@farrybarry requested #35 for the Spotify Wrapped Game
#35 on my 2023 Spotify Wrapped is Please by Daisy Jones and the Six (this is like 950 words I cannot seem to be stopped - but at least this one got a little spicy)
(send me a number between 1-100 and I'll write a drabble about the corresponding song on my 2023 Spotify Wrapped)
“You should go,’’ Illya says. The sound of cicadas is loud through the open window.
“Why?” Napoleon asks, easy grin on his lips. He’d lost both his jacket and waistcoat at one point. The first couple buttons of his shirt are open, revealing a tantalizing vision of chest hair.
“You know why.” They had this conversation a few weeks ago. Or rather, they hadn’t had it. Napoleon had poked as he tends to do. Illya had grown increasingly more uncomfortable, his lies stretching thin until he’d just told Napoleon that no matter what he might be thinking or feeling or fantasizing about… it doesn’t make a difference. Whatever is brewing between them would stay there until it fizzles and dies.
“I thought it wasn’t an issue?” Napoleon asks, pouring them both another glass of whiskey. Not leaving then, Illya thinks bitterly but accept the glass all the same.
“Is not good… to tempt fate like that,” Illya mumbles.
“You find me tempting? Why, I’m flattered.”
Illya rolls his eyes. It’s exactly this kind of carelessness that drives him insane. How could Napoleon not see the devastation this would bring down on them if they gave in? “I told you to stop.”
“But I can’t help how tempting I am, Peril,” Napoleon teases and Illya wants to wipe the grin off his face. Whether he wants to use a punch or a kiss, he’s not sure.
“I was not joking. You need to leave,” Illya says sternly, grip tightening on his glass. He can feel the tremor come on. He doesn’t trust himself around Napoleon. This has always been the problem.
Napoleon sighs and puts his glass down. “I wasn’t joking either, you know. All you have to do is ask.” He reaches out and his fingers on Illya’s exposed forearms burn like fire.
Illya looks down at them. Napoleon’s pale skin against the bruise that had been blooming there since his fight with a couple of THRUSH goons a few days ago. Fingertips find the scar from his training with the KGB a lifetime ago and Illya squeezes his eyes shut. “Please,” he whispers.
“Please what, Peril?” Napoleon asks sounding more breathless than Illya has ever heard him before.
“Stop. Please stop.” Fingertips on his arm still, then disappear. Illya opens his eyes, sees the resigned expression on Napoleon’s face. The flirtatious smirk from a few moments ago is all but gone. “I just- I can’t-” He tries to explain.
“I know,” Napoleon says bitterly. “I got that.” He throws his drink back and then makes a face. Illya feels helpless at the display of bitterness. It’s not something that Napoleon shows very often and when he does it is mostly directed at the CIA. Illya doesn’t know what to do now that he’s the cause.
“You are never going to let us have this, are you?” Napoleon asks and his eyes seem to pierce into Illya’s soul. He’s not pleading - that would be easier to handle. This is so much worse. The tilt of his head, the sweat Illya can see on his skin, the bruise he can see on his shoulder from a rough blow of a bat. How many times had he dreamed about giving in? How many times had he dreamed of reaching out and just taking?
He remembers the other day when Napoleon’s eyes had met his across the bar, one hand on a gorgeous woman’s waist. How many conquests would he watch disappear behind Napoleon’s door, knowing all it would take is a word?
“Illya?” Napoleon asks, drawing his attention back into the present moment. “Just say it.” Napoleon reaches out, takes his hand and pulls it closer until Illya can feel his muscles through his thin shirt, until he’s reminded the sight of Napoleon at the beach, ocean water running through the crevices between his muscles.
“Please,” Illya pleads, feeling his fingers start to tremble. “I need you to say no. Napoleon, please.”
“No, Illya, I won’t do that.” His hand on Illya’s wrist guides him, up and up until his fingers meet skin, until he can feel Napoleon’s pulse, strong and quick under his skin.
Illya is not a religious man, far from it. But he thinks of the apple all the same. Only a single bite, he thinks, desperately, forsaken already.
“I want this too much to let it go. If there is even a sliver of a chance…” He leans into the touch, the weight against Illya’s hand startling, “I’m going to take it. Even if it’s just a moment,” he whispers and it doesn’t sound like a ploy. It doesn’t sound like the shameless flirting that Napoleon engages in like it’s a sport.
Illya doesn’t make the conscious decision. The next thing he knows, he’s pushed Napoleon’s shirt open further, the revealed skin making him almost dizzy with want. He doesn’t want things, not for himself. Especially not a man. The firm muscles under his fingers, the deep rasp of Napoleon’s voice, it’s everything that Illya should not want to keep. But he’s here all the same, watching his shaking fingers undo the buttons of Napoleon’s shirt. He hears the hitch in his breathing with every inch of skin he reveals and wonders if he himself is still breathing at all.
“Napoleon,” Illya whimpers.
“It’s okay. It’s okay.” Soft lips touch Illya’s temple and he can feel the way Napoleon has to stretch under his fingers. There is no going back now and he was foolish to think he would ever be able to resist.
