Hartwin: 23. “Just once.”
For these dialogue prompts.
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Normally, Harry let Eggsy drive. Kingsman, Eggsy had once complained, was rather lacking in James Bond shit specifically where automobiles were concerned — and Eggsy was, of course, a magnificent driver — so when they were in the field together and furnished with a fast car, Harry let him drive.
Normally.
A tiny part of him was reconsidering that as Eggsy’s hand alighted on his knee. “You know how fucking sexy you look behind the wheel?” Eggsy asked.
Harry changed gears as he took that tiny part and throttled it.
“Well, you do. Smoking hot.”
The people who had drugged Eggsy had him for less than an hour, all told. Still, it occurred to Harry that he might have killed them too quickly when he was pouring Eggsy into the passenger’s seat and Eggsy nuzzled his throat and said, I’m obsessed with your neck, you know? The field tests Harry had run since then showed it was merely a truth drug; any aphrodisiac effect, it seemed, was the unfortunate result of Eggsy, stripped of inhibition, riding in a car with Harry.
Kingsman spent of a great deal of time and resources training its agents to resist interrogation, even under the influence. Eggsy was talking now because he felt safe. That was a good thing.
Less good was what he elected to say.
You know had become his favorite phrase. It prefaced nearly everything, if it wasn’t tacked on at the end. The questions seemed rhetorical — but were they, really? How much should Harry read into the repetition, he wondered — how much did Eggsy think about it? What Harry knew. That Eggsy desired him… yes, Harry supposed he had known that, before today. He had allowed himself to be flattered by it. He had not allowed himself to picture Eggsy touching him like this.
Harry released what had become a death grip on the gear shift to remove an admiring hand from his thigh. If that hand climbed any higher, he would have to pull over.
Moments later he was pulling over anyway. “Fuck yeah,” Eggsy said in his ear, body pressed against him and wriggling. Harry knew he was entirely limber enough to to work his way into Harry's lap in the driver’s seat if sufficiently motivated. “You know—”
Harry had the car parked just in time to clap his other hand over Eggsy’s lips, pressing him back into his seat. “What do I know?” he snarled.
The flirting was one thing — Eggsy did that sometimes without any outside influence at all. Harry enjoyed it, in the way any man might enjoy having a beautiful boy flirt with him. It wasn’t — the reality of Eggsy’s touch threatened to undo him.
Eggsy’s eyes were bright above Harry's restraining hand, startled but not afraid, never afraid, even though there was still blood on his cuffs from the carnage behind them. He felt Eggsy’s breath on his palm and let him go.
“You know you could have me right here,” Eggsy said.
Harry wanted to cover his mouth again.
“C’mon. Please. Just once.”
“No.”
“Why not?” Plaintive now.
“Because it could never be just once, you foolish boy! You beautiful—” Harry cut himself off, breathless. He wanted to curl away from Eggsy, into the door, into whatever privacy the confines of the car could afford — but Eggsy’s face was so close, his eyes so wide, and his mouth hanging open so beautifully, Harry couldn’t look away. He could hardly move. He rested his cheek against Eggsy’s forehead. “It could never be just once, not for me. Not with you. Don’t you know that?”
Eggsy’s jaw worked briefly. “You know—” he finally started.
Harry breathed in sharply and moved, at last, to cover Eggsy’s mouth again. But this time Eggsy didn’t let him. His hand came up to catch Harry’s wrist. “You know I’m telling the truth right now. You now it’s all I can do.”
Harry wanted to call that the problem — but was it, really, when Eggsy had said such things before? The constant refrain of you know, intentional or not, said something else. Harry did know Eggsy wanted him. He had allowed himself to be flattered by it, yes — he had also forced himself to dismiss it. He had never imagined admitting what he had just been baited into saying aloud. Was the litany of honest appreciation too much because he hadn’t, truly, believed Eggsy’s interest was sincere all this while? Or was it because what Eggsy had ultimately offered — just once — was all he had known it could ever be? “Yes,” he whispered raggedly.
He knew Eggsy wanted him. Did Eggsy know Harry loved him?
