Naked. Wet. And dripping.

It's the last that makes it so delightfully obscene, gives Ezra's stomach that little shock. The waterdrops drip-drip-drip against the creekside rock. Tiny splashes, wet against hard. Dripping down.

Josiah might only be clothed in clear water and moonlight, but it's the drip...drip...drip that makes Ezra forget that he's here to say no.

No.

Wrong.

Can't.

Won't.

Short little words, rough and unpolished. Not at all like the smooth little stones glittering wet at Josiah's feet.

Drip. Drip. Dripping.

From where Ezra is almost hidden, the tangled shadows of the branches are cool against his skin. He shivers the sound of rustling leaves.

A smile flashes in the dark - that feral smile of Josiah's that looks much too at home here in the waters and the wild. Sharp white teeth, the sort of sharp that has never had to prove itself; the sort that needs only to scrape and tease, and hint at just what pain they could inflict.

Crunch.

The snap of a twig under Josiah's bare feet; the moist, not-quite-there impression of pebbles pressed into the dirt. It hurts Ezra's feet through his boots to listen to it, and something else pains him - flickers briefly, and then it's gone.

Josiah's voice is a low rumble fading in and out of a whisper. It's strange, that need to hush so in this little grove where the trees and the night are too thick for travelers in-between.

But still, but still...

Josiah offers a swim with that shy eagerness of his, like a young farmboy calling on his sweetheart with a five-and-dime ring in his pocket. It's a lie, that look on his face, and Ezra wants nothing to do with it; he's seen those teeth bared, and no endearing play at awkwardness is going to make him forget it.

Swimming? Not now, not here, too cold. And Josiah's smile falters a little now, because he should be hurt but doesn't quite know it yet.

Ezra stays cradled in his shadows, like a deer held in place by a hunting torch - as if he won't be burned so long as he stays put and doesn't dare to blink. As if the hunter isn't just distracting him while he reloads.

The blanket? Yes, there it is, very nice, spread out on the forest floor - grey, the way everything is in the dark. A warm pleasantry that speaks of thoughtful preparation.

No, no thank you. I just came to -

To what, Ezra? Josiah's smile fades, leaving only dangerous amusement in its place; a tilt of the head, stepping closer. Closer.

No.

And closer. No?

No. Pinned under a gaze that glitters with deadly knowledge, Ezra feels as though he's the naked one, bare, wet, dripping...

No?

A sigh - no?

And something like a kiss. He staggers backwards under the force of it, and shuts his mouth tight as if he can stop Josiah from tearing the consent out of his throat. For an instant, cold air settles on his bruised lips. Then, an unbelievably soft touch soothes his hurts. The bristle and tickle of a damp moustache rubs just under his nose, and the icy drip-drip from waterlogged hair against his neck is...running shiver-slide along his collarbone.

No?

...please. Oh, please.

He shuts his eyes. God damn him. He swore, he swore to himself that he wouldn't beg tonight. That he didn't have to, couldn't be made to.

Arms come around him, pressing the damp through to his skin. And it's on the tip of his tongue that no good can come from this. He has reason and he has rhetoric that sounded so convincing in his room, and in the saloon, and along the wooded sunset trail. But all his excuses now echo weak as consumptives dying hacking little deaths in his head.

So he lets himself forget. He gives himself over to that slow and dirty open-mouthed press, something too messy to be called a kiss. He squirms against the fingertips smoothing over and through his hair, making him itch. Too soft, dangerously soft, and it takes a moment for him to realize it. A moment where his mouth is slack and he's all soft inside, before he knows -

Dear Lord

He knows

- that come hell or high water, he's going to pay tonight. Because Josiah knows that Ezra means to leave - just might if he can clear his head and gather his thoroughly fucked senses - and he'll take Ezra to task in the ways that make Ezra forget how risky this fallacy of an affair is. Those "lessons"...the sort that leave smudgy bruises around Ezra's hips in the shape of fingertips; the sort that bring him calling on Josiah with a midnight hunger more often than control and good sense should allow.

One big hand is curled in his hair, the other at the small of his back. The water seeps through his shirt - no vest because those little pearl buttons are a dear sacrifice to the forest floor (and what does that say, he wonders, when he assuredly came here tonight to put an end to things.)

He shivers, irritated that a cold prickle of gooseflesh creeper-crawls over his skin while Josiah seems to be quite content au naturel, warm, hot even. He shivers again.

Would you, could we - whispered wetly against his neck. A lick, and the hot tightness that follows the press of teeth.

Would you, could we - it always starts as a question, something gentle and coaxing. The demanding comes later: let me, do it, say it. But Ezra won't let it get that far this time, no he will not. Because he is in control, he is in control, and - Josiah nips again at his tender throat - his knees buckle.

They follow the familiar, awkward steps of a backward waltz, and only Josiah's hand keeps Ezra's head from hitting thick-barked trunk. (When did his shirt come untucked?) Because Josiah's hands are suddenly against his bare waist, squeezing and stroking with calloused friction, fingers working just under the waistband of Ezra's pants.

A disorienting time-skip, and he realizes that his mouth is free, cold. Josiah's lips are pressed to his neck in that strange and wet and noisy sort of kiss of his.

I don't think - don't think - don't think, and he doesn't bother to say it, because Josiah will look at him with that tired, tired look and say that's right, don't think, don't think.

And maybe...

He melts where Josiah's mouth touches him, and freezes stiff against Josiah's hands...and maybe...maybe he should tell Josiah after, after.

He sharply inhales a mouthful of warm night air as hands move over his back and down, his trousers pooling around his ankles. There's that complexly layered rub of Josiah's palm, and Ezra's drawers, and Ezra's skin.

