Dom offered his two Declarations of the Day to Orlando as the Elf helped him up a flight of stairs.

"One, this house is too bloody nice. The feck decided you needed the sodding beach house with all these rooms then, eh? I mean, really mate, 's'fuckin'—"

"Hold still, would you!"

Oh, suuure. Tell the injured man to hold still. He growled as his foot snag-slammed into one of the steps. "Who hired you to do this!" He grumbled through Orli dragging him into the guestroom and all but tossing him onto the bed.

"And two. I maintain that your surfboard is to blame," Dom stated as he lay back on the sheets, wincing all the way down.

"Bollocks!" Orli shot back as he moved between the bathroom and the bedroom, getting towels and a robe for Dom to wear.

"That ruddy thing had it out for me since this morning. Was looking at me! Plotting its every move..."

"You've swallowed too much sea water." Orli dumped the mess of white cotton robe on his head. "I'm going to find Billy."

Dom grappled with the robe and its clinging sleeves and sashes, calling out to Orli's retreating form, "If the surfboard's gotten him, I'll have your arse on a platter, Elf!"

And the silence of the room mocked him as he tried to get out of his swimming trunks and into the blasted robe, which was set, instead, on strangling him.

It wasn't enough that he had gotten the business end of a massive wave that he never should've tried to take, or that the borrowed surfboard strapped to his ankle seemed to find satisfaction in smashing him repeatedly over the head, or that he had looked like a complete moron in front of Billy and Orlando.

It was really the fact that they only had a few days left of their break and he wasn't looking forward to spending it popping aspirin and limping and getting a lecture from Billy as to how they were going to lie about it to Peter, who would—

Dom tried to ignore the ugly splotch of blue-colored pain over his arse. The Treebeard harness would not a comfy seat make come next week.

And then he recalled the big honking claw-footed, three-foot-deep bathtub in Orlando's guest bathroom and scrambled with much groping of furniture towards it.

He teased a fingertip along the strip of yellow light that sat invitingly between the door and its frame and blazed with the temperature of the room. His fingertip lazily traced the sheen of condensation on the brass doorknob and then gave it a turn and a pull. A gap of about two inches fell open and Billy's eyes filled the space, peering within.

Squinting against the thick steam, his gaze landed on the overly pearly-white bathtub and its inhabitant. The bottom fell out of Billy's stomach with a pleasant rush of heat.

The overhead lights left nothing of Dom's body to shadow. Instead it played with the steam, offering up the loveliest bits to Billy's roaming gaze. All Dom's skin was powder-brushed with red, hinting at how hot it would be to touch; and Billy could feel it already under his fingers, that soft give of externally heated flesh.

Dom's head was leaned back over the head of the tub, exposing the outline of his profile, neck, and shoulders deliciously. Billy took a slow breath—timing it purposefully with Dom's—and settled his stare on the shape of Dom's shoulders; how they were just wide enough, how they tapered so very perfectly into proportion with the thick neck, taut with several lines of muscle that Billy could see just under his tongue, giving way with red lines of blood and straining muscle.

He opened his eyes, unaware of having closed them, and looked again. And there was the cleft in his chin, so familiar, a place suited for the tip of Billy's tongue without a doubt. And that stubble, well—there was no stubble in the world quite like Dom's, and it was a texture to Billy again, scratching his chin and lips as he imagined kissing up over the rise of Dom's chin—sweetly bruising the sensitive skin around his mouth. The movement of Dom's lips back into his would grind the sensation home.

And as Dom's lips opened and closed wantonly around his bottom lip, Billy would wrap his fingers around the shape of that gorgeous neck, fingers hotly imprinted with the scattered freckles that no one ever seemed to notice, and the single mole just on the right side. Billy's thumbs would tease the dip of Dom's chin and then go lower, tracing the flare of a collarbone and finally squeezing hard just over the tightly packed mass of shoulder on either side.

