt rubbed the back of his neck ruefully. “I fell in love with him pretty much from the first day. And when I basically jumped him, and he reciprocated, I convinced myself he felt the same way.” He shook his head. “But he was just a horny sixteen-year-old who'd been offered free, no-risk sex in his own house. It was like room service at the Ritz to him, only with blow jobs.”
“He used you,” John said, suddenly, irrationally angry.
Matt ran a hand through his hair. “Yeah, he did. But now that I, uh, think back on it – and the memories have been coming fast and furious today, let me tell you – I saw the signs I was being used and ignored them.”
“You were just a kid,” John growled.
Matt's chin came up. “You know, I thought you looked like you wanted to punch Chad a couple of times today,” he mused, his mouth curling up at the corners.
John shifted, embarrassed at being caught out. “Yeah, maybe.”
Matt set the bottle down and slid closer to John in the water. “Thanks.”
John's arms slipped around Matt's waist as he straddled John's lap. “For being a caveman?”
“I gotta say, that is kind of a turn-on,” Matt admitted, taking John's face in his hands, “but mainly I'm thanking you for not punching him. And for coming with me.” He leaned in, kissing John with an easy familiarity that made something tighten in John's chest. They moved together, touches increasing in urgency until Matt bit John's shoulder and said, “Like this, okay? Like this, right here,” and John nodded dumbly, too far gone to manage speech.
Matt reached over the side of the tub and retrieved lube and a condom he'd apparently left there. At John's look, he beamed. “And you know, I was never even a Boy Scout.” Before John could summon a response, he'd flipped the cap and was lifting up so that he could press his own fingers inside himself. John grabbed the condom and ripped the packet with his teeth, because God, if he didn't get to fuck Matt soon he was going to explode.
Luckily, Matt seemed to be as desperate as he was, because he prepared himself hastily and then he was sinking down on John's cock, taking him in in one smooth glide.
“I think I want to go steady,” Matt whispered against John's mouth. “That okay with you?”
John buried his hands in Matt's hair and kissed him, putting everything he couldn't say into the messy clash of tongues and teeth.
“Yeah,” John husked. “Yeah, that's okay.”