The key turned twice. Marcus always locked it that way when he wanted the night sealed.
Eli stood where he’d been told: middle of the living room rug, shoes off, jacket still on. The apartment smelled like rain dragged in on wool and the coffee Marcus had made and forgotten. Streetlight cut a hard stripe across the floorboards. Everything else was shadow and the low hum of the fridge.
Marcus set his keys in the bowl without looking at them. He was taller by three inches and built like he used work for a living—shoulders under a dark shirt, sleeves rolled once. He walked a slow circle around Eli and stopped behind him.
“Hands.”
Eli put them behind his back. Not cuffed. Just held. The fabric of his own sleeves pulled tight across his chest.
Marcus’s mouth found the side of his neck, not a kiss so much as a claim. Teeth, then the flat of his tongue. Eli’s breath went thin.
“You answered in twelve minutes,” Marcus said against his skin. “I texted at nine-forty. You’re here at nine-fifty-two. Good.”
“I was already downtown.”
“I didn’t ask.” A palm settled between Eli’s shoulder blades and pressed until Eli had to lean. “Jacket off. Fold it. Chair.”
Eli did it. The room cooled on his arms. Under the shirt he was already half-hard, which Marcus would notice the second he wanted to. Marcus always noticed.
Marcus came around front. He took Eli’s chin between thumb and finger and tipped his face up.
“Look at me.”
Eli looked. Marcus’s eyes were dark and steady, the kind of calm that wasn’t soft.
“You remember the word.”
“Red.”
“And if you can’t talk.”
“Two taps.”
“Good boy.” The praise landed low in Eli’s gut, hot and stupid. Marcus’s thumb brushed his lower lip. “Open.”
Eli opened. Marcus slid two fingers in—not gentle, not cruel—and rested them on Eli’s tongue. Eli’s mouth filled with the salt of Marcus’s skin. He didn’t suck until Marcus said, quiet:
“Go on.”
He did. Slow. Marcus watched him like he was checking a measurement. When he pulled his fingers free he wiped them once on Eli’s bottom lip and left the shine there.
“On your knees.”
The rug bit through denim. Marcus undid his belt with the unhurried patience of a man who had already won. The sound of leather leaving loops made Eli’s pulse jump in his throat. Marcus didn’t take the belt off all the way. He doubled it and set the folded length under Eli’s chin, lifting.
“You spent the week thinking about this.”
It wasn’t a question. Eli’s face heated anyway.
“Yes.”
“Tell me what you thought.”
Eli swallowed. The belt stayed. “You. Holding me down. Your hand on the back of my neck. Fucking me until I couldn’t—” He stopped. Marcus waited. “Until I couldn’t talk without sounding wrecked.”
Marcus’s mouth tipped. Almost a smile. “Ambitious.” He let the belt drop against Eli’s chest and finished with his fly. His cock was thick already, the head flushed dark. He took himself in hand and painted Eli’s lower lip with the wet tip.
“Ask.”
“Please.” Eli’s voice came out rough. “Please let me.”
“Let you what.”
“Suck you. Sir.”
The last word unlocked something in Marcus’s face—satisfaction, clean and sharp. He fed the head past Eli’s lips and held still.
“No hands. Just your mouth. Slow. I want to feel every inch go in.”
Eli took him. The stretch at the corners of his mouth burned in the good way. Marcus’s hand settled in his hair—not shoving, guiding—and the weight of that palm was the whole room. Eli worked down until his nose pressed the dark hair at the base and his throat fluttered. He held. Tears pricked. He held longer because Marcus said, low:
“There. That’s it. Breathe through your nose. I’ve got you.”
When Marcus pulled him off, spit strung between Eli’s lip and the wet shaft. Eli gasped. Marcus thumbed a tear from under his eye like it was nothing personal and everything personal at once.
“Up. Shirt off. Pants to your thighs. Facing the window.”
The blinds were half-drawn. Enough glass to show the wet street six floors down, not enough for anyone to get a clear look unless they tried. Eli stripped as ordered. Cool air hit his nipples, his stomach. His cock stood out hard and leaking; the waistband of his jeans trapped mid-thigh made him feel more naked than bare would have.
Marcus stepped in behind him. Full body. Heat along Eli’s spine. A forearm crossed Eli’s chest and pinned him back. The other hand wrapped Eli’s cock—loose, almost idle—and stroked once, twice, just enough to make Eli’s hips jerk.
“Still,” Marcus said in his ear. “I move you. You don’t move yourself.”
Eli locked his knees. Marcus’s fist tightened and worked him with long, mean strokes, twist at the head, thumb smearing precome. Eli’s breath stuttered. His hands hovered useless at his sides until Marcus said, “Behind your back again,” and Eli laced his fingers hard enough to hurt.
Marcus bit the tendon in his neck and stroked faster. The window threw their reflection back: Eli open-mouthed, Marcus solid and dark behind him, arm a bar across his chest.
“You’re going to come like this,” Marcus said. “Standing. Looking out. And you’re not going to make a mess on my floor. You hold it until I say. Understand?”