Reaching Dom's jaw, he would smooth the twin contours with either hand, knowing perfectly well where his fingers were headed and always grinning over the fact. He would cup his fingers carefully around either blood-flushed curve of Dom's ridiculously big ears and pinch the shape of them between his fingertips, which always made Dom squirm—pinch, shift, pinch, crease on his brow, pinch, licked his lips. He'd reach the bottom and do the same with each earlobe, giving them a tug which Dom had told him made a funny sensation go right down his neck—

"Nothing subtle about a peeping Tom who lets in a wickedly uncomfortable draft..."

Billy stood up straight and smirked into the bathroom. "Who said I was goin' for subtle?"

"Point."

He pushed off the doorframe and stepped inside, pulling the door closed and flicking the lock. "Nothing broken, then?"

Dom didn't sit up or even open his eyes. He kept on lying the same way with arms balanced along the rim of the tub. Billy's attention was wrenched down to those biceps; limbs that were connected to many a hot memory; coming around his back to balance him, gripping his chest from behind, folding under his thighs and pulling him in—

"Just a lot of bruises. Check this one out," Dom said, flinging out an arm and showing a particularly nasty yellow-rimmed red-centered bruise.

"Ooh, nice," Billy breathed approvingly, sitting on the edge of the tub.

"Get the chair."

"Why?"

"Can't reach my hair or back without stretching the bruise, man. Thought you'd help out."

Billy gave a look but complied anyway, wrestling the indicated folding chair to a decent position just behind the head of the tub. He sat down. "Soap?"

Dom lifted the bar, but held it firmly as Billy's fingers wrapped around it. He flicked a wet finger at Billy. "Much more convenient from in the tub, don't y'think?"

Billy smirked, eyes straying to the slippery bubble-laden tangle that was their fingers around the ivory lump. He let go and then slid his soap-sticky fingers up Dom's arm, pressing damp trails that painted a different color all the way to his shoulder, where he detoured a brushstroke of lather along the prominent ridge of Dom's collarbone.

Dom tilted his damp hair back onto Billy's shoulder, all the breath patiently squeezing free of his lungs. "Orrr you could keep that going..."

Billy smiled, rubbing his cheek so that Dom's hair was spiky-frizzy all around his nose and lips, skimming his fingers back up the length of Dom's throat, following the bob of his Adam's apple and then scraping along stubble until he found the soft velvety slices of twin lips there.

Unplanned: Dom's lips opened and detained Billy's fingertip, wrapping Billy distractedly in the sensation of warm breath and moist inner lip. He meant to eventually do the washing he sat down to do, but forgot his name along with the contents of half his head when Dom sucked in his fingers. Shuddering, Billy worked them out and then in again, testing Dom's tongue and the suction of his cheeks.

"Shit, Dom," he breathed into the suddenly hot scalp under his cheek. "Stop."

Dom's mouth parted wider and swallowed Billy's fingers.

"Dom!"

"Mmm?"

The sensation was like dangling electric ribbon, tickling Billy's cock from the inside out—sharp one second, then numb, then sharp again. He could just see the reddish poke of Dom's tongue, that thick wriggling length of flesh that knew just how to torture—

"You're all banged up and we shouldn't be—"

Dom let Billy's fingers go, but turned his head and pressed a slow kiss to the corner of Billy's eyelid. "Do I detect a hint of...hesitation?"

"Ergh."

"Very expressive."

Billy sighed and sat up a little, his swimming trunks feeling about three sizes too small.

"You taste like saltwater." Dom licked the tip of his tongue just above Billy's lip. Billy's bottom lip dropped in response. His left hand crept once again downward, pressing dents into the back of Dom's skull, pushing along the back of his neck to feel the sharp swish of clipped hair there as he rubbed it the wrong way.

He sunk forward into the offer, letting Dom claim his bottom lip before tilting his head so that their mouths jigsawed together wetly. Billy exhaled and Dom felt the hot rush escape and snag on the corners of his mouth as they pulled apart. And when those eyes fixed glazed and stormy blue-gray, Billy couldn't help but stare at the flecks of silver in them. And the silly bulb of Dom's nose, that was really just sex-defined-cute, and he kissed it, too.