Oh...oh yes...later.

Josiah's skin is too wet, too smooth. It takes Ezra's nails to get enough of a grip to press close to Josiah while pushing away from the tree to spare himself a chest-full of cracked ribs. And it flits so briefly in his mind, 'Too close, not close enough,' awakening something that rouses drowsily in the back of his head. Something he should be remembering, something deeper there...deeper, and deeper, and...harder too.

Please.

Please?

Josiah whispers something in his ear, perhaps something heartfelt and beautiful, perhaps something heartfelt and obscene. The scraping sound could go either way with words too close and wet to be clear.

He shudders, a curious mix of arousal and revulsion calling a skittery dance from his throat to his groin. Out thrust his hips, and back thuds his head against the tree trunk.

Tight and tighter and too tight as his hair is wound around Josiah's fingers.

And then there's a...

Pause...

...As if the gears in Josiah's head are just now turning towards what he could do with Ezra's face. Drag him down to his knees maybe, and hold him just far away to...brush against his cheek. And tighten his grip until Ezra opens his mouth and asks for it and asks for it and begs for it.

Maybe.

Or maybe not, because it's back to the scritch-scratch rhythm of tree bark against his shirt and skin, and the only thing in his mouth is Josiah's tongue. Tastes sour with liquor, thrusting in and out, as though Josiah can read Ezra's mind like he reads his body.

Mouth open and gasping - Josiah's hand slips into Ezra's drawers, his whisper riding a breath into his ear.

Ezra turns his head. No, you don't. You don't, so don't tell me that you do.

A short, ragged noise rips from his throat. Something that might be no, if Josiah's hands weren't where they are, doing the things they do so well.

Scritch-scratch - between the skin of his back and the tree bark, it's no question which will give first.

He almost laughs. 'No skin off my back...'

And...

And...

He shuts his eyes tightly at the feathery touch of exploring fingertips that move everywhere. And he's - moan - twitch - harder because he knows that gentleness comes from a hand that could hurt him so very badly, so very easily.

And he almost says it - hurt me, hurt me - but he doesn't really need to, now does he.

Josiah, Josiah, Jo - That, he can say, and cup his hand to press Josiah's cock against his belly, barely breathing. Seeing through the eyes of whatever little creature is rustling behind them, how ridiculous they must look, groaning and grunting, rutting with animal stupidity.

Ridiculous.

Oh...

And it's rather a letdown, to come with the thoughts of his own idiocy in his mind. It's just a breath that's held and then released with the rest of him when Josiah's strokes hit that magic number.

Weak-kneed again. Josiah holds his hips with strong hands to keep him upright. He's just the body now, something alive that Josiah's pressing against with naked flesh that's wet and warm...and dripping something thicker than water.

Just finish, just finish, just finish.

And Josiah does, pressing his lips to that spot between Ezra's neck and shoulder, breathing in loud and deep. Moaning Ezra's name with rough reverence. And maybe Ezra's not just the body. Maybe it's even more frightening to be just the opposite.

Josiah steps back, grinning and rubbing the right side of his jaw. There's a waxen sound as Ezra peels away from the bark where his shirt has ridden up.

They don't say anything.

He pulls up his pants, shaking fingers leaving the buttons for later. He wipes away the sticky mess on his stomach with the tails of his shirt; lies down with Josiah on the scratchy grey blanket that smells as if it's been dried in the sun.

He settles with his back to Josiah, who's stretched out naked and shameless, and Ezra shivers under his clothes, the water and sweat and semen chilling his skin where it meets the night air. It's no longer delightfully obscene, this wetness that's touching him all over. It's something dirty now. Something tiring.

Very softly, fingertips whisper unintelligible words against the back of Ezra's neck, and he has to wonder what it would be like if he were still less fond of Josiah than Josiah is of him.

What would it taste like to still have that power? To feel...anything but this diseased dependence. He fights the urge to turn and let Josiah wrap around him; rocks himself gently in place.

He's bleeding, he notes with little interest. There's a scrape high on his hip with bits of tree bark still clinging to the torn skin. A little red ribbon of watered silk unwinds down his thigh. Dripping.

He wraps his arms around himself, still letting Josiah run fingers his hair. Like a pet - a dog trained to come running at a whistle, no matter what he expects from his master. And if he were to one day bite the hand that feeds him, what then?

A sharp breath from Josiah, as if Ezra's spoken aloud. Then speech, sudden and careful.

Ah, Ezra. 'Little you know the subtle electric fire that for your sake is playing within me.'

Walt Whitman. And Ezra could be clever and identify the quotation, but Josiah knows that he knows it. Instead, he rests his weight back, letting his body fall into the rhythm of Josiah's breathing. Through too many layers, he feels the blood and heartbeat, and the other secret things that echo through Josiah. There's cricket-song, emerging suddenly from the background of the night, filling up the silence between the two men.

The next time...the next time he'll say no. He'll tell Josiah why this isn't a good idea. How they'll no doubt be discovered. That he doesn't love him.

Words that he can't make sound convincing, even to himself.

But he'll shine these untruths, make them confident and beautiful. Someday soon, he'll give them to Josiah as a gift. Someday.

For now, he marvels at Josiah's warmth and pulls the edge of the blanket over himself, scooting backwards when Josiah helps to cover him up. He crests along with that deep, even breathing, and tries to hear the thoughts that he knows are falling into place inside Josiah's mind with the great weight and dangerously fast descent of an avalanche.

He waits for it...

I do love you, Ezra.

Ezra closes his eyes, and lets this moment be perfect enough to last him the rest of his life.