From the way Eggsy was staring at him, eyes gone impossibly wider, the answer was no — not, at least, until now.
“I’ll do it again later,” Eggsy said strangely, his fingers digging into Harry’s wrist. "I'll tell you I'm crazy for you, later — I’ll tell you everything I’ve ever thought — I’ll tell you when Merlin clears me, and I’ll tell you tomorrow and I’ll tell you — fuck it — ten years from now when you’re absolutely sick of it. But right now you asked me a question and I feel like I’m gonna burst and I want to say this much right now, while I’m sure you’ll believe me.”
Harry wasn't sure he wanted to hear it — but how could he refuse?
“I didn’t know,” Eggsy said. “I had no idea. I thought — for me, it could be just once.”
Harry wondered how that could possibly break his heart, when he had been so sure of it already. He shut his eyes — too late perhaps — and nosed against Eggsy's hairline, trying to just breathe.
But Eggsy wasn’t finished. “It could, because if I thought that’s all I’d get of you I’d take it, you know?”
You know, you know, you know. But the squeezing sensation in his chest had started fading as immediately as it had begun.
“But I’d be thinking about it for the rest of my life." Eggsy laughed a little shrilly. "It wouldn’t even have to have been good.”
Harry cracked his eyes open and drew back enough to look at Eggsy's face.
His eyes were wet, but he was grinning in that impish way of his.
“It would have been,” Harry heard himself say through gravel in his throat. He might not have let himself to imagine it, not as Eggsy apparently had, but that much he could say without doubt. If he had decided to break his own heart to have that body under his hands just once it would be good. And it would not be a rushed affair in a cramped car. Eggsy’s face colored beautifully when Harry told him as much.
“Yeah,” he said softly. “Yeah, okay." Eggsy’s fingers, now only loosely encircling Harry's wrist, crawled up the back of his hand, bringing it to those plush lips once more and kissing the palm.
Harry hissed softly.
Eggsy buried a smile, but Harry could feel the wry edges of it. “But if we had — I'd always be hoping that it wouldn’t be just once after all. Always."
His eyes darted all over Harry’s face, his hand dropping from Harry's hand to his chest.
"So. Fuck, Harry. Are you gonna kiss me, or do you need Merlin to clear me for that too?”
Harry’s thumb traced the plush curve of Eggsy’s lower lip. “Just once?” he asked — teasing, maybe. Was it in him to tease, yet?
Eggsy shook his head, fingers curling into a fist around Harry’s lapel, “No. Please. Again and again.”
Harry was already pushing his hand backward into Eggsy’s hair, dragging him even closer. “Again and again,” he agreed, and kissed him hard.
It was a rough, breathless thing, and the gearshift dug awkwardly into his hip but Harry hardly cared as Eggsy's mouth opened for him. Harry couldn’t get enough of the taste of him, the heat. A part of him understood, suddenly, what Eggsy had really meant with his just once. He was afraid to let this first kiss end, in case Eggsy changed his mind and it would the only one after all, in case there was something — anything — that might later change his mind back again. But — again and again, Eggsy had said, and what could Harry do but believe him? He turned his head at last, sucking in a breath against Eggsy’s lovely jaw. Eggsy made a sweet, needy sound and they fitted their mouths together again, softer now, slower, once kiss melting into another until Eggsy nuzzled down, lips tracing the line of Harry's jaw and neck, down to the place just above his collar.
I’m obsessed with your neck, you know, Eggsy said, what felt like a lifetime ago now. Harry did know after a few more kisses — he knew it as well as his own name.
They would have to stop eventually. Eggsy did need to be checked out. Harry finally pinned Eggsy back against his seat when the hand at Harry’s chest started to work on a button. “I’m still not fucking you for the first time in this car.”
Eggsy made a noise that was half laughter, half whine. “But some other time, you will?”
“Some other time,” he agreed, almost giddy with it. “Now be good. They’re expecting us back, and you owe me a talk, and if you touch my leg any more I’ll crash and kill us both.”
“Maybe I better drive after all then,” Eggsy said.
Harry growled and kissed him again.