"Shove over."

Triumphant, Dom made room. Billy slid in right behind him, and they managed to slop a good deal of water on the floor before he settled with Dom between his thighs. Dom leaned back into Billy's chest, wincing a bit as sensitive spots pressed.

"You need to get some aspirin in you or somethin'."

"Fine for now."

Billy wrapped his arms around Dom's waist. The soap bar, floating along the bottom of the tub, brushed his thigh. He wrangled it and a cloth from the water and lathered the two together before nudging Dom forward so he could scrub his back.

Dom's shoulders and back glimmered spectacularly under the coating of soap. Billy was drawn once again to the spray of freckles and tiny scars. But by far wrapping his soapy fingers around the tops of Dom's shoulders was most pleasurable. He trickled his palms back down, skimming the v shape, thumbs tracing direct and straight over the knobs of Dom's spine.

Billy smoothed his hands down under the water, rubbing fingertips around Dom's lower back and waist. His fingers curled around Dom's belly, pressing slippery and sure upwards until they met two identically beaded nipples.

A low sound came in Billy's throat and Dom chuckled, leaning back into the solid strength of Billy's body. "Can't help it..."

Dom's hips moved and the curve of his ass pinned the beginnings of an erection just there in the space between them. Billy winced and found himself rubbing back. "Dom, honestly—"

Dom's mouth was just under Billy's earlobe. "If you don't put your hands on me within the next thirty seconds, I'm not going to be the only one here with bruises."

The sounds of their movement were amplified off the tile—every lap of the water, drip-drop of it from their bodies, every breath and shift of skin on skin. Dom's cheeks were pink and hot, pushing softly into Billy's neck and shoulder with a mouth that begged to be tasted.

Trying to avoid the sore spots, Billy gave in, palms flat and purposeful on their trek back down Dom's flat belly just as Dom claimed his mouth, tongue and teeth leaving invisible velvet marks as they branded their claim. Billy shivered, closing his eyes as Dom's body flinched into him—sure he'd hit a bruise—and he tried to move away from it.

"Nnn. Wha?"

"I hit a—"

"Felt good."

"What?"

"Felt—do it again..."

Billy pressed his thigh into the spot and Dom's face screwed up, flooded with a darker rush of blood. "Shit..."

He wrapped his hand carefully around the base of Dom's cock—pressed the spot again—and felt the hot flesh twitch in his palm. Kinky little bugger. Smirking, Billy took the soap in his other hand and transferred it, satisfied only when he had a slippery fist around Dom again.

Put his free arm around Dom's chest and with the other began a hard, slick fisting that left nothing to slow or teasing. Dom closed his eyes and let the steam from the water absorb his attention, the contrasting difference between the heat of the water and the heat in his body building until it was nearly uncomfortable. All his bruises seemed to throb and respond to the arousal and the fucking delicious hard grip milking him, making him feel as if he'd come after every stroke.

A combination of steam, water, and sweat trickled down his temples, down his neck, down his back, and it gathered in slicks across his forehead and nose, tracing intimate paths down the sides of his nose and mouth. Hovered just there on his trembling lip, swallowed by Billy's kiss time and time again.

Billy's palm pressed the tip of his cock between hard edge and gripping fingers and gave a swiveling jerk—left right left right—and he choked on a breath and flushed with restraint, a whimper lodged in his throat. "Bill..."

He did it again, shifting it more up and down, a perfect jerk of his wrist just hard enough without being painful. And then he stopped and Dom could breathe—albeit haltingly—as his fingers cupped lower, palming his balls and rolling them up against his body. Dom shuddered, knowing if they went any—

And they did go lower, the pads of Billy's middle and ring finger pressing as one down under his balls. "Billy!" Again, pushing the flesh in and then with that measure of control rubbing—rubbing, fucking working that patch of—around in a circle, so that Dom felt it all the way to his forehead, because that was just to close to— "Billy!"