“Yes—fuck—yes.”
“Try again.”
“Yes, sir.”
Marcus’s grip went merciless. The wet sound of it filled the quiet. Eli’s thighs shook. The edge rushed up too fast, bright and brutal, and he made a broken noise.
“Marcus—”
“Hold.”
Eli held. Barely. His whole body was a wire. Marcus eased off to almost nothing—just the circle of his fingers under the head, a cruel little pressure—and waited until Eli’s breathing staggered back from the cliff.
“Good.” A kiss, open, behind Eli’s ear. “Bedroom. Hands and knees on the bed. Ass up. Don’t touch yourself.”
Eli walked with his jeans hobbling him and didn’t care. The bedroom was darker. Marcus’s bed was made tight, military corners. Eli climbed on and got into position, face turned into the duvet, the air cold on his hole and the backs of his thighs.
He heard the drawer. The click of the lube. Marcus’s belt finally hitting the floor.
A warm palm spread him. Then slick fingers—one, then two—pressing in without ceremony. Eli pushed back and got a sharp slap on the meat of his ass for it.
“I said I move you.”
“Sorry—sir—”
“Don’t be sorry. Be still.”
Marcus worked him open with patience that felt like punishment. Scissoring. Crooking. Finding the spot that made Eli’s spine try to melt and staying off it on purpose. Three fingers. The stretch burned clean. Eli’s cock hung heavy between his legs, dripping onto the duvet in slow ticks.
Marcus pulled his fingers free. The blunt head of his cock lined up. He didn’t thrust. He waited, one hand firm on Eli’s hip.
“Color.”
“Green.” Eli’s voice was wrecked already. “Please. Green.”
Marcus pushed in in one long, controlled slide that stole the air out of Eli’s lungs. Full. Too full. Perfect. He bottomed out and stayed there, hips flush, while Eli shook under him and adjusted around the thickness.
“Breathe.”
Eli breathed.
Marcus started to fuck him. Deep, measured strokes that dragged over his prostate on every pass. Not frantic. Owned. The sound of skin on skin built. Marcus’s hand slid up Eli’s spine and settled between his shoulder blades, pressing his chest down into the mattress until Eli’s ass was the highest point of him and there was nowhere to go but take it.
“This is what you wanted all week,” Marcus said, voice rough now, the calm fraying at the edges in a way that made Eli’s stomach flip. “My cock in you. My hand holding you down. You don’t get to rush it. You get what I give you.”
“Yes—yes, sir—god—”
Marcus fucked him harder. The bedframe knocked the wall in a steady rhythm. Eli’s mouth fell open against the duvet. Every thrust punched a sound out of him. His cock swung neglected and aching.
Marcus reached under and got a hand on him—tight, matching the pace of his hips.
“You come on my cock,” Marcus said. “Not before I say. When I say, you don’t hold back. You give it to me. All of it.”
Eli nodded frantically into the fabric. Words had gone somewhere else.
Marcus’s rhythm broke into something rawer. His breathing went harsh. The hand on Eli’s cock stroked in time, ruthless, and the dual pressure stacked until Eli was making high, helpless noises he would have been embarrassed by if his brain still had room for embarrassment.
“Now,” Marcus growled. “Come.”
Eli came apart. Orgasm ripped through him in hard pulses, striping the duvet, his hole clenching down on Marcus in waves that made Marcus curse and drive deep and hold. Marcus followed a few strokes later—buried to the hilt, a low broken sound against Eli’s shoulder, hips stuttering as he emptied into him.
They stayed locked like that while the room came back. Rain ticked the glass. Marcus’s chest heaved against Eli’s back. He pressed a kiss—softer now—to the nape of Eli’s neck and eased out carefully. Eli made a small noise at the loss. Come slicked the inside of his thigh.
Marcus left and came back with a warm cloth. He cleaned Eli with the same focus he’d used to wreck him. Tossed the cloth. Tugged Eli’s jeans the rest of the way off. Pulled the duvet out from under the mess and dragged Eli into the clean side of the bed, back to chest, one heavy arm slung over his waist.
Eli’s pulse slowed in increments. Marcus’s mouth brushed his shoulder.
“Water?”
“In a minute.”
Marcus hummed agreement. His hand splayed over Eli’s stomach, possessive without pressure.
“You did well,” he said into Eli’s hair. Simple. Not theater.
Eli closed his eyes. The streetlight stripe had moved. The lock on the door was still turned twice.
“Next week,” Marcus said, already half toward sleep, “you’re going to keep your hands behind your back the whole time. Belt. Think about it.”
Eli’s spent cock twitched traitorously. Marcus felt it and huffed a quiet laugh against his skin.
“Yeah,” Marcus murmured. “You’ll think about it.”
Eli did. With Marcus’s arm around him and the rain going and the word *red* still safe in his pocket if he ever needed it, he lay still, exactly where he’d been put, and let the week start opening in front of him like a door Marcus already had the key to.