Grinning, Billy smoothed the fingertips hard lower and then up again, wrapping them around Dom's now solid as rock erection. The tube of his fist worked up to a quick jerk again and Dom seemed to settle into that, his belly hitching with the motion.

Billy's eyes were trained peripherally on Dom's face; those gorgeous eyelashes cinched together, trembling, a tick of muscle going in his cheek under that scatter of stubble, the beautiful and sunburned red splotching messily over his forehead and cheeks.

He bowed his head—kissed once just there on the upward curve of shoulder and then bit down on a bruise-free patch just to hear Dom inhale sharply. Pulling back and flicking his tongue out, he licked a slow line from shoulder to the throbbing vein in Dom's neck, where he bit again. Dom's legs jerked, bringing up further disturbance in the water.

Billy looked down, watching the steady roll of his wrist create a diluted ripple across the surface of the water. If he held his breath, he could hear the low squish of his hand shifting that water, pushing and tugging Dom to complete distraction.

And if there was anything more erotic than the way Dom's body slowly curled itself like a strand of wire around rods of tension—wires burned red hot and glowing, with a hiss as they hit the water (skin), and there is reaction in the causal state with action—then Billy wasn't aware of it. The way he clung gradually harder, one hand on Billy's wrist, one hand on the edge of the tub, knuckles turning white under the strain.

"Open your eyes..."

Billy wasn't aware of saying it, but he did; the desire voiced itself before he recognized it. Dom's eyes flicked open and satisfaction trickled drippy and slow through Billy's body at the gaze there. The gray-blue of an hour before was replaced with a dark navy color—flecked with diamond-like points that winked, went out, and flicked on in different spots as Dom got closer to coming.

The staring went from too intimate to completely comfortable—alternated like that because if you stared long enough they ceased to be eyes and became a radar of arousal that offered signals and—and well, it wasn't just the arousal, it was—if he looked long enough he would remember it forever and hoped that it would always be there too—is that love, then? And he guessed that it was.

He watched Dom's toes—the ones on his right foot, because he braced it there on the other end of the tub—turn wet curls into the porcelain—the tiny stars needled there drawing the light and Billy's eyes alike.

He turned his face into Dom's neck, shuddering with Dom as he groaned.

"Yeah, tha's it..." Undo yourself for me.

"Mmm..."

A protestingly arched back as the pressure layered on. Rebellion down Dom's legs, muscles drawing in on themselves. His grip on Billy's wrist redoubled, encouraged: demanded.

The next exhale started as a groan, impersonated a whimper, and then petered out as a high-pitched sigh. Picked up a second later by the inhale, which made it a moan—a warning moan, down low at first and then up the scale (I'm going to—!).

Fell into the space between relief and no turning back, then, and Billy's wrist—hard, hard, hard, tight—never stopped, didn't offer reprieve. And his eyes just watched half-lidded; I'm watching you. Watching you. Watching you.

And then there was that telltale stiffen—Billy's free hand shot up, covering Dom's mouth—"Orli's still in the—"—and somehow feeling the sound was better or just as good as hearing it, the sudden loud vibration on the fleshy inside of his palm as Dom cried out against it and then moaned. Pause, jerk, another soft cry—and then just breathing as the water swept away the evidence.

"Fuck."

Billy chased his breath.

Dom went still, slumping back into Billy, the water and sweat between them causing a slick instability. He gave himself a minute to pant and come back to his body.

"What did you do with Orli?"

"Er."

Dom stared at him.

"What?" Billy replied defensively. "Just...told him to feck off."

"That's sweet."

"He went to put the surfboard down, I think."

Dom laughed. "Good. Rabid thing." He sighed, listening to his heart jackhammer against the inside of his breastbone. "Think I need some aspirin."

"I just said—"

Dom leaned up and kissed Billy firmly, until all the words poured out his ears instead of his mouth. He drifted back, offering a winning grin. "Then you can be happy knowing that your advice? Is almost as good as your handjob..."